Empty parks! Your best advice for when to find em?

I was reading GregLegs TR and found out about his hypothesis that CP's opening day might make SFWoA empty (relatively speaking). Anyone have any other hidden gem days they can recommend? I remember going to Carowinds as a kid on Memorial Day Monday and it was a ghost town. My home park now SFoG might not ever have an off day during the season, but I was wondering if anyone had any ideas.

I may never go on a Saturday, but Sunday's don't end up too bad.

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Sorrrrrrrry folks! Parks closed. The moose out front should have told you.

Come to Carowinds any time, any Sunday. The longest that you would probably wait is 5 minutes....assuming the ride is running to full capacity.

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-Hurler Crew 2002-

I like to take the risk and go on rainy days. The rides are usually walk-on.

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Are roller coasters my life? NO, but I certainly like them!

Sundays arent' usually too bad. Weekday's are good. Especially tuesdays or wednesdays.

Afternoons arfe good too, especailly if u have a season pass and can go whenever without spending any money.

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So...you can't handle a rollercoaster huh? Well...you ARE the Weakest Link! Goodbye!
Number 1 Batwing Fan!

*** This post was edited by scoaster on 5/7/2002. ***

Rainy Tuesdays or Wednesdays are the best days to go. I went to SFWOA on a rainy weekday and the park was completely empty. There were maybe 50-100 people there, no exaggeration! The only downside to it was that the park closed at 6.

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mmm, roller coaster
(Homer Simpson)

I went a couple of Sundays ago, and it was rainy. But SFoG doesn't run coasters in the rain.

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Sorrrrrrrry folks! Parks closed. The moose out front should have told you.

Great Adventure seems to be empty whenever it rains. I am probably the only person who looks for rainy days to go(Thank God for 5 day forecasts) . Marine World is empty on Fridays (given school is in session and its not spring break)

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You're so contagious, you turn ma pages!

Sunday mornings, pre-Memorial Day weekend, are the best times to go to any park. I've found every major park I've done in the aforementioned time frame near-empty. Good times....

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-Rob Vaccaro

Is May 24th a good day to go to SFNE, because that's when i'm planning to go there. May 24th is on friday during the pre memorial weekend.

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SFNE's Superman's the best! check out my new photo in my info page.

It's tough to predict a specific date. For Sunday at SFWoA, we went on several factors that played into our hunch:

o It was NOT their opening day. The park had already opened the day before.

o Cedar Point was opening that day, complete with a new coaster that was getting lots of speculation.

o We looked at the meeting calendar, and noticed that LOTS of people had listed Cedar Point, but nobody had (yet) listed SFWoA.

The other suggestions here are good -- overcast days at a park that doesn't just shut the rides down, weekdays while area schools are still in session, and so on.

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--Greg
"Are you justified in taking life to save life?" -- The Great Debate, Dream Theater
My page


PCarowinds said:
Come to Carowinds any time

Ditto! Everyday at Carowinds is an "empty" day, except for Saturday when the longest you'll wait is maybe 20 minutes.

*** This post was edited by JamminJ on 5/7/2002. ***

I always make my vacation trips to parks about the third week of June, It has worked very well so far and I usually book a small park for sat and sun and hit the corprates on the weekdays. Here is how last years trip went.

Fri eve, June 12th Leave Cincy, Drive to Altoona PA.

Sat, June 13th Lakemont park, Delgrosos and a night ride on Phoenix at Knoebels to end the day.

Sunday June 14th Steamtown Scranton PA and evening rides on Phoenix and Twister

Monday June 15th Knoebels all day and half the night.

Tuesday Travel day but we found Quassy Park by accident and stopped for a visit and two coaster credits

Wed's June 17th Lake Compounce all day

Thursday June 18th SFNE and walk ons on S:ROS after 6pm, Got 27 rides on S:ROS can't beat that with a stick.

Friday June 19th SFGADV, Not busy and fun with friends.

Saturday June 18th, Dorney for 4hrs and multiple rides on Lazer, Talon and Steel Force with the other coasters also, The only line was for that Mouse.

That was last years trip, Here is this years.

June 15-16th Timbersfest

June 17th (Mon) SFGAM

June 18th possibly Arnolds park or just a travel day.

June 19th Worlds of Fun

June 20th SFSTL

June 21st, Holiday World.

Im a woodie freak and plan my trips accordingly. I am so looking forward to Timbers again, Boss, Timberwolf, VIper, Mamba and of course legend and Raven

Chuck, who will have done HW only two weeks prior but thats a park I cannot get enough of. See you soon

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Charles Nungester
Americana (Now called The great americana amusement park at Lesourdsville Lake) is opening in 2002. Indivdual visits are very improtant to the parks survival.

*** This post was edited by Charles Nungester on 5/8/2002. ***

Like Charles, I try to make the park run as early in June as possible (i.e. -- when school lets out). Last year worked out well as we had pretty much walk-on weekdays at Lake Compounce, Knoebel's, Kennywood, Idlewild, Conneaut Lake Park -- and, well, then we hit Cedar Point and all bets were off.

Weekdays in June are the best. Absent that, Mothers Day is always a time to watch the tumbleweed drift through the parks all over the country.

Actually Charles if I were you I'd hit Adventureland instead of Arnold's Park. I mean Arnold's Park is a great lil park, but Adventureland gives two very solid wooden coasters and CCI's first dark ride, and it makes for easier travelling between Chitown and the Twin Cities.

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Flume & Hydroblaster Crew for 2002!


Valleyfair Fan said:
Actually Charles if I were you I'd hit Adventureland instead of Arnold's Park. I mean Arnold's Park is a great lil park, but Adventureland gives two very solid wooden coasters and CCI's first dark ride, and it makes for easier travelling between Chitown and the Twin Cities.

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Flume & Hydroblaster Crew for 2002!



I screwed that post up and have since edited it. We are not doing Valley Fair this year, we are going from Chi Town out to Kansas City to Worlds of Fun.

Chuck, who swore he wasn't driving 2000 miles again within a week but is going to anyway

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Charles Nungester
Americana (Now called The great americana amusement park at Lesourdsville Lake) is opening in 2002. Indivdual visits are very improtant to the parks survival.

During a heatwave when it was like 110 degrees out I found Six Flags Great America to be empty, so im just guessing if its really hot the parks are empty.

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Top 5 Coasters
1.Deja Vu(SFGAm) 2.Raging Bull(SFGAm) 3.Millennium Force(CP)
4.CornBall Express(IB)
5.Viper(SFGAm)

*** This post was edited by CoasterDude316 on 5/8/2002. ***

Well then Chuck it'd make even less sense travelwise to hit Arnold's and more reason to hit Adventureland as you'll be going right by Adventurland (if you're going the Iowa route) to get to KC whereas Arnold's Park is in Northwest Iowa.

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Flume & Hydroblaster Crew for 2002!

Yeah, HomeyG, SFoG is usually like peak-type crowded off & on for the first few weekends, one SAT you go, there's a gazillion people, the next, only a third a gillion. Like a local told me its a "coupon season pass saving, we haven't been outside in a while" RUSH up until Mother's Day, then it becomes "normal".

I was there on Mother's Day last year, & the only things you had to dodge were basketballs &, well, tumbleweed. It was easy to get lost in the Batman line with nobody around, it just doesn't look like a line without people in it;).

But, I actually have not developed a science to the planning that helps us avoid madness, & that we be a grand thing. It usually just happens.

So, if I try to hit SFoG on Mother's Day (my hunch), I should have the park pretty much to myself, right? Now, I have to snooker someone into going along. :)

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Sorrrrrrrry folks! Parks closed. The moose out front should have told you.

A really good bet is to hit parks when they first start daily operations in the month of May before the kids get out of school. If you go to CP say next week Wednesday I gurantee you that even lines for WT won't be over 30 mins.

You can still get some decently short lines during the middle of the week in June at most parks but once you hit July and August going to anything other than smaller regional parks will equal pretty long lines.

The best time other than now is the late Fall though, this isn't true at the super large draw parks like CP (well, other than on the perfect cold rain near 0 degree weather days :-) but at moderate sized parks you can usually get some decent lines, especially if you can hit the park during the week right after the kids go back to public school.
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* The Legend @ HW
* Superman: Ride of Steel @ SFNE
* Mondial Top Scan

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