First Time -- SFMM (3/17/02)
Associated parks:
None
Low and behold, my brother and I finally made it to the Mountain. We are both from Cincinnati, OH, but he now lives in Phoenix, AZ. I decided to take a vacation to visit him and we decided to head over to SFMM since this will be the closest I'll get to the West Coast for a while and he too wanted to get over to SFMM. On with the TR:
We arrived around 9am and were the first few people in line at the main gate. I've never experienced waiting in line for a park to open. When they opened at 10am, the mad dash to X started. By the time we got up there, I was out of breath. Now I see why it's called Mountain! Of course, the queue line was not opened as testing hasn't begun. We waited another hour before they finally opened the ride. Since this will be our once in a few times riding X, we rode front seat! The anticipation of watching this coaster being built, thanks to http://www.twistedrails.com, to reading reviews, I was Xcited. Needless to say, this coaster is incredible. It's very hard to Xplain, Xcept the first drop is WOW! We loved it and give it 2 thumbs up. More thumbs if we had them.
After riding X, we headed over to Superman: The Escape. They only had the right side operating since the left side is under rehab. The wait was about 15 minutes, but once inside, the line went quick. The launch was great, but overall, I wasn’t too impressed as the TV shows make it out to be, but hey, to each his/her own.
After that, we wanted to ride Ninja since we were up there, but the ride was closed. We then headed down the hill, over to Riddlers Revenge. I was excited as can be since this coaster is much talked about. Plus, we don’t have a decent stand up at PKI, especially now since King Cobra is RIP (1984-2001). The wait was about 30 minutes and overall I loved it. One thing that did get to me was the head banging with those OTSR. But maybe that happened because it was chilly outside. Next up was food! We ate pizza, but nothing compares to the pizza at PKI. I’m not sure if I can mention the name since it’s a local pizza chain, but anyone who’s been to PKI, or is from Cincinnati knows what I’m talking about.
The clouds were starting to roll in and in LA, they were predicting rain and thunderstorm showers in the afternoon, so we headed over to Goliath. We waited about 5-10 minutes and what a ride!! The speed and the G’s were the best! Next up was Colossus. I hate to be negative, but this ride was not all that we expected. We were thinking a good wood coaster and bam, after the first drop, it went so slow around the first turn that my brother and I started laughing because of all the hype. Every turn, the train just creeps around the corner as if it was a junior coaster. Maybe it was good in its days, but SFMM really needs a good wooden coaster that keeps up with its speed.
After riding Colossus, we headed over to Batman The Ride. Nice inverted coaster with a couple head banging, but not bad at all. I’ve been on similar ones before. Next up was Psyclone. Nice twisted type coaster, but again speed is an issue. It has some nice elements with the way it twists here and there, but hardly any speed when it goes through its turns. We wanted to ride Déjà vu, but as you have heard, the train was sitting in the cobra roll and wasn’t operating today. I wasn’t too depressed since we have Face/Off at PKI. I know, there is a difference, but once you ride one, you rode them all. We headed over and rode Gold Rusher. This is a nice little Mine Train ride and it was nice to get away from all the extreme rides. After this, we rode the Log Jammer. Yes it was cold outside, but we wanted to experience this log flume ride. This ride is much better than the one at PKI; even when PKI revamped it to Wild Thornberries.
Next up was one that we wanted to ride because of the movie we saw as kids--The Revolution. Yes, it’s not up to par with today’s standards, but it was nice. And it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be since all I heard about the ride is it’s a head banging ride. Secret: Keep your head back against the headrest and enjoy the ride. Plus, we both liked how the trees have grown since 1976 and how the ride goes through them. And the loop has a different feeling than any other loop. What this ride needs is a good coat of white paint. After Revolution, we went and rode Flashback. We rode it because it was different. Not a bad little ride, but sure rough on the shoulder blades. After riding this, we went up to ride Viper. Yes, we could have ridden Viper after X in the beginning, but actually Viper is similar to Vortex at PKI, except for the dive into the 1 extra large loop. The other elements were the same, except the path of the ride is different. Overall, it was a nice ride. Since we were over in the area, we got in line and rode X again. We waited about 1.5 hours in the cold and would you believe that someone tried to cut in front of us!! Normally I would let it go, but I’ve noticed this a lot at SFMM that line cutting is the thing and no ride attendants to monitor it. Needless to say, the guy who tried to cut, didn’t get far after I said a few choice, non-curse words, to him. Once we got on and started up the lift hill, the rain started coming down. Oh how fun to ride that ride in the rain.Overall, we had a great time at SFMM. I loved how they incorporated their rides throughout the park. Not one area has all new rides, which helped out with the wait. Of course the chilly weather and the clouds helped too. I’m sure during the summer months the wait times are much longer. This is the first time I got to ride almost every coaster (2 were down and of course we didn’t ride Goliath, JR.) and some smaller rides in 8 hours. I will definitely return to SFMM within the next 2 years.
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http://www.stridewithpride.com
I completely agree that The Mountain needs a really good wood coaster.
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Nothing... NOTHING... can prepare you for... the Fourth Dimension!
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