first timer's visit to KBF -- 6/12/06
Associated parks:
None
I think it's interesting how they have the little area outside of the park with shops and food, and it's nice how Soak City is so close. Anyway, I'll just make some comments/observations as usual.
-- This park is nice. It is also fairly well-themed. I would describe it as a sort of Hersheypark of the west, though it has better theming. Definitely more character than Dorney Park, though it definitely is a Cedar Fair park.
-- Jaguar! is a so-so ride. I wonder what they were thinking when they put this thing in. The theming is pretty darn good for a Cedar Fair park.
-- Monte is fun. I've only ridden 2 of the Schwarzkopf shuttles, and this is the better of the 2. The other is a weight drop version, and the launch is better on this one.
-- I like Xcellerator. This is probably my 2nd favorite of the rocket coasters, beating out Storm Runner & Kingda Ka; eclipsed only by Top Thrill Dragster. It's also the only one that launches out of the station. I definitely like the lap bar and seat belt combo better than the OSTRs.
-- Ghostrider is ok. I like the station and queue; they did a great job here. The ride is somewhat rough, and the ending is somewhat anti-climatic to me. Good thing CCI was still using PTCs at this point.
-- Boomerang is your average Vekoma model. It's decent for its age, I suppose.
-- Silver Bullet has got to be the mildest B&M invert that I've ever ridden. It's not a bad ride; it's just not very intense. Usually, cobra rolls on the B&M inverts are intense/snappy, but this one felt more like something on one of their floorless coasters. I like the semi-inverting turn between the loop and the cobra roll, and I like the placement in the park, including over the pond.
-- I didn't bother with Supreme Scream, the main reason being that the 2 sides running were both turbo drops; the 3rd side was closed--is this a TD also, or is it a space shot? I like the space shots better myself.
-- Perilous Plunge opened later in the day. I didn't want to get soaked, so I didn't ride, but that thing looks crazy. Do the new boats have OSTRs like the giant drops or like SR & KK? What kind of retrofit did the boats have after the accident (I didn't see extremely close)?
-- Knotts has a decent collection of flats, and they have a nice version of Camp Snoopy (nice to know that it is the original).
-- One of the nicest employees we encountered on the trip was a waiter at a restaurant in the Ghost Town area (not sure of the name). The food here was good and priced decently for a theme park. I definitely recommend it.
-- Knotts has the best log flume that I've ever ridden. I'm a coaster enthusiast, but I also like log flumes as well. I also got to sample PGA's and SFMM's log flumes, and I like all of them.
-- Nice that they've kept the Calico Mine Ride all these years, and it still has decent theming.
-- The park was fairly crowded, and there were lots of kids there. I saw more line jumping here than at SFMW or PGA, and maybe even more than SFMM. I wish the park would monitor their queues better and have more security present.
-- Silver Bullet was only running 1 train, which was displeasing to me. The other train wasn't fully assembled. If they need to work on the trains, please do this during the slower months and not in June, unless they ran into some sort of problem and not just routine maintenance.
-- The theming at this park is good; very good for a non-Busch and non-Disney park, actually. It's also cool how they have a train ride and a stagecoach ride.
-- As far as expansion at this park, I'm not sure where they'd go with another major coaster. It would be nice to see a hyper put in somewhere, but where is the question.
-- As a side note, anyone know where Windjammer formerly stood?
-- What is the native American attraction like? It was closed when we went by it.
-- Overall, this is one of the nicest-looking parks I've been to in terms of theming and upkeep. Definitely worth a trip if you're in SoCal. It does pretty well for having 2 Disney parks only several miles away.
rablat5 said:
-- I didn't bother with Supreme Scream, the main reason being that the 2 sides running were both turbo drops; the 3rd side was closed--is this a TD also, or is it a space shot? I like the space shots better myself.
I believe they are all turbo drops.
rablat5 said:
-- One of the nicest employees we encountered on the trip was a waiter at a restaurant in the Ghost Town area (not sure of the name). The food here was good and priced decently for a theme park. I definitely recommend it.
You should have had the fried chicken in the California Marketplace. Mrs. Knott's fried chicken is worth the flight out there for me :)
rablat5 said:
-- The theming at this park is good; very good for a non-Busch and non-Disney park, actually. It's also cool how they have a train ride and a stagecoach ride.
It's also the only place you can ride a stagecoach in the United States.
rablat5 said:
-- What is the native American attraction like? It was closed when we went by it.
It is basically a show, with special effects done behind a plate glass window. I highly recommend doing it if you ever go out there again.
Certain victory.
We would have caught that show, but it wasn't open when we went over there.
Do the stagecoach rides cost extra? I didn't bother checking it out.
Why did they make them ALL turbo drops? Couldn't they have at least made one a space shot? I like those better, myself.
rablat5 said:
We would have caught that show, but it wasn't open when we went over there.
It's too bad you missed Mystery Lodge, which is an industry award winning attraction. It's not a live-"show" persay, but an incredible "story-telling" visual effects attraction in which an "Native American tribesperson" (the person isn't real, but it sure looks like it) tells the audience a story, which is highlighted by effective use of special effects.
Do the stagecoach rides cost extra? I didn't bother checking it out.
No, it's not an extra-charge attraction -- however, the queue wait takes a while because they can only fit so many people on the carriage at one time.
Why did they make them ALL turbo drops? Couldn't they have at least made one a space shot? I like those better, myself.
Very, very long story. I could go into the whole thing and be very detailed about it, but that would, no joke, would require paragraphs and paragraphs. So long story VERY short, Cedar Fair wanted Knott's Supreme Scream to be a four-leg tower complex like the Power Tower sister ride at Cedar Point, with two Space Shot, two Turbo Drop legs, but Disney's California Adventure had already secured the rights to the Space Shot model in that market area, thus Supreme Scream's all-Turbo Drop setup.
*** Edited 6/27/2006 7:24:16 PM UTC by kRaXLeRidAh***
Still, I wonder why the Knott family put in something like Jaguar!? It seems kinda bizarre and like, what's the point? Decent theming, though. Perhaps the Knott family was into stuff that was kinda different--just look at the failed Windjammer Racers.
Their log flume rocks. Actually, CA seems to have a collection of decent/good log flumes--SFMM, PGA, KBF, and DL. We don't seem to have quite as good of a collection here in the northeast, though we do have a decent "amount", the rides and/or locations aren't quite as good overall.
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