Geauga Lake 8-11-07

Ok, after doing a bunch of housework on Saturday I decided to reward our little family with a trip to GL later in the afternoon. Even though I live 20 miles from the park we have Dorney Park Maxx Passes since that was the first park we went to this year. Driving down 43 I was shocked to see that the lot on the ride side was PACKED. After hearing all the dead park comments this was really an eye opener. Since we were mainly going for the water park I drove to that side, dropped the cash, and wound up in the second row. Not many cars there at all and it was 4PM.

The admission process with the passes was efficient. The list I saw had CP and DP visitors, nothing else. Once inside though, things got dicey. The locker system they have is horrendous. If you get a locker early in the day, it's yours all day, period. That means that if you are done at 1PM and empty your locker out and walk away, it cannot be reset or rerented. No keys, it's all computerized. I found this out after about a half-hour of wandering the lockers and finding nothing empty. I then watched a family empty theirs out and leave. I went to a girl that was working there and mentioned this to her and she said that they reset after the park closes and that there was nothing that she could do for me. The only way I could get a locker was if I were to ask someone for their password when they were leaving. I'm guessing the people who were leaving might want $6 bucks too, which is the locker price. So basically I had a wallet and a set of keys that stayed with us at all times, makes for some interesting water fun no?

The water park itself was packed to the gills. With a 47 1/2 inch daughter and a 40 1/4 inch son there really wasn't going to be much in the way of water slides, but the kids play structure was tremendous and they had a blast in it. We also stopped up at the pools that had what could be considered very warm water, and a trip to the wave pool was also done. By this time we were hungry and wound up dropping 26 bucks total for hot dogs, fries and drinks. Afterward the kids decided that it was too cool to play in the water so we changed and carried our belongings on the long trek to the dry side. The water park was fun and it will only get better as my kids get taller.

The dry side was definitely different. The bridge across the water dumps you right into the kids area, so we spent some quality time with nets and foam balls and the like, but it was time to head up into the park. A trip around the main midway area was a waste of time. There are only a handful of rides such as El Dorado and Starfish plus two coasters and my kids could ride none of these. We opted to head back past Americana, the ferris wheel, which had a huge line but they were not filling all the cars, couldn't figure that one out. Our first ride was the old-time cars. After a 20 minute wait my son and I loaded ourselves on a car that was basically on fire. There was smoke pouring our from under the hood but the operator sent us on our way. We barely made it out of the station when the car stopped. It was still running but even though I was flooring it we were not moving. I turned around to my wife and daughter in the car behind us and said, through the haze and smoke, that they might have to bump us the rest of the way when the car we were in suddenly took off! We managed to complete the circuit without much incident other than a bad smell when one of the operators took over and decided that maybe he should take that car off the track. You think? :)

The next stop was the Log Flume. Not too exciting until AFTER the drop. They now have water bombs installed for the public to use. Great. After getting a little splash on the hill we got SOAKED by the water bombs. So much for not squishing the rest of the day!

While I took my daughter for a ride on the Haybaler(Matterhorn in a barn) my wife took my son on the Carousel. This was followed by a good half hour wait for the Beaver Land Mine Ride, the only coaster my kids could ride, allegedly. Once we got to the station the device that the employee used passed over my sons head by literally a millimiter. We know he is over 40 inches tall, but the employee said that their bar takes into account people with shoes and that my son could not ride. My son went off crying with my wife and my daughter and I rode my 98th coaster together. For a kids ride this thing packs a good punch and that train is LONG!

It was about 9:30 by this point in time so it was time to take the long trek back to the water side and out to the car. My son was still upset so after a mile :) or so we stopped at that little patch of rides over by the water park and took a spin on Pirate's Flight, Bounty and the Boardwalk Typhoon(Scrambler). Nothing major here but the Scrambler is a good one!

All in all it was a decent six hours but a LOT of walking. I believe they really need to add a few more flats that families can go on but the water park is tremendous.

Tom

Sounds like a pretty good day. I really hope next year they will add more rides, but I hear they might take out more for next year, such as Dominator.

CedarPoint837 where did you get your info? From the Dippin Dots Guy?

I don't see them removing Dominator ever.

The water in the river/play area is pretty warm, not sure whats going on there.

If they pulled out Dominator, that would be one of the dumbest mistakes they could make. It's easily the best ride in the park. Pulling it out would give me much less incentive to return.

If they should pull any more coasters out, it should be either the boomerang or the double loop. What the park really should do is clean out the old waterpark area, liven up the front of the park again, and expand the waterpark some more. Also, retracking Big Dipper and putting PTCs on Villian wouldn't be back ideas, either.

Uh, not to change the topic, but Geauga Lake needs is more coherency.

The Carousel is in a bad position (I would rather see it moved to a more centralized section of the park, with a Wave Swinger going into the current spot), the entertainment needs a tune-up (add some shade structures to the theater between Dominator for starters), and some of the rides need to go (Sky Scraper, Head Spin, the upcharge go-karts right there could all be removed to make way for a few flats (Music Express, Chance Revolution, Rock'N'Tug maybe?) and a spinning coaster, and I would also remove Grizzly Run (which I've yet to see in action, even after three visits to the park) and work in a train that goes from that area by RWB and stops at the Happy Harbor area, as well as even more family flats).

Not all of the flats have to be family-friendly, just a majority (I'm thinking 70% of rides with a height requirement 48 inches or under would work for this park... don't alienate people, or make them wish they went to Cedar Point instead, but don't loose sight of the reason Geauga Lake stayed in business for as long as it did). Honestly, if I were in charge of figuring out a long-term plan for the park, I wouldn't add a new coaster with a height requirement over 48 inches for the foreseeable future. The park could probably do with And on top of that, keep expanding your water park, and stay on top of retracking your woodies and repainting what you already have. But that's just my take.

http://pointbuzz.com/cpplace.aspx?mode=thread&TopicID=21662

That Pointbuzz thread is funny.