Geauga Lake Opening Day 5/7/05

I arrived at the park at about 9:45, 15 minutes before the park opened. Me and my friends waited by the chains, and then when they opened them we had a mad dash for the villain! When we got up there it was closed, but then it opened up 30 minutes later.

The Villain

It ran one train all day, and the ride wasn't very bumpy. The thing that disappointed me was there was only one person checking lab bars.

Dominator

Dominator ran two trains all day. It also had bins added which made me happy! The crews were moving fast and there was almost no stacking

Raging Wolf Bobs

Ran one train all day. The retracking made the ride much better, The first turn around is amazing, and actually rideable now. But unfortunatly the second turn around wasn't worked on and was barely survivable. I can't wait till the second train gets on there so the line goes quicker

Escape From Dino Island

This ride didn't open until later in the day, sometime between 4:30 and 6:00 I think. The new movie is much better than MBT, and now there are water effects, air blower thingys, and foot ticklers. The pre show also adds to the ride, and its one thing we haven't seen in a while.

Robots of Mars

This movie was good overall. The only thing i didn't like was you just kind of ran right through meteors. Almost all of the rows in the back were closed off for some reason, there were about 10-20 rows open in the front. I really like the fog effects, and the light effects on the side of the wall. This show should be great for small children and families.

Steel Venom

Open all of the day. Ride ran like normal. The crews got the train out fast, even thought there were only two people checking restraints. Bins were also added.

Head Spin

Aboslutley no one was on this ride, I rode it two times in a row, and after the second time i had a terrible headache. Looks like I learned a lesson: dont ride headspin more than once in a row!

X-Flight

Ran one train all day, I was a little dissappointed about that hopefully both stations will be running, or at least two trains will be running soon. Line was about 15-25 minutes

Mr. Hydes Nasty Fall

Barely ran all day. Saw it test run a couple times, but thats it. I was really looking forward to it too. Hopefully it will be open next week.

Thunderhawk

The new paintjob looks great. There are still a few spots that havent been completely painted. Theres also a huge section that has had nothing done on it, but the ride still ran with one train. This is one of the only times I saw thunderhawk have a line. Later in the day the ride was a walkon. Bins were also added to this ride.

Big Dipper

Ran the red train The bid difference was that they added logos to the front of thr trains.

The park was pretty good overall. It was clean and the ice cream stand by texas twister is now a ben and jerrys. Construction on the WWK looks really good, but its nowhere near complete. Most of the rides had minimal people checking restraints, which was a huge difference from last years opening day. Almost all of the rides were walkons, or else they had very short waits. I hope that thunderhawk is finish being painted by next week because it will look much better.

Ok, that arouses a question, was the number of staff, just by notice, better or worse than last years? Seems pretty good, if they can get everything up to a better system, more staff, more trains, and faster loading.

X flight 15 25 minutes yeah right, we waited an hour alittle after it opened at 130 i might add.

The park was severly understaffed they had supervisors at rides not letting people on and so it was kinda bad.

Thunderhawk also was a waste they had one guy on it when i rode it, and the restraints kept getting stuck.

Hopefully when school lets out there will be more ops, and i got to give a shout out to my cousin who is in ops on the raging wolf bobs. Its good to see another person willing to love coasters in my family or at least like amusement parks.

I was disappointed in GL's opening day. As MagnunBarrel said, the park was severely understaffed and many of the rides did not seem ready to be open. For the 2 hours I was there (I arrived at opening, 10:00), most of the food stands were closed, and a few of the shops (fudge shop and maybe a couple others) were not open.

The employees also seemed as though they could have used some more training, as I saw many of the employees asking their supervisors if they were allowed to do 'that' or how "how do I do that?" And, they were all things that, IMO, were basic things/policies that they should have been taught before the park opened.

I went to Cedar Point after my two hours at GL, and I did not see any of those kinds of problems there. Since most of the managers at Geauga Lake have worked previously at Cedar Point, you would think that GL would be in much better shape than it was. (Please note: I am not saying that GL should have been operating as smoothly as CP was on its '05 opening day, as GL is only in its second year as a CF park. BUT, considering who is in charge at GL, I expected it to be operating better than it was)

Call me crazy, but I think on opening day 2004 the park seemed much better prepared and confident about their operations than on opening day 2005. I know it was only opening day and one should expect things to be a little shaky, but, after the low attendance of last season, I think the park should be going above and beyond the usual, to exceed our expectations and make us want to return (and tell our friends to return too). That was not the case yesterday. *** Edited 5/9/2005 3:37:11 AM UTC by HW Knoebel***

As to the comment about the staff not being trained... Kennywood opened this season to many team members also not trained because they either deceided not to attend training or got hired late. There were 6 training days for all ride ops, which was plenty of time. I know what I have to know and the others will catch on. You just have to realize that it is opening weekend and parks are still getting ready for the full season. Overall with the pics and reports I've seen, Geagua Lake & Wildwater Kingdom is off to a pretty good start.

Geauga Lake had a great turnout I thought. Worse than last year? what the hell are u smokin? This years opening day was awsome compared to last year, and for a park trying to reshape it's image, it was a great turnout. The ride staff was limited, since the park didn't expect a large turnout largely due to last years attendace and also it is just opening day.

Someone made a CP comment. Well I got news for you buddy, CP is well established. It made a name for itself a long time ago. GL is in the process of starting to establish theirs all over again. My god give them a break!! It was a great opening day, and once WWK is open, the park will be at full performance indefinately.

Ease up, they have only owned it for a little over a year. jesus!!!!!! For the millionth time it TAKES TIME. AND IT IS HEADED IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION!!!! JUST GIVE THEM TIME!!!! THEIR NEW EXPANSION ISN'T EVEN OPEN YET!! You act like it's mid summer or something. It's still may. It's still spring until June 21st, the FIRST DAY OF SUMMER!! NOTE: summer doesn't end til MID september!!! You people just have nothing better to do than find everything wrong with ****. It's sickening. it's people like you who do nothing for the park's image. I constantly talk up the place to everyone I talk to. I love the place and I see all the positives of it. *** Edited 5/9/2005 2:17:13 AM UTC by lakecrystal***

^ agree with lakecrystal, i was pleasently surprised.

one thing i did notice, they jacked up prices everywhere it seems (well, food I mean)... i guess they had to make up for making the ticket prices so low.

Anybody else lucky enough to participate in the "everything $1.07 sale" at the ben and jerrys (the new custard one -- sad to see the old one go, i was looking forward to a $2.50 large/waffle cone :()? lol, the girls at the register couldn't get it to work, so all day they were charging $1.07 for everything...

... you would think they would tell somone, but even by evening they were giving everything cheap, still...

saw dick kinzel strolling the park as well.

had an awesome time, got the last rides of the day on villain and had a blast.

-- alan jacyszyn

To those who commented on my post...

Please don't take my comments the wrong way. I have always been one of the biggest supporters of GL, even when it was at its worst as SFWoA. I'm sure this will be a great season for the park (or, at least better than last season). I was simply disappointed that opening day was a bit weak.

As I said, I think that park MUST do everything it can to exceed guests' expectations, if they want to convince the general public that it is new/improved and no longer the 'bad' Six Flags park. I am well aware of the challenges it takes to get a park open and know that there are many things beyond the park's/management's control that can cause a shaky opening day. As an enthusiast, I understand that, but I'm not so sure that the general public is willing to be patient with that park any more.

I expect understaffed...the fact its just the opening day, well its expected, except for CP which is not expected. Geauga Lake will take soem time to regain its title. Every year I've gone to that park and had fun, no matter how much staff there was. Its a great park, GIVE IT TIME. I expect it to be better by June 5th around the time i go, and on like June 9th I head to CP so I expect to have lots of fun around then.

LakeCrystal, bud its ok. i agree with you on alot and i even made it there. Even though i told you a while back i might not.

The thing is i was dissapointed with the ride ops on some rides. The whole thunderhawk situation, at least when i was on it, was horrible. They had one guy doing everything during a few rides on it. He had to also deal with the fact that the restraints werent opening, how can one guy deal with a crowd of restless people. They were running two trains half empty on Dominator and and were overstaffed with like five people there, rotate them, please even if it was to check restraints, especially on thunderhawk.

The food stands were few and far between being open. Plus the prices were up there. i agree with them being light in the crowd department, but variety is limited too a few stands.

I loved the snoopy characters for the little kids and adults. I know this is Cedar Fair, but it seemed to me that they were out in full force when i never see them at Cedar Point hardly ever. I just hope they turn the kids area into a camp snoopy it seems to fit better.

I know it will get better im a Gl fanboy, but i was kinda disappointed, but by no means did it suck, i was dissapointed with Kings Island last year, the capacity they ran for a much bigger park was horrible. I have a season pass and i plan on going back and I KNOW not guess it will be better. i also have to commend them on the retracking on RWB it was so much better, but the second turnaround was rough.

Things are looking up and the waterpark will help so dont trip out, i love the park. You definately have a right to your own opinion and im not gonna fire back at you. We all had different views, so just let us have ours too.

Hey maybe we will even see each other and have fun!

I certainly agree with the rest of you about the Thunderhawk situation. My thoughts are the same. I do, however, have to give the worker who worked the bars in the afternoon on Thunderhawk credit, however that he was truly checking each and every restraint, something that is sometimes glanced over.

I have to say opening day this year far surpassed any day of hte 5 times i visited last year....

I agree it still has some work to be done, but they have done wonders, in my opinion.

Not aware of the thunderhawk situation since I stayed away from that ride all day :-P

-- alan jacyszyn

Opening Day was great, it's just that the park looked a bit unprepared as if the season came up on them too fast. Everything should be worked out, however, as the park is only open on weekends in May.

I felt that they were severely unprepared as well. It felt like Six Flags all over again.

I know that it was opening day, but they seemed more prepared last year.

I was also very annoyed that they didn't re-track the high curve on Wolf Bobs.

They have got a ways to go.

In time Im sure they will do much better, plus its their opening day, we can expect the more it opens the better its run. They have quite a lot of time to claim their name.