Associated parks:
None
I never know how to approach these things. If you just want the rides scroll down and skip around. If you want the whole general feel, including the opinions of a non-rider - read on.
Got to the park nearly 11 AM. (Yes, I was grumbling). The line for the parking lot was a bit unusual. It seemed af if the booths taking cash, were the slowest and the season pass parking line was empty.
The parking lot has a nice crowd going, though it didn't look like Hurrican Harbor was rocking with peeps. It was hard to see, but the lines on the slides were tiny as we were driving in.
After a bathroom break at the front of the park... (Bathrooms were cleaned earlier in the day, but this bathroom gets a lot of traffic and could have used a touch-up)...we were on our way.
Tea Cups - Why am I writing about this ride. Because we went on it. Nice clean cups, good rolling sound, but a very short cycle. Pre-Flux doesn't like it when I spin the car...he likes everything to run naturally. We got a little spin, but he liked it.
SpongeBob - This thing hasn't changed since it replaced Top Gun, but it is still charming. The pre-show is a bit dry, but hte warning film about not to ride if you are pregnant is well done and worth watching. The main show is entertaining and funny if you haven't seen it already. If you like Spongebob...you will like this. The 3d effects are impressive. The theatre is air conditioned. Preflux laughed at the right times, so he got the jokes.
Log FLume - this classic ride could be a little better. It has quite a few metal patches in the fiberglass, runing its look and feel. It is well supervised with ride guards at all three hills, and the area when you first climb the hill and before the first drop.
Tango - My son liked it. I sort of hoped it would be a little stronger on the higer end of hte fruit baskets. Perhaps some tropcial or Spanish music would help this ride. The cycle was very quick.
Rolling Blunder - New Credit for Preflux. Both sides running two trains, but a very slow launch and a bit of confusion in the station between bot people, hanicapped passers and ride exiters. When we got towards the end of the ride, the brakes wouldn't release us, so a crew had to be called in to push us in. This took ten minutes. I felt that the ride itself was not good, but my son liked it. Mom was worried and wanted to climb the tracks to see why another train was stuck up there. We rode the right side.
On the way to find mom a bee hit my forehead and my nose and just left. I don't think I was stung, but it was weird.
Pizza - Here is where general peeps give the park a bad run, and with just cause. I ordered 3 slices and two small drinks. THis came out to over 27 bucks. That is insane. The pizza wasn't even good. We vowed to eat on the way home from a place outside of the park. When I go solo, I know the deal and I plan accordingly. Regular peeps don't like it. THere also was a time when Great Adventure had a picnic area outside of hte park, iwth a bathroom. That option is gone. Do you know how much pizza I could get in Brooklyn or Long Island or even Antartica for that price.
Runaway Train - New Credit for Preflux. He is finally tall enough. He liked it and laughed. I liked that he liked it, but wished there was more leg room. I also saw a coworker leave the ride. You never know who you will meet at a park.
Skyride - We all did this one and we all liked it. There was a kodak moment...as I was looking towards the west, I saw (at the same time) a Ka Launch, A toro train going up the lift and a Medussa train going through the loops. (LIfe is good!) Mother FLuxer loved the breeze up there.
AS we were waiitng a guy recognized my Knoebels shirt and told me he lived a few miles away from there and that he is a frequent visitor. (Nice to meet peeps who are initiated into the finner arts of "Coaster-Geekdom."
Congo Rapids - Not very wet, not very good, but decent at times. (Waterfall Effects are still off)
Nitro - I scored a ride (solo) in the front for one lap. The station was busy, so none of my usual "funny business"
Nice, smooth, just a darn good ride. By the way, it wasn't hazy so the view from the lift hill was spectacular.
Buggs Bunny Fun Factory - Um...can you say chaotic? At least there weren't any big kids pouncing on the little ones. There were a few husbands throwing balls at their wives. (I pegged the Mrs. a few times too!) If you've never done it before, grab a kid (preferably one of your own!) and have a good time. If you don't have a kid (Make one!) - we were in there for an hour.
Watertown effect - BRoke down as we were getting ready to board. They had evrery rider in a boat sign a paper or something. I don't know why.
Skull Mountain - (New credit for Pre) - He was always scared of this one becuase of the skull on the front of the ride. He liked it and a great time. He was shocked at the very short length.
Batman The Ride - I scored a second solo ride. Got hte second train. I was asked by the group boarding if they could ride together, so I instantly moved from my seat one over. Fast, fun, short...it's everything you would expect.
Jolly Roger - needs more leg room
Golden Kingdom - Splash fountian. Someone, a few minutes before we got there, pulled his pants down and proceded to make a "#2" in the middle of the attraction. It was closed off and dealt with. This is nice area for little kids to get soaked and to runaround and get tired, making the ride home more enjoyable for all. Unfortunately, the water was too cold and some of the kids were freezing.
Golden Kingdom - Climbing Structure - Like its wet counterpart. These have been very well themd and planned areas and they remain very popular. It was nice to see that there was only one way in or out of the playzone area and there was an employee in the middle of the playing strucutre offering help to those who needed it.
TIme to start heading back.
COMMENTS FROM A NON-RIDER:
1) The food stinks, and there are too many pizza places, aand they are overpriced.
2) Quite a few of hte bathrooms (especially the one near the lake, was filthy.
3) There were too many smoking areas.
4) While there are more benches, most of them are not in shade.
Comments from me:
1) EZ PAss saved us a ton of time going back and forth.
2) There is now enough to do at Great adventure for a short tweener.
3) Last year, I complained about the condition of the Buggs Bunny Fun Factory. This year, it has gotten even worse. Elmer Fudd...the one in the boat who turns over periodically and dumps a crap-load of balls on you hasn't been washed since it has been installed. The balls are full of stepped on marks. If you allow your child to go in there, make sure you know to wash his or her hands after you do.
4) The park was very clean.
So there you have it. A family report. (OOOOOh! Ahhhh!)
Here's To Shorter Lines & Longer Trip Reports!
Maybe if enough of us complain about the food prices, they'll realize they're losing a whole lot of money when people are only eating once in the park, because twice would be way too much money.
May I make one suggestion though? Do you use Microsoft Word (or a similar program)? Word has a feature which can be good and sometimes can be bad.
It's called Auto Correct. You enter in something that you type incorrectly, and it automatically fixes it as you type. In fact, it already has a huge built-in library of things that people commonly mistype.
It can also be used to spell out long words from acronyms. Like, let's say that you hate typing Blackbeard's Lost Treasure Train, you just enter BLTT and everytime you do, it automatically replaces that with the longer version. The only problem is it does it as you type, not after.
So you're probably asking "How does apply to me?" This would take care of the multiple transpositions you did of the word "the" which kept coming out as "hte."
Usually my brain rushes past my fingers and I type (as I am doing now) directly to the site.
I may not do that when I reply to something quickly, but I will do it the next time I post a report.
Great Adventure with a 46" child is doable, but you need to plan, assume that your day is your child's and hope he / she enjoys it at their level as much as we do for the bigger things.
You also have to allow your child to gage when to eat, what to buy and when to leave.
Here's To Shorter Lines & Longer Trip Reports!
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