Holiday in the Park - SFoG 12/23/2016

Since my family defected from Cleveland, Ohio to middle Georgia, we decided to take our rare opportunity to visit a park in December. We signed-up for Gold Combo Memberships during the holiday sale, plus my company offers additional discounts makes our memberships about $7 a month. My wife, 19-month-old son and I packed up the car, and took the 75-minute drive to Six Flags over Georgia.

Upon arrival, there was a nice crowd as the parking lot was nearly half-full. I was surprised how far the parking lot was from the main gates. It made for a nice walk to the gates as we got to see a lot of the attractions arranged around the perimeter of the grounds. It was very exciting since this was our first park visit since we found out we were pregnant in 2014 and our first Six Flags Park other than Six Flags Ohio/Worlds of Adventure during their short time in Aurora.

The gates were slow moving as the finger print scanners were being difficult. Security was frighteningly easy to get through. My wife and I both set off the metal detectors but were just waved through. Once though the gates, the only word that came to mind was “majestic.” The carolers, the lights, the fake snow coming down. It was amazing. It reminded me of Public Square downtown Cleveland when I was a kid in the 80’s. The decorations were top notch.

As we made our way through the park, we went clockwise and enjoyed the sights and sounds. We made our way to a tunnel lined with lights dances along with Glee Christmas music. Since my wife and I were both Gleeks, we took a little extra time to get through it. The music nicely transitioned from area to area. Before we knew it we were back at the main gate. The main loop of the park is quite small compared to what we’re used to.

We didn’t intend on getting on any rides while we visited but did notice that Monster Mansion didn’t have a height requirement. Since we saw a line of strollers at the entrance we figured it was a safe bet to leave the stroller and get in line. This was my son’s first amusement ride and although he didn’t really understand what was going on, he did see the water and boats and got excited. The estimated wait time stated 30 minutes, but it worked out to be about 10 minutes they were pumping people though quick.

Maverick’s First Queue Line

The ride was pretty cool. The animatronics were nice but the marsh area was kind of scary as I felt my son pushing against me to get closer as the monsters were getting scarier as we moved along. Once we left the marsh and the fun monsters were out again he was full of smiles and we had a good time. When we got back to the station, the operator helped my son get out of the boat and was very interactive with him asking him about the ride. It was a nice touch and everyone seemed so genuine.

From Monster Mansion, we made our way around the park a few more times taking in the music and scenes. We wanted to take the train to the North Pole but wasn’t sure if it was a round trip or if it stopped somewhere else and didn’t want to take the chance of losing our stroller so instead we headed up to and took a spin on the Riverview Carousel.

The Carousel was in a beautiful pavilion and decorated with garland and lights. Candle lanterns hanging everywhere plus the music playing really took me over the moon with joy. We waited two cycles and then it was our turn. It was great that there were stationary horses that I could hold my son on as we took our ride. He was absolutely fascinated by the other horses going up and down and all the lights. I might have an engineering enthusiast on my hands.

From high above we took in some more sights and sounds of the holidays. As we made our way back down the hill and across the bridge we decided that it was a good time to grab a snack. I’ve read for years how expensive food and beverage was at Six Flags and other parks, but I was actually taken by surprised by the prices. A chicken tender basket and a soda was $20. That just seemed crazy. Later my wife got a $10 hot chocolate and a $6 bag of popcorn.

We generally don’t eat anything at parks, if we get hungry, we normally hit up a causal restaurant outside of the parks, but weren’t going to be at this park very long so just paid the prices. It all balances out as we only paid $14 to get into the park for that day and will only be paying $80 each for the year. It doesn’t seem like there’s a whole lot of retail around the park, so we just might shell out for the dining passes as well.

As my wife was waiting in line to get her hot chocolate and popcorn, I went over and grabbed a ride on Goliath. The wait was extremely short, two train wait for the back row. The operators were moving quick and checking restraints quick for fast dispatches. The train was already on the lift before the second train hit the final brakes.

I was pleasantly surprised by the power of Goliath. The train is just long enough that the back gets ripped over the crest of the lift offering a nice pop of air as the train cruises down the first drop. Being so long since I had been on a coaster, for the first time in years I got that stomach-dropping fear. The helix at the far end of the course was full of forces and the return bunny hills were full of awesome air. In a nutshell, amazing. Can’t wait to ride it again.

Just as I got off Goliath, my wife got her popcorn and hot chocolate and we hit the giftshops to find a keychain and made our way to the car. I am looking forward to visiting the park again soon. We are hoping to meet up with some friends later this week before that park closes for the winter in early January.

Hopefully we can get some quality photos to share on our next visit.

SFoG is definitely one of the nicest SF parks and an overall nice park in general. Glad you enjoyed your visit.