IOA HELP!

I will be making my first trip to Islands of Adventure over spring break, and with my love for B&M inverts has had me counting down the days untill my first ride on dueling dragons. I have a general idea of what the park has to offer but i wanted to ask someone who new about theme parks what to see and do first wile at the park.

Do a little searching here....you'll find tons of trip reports.

What I do is get there right when open go to hulk ride a couple of times.Get a express pass for later or get one for spiderman. then head to dragons ride both. then just take in the rest a slow walk. The coasters and spiderman will have long waits later in the day.You can get one express per hour with your ticket.If your by yourself or with adults you can use single riders line.(I can't with an 8 year old) .The place will be packed that week I have an annual pass and i am not going (unless they soft open mummy at UO).You can do dragons first but by the time you walk back up front they will have a line.Most people go left into marvell first.Do not express shows most people get in anyway and will waste an express.

Hope this helps

Kevin

P.S. they will be out of express's for spiderman and coasters by noon (when they run out) *** Edited 3/24/2004 12:39:22 AM UTC by kevin38***

If you are looking for the credit on Pteranodon Flyers, be sure to head there first thing. This is a 2-rider coaster in the Jurassic Park section, and they only allow children to ride (or those with children). To save yourself from borrowing a kid, they allow adults to ride if the line is short, normally during the first 30-60 mins the park is open.

You can always get Express passes for Hulk and Spiderman on the way there, and then head to the dragons afterwards. Usually the crowds tend to die down closer to closing, so you will be able to get on more rides the later you stay. Utilizing the single-ride lines on Hulk, Spiderman, and Dr. Doom will also get you many more rides than the average guest.

I recomend getting there early before the park opens and heading straight for Incredible Hulk. If there is a line just skip it and head for Spiderman. You can always come back. These are the two most crowded rides, well at least they were when I went. The dueling dragons have an extremly long queve line but the actual line isn't too bad and the themeing makes the wait not so bad. Fire is the better of the two inverted coasters but you definatly have to ride both. They are both incredible. Finally the Jurrasic Park water ride is a must but that can wait. Due to the high capacity of their boats there isn't too bad of a wait.

The parks a loop, go counterclockwise from lake:

1. Ride Increadble Hulk, ride again (its good)

2. Ride Spiderman, ride again (1 of a kind, amazing)

3. Ride Dudley or Popeye whatever enterance you see first (Dudley was closed when I went there)

4. Ride the one you didnt

5. Ride Jurassic Park

6. Ride Dueling Dragons, Ride again, and again and again until you cant take the short cut anymore or you get sick of it

7. Do Posideon

8. Ride Cat and the Hat

9. Do any rides/shows you missed and re-ride, the park doesnt have too much stuff to do so you can plan on doing a lot of re rides.

Be sure to hit the water rides, they are unique and extremely fun.

Reminder....there's single-rider lines for Doom, Spidey, and Hulk...on the FIRST lap, you'll wanna stick with your friends, but they're PERFECT for re-rides...

Get the Express Pass for Spidey immediately upon entry unless you get to it before the line grows....but as mentioned, picking up that pass on the way to PF might be your best bet for even getting a CHANCE on the suspended...

Best water rides ANYWHERE, make sure to have dry clothes in the car...;)

Spend some time at Seuss Landing, or you'll risk growing old before your time....:)

This has nothing to do with the post but I would just like to say I agree 120% with Touchdown. Although Millennium is a great coaster what is better then a classic coaster that is full of airtime, speed, height, and tunnels. Magnum dominates CP. And as far as TTD, it is definatly one of the greatest coasters in the world but it is still lower then Millennium.

You guys I went to IOA at the beginning of this month and I must say that Hulk is runnin' a bit rough latly. I went a few years ago and it was awesome and very smooth, what happened to this ride? Its still fun but nothing beats how the ride was a few years ago.

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MAGXL200 said:
This has nothing to do with the post.

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Bingo

We went to the park many times at all hours of the day. Maybe it was just our luck, but even when the queue for Pteradon Flyers was empty, they refused to let us in.

Pretty weird policy they've got going. I mean, they'll let Dad on with his two kids, and the two kids ride together leaving Dad on his own. They're never running the thing at its capacity either.

I'm probably a tad different from most, but I say just go to the park and hop the first thing that takes your fancy. You don't need stupid strategies and ride orders or whatever to experience everything in a day at too many parks. IOA can fairly easily be done in a day at an easy pace.

Tip: If the park opens at nine, they let people in at 8. Very few people know this! I was very glad that I was "wondering around" at that time.

Also, they'll let you ride Pteranadon Flyers then.

touchdown, doing that way would be clockwise.

also, if you don't already, stay at a hotel on site (Royal Pacific, Hard Rock, Portofino bay). The hotel guests use their room key as an express pass, and this comes in handy big time (i work at hard rock, so I know.) Also, hit hulk, spiderman, dudley doo right, popeye, skip JP (in my opinion, the rides are lame) and hit dueling dragons (special line allows you to go from fire to ice and vice versa), and cat in the hat.

skip doctor doom, standard S&S space shot, triceratops encounter (walk up to a robotic dinosaur, stupid), jp river adventure is boring, but if the line is short, hit it up, check out the talking fountain by the sinbad show, and check out ioacentral.com

Oops, my bad thanks Turbo. I had the picture right in my mind just didnt compute it right. Cant wait to go back to that park for the first time in 4 years this summer :).

auscoasterman,

Unless you observed them running less than 3 birds, P-Fliers runs at full capacity. The reason for the stupid rules is that the ride only does between 300-500 pph, depending on the efficiency of the crew. The line can be very short and still have a long wait time. Add to that that the ride looks more like a family ride rather than what they claim is a childrens ride, and it is a recipie for producing upset guests.

I feel that they should replace the ride with a new, higher capacity Setpoint Swing Thing (like Roller Soaker at Hershey). The current structure wouldn't be able to hold a four person bird, wich is probably the only way to increase capacity, so a whole new ride would have to be built. Either that or build another track to race beside the current one, which I believe would be impossible.

P-Fliers is fun, but not nessessary. Go to Hershey if you want a Swing Thing.

I do, however agree with you about not haveing a stratagy while visiting IOA.

cedar point king,

Just go and "live the adventure". I am all about doing IOA at a leisurely pace. If you run as fast as you can from one attraction to another you will miss the whole point of the park, which is to soak in the enviorment and notice little details that envelope you into another world. There is a surprise around every turn and if you go to quickly, you will pass them by. Just sitting on a park bench at IOA is exciting.

Do not miss the Marvel Parade. Make sure you visit the lake while at every island for fantastic views of the park. Camp Jurrasic is a nice place to go spelunking. Try to memorize the lyrics to "One fish two fish". Relax and enjoy yourself.