Kings Island - Friday, July 7, 2023

We went as a family (two adults, two kids under 10) to Kings Island. The kiddos aren't much for roller coasters so we mainly did kiddo rides and spent about five hours at the water park. We haven't done many water parks so this was new for us all. Other than the 30-dollar fee for a locker, it was a pretty good experience. The wave pool had enough room for all of us to enjoy and there were plenty of smaller kid options for pools/tiny slides. Staffing seemed fine. We went during the busiest and warmest time of the day, but it was worth it to cool off.

I dipped away to ride Orion, but it's been over 10 years since I've been at Kings Island. Both the spouse and I agree we need to come back without the kids. But this was a family trip. So rides on many of the newer (for me) coasters will have to wait for another time. However, Orion had a great air time and the wait was only about 20 minutes.

We ate at Panda Express in the Festhaus. The kiddos had pizza. Expensive, of course, but quality of food wasn't bad. Long line for Panda. There did seem to be some pretty good optoins for food but we went with something we could have a few options for. The 1970's music show was 30 minutes long. Lots of songs! It was the 2020s, and I listened to individuals born in the 2000s sing a theme from a show from the 1970s (Happy Days) about the 1950s and 1960s. What a time to be alive.

Ride times for most rides seemed okay for a Friday. Didn't get to take in as many adult rides as I would have liked.

Multiple kiddo ride operators were kind and patient. The blue raspberry soft serve in the Snoopy area was a hit with the kids and I liked it too.

Went from open to close (10 AM to 10 PM) and pushed our dinner to after the park closed. We planned to go to the Outback nearby Kings Island as the kiddos like the kids meals, but we were pushing their 11 PM close by the time we go to our car, etc. Instead, we went to a TGIF Fridays in West Chester that was near our hotel that was open to 1 AM. It was very dead and perfect to decompress a bit. We have kids that stay up late, so the 11 PM close at Cedar Point is nice to squeeze a little extra value out of that trip. But couldn't do that at Kings Island with the 10 PM close.

We did Michigan's Adventure, Idlewild and Cedar Point as a family last summer. It is funny how being a parent changes your feelings on things because as parents, we enjoyed Michigan's Adventure best since it didn't feel like we were missing much just going on the kids rides. The 7 PM closing time when we went hurt the value of Michigan's Adventure but also made a hotel that night optional. My spouse has a soft spot for just physically being at Cedar Point, though. The breeze of the lake at night. The main midway, she adores the Magnum, etc. I get that. So we'll see where our next stop for a theme park is as a family. It has been 20 years since I've been to Holiday World. Perhaps that is the next stop.