Knott's and Magic Mountain 7/15 - 7/17

My 8 year-old is now a solid 56 and 1/2 inches now and we decided to do the deed and take him to the Roller Coaster capital of the world (or our neck of the woods anyway), do not pass go, (spend WAY over $200), to test our mettle. Also, I wanted our son to experience Colossus for a comparison with next year's extreme makeover.

For the past few years, annual passes meant going to Knott's or Disneyland for three to four hours max before heading home. This would include a couple of overnight stays and a marathon day attempting to ride as many coasters at the Sunstroke capital of the world.

We decided to divide the drive up with a layover at Knott's. I've posted many times about this place, so I'll keep it brief.

First stop, the newly refurbished Calico Mine Ride. The ride is in tip-top shape now (with the exception of the trains, which were weathered for effect). The sound is great and the entire mine is alive with animated figures. The ending effects were fantastic. The only thing was that the characters are incredibly creepy. For those of you who have experienced the updated Timber Mountain ride, you'll know what I'm talking about. This is even more strange. At least they were having a party in the log ride. But most of the characters were mumbling and speaking in tongues. It was quite nightmarish actually. But I loved it. Very creepy though.

Good news! On Montezuma's Revenge, just to test the water, I asked if I could keep my glasses on. The operator basically said, "We don't recommend that you keep them on", and that was it. I got to experience my first ride on Monty without getting sick from blurred vision. Awesome!

The next morning, we headed out to Magic Mountain. My son had been excited for weeks in advance, so that rubbed off on us. Until this point, Xcelerator was his biggest ride. And after processing our passes at the gate (no need for separate processing, which was nice), and a bit of a wait for Q-bot (they should sell Q-bots to jump ahead of the line for Q-bots), we started with Revolution. So, yah, head slammer. Lose the shoulder restraints already!

You all probably know that Ninja was down, which was quite a bummer for me. I love that ride and was looking forward to riding it with the boy. So we "settled" for Superman, which was great fun backwards. Goldrusher was great twice in a row. But I was really interested in Apocalypse; I've never been on a GCI, just CCI. And WOW, just wow! What a great ride. We rode three times before heading off to B&M corner.

On our way over, the heat started getting to us (Apocalypse land is brutal), so although my wife did Riddler, she opted out for Batman and Scream. She did want to say goodbye to Colossus a couple of times, and I must say, we got a nice bit of air, which was refreshing after all the swoopiness. I think my son was getting tired of the swoopiness too, so we took a break.
The heat, along with lack of eating (though we were pretty good with hydration), we had just about had it. So we decided to use our single Q-bot reservation for X-2 and called it a day.

Just a couple of comments about X-2. Since we waited all of 30 seconds, I didn't have that much time to psyche my son up for this thing. Although all day, whenever he asked which was the scariest coaster in the park, I said X-2. And when we were in the station, over the noise I pointed out just how huge the trains are and what a mechanical masterpiece he was just about to experience. That they weren't coaster trains, they were monsters. That you couldn't even see the other passengers the way you can on other rides. We would be utterly alone with the beast. And boy did that thing deliver! I LOVE wooden coasters because of the chaos factor. This is one of the few steel coasters that delivers it and I received a big high five after it. And the coup d' grace, my son, with his brand new X-2 shirt said, "Mom, Dad? This was the BEST day in my life EVER!" So although I wasted a ton of cash on a Q-bot on a slow day, it was all worth it.

The next morning we came back and finished up business on Viper, Tatsu (what an INSANE ending!), 4 more rides on Apocalypse (we could have spent all day on it), a couple more on Goldrusher, and a couple of drops on Dr. Doom. I asked our son what his favorite ride was, and he said "Goldrusher, but I really liked X-2, Tatsu, Apocalypse, oh, and Superman." :)

A last note on Dr. Doom. Although it had just become the second tallest drop ride in the world the day we visited, it was quite a thrill. That being said, with the brakes starting 100' or so up the tower, you don't necessarily get that much more freefall than a shorter ride. The view was great though. I saw our car.

Thanks for reading.

No Goliath? Was Green Lantern or Full Throttle running at all?

Oops. Yah, we hit Goliath. I love the first drop, turnaround, and huge air hill, but they may have well added the brake run just after that. I've never cared for the second act. We would have done it again if my son had asked. The only two coasters he asked for seconds on were Apocalypse and Gold Rusher (takes after Dad).

Full throttle was running, but had a 45 minute wait and I didn't want to pay even more for the Q-bot upcharge (45 minutes isn't much in the grand scheme of things, but we had to prioritize). We'll do that next time with a couple laps on Ninja. Green Lantern was down because of the recent accident in Italy, but I doubt I'll ever get on it. But you never know. I just think my time would be better spent on Apocalypse.

I feel the same about SFoT's Titan. I'd rather the ride stop after the air hill on the return trip, but I'd MUCh rather all that track did something other than just spin around (see: SFA and DL's S:RoS's).

Right. Every time I pull into the final brake run at high speed, I "wish" they had added more air. That being said, I guess it is difficult to add air in a small footprint.

I dunno. The twister section of Bizarro SFNE has copious air and a small footprint.