Morey's Piers 8/4/09

Other than a trip to Gillian's in Ocean City, this was my first trip to a park other than Great Adventure or Dorney this season.

On Tuesday they have a special for $20 wristband that gives you unlimited rides until 6 p.m. on all 3 piers except for upcharge rides. Considering a regular wristband is $46 and a single ride on the major coasters is around $7 using tickets/point card, this is a great deal.

The first ride was the giant slide. It is a 15 lane slide but I have only seen them use 1 lane. Even though there were only about 8 people ahead of us in line it took around 10 minutes because all little kids had to wear a long sleeve shirt the park provided and because the op at the top of the slide had to wait until the op at the bottom gave the thumbs up sign for the next person to slide. It's a shame because if even 6 lanes were being used, the line would move a lot faster and sliding more than once would be possible (since it isn't worth waiting that long for each slide).

After that we went to Flitzer since my sister needed the credit. It was the longest wait of the day at 12 minutes. Even though they had 6 cars running, they waited until the car cleared the 2nd set of block brakes until dispatching the next car. I also noticed the braking at the end was automatic unlike the one at Playland in Ocean City where they still use a brake lever. Doo Wooper had a 3 minute wait so we went to that next. My sister said it was a lot worse than the Dark Knight which I have to agree with. I actually think it is the 2nd worse mouse I have been on with the worst being Dorney's.

I went to Great Nor'Easter next. Only the blue train was running but it was a 1 train wait. I remember it shuffled and vibrated a lot last year but I didn't remember it being like that the entire ride. It ruined the ride for me so I wasn't willing to ride again.

We stopped at Zoom Phloom which was about 5 minutes. I forgot how steep the drops were and it is still my favorite log flume after Splash Mountain.

I saw AtmosFEAR had no line so I went there next. A single rider line has been added which I think is a great idea but it wasn't needed today. I forgot once you get to the top, you drop right away. The speed of the freefall took me by surprise as did the brakes at the end. It was a lot more intense than the Turbo Drop side of Dominator at Dorney,

Adventure Pier opens at 4:00, so I went there to get to Great White. A small line had formed outside the entrance but they opened the ride a few minutes after than and thankfully were running and loading both trains. My first ride was the front row of the last car and I was a little disappointed by the lack of air time and that it seemed rougher than I had remembered. I next tried the front row with a 1 train wait and it was a lot better with more air time throughout the ride. I also tried the 3rd car which didn't give much air time either. It is still a good coaster but not as good as it was in past visits.

It was around 4:30 at this point so we went to Mariner's Landing pier. My sister wanted to try Rollie's Coaster. I wasn't sure if she would like the coaster or not since it has those stupid unnecessary OTSR's and I remembered it being very rough with a lot of sudden stops. With no wait, went into the first row of a car. It wasn't that rough at all and didn't have any sudden stops. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be but I still wish they would convert the restraints to lap bars.

We went to Sky Ships next which is very low capacity but was only a 5 minute wait. It basically gives you an overhead tour of the waterpark. Pirates of Wildwood was close by with a 2 minute wait. No live actors today, there were 2 workers in the ride but they were just walking around not doing anything.

The only coaster left was Sea Serpent. It was a walk on and just as I remembered, it was very smooth for a boomerang with no headbanging. I forgot how forceful it was going through the loop backards. I went back for 3 more rides and when I sat in the last row of the first car, the loop really got me, it was almost too intense.

Morey's may not have the best coaster collection around but it is still my favorite shore park since it has coasters you would find in a regular park compared to the carnival style coasters the parks at Ocean City has and is something I look forward to every year.