SF America and Great Adventure Tips

My younger sister and I are going for a two park trip to SFA on Friday, Apr. 14 and to SFGAdv the next day, anyone have any tips about either park such as what is a good time to hit what rides, any shows that would be worth seeing, best places to eat, or anything else you can think of.

^^^^^GET THE FLASHPASS!

I suppose ride Ka first at Gadv, if not go to Chiller and the Batman and Nitro. Then do Superman, Scream Machine, Rolling Thunder, and Medusa. Chiller has a short line when the park opens. Ka was closed when I went last year so I can't comment on that. But enjoy your day and be sure to ride Nitro in the back, Medusa in the front, and don't bother wasting time for a front row on Superman because it all looks the same anyway.

Go ahead and ride what is open as quickly as possible at both parks. Don't pace yourself. Get on the big rides while they are still running and then enjoy the smaller rides and the shows later in the day.

Since SFA hasn't opened for the season yet and with the parking having a new GM it's hard to say what condition the park will be in on April 14th. That said, and going by past history, I would start with Batwing (tends to have alot of problems)and work your way towards the front of the park. Batwing, Superman, Joker's Jinx (whether or not it will be running is a toss up) and from there you should probably do Two Face and while your over there hit Wild One, followed by Roar and Mind Eraser. You will probably be able to do the whole park in a matter of five or six hours.

Now granted I've only ever been to Great Adventure when there was rain for at least part of, if not my entire day, but here's general trends I've seen:

First off I guess is that even in a freakin' downpour, as long as there's no lightning, everything stays open, so as long as you don't mind being wet, don't let rain ruin your day.

Head to the back of the park first - everyone will be heading to Ka, so if you head back towards either Medusa or Nitro and hit the rides that are grouped near both of those coasters, you should be able to get on 3-4 rides (depending on the side you choose) with re-rides in a little over an hour. When the people start arriving, take the route along the lake to get to the other side and you should still have relatively short waits. The rides front and center have the longest waits due to the short walk to get to them, so get in all your riding then just suck it up and commit yourself to the wait. That's how I usually manage a SFGAdv day.

Your going early in the year will greatly help your wait times too. Have fun, IMHO GAdv is an amazing park, sometimes in spite of itself!

One can only hope that they have both sides & two trains going on Batwing this year,preferebly by opening day.

Guts: any idea if Safeway has begun selling season passes yet? with only two weeks til the start of the season <& a trip planned for opening day> I'm really running short on time to get my season pass....I should've just taken care of it at the end of last season but money was pretty tight back then so I ended up putting it off until now.

Keep an eye on the weather!

We did the same combo in 2003, hitting SFA on April 16th then cutting back for the opening of S:UF on the 17th.

The weather at SFA was unseasonably warm with highs in the mid-to-upper 80's. By the time we got to our hotel in Jersey, a cold wind had kicked up. The next day at SFGAdv it was in the low 40's with high winds and spitting rain.

Sounds like the perfect day for GAdv! :)

Lord Gonchar is right. The weather in April could be really nice one day and turn extremely cold the next. We've had snow storms in April in Washingotn, D.C.

BatwingFan, I've never seen season passes as cheap as they are right now. $49 Play Passes online isn't a bad deal. I'd do Print-N-Go (I believe the price is the same) and get your season pass at the park. Don't forget, April 1st & 2nd are season pass processing days.

^If I had a printer hooked up to this thing I'd use the online route but seeing as I don't I'll have to go the Safeway route this season much like I did in 03...granted I could just get it at the park on opening day for around $50.00 or so.

Hopefully the weather will be better than last year & the better rides will be running,it was such a disappointment to have supes out of action the whole day last year due to the unforeseen vally of the train during morning test runs...crossing my fingers that history doesn't repeat itself LOL.

With new management, I think it's going to be hard to make a call on either park. As always, you're asking people to predict things that haven't happened yet. The Friday that you're going to SFA will most likely have lots and lots of school kids, but usually they leave around 5pm or so.

If you ask me, a Saturday at Great Adventure could be excessively crowded. As the wise man said, get there as early as possible and get the Flash Pass. If that's not an option, plant your butts in line for the Chiller as soon as possible. I assume based on your screen name that you've been to Six Flags Over Georgia. So that gives you two coasters you can cross off the list, if you can bear to lose the credits (trust me, you won't miss them if it gives you more time to do other stuff). If there's one ride that really stands out in my mind as "You must ride this!," it's Houdini's Great Escape--a Vekoma Mad House.

A word of warning: Kingda Ka does not run in the rain, and you can find that in print.

Hints for GAdv are that the crowd not only runs to Kingda Ka but Superman:Ultimate Flight also. So you might want to avoid them early in the day.

If it's raining I still head to the park since the crowds will be lighter and I can hit what is running. Some of my best days have been when it rained for an hour or so and everyone left. Rain won't close most coasters but rain and cold will.

If Kingda Ka is open early, get on it before it closes (i.e. the first 30 minutes of the day).