SFDK 6/9/07

Nice little park, really enjoyed it. The layout made it difficult to really have a good plan of attack, but it worked out fine.

Arrived about 30 minutes before the gates opened, parking is so far away but the trams were running. Great view of the park from the lot, though. $15 for parking just seems like such a ripoff to me, but what can you do, right? Don't know if that's a Six Flags thing, or just a Six Flags in Cali thing. California prices.... :) My one complaint about the opening of the park is they don't have a good "staging area" like they have at SFMM. It wasn't well established that they had ropes up to not allow people in yet, so people were pushing their way through the crowd to get in. Could be similar to the running of the bulls at CP, but I don't know. I never went in through the front entrance.

We headed straight for Medusa, great ride. Would have liked to see something under the course other than parking lot, but I was more interested in the feel of the ride and looking around rather than down. We waited about 15-20 minutes for this. My friend that was with me has a bad back, but she stuck it out on the coasters, so we felt a better plan would be to spread the coasters out over the day, so we next headed to the dolphin show. Good show, nothing really different from any other animal show, but they really seemed to do a lot of teaching about the animals (this goes for all the shows). After that, we grabbed a bite to eat at the food stand outside the dolphin and Shuka's stadiums. Chicken fingers and fries for her, burger and fries for me. We headed into Shuka Stadium for the whale show, as well as a spot to sit and eat in the shade. A good show, again, educational as well as entertaining. Even at 30 years old, I learned things about whales that I didn't know.

We then headed back around the park, stopping at Boomerang to ride. How do you describe this ride? It's the same as every other boomerang I've ridden. Good ride, short line. I think we waited about 5 minutes and sat in the front seat. Then off around to the elephants, tiger, giraffe, etc.

Next up, the butterfly exhibit. If you are from Ohio and miss the summertime weather at CP, or if you just want to get a feeling for what CP in the middle of the summer feels like, go in there. :) It was like being home again, I loved it. My friend, she hated every minute of it, and stated that she would NEVER go back to Ohio with me to visit. I wish she would have been able to stay in there longer, because it really was a great exhibit. I was hoping to get some pictures of some butterflies, but she was walking through so fast they never even attempted to land on her. There were several other people that had 3 or 4 on them.

Yadda yadda yadda, we spent $5 to feed the seals, then went over and road Roar. Only about a 10 minute wait. What a great woodie. This was my first GCI, and it definitely lived up to the hype.

Next we walked over to V2. This is where my day went to hell, even if just for a bit. This was a wake up call to me on so many levels. We waited about 15 minutes, and I jumped up in the seat like I have done so many times on Wicked Twister, pulled the harness down, then.... what the.... I couldn't get the belt to fasten. Now, I know I've put on a few pounds since I lived in Ohio, but I NEVER had a problem fitting on ANY coaster. This was a new feeling to me, and I now feel the pain other feel when they aren't able to ride a coaster. I couldn't believe it, and I felt so embarassed that I couldn't ride. I literally was depressed and pissed off for about an hour or two. We then walked around a bit more to see the rest of the parts of the park we had not seen, did a little shopping for my friends nephew, then headed back over towards Medusa.

My friends brother-in-law told us that the "red coaster you hang from" beats the hell out of you, so when we got over to Kong, she said she didn't want to ride, but she knew I was going to ride every coaster in the park (well, the big ones. I'll ride the family ones next time). So she waited for me, I rode it. It did beat me up a little bit, but it wasn't as bad as he had made it out to be. I really liked this ride, a lot of leg choppers, that's for sure.

We then decided to ride Medusa again, and still only waited about 20 minutes. Still a great ride, so quiet, so smooth, great transitions.

We then wanted to catch the sea lion show, so we headed back over to the other side of the park again. We had about 30 minutes to kill before the show, so I decided to try V2 again. I took EVERYTHING out of my pockets (sunglasses, phone, water bottle), hoping that was what caused me not to be able to get fastened in. Waited about 10 or 15 minutes, got in the seat, pulled down the harness, took a deep breath, and pulled that harness down as far as I could with all of my might. I could get the buckle right there, but just not fastened. The ride op came by, she looked me in the eye, stepped in front of me and pushed down on the harness, and POP, it fastened. Still embarassed about how big I have apparently gotten to not be able to fasten it myself, I at least was able to ride. Just an interesting feeling, not sure I'm a fan of the ride. It's a good ride, but the twist at a 45 degree angle just is a little wierd. Stopping upside down was definitely a trip.

We went over to the sea lion show. This was the only show we saw all day that really had nothing to do with education and was all about entertainment, and it was definitely that. Very funny, very good.

After all this we were a little wore out, definitely got our fair share of sun, and ready to head out. We had reservations at 8:00 at Guy Fieri's restaurant Tex Wasabi's in Sacramento, so we had to hit the road. Made a stop at the front entrance to snap a few more pics of the coasters, as well as one from the parking lot, and we were on our way.

So all in all, a very nice park. Plenty of entertainment, good rides, and a lot of fun.

I'm glad Roar was a mighty great ride for you.

Yeah Roar is my number one woodie just because it is the only GCI I have ridden except for Gwazi and Medusa is my favorite steel coaster because I love floorless coasters, but glad you had a good time at my favorite park.

I guess Roar was really bad for Coaster Con, but I'm glad it was running well for you. It usually seems to get the "off season" work done at the end of June, and then runs great for the rest of the season. Aren't the shows fun? That's one reason I like the shows at DK, they try to get you to appreciate the animals.

It's almost like you have to pinch yourself to believe you're in a SF park here. It's certainly much better than KGA IMO.