Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Day 8: Mantis, Mean Streak, Iron Dragon, Blue Streak, and Raptor
For future reference, there are no "light" visitation days at Cedar Point during the summer peak season. I had a dim hope that going there on a Tuesday, being a typical work day, we might catch a break from long lines one might see on the weekends.
The place was a zoo. You know when a theme park has its own radio traffic info signs on the interstate 20 miles away that lots of folks are headed there. Today was no exception. The weather was sunny and hot, and the roads were choked in the 10am hour. For some perspective, we arrived about 10:30 and parked in section 28-C of 75-K potential sections.
We decided to walk to the back end of the park and make our way forward to the entrance, checking off roller coasters as we went. As we walked, we decided to dive into a line if there seemed to be few riders. We first rode Mantis, after a full 1 hour in line. Rather than pictures, you can view the park's video of these rides by following the ride links. Next we rode Mean Streak twice, back-to-back, and the wait was shorter than the actual ride - go figure. We have experience now with two of the country's major wooded coasters, Mean Streak and Ghostrider at Knott's Berry Farm in California. I think Mean Streak is a longer duration ride, newer, and features more steep drops, but we thoroughly love both. I think we agree that Mean Streak was the best ride we were able to ride today. From there, we rode Iron Dragon and Blue Streak in succession with very little wait. Finally, we rode Raptor, after about a 45 minute wait. We had hoped to ride the Millennium Force, but the 1.5 hour wait time was too much to overcome, given that we still had to drive to Chicago by nightfall.
So the inevitable compromises trading off attraction time and driving time had to be made, and we left Cedar Point right at 3 pm, as originally planned, after only getting to ride only 5 of the 17 possible coasters and getting just 6 total rides in 4.5 hours. The kids were in great spirits about the plan and no one felt cheated. A new sign of growing maturity in Kimberly and Jake, as they were able to "do the math" and figure that even if we had all day, we would not be able to ride all the coasters possible, due to the crowds in the park and the associated wait times.
We got into Chicago and are staying at the Courtyard Downtown/River North, the best hotel room so far on the trip. We pulled off the freeway for dinner in South Bend, Indiana, at regional chain found in the Midwest and South called Stake and Shake. It is basically a retro diner concept featuring fast food and waiter service, where everything is ala carte. We liked the food (burgers) and had no complaints.
Plan for tomorrow: Right now the plan is to go to the top of the Sears Tower, but beyond that we have not yet planned. We will likely make better plans after a good night's sleep and a good breakfast in the morning. We also arranged for a late check out, so we can tour around without our luggage.
Sorry, no pics were shot today...
The place was a zoo. You know when a theme park has its own radio traffic info signs on the interstate 20 miles away that lots of folks are headed there. Today was no exception. The weather was sunny and hot, and the roads were choked in the 10am hour. For some perspective, we arrived about 10:30 and parked in section 28-C of 75-K potential sections.
We decided to walk to the back end of the park and make our way forward to the entrance, checking off roller coasters as we went. As we walked, we decided to dive into a line if there seemed to be few riders. We first rode Mantis, after a full 1 hour in line. Rather than pictures, you can view the park's video of these rides by following the ride links. Next we rode Mean Streak twice, back-to-back, and the wait was shorter than the actual ride - go figure. We have experience now with two of the country's major wooded coasters, Mean Streak and Ghostrider at Knott's Berry Farm in California. I think Mean Streak is a longer duration ride, newer, and features more steep drops, but we thoroughly love both. I think we agree that Mean Streak was the best ride we were able to ride today. From there, we rode Iron Dragon and Blue Streak in succession with very little wait. Finally, we rode Raptor, after about a 45 minute wait. We had hoped to ride the Millennium Force, but the 1.5 hour wait time was too much to overcome, given that we still had to drive to Chicago by nightfall.
So the inevitable compromises trading off attraction time and driving time had to be made, and we left Cedar Point right at 3 pm, as originally planned, after only getting to ride only 5 of the 17 possible coasters and getting just 6 total rides in 4.5 hours. The kids were in great spirits about the plan and no one felt cheated. A new sign of growing maturity in Kimberly and Jake, as they were able to "do the math" and figure that even if we had all day, we would not be able to ride all the coasters possible, due to the crowds in the park and the associated wait times.
We got into Chicago and are staying at the Courtyard Downtown/River North, the best hotel room so far on the trip. We pulled off the freeway for dinner in South Bend, Indiana, at regional chain found in the Midwest and South called Stake and Shake. It is basically a retro diner concept featuring fast food and waiter service, where everything is ala carte. We liked the food (burgers) and had no complaints.
Plan for tomorrow: Right now the plan is to go to the top of the Sears Tower, but beyond that we have not yet planned. We will likely make better plans after a good night's sleep and a good breakfast in the morning. We also arranged for a late check out, so we can tour around without our luggage.
Sorry, no pics were shot today...
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