Ok, so we pulled into the Great Escape Overflow Parking, Seems the real lot was full (and its only 10:30!), but that real lot looks small. Anyway the overflow lot is FREE, and we make our way to the front gate. Soon we would learn that just about every school in a 100 mile radius was having yet another 'school day in the park'. We proceed to the ticket booths, and look for guest relations. There it is, its just a ticket cage labeled Guest Relations. Then I procceded to wait over HALF AN HOUR to talk to Guest Relations!! Disgraceful! Anyway courtesy of Chris K. we had free tickets waiting for us at GR. Anyway Chris promised one ticket, but lo and behold there were TWO waiting there for us! Way to go Chris K.! I owe you a BIG favor! Well the tickets were actually the "Bring a friend' coupons in the back of the season pass premium books, with a note from GR written on them that they were alright to be accepted without a season pasholder. Well the ticket taker stops to look at them and starts to question it whent he line starts really backing up, when he just said "Enjoy your day!" We then entered the park. Wow, what a pretty park. All of the little hidden touches really make thois place special the storybook land, all the little things. Not to mention the confusing layout. We got turned around a few times but finally found the Comet and an hour wair. We turned away and noted that maybe the line will die down after the Splashwater Kingdom opens. We head to the Festhaus and have some german food (I had the roasted chicken), and wait it out. We leave the Festhaus and take a ride on the Giant Wheel to get our bearings and photographs. (a walk-on). Ok, we start heading back to Comet and the Alpine Bobsled line looks tolerable. We enter the bobsled queue. (Did I mention the excellent paint job on the outside of the troguh?) After a short 15 minute wait we get to the part of the line that runs alongside the brake run just in time for the ride to go DDM. We watch the sled on the brake run get evacuated, we then waited for the ride computer to reboot (or so we were told), we watched them cycle the sleds empty and run tests, 20 minutes later the ride reopened. So our wait turned into 45 minutes. We boarded row 1 of our sled, pulled the lapbar down and were soon off an coaster number (#83) It''s not a bad bobsled run, I still prefer the Mack version a lot better. Problem with this model is everytime you start getting into it, you hit a trim brake. (Whith the accompanying guide rails to bring the sled back to its home position). Still I have not doen many bobseld coasters so.
Now its time for the big show, we head down to Comet, still an hour wait, so this time we tough it out. And we noticed that we are in The Great Escape and Line Jumping Kingdom. I mean everybody line jumps in this park. (Of course that could be related to that sea of yellow busses and kiddies on free tickets.......) Anyway we had been told. the Comet has excelleent airtime in every seat, you can't go wrong, you can't miss it. So after an hour we were in the back seat. I prepared as much as posible, loose seatbelt, lap bar on 1 click. Disptach (#84) We went up the lift, down up, first turnaround (when does the air start?) Second pass, second trunaround (Where is that air, I leel some mild laterals but I want AIR), into the double down, Bummer, Third turnaround That air please!,, Brake run. Eric and I look at each other in disbelief. "Dave, are you just a little bit disapointed?" We stammer out of the car down the exit ramp, wondering just what went wrong. Maybe its a front seat ride, but do we really want to wait 1 hour + linejumpers to find out? Let's go look at the ride some more. But first I want to have ERT on the lawn sprinkler,, AHH that feels good. So with the picnic grove open we can walk all the way around the Comet. We look and analyze, we watch the trains fly by, we watch the riders. We watch the front car riders remain firmly planted in their seats. We look at the overly shallow hills and dips. and decide. "What an overrated piece of crap" (FLAME SHIELDS ACTIVATED). Also just for Dave Althoff, these fools did not open the queue gates until the previous train was empty, the riders were on the eixt ramp and the exit gate was closed. A lot of small things they could have done (ADD THAT SECOND TRAIN!) to make this wait more tolerable. I mean Martin's Fantasy Island and Seabreeze did not allow riders into the queue lanes (Seabreeze doesn't have gates) until the previous train was clear, but they do not have huge 1 hour waits to deal with either.
We go in search of a more worthy rollercoaster in this park. Uh, lets see we have a early Arrow Loop-Screw, and a Vekoma Boomerang to go. We stop by a stand Coco Loco to get a soft drink. Their A/C must have been broken. And soon we head up to Ghost Town. Now I must say the cave you go through to get to Ghost Town was impressive, and put us out right by the Condor, which we walked past in search of Nightmare, we knew it was not open yet, but we wanted to see the building, still work to be done here, looked around and got in line for the Tornado dark ride. The Tornado, from what I have heard is historically significant in that it is the last surviving dark ride from Freedomland. (since Cedar Point shuttered its Freedomland dark rides) I like dark rides, so we got into out little old-fashioned car, and were soon in the show building. A lot of dayglo here. The moving pieces seemed to work, but two noteworthy things. Nothing jumps out at you, and no noise is made. I have a hard time remembering another totally quiet dark ride. Ok, it was time for Condor.
I did not have much expectation of Condor, and noticed the ride time to be very short. The idea of it being an observation tower is good, and the ride action is sorta like a scrambler, but not really)
Ok, now time to score a 15-minute wait Steamin Demon (I mean Ragin Cajun) And whats this, no riders int he station until the train stops and clears, oh wait no queue gates, can't trust riders to stand behind a yellow line now. We finally take our small attack againt "The Line Jumpers From Hell" as Eric position ourselves into a wall accross the queu line. We were called jerks, inconsiderate assholes, and worse by the kiddies trying to meet friends who were very convineiently right by the turnstile. We lost sleep that night, NOT! So finally we board the train. Geez first they come around and unlock the bars all by hand, let the rider sinto the station, lock all the bars by hand, dispatch.. Eric said that's how Arrow inteneded their rides to be run. I don't buy it. Well Steamon Demon was not a bad ride. Alot smoother than we expected from a 1978 Arrow. Steamon Demon was my favorite coaster at this park today, if that says anything. (#85)
Also by now the hilliness of the park was getting to us, the heat was getting to us, the little whiney kiddies were getting to us, the incredible amounts of line jumping was getting to us, we finally said "Let's go ride that damn Boomerang and get outa here"
We make our way to Boomerang stop off at the Rotor, I have only been on one other one. We knew we were in for a winner when we looking into the drum from the line and saw the ops cleaning up a BIG mess. We got in and had a wonderful ride on the Rotor. I love spinneys. We then headed to Boomerang, and got in line. Now a park that has a line jumping problem as bad as this one ought ot be SHOT for building a rolleroaster with a 5 man wide queue trail. Amazing how much faster the line moves when you finally get to the fenced in protion. Almost 40 minutes later. (Geex I thought I left Face./Off back home!) we were on the Boomerang:Coast to Coaster. (#86) new trains, smooth ride, it's a boomerang. (Oh and they have queue gates, but they don;t fill the station until the trian is cleared. sometimes they open the queue gates, then drop the chain and let riders fill in the seats right away, other times they drop the chain fill the queue lanes, then open the gates.
Well by this time it was 4:30, park closes at 6:00 anyhow, let's get the heck out of Dodge. We noted the forced exit through the Gift Shop gimmick in use here, but I am not in the mood to buy anything, so we zoom right through and out to our car.
I hate to bitch after having free tickets and all, but I really did have a miserable day at The Great Escape. The kind of day where you have to keep dragging yourself through the parlk cause you want to ride certain rides, but your heart isn't really into it)