Carowinds!!!

First off, I'd like to wish all the moms out there a happy Mother's Day.  Anyway, for those who didn't know, I (along with some friends from North Carolina) visited Carowinds last Friday and Saturday (the 7th and 8th).  We had a great time, although it was a bit on the hot side.  I did get a great tan hanging out in the Carolina sun.  I left Thursday after classes (which are almost OVER), and took the long drive down to Charlotte.  I stayed at Motel 6 that night and the next which was quite nice considering how dirt cheap the nightly rate was.

Anyway, the next morning, I woke up early and got to Carowinds at 9 when it opened and met my friends there.  The entrance is very Six Flags-esque if you ask me.  I hadn't been to Carowinds for quite a long time; I believe the last time I went was around 2001 or 2002.  The additions since then have really changed the park and really gave it a different personality.  Anyway, the first ride we headed to was Intimidator, which had a very short line.  We rode it twice, and then the line became too unbearable for us to handle.  Overall, it is about the same as any other B&M Mega Coaster I'd ever ridden.  But, the newly designed seats featured on Diamondback and Behemoth as well, were very comfortable and a vast improvement over the older design featured on all of the other Mega Coasters.

Then, we headed over to Nighthawk, the Vekoma Flyer.  I didn't really get the theme.  First off, all of the signs seemed to have been left over from when the coaster had the "Borg Assimilator" theme.  And, I don't really imagine a Nighthawk being yellow and blue.  The coaster was rough and quite intense, but the line was absolutely huge.  Probably at least one hour.  I would wager to say it had a longer line all day then Intimidator, but that could be due to the train loading complexity and capacity differences these two rides have.  That being said, it is a very popular coaster with the general public.

 

Unlike Nighthawk and Intimidator, I had ridden Vortex before.  I love this coaster, it packs a lot of fun into a very small package.  The trains were very comfortable and the ride is absolutely spectacular for its age.  Afterwards, we decided to head to the other side of the park.  On my way, I noticed a well dressed official from Premier Rides, builder of coasters such as the new Skyrocket at Kenneywood and Flight of Fear.  Considering the park has no launching coasters, I'm crossing my fingers that they get one, perhaps from Premier sooner than later.  While in the County Fair section of the park, we rode Afterburn, Thunder Road, and Southern Star.  Afterburn was absolutely fantastic, I love almost any B&M Invert I come across. 

On our way over to the very well themed Carolina Boardwalk, we rode Carolina Cobra.  I absolutely love the new Vekoma train design featured on this ride.  I hope to see it implemented on older Arrow coasters with similar track styles to help with the roughness that causes shorter guests heads to hit the over the shoulder restraints on the older, outdated trains.  While at the Carolina Boardwalk, we rode the classic Carolina Goldrusher, Scream Weaver, Ricochet, and the Carolina Cyclone.  Goldrusher is such a classic ride, my friend's legs were to long to fit under the train's restraints, so he couldn't ride, but my girlfriend and I rode and had a great time on the Goldrusher.  Carowinds Ricochet has a much more interesting theme and layout than its sister at Kings Dominion.  I love how they blended it with the classic boardwalk theme.  Cyclone is just a mess, it apparently is having in identity crisis or something.  As I recall the track was painted three different colors.  It made absolutely no sense, even at a theming-impaired Cedar Fair park.  Hurler and Drop Tower were also in that general area, but are considered in the "Thrill Zone" section of the park.  Hurler was extremely bumpy and lacked airtime.  It was a nightmare of a wooden coaster, ten times worse then the one at Kings Dominion.  It has aged badly over the years.  Drop Tower was great, I like it better than the conventional Drop Tower at Kings Dominion.  

It was around Five after getting through all of those rides, and the park closed at six, so I decided to head back to Motel Six to get some rest.  The next day, I stayed at Carowinds for a couple hours with my girlfriend.  We rode just about all of the other more minor coasters and rides, and got some of the pictures you see on the blog today.  I made the whole drive home which was not very fun.  I had a great time at Carowinds.  Now, I'm going to give my opinion on a couple of debates that have taken place the in coaster community many times before now and will continue on into the future...

Carowinds vs. Kings Dominion:

Being so close to each other for two parks in the same chain, most would think they would be very similar, but that does not hold true in this case.  Carowinds is a much smaller park and incorporates their coasters into the park's paths to save room.  Some of their ride placement is spot on, while other placement is quite puzzling.  The park is very well maintained, the pathways are spotless, and the rides are generally reliable.  The Planet Snoopy re-theme did wonders for their kids section, it made it look bright and new.  The park lacks a launched coaster, and comes up a bit short in the flat ride department.  The placement of Drop Tower which is very out of the way is an awful mistake, the ride shouldn't been placed somewhere else.  Overall, Carowinds packs a lot of punch into a small, charming package.  It does have some shortcomings, but no park is perfect.  Especially, considering the park's competition is very below average.

Kings Dominion is a bigger park than Carowinds, has a bigger variety of coasters, and clearly has superior flat rides to Carowinds.  They do generally have more problems keeping their rides up and going for an extended period of time, but that is to be expected when you have a 400 acre amusement park full of rides to operate.  The parks' wooden coasters which are all identical (Rebel Yell to Thunder Road, the two Hurler's, and Ghoster Coaster to Woodstock Express) are virtually tied.  But, I have to give the edge to Kings Dominion due to extra wooden coaster (Grizzly) and the fact that Kings Dominion's woodies have been maintained much better by Cedar Fair.  I will give Carowinds a slight edge in the steel coaster department due to the fact that they have three great B&Ms and two popular Vekomas (which usually are hard to find within 500 miles of each other).  

.My final verdict is Kings Dominion, it is a bigger and better park.  I still love Carowinds for what it is... a somewhat smaller park with virtually no competition in its area.

Intimidator 305 vs. Intimidator Carowinds

I'd like to start off saying these coasters can't really be stacked up against each other.  They are too different. They are both at or near the top of their respective categories.  Intimidator 305 is a world class ride, something never seen before, a unique mix of Millennium Force, an Intamin Mega-Lite, and perhaps Maverick to a degree.  It is in my top five for sure.  That being said, it's train is simply uncomfortable and it has had some reliability problems with its train's wheels and it's anti-rollback system.  It is very rough and packs a whole lot of punch.

On the other hand, Intimidator Carowinds brings a reliable, fantastic ride to Carowinds.  It is a beautiful peace of B&M engineering.  A high capacity, reliable, crowd pleaser that will be THE signature ride at Carowinds for years to come.  Its trains are comfortable and it rides very smoothly.  

If I was Kings Dominion, and had to pick between a reliable, smooth, high capacity coaster which may not be world class, but will still stand out as the best ride at the park OR in some people's opinion the best coaster in the world, a unique, massive coaster that will be a bit rough and may have reliability problems due to its relatively new, unseen features, but perhaps would make roller coaster history if the gamble turns out right... I would probably have gone the opposite direction that Kings Dominion.  I would have played it conservative and took the more reliable coaster.  But, that being said Intimidator 305 is by far better than Intimidator Carowinds when you look at them purely ride wise. 

Well, that' concludes it, thanks for reading this massive edition of the Kdlvr Blog.  Stay tuned for more soon and have a great week.

-Jake

First Blog/May 2nd Kd Trip Report

Well, I finally have a blog.  I guess this is sort of my official coming out as an internet junkie.  It had to happen sometime.  Anyway, thank you for reading and please keep up with the blog, I should post every two or three days.  If you have any comments or questions, feel free to comment on this blog, I set it so anyone could comment without having to register which can be a pain in the ass.  With that being said, if you'd rather email me, my email is kingsdominionlvr@gmail.com.  Now, to the good stuff!

No, not processed food from Mickey D's, my Kings Dominion trip report.  Though, the latter does contain just as much of a risk of a heart disease as much as the former.  If you don't live in Virginia, then you wouldn't understand why the hell I would go to Kings Dominion at 4pm when they closed at 8.  During the Spring, Virginia's weather has violent mood swings, one day its pouring rain, the next it is 90 degrees outside.  I was waiting for it to cool down, but soon realized it would not.  So, rather then waiting any longer, my friends and I left around three.  On the drive down, rather then stopping for some artery clogging "Bacon Potato Pie", I decided to have an apple.  Folks, anything that is made from something called "Bacon Potato" is probably not the best for you.  Anyway, on the other side of I-95 right next to the Kings Dominion exit, Busch Gardens decided to put up a billboard.  Not so great marketing decision if you ask me, most people who go to Kings Dominion aren't looking to go to Busch Gardens Williamsburg directly after.  I would've taken a picture, but my camera battery died as soon as I turned it on, I'll be getting a Nikon soon.  Anyway, I decided to upgrade my pass to a Platinum Pass which is perhaps the sexiest season pass I've ever seen, because I will be going to Carowinds this Friday and perhaps Cedar Point or Dorney Park later in the summer.  Anyway, once we got inside the park, we rode Dominator and Berserker.  Dominator was great as usual, perhaps my favorite B&M Floorless coaster, Berserker was average, as usual.  

After getting over the soreness caused by the unusual restraints of Berserker, we headed to the "Congo" riding Generic Themed: Stunt Coaster, Anaconda (which had its brake run repainted in the off-season, only someone like me would notice that), Volcano which was repainted with some fresh pigeon shit, the Crypt, and Flight of Fear.  Then we headed down to Intimidator 305, which was apparently having some wheel problems.  We got to ride it, nothing seemed off to me.  But, if the train's wheels are already wearing down, something tells me that's not the greatest sign of reliability.  That being said, if I wanted reliability, I'd go ride the numerous dull B&Ms at Busch Gardens.  Actual picture from the site ;-)  

I think it was around 6:30 or so after riding all of that, it was fair to say we had made pretty good time, so we headed to the Grove to get some quick rides on some of the lower queued rides.  We skipped Shockwave and headed to the woodies.  I was surprised Hurler was already running again after its retracking.  Grizzly and Rebel Yell were superb as usual.  I didn't really notice any difference on Hurler, I never really got why everybody whines about its roughness anyway.  It seems like to me that if people really hated the ride that much, Kings Dominion would have scrapped it by now, not retracked it.  Typical coaster enthusiasts, so over-critical of everything they don't even take time to enjoy the rides.  We headed to the Flying Eagles, and the park was closing by then.  Overall, it was a great time with my friends as usual.  The perfect end to a great day was when we stopped at the heaven of all huge franchise restaurants.  The king of the pancake, the connoisseur of everything deep-fried and delicious, IHOP.  Yea, I know, I just went on a health rant a few paragraphs ago, but every now and then a little IHOP is allowed.  

Yummy!  I didn't feel like driving the extra 15 minutes home, so I crashed at my friends house.  And for the record, I woke up the next day with an IHOP hangover.

Anyway, thanks very much for reading.  Have a great day, and running is the best cure for an IHOP hangover.

-Jake