California Great America (CGA) Discussion Thread

[ZeppelinfreakIndiana Jones and the Temple of the Forbidden Donkey.]

Next year if there still is a haunt, will they be able to have the same mazes/scarezones or even monsters? Or will they have to start from scratch.

[SunfireFull Fledged Great America Enthusiast!]

That's a good question. I wonder if Cedar Fair holds the copyrights to the mazes and scare zones. That may be something to ask in the coming months.

[Angry_GumballIt's All About Quality!]

I don't think they hold copyright to our beloved theme songs but as far as CarnEvil and what not, I do believe that's a Cedar Fair thing. With this noted, I noticed a couple of the former Six Flags park still hold a "Fright Fest" branded event, which is a Six Flags name...I wonder how that's gotten away with.

Being as last night was crowded, how were lines for some of the other rides in general? I definitely plan on using the Boofet perks to my advantage and get CarnEvil and Club Blood out of the way, do Slaughter House once they're open, then jet to the back of the park to do Toy Factory, Cornstalkers, and Black Widows Cavern.

Last year, I waited in a line for Toy factory that utilized several layers of switchbacks plus the line spilling as far back as Drop Tower and the coke stand next to it.

I'm posting photos from last year around the same time frame as this second weekend into Haunt for you guys to compare with in terms of crowds.

[kidcoaster 2"Excuse me, miss, may I pound my large rooster into your donkey?"]

I don't think they hold copyright to our beloved theme songs but as far as CarnEvil and what not, I do believe that's a Cedar Fair thing. With this noted, I noticed a couple of the former Six Flags park still hold a "Fright Fest" branded event, which is a Six Flags name...I wonder how that's gotten away with.

I know they hold the copyright to the toy factory song.

[robmanDonkeys are my way of life!]

Didn't it say somewhere in one of the articles that Cedar Fair was still going to give some guidance to Great America? If its true maybe that guidance could be Halloween Haunt?

[Angry_GumballIt's All About Quality!]

^This:

JMA could begin operating the park in the final three months of the year, although, as a real estate company, the outfit could retain an experienced park operator, including Cedar Fair, to continue running Great America. The company, perhaps best known for its Lake Tahoe resorts such as Alpine Meadows and Homewood, says it will keep all of Great America's current employees.

Taken from the Mercury news. I don't know how likely this is, or if this means that CF will be holding their hand through the proposed woodie project (since that was part of a Cedar Fair influence back in the day), or what any of this means... We will find out soon enough though.

About CGA's music: Last I knew, that song (along with the rest of these songs) were written exclusively for CGA. Whether if Cedar Fair had influence on having these songs made or if the park made an executive decision to have some uniqueness to their event and have one of their people write up the music, I don't know...Only thing I do know is that one of CGA's people wrote the music.

[jab88She turned me into a donkey! I got better...]

Well guys, the crowds have definitely arrived for Haunt! Last night, the park was unexpectedly very busy. In fact, an area supervisor told me we actually surpassed our projected attendance, which is a great thing! People have heard about how great Haunt is, and they're checking it out finally.

That said, the lines for different attractions are starting to get very long. Yesterday, I saw that Cornstalkers was spilling way out into the midway, and they actually ADDED more rope queue for Toy Factory! I was operating Tiki Twirl last night, and at one point we had a 45 minute wait. It was definitely busy for only the second Saturday of Haunt.

I would say that if you can only come to Haunt on a Saturday, do the Boofet! Beat the crowds and get more mazes in, because yesterday made it clear that lines are going to be VERY long as we get closer to Halloween.

Yeah, it definitely was busy that night, never had seen them use all the parking booths before to pay for parking, but they were. It took a but of time to get into Slaughterhouse, well maybe around 40 minutes, but it was neat to see how it has changed. The night ride I did on Demon was actually fun, especially in the dark and the tunnels it goes through.

Were you at Tiki Twirl around 9 or so and making mention of not turning on the fire if the guests on the ride did not scream? I was on the ride during that time, and if so can you really control the fire and when it goes off or does it just not work at times. When I worked Firefall, there were times it would not work and we had no control over it, other than an emergency stop for it.

[SunfireFull Fledged Great America Enthusiast!]

On Tiki Twirl's control panel, there's a button called the Homing button. You hold onto it throughout the cycle and it triggers the water and fire effects. Back when it was themed to Survivor, Homing would also trigger the video response telling the guests that they were doing a great job on their "challenge". However, if the balance on the gondola is not just right, the fire will not go off. Still, the guests don't understand that, and that's why they booed me when the fire didn't work.

[Angry_GumballIt's All About Quality!]

So that's why I've seen the fire work on 1 cycle, telling me "Hey let's go ride" to "Oh cool, the magic seat!" Once our ride began, our seat wasn't so 'magical' and to my shock, no fire. After riding, I never paid attention to see if the next cycle got fire or not, assuming it was having problems or if it got too 'breezy' to use fire effects.

I do wish however that the misters/sprayers actually functioned rather than 'hissing' air at us. Initially, I was under the impression that a stream of water actually came out but it was just a matter of it just being a really light mist that's barely felt.

[ZeppelinfreakIndiana Jones and the Temple of the Forbidden Donkey.]

^This:

JMA could begin operating the park in the final three months of the year, although, as a real estate company, the outfit could retain an experienced park operator, including Cedar Fair, to continue running Great America. The company, perhaps best known for its Lake Tahoe resorts such as Alpine Meadows and Homewood, says it will keep all of Great America's current employees.

Taken from the Mercury news. I don't know how likely this is, or if this means that CF will be holding their hand through the proposed woodie project (since that was part of a Cedar Fair influence back in the day), or what any of this means... We will find out soon enough though.

About CGA's music: Last I knew, that song (along with the rest of these songs) were written exclusively for CGA. Whether if Cedar Fair had influence on having these songs made or if the park made an executive decision to have some uniqueness to their event and have one of their people write up the music, I don't know...Only thing I do know is that one of CGA's people wrote the music.

That's good news that Cedar Fair might still operate the park. Then not too much unwanted change will happen. Ex. Halloween Haunt, GCI etc.
It could be like Discovery Kingdom when the City owned the park but Six Flags ran it.