CoasterMonkey

There's finally a reason to go to Water Country.. really the first time since Aquazoid. I can't believe they're going with Mach Tower. I thought Der Fallinfast was a tad cheesy, but Mach Tower manages to be cheesy and vanilla. I can't believe I'm complaining about the name. I'm such a whiny geek. Happy to see Busch remembered the existence of the mystical "flat ride." Hopefully the way they're expanding Oktoberfest will leave room for another. Why not gut Castle O Sullivan, put in the bumper cars there and have a crazy light show? Excited for the launcher. I think it'll be Maverick-esque in some ways, but iSpeedish in others. Exciting. I'm looking for it to be painted a BRIGHT RED. But I fear the color of red would make the GP believe it's the Wolf...

Damn. I need to get one of those metal signs. They'll be gone by tonight no doubt... I want another Wolf shirt too!

Rollbacks are VERY common on cold, wet mornings, likely because the ride has not been run enough times to get enough friction with the launchers. I went up to CP this August where the Northeast had unseasonally cold, wet conditions (it was a miracle if we got CLOSE to 70 F) and when I was watching it, I could see it hang on every one of them. It probably rolled back, but I never heard about it.

That's why foreign parks are awesome, even though the stress it puts on the turns could rip out some hardware. And on BBW vs. Alpengeist, when you're hitting 110 deg. bankings after an 80 degree drop, it feels like the fastest coaster at the park, esp. when you compare it to Alpie, which has its life sucked out with its MCBR. When I rode Draggin' Iron the first time, it didn't feel like we broke 20mph. Of course, that could be skewed after you ride Maverick and before you ride Millenium Forceless.

I'd say that the trip down to Busch Gardens is worth it. It fits in the same pack as Idlewild and Knoebels, but it provides a decent quality of thrills and entertainment like your West Coast parks. And you can see how BBW blows Ninja out of the water.

First, Hello! I'm Virginian, and I've loved coasters since I was 10. BBW was my first coaster, and the fact it still packs a punch for me makes it an impressive design, and the miraculous collaboration between Anton, Arrow, Ron, and the park really adds to BGW's charm. The park sat in a perfect storm for about 6 years. There were 4 coasters, 2 were inverted, 2 were not. 2 looped, two did not. Two were intense family coasters, while two were high speed G-Force hogs. Two shot into the water below, two careening down their own paths. The exclusion of the original Le Mans and Griffon are what I believe to be a storm of change, so at the news of the Wolf's removal, I wasn't too surprised. No matter how popular it was, the ends have been failing to justifying the means for year. It doesn't make a direct return on investment, it's quickly become a maintenance nightmare with round pegs from Vekoma fitting into the square holes left by Arrow Dynamics. Plus with rather poor capacity, it isn't statistically worth overhauling entirely to the point where the Wolf ceases to be the Wolf. While it may be emotionally worth saving for a precious few more years, Busch Entertainment has a rather clean record of park development (with a few blemishes, looking at you DF and Gwazi!) and I trust the management team that works very close with its enthusiastic visitors. Second, say hi to kingsdominionlvr! To those who couldn't detect the bias within the name itself, it's best to avoid him. He'll slam my Gardens and cover his nasty tracks later... Third, the park already has a few ideas in place, obviously. They mirror the Disney Parks in almost every department, from entertainment to food, from theming to landscaping, from the lowly ride op right up to my hero, Larry Giles. They aren't even that different in their coaster quality. The Busch parks don't have a lot of coasters like their caprate counterparts, but they don't dump clones (well, Sea World SA, you're misunderstood) and credit count boosters into the mix, just as Disney does. Is a new country possible? Yes. What will it be? The bean counters and the creative gurus have plenty of heads to butt before they decide, but it'd be almost suicidal to not place any coaster at all in the space. What would I like to see, seeing as it is my home park and my park destination for years: Bring in a woodie. I don't want the Pain Train from Florida, but what I do want, is a hybrid Gravity Group/PTC ride that shoots down to the bottom of the Rhine, then turns around across the river, and cuts through the woods (at 90 degreEESSS!!) that Busch owns in the back. It'd bring in all the qualities of the Wolf: A family-friendly low height (no, not as low, but now that I'm older, I question how Wolf gets by with 3.5 feet), yet punch-packing river diving speed demon that uses the terrain and whips through the forest. Like I said, you don't need 15 coasters to be great, you just need a good one to boost attendance. Griffon, a rather subpar ride for me (maybe because SheiKra was really fun the second time?) should bridge the gap into the next great expansion of the park, where they add another massive country, with a great coaster as its centerpiece. Looking forward to posting on TPR! (?)