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Knoebels Discussion Thread


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Seems to dumb to not put it up yesterday if that's what they wanted.

 

They thought people would be decent humans and not show up claiming fake medical conditions by the thousands. I agree that trusting people to not be horrible was naive but I’m not mad at them for their optimism I guess.

 

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Here's a short TR of my awesome time at Knoebels after Hershey.

 

We arrived to a very quiet parking lot. As we walked into the park, it quickly became clear that crowds were light. I guess that this is because people don’t want to wear a mask, or more likely, are smarter than me and are staying away from amusement parks for now. Mask wearing was very well obeyed, although social distancing wasn't always followed in what few queue lines there were.

 

We went to Twister first, and the line took about 10 minutes (kind of weird), which was by far the longest queue we waited in. They were assigning rows with effort made to keep spacing between groups on both woodies. As I left Twister, I noticed that the queue line was closed off for them to do cleaning, and people were lining up behind the barrier. Twister is a top-notch wooden coaster that I find myself liking just as much as Phoenix sometimes, which is insane. It’s really strange, but I also know that I’m at Knoebels when I hand my tickets to the deaf guy at the Twister entrance. I hope that isn’t bad.

 

Phoenix was perfect as usual, with great floater airtime at the crest of the second turnaround that I had never noticed before and made me straddle the seat divider. I took two rides back-to-back two different times, in row 4.1, 1.3, the front, and the back, and the airtime was slamming on the double-down and the fourth hill.

 

Knoebels did better at precautions than Hershey. Hand sanitizer locations seemed to be more obvious, and they sanitized the trains more often. The ironic thing is that there were fewer people here than at Hersheypark! Enjoy the pictures!

 

BTW my Dad got a Bison burger here that cost as much as the crappy grilled ham and cheese I got at Hersheypark!

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They are taking apart 1001 Nachts, but according to the 2020 park map, the Tornado is going to be placed by Stratosfear (not sure if that's been mentioned yet).

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It's too bad I never got to ride this.

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This is still my favorite amusement park train ride.

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The Twister trains have new lap bars that are black instead of orange with a little yellow stripe. (What's that for?) Exciting, yep, and there are still no seat belts, so yay.

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A new trough is being built at the of Flying Turns to avoid valleying.

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The new Phoenix facade is sweet and will be even cooler when the logo is added to it!

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I always like checking out the Knoebels museums. This was cool. BRING BACK Billy Penn!!

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This timeline is a big improvement and is much more up-to-date, but I’m disappointed that it no longer begins with “God created the earth." ;-)

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Good memories

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I've never noticed this before.

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I had some fun with the camera.

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If only more parks had seen value in keeping the Lusse Skooters around...

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Don't trip!

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The light crowds let me get this picture on the Roto-Jet from Freedomland USA.

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Such a classic flat and better than the one at Hershey!

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Notice the social distancing signs on the carousel. Yep, those are each unique and hand painted. It's small details like this that make me love Knoebels more every time I visit.

 

Since we were pretty much the only people on an outside horse, I caught the brass ring! :)

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Yep, I'm including four pictures of the bumper cars.

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They reskinned this billboard for the season with that new 3-D Kozmo, and I love it!

 

Now it's time to go. See you next year, Knoebels!

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Our hotel was in Hershey because we originally had no plans to go to Knoebels. On the way back home, we stopped and took this picture of the old William's Grove Cyclone!

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the lap bar on 1001 Nachts was SO tight, we were miserable on it - was thrilled it was the shortest ride cycle we experienced.

 

my only negative from a long, long day at Knoebel's with TPR

 

we laughed about it for the rest of the day. . but yeah. . . .you missed nothing by not ever riding that.

 

 

bigger question (for me) tho. . did you ride the OTHER carousel (the antique S&G one over by the rocket slide?. . that one has got some portraits on it of Knoebel's family members in the hand-painted panels)

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good job on the brass ring :)

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Great to see! Honestly I’m all for social distancing and mask mandates to prevent airborne transmission but I’m a little tired of obsessive policies that prevent surface transmission. I feel like if haven’t figured out how to wash and sanitize your hands by now you’re just a dumbass. I’ll happily grab for some rings.

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^Exactly. Have we ever heard about any confirmed surface transfer cases?!?! I mean, if you could catch this from amazon packages or groceries we would all be dead by now.

 

WASH YOUR HANDS, DON'T TOUCH YOUR FACE, WEAR A MASK!!!!! Such simple things could end this all.

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Decided to take a drive to Knoebel's today before Emperor Wolf starts shutting things down again in PA. Splurged for the All-Day Wristband and probably got my money's worth out of it - 2 rides each on Phoenix and Twister, and single rides on: Haunted Mansion, Black Diamond, StratosFear, the Flyers, Cosmotron, Paratrooper, Roto-Jets, the main Carousel (grabbed a ring!), Skyway, Whipper, Skooter, Motorboats, and Gasoline Alley. Pretty much every adult flat that was open except for Round Up (just wasn't feeling it today) and Satellite (too much multi-directional spinning for me). I also skipped the log flume since it looked like people were getting drenched.

 

All in all, a much better time that I had here in 2017, when I walked away totally unimpressed. Twister is awesome (I originally was not a fan), and the park really does have a magic to it. Some of these rides, man... StratosFear is insane...not that tall but just feels like you're going to keep falling forever. Cosmotron is an awesome trip, but could use some AC in the building. The Whip seemed slower than Dorney's but much more forceful. I managed to complete the entire lap on the Motorboats without hitting anything.

 

The heat was starting to get to me after about 4 hours, so I took off, but it was well worth the 3 hour drive each way.

 

That said, Cesari's Pizza was meh. Yeah, it's good for amusement park pizza, but coming from a Jersey shore pizza snob who's used to 3 Brothers, Jonuzi's, and Mack's...not that great. Too much sauce I think. The cheesesteak from the round food stand near Cesari's was also meh, but the Oreo Sundae from the ice cream place right near there was awesome.

 

Crowds were pretty much nonexistant; didn't wait more than 5 minutes for anything. The pool, however, was packed (to be expected with 88 degree ambient). Good compliance on masks if you care about that sort of thing, and some employees were very adamant (almost angry) when they saw someone not wearing it properly. Kinda surprising from a park that initially said "if we see you without a mask, we're going to assume you have a medical condition and not ask you about it" before the governor mandated masks outside.

 

Did they ever have an Action-Park-style Alpine Slide on the mountain? While riding the SkyRide I couldn't help but think that adding a few lanes of those would make this the perfect park, and the "oh well if you get hurt" nature of them would fit right in.

 

Next trip, maybe Dorney on Friday.

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^I don't think they ever had an alpine slide, but I would also love to see one built there!

 

That would be awesome, but it has to be an old school concrete trough slide, not one of these fancy new ones where your car is connected to the rails and it's actually safe. None of that nonsense, I want scraped elbows and the fear of actual bodily harm on my scenic slide down the mountain.

 

(just kidding, mostly, an alpine coaster would be cool there)

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^I don't think they ever had an alpine slide, but I would also love to see one built there!

 

That would be awesome, but it has to be an old school concrete trough slide, not one of these fancy new ones where your car is connected to the rails and it's actually safe. None of that nonsense, I want scraped elbows and the fear of actual bodily harm on my scenic slide down the mountain.

 

 

Thank you Thank you Thank you! Some of my coaster friends are going wild over the newer Alpine Slide/coasters things - and I do like them, they're fun. But nothing compared to the old concrete ones. It seems we always would find those awesome concrete ones on coaster/road trips. Most gone now.

 

Same thing goes with water slides. If I want fun, I can go to any modern water park - a blast (hello Holiday World & Splashin' Safari - top notch!). But take those old (but well maintained) simple dated water slides at Conneaut. Holy cow, now that's a thrill ride. Same thing goes with most rides, I figure.

 

Rides have always been safe (with obvious exceptions), but people don't like taking responsibility for their action. Or following rules.

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That ridge that the Scenic Skyway goes up is really steep... It would be cool but I don't think it would be suitable for a mountain coaster or alpine slide.

 

Now, Knoebels with a Bobkart? Whoo boy.

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Thank you Thank you Thank you! Some of my coaster friends are going wild over the newer Alpine Slide/coasters things - and I do like them, they're fun. But nothing compared to the old concrete ones. It seems we always would find those awesome concrete ones on coaster/road trips. Most gone now.

 

There's one at the Seven Springs mountain resort in PA. Not quite as fast as the ones at Action Park in its heyday, but better than nothing.

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^Thanks for the tip. I'm more likely going out of my way for a classic wild ride/water ride than a new big giga. It's got to the point where fun trumps credit count. Ah, to be over 40.

 

Skyrides, wild slides, classic flats, classic coaster vehicles here I come!

 

Fun beats bigger - I spent 3 days at Knoebels last year but only 5 hours at my local corporate park (on 2 visits). Gotta ride Whizzer

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