Finally made it to SFA

[Frito]

I finally made the trip to SFA (about a 6 hour drive round trip) today. All in all, I had a good time. The park wasn't very crowded, as I would have expected on a Wed. I kept a watchful eye on some of the things Harpo brought up like rider unattentiveness, trash build up, rudeness and so on. Maybe cause it was a Wednesday, but I only saw one issue the entire day.
The second time I rode Mind Eraser, I noticed only two employees working the ride. One was slowly checking the restraints (at least he did do that) and the other sat at the control panel, talking on the phone to someone I guessed wasn't even in the park, and looked up every once in awhile to see if it was ok to push the button that sent the train in motion. I did notice on several different rides one staff member correct another staff member. For instance, on Superman: Ride of Steel, one employee was half way finished with checking restraints on her side, when they unlocked all the restraints for whatever reason. This employee waited for the restraints to be relocked and resumed checking restraints from where she left off. Another attentive employee told her to recheck the first half. I saw that happen on Batwing as well.
Speaking of Batwing, I have another gripe. Out of three trains, they were only running one. This made no sense to me what-so-ever as this ride was their newest coaster, appeared to be the most popular coaster as it was the only one I had to wait more than 5 minutes to get on the entire day (35 minute wait on this one to be exact) but run at only one third capacity. Then I guess I found out why later that day when it shut down and didn't reopen. The one ride that brought SFA to my attention and it was broke down for the majority of the day. Go figure. At least I got to ride it before it broke down.
I caught two stunt shows, one was the Batman Stunt Show and the other was some kind of Wild West Comedy Stunt Show. The Wild West was pretty entertaining. It had stunts (rip lining over the audience, jumping/falling off buildings), amusing characters (an idiot sherrif, a Chinese bodyguard, a wanna-be-slick thief and his bumbling sidekick) and a somewhat risque senario for a theme park to do with small kids (implied sexual induendo above a salon, cross-dressing, and that song "It's getting hot in herrre"). The Batman Stunt show on the other hand, was a complete waste of time. I won't even bother discussing it.
Coasters: 1. Mind Eraser - Compact inverted coaster. A bit of a headbanger, but I enjoyed it. Some interesting elements including a barrel roll directly over another piece of track. Gives the illusion that your feet is going to get clipped off. 2. S:RoS - Hyper coaster. I really enjoyed this one. Rode it twice without having to get off. Did that again later in the day, then rode 2 more times throught the day. The parks tallest ride (just over 200 ft) with some great air time and two large helixes. The first one down, the second up, both gives the illusion that you're going to hit the supports. Not as great as the Magnum, but it still better than most hypers. 3. Batwing - Flying coaster. I have come to really, really, really liking flying coasters and this one is no exception. I already discussed my only problem with Batwing so no need to say it again. Even though I only rode Batwing one time while I rode all the other coasters at least 3 times, Batwing is my favorite at SFA. I felt they could've done some more elments to make the whole flying sensation better like a dive loop. 4. Joker's Jinx - LIM coaster. Good ride, even though it's very similar if not the same as Flight of Fear at PKD and PKI. It did feel slightly different being outside instead of inside. For one, I could never map out Fight of Fear, but I can now with Joker's Jinx, or can I? Hmmmm. 5. Some wooden coaster that I can't remember the name - out and back wooden. This woody was ok. First time I rode a coaster that double dipped and a nearly unbanked helix. 6. Two-face: The Flip Side - Boomerang coaster. To this date, I haven't really cared to much for boomerang coasters. This one is slightly different in that you can sit facing someone, instead of everyone facing the same direction. But even that has been cloned several times.
I got to the park just as it opened at 10:30am and was very much surprised that I had ridden every coaster there by 12:30. Not only riding them all buy two of them twice, Roar and S:RoS. I went back and rode each coaster at least one more time before leaving at 4:30p which I didn't epect doing, but it was just as good as I had a three hour drive ahead of me. Final note: On my list of parks I've visited, I would rank SFA a 6 out of 8. Walt Disney World being worse and tied with PKD for sixth place. However; I would go back to SFA, I wouldn't Walt Disney World and I would only go back to PKD if someone took me.

[SFA PKD Fan]

Nice to hear that you had a good time at SFA.

About Batwing:SFA being my home park I can understand your frustration with the ride only running one train,although by the end of the 04 season they did manage two train operation briefly but I just don't get why after four seasons they can't seem to get more than one train to run a majority of the time.

In regards to JJ.....yes it's a clone of flight of fear but the only problem with it is that they can't run it in october due to nearby complaints regarding the noise generated by the ride(04 was an exception however)which I hate because it means one less coaster for me to ride,I don't ride mind eraser anymore after nearly being ejected twice after the restraint opened up on me mid - ride.

The out & back woodie you mentioned is known as wild one & is a decent ride considering it's age & it's a lot smoother than Roar which as of the 04 season has gotten so rough I can barely tolerate it(hopefully they'll give it some TLC before the 05 season).

Speaking of 05 it looks like yet more water related attractions are in the works.....already the park has on their website hints regarding the rumored waterpark expansion,although what they really need is a new coaster but that'll have to wait til 07 because after rennovating paradisse island to turn it into hurricane harbour they'll definitely be taking 06 as an off year.

[momo1tx]

SFA is my home park, but I only visited it once, I was very dissapointed. Batwing loaded VERY slowly (one train every 10 minutes) and it broke down before I could ride it. Mind Eraser opened up 3 hours late, and Two Face: The Flip Side was closed the whole day. (I still have never been on a boomerang) I have no intent to return soon.

[SFA PKD Fan]

Well perhaps 05 might spark in interest in you to return?

Sure the 04 season had it's ups & downs(new restraints put on superman for starters) but they did manage to get Batwing to run 2 trains so it's a start.

Two face went down in mid july /early august because a replacement part had to be custom made & due to the few clones of the ride being in operation vekoma didn't have the part in stock so it should be up & running by the time they open for the season this year personally if it weren't for superman I would've stopped visiting the park years ago.

They really need a new coaster bad,I mean Batwing's novelty has worn off a long time ago & there's plenty of land to build a new coaster on but no they keep giving coasters to SFMM or SFGRADV all the time when it's the smaller to moderate sized parks that really could benefit more from such a ride being added.

I've already renewed my season pass for 05,but if things don't improve this year over some of the negatives of the 04 season I probably won't buy a pass for 06 that's for sure.

[Sixty0neBones]

My first time to SFA was last summer, I enjoyed the rides, however I was very disappointed by the service there. The ride operators were VERY slow and unattentive. They were also quite rude. This was also the first time I got stuck on a ride, only for 30 minutes, but still a pain. My home park is PKD and I'm quite used to their service which is the best I have experienced. I don't expect people to be chipper, but i do expect them to do their jobs. Also I saw a lot of seats in coaster trains that were tied off, which made me feel very safe :eek: .

[SFA PKD Fan]

^What ride were you stuck on for 30 minutes while at SFA?

I've been to PKD several times myself.....too bad I don't have a pass for them though because the service there this season was just outstanding compared to that of SFA & I'm definitely looking forward to the new tomb raider top spin being added this year.

Now of course it's not entirely the park's fault......I mean look at who's running the place from upper management,the GM's hands are somewhat tied as to what she can do to take better care of the park & get rides running to capacity but the biggest thing I hate is that fastlane BS.

It's the worst over at superman where they'll let a whole trainload of fastlaners on at once instead of the two per train that are allowed to use the blocked off rows.

[Sixty0neBones]

I was stuck on the Joker. The bad thing was, the ride wasn't even all that great.

[SFA PKD Fan]

I'll agree with you on that because after the third inversion the ride just slows to a crawl over that section just above the MCBR(the area with the rings) but once through there the ride does pick up the pace again.

The other thing I hate about it is the fact that it's always closed in october due to noise restrictions,that & for the space it takes up they could've put a better coaster there such as a mid sized floorless instead.

[soundgodz]

I was at SFA, PKD, BGW,Carowinds, SFoG, and HersheyPark all in the same trip this past June. SFA did not impress me very much. I've mentioned in other threads that Mind Eraser had rusted supports and that I don't like Vekoma SLCs. Roar on the other hand was a HUGE letdown. I love Great Coasters. Gwazi, Lightning Racers, and Wildcat are top flight rides. Roar! was very badly maintained and very rough. We were at SFA for two days, and we needed it. We arrived the day Reagan died, a Friday, and it started to rain. We got one ride in on Superman but couldn't go again because they had shut it down because the brakes don't work well in the rain. Forget Batwing. The rain got worse so we checked into our hotel. I called the park around 6 and was told that rides were still running. We'd returned by 6:20 and were told the park was closed. I was lucky they gave me a refund for my unused Fast Lane passes. We waited much of Saturday for the rain to stop. At least I could get a glimpse of FedEx Field from our room (I'm a Skins fan). Eventually the rain slacked off and the park said they had several rides up. They were open, but you should have seen me trying to strap into Batwing with my poncho on. That's right, they did run in light rain. Rode Joker's Jinx twice, but because they are so slow loading, we had to sit out in the drizzle on the brake run for 15 minutes. Joker's Jinx, from what I can see, including comparison of the two on RCDB, is pretty much the same as Flight of Fear without being enclosed. We did ride Flip Side and despite hating boomerangs and Vekoma SLCs, I really liked it. I don't think any of the water rides were running, I wonder why. If I lived in the DC area, I guess I'd have an annual pass, but unless they put something great into this park, I don't know how soon I'll go back.
PKD was a different story. Between the weather moving out and the park being south, things were much better on Sunday and Monday at PKD (it literally cleared as I was taking pictures out on the Mall Sunday morning). The park itself is so much prettier than SFA. They have a nice collection of coasters, despite the incusion of a Togo stand-up. I liked Volcano greatly, and Hypersonic is fun once. Nice bunch of woodies, even if you have to include Hurler. Flight of Fear, same as Joker's Jinx. avalanch is nice, and presents an interesting ride moment for two. But it's operations where PKD blows away SFA. Clean, bright, cheery, and the staff are as well. Big minus points to Paramount Parks as a whole though. It's bad enough when all your parks have the same tee shirts with only the park name changed. But when I see many of the same shirts I saw yesterday at Six Flags it's just too much. You're left with a shirt like:

"Coaster Riders Club, your park name here". Shame on you!

[SFA PKD Fan]

I felt the same when at PKD last year in july.......it was like a complete 180 in terms of operations when compared to SFA & at least all or most rides were in operation at a decent capacity.


You say you spent 15 minutes on the brake run on JJ? the longest I've ever spent there is maybe 5 to 7 minutes but you can't fault the crew entirely because sometimes it's the guests that don't quite know how to get into the restraints especially when it comes to that seat belt they've got.

Batwing is even worse however because most peeps don't know that the ops are supposed to lock the lower lap bar & if you try to do it yourself they just unlock the entire row(or even the entire train) & have to lock them all over again.

You said you're a big skins fan? well next time your'e at SFA on superman try looking to the right as you're going up the lift & you can see Fed-Ex field from up there.one of my friends almost always points that out to whoever happens to be sitting in the seats behind ours.

As for Roar being so rough:I think it's due to a combination of poor track maintenance & bad choice of trains,GCI no longer uses PTC trains in their designs & instead uses their own m-flyer trains(like those on lightning racer) if Roar can get a set of those plus some work done on the turn leading into the brakes then it would be a much smoother ride......just like it was back in it's innagural season in 98.

[soundgodz]

A couple of quickies. I talked to one of the guys from GCI at IAAPA and mentioned that Roar was rough and he pretty much just sighed, shrugged, and you could tell it was maintainance. He did also mention the old style cars and I might get to SFMW this June and see how much difference the MF cars help. I was at SFA once before, but that was Sept 82 when it was Wild World. I didn't have time to do anything because the band I was working with was playing there and we'd raced in from Raleigh just for this date because it payed so well.