Trip Report: Paramount's Kings Island (#1)
Mason, Ohio - 04/09/2004

"They sent one out, it didn't come back."

When I got to the park, I started with a long line at the parking entrance. I have no idea what was taking so long, but it seemed to take forever to get people through the toll booths. I still think that given the large percentage of Kings Island patrons who have parking passes, they ought to seriously consider rolling the parking fee into the admission price and going the Kennywood route, charging $0 to park and $5 for preferred parking. They could eliminate this traffic jam at the parking lot entrance, and probably sell a lot more preferred parking. Ah, well, though it makes sense to me there must be some reason it doesn't make sense to the park...

Getting in was also an adventure, but I think it had something to do with the four or five clueless and unprepared people who jumped in front of me at the metal detector (and took forever to get through) and then jumped in front of me at the admission gate (and took forever to get through). In the past, Kings Island has always been one of the quickest parks to get in; today it was a bit of a chore even with a very light crowd. I did notice that the self-service Season Pass entrance they set up last year apparently didn't work out; it's gone this year.

Since it's been a topic of discussion recently, yes, there were a half-dozen photographers in the entrance plaza, but I wouldn't describe them as aggressive. I do think that when they are arranging to take group photos, they should make an effort to get the group to turn around so that they can get the fountain and tower as a background instead of the back of the admission building and the mostly-abandoned restaurant.

I walked quickly through International Street, around the back of the Eiffel Tower. The Tower was the only ride listed as closed for the day, and a crew was working on the elevators. Rumor has it that the tower is getting a set of new elevators for this season. I bore right, going clockwise around the Antique Cars and down Coney Mall. A right turn at Preston Tucker's place, past the Troika and the Vortex until I heard a loud, metallic BANG! overhead.

The Flying Scooters look like they got a fresh coat of paint this season. New paint same as the old paint, but looking good. As for my own flying, I'm a bit out of practice, but I did okay. Getting off was when I met John Cline and posse. By mutual decision, a crowd of us opted to ride Flight of Fear.

It's well known now that Flight of Fear now has lap bars. It's reasonably well known that those lap bars include a safety belt which extends from the outboard edge of the seat to about halfway down the outboard support on the lap bar, where a buckle tongue is welded in place. I sat down and pulled the lap bar down without difficulty, but had a terrible time getting the belt to latch. The latch plate would slide all the way down on the tongue, but I couldn't get it to latch. Somehow, the attendant managed to hit it in just the right place to get it to go. I still think there has to be a better way. Perhaps a kicker bar of some kind, similar to the roundly-hated seondary on a Chance Trabant...

Anyway, once secured in the train, we were off. We shot through the dark tunnel and into the cavernous, but brightly illuminated ride building. I've been in there with the lights on for two occasions, but this is the first time I've had a complete ride with the lights on. I've been waiting almost nine years for this experience, and to be honest, it is worth the wait. Pity I was in the back of the train instead of up front, but to see the tangled mess of track in there while riding is pretty wild. Some of those clearances are REALLY tight! Oh, and there is a disused King Cobra train parked in the Flight of Fear building.

The Flight of Fear train got another modification this year, but it's easy to miss: the headrests are now molded foam instead of an upholstered cushion. On this ride, it's a very minor change.

From Flight of Fear, the next stop was the Paramount Action F/X Theater, featuring Spongebob Squarepants. It's an Iwerks "follow the bouncing screen" theater with a cute 3D cartoon. It seems that motion theaters are going back to basic rules of continuity, as both Spongebob and Busch Gardens' Corkscrew Hill return to a consistent point of view, as is necessary for a ridefilm. I do wish these parks would offer as an option a 'clip-on' version of the 3D glasses for those of us who require corrective lenses. I always have trouble with the glasses falling off 'cause there is only so much space around my temples.

Spongebob is quite possibly the best film I've seen in this theater so far. One odd thing about it, though...there are a couple of points in the film where it looks like there ought to be in-theater stunts (water sprays, bubbles, wind, whatever), but there aren't any. Odd, because I think the film was produced for Paramount Parks.

The Racer was my next stop down the midway. As if the ride didn't already have the most wretched set of PTC trains in North America, Kings Island has modified them again. Seat belt retractors have been attached to the outsides of the seats. At the center, push-button buckles have been installed, and they did something interesting...the belts come up between the seat cushion and the seat divider as expected, but at the top of the divider the two belts are stitched together, which keeps them from disappearing under the rider. At the other end, a stopper attached to the belt prevents the belt from retracting all the way into the retractor, and may help prevent jamming. The belts are orange, which is probably a good idea, but would be an even better idea if the lap bars were not also orange. The practical upshot of all this is that I pulled out the seat belt, fastened it around me, sat down, then pulled back on the lap bar. The seat is still entirely too narrow, and still has the way-too-short seat divider topped by the separate way-too-tall seat divider. The side and back "cushions" are still made out of that wretched hard foam stuff that ought to be outright banned from wood coaster seats. And they've done nothing about fixing the ratchet positions for the lap bar, so the Kings Island lap bars are still about 45-degrees tighter than anybody else's. The attendant came around and insisted on another notch, so I unfastened the seat belt, stood up, pulled the bar back another notch, sat down, and refastened the belt. At that point, I'm well and truly wedged into place when the ride starts. Since some people have expressed concern, I should mention that I pulled about five feet of belt out of the retractor and still didn't reach full extension, so these belts are not going to prevent anybody from riding by being too short.

What followed was not at all pleasant. Racer is running slow, but more critically, it's running ROUGH. It bounces and hammers and generally beats the living crap out of anybody who rides it, and the experience is not at all pleasant. It's still not as bad as Rebel Yell was on my one visit to Kings Dominion in '01, but it is getting close. Rebel Yell at least has soft seats and no brake on the turnaround. Racer is just trying to vie with Son of Beast for the title of "Worst Coaster in the Park."

On the South side of the ride, the recaR was operating all day, in fact was racing, but was not carrying any passengers. Something about the trains not being adequately broken in or something.

Adventure Express is always fun, and on this trip performed nicely. It was a bit distressing that much of the decoration is broken down. Specifically, about half the lights on the second lift are not working. It just looks bad. Doesn't change the fact that Adventure Express is a fine example of Arrow Dynamics' later work with the Runaway Train. The ride doesn't get a whole lot of respect, but I think it's a good ride...most important, it's fun.

Top Gun is a bit on the shabby side these days as well, starting with the badly faded entrance sign. Again, though, this ride delivers where it counts. Apart from being too darned short, it's easily one of the best of the Arrow suspended coasters.

I took a ride on Drop Zone, and shortly after I sat down I wished I hadn't. Someone said that the seats were new, but the condition of the foam suggests otherwise. The seat does seem rather shallow, and I wonder if they've changed seat molds since the ride opened. I pulled the shoulder bar down tight against my shoulders, stretched the safety belt to its full length and...no dice. Now, wait a minute...I'm only 5'12" [Footnote 1] tall, which is hardly above average. I know I have ridden before, even with the safety belts...in fact, even with THESE safety belts, which are a bit like the ones used on Intamin's newest coasters, with the Stubai paragliding carabiner [Footnote 2] for a buckle. I know that over the winter I've become a little bigger around the middle, but down there I have plenty of room, in fact with just a little effort, thanks to the shallow seat, I could probably slide out from under the shoulder bar if I wanted to. The thing doesn't even come close to touching my stomach.

That should have been enough right there. A quick crossed-arm "no-go" signal, and I'd be out, and I could go ride Delirium again. But no, I couldn't do that. I grabbed the shoulder bar with both hands and pulled straight down on the top, the Wicked Twister trick. I stretched the belt a little more. Still nothing. I slouched down, slid forward a little, and pulled down again. Finally, with my upper body pinched tightly between the shoulder bar and seat, I snapped the belt closed. Luckily these buckles can be operated under tension!

The gondola climbed the tower and rotated one full turn. That means the rotation got us almost to the top of the braking zone, then we went straight up to the top of the tower. That put me on the side facing Delirium. What I noticed from up there is that I was on an uninteresting side of the tower. The most visible thing in front of me was the fenced box previously occupied by King Cobra's station and final helix. There is nothing in there; it's bare dirt. Okay, there is something...there is an electrical service panel. I wonder why the park doesn't simply seed it with grass and take the fence down. It would certainly be more attractive when viewed from above, as from Drop Zone or Delirium. That is an odd thing about the Action Zone; with a 300' drop tower, a 200' wood coaster, a...what...120'? pendulum ride, and a 180' Skycoaster, this one area of the park has more overhead viewing oppoortunities than anywhere else in the park, but surrounded by parking, maintenance, and the usually-dark Timberwolf performance shed, it really doesn't have the best appearance when seen from above. That distinction has to go to H-B/Nick Central, Coney Mall, or International Street.

Odd, the things you think about when you're just short of 300 feet in the air, looking out over the park, waiting fo--WHEEEE!

My, that was unpleasant. Oh, the ride was great, but now my shoulders hurt like hell! Ouch!

By this time I had collected a bit of a posse, most of whom now wanted lunch. We cut through the Festhaus, possibly the most depressing thing in the entire park. It had been built to house a restaurant featuring German sausage and a floor show reminiscent of the famous Hofbräuhaus [Footnote 3] and other beer halls in Munich, and very closely resembling the Festhaus at Busch Gardens Williamsburg. Today, only the long wooden tables and benches and the large, disused chandeliers remain to suggest the origin of the name. Most depressing. I didn't actually have any lunch, but some members of the group spent about 40 minutes standing in line at the Lunch Basket trying to get some chili dogs. I couldn't tell what was happening in the stand, but something was simply not working. Meanwhile, I took some pictures on Coney Mall and got into a conversation with a group of people who all work for an amusement park with five pennants in its logo. The conversation lasted long enough that the other group disappeared after their lunch (I'd meet them again later), so I headed off to see the rest of the park. This meant a stroll through Hanna-Barbera, where the lines were longer than I cared to endure for Scooby Doo and for Beastie. On to Nick Central.

At the Wild Thornberries River Adventure I noticed that the operators in the unloading station have thoughtfully been equipped with roller mops. These appear to be useful multifunction tools, good not only for sponging the water off the seats in the boat, but also for dragging the boats through the station if they get hung up going over the brakes. I did think it was a bit cold to ride, particularly since the elephant was completely functional.

Rugrats Runaway Reptar Roller Coaster, on the other hand, was not functional at all, its train stranded mid-course over the boarding platform. That seemed to me a rather odd place for it to stop, but the ride was down all day.

I just missed the train, but I stopped off at the Kettle Corn trailer and bought a "small" bag ($3.50, I think). That stuff is good! Eating it consumed a good bit of time, as the "small" bag is quite a large serving of popcorn. To justify the high price, I presume. Some munching later I was standing in line for The Beast.

The Beast is celebrating its 26th season in 2004, that is to say, The Beast is 25 years old. In honor of that, there are some changes to the ride. A couple of new signs have been planted in the flower bed next to the ride entrance, the commemorative signs in the station have been re-done, and there are now some special audio effects in the station, and a new "arms down, head back an hold on" warning message on the first lift featuring a music bed and Jeff Siebert, who is rapidly becoming The Voice of Kings Island (his work also includes a "no smoking" recording heard throughout the park, and a special "agressive ride" warning for Son of Beast). It's actually pretty good, and a good idea considering how long it takes to get to the top of the second lift most days. Beyond that, it's the same old Beast, with the lousy seats, crummy trains, and on this visit it simply was not running well. The Beast seems to have picked up a jackhammering action I normally associate with Geauga Lake's Big Dipper, the same kind of action that made me hate Rebel Yell back in 2001. It is, however, not an action I am accustomed to feeling on The Beast...Kings Island's wood coasters are normally much better than that. Ick. For now I will chalk it up to this being very early in the season. But I sincerely hope it gets better!

Vortex is another story. Vortex came off its winter hiatus virtually unchanged from last fall. I was a little surprised to find a nasty crack in the Fiberglas ahead of my seat this early in the season (nothing serious, I've seen much worse elsewhere...). Out on the course, though, Vortex is running great. I know it's my imagination, but it even felt like the train ran a little faster off the mid-course.

I returned to the Action Zone for a ride on Delirium. For the moment, at least, it appears that the difficulties the ride had last season with centering and getting the platform up for unloading have been fixed, so the ride is running at significantly improved capacity over last year. Have I mentioned that this ride is easily one of the best new rides installed in any park, anywhere in the past few years? It goes back to what I was saying about the Zamperla Disk'O, which is the same action on a smaller scale. It's an exciting ride, exciting enough for the hard-core thrill seekers, but it's approachable enough for the less daring. Overall, there is very little not to like about it. Well, okay, I really don't like Delirium's shoulder bar. But that's about it.

I also took a no-wait ride on Face/Off. The shoulder bars on this one have changed this year, but the mold seems the same. They're all black, with some yellow paint on part of the assembly where last year they were molded in yellow. What surprised me was the ride I got out of the thing. I remember that Face/Off had developed some nasty shuffling, hunting, and banging characteristics usually associated with the short-train SLCs. This time around, however, there was none of that. Face/Off gave an uncharacteristically smooth ride, perhaps indicating that they are finally figuring this one out.

I revisited a few favorites, and ended up, as I often do these days, at the Flying Scooter, where my flying skills improved noticeably between my first and second rides of the day. Finally, I took advantage of the 8pm park close and had dinner at the little Mexican restaurant North of the park on Kings Mills Rd. between Kings Island Rd. and IR-71. It's worth mentioning because the food turned out to be pretty good, at a reasonable price, though the place closes at 10:30pm so once the peak season hits it will be back to the Big Boy and Waffle House.

In all, it was a reasonable early-season opening-day. The park doesn't look like it is really ready for the new season yet, but this is the earliest Kings Island opening I can remember. The lack of a big, obvious new attraction in the main part of the park makes the various improvements much less obvious than they might be otherwise, but it is clear that crews have been busy over the winter. Since it's still the only park in the area open, I'll be back next week!

--Dave Althoff, Jr

Footnote 1: I'm too short for people to believe that I am 6'0", but an inch taller than 5'11", therefore... 8-) [return to text]

Footnote 2: The manufacturer's site is "www.stubai.com" and you can find it under "Bergsport" then "Flugsport" if you can actually get their horribly broken site to work, but there is no reasonable way to link to the product page. [return to text]

Footnote 3: (Footnote replaced with an in-line link) [return to text]

--DCAjr

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