Ever since my last visit to Knott's Berry Farm in 2006 I have wanted to make a return visit. Over the last couple years I have wanted to go to their Coaster Solace event for coaster enthusiasts. Mainly, I have wanted to go so that I can get an early start to my seasonal riding. If you live in Kansas and want to ride coasters December-March you choices boil down to going to California, Florida, or Texas. Unfortunately, flying to Southern California is expensive where I live. It doesn't seem to matter whether I try to fly in to Long Beach, John Wayne, or LAX. Most of the time round trip tickets usually run about $300 a person. However, this year we have this great thing called a recession/depression and Valerie and I were able to fly out to John Wayne for less than $400 round trip. We also already had Cedar Fair Platinum passes so our tickets to the event were only $25 a person.
Morning Exclusive Ride Time (or ERT) started at 7am the day of the event, March 21st. Valerie and I had both already decided that there was no way we were going to try to get there that early so we decided we would shoot for 8am. We left the hotel with enough time to get to the park close to 8am. I had my GPS search for the location of Knott's Berry Farm, and clicked on the first result that showed up. I thought the address seemed weird at first but I disregarded it. When we got to our destination it ended up being the the corporate office for the food division. I re-searched for "Knott's Berry Farm" under the amusement park heading and remembered that the correct address was on Beach Blvd, not Boysenberry Lane. After selecting the correct address we got to the park around 8:30 and checked in for the event.
The coasters scheduled for morning ERT were Boomerang, Jaguar!, Montezuma's Revenge, Timberline Twister, and Xcelerator. Of those I hadn't ridden Montezuma, Boomerang (this particular one at least), or Timberline Twister, so morning ERT was going to be a nice way to get these credits without having to wait in long lines. The first coaster we hit was Montezuma's Revenge. This was coaster number 80 for me. Montezuma is a launched shuttle coaster that has one loop that you first go forwards through, then backwards. It is similar to a Boomerang without a cobra roll. It's a short coaster, but it was fun nonetheless. I could foresee riding this again. I usually can't say the same for Boomerangs.
Next we headed over to Jaguar! since it was closest. Valerie and I had ridden this before and it was like we remembered it. It is a slow and relaxing ride with a top speed of 35mph. However, even though the coaster itself isn't all that exciting the layout is interesting. You go through the loop on Montezuma, and you crossover
Valerie and I decided that if we were going to ride Boomerang we might as well do it at this point while we were both fresh. Boomerangs are one of the few coasters that will make me sick so I have to ride first thing in the morning or not at all. This particular one was almost as smooth as the one at Elitch Gardens. It also had the newer padded restraints and this helped keep me in place a little better. Unfortunately, Valerie wasn't as lucky and got her ears boxed a little bit, and she may have also suffered a brownout based on the symptoms she experienced.
After our Boomerang experience it was time to knock it down a notch. At Knott's there is no better way to take it down a notch (or 5) than to take a ride on the Timberline Twister. This is a kiddie coaster that felt like a bucking bronco with how close it had it's bunny hills. I still think that Shamu Express is my favorite kiddie coaster, but this is a close second. Timberline had a few operating quarks that I hadn't noticed on other coasters before. The first being that it uses a manual had brake for the station. No pneumatic brakes for this baby. Also, since there are no station shuttle wheels the ride-op has to pull the coaster into it's loading position. At 26 years old I think this is the oldest kiddie coaster I have ridden, which probably explains the lack of modern ride technology.
After we had ridden Boomerang earlier we were told by the ride-op that testing on Xcelerator was going on. When we came back after riding Timberline we saw a rush of people making their way to the ride entrance. I knew in advance of the event that Xcelerator had been down since 2/20/09 and I had heard various rumors regarding whether or not there was going to be morning ERT for Xcelerator. The original flyer for Winter Coaster Solace X showed there would be ERT, but the most recent flyer (and the one still there if you are willing to look for it) did not have Xcelerator listed. Even with a late opening of 9:45am this was definitely a pleasant surprise. We both had a fun ride on this and neither one of us were as terrified as we were the first time we rode it. Even though this coaster has lost some of its flair with me, it has a special place in my heart as being the coaster that turned me in to an enthusiast. When I took my first ride 3 years ago I realized if I could ride this I could ride any coaster. Not only that, I wanted to ride as many as possible.
Since we had gotten a chance to ride the coaster that brought us to Solace we decided to ride what we thought was our other favorite coaster in the park, Silver Bullet. As we walked up we noticed they were still doing morning testing and we figured the line wouldn't be too bad. However, there was already a plethora of folks waiting in front of the ride entrance. Based on how many were in line it was probably going to be a 30 minute wait, once the line actually starting moving. We opted to skip this since the wait was so long and we were going to have night ERT on it anyway. Instead, we headed over to Pony Express which is the most recent addition to the park. I had never been on this kind of motorbike coaster before. It has a shuttle launch system that takes you a blistering 0 − 38 mph in 3 seconds. The restraints are more comfortable than I expected them to be with still feeling safe. Other than the restraints the ride is a good family coaster. I think some little ones might be scared of the restraint system, but otherwise I see this as being a continually crowd pleaser. It's not too intense, but it's also short which is its only drawback. With such a small footprint I imagine more of these will be showing up in parks (if there aren't already).
After our Pony Express ride we decided to exit the park and do some shopping in the Marketplace. As we were exiting it was obvious to both of us that it was going to be a busy day at the park. Lots of sports teams, groups, a plenty of locals had come out that day and we knew this meant long lines. At the marketplace I was able to find Knott's shortbread cookies. These particular shortbread cookies have a dollop of jam in the center that gives them a great taste. On my last visit I only bought 2 of each of the flavors I like (Raspberry, Blueberry, and Boysenberry). When I got back home I regretting not having bought more. This time I refused to make that mistake and I bought 5 of each and I plan on rationing them. I also bought some boysenberry tea and some boysenberry coffee. I haven't had a chance to have the coffee yet, but the tea is wonderful. Once we had sufficiently loaded up our shopping basket we checked out using the 25% off coupon that was given to us in our registration packet. That saved us 10 bucks so that ended up being a nice little perk.
Once we were done shopping we checked the time and saw that we only had about 30 minutes before lunch. Instead of going back in to the park and them going back out and across the street to the lagoon we decided to head over early. Lunch consisted of Mrs. Knott's Famous Fried Chicken. I had seen countless specials that featured this on both Food Network and the Travel Channel. The chicken was indeed really juicy, but because it was a buffet format the outside wasn't very crunchy. Valerie had a piece that had some crunch to it and she enjoyed it. Because of the format in which we were served I will hold judgment for the time being on whether or not it is the best fried chicken.
After everyone had polished off as much fried chicken and boysenberry pie as possible, General Manager Marty Keithly held a Q&A. One of the first questions was what was going on with the construction in Ghost Town. He explained that the wood was rotting and the structure had become dangerous. They decided the best course of action would be to re-build structures as close to the originals as possible within current code standards. He admitted that it was a controversial decision seeing as Ghost Town has some of the only original structures left in the park. One of the questions was whether or not they plan to make a parking structure so that they could utilize more of the parks land to make an expansion. He said they had done studies in the past and because of the strict building codes in California that a structure would cost upwards of $11,000 a space. I know some of the folks in the audience were doubting this figure, but I know that the parking structures on the Sprint Campus in Overland Park, KS cost somewhere between $7,000-8,000 a space. Add in a few years inflation, and the necessity to make it earthquake resistant that figure didn't surprise me. Its probably near impossible to make a return on that kind of investment without jacking up ticket and parking prices. The final question he was asked was if he was given an unlimited budget what new attraction would he like to add to the park. His response was a mega-coaster, which of course pleased the crowd. However, I hope if he is ever given such a budget that he instead opts for an E-Ticket type attraction that would rival Tower of Terror or Revenge of the Mummy.
After lunch we decided that since the park was so busy and that the remaining coasters we wanted to ride had night ERT we headed back to the hotel to nap and relax. Once we had recovered from our food coma and were ready to eat again we went in search of an In-N-Out Burger. We had been told on the previous trip we had to eat there, but never got the chance. More recently, I read a blog post on Theme Park Insider touting how wonderful they are. After sampling them myself, I have to agree. I had a Double Double Animal style and it was like a Big Mac only much better. Valerie had a regular Cheeseburger, which she also agreed was great. If you make a visit to SoCal, make a point to add In-N-Out Burger to your meal plans.
With our belly's filled with meaty goodness we headed back to the park and got there around 8:30. The park was still packed but we decided to go ahead and wait for GhostRider. Because the queue isn't very visible from outside of the building it was hard to gauge how long our wait would be. Valerie and I agreed we had nothing else to do so we stayed put even though it was the biggest line we had seen for it. The wait ended up being a little under an hour. We sat in the back and had a great ride. I had forgotten just how intense GhostRider is. You barely have any time to catch your breath, much like Boss at Six Flags St. Louis. During the first half of the ride there are a few spots where you catch some air and just as you touch your seat you are back up again. This one throws you around quite a bit, but not in a painful way.
We figured the lines were going to be just as bad in the rest of the park, so after Ghost Rider we sat down for a bit to let the lines clear up a bit. We headed over to Silver Bullet about 10 minutes til normal park closing. At 10:00pm they made an announcement that unless you were there for Solace you needed to exit the ride. Well, there were several people who were in line and had been in line prior to us even getting in the queue. All the folks that had Solace badges made a point to tell the folks in front of them not to exit as we didn't feel this was a fair way to do this. The line should have been capped. I have never experienced something like this ever. Basically, what it amounts to is whomever was supposed to be monitoring the entrance showed up late so the ride-ops were doing it for them. For the most part the people who should have ignored the request did so, and those didn't were really the ones that needed to leave. While I don't like how it was handled, you do kind of have to expect to be turned away if you enter a line after park closing, even if there is no one there to stop you from doing so.
Now that line debacle is off my chest, lets get to the coaster itself. Unfortunately, it was not as great as I remembered. The first drop is too small, and the last quarter of the ride has too many postive g's for my tastes. After haven ridden Sierra Sidewinder. Our GhostRider ride was just as good as the first. However, Valerie decided she needed to take a break before going on another coaster so we took advantage of Free coffee, brownies, and cookies in the GhostRider Midway. This ended up being mistake number one. Once our snackatites were satiated we walked over to Sierra. There was no wait and we were able to get on the next train. As we were boarding the ride-op asked if we wanted to spin. Apparently, they can control it to some degree. We said sure. This was mistake number two. While it was an incredibly smooth ride it did Valerie and I in. In was a lot harder on us than other spinning coasters likeSpinning Dragons or Tony Hawk's Big Spin After we sat for about 30 minutes I knew I could probably squeeze out one more ride on GhostRider, but I decided to go ahead and call it a day with Valerie.
I had a great time at this event and I am sure I will return in the future. Look for my Disneyland report in a few days. Until then, be sure to take a look at the rest of my photos from this event in my Gallery or on Facebook.