nbadude44

Hi everyone! This is my first visit to the park since 2019, and boy, how things have changed! My mother and I went to the Safari Drive-Thru (which I never thought would be a thing again after 2012) at noon and were done in about 45 minutes. It was nice to see all the animals again (including the monkeys) right before they go back in to hibernation after this weekend. Our reservation for the park was at 2PM sharp and we had no problem getting in. The entrance was swift and efficient and the employees did a good job of enforcing the masks on all the guests. I can't the same for social distancing on all the queues, however. As much as we tried to space ourselves away from the people ahead & behind us on all the rides we went on, I still felt sandwiched by guests who didn't seem to care at all. Anyway, the two of us went on Nitro then Batman, and even though they were walk-ons with no lines, the staff didn't let us re-ride like usual (for admittedly obvious reasons). Also, I could see pieces of Jersey Devil and every piece of Road Runner Railway laid out, which leaves me to believe that they'll rebuild it somewhere else eventually. Next, we went to Mama Flora's under the impression that we had to use our Dining Pass lunches by 3PM like normally, but the man behind the counter said we can use them any time of the day (up to an hour before the park closes) to my surprise. We went on the Big Wheel next, basically so we could digest our lunches properly. Next was Superman, which had a sizeable line since the guests weren't using the entire queue at first, but it got much worse by the time we got off, so we lucked out. After that, my mother went to rest in the car and ended up staying there for the rest of the day. Good thing she did, since the crowds got worse as the sun went down, like they always do in Autumn. I was only able to ride Bizarro (twice), Kingda Ka (albeit with technical difficulties that occurred only two trains ahead of me) and El Toro, which had a 30-minute wait on the express line even though I had a skip-the-line pass. I redeemed my free ticket for a walk-through maze, but never ended up using it because it got too late at night between Ka breaking down & the long El Toro line. I did buy the Nanocoaster of El Toro before I left, and saw that they already had plenty of Jersey Devil merch, including shirts with the monster on it (which looks like Darth Maul). Ride count: Bizarro 2x El Toro 1x Kingda Ka 1x Nitro 1x Superman 1x Batman 1x Big Wheel 1x The entire album of photos (over 100 pics) can be found here: https://imgur.com/a/69QX9Zh Here are some highlights:

Also, anyone with a Diamond Membership gets one free maze ticket. I didn't realize that until just now because I was upgraded to Diamond recently thanks to the Covid-19 debacle.

Good to see that the safety precautions will continue into the fall. Maybe the winter will follow? Also, I hope the name change isn't permanent. I get that they want to indicate that things will be VERY different this year, but I think the name "Fright Fest" is too iconic to discard outright.

Awesome update. I'm planning to go to both the park & safari on the 27th and I haven't seen much on the web so far of how the park is operating so far, so thank you. I wasn't expecting so many side attractions (like the arcade games for instance) to be completely fenced off. Also, since the Coke Freestyle building is closed this year, do you know if the freestyle soda machine at the Sky Bar still available?

As of right now, the website is only accepting reservations up until Sunday, July 26th. I'm planning to go On July 27th, so I guess I'll have to wait a few days to make my reservation.

Every single time my mother and I go to the park recently, my mother actually asks me if they added any new Coke Freestyle machines anywhere else in the park. They HAVE added a few in recent years, but I also wish there were more. Actually, when I went to the park in a few months ago (early September), Coke was actually doing a promotional thing involving the Freestyle machines. Unfortunately, they only let us fill up tiny sample cups rather than our Membership bottles, which seemed nonsensical to me. Hopefully, this demonstration leads to more machines in the future.

In previous years, they usually close both water rides right AFTER Labor Day. I doubt it'll be open on the 7th and 8th of September.

My pictures of the day can be found here: https://imgur.com/gallery/xFdXEut Thanks for reading!

Hello everyone! This particular visit to the park for me was special because I haven't actually BEEN to Great Adventure since December of 2017. Since I went to college in Connecticut in 2016, it became nigh-impossible to find time to visit the NJ park (although I did make plenty of visits to Six Flags New England in the last 3 years.) Fortunately, I graduated this past May and got myself a new Membership card for Great Adventure a few weeks ago. I'm also aware that I was visiting the park the day before the big 2020 announcement, but it was the only day this week that I had off from work, so it was a coincidence. My party (Me, my mother, her friend and her two children) arrived at 11 AM and immediately went on the Safari Off Road Adventure, which barely had a line. Due to the muggy weather yesterday, it didn't stop at Camp Adventura and (according to the app) actually closed altogether later on; we lucked out big time. Next up we rode Runaway Train, then the Skyride so that we could get lunch on the other side of the park. Then we able to all ride SkyScreamer twice in a row since the lines were so short (which ended up being a common occurrence thanks to the on-and-off rain that day). Next up for me was Wonder Woman & Cyborg, (while our 3 friends rode Dark Knight) and now that I've finally ridden both of them, I now know to NOT ride them back to back. The number of times I felt my stomach drop between both rides was almost too much for me. After a brief break, we all rode Justice League together, which accumulated a 20-minute wait since it was raining at the time. Also, keep in mind that the younger of the 2 children in my party is too short to ride the attractions that have a 54" height limit, so he wasn't able to ride everything. The elder of the two young'n's tried to ride Nitro with me, but it broke down right as we were about to board (it would have been a walk on!) After that we were able to ride Congo Rapids twice in a row. I usually don't go on the water rides, but before the actual 2020 announcement, the rumor was that Congo Rapids would be replaced by the new ride, so it was now or never for us. Next up was Joker, which also broke down was we were about to ride it, but we eventually got to ride it after a quick ride on Swashbuckler and back to back rides on Skull Mountain. Next, was the Parachutes, which we were able to ride 3 times in a row. While we were up there, we finally saw Kingda Ka running, so that was next for myself, my mother and the the elder of the children. She was worn out after one ride (which was her first on KK), but I got to ride it a 2nd consecutive time, which is practically unheard of! Then was Zumanjaro for my mother, the younger child, and I, and he loved it so much that he & my mother rode it three times in a row (I only did it twice). After that it the rain became the worst it was all day, and by that point it was 8:45 PM so we called it a day after a quick trip to the Main Street gift shop. My FInal Ride-count : Parachutes 3x Kingda Ka 2 SkyScreamer 2x Skull Mountain 2x Zumanjaro 2x Congo Rapids 2x Wonder Woman 1x Cyborg 1x Joker 1x Justice League 1x Swashbuckler 1x Runaway Train 1x Skyride 1x Safari 1x My camera actually broke in the middle of the day, so I wasn't able to get as many pics as I wanted, but I still took plenty of photos. I'll upload them shortly...

My favorite rows are whichever ones have the smallest lines... (except El Toro, Skull Mountain, and Bizarro- I always try to get the back row whenever possible)

For me, Superman is one of those rides that you either ride first or not at all. After all, most of the time, the lines are SUPER long, like long enough to the point where it's not worth it afterward.