Yoshi

Thank you Thank you

I kind of have mixed feelings about EPCOT. I still like the park but I miss what it once was before every new ride was tied to Disney characters or when the original rides were better like Journey Into Imagination. Even getting to Test Track 15 minutes before park opening it already had a 45 minute wait so we decided to go to Soarin' instead. I waited at the exit since I can't really handle simulator type rides well anymore. Living With The Land is always fun, and I look forward to trying the ride at night to see the greenhouses then. After The Seas and Journey Into Imagination With Figment, we went back to Test Track since the wait was 25 minutes. I was not too comfortable with the room before the pre-show where every group stands on a circle and they were all close together. There were also announcements that the ride could close at any time because of severe weather. This is my favorite ride at EPCOT but I prefer the original version and also miss World of Motion. The high speed banked turn feels like a coaster. After Gran Fiesta Tour, we walked around World Showcase. There were annual passholder previews from Ratatouille but only for people who were passholders prior to the new sale of Annual Passes. The EPCOT Experience was cool to see future projects and had a neat model of the park with projection mapping. Spaceship Earth is the last classic EPCOT dark ride that hasn't changed much (at least for the first half of the ride). I was glad to see the refurbishment was put on indefinite hold. I just would like to see the backwards portion of the ride restored to having show scenes to look at rather than a screen. Before leaving, we stopped at the monorail to take a full circuit on the EPCOT loop. It's always fun to see Future World from the monorail. It was a fun 2 day trip and I can't wait to go back. Tron construction, I forgot to post this picture in the Magic Kingdom report. I like the old pavilion logo flags.

Hershey was limited to 50% capacity last year (except possibly towards the end of the year they might have allowed 75%) and other than a few Saturday's in the fall last year where they reached capacity, crowds were very low even with a new coaster opening. There's no way they got around 50% of their normal attendance when they were only on daily operations from July 1st - Labor Day and then the weekends up until the first weekend of January since it would have meant they were at capacity or close to capacity almost every day they were open.

I never knew there were so many types of trams that were in use over the years. I like the blue and white design especially since it says Great Adventure on it.

Happy Birthday XENITH

I like the orange fountain. It is interesting to see Starbucks in the park now. They are everywhere now I guess.

With Disney World finally selling annual passes again, I was looking forward to being able to visit the 4 parks as much as I wanted, plus Blizzard Beach (and hopefully Typhoon Lagoon soon) The wait at the Ticket and Transportation Center wasn't too bad for a Saturday. The whole process took about 40 minutes from getting in line to getting the actual passes. It was strange to go to Disney World and not leave from a hotel room. Even after leaving Tampa at 8:15, we didn't actually walk into the Magic Kingdom until just after 11:00. For a Saturday and the first weekend for new annual passholders I couldn't believe how empty it was. 2 hours after opening and Splash Mountain was a 5 minute wait and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad was only 10 minutes. I used to prefer other mine trains with just 1 lift hill but with this being the only mine train around, I appreciate it more. Haunted Mansion is back to the old operations with the stretching room. Jungle Cruise had some new theming and others removed or updated. I did like the new scene with a partially sunken boat with monkeys taking over. Space Mountain is probably my favorite coaster in the park. It feels a lot faster than the 28mph it goes. Sitting in the last row there was some good air time. Buzz Lightyear's Spaceranger Spin is also another favorite ride for me. It's not as technologically impressive as Justice League but I like how the ride has no screens except the speed tunnel. We saw Happily Ever After and Main Street was crowded for the low overall crowds but not too bad. After the fireworks we went back to Fantasyland to ride Peter Pan's Flight and Seven Dwarfs Mine Train. We also rode It's A Small World, People Mover, Under The Sea Journey of the Little Mermaid and saw Mickey's PhilharMagic. I'll post the EPCOT report later. 50th Anniversary Banners

I’m looking forward to going to Adventure Island in the winter. I hope it is successful for them. I agree about the prices and portion sizes for the festivals. The nachos I had a few weeks ago were enough for a meal. I have been to the Flower and Garden festival at EPCOT twice in the last 5 years and last time didn’t get anything because of how overpriced it was for the portion.

I went to Busch Gardens Tampa yesterday for a short visit since I was only 15 minutes away from the park. It was almost 100 degrees out and I decided to stick with the less intense rides. Cheetah Hunt was a walk on. I sometimes forget how close the first and second launches are to each other. I hope the area where the water is supposed to be gets filled in. After Cobra's Curse, I went to Sand Serpent. There are no brakes during the hairpin turns part of the ride and the next car isn't dispatched until the car gets to the drops. With only 4 cars running, this could be a slow moving line on a crowded day. The log flume gets you soaked in the front (single riders have to sit in the front section). The last ride of the day was Sheikra. It is a lot of fun to sit in the front row and stops over the vertical drop. On the way out I went to the main store to get a shirt because passholders got $10 in Busch Bucks and combined with my 50% Platinum Pass discount, I got a $27 shirt for $4.50 with tax (I'm still not used to almost everything except most food and some health items having sales tax here). The perks with the annual passes have been really great so far. Besides the 6 bring a friend free tickets that are included with the Platinum Pass, there was an additional bring a friend free at the end of last month, bring a friend free to Sea World and another for Adventure Island this month and another $10 in Busch Bucks in July. There have also been some smaller free items to like a cup at Sea World and a free food item at Bier Fest at Busch Gardens. It's fun having a park so close that I can just stop in for 2 hours or less although once it gets cooler out, I want to go for a longer visit. The signs have been updated to have the 2022 opening date.

I really like that picture of Nitro and the one with Skull Mountain's waterfall.

^ I always was disappointed that water park season was only around Memorial Day to Labor Day. Even if it was just a few slides open, I would have gone to water parks in early to mid May and through September (even October if it was above 70 degrees out). I was looking up the hours for Adventure Island and apparently they recently decided to be open all year now although mostly weekends only from November - March except for school holidays. It will be nice to have another option other than Orlando water parks for the winter. https://adventureisland.com/park-info/water-park-hours/

I hope to get back there in the next few years to try it. I knew it was going to be closed when I visited in May but it's been one of the coasters I have been looking forward to riding since becoming a coaster enthusiast.

Seeing pictures of the booths they look familiar to me, though I don't remember specifically trying them out at the park. I like the idea of having more non ride things to try in the park.

I hope everyone stays safe from the tornado and storms. It looks really bad. I saw on Twitter my high school's pool roof got ripped off. https://twitter.com/Christie_Ileto/status/1433207937766412288

As much as I hate the increases, I'm still going to buy one. Either the $399 or $699 pass depending on what the rest of my family decides and then another $100 for the water parks. We are going to try to spend as little as possible in the parks like buying food and souvenirs (I like the Character Warehouse outlet with the much lower prices). Not that there are great souvenirs anyway since most stores have the same generic merchandise that is sometimes not even WDW specific like some jigsaw puzzles at World of Disney with just Disneyland and California Adventure attractions.

I was surprised too when I saw they aren’t open all year. I’ll probably go to Aquatica when Adventure Island closes for the season or maybe before that since I haven’t ridden Mako in over 2 months.

Today was the first time I visited a water park in almost 2 years. I'm still getting used to the idea water park season for me doesn't end on Labor Day. I wanted to wait until schools were back in session before going to a water park because of how hot the weather has been and waiting in lines when it is 95 degrees and humid isn't much fun. I had never been to Adventure Island before and it was interesting to try a new water park. The lazy river has multiple entrances and exits which is good since you can use it for transportation. There is a fork in the river that goes around the back of the park but it was closed and you had to take the shorter path. The river didn't have any features like waterfalls and fountains. One thing I liked about Dorney's waterpark was everything was single rider only except Cascade (single riders were allowed) and Aquablast. Adventure Island has been removing older single rider slides and replacing them with group slides so I couldn't try the 2 newest slides. I also liked that you were allowed to wear aqua socks on the inner tube and mat racer slides. Their operations were better than Dorney too. Instead of each slide platform chained off and only letting 1 group at a time on the platform, you walked up to the platform and sat down at an open spot and waited for a green light. You could literally walk up and slide without having to wait for permission to go. It didn't matter today as everything was a walk on. The mat racers were fun with a helix before the drops. The drop box slides also had a traditional body slide at the platform which I thought was a great idea considering how often at Dorney (and probably other parks) people would chicken out when stepping into the drop box. Caribbean Corkscrew had 2 slides that twist around each other and it almost felt like you were moving sideways at times. My favorite slides were Aruba Tuba and Calypso Coaster, the 2 inner tube slides. One was all open and sometimes spun you around backwards and the other one was partially enclosed. It was fun to be back at a water park again and I hope to go back next month. After Adventure Island, I went to Busch Gardens. The park was completely empty. Even Cheetah Hunt had a station with only a few people waiting. I asked to wait for the front and almost had a solo ride but 2 others re-rode. Until March next year, this is going to be my favorite ride in the park. Cobra's Curse had a problem with the lap bars not unlocking so I went to Montu. Montu is forceful and it really got to me, probably from being tired after climbing stairs for 13 slides and the hot weather. I went back to Cobra's Curse and was going to ride Sheikra but it was announced all rides were closed because of an upcoming storm. The park was closing in 30 minutes anyway so I walked over to Iron Gwazi and then left the park. 2021 signs are covered up, no 2022 signs yet.

The special renewal price for a 2022 season pass is $49.99 for Great Adventure.

If I was buying a 2022 pass, that would convince me to switch to a membership. I wouldn't want to miss being able to go to HITP as much as I wanted.

I kind of expected 2022 at this point but was still hoping there was a chance the coasters would open this year. I’m also glad to see that annual pass holders will be able to ride both coasters early.

2 things I found interesting looking at the application. That there is only space for 6 digits for the pass number and that it is in the terms about a limit of 3 bonus prizes from skill games.

I got this email “I want to thank you for being a 2020/2021 Season Pass Holder during what was a challenging year for everyone.We’re putting our 2022 Season Passes on sale next week. In appreciation for your patience, patronage, and support, we are going to send you a deeply discounted special offer on 2022 Season Passes.You’ll receive your special offer by email on Thursday, August 26. Please do not buy your 2022 Season Passes from our regular website at the regular price.Again, thank you so much for being our guest this year. We have an exciting season planned for 2022, and look forward to you being part of it.” The 2020/2021 pass was already such a great price, it will be interesting to see what the 2022 pass is priced at.

That sounds horrible. I hated having to get up at 6:45 am to get the Rise of the Resistance boarding group and that was just 1 day. There was no going back to sleep since I knew I was either going to be happy to get the boarding time or too annoyed if I didn’t get it. We ended up just going to the park to get there before opening to ride the Runaway Railway with no wait. That was back in May with the reduced capacities, now it’s probably even worse.

Great pictures, they new food places in the Boardwalk look interesting.

It’s not bad enough they are charging for Fast Pass, now an extra surcharge on top of paid Fast Pass for the popular rides after paying $100+ day to enter? It never bothered me to see other parks like Six Flags and Cedar Fair charge for their line skipping because of how cheap the season passes are and that a Great Adventure gold season pass with all season Gold Flash Pass is around the same price as a 1 day park hopper at Disney with parking. I’m almost dreading to see what the annual pass prices are going to be when they return.