franky

Doomsday is under maintenance, has been our entire visit. Wild West open with signposted 115m wait. When we lined up at the queue was just near the end of the entrance door. Overall the park seems much quieter today, still long waits for rides but definitely less crowded.

Green Lantern down today. A frame out the front says it's not operating but the monitor above the ticket station says it was open

Yep. Since our visit in 2019 the flood effect is working and the tunnel smoke. Other than that everything else is as I can remember.

Primary thing they can do easily is stop gatekeeping wait times behind a park entry. Guests can see how busy the park is up front. Other than that restricting numbers or extending hours is all they can do, but I think that will upset an equal number of people being locked out of the park than those that want to go and wait in 3 hour lines. We hit up wet and wild today. It there was very little wet and quite a bit of wild. Got in a ride on Constrictor and then Kaboom and it was 1:30pm. We gave up, got changed and went back to SeaWorld. JetRescue was running much faster today! SeaWorld a lot quieter today than Sunday in our experience.

I haven't made it over to Dreamworld yet, so I can't compare, but I couldn't really fault the ops on Rivals today (compared to Jet Rescue yesterday) They weren't running around, sure, but they had the next train consistently ready and guests loaded straight through. Props to the grouper running it today, the amount of yelling they did about not touching the belt, I'm surprised they still had a voice left by 5pm. Got assigned to the back row (but not backwards) seat. I was shook by the drop off the lift.. got flung up in the seat and was NOT prepared for that! One thing a few people have mentioned here is about the cash grab with FastTrack. From what I witnessed at both SW yesterday and MW today, there hasn't been a long line for fast trackers, and when there is people in the FT queue, they'll only load a couple and backfill the rest from the general queue. I did hear mentioned that due to being busy they weren't running Virtual Queue or single rider lines. So they're selling out of FastTracks, but they're not overselling them (when compared to something like FastPass/Ride Express at Disney / Universal. I can't comment on slow days, but here's how it was working today: 1. Harnesses would release on current train but ops would need to assist releasing some of these harnesses 2. Give guests a couple of seconds to dismount and get their stuff. 3. Open gates and let guests sit down. Guests told to lower their own harness but not touch the belt. 4. Ops lower remaining harnesses and secure belt / tighten etc. They would do each row at the same time. (If one side was taking longer the other would wait). 5. Brief speal to backward facing riders ( didn't manage to hear it but they always stopped to explain something specific to them). 6. Thumbs up and button press at back of the train and dispatch. The ops certainly weren't rushing, but the impression I've gotten from ALL ride ops so far on my trip is to take as much time as required to do the job correctly with no mistakes. Some of these rides would be very demanding physically in an op. I'd be interested to know if they have many manual handling injuries at theme parks purely as a result of loading coasters.

SE looked to me like it had two trains, they were a bit slow at dispatching though. Just had another look at the app and it looks like SE is closed... The line was almost around the corner toward the Arkham entrance when we got off. Edit: just saw a SE train going so it's still operating

We were at SeaWorld today. We arrived at about 1pm (we went to Paradise Country early). Park was busy but we managed to get 2 rides on Jet Rescue and 2 on Storm (Storm rides were right before close). Operations on Jet Rescue are frustratingly slow. When the ride finishes, the passengers dismount but they never move the train to reload until every single passenger walks 25m to the photo room and closes the gate. Only then do they move the train up to loading. Now that the train is now in loading, it's time to start assigning people to rows, why can't someone be doing this while the ride is running so they can load straight in? I get it that the unload procedure is a safety thing, but why not rework the unload station so the gate is much closer to the train? Everyone was dawdling to the gate and it just prolonged the cycle time. On what everyone is saying is one of the busiest weekends, why only one train? (does JR even have two?), Why not have another loader/grouper? In saying all of the above, riders were just as to blame for delays but could have been helped by another loader/grouper. People were locked in and had to be unlocked as they still had hats/glasses etc on. Storm was great but only appeared to have 3 boats, not sure if this is normal or not. Two seemed to sit in the station while one was on the course, they'd dispatch one as the previous one was rounding the corner to unload. This is our first trip to the GC in 3 long years and the first trip really since I've been paying attention to how rides operate. I'm not mad, I'm just disappointed fingers crossed the crowds get a little better after tomorrow. Bonus image of our park today, we were in the overflow of the overflow carpark

It does but it also needs to be careful in doing so. It doesn't sound like they have any other fall back options now if it doesn't work out.

Assuming these are three full days where you can enter at park open and leave at park close, Dreamworld, Movieworld, Seaworld in no particular order, I'd just consider ride closures and work around these if there's any ability to do so. If the ticket I happened to purchase for VRTP allowed for park hopping, I'd probably enter Seaworld at park open, do the rides, look at the attractions/shows etc and head over to Movieworld in the afternoon.

I'd argue that this is already a step above cheap. It's painted black. Cheapest I'd expect to see is plain galvanised metal.

There is a lot of white around Sea World, mainly roofs etc, but there is a lot of shade structures that are also white or quite light in colour (beige/cream) It's been a few years since my last visit so I'm working with Street View here, but I don't think it would look as out of place as some of you are making it sound, especially once some planting takes place. Most of the sheds are going to be facing back of house are they not?

I don't know a lot about our parks, but we were in the GC November 2019 and Surfrider was running. It went down a lot during the day we were there, but it was running.

Could be as simple as a limit switch/sensor is malfunctioning and needs replacing, and they don't have the parts/staff to do it.

I think its more about bullying a company into submission through fear of viral negative backlash / boycotting when said bully doesn't get their way.

Just as a contrasting story. I had a pass purchased as a gift last christmas for the VRTP theme parks. It's valid for 12 months. Now there's been time within these last 12 months where we could have attended, but really we were waiting for these new rides to open to make better use of our time. Lockdown's came and its now going to be too close to Christmas when we're allowed back in to QLD. So we asked VRTP what we could do, they gave us a 'refund' in the form of a credit to use within 3 years. Now, did they have to do that? No, but it's good PR that they did. They could have said 'sorry, but these are the terms' but they didn't, and I'm happy that they did. Instead of having something negative to say, I'm saying something positive. Whilst I don't agree that anti-vaxxers are on the right side of the argument, I do feel that the parks need to take their requests seriously. Remember, just because someone is vaxxed, doesn't mean that they won't retaliate against businesses that enforce their own mandate for vaccination (in addition to existing Gov. rules), some have reluctantly been vaxxed due to threats of job loss etc.

Look between Taipan's spike and and loop... took me a while too.. Well done

Its been about 6 months since most of those rides were commissioned, is there like a 6 month mandatory service that rides would need to have happen, regardless of them being used or not?

He says that, but now that he's let the cat out of the bag, he can say hello to the introduction of limits on the offer to prevent others from exploiting this loophole.

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As someone planning to do exactly this when our borders reopen, what's nuts about it?

Could it be equally likely that noone bought it and DW are just going to demolish it instead?

I think what's going to make it difficult for a new comer to the Aus theme park market is that there are now well established parks to compare it to. If you were to open a theme park with only 1 coaster (and nothing else to complement it, like a wildlife park or a garden etc) then you're going to have a hard time staying afloat when everyone will be continuously comparing you to the gold coast parks in terms of value. Seaworld/Movieworld existing with only 1 coaster was fine at the time, because every other park was only small and newly established. My mind is open and hopeful though!

It's funny because every year my wife and I go to HVG for the Christmas Lights I always say they should put a coaster in. It would go gang busters even if they brought in a travelling model like a spinning wild mouse for the Christmas period. That being said, I don't think they're in the right location to be a fully fledged theme park. The area is known for it's winerys and quiet getaways in a tranquil area. Putting a bunch of screaming people in the middle of it all is not what I'd personally see being received well by the local businesses. The place is miles away from major public transport. Newcastle (Williamtown) is the closest major airport and it's limited in where you can fly from here. Locally, Cessnock isn't exactly known for its citizens being awash with money. However, the Christmas Light Spectacular draws in major crowds every year with tour busses from Sydney etc so it stands to reason if they get it right it might work. It's pretty easy to get to from Sydney if you wanted to make the trip up (M1 then Hunter Expressway). We've been to HVG during the day outside of the Christmas period and the place is a ghost town, maybe a few thrill rides will keep attendance chugging along. I've often thought that Old Sydney Town would be a great location for a theme park. It has the reptile park next door, is situated almost halfway between Sydney and Newcastle and is straight off the M1 and close to the train line (Gosford). Disappointingly it appears as though it's going to be housing.

And I can sleep easy now Good stuff Dreamworld!

Does the colouring of the S in Steel look upside down to anyone else? #CantUnseeIt