Monday, July 7, 2014

Holiday World, July 5th, 2014

So in addition to visiting Stricker's Grove on the Fourth of July, we opted to visit another park for our first time, Holiday World in Santa Claus, Indiana. I always wondered if the buzz about the park was just hype. ABSOLUTELY NOT! This park as three of the absolute best wooden roller coasters there is, including two top flight wood coasters in the Legend and the Voyage. The park also has a large waterpark with the two longest water coasters, Wildebeest and Mammoth. Overall, this is one of the best amusement park destinations. Below you can see the first view as we turned the corner to enter the park. This gigantic coaster is the 163 foot tall and Gravity Group designed, Voyage roller coaster, the wildest roller coaster ever made. The bulldozed area of land adjacent to it will be for their planned 2015 attraction. I did not take any photos right on the site because I do not carry my camera in waterparks. There is a series of square shaped footers littering that area. The only thing I can tell about them is that they are for some sort of steel supports. You can see my guesses later on in this post.
 AHHHHH the anticipation!
 Heading in through the main midway, you get a view of their unique 1995 CCI creation, the Raven. This awesome ride traverses the woods in a twisted and airtime packed layout. If the coaster were longer I would place it among my top favorite coasters. For what it is, the ride is fantastic.
 Heading down!
 As the Holiday World name suggests, the park has areas themed to the different holidays. The front gate area is the original section, themed to Christmas for the park was founded as Santa Claus Land, named after the town it is located in.
 Now for a ride on the Raven! The station is beautiful and themed towards the Raven poem by Edgar Allen Poe.
 The Legend! This coaster is an unreal, top flight ride. It ranks among my absolute favorites with its completely unpredictable layout that includes lots of random airtime and helix elements. No matter how many times you ride, you really have no clue what will happen next. Awesome lateral forces. The turn at the top and twisted drop are wild!
 There may no longer be smurfs at Kings Island and Kings Dominion, but no worries, you can find them at Holiday World!
 Onto the 4th!
 But a look at what is to come at Thanksgiving
 And one ride in Halloween. Their swings ride is awesomely themed towards Halloween.
 Brit opted to take my hat and turn it into a "bro hat!"

 The S&S Space Shot tower, the Liberty Launch, is unreal! The tower is very short, but the multiple upwards launches offer some of the most ridiculous airtime at the top.
 Another flyer credit!
 Now onto the gigantic Voyage! Truly the most ridiculous coaster ever made! Seventh longest coaster in the world at 6,442 feet and second longest overall. The coaster does not feel long at all, it is that action packed! It is an unrelenting masterpiece.
 After our Voyage, we opted to have some Thanksgiving dinner in the great restaurant they have in the Thanksgiving themed area. The staff in the park really understand hospitality and the food options are top notch. This is an all around great operation.
 Additionally, the ride operations are exceptional as well. The operators are engaged in watching for safety in addition to being very hospitable and professional. Trains were being constantly dispatched, something that needs to be looked at by many other parks. The park's ride operations were superb. Enough praise though, back to the Gravity Group masterpiece Voyage!
 Simply wow. The airtime, twisted layout, and tunnels are unreal. I still do not fully know what happened. I am a front seat rider and it was right on my threshold for intense. The backseat is just unreal for those of you who really like a wild ride!
 The Legend is an AWESOME ride as well. The helix elements are fantastic! Climbing!
 DROPPING!
 Another beautiful station. The headless horseman theming was also a cool touch "DON'T LOOK BACK! HEHEHEHE." The ringing of the bell upon dispatch is a cool touch as well.
 After a long afternoon checking out the park's fantastic waterpark, including their water coasters, the two longest in the world, we headed back for a ride on the trifecta of great coasters. I did take in the 2015 construction site and your guess on the addition is as good as mine. I did not take my camera into the waterpark. What I can tell you is that a few acre area is excavated and a series of square footers exists to hold supports for whatever the addition is. The thing that puzzles me is the location of it. There is a series of existing watersides flush against one of the square footers. Could this not be a coaster addition at all, but rather a waterside? The footers pattern makes sense for that. 

However, upon evaluating the footers, I can definitively say they are for a steel support of some kind, whether they are for a coaster or waterslide. I do not have pictures of the footers at Holiday World, but in breezing through the footer pictures that exist for recent additions, they most resemble these recent Zamperla footers from the new Coney Island Thunderbolt. The second closest in resemblance is to Kings Island's B&M Banshee. Thankfully we do not have a long time to wait for I believe they said the announcement will be on July 20th. 
(Coaster Force Photo of the Coney Thunderbolt footers)
At least we do not have too long to wait to find out! Back to the fantastic Voyage! Completely worth the drive from Pittsburgh!
 One of the completely redone spaghetti bowl turns with the Legend in the background.
 Such a lovely park.
 The last ride of the night was on the very fun Raven.

 The last row riders pretty well sum up what a ride is like on a Holiday World wood coaster.
Make the trip! This park's hype is well deserved! Make at least one trip to this awesome park, you will not regret it! The Legend is a top flight ride and the Voyage is my new overall favorite coaster. The ride is unreal amazing. Everything about this park is great and I look forward to finding out what is going on with the upcoming project!

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