Your report Butters.
Just to get it out of the way, the Fast Pass is pretty much slightly over double the price, but well worth it. For example, it can take up to 3 hours to get on a ride, while with a fast pass, we can get on a ride in 5-10 minutes, usually 5 minutes I kid you not. We sometimes get bored from riding rides we've ridden them so much.
Behold. Wonder rock Mountain ! It magically generates enough fresh water for the entire planet every day ! It also has 3 rides attached to it. This park has 0 casualties, except for an incident where someone fell into the pond and drowned in front of this magical mountain.
It's all about the giga and hyper coasters. What sets them apart is in order to be considered a giga coaster, the first drop has to be at least 300 feet. Other than that giga and hyper coaster provide basically the same experience within their uniqueness.
Visiting the best parks in the world is on my todo list. Mainly cause I want to ride the 7 great Giga coasters in the world.
There are actually several rides in this image. But this one is the Leviathan located in Canada's Wonderland.
Under the Leviathan's first drop, way below you can see another coaster, the Dragon Fyre, which is actually the first coaster I rode when I was a child in the 80's. That used to be a big coaster.
To the far right we see a tower with the checkered top. That's a drop tower. Few years ago my Goddaughter and I got stuck up there for 20 minutes or so with these 2 Chinese girls. I tried to grab my phone to film the experience but the child was begging me not to, the thought of dropping something at that altitude while strapped to the edge of a seat is unsettling. In the end they just lowered us down. Getting stuck up there was more thrilling than the drop itself.
The Behemoth is a hyper coaster
This one provides a lot of air time as it keeps dropping you and dropping you you can feel how you would fly off the coaster if it weren't for some "1 size fits all" lap bar holding us down. Because of it's layout it's difficult for me to say which one of these 2 coasters is better. Most people say it's Leviathan.
This is the CG presentation of the Yukon Striker, the latest in this Amusement park. I chose to post the CG demonstration cause it's shows off the Windseeker and Vortex in action. I've rode it a few times and I don't like it. Or rather, I would have liked it if I never been on the other 2 monsters. It isn't as fast and it does stop mid ride, or else the drop could be fatal at it's speed.
Some Footage of the Leviathan and Behemoth ( shot before the Striker was built )
As a professional coaster rider, I recommend sitting in the back of the train. In the back we don't hang off drops, so for every drop our ass will try to fly off the seat. There is also the sensation of the car busting off the track as we can feel how stupid strong the train is. In the front seat you will shoot uphill faster and slow down for every drop. The back wins, but this is my opinion.
Leviathan is the only Giga I rode to date. It So happens people like to compare Leviathan to their Giga coasters and claim theirs is better. My upcoming tour ( When they let us unvaccinated ppl travel in 2022 ) will bring me to the other six giga coasters, with a chance to try out some hyper and other notable rides.
The 7 Giga Coasters and their locations
I think the furthest park is Nagashima SpaLand in Japan. Might as well make a tour of Japan when I go. I hope to feel an Earthquake while I'm there, they get them almost daily, and that's not happening while I'm on the coaster.
Kingda KA is a strata coaster, the largest one. Located in Six Flags Park in New Jersey, which is a brief road trip for me. The locals like to celebrate this coasters failure which improves the experience for the lucky rider. It's a rare thing to see, and most regular riders of this machine, will never in their life get to ride a rollback.
6 Flags also has this one I've been eyeing called El Toro.
Aside from it's reputation what interests me is how long the train is on the El Toro. This means the back of the train is going to be stupid strong.
I do think last year there was in incident with El Toro, the rear car actually did bust off the track causing the ride to grind to a halt. No one was hurt. On that note I hope they don't shorten the train on this one before it's my turn.
