Originally Posted By brotherdave For those that may be interested, Cedar Fair has permanantly closed the ride side of the 119 year old Geauga Lake amusement park near Cleveland, OH. All that will remain is a water park to be called "Geauga Lake's Wildwater Kingdom". Most rides will be moved to other Cedar Fair parks while others will most likely be sold or demolished, including the classic 1925 Big Dipper roller coaster, a long time historic landmark of the park. <a href="http://www.cedarfair.com:80/ir/press_releases/index.cfm?current_root=15&mode=story&story_id=133" target="_blank">http://www.cedarfair.com:80/ir /press_releases/index.cfm?current_root=15&mode=story&story_id=133</a>
Originally Posted By t1lersm0m I was never to Geauga Lake, but I've read what you guys were saying in my thread about the Premium Passes, and I'm sorry they are doing this.
Originally Posted By brotherdave Geauga Lake was a very nice traditional style amusement park that began in 1888. It was modest in offerings up until 1996 when Premier Parks bought the park. They began adding newer coasters and rides, but did so at a proper pace. Premier Parks ended up buying the Six Flags chain in 1998, and expanded and renamed the park in 2000 to Six Flags Ohio. They added 4 new roller coasters, plus a new water ride and Looney Tunes children's area. In 2001, they bought the neighboring Sea World of Ohio from Anheuser-Busch and merged the two parks together to form Six Flags Worlds of Adventure. Before this merger, each park did about 1.2 to 1.5 million people in attendance. After the merger, they expected the park to do about 3 million, but all they could manage was about 1.4 million. Due to poor customer service, attendance continued to decline until they finally sold the entire complex to Cedar Fair in 2004. Six Flags took all of the animals from the old Sea World side of the park, and Cedar Fair renamed the park back to Geauga Lake, closing the former Sea World side, then demolishing the structures to build a new waterpark, Wildwater Kingdom on that site. Attendance continued to fall due to various reasons, including poor marketing and group sales, plus the loss of the animal attractions. Now, they've decided to close the ride section of the park to focus just on the waterpark. My feeling is that Cedar Fair purchased the park to dismantle it from the beginning to eliminate their major competitor for Cedar Point from the Cleveland market. We first lost Sea World, now we've lost Geauga Lake as well. So, it is a very sad day for us who were fans of the old Geauga Lake.
Originally Posted By midget3175 That's really sad, I only got to go one time to this park - It was so crowded that we only made it on 5 of the rides. I am SO HAPPY that I made my partner at the time go on the Big Dipper Roller Coaster. We went on it twice it was so much fun riding a classic. The fact that our knees hit that pad on the back of the seat in front of us, and every element of the ride. This makes now two coasters in a week that have been closed or "modified" from original design in Ohio that I will only have the memories of riding. I hope another park steps up and buys the old classic Big Dipper, I would be sad to see it gone forever.
Originally Posted By t1lersm0m It sounds like it was a nice park. I'm sorry that they are closing it. There is an amusement park that is very near and dear to my heart here in NorthEast PA. Knoebels. I love that park. It is a nice small park. No parking fees, no admission fees. You can get your hand stamped, or buy tickets and pay as you go. It's a wonderful park when you have small children. However, with Tyler getting older and liking the bigger rides, Dorney makes more sense for us. But I still try to get to Knoebels once a year (although we didnt make it this year). They usually have a fall fair type thing the weekend before my birthday (the 10th of October), so maybe we can go out for that.
Originally Posted By brotherdave Yes, Knoebels is a wonderful family park! They have lots of classic rides in a very rustic, wooded atmosphere. I've been there for the fall Covered Bridge Festival/Phoenix Phall Phunphest, and it IS a lot of fun (and crowded!). My favorite rides in the park are the Twister coaster (based on the ride that used to run at the old Elitch Gardens in Denver, CO), the Phoenix (one of my all time favorite wood coasters), and their impeccable Haunted House! Their Haunted House is an old fashioned style dark ride with lots of scares and unique surprises. It is definitely one of the best traditional style dark rides ever built!! t1lersm0m, I highly recommend two parks in Western PA that I think you would really enjoy, Kennywood and Idlewild. Both are exceptional traditional style amusement parks that offer unique attractions that they just don't make anymore, plus, Kennywood offers some high-tech thrills, too, like Phantom's Revenge. That coaster is currently the fastest in Pennsylvania with the longest and fastest drop of 230 feet! They also have 3 old style wooden coasters, an Old Mill water darkride themed to Garfield & Odie (Garfield's Nightmare) where the ride dates back to 1901, a unique Noah's Ark funhouse, and other classic rides. I really think you and your family will like it. It's also quite reasonbly priced, too. Idlewild is a more younger child friendly park set in the woods (like Knoebels) that features a trolley ride through Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood of Make Believe, several classic amusement rides including a Wild Mouse and the excellent wooden Rollo Coaster, and a walk-thru Story Book Forest. Great family fun! Besides, both parks allow you to bring in your own picnic food, if you like, or you can buy their reasonably priced food which is very good. You won't be dissapointed with either park!
