Originally Posted By ctdsnark Great America,in its original incarnation as Marriott's,opened one year before I graduated from grade school---our final field trip there was my first visit---and one year after my first visit to WDW,which fueled my lifelong love of theme parks,so this park has been part of my life for a long time;as soon as I could drive,I spent much of the 80's there,sometimes visiting twice in one summer. My last visit,three years ago,was a disaster.Due to a combination of family obligations and some very poor judgement,I visited on a Saturday,not arriving until well after noon.Rather than go into the details,suffice it to say that the day was so horrible,I actually found myself swearing I would never visit again.Remembering I once made a similar vow after my first visit to Universal Orlando---during its first year,when none of its much-advertised high-tech rides were operating---and not really wanting such a disagreeable experience to be my final memory of the park,I eventually resolved to go again. And so I did---yesterday,July 29,2009. To anyone who'd care to listen,I've certainly bellyached about Great America no longer being the place I remember from my youth---in particular,when it opened in '76,video games were still in their infancy,so their many arcades were filled with the type of games anyone else old enough will remember---but even accounting for the inevitable changes that come with time,I must point out that at one time,Great America took its different themed areas with an almost Disneyesque dedication---employees wore costumes/uniforms that fit the time period/geographical location of the setting,and appropriate music---"muzak"?---flowed from the park loudspeakers. Today,all S.F.G.A. employees,regardless of where in the park they worked,wore fluorescent yellow-green T-shirts with a rhyming slogan printed on the back---a visual tie-in to their being "the cleanest theme park in the world"---and modern rock and pop now comes over the P.A. systems;while taking a breather in Yukon Territory,I was serenaded by/subjected to a tune whose name and artist I am completely unfamiliar with,but will,I'm certain,be recognized by many when I identify the choral tag line as "I like to move it-move it". And the corporate sponsorship,my gawd!Many of their smaller eateries have been usurped by the likes of Papa John's,Panda Express,Johnny Rocket,et cetera.---seemingly everywhere I looked,huge banner ads for Snickers,M&Ms,Heinz,and whatever the heck "Wii" is;I couldn't help but be reminded of the movie "Fierce Creatures". If anyone from the corporate level of Six Flags is reading this,they'd probably respond with something akin to,"Hey,whattaya want from us?!?Our company is in severe financial trouble right now and we're TRYING to keep these parks OPEN!!What---like Disney doesn't rely on corporate handouts?!?" ************************************************************ Okay,I've done enough complaining. As I said before,I wanted to erase the mental stain of my last visit,and I succeeded. The weather in the Gurnee area was perfect yesterday---only slightly warm,and just a few clouds,which did increase a bit as the day wore on;I'm almost sorry I didn't visit Hurricane Harbor,the water-park section they opened a few years back. Of course,if you want to get wet at Great America,and the two flume rides or the rafting ride are not to your taste,new this year is Buccaneer Battle,an interactive water-fight attraction which you don't even have to RIDE to get drenched-----no fooling. They had several live performances by that bizarre,gnome-like dancing old man who reappeared in the Six Flags commercials this past year;he also appears in the two parades,as do a surprisingly underwhelming collection of DC comic-book characters---Wonder Woman,The Joker,The Riddler{whose costume was white,for some reason}and Sinestro,and that's it.No others.You could get your picture taken with them,though. This visit marked the first time I visited the park section known as Southwest Territory,an impressive realization of a Texas-Mexican town---in fact,this area was much more interesting architecturally than the rest of the park.Upon exiting back into County Fair,I found myself walking directly underneath the twisting tracks of the rollercoaster known as The Demon---in fact,I was close enough to see the terror-ecstacy-delight on the upside-down faces of its riders. All in all,it was a great day. ************************************************************ {I was joking before---I do know what a "Wii" is---my nephews have one.}
Originally Posted By Jim in Merced CA I visited Great America here in Northern California area about 2 years ago. It really sucked. It was a mere shadow of what it was when I first visited it in Summer of 1980. It made me sad.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros I actually visited SF Great America about a week ago too. I wasn't really sure what to expect, since my only other Six Flags experience was at Six Flags Over Georgia about 6 years ago and it was absolutely packed (even though it was in March), hot, and not a particularly great day. I was pleasantly surprised when I got to Great America that the lines didn't seem terribly long. I had gotten there about 30 min after opening, so I expected it to get worse as the day went on. A little before noon, there was a storm that rolled through, which I think helped keep some of the crowds away (it was also a Wednesday, which I'm sure helped). I ended up doing all the major coasters in the park, except Superman (which I had done in Georgia) and American Eagle (which had a 2+ hour queue all day), and I think my longest wait was about 20 minutes. I had a backpack with me because I was planning on going to Hurricane Harbor, and I was a little distraught to find out that they wouldn't allow any bags on the rides, and they didn't have anywhere that we could store them in the station. Instead, they offered one-use lockers for a dollar, with a 2 hour time limit. After using 2 of them, I headed over to Hurricane Harbor (which was fun but fairly forgetable), where I had to get another locker. I got the cheapest one, which was $11, with no sort of security refund. I thought that this was extremely tacky and I honestly felt very ripped off. After I had finished with the waterpark, I headed back to the car to drop off my bag, which I should have left there until I wanted to get wet. The parking situation was also a little tacky. The parking lot was quite large, and the entrance to it was about halfway between the park entrance and the back of the lot. There was a road that cut the lot in half with some trees along it. They sold standard parking passes for $15, or preferred parking passes for $25. The difference was which side of the road you got to park on, even though the crowd wasn't nearly big enough to fill up the front half. It looked like they had originally built the lot with the back half for very busy days, and they're now using it to just squeeze more money out of people. Given that there was no tram service to any of the spots, I thought that even the $15 was pretty unreasonable. I really appreciated the park's bones and general layout. There were parts of it that were pretty dated (the County Fair section looks like it's straight out of 1976), but it was fairly well maintained. It really did annoy me that the music was the same in every area, and very loud and generally obnoxious songs. I did appreciate that they all seemed to be appropriate, even if I did hear them all again every 90 minutes. The flourescent yellow shirts for the staff were out of place, but it made it easy to find someone if you needed something. There were a lot of really unique rides that made the day a lot of fun. Raging Bull is a pretty amazing coaster with a first drop that literally took my breath away. Wizzer is a fun little Arrow coaster that has a really neat lift hill. The Dark Knight coaster/dark ride really confused me (I think dumbfounded is the right word to describe it), but it was fun enough. Batman was a little too intense for me, since I started to black out a little, but I appreciated its historical significance. Condor is a pretty unique take on a standard flatride that made for a memorable side attraction. Demon was an interesting take on a loop/corkscrew coaster that added a lot with some pretty simple tricks. Overall, I had a pretty good day. I was less than impressed by the charging extra prices for all sorts of little things all over the park. I noticed the advertisements all day (there seemed to be a bunch for Redi Whip), and it kind of made me want to avoid the products rather than go buy them. The loud music got irritating, and the staff outfits weren't terribly original. With all that said, I still enjoyed it. For the most part, the attractions were run efficiently and the staff was very friendly. The park was clean (apparently it's the cleanest theme park in the world, but I'm not 100% convinced), but there were places that needed a good repainting. The additional fees all day got old, and I would definately take a different plan of attack in the future. At this point, I have no desire to go to another Six Flags park for at least a couple years, just because it was a very homogonized experience. The various areas of the park felt the same because of the music and staff outfits, and there were several attractions that were copies of ones that I had done in Georgia. I can't single out a negative thing that turned me off, but there were just enough little things that made me very willing to leave several hours before the park closed.
Originally Posted By brotherdave Six Flags Great America has some fun rides (Raging Bull hypercoaster, Viper wooden coaster, Batman The Ride, Whizzer). (By the way, Ferret, Whizzer was built by Anton Schwarzkopf, not Arrow.) But, it is definitely overpriced and they GOUGE you where it hurts - parking, mandatory lockers, food, etc. Six Flags is hardly my favorite chain of parks. They make Cedar Fair seem great. But, that doesn't mean you can't have a good time at one, which we do. Just be prepared to pay for it, not to mention how crowded they can be, especially on a weekend. Overall, I liked Six Flags Great America when I last visited it in 2002, but since a NFL team owner took control of the park, expect to pay outrageous fees for like you do at a stadium. And people think Disney overcharges???
Originally Posted By Anatole69 ^^ I went there last year for the first time and I so wanted to like it. Top Deck and the Survivor ride I really liked, and some of the areas were a lot more themed than I was expecting, but I was still disappointed. My main beef was the lack of refurbishment of the coasters. The Demon made me twist my back, the Viper was so rough I hated the entire ride and the stand up coaster made my groin hurt. Take those away and there were only 3 other coasters and the water raft ride that I enjoyed. I also liked the Spongebob movie. - Anatole
Originally Posted By ctdsnark Admittedly,it was difficult for me not to turn the above into a laundry list of Things No Longer At Great America Which I Really,Really Miss---the two animated shooting galleries,the Hot Shoppee,the Alee Mystique Magique shop,the cable cars{one of which was round-trip!}---on my "disaster" visit three years ago,I was outraged to see that the Sky Whirl,a three-wheeled Ferris Wheel that gave you a fantastic aerial view,was gone,replaced by yet ANOTHER ride that takes you high up in the air and turns you upside down---Great America seems to have sacrificed much of its old-fashioned quaintness for becoming Rollercoaster Central. BUT---I remind myself that one of my favorite extinct rides,the Traffique Jam{car ride,whose vehicles look like Model Ts},was replaced by the White Water Rafting ride,which is much better,and while they were still Marriott's,they took the blue-and-white-tracked coaster Turn Of The Century and painted its tracks black,added rockwork and two more corkscrew turns,and re-named it The Demon. SO---I'm still not ready to give up on Great America.
