2023 Coaster Year in Review

Hershey season passes and a magnificent 10-day road trip in early June made 2023 an incredible year for coasters. I posted some of these pics earlier this year but it appears Imgur deleted the album. I brought along an old Fujifilm Finepix 1300 (circa 1999-2000) with me. An old digital camera that takes 1.3MP photos. It was the camera that my parents used to have back then, and I wanted to capture the vibe of our old vacation pictures. The pictures you'll see in this post are from that camera.

In April my wife and I decided to take a short weekend trip to Hershey for opening weekend. We got a great view of Wildcat's Revenge under construction, and it was fun watching people congregate in various spots around the coaster to get the best views. Great Bear was closed opening weekend but reopened quickly after. We missed out on returning in May, but that was only in preparation for the June road trip, which I'll recap here.

We began our trip at Knoebels on an unseasonably hot (90+ degree) Friday afternoon, the hottest day of our trip by far. Knoebels was a trip. A never-ending fever dream carnival with rare old-fashioned rides and two elite woodies. Read the full Knoebels trip report here.

Phoenix at Knoebels - Excellent airtime as advertised, and truly a wonder that it runs so well. Knoebels understands woodies like no other. Plus they have their own lumber yards.

Twister in the distance at Knoebels, just past the large pool. Twister was built based on the old Mister Twister at Elitch Gardens, but due to size constraints, has a unique two-lift-hill design. THE coaster for lovers of laterals, speed, and crazy fast helixes.

We moved onto Waldameer, a tiny park at the very tip of northwest Pennsylvania, right on Lake Erie. In contrast to the day before, our day at Waldameer was cold, windy, and pretty blustery. Another unique small park with one surprising, rollicking woodie in Ravine Flyer II. While it's an elite and forceful design with interesting wood-track-on-steel-frame construction, I found this coaster to be terribly rough and headache-inducing. This badly needs retracking and would be a good candidate for Titan Track or 208 ReTraK. Read the full Waldameer trip report here.

Ravine Flyer's lift hill from the queue. You can see just how windy it was from the look of the flags. The view of Lake Erie from the top of the lift hill is one of the best coaster views I've experienced, and not many coasters offer the chance to cross over a real active road.

After two days at relatively small regional parks, we made our way to Sandusky, Ohio to spend two days at Cedar Point. Not much I can say that would have enough gravitas to express how I felt about that park. What a magnificent collection of coasters. What an absolutely incredible park atmosphere. I wish I could go back again and again. Read the full Cedar Point trip report here.

Millennium Force, my first (and the world's first) giga, viewed through some of the scenery in Fronter Town. Millie's stature and speed are awesome, and it has perhaps the most epic and intimidating station atmosphere of any coaster I've ridden. Maverick, my new #1, is visible to the right.

Steel Vengeance as viewed from Gemini's queue. This is one of the finest coasters ever devised. A ride that feels like it never ends, with great pacing, ridiculous airtime, and great inversions. We rode this the most of any coaster at CP. In spite of its intensity, it's smooth and infinitely lappable. That being said, possibly controversially, it's not my #1 RMC.

Magnum XL-200, my second-favorite coaster at Cedar Point. Before this, I had not had the chance to ride any Arrows bigger than a mine train. I adored this ride, all of its jank, and the \"how-is-this-allowed\" airtime you get in the magic seat. After my first ride, I was in tears from laughing so hard at the bunny hills' airtime. This coaster was actually one of the biggest motivating factors for this entire trip.

Great view of Raptor and Blue Streak from CP's awesome Ferris Wheel. Blue Streak was a surprising sleeper hit of a coaster with some unexpectedly good airtime, and not too rough. Raptor, while having a great design, banged my head around too much to be fully enjoyable for me.

Valravn from the Ferris Wheel. Dive coasters are not always fondly seen in enthusiast circles, but I thought this was a great ride, especially in the front. The vest restraints eliminate any of the headbanging experienced on Raptor (or worse, Rougarou).

Turned around one last time to say goodbye to Cedar Point. Seeing this view entering the park for the first time was stunning and kind of emotional, honestly.

We headed south to Mason to visit Kings Island for a couple of days, taking a rest day before to visit the Cincinnati Zoo and let ourselves recover after four straight days of nonstop coasters and driving. We also had our first (and second... and third) Skyline Chilis which we fucking LOVED. To me, KI was a top tier park on par with Hersheypark. Read the full Kings Island trip report here.

Diamondback, KI's resident hyper. This is absolutely a good coaster, but to me ranked below Candymonium and Nitro.

Banshee, now my #1 B&M invert. Intense and swoopy. Badly wanted a repeat ride on this, but my stomach cut day two at KI just short.

THE BEAST. This coaster was the #1 reason I drove all the way out here. As a lover of woodies, I wanted to experience this one for real, and it really lived up to the hype. Daytime rides were great but my second-to-last-train-of-the-night-ride at 10:30pm in a nearly empty park was just breathtaking. Coaster nirvana.

Two "big boy" parks led us right back to a quirky regional Pennsylvania park, this time Kennywood in West Mifflin, near Pittsburgh. This park didn't charm me the way Knoebels and Waldameer did (perhaps due to my own exhaustion at this point) but what a FANTASTIC collection of vintage woodies. They are really working magic on these antique rides and have them running like a dream. Read the full Kennywood trip report here.

Phantom's Revenge's lift hill. I was very excited to ride this, but it fell short of expectations. While the second drop into the ravine is quite cool, it doesn't have much force behind it, and the airtime in the coaster's second half just didn't hit as hard as I was expecting, even riding in the back. It was also over really fast.

Thunderbolt. I enjoyed this one. No seat divider meant my wife pummeled me during the twister section. I thought this coaster's layout was so cool. If you love stomach-dropping drops on woodies, this is your ride.

The gorgeous old-fashioned facade of Racer. A less-intense woodie with a great Mobius strip layout. You race so close to your opponents that you can high-five during the ride.

Jack Rabbit. The oldest coaster at Kennywood. Runs buttery smooth with very minimal restraints (basically just a seatbelt and laughable \"lap bar\"). The double dip element is WILD from the back.

Steel Curtain. Even with all its issues and it breaking down for 30-40 minutes during our visit, we got two rides on this. I thought it was a really cool coaster. Hopefully they get this thing ironed out and everybody can enjoy it again.

At long last we made our way to Hershey. Wildcat's Revenge had been open for just over a week and I was chomping at the bit to ride it. It didn't disappoint - not only is it my new #1 in the park, it's my #1 RMC and my #2 overall coaster behind Maverick. Read the full Hersheypark trip report here.

Wildcat's Revenge's truss lift hill. As someone who grew up going to Hersheypark, seeing this where the old Wildcat once stood was, well, WILD. Can't believe Hershey has something like this now.

From the Ferris Wheel you get a good view of Hershey's coaster lineup. Visible is Wild Mouse, Great Bear, Fahrenheit, Wildcat's Revenge, Jolly Rancher Remix, Storm Runner, Skyrush, and Candymonium.

Our last stop of the trip was Dorney Park. Again maybe we could blame this on exhaustion, but this was the worst park stop of the trip by far, with an underwhelming lineup and a "blighted" park that gave me some real bad Six Flags vibes. It was however mostly empty on a Sunday afternoon, meaning there were virtually no waits for any of the rides. Read the full Dorney Park trip report here.

The lift hills for Steel Force, a Morgan hyper, and Thunderhawk, a vintage PTC woodie. Steel Force looks a lot like Magnum but didn't pack the same wild punch. I liken it to riding a hyper in a big Lincoln Towncar. Thunderhawk was a decent old woodie with a nice cream-yellow paintjob, but didn't do much to distinguish itself from other woodies of the era.

We managed to get a few more visits to Hersheypark for the year, including another weekend in July, a long weekend August trip with my family, an early Dark Nights visit in September, and a Christmas Candylane visit in late November. Hershey is truly a great park and I always enjoy visiting - kinda sad that we didn't renew our season passes, but probably time to give that place a break anyway.

We decided to get Six Flags passes again after letting them lapse after 2022, possibly against our better judgment, but the price for a Diamond Pass was too good to pass up. We managed to visit Great Adventure for Fright Fest and for Holiday in the Park. Hopefully with the park's 50th Anniversary being celebrated next year, the park gets a much-needed sprucing up, and the new Flash coaster is certainly intriguing.

Here's roughly how I'd rank my new credits for the year - all 49 of them. This is in terms of my own personal enjoyment, not necessary a ranking of "best layout" or "best airtime" or whatever:

Maverick
Wildcat's Revenge
The Beast
Mystic Timbers
Magnum XL-200
Steel Vengeance
Twister
Phoenix
Banshee
The Racer (KI)
Flight of Fear
Diamondback
Valravn
Millennium Force
The Bat
Steel Curtain
GateKeeper
Flying Turns
Orion
Ravine Flyer II
Blue Streak
Jack Rabbit
Steel Force
Thunderbolt
Raptor
Racer (Kennywood)
Impulse
Gemini
Phantom's Revenge
Talon
Sky Rocket
Green Lantern
Hydra the Revenge
Backlot Stunt Coaster
Rougarou
Iron Dragon
Cedar Creek Mine Ride
Thunderhawk
Steel Dragon
Invertigo
Wild Mouse (CP)
Adventure Express
Corkscrew
Comet (Waldameer)
Wild Mouse (Dorney)
Black Diamond
Kozmo's Kurves
Possessed
Flying Ace Aerial Chase

2024 holds promise - Six Flags passes means for sure some visits to Great Adventure as well as SFNE, where I have yet to ride Flashback, their resident Boomerang. Visiting SFNE likely means a visit or two to Lake Compounce as well, where I still have yet to ride their Boomerang. We're also looking at a trip up the east coast to visit Carowinds, Busch Gardens Williamsburg, Kings Dominion, and possibly Six Flags America, which I last visited before I got my proper sea legs (er... coaster legs). Happy New Year everybody!