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Holiday World: General Discussion

Rather large bump for this topic, but it was announced yesterday that Holiday World are performing extensive refurbishment on their wooden coasters for this season, especially on The Legend which is getting a new 'double down' and lowered turn featuring a tunnel from GCI.

 
Bump!

Holiday World have announced that they will be re-theming the Kringle’s Kafe food outlet in to Santa’s Merry Marketplace. As well as new food court options there will be an ice cream shop, bakery and coffee shop.

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This is going to be a vast improvement as the Christmas themed area of the park does not feel overly Christmassy at the moment.

:)
 
So, in the last week or so Holiday World have been teasing for a new 2020 attraction which is set to be announced on 6th August. Here are a couple of the teasers:





They've said that this annoucement will not be for something as big as Thunderbird was. And a lot of the clues do point towards a water park attraction rather than a theme park attraction, what with the animalistic nature of them and the fact that the water park has a safari theme. But then these plans have leaked out over the weekend (source):

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And here they are overlayed on to the park:

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Holiday World might actually be getting an AquaTrax (or at least a new version of one)! The thought is that this could be a launched water coaster from Intamin (they showed off a new version at IAAPA last year) and will make use of the Pilgrim's Plunge splash down area.

I'm not totally convinced that the plans are legitimate, we'll just have to wait and see.
 
Very surprised that the park would be sticking with Intamin for another water coaster after the issues and ill-fit of Pilgrim's Plunge. Still, maybe if the plans are legit, Intamin have offered a generous discount?
 
Plastic Person said:
Very surprised that the park would be sticking with Intamin for another water coaster after the issues and ill-fit of Pilgrim's Plunge. Still, maybe if the plans are legit, Intamin have offered a generous discount?
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The way the park have described their experience with Intamin at some enthusiast events, you'd think Intamin would have to pay the park to get almost anything on their land and maintenance budget!

Time will tell.
 
Holiday World has announced their new ride, and it looks like it’s exactly what they need: two dueling water coasters from Pro Slide. Holiday World is about top of the list of parks I want to visit, along with maybe Cedar Point and Disney Seas. It’s got a reputation for being a park that’s very focused on its guests and meeting their needs, and a park that takes the time to get things right and do stuff to an incredibly high standard, particularly given their visitor numbers.

I was saddened when I looked them up on Trip Advisor the other day and saw how much negative feedback they were getting. It’s almost like Merlin have taken over. The queues for the water coasters (apparently over an hour on busy days) are one of the key sources of complaints, although apparently they do have single rider queues, so presumably they are trying to move the lines as quickly as possible. But clearly it isn’t enough. I assume they’ve been knocked pretty hard by all the complaints, something the park clearly isn’t used to. Hopefully doubling the number of water coasters will lead to shorter queues next year, and restore some of the goodwill they seem to have lost. It also means that when guests complain about the queues for the water coasters, they will have quite a good response: “We’ve listened to all the feedback we’re getting and currently we’re in the process of building two more water coasters. We hope you come back next year so you can give them a go”.

I really hope I get to visit Holiday World in the next couple of years, and that all the complaints are just a temporary blip.

https://www.coaster101.com/2019/08/...ater-coaster-coming-to-holiday-world-in-2020/

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attract...orld_Splashin_Safari-Santa_Claus_Indiana.html
 
The ride will be named Cheetah Chase; here's the announcement video:
 
Water coasters are a bit of a pain throughputwise...the one in the sandcastle at blackpool gets bad queues on anything but the quietest days.
Must only get about 60 people per hour at best.
 
Funcone said:
I was saddened when I looked them up on Trip Advisor the other day and saw how much negative feedback they were getting. It’s almost like Merlin have taken over. The queues for the water coasters (apparently over an hour on busy days) are one of the key sources of complaints, although apparently they do have single rider queues, so presumably they are trying to move the lines as quickly as possible. But clearly it isn’t enough. I assume they’ve been knocked pretty hard by all the complaints, something the park clearly isn’t used to. Hopefully doubling the number of water coasters will lead to shorter queues next year, and restore some of the goodwill they seem to have lost. It also means that when guests complain about the queues for the water coasters, they will have quite a good response: “We’ve listened to all the feedback we’re getting and currently we’re in the process of building two more water coasters. We hope you come back next year so you can give them a go”.

I really hope I get to visit Holiday World in the next couple of years, and that all the complaints are just a temporary blip.

https://www.coaster101.com/2019/08/...ater-coaster-coming-to-holiday-world-in-2020/

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attract...orld_Splashin_Safari-Santa_Claus_Indiana.html
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I will eventually get round to writing it up in my trip report, but our visit to Holiday World the other week was perhaps the biggest disappointment of the trip.

The park just doesn't have an atmosphere at all. It felt like a slightly better version of Lightwater Valley with a colossal waterpark sat next to it. The waterpark seems to very much be the main focus as it was packed, whereas the park was not.

Operations resulted in unnecessary queues. All rides were sufficiently stocked with trains, yet Raven and Legend were amongst the worst operated coasters on the trip. Even Voyage was somewhat of a disappointment (although I'm putting that down to being sat over the wheels so I'll give it the benefit of the doubt).

The staff were just zombies; there was no zest or haste in their attitude to getting guests through the rides. The saving grace of the entire park was the Turkey dark ride!

A staff member on Legend was insisting on guests putting phones, keys and wallets etc in tiny plastic trays; walking up and down the air gates attempting to extract every last item from guests. She would walk down the air gates, proceed to walk back up them, deposit the empty/full trays, walk back down to the front of the train, and check each lap bar with excruciatingly slow pace. Average dispatch time was around 3:30 - 4 minutes.
 
Danny said:
I will eventually get round to writing it up in my trip report, but our visit to Holiday World the other week was perhaps the biggest disappointment of the trip.

The park just doesn't have an atmosphere at all. It felt like a slightly better version of Lightwater Valley with a colossal waterpark sat next to it. The waterpark seems to very much be the main focus as it was packed, whereas the park was not.

Operations resulted in unnecessary queues. All rides were sufficiently stocked with trains, yet Raven and Legend were amongst the worst operated coasters on the trip. Even Voyage was somewhat of a disappointment (although I'm putting that down to being sat over the wheels so I'll give it the benefit of the doubt).

The staff were just zombies; there was no zest or haste in their attitude to getting guests through the rides. The saving grace of the entire park was the Turkey dark ride!

A staff member on Legend was insisting on guests putting phones, keys and wallets etc in tiny plastic trays; walking up and down the air gates attempting to extract every last item from guests. She would walk down the air gates, proceed to walk back up them, deposit the empty/full trays, walk back down to the front of the train, and check each lap bar with excruciatingly slow pace. Average dispatch time was around 3:30 - 4 minutes.
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What a shame; other people who've been have such positive things to say! The park also sounds really nice; they have free soft drinks and free parking!
 
The soft drinks are a huge plus, as would the ice cream have been had we found out where to get it from.....
 
I’m surprised to hear bad things about Holiday World. Historically it’s been a park which tended to have lots of good feedback.

It perhaps shows how susceptible parks can be to a few poor staff. It only takes one or two poor service experiences to really taint your visit at any park.
 
I'm sure there will be many other users who have had more enjoyable visits to the park than we did. The views in our group did differentiate (for example, Al and I weren't the biggest fans of Voyage yet @CGM and Pierre thoroughly enjoyed it - the tables were very much flipped for Thunderbird). In fact I know Craig will tell me I'm being too harsh on it, but the park just felt like it was capable of so much more and was a massive let down.

We went to Kentucky Kingdom straight after courtesy of its 10pm close. Ostensibly, Holiday World should be the better park. It clearly has the better water park, landscaping and such, but we just seemed to have a much better time at Kentucky Kingdom.
 
Danny said:
I'm sure there will be many other users who have had more enjoyable visits to the park than we did. The views in our group did differentiate (for example, Al and I weren't the biggest fans of Voyage yet @CGM and Pierre thoroughly enjoyed it - the tables were very much flipped for Thunderbird). In fact I know Craig will tell me I'm being too harsh on it, but the park just felt like it was capable of so much more and was a massive let down.

We went to Kentucky Kingdom straight after courtesy of its 10pm close. Ostensibly, Holiday World should be the better park. It clearly has the better water park, landscaping and such, but we just seemed to have a much better time at Kentucky Kingdom.
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You're being too harsh on it.
 
JAperson said:
Isn't this the first family boomerang in the US? Will actually be somewhat unique there, something they really aren't here.
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I believe it's one of three opening in the US in the next couple of years. They don't get one for years then three come along at once 😂
 
Think it'll be going were the old pilgrims plunge used to be. Visited last year and since then they seem to have filled in the troughs. But the station building is still standing.

Though yesterday they did just announce the rapids have been permanently closed.
 
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