The 2013 theme park season is almost here. I’m sure that many of you already have plans. Or you’re starting to draw red circles around theme parks on your huge wall map of the U.S. Or maybe that’s just me?
Just as I did last year, I’d like to ask where you’re going this year. Which of the exciting 2013 roller coasters have sparked your interest enough to make a long distance trip? Will you be returning to your home park or skipping it this year? I’ll go into my plans in another post, but first let’s hear from you.
List the parks that you’re targeting and which of them will be first time visits. And, let us know if you have any travel questions or are weighing a couple of different trip ideas. It could help to get some other opinions. Leave your 2013 plans below and vote in this poll.[poll id=”97″]
Coaster Critic 
47 responses to “2013 Theme Park Trips – Where Are You Going?”
Kings Dominion (home park)
Kings Island
Cedar Point
Busch Gardens Williamsburg
Hershey Park
Six Flags Great Adventure (possibly)
I'm definitely heading to Cedar Point to check out Gatekeeper, might get to Waldameer Park and Conneaut Lake Parks to ride Ravine Flyer II and Blue Streak as I've never been there before. I'd really like to visit Kennywood too as I've never been there either. With expensive wedding trips the last few summers preventing other travels, I've been in roller coaster withdrawal!!
1. Cedar Point (Every Year)
2. Kings Island (New Park)
3. Hersheypark (Every Year)
4. Six Flags Great Adventure (home park)
5. Dorney Park and Wildwater Kingdom (Every Year)
All of these are mine if I get above a 95 overall average in my grades.
Valleyfair (Home Park 1)
Mt. Olympus (Home Park 2)
Nickelodeon Universe (Home Park 3)
Carowinds (Home Park)
Kings Dominion (Becoming an Every Year)
Busch Gardens Williamsburg (New Park)
Cedar Point (Home Park now since I work there!)
Kings Island
Planning:
DollyWood (New)
Busch Gardens Williamsburg (New)
Kings Dominion (New)
Carowinds (New)
Hopefully that trip works out!
3 boring home parks I see…
I will be visiting SFSTL as always since I have my season pass. Since my theme park schedule usually revolves around my family's vacations, I might be hitting up the Disney parks (Test Track 2.0 and Star Tours 2!), and I'd also like to get some California parks in too if that's where we might go. I've been hoping to get to the east part of the US to hit up Busch Gardens, Carowinds, Hershey Park, and SFGAdv. Nothing for sure yet, but that's my wish list!
In addition to my Six Flags pass, I also bought a Cedar Fair Platinum pass this year and hope to take advantage of it. Here's what I'm shooting for this year:
Six Flags Magic Mountain (home park)
Knott's Berry Farm
Disneyland/DCA
Universal Studios Hollywood
Sea World San Diego
Belmont Park (new)
California Great America
Six Flags Discovery Kingdom
Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk
Gilroy Gardens (new)
The big trip I'm really hoping to make happen this year if I can get away is:
Cedar Point (new)
Kings Island (new)
This year won't be as big for me as last year, I think. We'll probably go to Alton Towers and Thorpe again, but other than that, nothing is set in stone, and no big trips are planned.
Probably heading to my home park (Carowinds)
I've never been to Dollywood (well, I guess technically I have – when it was called Silver Dollar City…yes I am that old)
So I might head up there this summer its only a few hours.
I would REALLY like to get back up to Cedar Point.
This is the first year for me that I have a season pass for my home park, SFOG, so I'll have several trips there and trips to maybe Dollywood? Kings Island? Cedar Point? Not completely sure, this is just what I think so far.
Kings Dominion (definitely)
Either Cedar Point or Busch Gardens Williamsburg (Likely)
Six Flags America (definitely)
Six Flags Great Adventure (new, very likely)
Six Flags MM (new, pretty likely)
Although I made 9 trips to visit theme parks last year, I can't afford to do that this year so will probably make only three. I've already booked a trip to Lake Compounce, and as I'm flying into Hartford, equidistant to Lake Compounce and Six Flags New England, will visit Lake Compounce one day and make a repeat visit to SFNE the following day to ride what I didn't ride last time as well as, of course, Bizarro which I did ride on the last visit. I've also booked a trip to San Antonio for Six Flags Fiesta, as Iron Rattler has sparked my interest, but I'm afraid that I'm going to have to pay a change fee to the airline because my trip is booked for April 27 and Iron Rattler may not be up and running by then. (The latest email I got from Six Flags is predicting that it will open in late spring, which could mean anything ). I've been to Cedar Point twice but want to check out Gatekeeper. For the trip to Cedar Point I am planning to incorporate another visit into that trip and here's where I could use some feedback. The initial idea was to go to Cedar Point for Coaster Mania on June 7 and then continue on to Wisconsin Dells to ride Hades 360, which looks awfully interesting. However, upon reconsideration, I'm now thinking of nixing Wisconsin Dells in favour of Silver Dollar City, as Outlaw Run is beginning to look even more interesting than Hades 360. If you couldn't afford to go to all three parks, would you be more inclined to want to ride Hades 360 or Outlaw Run? (For some reason I am unable to log in from facebook, which is a nuisance.)
I am so excited to go to cedar point this summer and their opening the gate keeper!!!!! I am also going to six flags and dollywood and carowinds
Oh, I forgot Universal Studios Holywood (last went in 2005).
while none of these are certian (well except for 2), it's still a short list,
1. Six Flags over Georgia
2. ValleyFair
3. Mount Olympus (regetably, becaus Cyclops is the ONLY good ride there and my current no1, but i'll give Hades 360 a try, but if you go there DON'T even touch Zeus)
4. Bay Beach
5. the park inside Mall of America,
it's a weak list, but considering the options, it's better then multiple trips to Mount Olympus, but you'd better get your rides in on Hades 360 before it turns into garbage like it did before as Hades, just saying knowing their track record,
HersheyPark (home)
Kings Dominion
Great Adventure
Dollywood
Cedar Point
Holiday World
Dollywood [new]
Carowinds [new]
Hershey [new]
Kings Dominion {Home}
SFNE [new] maybe Jiminy Peak detour for Alpine [new]
Lake Compounce [new]
Cedar Point
Great Adventure [Old Home] SFA for cheaper pass and local fun
Maybe Dorney again just bcuz have Platinum and will be close by Hydra=FUN!
Maybe Universal Orlando or Texas tour if this climate change nightmare keeps me off my snowmobile again next winter 😦
Good for you! CP is my favorite too!
I would want to ride Outlaw Run more.
I am pretty sure that I am going to CP.
1)dollywood (old)
2)kings island (new)
3) cedar point (new)
4)dorney park (new)
5) kings dominion (new)
6) carowinds (new)
7) hersheypark (maybe)
8) busch gardens europe (maybe)
Ok, my original comment from 3 days ago hasn't shown up. So here's what we're doing this year. Coming over from Australia & visiting:
– Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk (new)
– Six Flags Magic Mountain (last visited 2005)
– Universal Studios Hollywood (last visited 2005)
– Cedar Point (last visited 2007)
– Kennywood (new)
– Six Flags Great adventure (maybe – new)
Can't wait to get back on some decent rollercoasters!!
Sorry about that. I've been super busy. I wish that I could set the site to auto approve for all commenters, but you'd be surprised the kinds of comments that I have to delete before they're seen.
You should definitely get Great Adventure into your trip if you can. Wow! To have SFMM, Cedar Point, and SFGADV in one trip would be quite a line up. And then you'd still get Kennywood for a completely different feel. Have fun!
Nice lineup! Enjoy my home park.
Don't forget to hit up Timber Falls for Hellcat. It's small, but a lot of fun!
What happens when you try to log in from facebook? Sorry about that.
Hmmm….. I've never been to Silver Dollar City, but I'm targeting it for this year (along with Worlds of Fun). Anyway, I agree with RollerCoasterRider, I'd Outlaw Run looks a bit more enticing. While I really like the original Hades, it has gotten really rough. I'd imagine it'll be smoother this year, but you also have to factor in what else these parks offer. Let's say those two rides are equal, look at the rest of the lineups (include neighboring Hellcat at Timber Falls when considering Mt. Olympus) and see which would be more worth the trip.
Any of those new for you?
Dollywood is definitely worth the trip. It's such a nice park and the coasters are very strong. Have fun!
Awesome! I hope you can make it to Ohio. I don't need to tell you about the awesome coasters in that state. I'd love to hear your opinion on them. But, if you don't make it, there's always Kings Islands (rumored) huge steel coasters for 2014. So you could go next year.
One day I'll make it up to MN. Maybe the next time Valleyfair builds something big and interesting.
Good luck James. You can do it. There's airtime and g-forces at stake!
Going to some parks in my home country.. the netherlands..
A second visit to europa park in germany..
And going to florida U.S. to visit all themeparks there for the first time.
Yup, first time for all of them except for SFOG. Looking forward to this summer.
Universal/Islands of Adventure (homepark)
Sea World (homepark)
Busch Gardens (homepark)
I didn’t renew my Universal pass this year but will probably get another one once Transformers opens. Also planned on waiting for Antarctica to open before canceling my Seaworld/BG pass.
Also will be doing another coaster trip this summer. The wife and I are getting Six Flags passes and hitting up:
Six Flags Great America
Six Flags Over Georgia
Dollywood (Will drive up from ATL)
Six Flags Magic Mountain
I really want to ride Bizarro at SFNE but hard to justify going up there essentially for one coaster. Perhaps I’ll combine that with a trip to NYC for the wifey to make it worth her while (although I’d probably throw in a trip to SFGAdv for another ride on El Toro ;)). Still wanna do the Texas SF parks as well so, maybe that’s a 2014 trip? Trying to knock them all out before the babies start coming!
Thanks for that! It was more that I did the main post, then added Universal Studios after. The 2nd post showed up so it didn't make any sense when I said "Oh, I forgot Universal Studios". We're getting season passes for Six Flags so we can go multiple days at Magic Mountain, so if we can get to Great Adventure we definately will!!
Carowinds ( old)
Cedar point ( new )
Kings island ( old )
Cool
Going to dorney park, six flags great adventure, and knoebels (all have visited before). As for new parks, I will be visiting Six Flags Magic Mountain and Knotts Berry farm. Also, I am debating on visiting dollywood, six flags fiesta texas, or universal orlando on a separate trip.
Cedar Point (home park)
Universal Studios in FL. (Never been there)
I would like to go back down to Missouri and ride outlaw run, but I can't afford that.
Just got back from a Florida trip that included all four Disney parks and both Universal as well as a stop at the Fun Spot in Kissimmee for the Power Trip credit. Also heading to St. Louis in April to revisit Six Flags St. Louis for the first time in several years (looking forward to American Thunder and Pandemonium as new credits), and driving out to Silver Dollar City (new park) for Outlaw Run. It’s becoming a bit of an annual tradition to head to the Disneyland Resort in September/October, just instead of hitting up Universal Studios Hollywood and SeaWorld like last year, switching things up a bit with Knott’s and SFMM instead to check out the new coasters.
other than that
-Wild Waves (home park)
-Silverwood (home-ish park)
-Six Flags Discovery Kingdom (old)
-California’s Great America (old)
-Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk (old)
and possibly
-Six Flags Fiesta Texas (new)
-SeaWorld Texas (new)
-Six Flags Great America (new)
-Bay Beach (new)
-Wisconsin Dells area (new)
bring on the year of the inverting woodie!
Michigan Adventures (Home)
Cedar Point
Kings Island (New)
Canada's Wonderland (New)
Cedar Point (Home park)
Hershey Park
Kings Island
Possibly Holiday World
Kings Dominion and Busch Gardens Williamsburg in the same trip
and possibly a couple more if possible
A friend and I are doing two trips:
Trip 1
Six Flags St Louis (old)
Worlds of Fun (old)
Silver Dollar City (New)
Frontier City (New)
Six Flags Over Texas (New)
Six Flags Fiesta Texas (New)
Sea World San Antonio (New)
Trip 2 Coaster Con:
Quassy (New)
Lake Compounce (New)
Rye Playland (New)
Six Flags New England (old)
Six Flags La Ronde (New)
Sx Flags Great Escape (New)
Canobie Lake Park (New)
Palace Playland (New)
Funtown/Splashtown (New)
Have revised our trip slightly & have decided that seeing as we can’t fit Six Flags Great Adventure in, we’ll drive to Kings Island after Cedar Point. Really looking forward to riding The Beast.
Definatly going to be trying out the iron rattler in sfft being the closest park to houston …which by the way needs one badly !