Valleyfair

There is so much to love about Valleyfair. A charming
mid-sized park, plenty of character, great landscaping and a solid lineup of
rides. Let’s start with the coasters because those are the standouts. Ranked
worst to best in the park with the format:

Ride Name, #Credit (#Top30)

with a final score out of 10 given at the end of the
description

Mad Mouse, #115
I am an unapologetic Arrow fanboy, and was super excited to
get three more Arrow credits at this park! I was excited for Mad Mouse, as I
heard the Arrow mice are some of the best. We went their first in the morning
because I also heard these coasters are very low capacity. Overall I managed to
overhype myself for a wild mouse. It was smooth, the laterals were decent, and
the airtime was nonexistent. Mildly disappointing, but I was glad I didn’t wait
an hour for it. 4/10

Cosmic Coaster, #122
The opposite effect of the last coaster, I went on this
powered kiddie expecting nothing except shame and actually got some really fun
laterals out of it. Would credit whore again. 4.5/10

Excalibur, #117
Another instance of overhyping myself. Got some ok pops of
airtime in the back row and it carried its speed very well, unlike most Arrows,
although this led to a very short ride experience with not much to show for it.
Probably why they only had one train. I like this coaster and hope they keep it
around because its basically half of Gemini and very unique but was again a bit
of a letdown. 6/10

Corkscrew, #119
The park’s only coaster with inversions(?!?!?!?!?), this
Arrow classic leads off the strong top 5 of this park’s lineup. The coaster was
very smooth, photogenic, and couldn’t have a better location. Plus I love the
badass sharp lines of the classic Arrow looping train. It wasn’t quite as
intense as Anaconda or Demon but was a lot more enjoyable than its sister at
Cedar Point. 7.5/10

Steel Venom, #121
My third Impulse coaster was a fun one, and being the park’s
only invert, launcher, and shuttle, fills a lot of spots in the lineup. This is
the perfect park to have the standard Impulse model (unlike SFGAm), and Steel
Venom was nice and smooth to boot, which V2 cannot claim. Unfortunately, I went
a week before the holding brake was re-enabled, so I can’t comment on that
experience, but even without it, the coaster is a solid 8/10.

High Roller, #119
The sleeper hit of the park! Super solid woody; gave plenty
of floater airtime with zero roughness whatsoever. Darn pretty too. A lot
better than the two Racer coasters of the Kings parks and kudos to VF
maintenance for keeping her smooth! 8+/10

Wild Thing, #118 (#26)
My first Morgan hyper was a really solid coaster. The first
drop and subsequent hill delivered on the flojector airtime. The turnaround
spaghetti bowl section was kind of a letdown, but the showcase of speed was
enjoyable nonetheless. Even after the midcourse clack clack clacked us down
about 10 mph, the return trip had a bunch more floater airtime, and along with
this being one of the smoothest coasters I’ve ever been on, a wonderful coaster
all around and a true crowd pleaser. 9/10

Renegade, #116 (#11)
Wow. Just wow. After getting excited after American Thunder,
and disappointed again by Mystic Timbers, I was prepared for this to be a
letdown and overhyped. Thankfully, I was completely wrong. This coaster
combined all of the best parts of my previous GCI experiences and delivered
without pulling any punches. Solid floater on the normal hills and the classic
GCI off axis pops, plus the breakneck pacing, laterals, and darting from left
to right immediately made this my favorite GCI. It fixed the one issue I had
with American Thunder, with what felt like a much longer ride, without really
ever giving up on the relentless pacing. I freaking love this coaster, and I
wish more GCIs were this great. 10/10

Overall, I had a fantastic time at the park. I rode their
river raft ride, which was pretty pathetic, and their drop tower, which was a
fun S&S tower in an absolutely gorgeous location. Unfortunately, it didn’t
have the glorious combo mode, but the space shot routine was fun regardless.
Their starflyer (which wasn’t Mondial for some reason, and instead a Six Flags
model) looks fun, as did their screamin swing, however I didn’t want to wait in
those lines, so I didn’t do them. The park looked excellent, and their
employees were typical Minnesotan nice, and overall there wasn’t anything not
to love. Which brings me to…

Why the hell doesn’t Cedar Fair love this park? It’s only
like 20 mins from Minneapolis, and 40 for St. Paul, and you would think that
there would be a larger market for people to come out. The day we went nearly
hit capacity, so they definitely aren’t struggling to pull people in, so I’m
wondering why Cedar Fair doesn’t throw a bone to this park? Many park guests
were complaining that there was nothing new in a while, and even though
everything looked nice, it would be a good idea in my opinion to try and expand
the park. With both Excalibur and Steel Venom reportedly on the chopping block,
I really hope this undergoes a CGA-style rebirth in the next few years. They
have no coaster focusing on intensity, their only inverting coaster is a custom
looper from the 80s, plus the lack of any ejector airtime or invert/launcher if
Steel Venom is removed leaves a lot of holes in its lineup. This is in stark
contrast to a very similar Six Flags St. Louis, that basically covers
everything with it’s 9 coasters minus a true kiddie coaster. There would be a
lot of affordable options to help VF with its coaster lineup, so I’ll give a
few scenarios for the sake of discussion:

If Kings Dominion ends up being Geagua Lake’d (COMPLETE SPECULATION, NO EVIDENCE OF THIS), I would give VF their Backlot Stunt Coaster. New theme, remove the midcourse, and
make it just a solid launch coaster for the park. I would also give them a
hand-me-down SLC with the Riddler restraints, as this would fill out literally all
their holes in the lineup for an incredibly cheap price tag. Otherwise, a
simple RMC Raptor prototype clone (or Stunt Pilot) would fill in the inversions
(ish) and intensity, while a Gerstlauer infinity a la Hangtime or Monster would
be awesome. Maybe to differentiate it from Rock Bottom Plunge only 15 mins
away, it would be Monster’s layout with an LSM launch instead of a lift
somehow.

Overall, my time at this park was fantastic and I hope it
continues to grow into the destination it deserves to be. Definitely will be
back!