Paramount Canada's Wonderland
Opening Season Pass Holders Night 05/05/00
After enviously reading the many trip report of the one’s who home park’s had already opened the time had finally come for Reids to dawn their Wonderland duds and become the PCW Junkies once again. We had been waiting for this night since the Reids and Shaggy walked out of PCW on the last day of the season in October 1999.
The day did not start off to good for Kevin because he felt that he was coming down with something. So by noon he left work to get home and try to shake this think off before 5:00PM arrived. It was going to take more than a little flu bug to keep the PCW Junkie away from his beloved Wonderland on Season Pass Holders Night.
It was just like Christmas Eve for us boys while waiting for Donna to get off from work. Finally, Donna is ready and we bolt across Major MacKenzie Drive and arrive at our home, I mean Wonderland, around 5:30PM. Of course, we didn’t have to wait in any lines to buy passes because we have had our 2000 season passes since September. We notice the sign apologizing for Cliffhanger not operating. To be honest none of us were disappointed because none of us were ready for it. We were just interested in seeing it operate and to see how wet you really get. Cliffhanger is located in the area that was once occupied by old Dragon Fire queues. Dragon Fire’s front entrance has been changed to allow for Cliffhanger. There is a new concrete ramp leading up to the loading platform. Looks like Dragon Fire is going to get a new paint job. A nice shade of green for the track while the support gets a funky purplish colour. They only have the section where the train drops out of station and to the base of the lift hill done because this is the area visible while viewing Cliffhanger. Cliffhanger should bring some much-needed rider ship to the 1981 multi-element Arrow Dragon Fire.
Time to do some coasters so we head over to a Reid favourite, Wild Beast. Unfortunately, Wild Beast was not quite ready to go so we opted for PCW’s 1999 new attraction, The Fly, to start 2000 off with. The crowd did not make their way to this part of the park yet and we only waited a couple of minutes. On the first drop there was "Yeah babies" and three sets of hands in the air while Donna decided to brace herself for the hairpin curves ahead. The boys were glad to be back in the coaster mode again and we quickly headed for Vortex next.
We were also able to walk right on to Vortex, Arrow suspended, and Nolan and Kevin waited a little extra for Nolan’s first front seat ride. I thought this ride was good last year well it keeps getting better year after year. We love this ride with its speed and constant in your face G-forces. There is still so much left in the train when it is halted in the brake run which makes the structure shake.
We walk over to Hanna-Barbera Land to check out the line up for the new Scooby-Doo Haunted Mansion. Luckily our boys are still short enough to be our chaperones and waited about 30 minutes to experience the ride. It is a very good ride for folks with younger children and a great addition to the kid area. It occupies the area that Bedrock Docks once did. Unfortunately for the rest of Bedrock its entrance is by the swans which will leave the Bedrock area a neglected and not a very busy area of Wonderland.
Over to Mighty Canadian Minebuster (MCM) and to be quite frank over the past few years we found this ride getting quite rough especially after the first drop. I am pleased to announce that MCM has had it first half of the ride completely re-hab’ed. There is still a nice pop of air off the first drop while the hill before the turn around is a little flat but, we will give it a little time to work in.
The 2000 season is finally here after a long off-season. Not sure if we will be able to beat last year’s record attendance at 51 but we will have fun trying.
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