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| Status: |
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Operating since 1888 |
| Also Known As: |
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Geauga Lake(1888-1999, current), Six Flags Ohio(2000), Six Flags Worlds of Adventure (2001-2003) |
| Phone: |
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330-562-7131 |
| Fax: |
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330-562-7020 |
| Web: |
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Geauga Lake's site |
| Address: |
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1060 Aurora Road
Aurora, OH 44202
USA
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| Visits: |
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537 |
| Rating: |
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| More About This Park |
History:
Geauga Lake was purchased by Funtime, Inc. in 1996.
Was branded a Six Flags park in 2000, under the moniker "Six Flags Ohio" with $40 million in improvements.
To view past park maps visit: http://geaugalaketoday.com/Park_Maps.htm
In 2001, Six Flags Inc. acquired SeaWorld Ohio from Anheuser Busch, adjacent to Six Flags Ohio, for $110,000,000. The amusement park operator then combined the amusement park, water park, and marine life park into one and renamed the property "Six Flags Worlds of Adventure." Over the following seasons, the park suffered a gradual decline in attendance and undesirable feedback from guests. The lackluster attendance was allegedly due to poor customer service and unsatisfactory park operations.
With Six Flags Inc.'s heavy $2,000,000,000+ debt load and the park's declining popularity, the company sold Worlds of Adventure to Ohio-based competing amusement park operator, Cedar Fair, L.P on 3/10/2004 for $145,000,000 cash. Under new ownership and management, the park was given back its original name - Geauga Lake.
Notes:
At the end of the 2007 season it was announced that the ride side would close along with all the coasters and flat rides. |
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| Reviews |
Sir Willow
Joined: May 2001
Posts: 3550
View Park/Ride Count
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From 6/3/02
As I type this I'm on an Amtrak train going down
the coast (watching my kids play in the play room here), so not only am
I dealing with the passage of time but I also don't have access to my
maps or other park info. So if I get a name or something else a bit
mixed up, that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it. :-)
The Park: Six Flags Worlds of Adventure, Cleveland OH
The People: me and Brian (AFLAC!)
The Weather: fairly nice as I remember it.
Crowds: pretty light. no complaints really here.
Scoring: 1-10, with negatives being horrendous. In other words, my
standard deal.
Brian and I headed to SFWoA with only a few hours available to us before
we had to head to the airport so I could catch my flight back to CA.
The original plan had been for SFWoA to be the very first park that we
hit on my trip, however I got bumped off my standby seat and ended up
coming out a day later than the original plan. This lack of time, as
well as the day, did have an impact on what we were able to do and see.
We were limited to only the old Geugua (sic) Lake side of the park and
the rides there. On a normal day I would have really liked to have gone
over to check out the animals and the shows, but it just wasn't able to
happen. I did notice that there was really only a couple of ways to the
old SW side of the park- either by a ferry or by a long walk that was
only on one side of the park. I've heard they've since moved the
boardwalk over to complete the circuit, and that'll help, but another
way accross the lake would be a huge help here.
Opening impressions: While I wouldn't call SFWoA dirty per se, I
couldn't say that it really looked clean either. The walkways looked
dingy and in need of a good powerspray overnight to remove the tar
spots. I also noticed several spots with chipped, peeling, or faded
paint- which isn't good this early in the season. Little things like
that really affect how people feel about a park and whether or not they
want to come back. Definately room for improvement there.
Brian and I parked, waved our passes at the gate, and the first thing
that we headed for was V2. This was the third impulse of the trip for
me, and of the three, I'd put it even with WT, and just barely a tick
below the one at SFGrAm just because of the location. I also liked the
elevation at Great America's version to. But the impulses are
definately fun rides, and this one didn't fail to satisfy. Score- a
nice 7.5
I believe that the next thing that we hit (literally) was the boomerang.
A standard Vekoma headbanger, and it gets the pretty standard score of
a 4 for a boomer. Great rides if you've never been on one, but not
worth repeating. I do also remember somewhere around this time
commenting on how slow the monorail that is here moves. It would seem
like it would be nice if they sped it up and actually lengthened it so
it went somewhere (like the other side of the park maybe?) But I
remember wondering why anyone would want to bother with it the way it is.
As I recall after this we were both a bit hungry, so we grabbed a couple
of quick burgers to eat. Pretty standard park food- not horrible, but
not great either. After eating and feeling much more satisfied (and
also noting that they gave out cups of icewater free to anyone who
asked- something that not all parks do), we headed over to the newest
coaster at SFWoA, one that's been getting a good amount of press- Batman
Knight Flight.
B:KF is one of the newest B&M floorless coasters, and it had a much
longer than necessary wait due to them running only one train. I
believe it took us about 45 minutes to get on, which would seem to
justify 2 trains if there was no other reason that they weren't running
a second. After riding, I determined that the floorless gimick still
doesn't do much for me, but that the layout here is a lot of fun.
However, B:KF is a coaster that is going to have some major problems as
it ages. Due to it being so quiet as it runs (since they filled in the
supports) you can hear something vibrating on the train that isn't
supposed to. Additionally it's got a couple of spots already that are
showing signs of headbanging and problems that will grow in the future.
Right now though they aren't bad and it makes for a very enjoyable
coaster, and one that I wish time would have allowed us more rides on.
But based on the one ride I'd give B:KF a very respectable 8.
We walked around the area a bit, looking at some of the different rides
and them working on several of them. Seemed like a lot of the rides and
coasters were down for maintanance on this part of the park. But we did
make our way over to Raging Wolf Bobs, so that's what we hopped on next.
RWB looks like it's going to be a fun coaster with some good twists and
turns and some good spots for potential airtime. Unfortunately the
rolling stock they have on the coaster kill it. This was the first
coaster I had been on that ran old trailored PTC's, and after riding I
can see why these have fallen out of fashion and have been replaced in
so many places. There was far more shuffling, banging, and complete
lack of being able to track well, thus killing so much of what this
coaster could be and adding in some definate moments of
uncomfortableness. It's not by any means a painful coaster, but just by
putting on a regular 2 bench set of trains I can imagine that it would
smooth it out tremendously and make this feel like a totally different
coaster. If anything I came off sad for what it could be but wasn't.
Score: 3.5
From here we then hit up the SLC (Mindbender?). It had a longer line
earlier, which was one reason we had skipped it, but now the line had
gone down some, so Brian and I hopped in for some more painful action.
All I can say is that when I rode Kong at SFMW a year ago as my first
SLC, I must have had one incredibly blessed day on it, as none of the
others were anywhere near as smooth. This one had the nice soft padding
on the otsr's, and it needs it. With the padding, it's a tolerable
ride, and one that I'm sure the GP will like. Once or twice is plenty
for me. Notch it up as one for the count and one that no I can comment
on from experience. Score: 5.
At this point we were really starting to watch the time. X-Flight
hadn't been running when we came in, but we could see it going now.
Knowing we really only had time for Big Dipper (and maybe a flat) or
X-Flight, we decided to take a chance and hopped in line for the Vekoma
Flyer. Also influencind the decision was that I hadn't been on one of
these yet (Stealth is still waiting to happen for me) The line was a
bit long, but looked to be moving at a decent rate when a t-storm rolled
in and shut down everything in the park. It also sent a whole lot of
the people in line packing, so we decided to try to wait it out, knowing
that it was going to be cutting our time to get me to my plane a bit
close. As it turns out, I'm happy we waited, as we did get on, working
as single riders to speed it up a bit. Brian took the back row left
side (looking towards the back of the train) while I was a row in front
of him on the right.
I really enjoyed my ride on X-Flight, and didn't notice any banging at
all. On the other hand, Brian said that he got beat up bad. I also
really enjoyed the sweeping turns and the helix, while the loop was a
little better than ok in my book- again a bit different from most
people's view of the coaster. I would have really liked more time so
that I could get to know it a bit better and experience the "pain" that
others talk about so I could have an idea, but as it was my ride was
really a lot of fun and I came off it quite excited and pleased.
Especially in comparison to what I was expecting it to be after hearing
about it here and other places. Score: 7.5
From there our time ran out and we had to hit the road. A few more
things I'd like to mention though:
Disappointments: The number of things I missed. Double Loop and Villain
were both down (with a crane and guys working on V's lift hill), and we
ran out of time to ride the Dipper. Also would have liked to have
peeked at the animal side of the park.
Good things: Park Potential. This place can be an awesome park, but
it's going to take some investing and a willingness to run in the red
for a couple of years. Very simply it needs more infrastructure-
cleaning, painting, quality staffing, increased capacity on rides,
accesibility to the other side, etc. I know that they are cutting hours
and staffing right now, and I understand why, but I think that's the
wrong approach at this point since in so many ways this is a "new" park.
Spend the money now to get people really liking the place, and they'll
make the money back up later. But if they lose the people now because
they aren't willing to spend that, getting them back after a bad
experience is going to be much much harder.
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| 1-21-04 13:19:27 |
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spcleddy
Joined: May 2003
Posts: 21
View Park/Ride Count
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With an odd history behind it and the recent acquisition by Cedar Fair, Geuga Lake seems like it will never be cast aside with dozens of other "ordinary" parks. Although it added new thrills (or in some cases, I'd say frills) under Six Flags management, I think the parks strength lies in its older, more characteristic rides, like the classic woodies Big Dipper and Raging Wolf Bobs. Don't get me wrong, I welcome the newcomers as well, and in fact enjoy Villain a bit more than Dip or Bob; just don't overlook the classic side of this quirky Cleveland area park.
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| 3-26-04 1:37:34 |
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SFOG Freak
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 2627
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I was lucky enough to visit this park a few days ago. The park was great for being so small, they had a great selection of rides. The employees could be better though.
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| 6-30-04 20:22:28 |
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Nick6212
Joined: Oct 2004
Posts: 3
View Park/Ride Count
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My home park. i think everything this year is great... i also work there ;) and for EetPinKcrayons post, Geauga Lake was owned by Six Flags when mind eraser and serial thriller were put in, they just still had the name geauga lake. They changed the name to Six flags in 2000 when they added a whole bunch of new coasters.
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| 10-13-04 18:12:17 |
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slnewbus
Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 1652
View Park/Ride Count
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This park was ok. Parts of the areas look like Employee only areas. The only outstanding ride was Dominator. Otherwise the rides were just ok. Villain and Raging Wolf Bobs have a lot of potential, but they are ruined by their junky Gerstlauer Trains. If they had PTC trains they would be awesome! The Big Dipper was in horrible shape. The Boomerang and the Impulse weren't too good. We had a good time, but this park is just ok.
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| 3-3-05 16:58:31 |
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SFGAFan4
Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 963
View Park/Ride Count
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Trip Report - 7/13/07
Yay for amusement parks on Friday the 13th. We got to Geauga Lake at 12. The parking lot was empty, with not even 20 cars! Everyone at Cedar Point? I assume. It took 20 minutes get to the coasters, because we walked all the way across the bridge, and the employee wouldn't open the locked gate. What a great employee! We had to walk all the way around, and went to Dominator. Walk-on.
Dominator - We went to the back row, and it was a great ride. Real fun drop, fun loops, and a lot of airtime. 9/10
We took two more rides on Dominator since it was so good. After, we just decided to go to Thunderhawk for a walk-on to front row.
Thunderhawk - Painful, painful, painful. I got a huge headache, and hurt my neck on this painful ride. It hurt so much. The ride was boring too. 3/10
We went to get lunch, and just like Thunderhawk, it was bad. Wow, I'm still wondering why people right next to this park would rather drive to Cedar Point. We then went to Head Spin. Back to back Vekomas! Hooray! No wait, again.
Head Spin - Painful ride, and it was really boring. 3/10
Next up was Big Dipper, no wait like usual. There must have not even been 50 people in the park.
Big Dipper - Painful, and no airtime at all. It looked pretty decent at first, but it sucked. 3/10
We then headed over to Double Loop. No wait, *sigh*.
Double Loop: This wasn't actually all that painful for an arrow looper, but it still hurt. Some of the ride was okay, a slight upgrade from most rides. 4/10
We headed over to The Villain, which finally, looks like we have a great ride ahead of us. Wrong.
The Villain - Wow, this was so painful, I couldn't keep my hands up. I didn't even know I was on a coaster, just a death machine. 2/10
We went to Raging Wolf Bobs, and it was closed. We then took two more rides on Dominator, including one in the front seat. Great ride. They need X-Flight and Steel Venom back..
We then hear an employee, who took us on the transportation train, that Raging Wolf Bobs had derailed and will be closed for awhile. Ugh... no credit for that.
We walked around the water park for 15 minutes, but no one wanted to get wet. We then went to Dino Island II, for a 5 minute wait.
Dino Island II - This could have been better if people weren't screaming the whole ride, but good nonetheless. 7/10
We walked around for another 10 minutes, and left at 3:30. There was absolutely nothing else to do, except marathon Dominator, or actually go on slides. The park was boring, and needs some better rides. Cedar Fair is just tearing the good rides out of this park.
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| 8-26-07 17:42:00 |
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Wes
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 11176
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I thought this was a nice little park. It will be missed.
Who cares about water parks? lol
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| 9-24-07 7:58:43 |
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