While the park put a ton of work into Planet Snoopy, it isn’t the only new thing for 2013. Improvements can be seen all around the park from the fountains at the entrance to some track work on Anaconda. Nice to see the rest of the park didn’t get overlooked in favor of the new Planet Snoopy.
Fountains
Over the off-season the fountain pool received a fresh coat of paint!
Dominator
Dominator also received a fresh coat of paint over the off-season.
Anaconda
No, Anaconda did not get painted this year… however something was done to the ride. If you look at the photos, you will see that there is a small section of Anaconda’s track that has fresh paint along the running rails. However, it seems that it is not merely fresh paint, but looks to be new running rails entirely, judging by some of these close-ups below.
The On-Ride Photos have been removed and the photo room has been gutted.
Windseeker
The more I hear about WindSeeker, the more I believe that it will not open anytime soon (possibly not even this year). I’ve talked with numerous people, and each has said that the up and down movement from the other WindSeekers in the Cedar Fair chain isn’t any sign on reopening. Carowinds has a webcam set up on their WindSeeker and it makes the occasional trip to the top of the tower, but I still have not seen any type of spinning. In some cases I’ve see workers getting dropped off at the top to do some work. Anyways there are some pictures of the ride in its current state below. You will notice that the evacuation platform is located behind Hurler and is slowly being pieced together.
The gallery below is from my April 14th visit and shows the new evacuation platform fully installed and looks like it is ready for testing.
Carousel
The Carousel is on a multi-year, full restoration plan. Kings Dominion has already restored about 16 of the 60 horses. It’s also worth noting that the Carousel will be celebrating its 100th birthday during the 2017 operating season.
Coke Truck
The old Ice Cream truck is now parked in the Grove near Xtreme Skyflyer and has also been changed to a coke truck.
Grove Stage
To say the Grove Stage is poorly located is a massive understatement. It seems like it was just thrown together in the middle of the pathway. Also, the stage doesn’t fit the look and feel of the Grove area at all.
Karaoke Superstars and Got Country both perform on this stage, and unfortunately, Got Country does not have any distinguishing set pieces.
Planet Snoopy
A new sign has been added next to Snoopy vs. Red Baron. These photos were taken on my April 14th visit.
With Kings Dominion’s focus mostly on Planet Snoopy this season, it’s not a surprise that the rest of the park was only treated to minor changes. Still, it’s nice to see them addressing some smaller problems around the park. Speaking of Planet Snoopy, if you didn’t read part 1 of our opening week report, it can be found here. It contains well over 125 pictures of just about everything inside the new area.
If you would like to join in on our discussion, visit the General Improvements for 2013 thread on the forums!
Disclaimer: I want to give a BIG thanks to Zachary, Shane, and Alpenghost for heading to the park Saturday for me, since I was not able to make it. All of my opinions in this post are based off of what I saw in the many pictures that Zachary took.
Anaconda Dominator International Street Planet Snoopy The Grove WindSeeker