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| Status: |
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Operating since 1968 |
| Also Known As: |
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Six Flags Marine World, Marine World, Marine World Africa USA |
| Phone: |
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707-644-4000 |
| Web: |
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Six Flags Discovery Kingdom's site |
| Address: |
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2001 Marine World Parkway
Vallejo, CA 94589
USA
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| Visits: |
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142 |
| Rating: |
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| More About This Park |
History:
The park opened in 1968 as Marine World in Redwood City, CA. They featured tigers, lions, elephants, killer whales, dolphins, and a ski show along with other wild life. Later the park's name was changed to Marine World Africa USA.
In 1986, the park was moved to Vallejo under Marine World Africa USA. Premier Parks purchased Marine World in 1996 and rides began to show up in the park in 1998.
Effective 2007, Six Flags rebranded Marine World into Six Flags Discovery Kingdom, with the emphasis of three major themed park sections --- Land, Sea, and Air. The Land area allows guests to interact with and observe wild animals in simulated natural habitats; the Sea area allows guests to interact with and observe marine life; and the Air area showcases the park's exciting amusement rides.
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| Reviews |
Sir Willow
Joined: May 2001
Posts: 3553
View Park/Ride Count
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June, 2001
Ahh, it's good to be back home after a week away. I finally made it to SFMW for the first time since they put in the rides. We used to go once a year when it was Marine World Africa USA and I always enjoyed the park then, so much of my report is seen through that filter.
I'll use a scale of 0-5, with 5 being the best.
I arrived at Six Flags Marine World about 45 minutes before opening since I didn't know what traffic would be like on the way. I was able to skip the parking fee ($10!!) since I'm a season pass holder, even though it's for a different Six Flags park, and I was there before 10am. That's a nice touch for pass holders - they can park free before 10am or after 6pm. I parked right in front of where the tram picks up since I was one of the first ones there, which was a good indication that lines would be short for the day (Wednesday). It was walk-on city for almost everything.
I got to wait around for a bit and watch them test run the coasters. From the front the park now looks like a mass tangle of coasters, but that's also because all of the coasters are in the front. I noticed that V2 and Medusa never got tests off before the park opened - not a good sign, and one that was confirmed by the signs saying that V2 was closed for the day because of an apparent breakdown the day before. So when the park opened, I immediately dashed around the right to Medusa, which was closed due to mechanical difficulties. Aarrgggghhhh. Okay, so off to Kong instead.
Kong - 4.0 (morning), 3.0 (afternoon/ evening)
I was on Kong's second run for the day in the front seat and 7th of the day in the back seat. Also got rides in the middle - a total of five rides. Kong is a Vekoma SLC that I really liked, actually. It features elements that I've never seen or experienced anywhere else and, contrary to what I'd heard, was very smooth in the morning. From the back it zips around, pulls some good g's, and offers a nice mix of loops, twists, and a couple of brief pops of airtime. The spot where one piece of track twists over another piece that it is laying on offers the scariest footchopper I've experienced so far. But it definitely banged around later on in the day after it had warmed up, bringing out some of that roughness I had heard about. My biggest beef was that after five years in the park, they still haven't done a bit of landscaping around the coaster. It's wild grass and weeds, some 2-3 feet tall, underneath. Why couldn't they have planted or landscaped this by now?
After Kong I headed over to Cobra:
Cobra - 2.5
Cobra is a nice family coaster with 20(!) cars. It definitely lives up to it's name and looks like a big long snake. Cobra has a nice little drop, two near helix turns taken fairly quickly at ground level, a bunny hop or two, and they give you two trips around the track for each ride. Definitely bigger than most kiddie coasters out there, and a fun little coaster, especially in the back. This is a great training coaster for little ones that won't bore the coaster nuts out there - and you don't need a kid to ride with you! But once again, the landscaping was dirt with a few plants here and there.
Medusa was still closed, so I headed out to Roar next, which was a nice surprise since my sister had been convincing me the day before that it had banged her around.
Roar - 4.5
Roar roared itself into my top 10 coasters with an exciting, twisting, turning ride that even after several rides still left me disoriented and not sure which direction I was going next. I also see now why some of you rave so much about the Millennium Flyer trains - very comfortable, padded seats with a divider, and a train that handles the twists and turns very well. Roar has the normal vibration of a woodie, and some good lats, but it doesn't hammer you like Paramount's Great America's Grizzly or Six Flags Magic Mountain's Psyclone does. It gives a very exciting ride in the back, but also fun in the front with the wide open rail that doesn't block any of the view. I kept finding myself coming back here again and again throughout the day. But again, just weeds growing around it that looked like they hadn't been chopped in weeks.
I then took some time to wander around the park and catch some of the sights, shows, and flat rides. Thankfully, the animal shows are still the same quality as in the past. Six Flags hasn't messed those up. They've also kept much of the animal park that I so enjoyed, though it's mostly at one end of the park. They do have a small train that seems like a bit of a waste, though, running along the shoreline that you can walk next to the entire route and that gets in the way of the Shark experience, a restaurant, and stage area for local talent, and a couple of other spots where there are track crossings.
Medusa was still closed (!) so I headed over to the Boomerang (2.5) which is just a typical boomerang. They have added in the catwalk since it valleyed a couple of years ago. It was also interesting that they only allowed the people who were getting on and off the train into the station, apparently for safety concerns. First time I've seen that, and I can imagine it slows things down a bunch, but not noticeable today, since it was a walk-on.
After this Medusa finally opened!! After all that I had heard about Medusa, I was psyched up for this coaster. And for my first ride I got a coveted front row seat, which happened to be next to an ACER who had been on over 100 coaster and had Medusa ranked at his number three, especially because of the Sea Serpent element. I was then able to later ride four more times - once more in front, two in back, and once in the middle, trying to make sure I had a balanced view of the ride.
All that said, Medusa ended up with a 3.5 from me. Yes, I actually enjoyed Kong more in the morning than I did Medusa. The front seat of the floorless didn't do much for me. In fact, the whole floorless gimmick just really didn't do anything for me. I loved the first drop, loop and dive roll combination. And there was one other element - I think it was a corkscrew, but it wasn't a normal one - that, between the airtime and hang time in the back, was incredible. But I found much of the rest of it (holds up shield to protect from repercussions) boring. In fact, the whole second half it was almost like B&M didn't know what else to do with it. And the sea serpent felt like a long, elongated and elevated corkscrew with little thrill to it. I would have much rather had the cobra roll that I heard is on Medusa East.
Overall I was disappointed with Medusa. And I tried to like it. Several of those rides were later in the day, after I had taken a break to try a little perspective. But by the end of the day Medusa was not in my top 10 overall, and I'm not sure that it made my top 10 steelies either, which isn't great with a track record of 64 coasters. Oh, and of course no landscaping. You could still see the parking lot lines under most of the coaster. Very sad.
They also had a pretty good mix of flat rides - much better than SFMM's (not that that says much) with some good for family and some very exciting ones. I have a new favorite flat after the trip - their Tasmanian Devil, a Huss Frisbee. What a great ride, and one that blew away the poor program on their top spin (four flips, then nothing but rocking). There were only two water rides - the rapids and a shoot-the-chutes, which didn't make a splash. Not good for a hot day. And the Dinoshere 3D action simulator was only in 2D today and looked rather cartoonish.
Other notes from the park and overall impressions:
Landscaping was in sad shape, especially around the coasters; it was bad enough that I made a complaint about it at guest services. Park patrons must have also been some of the (how do I say it politely) dumbest that I've seen. I can't tell you how many times I was stuck in a line that didn't have to exist because people didn't know how to enter a boarding station. If the line directly in front of them had people in it, they stopped and waited - even if every other boarding line was empty!
Employees got a mixed bag from me. The crews on Roar and Kong early in the day was slow, but evening crews were great. Boomerang's group was totally uninterested in their jobs. And the boarding crew on the rapids needed some serious retraining or something. It had the longest line (hour and half) of any ride, yet they continuously were sending out six-person boats with three, and sometimes even two people. Totally unacceptable. On the other hand, several of the flat ride employees were awesome, doing everything they could to ensure a fun time. I had several employees that were walking by greet me and occasionally ask how my day was going. And I was impressed that after the shows the people always came out to greet to the people who had watched the show - even the Batman water show.
My one other gripe was a lack of cool spots for a hot day. There were several food places, but only one was enclosed and air-conditioned: the former aquarium-turned Blue Water Cafe. $10 for an all you can eat buffet of salads, soups, scalloped potatoes, chicken, hot dogs, or BBQ beef. Not a bad price, not a great selection. But nice atmosphere with all the fish tanks around. Every other eating spot was outside, though, where it was hot. Also, many of the show areas did not have any covered or shaded seating, and I was surprised at the lack of "cool zones" with misters. I only saw two, and neither was working well. They definitely need to work on this.
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| 1-21-04 13:15:39 |
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Sir Willow
Joined: May 2001
Posts: 3553
View Park/Ride Count
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From 7/5/02
This one is going to be a little different than most of my
others. I visited the park with my kids, sister, father (55 years old
and not as young as he used to be), my foster sister and her daughter,
and a couple of my old college friends and their daughter. Needless to
say with all those kids we didn't do as much coastering as I might
without them, and we caught a lot more shows and exhibits. But I'll try
to give you a rundown on what we did see and experience.
We had originally planned on going on July 3rd. However through RRC and
other spots I got wind of a big radio promo that was going on that day
that were were afraid was going to flood the park with people (anyone
know how that turned out?) So we switched course a bit, went to
Waterworld on the 2nd (where I got the first bad sunburn of my life) and
hit SFMW on the 5th. We were still expecting fairly heavy crowds, being
the holiday weekend and all, we were pleasantly surprised to find that
the crowds really weren't bad at all, with the longest wait of the day
for anything being Medusa, which was probably around 45-50 minutes, and
many of the rides being walkons.
This was the first time visiting SFMW since they put in the rides that I
really tried to fully experience the park. My last visit was much more
focused on teh coaster as a whole, but this time we took in some of
everything. I've reviewed Cobra, Medusa, Roar (still awesome), and the
boomerang (not as rough this time) in the past, and my experiences this
time were very consistent with my last one, so if you want to see my
thoughts there the TR is up on the group website. Don't hesitate to
check it out there, cause I'm not going to go into them much here.
Really, there was one ride, one coaster that I wanted to experience on
this trip. One that I wanted to do above everything else and if it was
all I did I would be happy. And as things worked out, with wait times
of about 5-6 trains on average, I got to do it 5 times- V2. This is a
readically different impulse compared to the others now and all I can
say is that while the back spike is a bit shorter, and the hold/ hang on
it is not as good as on the others, the inline twist over the entrance
ROCKS! This very easily became my favorite of the impulses. It's
launch isn't quite as intense as I remember the others, but the hang
time in the twist (depending on where you sit) is a blast. You get
about 1/2 way through it on the first and third trips up the forward
spike, and all the way through on the second. Very smooth and taken at
just the right speed to make it a lot of fun. When I redo my lists of
top coasters (something to do when I get off this train tonight maybe),
it may very well make it up there. A very easy 9 and it stands very
well alongside Roar as my favorite rides in the park
Also thanks to my son I got in my first rides on their kiddie coaster,
where they gave everyone 3 trips around the course instead of the often
seen 2. Very nice, and it pulled some near wicked lats in the
turnaround into the station. However, being a kiddie coaster I'll
decline to score it.
We caught several of the shows (dolphins were ok, animal stunt show was
very good, sea lions were a pretty typical entertaining sea lion show,
and the ski show was also very good.) SFMW has also done a good job of
improving some of my landscaping complaints from my last trip. Though
they still haven't done anything about the parking lot under Medusa.
How many years and you still see all the parking stripes there? Just sad.
The Top Spin is still running it's tame program (though most in my
family liked it that way, including my dad who kept calling it the big
swing thing- arg!!) And the Jambo (falling star), thrilla gorilla (a
little like a music express), monkey business (giant teacups that look
like a gorilla) and some of the others were all favorite flats with
everyone. However height restrictions kept us off a lot of the others.
We closed out the day with their fireworks show, and I have to say that
SFMW put on one of the best aeriel displays I've seen, going about 25
minutes with music and an awesome finale! Not as good as Disney, but
they definately at least hold their own with every other show I've seen,
and outdid several of them.
Overall a very fun day at the park, and one that is a good one for
people who like a variety of things to do. With the rides in now, it's
impossible to do everything on one day. You may be able to see all the
shows, or maybe ride all the coasters and big thrill rides, but you're
not going to be able to do both. And leaving either one out means
you're going to be missing so much of what makes this a great park.
It's definately worth more than one visit if you can get it.
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| 1-21-04 13:16:48 |
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snafu
Joined: Jul 2003
Posts: 254
View Park/Ride Count
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4/7/04
Since I'm in Reno for work reasons, I decided to make my way to the great state of California and visit SFMW.
Since this is my first park for the year, you can imagine that I was pretty excited. I think I was the 5th car in the lot. $10 is a rip for parking if you ask me though. It's not like paying for parking makes the passes any cheaper.
I took the tram, since the lot is quite a bit away from the main gate, purchased my season pass and waited for the next 50 minutes for the park to open. SFOG at least had their season pass processing outside of the park - I digress.
The park was very clean and nicely thememed. The landscaping looked good as did all of the buildings. I would expect that this early in the season.
My first mission was to process my season pass. The season pass staff did a wonderful job. I was in and out in no time with minimal effort on my part. Just the way a guest should be treated. Excellent job.
The first ride of the day...what should it be. Since Medusa was close, I decided upon it. I love B&M rides. They're always so smooth. This one was no exception. The ride staff (minus one overweight woman) was right on the money. Did everything right. Great ride...I love B&M's...especially the floorless ones.
Next was Kong. Typical Vekoma ride. A bit of headbang through a couple of the elements, nothing more than I'd expect though.
I skipped Cobra because it looks funny when a grown man (33) gets on a family coaster alone.
I headed over to the other side of the park and to my chagrin...V2 was closed. I do like the impulse coasters. They're always good for that jolt of G-Forces that you look for. I settled on ROAR!
Roar is a great wooden coaster. I completely enjoyed this one. The ride ops were cool. The guy ride op on it the second time around actually made me laugh while waiting in the queline. That made the ride even more enjoyable.
Still no V2...after wandering around the park for a couple of hours. Same for Zonga, which I really wanted to ride. The mechanics were working on the whole ride, cars, track, lift, etc. They had the fiberglass panels off of the second train - not a good sign. Oh well...that's why they make season passes.
As for the shows...I only saw two and they were both well worth the time and I hate to go to shows when there are coasters in close proximity.
The Sea Lion and Dolphin shows were both well done and very entertaining.
Overall, a very good day. The staff seemed to be friendly although not too knowledgable when I asked them if Zonga or V2 would be running at any point during the day. I can't say that I'd visit SFMW again if I didn't have a pass, but I did enjoy it.
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| 4-8-04 2:50:29 |
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