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Ride Rehabs - The following information is not guaranteed to be 100% accurate.
Windseeker - NOW CLOSED until Further Notice
Timber Mountain Log Ride - NOW CLOSED through 5/27/13

Park News - (5/20/13) You know Summer is almost here when the waterparks start to open. Case in point, Knott's Soak City is now open and one of our readers, ThemeParkHD, was on hand to shoot some video of the first day of splashing fun in 2013 from a variety of attractions in the park.
    (5/6/13) Windseeker is still closed at Knott’s Berry Farm this week… while the other Windseekers around the continent have opened up except for Cedar Point which is expected to open with the park’s season next weekend.
    The delay at Knott’s is said to be in part because of state inspections and possibly a live rescue drill is expected to be required before Knott’s reopens the ride. In short, they’ve got to schedule all the players have to be in place at one time so Knott’s can show off the rescue platform in action which is taking longer than expected. So why is this taking so long?  Mostly because Knott’s has bigger fish to fry right now. The majority of the park staff required to get Windseeker checked off has their hands full finishing up the Log Ride refurbishment as well as opening up the park’s three new 2013 rides. Once these issues are taken care of, then they’ll focus some attention back on Windseeker.
    (4/23/13) ThemeParkReview took a tour through Knott’s Berry Farm the other day, checking out the construction site of the Coast Rider as well as checking out details about what is to come for the extensive Log Ride renovation project. This includes a look INSIDE the mountain itself as they work on overhauling one of the ride’s indoor scenes. (On a side note: They also confirmed no more changing out the scenery and props for Halloween or Christmas anymore.) Check it out.
    (3/28/13) Cedar Fair has so far made changes to the Fast Lane system at several parks for the 2013 season, increasing the cost of Fast Lane in most cases by $5, and offering a new Fast Lane Plus program for an additional $10-15 with the benefit of exclusive access to two of the park’s more popular coasters.
   So far California’s Great America, Worlds of Fun, Dorney Park, Michigan’s Adventure and Valleyfair are still offering the same Fast Lane access as last season, with no sign of Fast Lane Plus yet. It is also interesting to note that Knott’s Berry Farm is also sticking with the regular Fast Lane system for now, though the park’s proximity to Disneyland and their free Fastpass program may keep Fane Lane Plus away from Knott’s for the time being... or at least until Haunt season.
    (3/27/13) Westcoaster has posted a new report from Knott’s Berry Bloom this week, which is kind of a Knott’s version of the Epcot Flower & Garden festival going on now in Florida. They also take a look at the progress on the new Coast Rider coaster which is now already nearly complete.
    (3/15/13) A reader sent in a new photo from Knott’s this week, showing off the park staff setting up that new evac platform on Windseeker.
    (3/8/13) Knott’s has reopened the Boomerang which looks awesome with the fresh new paint job. Check out a nice collection of pictures sent in by a read er showing off the Boomer as well as an odd new contraptuion Knott’s is testing out that rolls out and installs to the bottom of the Windseeker. With arms on each side that go out to small platforms, it appears this is an evacuation platform. If this works out at Knott’s, I’ve got a hunch we will see these rolled out to the other Windseekers in the chain later this year.
    (3/4/13) Knott’s Berry farm has confirmed that the park will not only reopen the famous Timber Mountain Log Ride on May 25th, but has also chosen that date to open the park’s three new 2013 rides: Coast Rider, Surfside Glider and Pacific Scrambler.
    (2/28/13) Today we get another quick peek at all the project’s in progress at Knott’s Berry Farm thanks to the WestCoaster crew.
    (2/25/13) Good news this week for Knott’s Berry Farm passholders because The Farm announced on Facebook that passholders will now receive their (10% or 20% discounts, depending on your pass type) at all Knott’s food locations both inside and outside the park gates. Previously the discount was limited to mostly a few sit-down locations inside the park, but now it is valid everywhere, even at the carts.
    (1/18/13) Theme Park Review has announced the details of the 2013 West Coast Bash event, which will take place at Six Flags Magic Mountain on Saturday, Sept. 7th and Knott’s Berry Farm on Sunday, Sept. 8th. Click here to see the official details.

Knott’s Scary Farm 2013 - (6/18/13) Knott’s Scary Farm has released a little more info about the 2013 Halloween Haunt on their Facebook page. In addition to the new Forevermore maze, they have now confirmed that last year’s Trick-Or-Treat maze will be returning with some all new tricks and fun changes to keep it fresh. Pinocchio Unstrung will also return for the 2013 season. On the show side of things they have confirmed a new show called Possessed will premier in the Mystery Lodge Theater.
    (6/6/13) Knott’s Berry Farm leaked out information on the first of their new haunts for the 2013 Knott’s Scary Farm event. This one will be called Forevermore and inspired by the works and world of Edgar Allan Poe. According to the Facebook posting, “Forevermore is gothic horror with a modern day twist. Will you escape? Or will you remain in the horror Forevermore…?” Look for this to be installed behind Mystery Lodge.

2013 - Timber Mountain Log Ride Update - Confirmed - (6/3/13) While the Timber Mountain Log Ride was not ready to open for the Media on Thursday, it did finally open for guests the following day. Our friends over at ThemeParkHD managed to shoot a great POV video from the front of the very first log! You’ll quickly see that all of the scenes and animated figures have been dramaticly upgraded inside the mountain, bringing the classic ride into the 21st century and it looks beautiful! Check it out below!

    (5/30/13) It looks like Knott’s is on a serious time crunch to get the log ride back up and running in time for the grand re-opening event. A video was shot on Monday morning showing work crews hoisting themed items up and into the mountain. Check it out below.

    (5/7/13) The Season Pass Podcast is back with Episode #232 where they go deep undercover to learn all about the Timber Mountain Log Ride refurbishment, talking with Raffi Kaprelyan and Jennifer Blazey of Knott’s Berry Farm, Garner Holt, Bill Butler and Tony Baxter.
    (1/3/13) Knott’s Berry Farm issued a major announcement earlier today, confirming that the park will spend several million dollars on a massive renovation to the Timber Mountain Log Ride over the next five months.
    “Garner Holt Productions of San Bernardino will assist in the revitalization project that is expected to take five months. Garner Holt is the world’s largest designer and manufacturer of animatronics for theme parks, museums, dining and retail locations and has built nearly 3,000 animatronic figures and hundreds of animated props and show action systems. Garner Holt will work with the Knott’s team to upgrade all the ride figures and sets as well as add new scenes and characters to enhance the ride experience while still maintaining the original theming and storyline of the attraction.”
    I can’t wait to see how this turns out… and maybe they’ll turn an eye on updating the old Calico Mine Ride next year too.

2013 - Coast Rider, Pacific Scrambler, Surfside Glider - (5/31/13) The offic ial Media Day for Knott’s Berry Farm to open the new Boardwalk Pier area and three new ride, as well as reopen and dedicate the Timber Mountain Log Ride took place Thursday morning. A member of the Scream Team was there to cover the event for us, take some picture, video and ride the rides.
    The new Boardwalk Pier addition actually looks great, and is a colorful new addition to the park, adding in three new rides (Coast Rider, Surfside Glider and Pacific Scramber) to take the place of the former Perilous Plunge ride, so it’s nice to see the park add some extra capacity. I’m told that the while the Coast Rider is essentially the same coaster as the Technics Test Track at Legoland California, Knott’s seems to be running this one without as many trim brakes, so it has been reported as seeming to run quite a bit faster.
    After the opening of the Boardwalk Pier, the crowds moved over to the Timber Mountain Log Ride for the rededication. Unfortunately, things soon ground to the halt after that, because workers were still walking in the flume and trying to finish things up as quickly as possible. They had hoped to open it later in the day, but after several hours and no sign of any testing of logs in the flume, Steve, our man on the scene called it a day and departed. Hopefully the log ride will be ready to open any day now.

    (5/27/13) Fun times at Knott’s Berry Farm this past weekend as the park opened the new Coast Rider roller coaster along with the Pacific Scrambler and Surfside Glider. GhostRider also reopened after a long rehab as well, now ready for the busy summer season. ThemeParkHD has posted new POV videos shot on the new Coast Rider and GhostRider which I’ve embedded below. The video for Coast Rider was shot at night, but also shows off all the great lighting that Knott’s has put into this new themed area, making it look great at after dark.


    (5/1/13) The latest news from Westcoaster’s new Knott’s Berry Farm update reports that Coast Riders cars are testing, the Flyers are up and the Scrambler will be back in place very very soon.
    (4/17/13) A new construction update from Knott’s has been posted to Westcoaster this week showing off the progress on the Coast Rider, Flyers, Scrambler and more.
    (4/5/13) Knott’s posted a very cool POV shot of the Coast Rider’s lift hill the other day, rising up into the blue California sky. I don’t imagine it will be too much longer before they start to test cars on it. Meanwhile a construction update from around the park has been posted to WestCoastThrills.
    (3/29/13) A new update for Knott's Berry Farm was posted to Westcoaster today, who reports that the track for Coast Rider is now fully installed with the exception of the station and transfer track areas.
    (3/25/13) Coast Rider at Knott’s is going up very quickly. Two pictures posted to Knott’s Facebook page show off just how quickly the new coaster is being installed along with confirmation that the ride’s 52 foot tall lift hill has also been fully installed.
    (2/20/13) A great construction update from Knott’s has been posted to Westcoaster this week, who shows off the who also takes a look at the goings-on at Windseeker. I’m hearing from locals that the ride has been seen testing several times early in the morning hours before the park opens this week. From the photos posted, they are loading it down with weight in the seats for these test runs... using not just water dummies, but also heavy sacks of quickcrete.
   Meanwhile the new Boomerang paint job is coming right along and I think is going to turn out very nice. It also looks like the footers for Coast Rider are nearly complete, but so far no coaster parts and pieces have been seen on site, so it will be a little longer until vertical construction begin.
    (2/4/13) West Coast Thrills has posted a new construction update from Knott’s Berry Farm this week, checking out the construction site of Coast Rider and new flat rides on the former Perilous Plunge site.
    (1/8/13) A new progress and construction update from Knott’s Berry Farm has been posted to Westcoaster this week.
    (12/18/12) A new construction update on the Coast Rider at Knott’s Berry Farm has been posted to Westcoaster.
    (12/13/12) Westcoaster reports in from Knott’s this week where they check out the latest holiday happenings taking place around the park, as well as spy on the start of construction for Coast Rider.
    (11/2/12) Knott’s Berry Farm confirmed that their plans for 2013 were exactly what I had been hearing rumors about for weeks. Three new rides will be placed into the old Perilous Plunge location include Coast Rider, a Mack Extended Mouse coaster, with a layout very similar to the one running at Legoland California.
    Pacific Scrambler, the family favorite ride returns to The Boardwalk at last.
    Surfslide Glider, a new Flying Scooters ride.
According to the concept art, the later two rides will make use of the old Plunge bridge and be placed onto platforms surrounded by water.

    (10/16/12) While no one knows quite what is going on at Knott’s for 2013, all the latest rumors seems to point to two attractions coming in to replace Plunge. If the older rumors are true, we can expect these to be a return of the park’s old Scrambler ride and the rumored Expanded Mack Mouse layout, identical to the Technics coaster at Legoland. An announcement may come sometime after Halloween.
    Speaking of which, Westcoaster has posted an update today that features a look at the old Plunge splashdown pool, which has been carefully saved from demolition. Oh, and the Stanley Cup came to visit Knott’s as well and posted for many pictures.  (So what happens when they run out of room to engrave the winner’s names on the cup?)
    (10/12/12) Screamscape sources confirm that the old splashdown pool from Perilous Plunge will remain to be reused for one of the next new attractions.
    (10/3/12) Rumor has it that the new family coaster that may be added to Knott’s could very well be a clone of the Technic Test Track coaster at Legoland California. As for the rumored Giga... we’ve got a new update on that as well below.
    (9/24/12) More rumors leaking in on Knott’s future plans. The latest word claims that in addition to a couple of flat rides, the parks next coaster may also be added… but it would only be something the size of a Mad Mouse style coaster. Can you say capacity nightmare? Disney has had enough capacity problems with their own mouse coaster down the road. Not to mention Knott’s has a pretty extensive collection of tiny family friendly coasters already: Jaguar, Pony Express, Sierra Sidewinder and Timberline Twister.
    (9/21/12) Has Knott’s pushed back their rumored mega-coaster project? We’ve heard a terrible rumor for the park’s 2013 project that not only seems to indicate that this may be so, but also that we may only see a couple of flat rides added to the park in 2013. Ok… flat rides are cool… but in this case I’m hearing that one of the may be the return of the park’s original Scrambler ride. You know… the one that has been moved around the park countless times and given more fake names than your average Spy?  You may recall it was set up indoors once as Whirlpool, set up under Windjammer as Headspin, or moved across from Bigfoot Rapids as Wilderness Scrambler for a short time before being displaced by Pony Express. Well… word has it that the ride was kept in storage all this time and may be coming back to The Farm, ironically close to where it once was set up as Whirlpool so many years ago. No word on what the other flat ride may be just yet, but I’m hoping this rumor is wrong, because Knott’s finger has sort of slipped off the pulse of the thrill seekers for too long now. This was especially evident in Summer 2012 when virtually every park in California pulled out the big guns except for Knott’s. If I still ran the old Screamscape Ultimate Awards, Knott’s would surely take the annual “We sat on our ass & did nothing! Award”. (Look it up! Past winners included Walt Disney World in 2000 and Islands of Adventure took it for three years straight from 2001-2003)
    (9/10/12) Several photos showing off the demolition of Perilous Plunge at Knott’s have been posted to the Knott’s Network fan page on Facebook. How does this tie into the park’s next coaster? I’ve also heard a weird rumor that we may see the splashdown pool and possible the bridge remain in place so they can be reused as part of a splash-down effect for Knott’s next coaster, which makes perfect sense if the B&M rumors are also true. Keep your eyes open.
    (8/28/12) The latest rumor in about Knott’s next coaster is a big disturbing, as this source claims that it will be a more modest size ride will simply take up the current site of Perilous Plunge only. Sounds very disappointing if true… but I’m hoping not.

2013-2015 - GhostRider Rehab - Rumor - (8/20/12) I’ve don’t have a timeline on this, but I’ve heard that sometime in the next three years, Knott’s is considering bringing on Rocky Mountain Coasters to perform a major rehab to GhostRider. This is not an Iron Horse conversion, but more along the lines of a Topper Track style rehab and retracking job. New trains to replace the current PTC trains are also being considered.

2013-2015 - Calico Mine Ride Rehab - Rumor - (6/17/13) An interesting find was discovered on the Garner Holt website… concept artwork drawn up for scenes and animatronic for an updated Calico Mine Ride at Knott’s Berry Farm. Click here and scroll down.
    (2/18/13) According to the latest rumors I’ve heard from a few different sources that Knott’s does hope to perform a major refurbishment to the Calico Mine Train attraction in the next couple of years, similar to the major refurbishment taking place right now on the Log Ride.

2015/2016 - Giga Coaster - Rumor - (10/12/12) More Screamscape sources have confirmed that the Hyper/Giga coaster project for the park is still on the books, but is still a few years away.
    (10/3/12) Good News / Bad News time. The good news is that apparently Knott’s still has that long rumored Giga coaster in their sights. The bad news is that I’m hearing it wont happen until at least 2015 or 2016. Seems they have a few other projects to put on the fire first.
    (8/20/12) The latest rumor on the Knott’s 2013 coaster claims that it may end up being a near clone of Leviathan that opened at Canada’s Wonderland in 2012. Of course this only adds more fuel to the old rumor that claimed Leviathan was originally intended for Knott’s and shifted to Canada at the last second when Knott’s Windseeker ride failed to open until the very end of the 2011 summer season.  There is also a chance that Knott’s may not plan on opening this ride until Winter 2013 rather than Summer 2013. While a rare move, the park has had some good success with winter openings in the past.
    (8/16/12) While Intamin was heavily rumored for the next Knott’s coaster project, the latest buzz I’ve been hearing does seem to indicate that Intamin may have been dropped entirely from the project in favor of B&M.
    (8/15/12) Knott’s new 2013 coaster looks like it should be moving full steam ahead at last. The rumors all point to a Giga sized coaster, possibly in the range of 325-340 feet tall. Intamin is still the rumored designer, though I have heard B&M’s name dropped as well a couple of times. All those wild survey markers seen around the park about 18 months ago may all come into play once again, with a crazy ride layout that could very well run wild over a large portion of the park..
    (6/27/11) This rumor is a bit out there… so please take it all with a big chunk of salt in case it’s entirely bogus, but I’ve been sent a short list of very impressive stats for what Knott’s next coaster project MIGHT BE.  As I said… this is all very out there right now, and if these stats are even close to being true for a possible 2012 project, Knott’s is going to have to start work on this project very soon.
    Now, you might be asking yourselves, if the rumor is so wild, why do I post it at all? Simply because the stats match up with what I’ve been hearing about for the past year… that Knott’s was in the process of designing their version of version of Intimidator. This is said to be an Intamin Giga-coaster of the highest degree, with a custom layout inspired by both Intimidator 305 and Millennium Force. In short, Knott’s could be on the verge of building what many might consider to be the best roller coaster in the world.
    While I don’t know anything really solid about the layout, it very well could travel throughout quite a bit of the park. Many might recall all those crazy survey markings that appeared throughout about half of the park about a year ago. The overall length of the ride is rumored to be just shy of 6000 feet, putting it just slightly behind Disney’s California Screamin’ coaster in overall length. As for the height… we’re talking about a coaster that could stand just shy of 340 feet with an amazing 85º first drop back down to Earth. As long as the actual height of the first drop was at least 328 feet, I believe the top speed of this coaster would hit at least 100 mph. That would make this ride the tallest and fastest NON-LAUNCHED coaster in the entire world. One for the record books for sure… now if only our crystal ball is clear on this one. Wait and see… wait and see…

???? - New Dark Ride - Rumor - (3/18/13) It sounds like Knott’s Berry Farm has a lot of possible projects waiting to be approved lately. There is the long rumored Giga coaster project, the restoration of the Calico Mine Train looking for funding as early as next year (assuming the Log Ride refurbishment goes well), and now I’m starting to hear talk about plans being developed at long last to put a new dark ride experience into the old Kingdom of the Dinosaurs building. That is one I’d like to see put into action sooner than later, as it has sat empty for long enough. I haven’t heard much in the way of details yet, though I did hear that they do want to make it interactive with the riders, though I’m not sure if they means a gun style shoot ‘em up ride or if they are planning on something a little different. Stay tuned!
    (3/19/12) According to MiceChat’s interview with new Knott’s GM Raffi Karprelyan, Knott’s and Cedar Fair have been talking with various dark ride manufacturers about some ideas for new dark rides to add to the park. And with that I say… about damn time! Its nice to see a new can-do attitude about dark rides at Knott’s under Raffi and Matt Ouimet, when the previous holdback was the old Cedar Fair management’s fear of being compared directly to whatever Disney was doing down the street. When I quizzed a former Knott’s GM about this very topic years ago, I was flat out told that no matter what Knott’s did, it wouldn’t be as good as Disney, “so why even try?” It was this attitude that saw Kingdom of the Dinosaurs shut down and sit empty for almost a decade.
    For even more talk with Raffi, check out the latest edition of the Season Pass Podcast recorded during the West Coast Bash event.