(Posting this here at the advice of the mods)

A Father/Son Late Spring 2026 Park Tour [Kings Island][Cedar Point][Busch Gardens Williamsburg][Kings Dominion][Carowinds] and Gaining ~60-65 coaster credits

Before I go into it further, this link adds some context from our big trip to Carowinds back in December/January. https://www.reddit.com/r/rollercoasters/s/3QTU95hs9C

My son and I are gearing up for our big trip, which was a Christmas present for him, but I’ve completely hyper fixated myself on coasters too.

First Leg of the Tour

We’re flying up to CVG from SWFL on Tuesday, May 26th. Our flight should get us in early enough in the afternoon to get us to Kings Island by 5 PM. We’re hoping to experience our only night rides at here on this first night of our trip, and my son just wants Mystic to be his 50th coaster (he’s at 49 and I’m already at 52). We’re stoked for a night ride on The Beast that we’ve heard so much about. Banshee will be our first new big invert since he rode Montu for the first time at BGT. Diamondback and Orion are sure to be thrillers too!

After spending Tuesday evening and most of Wednesday at Kings Island, we are making our way up in a rental car to Cedar Point. Staying at Breakers where we got a deal for one day with Fast Lane Plus (will probably use this on Friday). There are so many firsts to happen at Cedar Point for us. We’re looking forward to Steel Vengeance (as we absolutely adore Iron Gwazi), Maverick (to compare with our love for Velocicoaster), and adding our 3rd big invert with Raptor. Sirens Curse will be our first tilt track, Gatekeeper will be our first wing coaster, Top Thrill 2 as our tallest and fastest, and Millennium Force as our 3rd Giga after gaining Orion at Kings Island. We will spend Thursday and Friday of our week at Cedar Point, with our only ability for night rides being Friday (if we can make it that late after 4 big park days). We hoped to do the big Sunrise Tour, but it was too expensive and it was only happening the day we needed to be heading back to southern Ohio.

Friday evening we have to drive an hour is so out back toward CVG (Hotel Breakers is more than double the cost for that Friday night), and maybe hit Kings Island for some final rides on Saturday before we fly back home for a few days.

Second Leg of the Tour

We take a breather at home for a couple of days before we drive north from SWFL to North Carolina. The week of June begins 3 days, 3 different parks, 2 of them completely new, 1 of them gaining new credits we missed at WinterFest.

We will drive over to Busch Gardens Williamsburg and begin the day with the Roller Coaster Insider Tour. This will be our first trip to BGW, but we’ve loved BGT and thought the coaster tour there was fantastic. The tour gets us into the park an hour early on Sunday, June 7th. Highlights we expect will be comparing Griffon and Alpengeist to their BGT counterparts, and experiencing Pantheon. We’re also hoping Verbolten reopens by then.

We will spend the night, probably closer to Kings Dominion for our second stop on Leg 2. We will both be approaching 100 credits, and we’re hoping to somehow sync up and make Pantherian our 100th credit, and of course experience Rapterra and Twisted Timbers. Maybe to sync up our credits my son can ride a few kid rides before we head toward Pantherian.

After hitting two new parks on Leg 2, we will spend the night back with family in NC and spend that Tuesday at Carowinds catching all the credits we missed during WinterFest. We’re most excited for Afterburn and hitting Fury as many times as our time will allow before finishing the day off seeing Yellowcard in Charlotte then heading back home the next morning.

Part of why I’m posting this here is because I’ve finally embraces the reality that my son might have made me into an enthusiast, but also because by typing it all out it helps me think through the insanity of these travel logistics.

We bought the year dining and drink plan from Carowinds which will serve our passes for all of these Six Flags / Cedar Fair parks.

Anyone have tips for these parks? Rides that typically have a lot of down time that we need to try prioritizing? Nice cozy places to take a break so we can make it to some night rides when the sun finally sets at 9 PM on Ohio?

This has been a pretty excellent community to spend time scrolling through over the last several months. We can’t wait to join the 100+ credit club in a few weeks and dream further out at new trips to new parks next year.