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Busch Gardens Tampa offers it’s visitors a great mix of thrill rides and animal exhibits.  It’s a beautiful park with excellent landscaping and exotic foliage.  Our only visit to the park was on a Monday in early October so crowds were not an issue at all.  Weather was supposed to be an issue but all that we had to deal with was an occasional threatening cloud.  In the Midwest we know all about humidity and even we weren’t prepared for the stickiness of central Florida.  We ate at the Crown Colony Restaurant mid way through the day and I think that everyone in the group would be willing to recommend this as a place to sit down, relax and enjoy a good meal.

 

We arrived at the park shortly before it opened at 10am and once the gates opened we high tailed it for SheiKra.  This was the park’s most recent coaster addition and the only dive coaster in the United States.  The dive coaster concept involves a single 3 row car that is 8 seats wide but it gets it’s name from the fact that it descends a vertical section of track for it’s initial drop.  SheiKra actually does this twice with the 2^nd dive happening half way through the ride.  This is a very attractive ride and it can be seen from all over the park.  The best place to witness this contraption in action is from the walkways below it.  The ride traverses the park paths and a couple of shopping and dinning areas, which attracts a lot of onlookers.

 

SheiKra:  8 out of 10

SheiKra is a fun filled intense ride from beginning to end.  At the top of the first drop you’re temporarily held in a brake where you’re left to think about the oncoming plunge.  This brief stop just before the dive also provides an exceptional view of the park.  The drop itself is wild and I still haven’t been able to come up with a comparable experience.  This is followed by a giant immelmann and then after a turn or two it’s on to the mid course brakes.  Be sure to catch your breath here because the next step is another vertical dive, this time into a tunnel.  Once returning to the surface you make your way to the splash pool and the car uses scoops to throw water all over the place.  The riders stay dry for the most part but near by onlookers are punished for their proximity to the track (I got caught looking just like a lot of other people).  A few more turns and then it’s into the final set of brakes.  We rode SheiKra 4 times and I found the back row to be the most enjoyable but if you have the time you’ll need to experience the front row at least once.

 

 

Montu:  8 out of 10

Montu is an inverted coaster and being a huge invert fan I was really looking forward to this ride.  It’s one of the tallest invert in the entire country and it’s fast and long.  The theming in this area of the park is excellent and Montu’s uses this theming to it’s advantage.  The elements come one right after the other and you’ll spend a lot of time near the ground or in trenches that are used to create a foot chopper effect.  Near the end of the ride you fly out of one trench flip over and dive right into another.  We also rode this one 4 times and the back was once again the winner.  I was looking forward to this ride for months and it didn’t disappoint.

 

 

Kumba:  7 out of 10

Kumba is probably the most intense ride in the park.  The g-forces are extreme, speed is great and it seems to have every inversion known to the coaster world.  This is another ride that makes great use of the ground as it travels through trenches, tunnels and under bridges.  We were only able to ride this one 3 times because of it’s intensity.  The middle rows are the safest place to ride on this coaster while the back rows provide even more intensity.

 

 

Gwazi Tiger:  5 out of 10

Gwazi is a dueling wooden coaster, which means that it’s two coasters that fly past each other in several spots.  The only side that was open was Tiger and Lions was closed due to maintenance reasons.  With only one side being open we got gypped out of the dueling experience and instead had to settle for yet another intense ride, this time on wood.  Gwazi Tiger has a lot of up’s and down’s and even more side to side action, you really get thrown around.  I’m a tall feller so I complain about this a lot but this ride was really lacking in leg room.  My knees were plastered to the row in front of us and this can make things uncomfortable really quickly.  We only rode one time.

 

 

Cheetah Chase is your standard run of the mill mouser but I’m a big fan of mousers and this one was just as enjoyable as any other.  It possesses a nice collection of dips and turns and that’s all that you can ask for on one of these. 

 

 

Python is an Arrow double corkscrew coaster and these also seem to be quite common (at least they used to).  For a tall guy like me this ride will put a lot of pressure on your shoulders.  It’s a short ride so discomfort never makes it into the equation.  I pretty much share a birthday with Python so I feel a little closer to it than I would have if this wasn’t the case.

 

 

Scorpion:  3 out of 10

Scorpion reminds me of a lot of the other Schwarzkopf loopers that I’ve been on.  It’s a short ride with a bit of discomfort.  Every Coaster deserves at least one ride so give this one a shot just like you would any other.

 

 

 

 

These are reviewed based on the ratings of other noncoaster rides.

 

 

Stanley Falls is the parks log ride and it doesn’t stand out one way or the other.  The surroundings are nice but this applies to most of the park.  If you like log rides then you’ll want to hop in this one. 

 

Rhino Rally is an interesting idea.  You’re loaded into an SUV that seats probably 10-12 people and you drive through some of the animal exhibits and you even experience a close encounter with a Rhino.  Late in the ride the path breaks away and you’re transported via a raft/section of path back to the beginning.  This was our longest wait of the day at 30 minutes.  It was an interesting idea. 

 

 

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