The second stop on our whirlwind amusement park tour was Canada’s Wonderland, in Vaughan, Ontario, on Monday, July 18, 2016. We arrived at the park around 11:15am, after driving into Toronto the previous night and sleeping late. Canada’s Wonderland is a large, well-kept park with 69 total rides and 16 roller coasters, which is a lot. Like other former Paramount parks (Kings Island, Kings Dominion, etc), it has a large fountain at the entrance, headlined by a large monument. In Kings Island and Kings Dominion, this is the Eiffel Tower (1/3 scale). In Canada’s Wonderland, it is Wonder Mountain with a huge waterfall (Victoria Falls). Multiple coasters surround and enter the mountain.

Here is the park map (click to expand):

Ride ratings:


1. Behemoth
Canada’s Wonderland is anchored by two huge coasters, Behemoth and Leviathan, on opposite sides of the park. Steel, non-looping. 230 ft, 78 mph. Cool V-shaped seating. Big first hill with a view of Toronto and the park. Very smooth.
Eric: 8/10
Maria: 8/10

2. Back Lot Stunt Coaster
Was the Italian Job Coaster when Paramount still owned the park. Steel with train designed like 3 Mini Coopers. Quick turns and hills. None of the typical effects (fire, gunshot fire from helicopter) were running. Surprise dip at end. Maria hated how bumpy it was.
Eric: 6/10
Maria: 1/10

3. Orbiter
Not a roller coaster. Looked like a cool ride, with a near vertical centrifuge. Maria doesn’t ride such things, as they make her dizzy. Very smooth ride, but a long load time because they have to clip every person in by hand. Better than expected. The WindSeeker ride in the background of the picture was not running all day due to high winds.
Eric: 6/10

4. Wonder Mountain’s Guardian
Ride inside Wonder Mountain. I hesitate to call it a coaster. There is an extensive story, and you have a gun/laser on your seat, which you use to shoot 3D monsters. Train goes forward/backward/sideways. Surprise drop at end. I got the lowest score of the train for shooting monsters poorly.
Eric: 4/10
Maria: 6/10

5. Thunder Run
Steel coaster that runs the same track through Wonder Mountain twice. The ride uses a drive motor with a rubber wheel in the front of the train to drive it around the track, rather than a traditional lift. Flat, smooth, but had a long wait due to only one train (runs same track twice). Prototyping a virtual reality experience, but we didn’t try it.
Eric: 2/10
Maria: 4/10

6. Wild Beast
One of the original coasters of the park, it was formerly at Coney Island in Cincinnati. Wooden, bumpy. Track runs out and back twice.
Eric: 4/10
Maria: 3/10

7. Skyhawk
Not a roller coaster, but Wonderland’s new ride for 2016. You control wings that allow you to rock back and forth. If you exert some effort, you can get going back and forth enough to start spinning laterally. I spun 7 times. How do I know that? There was screen at the end of the ride with a picture of each passenger and a tally of how many times they flipped (camera photo of screen above, I’m in the 2nd row, 2nd column from the right). Only 3/24 passengers decided to flip on our ride, and I was second with 7 flips. Would have had more, but I was seeing if I could stop and get spinning the other way before the ride ended. Nope. Relatively short ride.
Eric: 7/10
Maria: 6/10

8. Vortex
Steel, but pretty bumpy. Hanging coaster near Wonder Mountain. If you are familiar with Kings Island, it is similar to Top Gun/Flight Deck/The Bat (stupid name changes), not at all similar to The Vortex.
Eric: 4/10
Maria: 4/10

9. The Bat
A Boomerang coaster. Seems like almost every park has one of these. You run the same track, once forward, once backward. This one was kind of cool because the line wound between the lifts, as shown above. Not at all similar to The Bat at Kings Island.
Eric: 5/10
Maria: 6/10

10. Leviathan
Giant steel non-looping coaster. 5486 ft long, 306 ft tall, 92 mph. 8th tallest/fastest coaster in the world (3rd tallest with a traditional lift hill). Very smooth. Good first drop with lots of air-time in seat. Line moves quickly and ride loads quickly. We rode it twice, back to back.
Eric: 9/10, 9/10
Maria: 9/10, 9/10

11. Dragon Fire
Steel, looping. First drop is lousy. 2 loops are slow. Bumpy. No good. No knee room. Only redeeming fact was its cool location with the track intertwining Leviathan a bit. Maria wisely did not ride. That is my hand sticking up in the back car above, taken by Maria.
Eric: 2/10

12. Flight Deck
Steel, hanging. Bumpy. Cool corkscrew. However, the shoulder pads were so painful that it was hard to enjoy.
Eric: 3/10
Maria: 3/10

13. Time Warp
Interesting idea: you lay on your stomach and fly on a track that doesn’t really have hills or drops, just turns as you go down. Loading/unloading seemed hectic and dangerous. Headrests lead to a lot of brain rattling, and both Maria and I felt ill after this ride (though that may have been the cumulative effect of so many coasters in one day).
Eric: 4/10
Maria: 4/10

We left the park at 8pm after almost 9 hours in the park. Lots of rides, but really only Leviathan stands out.