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KNOTT’S BERRY FARM
Buena Park, California
Six Flags Entertainment
---- THE LATEST BUZZ ----
(4/30/2025) New Montezooma's Revenge Track Finally Arrives
(4/25/2025) Montezooma's Revenge Construction Update
(4/16/2025) Knott's Soak City - 2025 Season Update
(3/29/2025) New Whispers About Montezooma's Revenge
(3/10/2025) Knott's Berry Farm Preparing for the 10th Annual Boysenberry Festival
Ride Rehabs - These dates are not guaranteed to be 100% accurate as refurbishments are subject to change.
Montezooma’s Revenge - NOW CLOSED through ????
Wipeout - NOW CLOSED through TBD
GhostRider - May 5 through May 16
Snoopy’s Tenderpaw Twister - May 6 through May 17
Coast Rider - May 19 through May 23
Pony Express - June 2 through June 6
Screamscape has posted our official review of Knott's Scary Farm 2021. Click here to see all the details.
See the official review of 2019’s new Calico River Rapids - Click here
Screamscape has posted our official review of Knott's Scary Farm 2017 this week. Click here to see all the details.
Screamscape has posted our official review of Knott's Scary Farm 2016 this week. Click here to see all the details.
You can read Screamscape’s full review of the Knott’s Scary Farm 2015 Halloween Haunt. Check it out here.
  Park News - (4/16/2025) Knott’s Berry Farm fans, be aware that Knott’s Soak City will open for the 2025 season starting on May 17th. While you can look forward to some general refubishments, there has been no new attraction added this season.
(3/10/2025) Just a reminder that from March 28 through to April 27, Knott’s Berry Farm will be hosting the 10th Annual Knott’s Boysenberry Festival. For those not in the know, it was the decision by Walter Knott’s to commercially cultivate the “Boysenberry” that really put his farm on the map. While Knott’s didn’t create the Boysenberry, which is thought to be a cross-bred creation between a Raspberry and Blackberry, Walter Knott’s was called in as a berry expert by a member of the US Department of Agriculture to look into the new creation, credited to a Rudolph Boysen, who had since abandoned his efforts with the berry and sold his farm. Knott transplanted some barely surviving vines back to his park in Buena Park and the rest was history.
“Cheers to 10 Years with Boysenberry Beer”
“There’s no better way to celebrate 10 years of the Knott’s Boysenberry Festival than experiencing more than 80 signature boysenberry menu offerings. New savory items include “The Stack” boysenberry BBQ pulled pork over boysenberry corn bread and coleslaw, French toast stuffed with boysenberry cream cheese, and Thai crunch peanut salad with boysenberry peanut dressing. New sweet treats include boysenberry cheesecake crisp pie, a vegan white chocolate and boysenberry tart, and a boysenberry ice cream sandwich. Returning favorites include boysenberry elote, boysenberry honey garlic chicken wings, and boysenberry sausage on a hoagie. Guests can wash it down with one of the many boysenberry drinks such as a boysenberry sangria, boysenberry and lavender lemonade, boysenberry tequila smash and so much more. A great way to enjoy it all is by purchasing a tasting card priced at $55. The tasting card offers six tastings from several boysenberry-inspired dishes and drinks. “
“No boysenberry festival is complete without a boysenberry pie eating contest, and this year has a twist. The NEW Boysen Bear’s Pie Kitchen Games in Calico Park invites guests to help thwart those sneaky coyote pups, Moxie and Brawny, from stealing all the pies! Once they save the day, they can celebrate on the Calico Mine Stage at the Boysen Bear’s Pie Eating Contest. The adventures continue at the Birdcage Theatre with The Great Bank Robbery, an all-new show that will have the audience cheering the hero and booing the villain.”
(1/14/2025) Knott’s Berry Farm will celebrate 75 Years of Snoopy and the Peanuts Gang at the park from Feb. 8 through Mar. 9th, 2025. As part of the celebration Knott’s will put on a brand-new musical Peanuts themed show called Let’s Celebration. Guests may also enjoy visiting a new limited-time art exhibit, “The Life and Art of Charles M. Schulz” inside of the Calico Town Hall.
Of course the Peanuts gang characters, along with Snoopy, will be on hand for meet and greets with the guests, and iconic photo ops will be set up across the park. After dark the Calico Mine Stage will transform into Snoopy’s Legendary Rooftop Concert.
Visit the official park website to learn more.
(12/12/2024) Knott’s Berry Farm has posted a rundown of the dates for the park’s major special events set to take place in 2025. The list includes:
Knott’s PEANUTS Celebration - Feb. 8 to Mar. 9
Knott’s Boysenberry Festival - Mar. 28 to Apr. 27
Summer at Knott’s & Ghost Town Alive! - June 13 to Sept. 1
Knott’s Soak City 2025 Season - May 17 to Sept. 7
Knott’s Scary Farm - Select Nights from Sept. 18 to Nov. 1
Knott’s Spooky Farm - Select Dates from Sept. 25 to Oct. 31
Knott’s Merry Farm - Nov. 21 to Jan. 4, 2026
(11/20/2024) The Sol Spin ride at Knott’s Berry Farm got stuck on Monday afternoon, trapping 22 passengers for up to 2 hours in the air. In the ride-trades the Sol Spin is known as a Top Scan ride from Mondial Rides, but due to the nature and timing of the stoppage, some of the riders were stalled out in some awkward positions. Park staff were able to finally lower the entire ride back down to the ground and unload the passengers, but two were sent to a nearby hospital for further examination once released out of caution due to how they were feeling. No further reports of injuries have been reported at this time.
2025/2026 - MonteZOOMa: The Forbidden Fortress - (4/30/2025) At last, brand new track for Montezooma’s Revenge has been spotted on the highway near the park. I’m not sure who made it, but it does look nearly identical to the original Schwarzkopf style coaster track, except that now it has been painted brown.
(4/25/2025) Finally it seems like there is some activity going on over at the Montezooma’s Revenge site at Knott’s Berry Farm. The latest video update posted by ACN this week where scaffolding that had been covering the rear spike’s supports has come down, revealing a new deep green paint on the spike, along with finally starting to paint the network of newer cross-supports that were added after the track was removed. Still some paint work needed on the lower sections however.
Why the extra support infrastructure? Well, the ride is fairly old, but the original plan was also to allow some backwards launches to go up the spike, so perhaps it was recommended. An entirely new train will also be added, which could likely be heavier as well.
Meanwhile there the forward spike is still totally covered up by scaffolding and tarps, so they’re working on that still. Meanwhile it doesn’t appear as if there is any track on either spike, and all looks silent at the station, but the entire launch track zone is now entirely surrounded by a new large tarp/wall to block it from view.
As we previously reported, the expectation was that we should be keeping eyes open for shipments of new parts to arrive sooner than later, so hopefully this is a sign that those new track sections are getting close to arrival.
(3/29/2025) While it may not look like much to outsiders yet, Screamscape has been hearing that work is actually taking place inside the Montezooma’s Revenge coaster station, ahead of upcoming outdoor work that will eventually see new track sections arrive and the classic layout rebuilt.
As before, the rumor is that the track is on the way, likely being shipped in from an overseas manufacturing plant which is a lengthy process. Until the track does arrive, we probably wont have much to see at the site, though given the time-frame, it also seems very unlikely that Monty will reopen in 2025 at all. While we don’t know when, a 2026 opening date seems the most likely.
(2/23/2025) So far I have no evidence to back any of these rumors up, but the latest whispers seem to indicate that while not a lot has been done with restoring Montezooma’s Revenge so far, things may be about to get very busy, very soon. According to our source Knott’s has been waiting for necessary shipments to arrive featuring all new track and trains for the Montezooma’s Revenge restoration project.
As we know from before the previously failed plan was to use a new train design from Kumbak (which were not well received by fans due to the nature of the new restraint system), and that deal fell apart when the new track and support systems were never manufactured by a third party company Kumbak had outsources them too. This was rumored to be Maurer, but according to unverified rumors, it came down to a lack of funds from Kumbak to pay Maurer for this service, along with rising costs all around due to the impact of the pandemic.
This time around, no one company has been named as being involved with the current efforts, though last Spring, one rumor was that Cedar Fair may have asked Zamperla to get involved in saving Monty. Of course, at that point in time, all was peachy between them and Big-Z, as testing for Top Thrill 2 had been going well at Cedar Point. That all changed in May when issues arose shutting down Top Thrill 2 for the rest of 2024, but here we are again approaching Spring time and rumor has it that Top Thrill 2 is intended to open this year, so you never know if Zamperla is involved or not. I would think Monty fans would appreciate the more open nature of the Zamperla’s Lightning trains over what KumbaK had proposed. It is also fair to say that any Zamperla staff spotted in the park over the past here were likely just there for the installation of 2024’s Snoopy’s Tenderpaw Twister Coaster… but that doesn’t mean they may not have looked over Monty. After all, coming to the rescue to save Monty could work to help mend fences over the Top Thrill 2 issues.
In any case… keep your eyes peeled for the arrival of any shipping containers and equipment in the park’s typical staging lots over the next month or two as a sign that some kind of progress may be coming.
(12/6/2024) Since it is December, it would be nice if Knott’s Berry Farm were to issue some kind of update about the pending status of Montezooma’s Revenge. Seriously… We’ve been quiet patient since it closed in 2022 and have seen the plans to renovate and reopen the coaster pushed back, canceled, restarted with a 2025 date without any reveal of who was doing the work. This has been followed with a little work on the coaster behind tarps… but as of now all of the missing track sections are still missing, and the park hasn’t issued any kind of update in quite some time. Not even at IAAPA last month where many expected that we might finally get an update and reveal of who was working on it. (On a side note, did you see the awesome themed Vekoma train revealed at IAAPA for a new coaster project in Mexico? Something themed like this would be incredible for the new version of Monty… just saying…)
So really Knott’s… please can we have an update?
(3/14/2024) Good news this week as local enthusiasts have begun reporting that work has started on Montezuma's Revenge once again. The biggest visible change is that the track on the spikes is being removed.
With the renovation plans to turn Montezuma's Revenge into MonteZOOMa: The Forbidden Fortress by 2025 now re-confirmed by Knott’s Berry Farm, I’m not sure if they are looking to fully replace all this track, or if the new vendors have removed them in order to take measurements in order to replicate the track for the sections that will need full replacement. Either way it is nice to see progress being made on the site once again.
(3/1/2024) Knott’s berry farm released some fantastic news today, as the park has finally confirmed that their plans to update Monty into MonteZOOMa: The Forbidden Fortress is now back on track and set to reopen in 2025. As previous updates had shown, many felt that the project was entirely dead when Cedar Fair’s year-end SEC filing specifically mentioned a “loss” incurred from “a specific terminated project at Knott’s Berry Farm in the current year.”
Between that and the fact that Knott’s had gone totally silent when it came to even mentioning the project, things did not look good. Of course, one reason for most of the silence may have to do with a rumored lawsuit the company is working on with the previous vendors who failed to deliver the project for the 2023 season.
While I’m not going to name drop those particular parties at this time, I have been hearing rumors that based on how things have been going so far over at Cedar Point on Top Thrill 2, that the top brass had been engaging in conversations with Zamperla to see if they wanted to try and save it. Now that we know the project is back on-track, it probably won’t be long before we find out who is working on it this time.
In fact, according to one local report, active work on Monty is set to begin once again on March 4th.
(2/18/2024) While Knott’s Berry Farm hasn’t officially made any kind of statement yet about the fate of Montezooma’s Revenge, Park Journey pointed out on Twitter that within Cedar Fair’s year-end performance filing, there is text that says, “The loss on impairment / retirement of fixed assets for both periods included retirements of assets in the normal course of business, including a specific terminated project at Knott’s Berry Farm in the current year.”
While the project isn’t named, this does sound like a confirmation that the plan to upgrade Montezooma’s Revenge into MonteZOOMa: The Forbidden Fortress has now been canceled. With the coaster currently sitting in pieces, after being partially disassembled to begin the project, it would seem that Monte’s fate has now been sealed. I too would expect some kind of formal announcement to be issued from Knott’s before too long.
(12/24/2023) Knott’s Berry Farm is rumored to be finalizing a new plan of action for Montezooma’s Revenge. According to the rumors sent my way over the past few weeks, Cedar Fair was said to have been looking over proposals for what to do with the Montezooma’s Revenge site from no less than five manufacturers. While I’m not sure if they’ve settled down on the exact one just yet, what I’m hearing is that the goal is to try and get a new plan of action in place that would see it come back to life by Summer 2025, if not maybe a little sooner.
Otherwise, in terms of construction work at the park, everything for now will be focused on the Camp Snoopy update to open in 2024.
(12/9/2023) With the Camp Snoopy 2024 announcement now out of the way, we are left to wonder just what is going on with Montezooma’s Revenge still. Coaster Empire was visiting the other just the other day and saw a small inspection crew going through the site, looking over areas like the former launch track and going through the station building.
So question is… will Knott’s be able to save it… or will they made the sad choice to demolish it in defeat?
(7/4/2023) In a small update regarding the fate of Montezooma’s Revenge, I’m now hearing that while the project may have been in danger at one point, action has been taken to address the issues and things are still expected to move forward once again. But the rumored new 2024 opening timeline seems to still be the most likely.
Maybe... to be honest, I’m still not sure about any of this, as the general feeling is that the park may be stalling for time and unwilling to commit to any one course of action just yet, even if they have to go forward with the unthinkable.
(7/2/2023) Screamscape has heard some disappointing rumors as of late regarding the status of Montezooma’s Revenge. Unfortunately the severity of these rumors go from bad to worse. On the lighter side, shortly after the confirmation from the park that the updated Montezooma’s Revenge would not be ready this summer, I had begun hearing that it probably wouldn’t be ready to reopen now until 2024. This did match up with the overall lack of any progress or new construction on the site and made sense. It also matched up with why Knott’s was suddenly talking to the press about their efforts to reopen Xcelerator next instead.
As for the “worse” news… things get oh-so-much worse…
NOW… don’t panic and keep in mind that this was just a single rumor sent my way, but the source claims that major issues have come up with the companies contracted to provide the new track and trains, and they may be unable to provide what they were contracted to do without a significant increase in funds above and beyond what was already agreed upon in the contracts. (Again...this is rumor only... nothing confirmed!)
Currently Montezooma is in pieces, with the trains and large sections of track and the flywheel launch system removed a long time ago to make way for the new parts. According to the story, this has put Knott’s in a bit of a hard spot… unable to restore the ride back to the way it was, and currently unable or unwilling to move forward with the original chosen partners in order to finish the job as intended.
You can see where I’m going with this… and it isn’t good. I’m hoping this rumor is wrong… or if true, that perhaps Cedar Fair could instead reach out to someone else instead to possibly finish the job. Cedar Fair and Knott’s management should be very aware of just how beloved and important Montezooma’s Revenge is to the Knott’s Berry Farm fans as well as the roller coaster enthusiast community out there. Any truth to the bad business dealings aside, I can only hope that they would make the right decision and take whatever steps are necessary to save Monty.
This would start with a call to Gerstlauer, as they are really the only company out there who have successfully completed a similar upgrade project on another Schwarzkopf Shuttle Loop. Walibi Belgium worked with them to update their Psyke’ Underground coaster in 2013, replacing the train as well as updating that ride’s launch system with a modern magnetic launch and braking system. A year before, in 20112, Gerstlauer also provided Hersheypark with new trains for their Schwarzkopf made Soperdooperlooper coaster. Simply put, many enthusiasts who are aware of these facts have been wondering why Gerstaluer was not chosen for the Montezooma project in the first place, as the park had just worked with them to open HangTime for the 2018 season.
Regardless… it’s all just rumor at this point, but keep your eyes open when visiting the park for any sign of possible activity.
2026 - Soak City Improvements - (11/14/2024) A press release from Six Flags today confirmed that the company is planning to spend over $1 BILLION on the parks over the next two years. Some of this will come in the form of enhancements to the guest experience, such as new themed areas, dining upgrades and technology enhancements. While we’ve seen the 2025 capital projects ($500 million) already announced, they decided to post a list of teasers of what they are already confirming will come to some of the parks in 2026 as part of another $525 million capital investment plan.
For Knott’s Berry Farm, the plan seems to focus on bringing a “water park refresh and aesthetic enhancements” to the Knott’s Soak City waterpark. This is probably a good thing, as I can’t remember off the top of my head the last time they really did anything new here.
2027/2028 - New Roller Coaster - (2/23/2025) Early rumors are starting to swirl that Knott’s may be planning on adding their next big coaster in 2027, in order to get things up and running ahead of the 2028 Olympic Games, and spreading the project a year-aparts from 2026 when sister park, Six Flags Magic Mountain, is expected to open their next coaster, along with the opening of the Fast & Furious coaster at Universal Studios Hollywood.
The interesting thing is that there is a chance they could be looking into the concept of the long rumored Giga Coaster once again, possibly similar in concept to the basic layout and location of the one leaked out years ago.
It’s still way to early to call anything on this… and even I’m not convinced that Knott’s is truly ready to commit to something like a Giga, but since Los Angeles will be on display for a global audience to see in 2028, the timing would be perfect to see something like this in 2027 or 2028.
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