Alpengiest was the coaster that I was looking forward to the most at BGW. The themeing and the terrain excited me, as well as the size of the ride. The whole ride speeds along the terrain wonderfully with grace and speed. However, it lacks intensity. I counted two intense spots on the ride: the cobra roll and the zero-g roll. The zero-g roll even lacked a bit. My favorite invert, Raptor, was an intense rush from start to finish, which is why Alpengiest fell a bit short. The themeing and terrain, however, are excellent, and its still a good ride. Its also my 50th coaster!

I am rewriting my review on Alpengeist after the simply awe-inspiring ride I experienced on this magnificent B&M masterpiece this past Sunday. I will begin with the basics. The ride itself is probably the most beautiful coaster I have come across in my travels. I am confident that I could easily spend all day just taking pictures of the thing. From a design standpoint, Alpengeist is pure genious. All of the ride elements were obviously carefully laid out to enhance the aesthetics to near perfection. Now you may be saying to yourself that all B&Ms are beautiful in their own way. Well, while many parks have beautiful B&Ms, Busch Gardens took their B&M invert to the next level by providing the ride with a textbook "Busch Environment" and great theming. The foliage that dominates the ride area is nothing short of phenomenal; far too many parks strip their construction sites of all life these days, and yet Busch Gardens persistently preserves as many of the natural towering trees as humanly possible.

Now on to the ride itself and the reason for rewriting this review. For some reason I have overlooked the nonstop action and mind-numbing forces that this ride packs up until this past Sunday. Thus, Alpengeist has always hovered in the middle range of my Top 10. This past Sunday, the ride was running in its prime, and I had the privelege to ride it at its ultimate height. The unrelenting intensity of this ride propelled it easily above the other B&M inverts Ive ridden, driving it higher still into my Top 10. Currently (as of May 2nd, 2006) Alpengeist sits as my #3 coaster overall, displacing Storm Runner and Thunderbolt (Kennywood Park). From start to finish, the ride seems to have an undeniable grudge against the hapless riders it has snared in its clutches. Compound the superb ride quality with the scenery, immersing theming, and the sheer beauty of the rides structure, and you have one hell of an experience.

My new favorite invert and even though it just missed my top ten it did cause me to rewrite my top ten since I moved Raptor out. APPEARANCE-10 It looks awesome the colors are fantastic, the skis are a nice added detail. The fake snow around the course, the loading station and if you look at other buildings in the area they even have theming to help the rider. Such as a skiers legs hanging out of the roof. I feel it is one of the best looking steel coasters in how it brings nature into its ride. CAPACITY-9 Very good the day I was there, but a ten for capacity is just to hard to receive, with three trains they would get it. RIDE QUALITY-9 I did get one instance of banging my head, but that was it. I found it to be pretty smooth and intense. FUN-10 I really loved this ride it is amazing that it actually is so overshadowed by Apollo. RERIDE-10 Since they only have two outstanding coasters how could I not ride this again. OVERALL-48 AVG-9.6 I will go ten, it feels like a ten and it rounds to a ten. Amazing that it just misses my top ten, also weird that I now have no inverts in my top ten, but I have 4-5 in my top twenty, it must be the little bit of banging you always get on these rides.

Alpengeist was good, dont get me wrong, but it was not great. Having ridden Top Gun just two days earlier, it would have taken quite a bit to impress me. The height sure did, as did the speed on the worlds tallest and fastest Invert. However, bigger isnt always better, and once again, I can agree with it in the case of Inverts. The Immelman was nice, but almost too big because it didnt seem intense like others. Loop was also ok, but nowhere near as fun as Top Guns loop. The cobra roll was really fun, even from the back where others have complained of headbanging, I didnt think it was too bad. After the brake run, I thought the subsequent series of elements was cool from busting through the building, to the zero-G roll to the corkscrew, and into the banked turns, it was a very good series, but still not great and still not among the best. The ride was overall fun and intense, but it just didnt thrill me like other Inverts did. Though it too had a great setting like my two favorite Inverts, Alpengeist was missing something, perhaps a batwing rather than a cobra roll considering my love for Montu and Top Gun. Overall, a fun coaster, but Ill put it to you this way: I only felt the need to ride it twice on a day when the wait was under 5 minutes, instead choosing to ride Apollos over and over, and enjoying the parks atmosphere. An 8 will do for now, and it sits as my 3rd favorite Invert, a bit above Raptor.

Im a fan of inverted coasters, and this one is among the elite. Visually, its stunning with its 190+ foot lift and its soaring, twisted inversions. The ride itself is even better, with great speed and relentless elements. The 170 foot twisting drop steadily picks up speed, and before you know it, youre going nearly as fast as Apollos Charoit. It also has a creative theme and the best immelman I have ever ridden.

I really like the theme for Alpengeist...a ski lift gone crazy! Its props and scenery had us all laughing the whole time! It was great! I especially liked the first drop because of its speed and height! Unfortunately, you cant see the "snow" during the corkscrews because of its speed and you have to watch the row in front of you (unless youre in the front) to determine where youre going! But this is a fun ride!

Ill give the front row a 10 but it only gets a high 7 from the back. First, the bad: the back is very rough, the guy sitting next to me summed up the back row experience "it really boxed my ears".

The view from the front is great but the wait was ridiculous for the front row. It was a one ride wait for every row except the front, which was a 16 ride wait. However, I find this ride to be the best in the country for my single rider trick. Since the second row never has a long wait I go to that row. Two times out of two I was able to move from the second to the front row as there were only three people riding in the front row. The first line queue is too long for single riders to snake through and climb over everybody to get to the air gates before they close. However, even in the front row you get one moment of ear boxing if your not ready for it.

Such a wonderful inverted coaster can only be found at Busch Gardens Tampa (from what I heard) and Williamsburg. Alpengiest is a crazy ride form start to finish. First, you crawl up the 170-foot lift hill, getting a wonderful view of the park and a great view of the Loch Ness Monster. Then you go plummeting down to the ground at speeds that seem like they could rival the monsterous Apollos Chariot. Then you go through a smooth yet commanding immelmen loop, followed closely by a loop that seemed very forceful. Then comes the best aprt: the Cobra Roll. Pulling what seemed like 7 gs, it pulled you through and whipped you around like a rag doll. Followed by a crash coarse into a building near Le Scoot, you fly through 2 corkscrews, ending at a very abrupt stop. This is one of the feircest, nastiest ride in Busch Gardens: which is why I love this invert better than the rest. A definate must ride when in Busch Gardens Williamsburg!

Alpengeist along with its twin at BG Tampa may well be the best Inverted coaster in the country. The ride which is heavily themed with an Alpine-ski resort motif, maintains its intensity from beginning to end. I am sure there are some differences (other than the obvious theme differences) between Alpengeist and Montu, but I would have a hard time rating one ahead of the other. I would definitely give both the edge over the Batman rides at various Six Flags Parks around the nation.

This is a pretty thrilling B&M floorless ride. Only problem I have with it is that you cant really see anything unless you are in the front. I hate the front of coasters cause thats where you get all the lag where as the back whips you around! Ah...I guess a nine should do cause its still fun!