There have been so many rumors as to what will replace Sand Serpent. These include everything from a Giga coaster to an indoor ride using the Pantopia Theater to a wing coaster to family coaster. Busch Gardens isn’t exactly known for its theming, however the Egpyt area of the park is highly themed including the men’s bathroom! Whatever replaces Sand Serpent, however, I’m just hoping a little time, money and effort are spent theming the new ride, at least as much as this restroom.

Busch Gardens is often a little light on ride theming (excluding the amazing work they did with Cobra’s Curse), but I do appreciate how they often tie the ride motion to animal motion. An excellent example of this is Cheetah Hunt which mimics the acceleration and ground movement of a cheetah. However, many people probably miss the animal connection with SheiKra, the awesome B&M dive coaster, and its movements matching the “shikra” bird of Africa and southern Asia.

Had a chance to ride the “milder” version of the Serengeti Flyer at Busch Gardens a couple of weeks ago. It was a Tuesday morning and the ride was a walk-on around 10:30am and running in “milder” mode until 1pm. I’ve ridden a lot of these S&S Screamin’ Swings now from Barnstormer at Dollywood to Finnegan’s Flyer at Busch Gardens Williamsburg.

I was hearing the rumors that Sand Serpent may be closing soon at Busch Gardens (we even wrote a post about it last month). Today the rumors were confirmed with the Sand Serpent scheduled to close permanently on July 9th. However, this closure was somewhat personal for me in that I’ve got a 6 year old son named Thomas who is slowly growing and graduating to new rides, essentially measuring his growth by newly available roller coasters. Just a month or so ago he passed 46″ and his first response was, “I get to ride Sand Serpent!”

There have been rumors of Sand Serpent closing on social media and YouTube after a demolition permit was filed for a structure at Busch Gardens. Sure, it could be for the play area in Jungala (which has now disappeared from maps), but with the demo of the looping starship Phoenix, all the chatter has been that this is the area for the next new attraction with survey markers all around Pantopia.

Ride operations can be a big part of whether you have an enjoyable or a frustrating day at a theme park, especially on a busy day. If you visit them parks a lot you may start to pay more attention to the workers and the differences between different theme park chains. An operator’s number one priority is safety, but they must also move quickly.