The whole park seems to have the green St. Patrick's Day treatment. Green flags flying in Banbury, Oktoberfest's outdoor bar is themed as "Shamrock Shenanigans" or something similar, Festhaus show was all aligned with the event and the violinist was fun. Felt a bit weird to be doing St Patrick's day stuff in a traditional Bavarian hamlet, but it was a nice day overall. The beer was green (Bud Light only), and while I didn't sample any of the event-specific items, the normal food was absolutely atrocious. Threw out an entire plate of Trappers BBQ because it was borderline inedible.
The park seems to be in good shape. Tons of hyacinths and pansies out that look great, lots of rides open (even if most of the coasters were on one-train ops), the park/rides as a whole felt clean and tidy, new staff were being trained, and everyone seemed fresh and friendly. Guest services' hard card printer was functional (needed to replace mine that the father-in-law lost last year and have had a nightmare with that thing being down more than a McDonalds shake machine in years past) which was nice. While we still felt like things were just plainly overpriced, the park/operations side of things were top notch.
One place I did actually find value was that it seems like some of the games now are a bit more friendly to those playing. There was a trade-up system on the one we played, they had quality branded prizes (Pokemon), it was easy to win and just landing a ball on the playing field would net a small prize (Pokeball). This felt very much like Dollywood's approach of "yeah, we're going to make money here but we still want you to win something" which was nice. Not sure if this is different than years past but I didn't feel fleeced at a game for once.
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