Eowyn's Ramblings

Geauga Lake is closing as an amusement park (water park only). We went there this year (almost finished writing all of that trip up).

What is it with us going to parks and having them promptly closed?

In 2006 we visited Six Flags Magic Mountain which was put up for sale that fall (it didn't get sold but it was a close thing), it probably would have been developed if it had sold. *sigh* While I had issues with the park...

In 2005 we went to Texas and among other things visited Six Flags Astroworld. It closed that fall, the land was sold. Some rides were salvaged but many of the best ones were not. *sigh*

In 2004 we visited Conneaut Lake Park on the trip north. We also visited Six Flags Darian Lake. In 2006 Conneaut closed (though to be fair, they do hope to re-open it). It's precious coasters are SBNO ... I don't know the status of the gorgeous carousel. Darian was sold in 2006 as well.

In 2002 (I think ... may have been 2003) we went to Myrtle Beach Pavillian which was a thriving park not that long ago. Now it is also gone. Fortunately the Alpine slide still operates in Gatlinburg (http://www.obergatlinburg.com/alpine2.htm).

Circa 2000 we visited Bland's Amusement Park it was sold to Del Grasso that November.

Kennywood Park www.kennywood.com

We wanted to start with Racer but it was closed so we started with the flume. I liked the various physics questions and discussions on the signs as you went through line. Chris got wet but I only got damp. Then off to visit Thunderbolt (http://www.rcdb.com/id122.htm) which is a truly unique coaster. You leave the station and DIVE into a ravine ... the lift hill is actually one of the last things in the ride. The laterals are pretty intense (to the point that they require 2 riders in a bench and that the larger one sit on the 'outside' so no one gets too squished (however, I should remember to be careful of where my keys are. Poor Java got a bruise.

Our next stop was another 'mine ride' that isn't. This is actually a cute little dark ride with very amusing and silly skeletons. Then to one of the classic rides in the park, the Turtle. Very nostalgic feeling ride and fun (you are in round cars that are joined together ... each car is attached to the center of the ride by an arm. The track is circular with hills and the machine moves forward and backwards to get the momentum to get over the first hill w/out needing too much horsepower. Some air but mainly just plain fun.

Then we went mega coaster and visited Phantom's Revenge (http://www.rcdb.com/id123.htm) which has the twist of the 2nd drop being MUCH longer than the first (it goes into the same ravine as Thunderbolt and actually dodges those tracks. I am very glad they got ride of the horsecollars. We got the 1st seat and is quite sweet until the back section. That area works best (for me) with my back curled a bit. However is is still so much nicer than it was as the Steel Phantom.

Then we headed off to Exterminator (indoor themed Crazy Mouse) - no line to speak of, no seatbelt use (they are there but not used), 2 people should sit together lots of sliding. Good ride. Our next stop was another classic ride, the Noah's Ark which is a Fun House. They have redone it a bit since our last visit (or at least we encountered things that I didn't remember). There is a vibrating floor (both a side-to-side section and an up-and-down section. Some bridges, some cute effects, the tilting of the building makes going up (or down) stairs interesting but once you get the hang of the timing it is better. The laser picture effects were nice and I liked the 'sinking ship' section. Very fun and cool.

By now we were hungry so we stopped for lunch and it was quite good food and we saw a fair amount of the pirate diving show which was reasonably well done. Then we visited Cosmic Chaos (new ride this year) and I wasn't sure about this one (there are certain movements that I do NOT handle well. However, when we were in the portion of the ride that didn't bother that part of my brain it is a complete and total blast. It is basically one of those roller-skate/surf-board rides but larger, circular and much spinnier. Facing out with nothing under your feet adds to the experience.

To let our lunch settle after the Chaos we took a spin on the 1926 Dentzel Carousel which had a major renovation a few years ago (as in they re-did some of the gears on the machine as well as renovating the horses). I am glad that apparently the 'tradition' of putting your feet on the forelegs of the horse has died down.

Then to another classic ride (yes, this is a major theme of this park) the Kangaroo, it is the ONLY one left. Period. We rode it twice (without being asked to exit the ride). For those of you unfamiliar with this ride, it (like the turtle) has a circular track that the cars go around. The unique part is that it goes up a hill that has an abrupt drop (90 degrees) but the springs in the arm of the ride allow it to 'bounce' down. You get a nice pop of air as inertia has you continue upwards a bit before gravity takes over (in the most friendly way possible). Whee!

Over we went to Racer (http://www.rcdb.com/id121.htm) and it was open! This fabulous ride is another truly unique one. Built in 1927 it is described as a Moebius and it well fulfills that description, twin tracks (sort of) that are connected. You leave on one side of the station and return on the other. It can run 4 trains into a single station (2 sides) on a single track. It is COOL, so we rode it twice (once on each side). It is also fun but wasn't as airy as I remembered. Then to the grandfather of the park, the Jack Rabbit (http://www.rcdb.com/id120.htm) a 1921 continuously operating (seasonally anyway) true terrain classic coaster. Does it have huge air? No, but it has everything you want in a classic ride (skids, no ratchets, no dividers, simple yet fun layout, maximum use of terrain, lots of up and down but I think the highest off the ground you get is about 15 feet. Another 2 times through the ride.

Then we visited Garfield's Nightmare which is a redo of a redone ride. The last time we were here it was the Old Mill Ride which I prefer to the 3-D Garfield. However the dreams of things coming after Garfield are cute.

The dodge 'ems were our next stop and this was a weird set up. The didn't require you to wear the restraints? People didn't wait for the bell to start. And Java (in his infinite creativity) terrorized people by driving backwards and nailing people. We then looped the park again and hit Phantom, Thunderbolt, and Racer.

We had reached the end of our vacation and needed to hit the road. We had the option of stopping if we got tired but homeward we made it. Time to crash and rest since I was leaving on Saturday to go to a conference.

Cedar Point - Day 2 - www.cedarpoint.com

The day started with us joining the stampede for Maverick (we run with the crowd, we are one with the crowd, we had to wait while some employees relocated a family of geese). The ride was fast, a bit rough and had some interesting restraints. The 95 degrees down was bizarre. I like the free T-shirt but wish that those of us who had Maxx Passes would have been able to get the sweatshirt as well. Unfortunately the shirts are white so have less use than others might have.

Then we headed up towards the front of the park to visit Wild Cat (I heart Anton, even without loops). Then it was time to take the sky-ride and enjoy some relaxing time and then visit the Midway Carousel all the way at the front of the park (pretty but needs some TLC). We decided to try Demon Drop and had that "what was I thinking?" moment as we went up. Loud sounds but not too bad a ride. My fear of heights wasn't too sure about this though. Then we stopped for a discount lunch (coupons are our friends) which ended up being quite tasty (I liked the pretzel dough roll). The theming of the restaurant was very cute (baseball bat pillars and such). Then aw shucks we were right next to Blue Streak with not much of a line so we took second seat.

We decided to stick out the line and ride Disaster Transport. I really don't get why the line is so long on this ride, the throughput must be insanely low for no obvious reason. It was a nice enough ride but I prefer Avalanche or Space Mountain. A trip to the arcade then ensued with much laughing and fun.

Then it was off to the races at Cedar Downs (racing Derby) and the Cadellac Cars (nice track layout) and aw shucks, we are next to Wild Cat. Giggle. I wanted to see the rest of the Train Loop so we took that back to the rear of the park (not as good scenery as from Mean Streak to Wild Cat). And we were right there next to Mean Streak. Such a hardship. Then off to the Red side of Gemini and out of the park. We had some driving to do and we had ridden a lot. We did some shopping for souviners and hit the road.

On the way to Cleveland we stopped and saw "Invisible" which was weird with nice scenery and rude kids in the theatre.

Then came problems with navigation. The road was closed due to a wreck so we take the detour and lose track of miles. Whose bright idea was it to have 480 have 2 exit numbered 23 onto Broadway??? Hmmm?????? We (of course) took the wrong one but eventually found the hotel and crashed for the night (after moving rooms since the first room's toilet was not functional).

Bucket
So we enjoyed a nice breakfast at the hotel, packed up, and headed out. Muskegon is a small town with some very nice old buildings to look at as you drive down the road. We were driving along on a fairly major road and I notice some buckets in the road ... large buckets ... the kind you get 5 gallons of spackling compound in. One of them is in the lane to our left (standing up) and one in our lane (lying down rocking gently side to side). I see these as fairly major obstacles but Java just keeps driving and saying in a nice calm voice 'hey look, there is a bucket in the road' (or something to that effect). My internal dialog is going something along the lines of (yes! There is a BUCKET in the ROAD! In OUR LANE! Are you planning to slow down???? Swerve???? Do ANYTHING????!??!?!??!!!). However, after the soda bottle, I didn't want to over-react. Then BOOM we pulverize the bucket at around 45 or 50 mph (I wasn't driving so I don't know for sure). I do know that the bucket was no longer a bucket ... there were fragments of former bucket flying all sorts of directions. Java said something along the lines of 'What was THAT?!?' to which I answer 'A bucket in our lane'. That is when I realized that Java had only seen one of the buckets (he was busy trying to see if the one to the left contained anything). And I became rather hysterical with laughter ... completely and totally out of control. 'Here I thought you were so calm, cool, and collected about the bucket in our lane and you never even saw it, you were talking about the other one. However since I thought you were talking about this one, I didn't point it out ... but you didn't see it.' Lots of repetitions but I was howling, having trouble breathing, tears streaming from my eyes ... the whole nine yards. The bucket extended the crack in the plastic panel on the bumper (it had already been cracked by me hooking it on a cabinet and Christi mis-judging a curb), it pushed it around, popped a gasket loose and made a bit of a mess. The word 'bucket' for the rest of the vacation was more or less guaranteed to give me the major giggles. It still does sometimes.

Michigan's Adventure http://www.miadventure.com/

Michigan's Adventure is a beautiful park with lots of flowers even before you get in. They have no metal detectors and some of the most enthusiastic hand-dryers I have ever used. Rumor has it that the park was originally owned by the people who still own Indiana Beach (or also owned Indiana Beach) but was then purchased by Cedar Fair. The dry portion of the park is sort of horse-shoe shaped with the entrance on one branch (I'm calling it right) of the shoe (along the Shivering Timbers), there is a water park that you exit into from the bottom left of the shoe, stuff goes up the left branch and there is a ride (train) that creates a bar for the shoe (closes the top). In the middle of the shoe is a good sized lake with some very large fish.

As you enter the parking lot a HUGE wooden roller coaster runs freely along side your car (faster than we were driving and it was on its return leg). Then you see the Wild Mouse, park and go in. The people were very helpful about how to get our passes working even though they didn't have the scanner, it worked very smoothly. Parking wasn't too bad either (price or location).

We decided to start with the Michigan Wolverine. This coaster is reminiscent of Phoenix at Knoebels. The ride queue had some graffiti (which was surprising given how nice the people in the area seem to be). We took front seat (of course) and there is some nice air on this baby. Very smooth, quick and nimble. The 3 bench cars exhibit a lot more obvious flex and it is an interesting sensation to go into a tunnel with the car wiggling around you (just like Phoenix).

Next we went to visit the big coaster of the park. Shivering Timbers a CCI monster whose goal in life is AIR with the secondary goal of SPEED. Both goals are well achieved. Poor Java was looking at the park until I said "Shiny" looking at the track ahead, there was a wow from beside me and a whoop as the train took off running. Lots of bunny hops, double ups, big hops, little hops, nicely banked turnaround and then off and running again. The weird feature(?) of this ride is right after the turnaround when you are screaming forward at a quick clip and are near the ground it banks left then right without changing direction for no obvious reason other than to throw you left and right (I learned later that this is called the Travers Shuffle from a feature that Harry Travers put in his coasters) ... personally I would have preferred a hop. After coming back through the structure you race through a nice helix and back to the station. Wahooo. When you have ridden Shivering Timbers you know without a doubt that you have been on a ride.

To recover from this, we headed to the flume. It has a nice view of the park and has most of it up high so you can enjoy the view (most flumes take you up, drop you, run you around some curves, up higher and then the big drop, this one took you fairly high, gave an itty-bitty drop, ran you around curves waaaay up in the sky, then dropped you).

Our next stop was the Wild Mouse (from the rear the sign for the Wild Mouse looks like a collection of giant flip-flops). The nice feature of this one was the fairly extensive gardens in the middle of the ride. Flowers, trees, shrubs, etc. all nicely landscaped and trimmed. This mouse also had some nice banking so the turns were more swoopy and less thuding against the sides of the car. The mouse cars were very cute. The stapling by the ride op was not cute.

Then we went to the Corkscrew which has a nicely themed entrance (piece of scale replica loop that you go through). Unfortunately, it is a typical Arrow looper which means that I find it rough and uncomfortable. You do get a nice view of the baby go-carts from it. We later walked over to get a better look at the baby go-carts and they are NOT tracked (well beyond the normal tracking for a go-cart) and there are those little kids ... maybe 2-4 years old driving them around having a fine time.

After a lunch break (and the obligatory drooling by me at the vintage cars in front of the restaurant) we headed to the antique car ride which wasn't wide enough for both of us so we had separate cars. The steering was non-existent in my 50s style sports car but I was amused to have a sound-track piped in of music. The track also has several bill-boards scattered throughout which are amusing (advertising local attractions and some other Cedar Fair attractions). Then we wandered over to Zachs Zoomer and both get the giggles at the Zoom! painted on the back of the train (we call it getting the Zooms when the cats go tearing around the house singly or together ... look at each other and comment Zoom!). The ride was slightly rough but it was nice and basically a clone of the Beastie/Giggles Coaster at KI or Scooby/Ghoster Coaster at KD. We stopped by the skeeball place and Java got a 340 on the machine (unfortunately the ticket dispenser wasn't working right not that we needed a prize. We tried to feed the fish but they didn't seem too interested in eating though one did follow us back and forth for awhile.

We continued around the lake and took a quick ride on the Swan Boats which really aren't very nimble in the handling department but were fun (and we did manage to avoid the fountains). We watched the Shoot-the-Chute but it was too cold to get soaked (upper 60s). We also watched the White Water Canyon which was delightfully done, very nice path, good use of waterfalls on the turn out of the station, very nicely set-up guns to soak people with and what looked to be a nice ride throughout. However, it was cold enough I was wearing a jacket part of the time ... not a good time to get soaked.

We decided to catch the miniature train back to the Shivering Timbers area. You can tell they recently re-did the tracks so that it can act as a people mover from the Canyon area to the Timbers area because the white gravel on the old path is still fairly visible. The train ride was nice but somewhat boring ... more gardens and/or figures would be a nice touch though we did see an Oriole right next to the train. So we rode the Wildcat again and Shivering Timbers and decided to play mini-golf. There is a cute course near the kiddie go-carts and we had not played much on this trip and we both enjoy it. Java won by 2 so it was a close game.

Out to the car to get the camera and we stopped by the carousel for pictures (and rides). I have not been able to get information on this carousel (it isn't on the National Carousel Association Census) but I suspect it is a metal or fiber-glass replica. The paint jobs are exquisite with little scenes on many of the trappings. We then started hunting in earnest for the kiddie coaster and finally found it (at the bend of the horseshoe). It is a small, tire propelled type coaster and was cute. Then as we were running out of time we headed briskly to Shivering Timbers for a final ride (final ride of the day as it turned out). Somewhere in the late afternoon I did do some shopping and found a wonderfully cute T-shirt (the Peanuts crowd coming down a hill on a coaster) which meant that I could get a 2007 Michigan's Adventure shirt (with the Peanuts crowd) for $5. WOOT! Unfortunately, I couldn't find post-cards. On our way out we stopped at Guest Relations with comments (mostly good, the only bad was the stapling and lack of post-cards). We later received a nice letter from the park thanking us for our comments and included a 3-D postcard of Shivering Timbers.

Craig's Cruisers http://www.craigscruisers.com/

Once we were on the road again, we were happily heading down the road and discussing options for the evening (dinner, possible movie, games) when I saw a mini-golf course off to the right and pointed it out. So, we decided to hunt for it (hey, I can now say I've been to Wyoming ... Michigan). With a lot of help from the Michigan Map and only a few wrong turnings by me (I thought we were going south when we were going north); we found Craig's Cruisers which is a good sized family entertainment complex.

They have 2 mini-golf courses, a kiddie go cart track, an adult one, an indoor one, bumper boats, bumper cars (boats on wheels), climbing wall, games, buffet, etc.. So, we got the "buffet & 2 activities for $12" option (most mini-golf seems to be in the $5-$9 range/person). We have been talking about go-carts but tend to not do them in the parks (we pay to get in and ride, it seems strange to pay to ride again ... besides which a lot of the parks courses don't look that much fun.

So, we got some food and went to play mini golf. We chose the western course because it looked less crowded. There was a family of 4.2 in front of us and the two boys were having a lot of fun. They decided to let us jump ahead of them (which was very nice of them) and kept us from having the next group breathing down our neck. I had one of the best mini-golf games ever for me. I had minimal cases of "Eowyning" holes (unlike poor Java) and won the game by 4 strokes (Go Me!).

We wandered through the arcade and saw an amazing display of Dance Dance Revolution where the young man was getting combos of over 80 (the highest I saw was a 120 combo) and his feet were flying. Then we got seconds on the food (you have 3 hours to go in and out of the food area) while watching more SpongeBob (more interesting to us than the baseball game).

Then it was off to the indoor Go Carts. The floor is a lot like a bumper car floor so they slide some but it feels a lot like a very fast and nimble bumper car that happens to have a variable gas pedal and also has breaks. Zoom! One kid blew by me early on the first lap but didn't get very far ahead of me, I kept almost passing him on this one turn but I was trying so hard to avoid bumping him that I was losing position. I finally got good position and he bumped me and his friend ended up passing me. Oh well, it was amazingly fun. These are electric so they don't stink and they get a good head of steam going.

Then it was dessert (none of the food was memorable) and time to hit the road again

King's Island http://www1.cedarfair.com/kingsisland
Today was a quiet day (by our standards anyway).

We went to Kings Island. The new coaster (Firehawk) will open on Saturday [MaxwellSmartVoice]Missed it by that much[/MaxwellSmartVoice]. Son of Beast is also still down (re-open date unknown) though that was not a surprise.

We started with a walk by the Son to see what there is to see, it is still massive and huge and while we miss seeing the loop, it doesn't look missing if that makes any sense (i.e. the coaster doesn't look incomplete without it). Then it was down the hill (and down and down and down) to visit Top Gun (suspended). We walked into the station and onto the car (front of a middle car). The ride is now sponsored by a company that gets to give a "sponsored by" note verbally while on the lift hill which I couldn't understand as we went by. Man this suspended goes fast. Very swoopy and swingy (and you get a decent view of Hawk's lift). Got back to the station and re-rode w/out leaving the car (w/permission).

Then it was up the hill to Delirium. We've ridden this type of ride elsewhere but not this one. The backwards and sideways portions were a bit rough on me but frontwards was WHEEEE! For those not familiar with Delirium, picture a pendulum that swings back and forth ... now at the bottom instead of the disk being parallel to the arm, make it perpendicular, now rotate the disk while the arm swings over a fairly wide arc (90 degrees total or more).

By then I was getting hungry so we went looking for food, decided the line at the first food place was stupid, and went to ride the mine train (Adventure Express). Fast, a bit rough, we both love the lift hill with the Aztec like gods threatening the train as it goes chugging up (I forget what they actually say but they are amusing). Next stop, Racer, front seat, second car going frontwards (back was closed). WHEEEE.

Then on to Subway for food, scrambler, bumper cars (these get a meh from me, slow and not nimble), and on to visit The Beast. 7500 feet+ of twisted terrain wooden track. I do wish that the new brakes were less enthusiastic but you can feel her pulling at her chains 'let me RUN'. We were in the frontish section of the train. Then a relaxing ride on the steam train (some of the scenery needs some TLC but I liked the fake tree stumps in the clearing), more drink, and Scooby's Haunted Castle. Java got the bad gun (301) I got the two good ones (750 and 930) - Preen. Then to the "fairly odd coaster" (aka Beastie aka Scooby's Ghoster Coaster) where they didn't want to let Java out (they relocked the bars before he got his open). Giggle at his on-ride picture of posing like an ape and move on to the carousel. The horses need some serious TLC (and the painters need to see pictures of real horses for paint patterns et al.) but still worth the ride. Another ride on Racer (hair loosened but not down, Racer failed to finish the job) and out to see a movie (Georgia Rules ... not great acting, script has some issues, more in a separate post).

Back to the park (theatre is across the street) and front seat, second car (line of motion) for Backwards Racer, 2nd car 2nd seat (twice) for frontwards, then walk by Flight of Fear (unreasonable line) and to the Beast to end the day. Front seat last car, then front seat front car. You really know you have ridden a big kids coaster on this one.

Shopping, dinner, and back to the hotel to sleep (and explore RCDB) for some info on various things.

One interesting note is that I think the only coaster at KI that we rode that did NOT require a seat-belt was the one that is designed to look like a automobile. I find this amusing, bizarre, and a bit annoying (most of these didn't need a seat-belt when they were designed, it is the CYA due to Darwinian people).