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I don't know the financials, but I don't fault them for closing on weekdays when the park was dead. Yeah, it was fun for us (back when the park used to kind-of-care and open things) but they are a business. What I do have a problem with is closing 2/3 of the rides on the days where they are open and charging people over $100 for one day between parking and admission.

More clues ! I love Jeffery

Queue-Times.com is also showing that entire week to be packed. Which will be super-fun when half of the major rides are closed for "reasons." I'd save your ticket, Flash Pass, and gas money and do literally anything else.

.... and now we've just lost Bob McGrath, one of the originals of "Sesame Street". He passed away at age 90. He will really be missed by a lot of us, myself included. Bob and the original human (with one exception) tenants of "Sesame Street."

New video inside the building:

The “enhancements” on wondy are the new trains coming it’s already beautifully lit at night bia spotlights. They won’t change that

We canceled our Six Flags membership when it became clear than Covid wasn't going to be over soon. We may pick up one of the new annual passes this year, as Great America is our new closest Six Flags, and we really enjoyed that one last time we were in Chicago. $74 may be higher than usual for Six Flags, but it's cheaper than Valleyfair's lowest tier pass, and both parks' middle tier pass is $100. I really don't think this pricing structure is the end of the world.

Day 7. . 2nd full day at Phantasialand. my view of the room when waking up. . . was packing up the luggage. . we got up and went down to breakfast, before checking out of the hotel this morning. The hotel stored our luggage tho, as we weren't leaving - we had a 2nd full day at the park still - and weren't headed out until ~6pm. So down thru the deserted bar, to have breakfast. . 2nd day was just as good as the 1st! yum! I took advantage after breakfast (but before going back up to the room to get the luggage) to snap some pics around the empty bar/lounge, that again, is only for Hotel Guests use. they really did an impressive job here. . . fully immersive and very stylish. .even out on the patio. took advantage of it being empty, and even took some pics of the bathrooms (something of a theme today, I discovered while looking thru day 2 pics. . LOL). GORGEOUS. . . Luggage dropped off (and held) at front desk, and it was off to Rookbugh/Phantasialand. F.L.Y. was getting ready for the day. . and since we're right here? why not start the day off with a ride? (without having to use a skip the line pass) then it was into the park proper. hmm. it was a bit overcast, and I think there was some drizzle in the forecast. so it didnt' seem like it was going to be a very busy day. Looking at my calendar/itinerary. . it also was a Monday. so that's probably why things were so quiet this early (tho it never really got super busy today) me and the Carousel (of course). .and *one* person coming in from the front gates. with it pretty quiet, it was easy to enjoy the beauty of the park. .the main square area is lovely too. . with the "flying carousel" at the center of it. so we got in the 1 cycle line, and took a ride. we headed over to Talocan next. . . John didn't want to ride, so he stayed up on the viewing bridge to watch us/take pics, and we headed down. to find it wasn't open yet but after a short 10 minutes or so, they started cycling it, and opened it up so could get some pics of the test cycle (complete with water and flame effects) the 6 of us that rode, courtesy of John's picture taking. LtR: Ian, Chris, Andrew, Me, Jon, James whee! (and hang on for dear life) yeah. . our faces say it all. . . WTF just happened to us??? then it was up the viewing area to meet John, and we headed over to Black Mamba beautiful. again, really no wait. . but I think we used quick queue just to cut the long queue line. . . the park was clearly gonna be pretty dead today, which was fine with us as we had a lot to cram in before meeting to load the bus later. the station is really lovely as well. .even tho most of it is just colored light effects, it still works really well. we headed next over to the Asia area, to ride the Madhouse and that Funked up/kinda racist/what the hell dark ride a couple of times (I have no pics of that ride, not sure why). . and then into the pretty well done Madhouse = Feng Palace. (with Mystery Castle peeking out behind it) oh! I actually DID get a pic of Mystery Castle's sign. . buried in the trees. . but there such a great entrance queue. . this is before you get to the main castle steps that were in my pics the other day. a couple of cycles on Mystery Castle, and then we went back to ride "Michael Jackson Coaster". . which is apparently called "Colorado Adventure". . . yeah. .TODAY they had a sign out pointing to the entrance - after we figured out where to go yesterday. LOL. .this is the pathway one has to go down before coming across the entrance. . . which is why we had trouble finding it the prior day. sorta nicely themed queue tho. and then back to Taron to use more of the skip the line passes. . SUCH a great coaster. and of course, have to take another spin on Chiapas Heading back over to Taron again after getting wet. . . and today, I got the train actually shooting up the "waterfall wall". . my favorite part of the ride. couldn't get the camera out fast enough, so missed him from the front, but here's one of the Mad Monks from Mystery Castle ..showing off the operator outfits int he daylight. it was then that Jere (I think?) surprised me with a gift. . . Napkins! (yay!) featuring a Dragon, I found out later, was named "Wang". Loved it! we had a bit of munchies. . . no dinner tonight in the park, as we were checked out of hotel already, but many of us had plans to eat in the small town we were staying in later after we got checked into the next hotel. was checking out options tho. . this chocolate dipped fruit looked great - especially the pears. but a bit too sweet for me right now. we checked out the Wurst cart in the main plaza. . .but nothing looked really appetizing. until we remembered the sandwich place that was over in Rooksburgh, which hadn't been open (or even considered, since we had eaten at UHRWerk in the hotel last night) so we headed over past the F.L.Y. entrance, and it's hidden on the side against the wall. everything sounded really good, and they made things fresh! So we ordered, and then I went into the Rooksburgh bathroom right there to wash up. see? apparently a toilet pics theme today. (LOL) and yes, that black splotch in the mirror is me blacking out the reflection of someone peeing. . that I did NOT even notice until I looked at these pics today. (oopsie). Not that anything naughty was visible. . I was just trying to get a pic of the cool sinks. and general vibe of the "industrial" bathroom. (see? it was empty when I took the pics. . I dunno how that guy even got in!). hands washed, went back to the sandwich place and snapped a pic of the folks who made our fresh sandwiches. which were really good! I believe I had Pork and Mustard while others had the Ham & Egg. Juicy and drippy and everything was great. and we were able to stake out tables just under F.L.Y. to watch it zoom by while we ate. tho this guy. . kept coming by and just staring at me and giving me sly glances. seriously. I mean, eventually I just aimed my camera at him and took a picture, and as you can see, he's staring RIGHT into the camera. LOL. I guess I'm flattered? *but also was married, and on a trip with friends, so looking back was all that was gonna happen I took more pics of F.L.Y. while we ate. .and as yo can see. . . he hovered right around us . . . LOL after a satisfying meal (and I think a ride on F.L.Y. since we were right there?) we headed back to the Indoor section to take another round on the Winjas coasters. this time I had camera out to get a pic of the loading station. I believe that's "Fear" closest to us. .and the track behind on other side is "Force" as with other places in this park, the design work is lovely. . they don't skimp on atmosphere, really. I had mentioned to others my solo ride on the "tower" yesterday, and how it stops to hold near the top for some nice views. so we all piled into two cars to take a ride. NOTED! these are NOT animatronics.. just stuffed birds the park put at the top of the atrium dome. I thought it was hysterical that many of them had fallen over and were hanging upside-down. . but were so high up, it just wasn't worth the effort to fix them, I guess. So took a pic. and what's an indoor section without a cigarette machine? I honestly had not even noticed anyone in there smoking, so it shocked me to see this. Enough that I took a pic of it. I had to pee so yet ANOTHER bathroom pic. . but these urinals here weren't near as fancy as the ones in Rooksburgh. but I took a pic because of the flies in the urinals. painted on. so you have something to aim for, I guess? BWAAA-HAAAA-HAAAAA not sure what we did next, but at this point my camera shows that we went back to the Asia section. . so probably the Madhouse, the Dark Ride, or the Colorado Express again. (or maybe Black Mamba again). this appears to be another gate/entrance to the park. . but it was closed today (as were the big restaurants in the park. I guess they were only open weekends?). so we hung out on the patio of the closed Chinese restaurant while I went into the pagoda store and did some shopping. this guy is a bathtub toy. no idea what character he is tho - he's most certainly not a dragon (each "land" in Phantasialand is represented by a Dragon). . but the lady operating the store had no idea. Only that all the merch with him on it was super discounted. . so maybe an older mascot? but hey, for ~3 bucks? I bought a stuffed one of him. and a Dragon "Wang" fan. . . it's a bit nippy today. . so sure, dress your teen in a PornHub hoodie. (actually saw THREE such hoodies in the park. .LOL). cool little model of one of the hotels (I think) over by Black Mamba I believe at this point we may have all ridden Taron one more time, then split off as I wanted to do some shopping and it was getting within an hour of the time to meet at the bus. I bought a bunch of shirts (for both myself and some nice polo logo shirts for Nick) then had to go all the way back to Colorado Adventure gift shop (with Ian) - as the one shirt he wanted wasn't in his size at the main store, and I wanted a Park Logo magnet - which they no longer carried but *thought* they might still have at that gift shop. So we trekked back there, and Ian found his shirt, and I got, literally, the LAST "Phantasialand" logo magnet they had on the spinner. so it worked out. then I headed back to the Carousel for a final ride, and right next to it? oh yeah. . . of COURSE I had to buy some. Several others in the group had stopped in this area too, mainly to get the waffles (too heavy for me, since I had that sandwich earlier). . but I got a bunch of sweets - that didn't last too long anyways. Cute box tho we had JUST enough time to run and get one final ride on Taron . . . before heading back to the Hotel, grabbing our bags, and loading up the bus to head out. it was a few hour drive before we arrived at the next hotel, and we'd only be there one night. . but tomorrow? we were gonna be at Walibi Belgium! thanks for following along.

oh. . look. . looking at the Skyliner Attractions page, they are now showing THAT track included in the example of the lighting package for P=Sghetti Bowl:

PortAventura World and Sony Pictures Entertainment announce World’s First ‘Uncharted’ Dark Ride Roller Coaster Manufacturer: Intamin Multi dimension coaster Investment: 25 million euros ($26,04 million) 700m length 12 meters high 5 launches up to 1g 4800m2 surface area Desing collaboration: Intamin and Sally Dark Rides Official announcements: Works: Supposed design:

Disneyland has announced that Mickey and Minnie's Runaway Railway will be opening on January 27th, and the entirety of Toontown will be opening on March 8th! https://disneyparks.disney.go.com/blog/2022/11/mickeys-toontown-to-reopen-at-disneyland-park-on-march-8-2023/ It’s Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse’s birthday! In honor of this special occasion, the Disneyland Resort is pleased to announce the official reopening date of Mickey’s Toontown in Disneyland park – March 8, 2023! It was this time last year that we first announced Mickey’s Toontown would undergo an ambitious reimagining, and reopen with some all-new experiences for families and young children to have more opportunities to play together inside Disneyland park. At D23 Expo in September, we shared a bit more about the interactive play areas and how we are stepping into a new era of inclusive experiences in this land for families of all ages. I know we are all excited to see just how Mickey’s Toontown will become a vibrant symphony of sights, sounds and sensations very soon. Here’s a look at some of what you can expect when the land reopens on March 8! The reimagined Mickey’s Toontown will provide open, grassy play spaces for everyone to unwind, starting with CenTOONial Park, the first space guests will see when they enter the land. CenTOONial Park will be anchored by two new interactive play experiences; a beautiful fountain featuring water tables designed for play that invite guests to have a sensory experience, plus a nearby dreaming tree with sculpted tree roots providing an opportunity for children to crawl and explore. Mickey’s Toontown will be home to the new attraction, Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway! Inside the El CapiTOON Theater, Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway will put you in the wacky and unpredictable cartoon world of Mickey and Minnie, where you’ll board a train with Goofy as the engineer. One magical moment after the next leads you to a zany, out-of-control adventure filled with surprising twists and turns that the entire family will enjoy! As you may have read, Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway will open on Jan. 27, when the Disney 100 Years of Wonder Celebration comes to life at Disneyland Resort! Over in Goofy’s neck of the woods, you’ll find Goofy’s How-To-Play Yard, as shown in this new aerial rendering of the area. Dedicated to all things play, Goofy’s How-To-Play Yard incorporates a whimsical sound garden where kids will discover new ways to make wacky noises, as well as enjoy an all-new, elevated clubhouse. When you step inside Goofy’s House, you’ll find a fun, interactive candy-making contraption that only Goofy could imagine! The confectionery contraption begins high outside of Goofy’s home, as drips of honey fall from a beehive onto a chute that slides the colorful drops around and down into the home. From there, junior candymakers will help Goofy make the candy, and the silly sounds of household appliances will combine to make a truly Goofy symphony. Donald’s Boat will be perched in the duck pond of the Goof homestead. Imagine larger-than-life spinning water lilies, balance beams and rocking toys at Donald’s Duck Pond that will help little ones get the wiggles out. Kids will definitely love making a splash in this space! You also can look into the boat through the portholes to witness bubbles of fun inside the flooded vessel and interact with some familiar ducklings including Huey, Dewey, Louie and Webby. For those wanting to get a little “nutty,” you can head over to Chip ‘n’ Dale’s GADGETcoaster, where Mickey’s Toontown’s favorite tinkerer, Gadget Hackwrench, has created a one-of-a-kind, fun-sized coaster for the town’s tiniest citizens. And at Mickey’s House and Minnie’s House, you’ll once again be able to step right into their homes and enjoy a self-guided tour as you discover special surprises in every room. You may even be able to visit with Mickey and Minnie while you’re there, should they be home! Roger Rabbit’s Car Toon Spin will also return, where you can board Lenny the Cab and spin through the streets and alleys of Toontown as you follow the adventures of Roger Rabbit. And when you feel a snack attack coming on, you’ll be able to turn to two new places to appease your appetites in the land: Café Daisy, where acclaimed culinary expert, Daisy Duck, serves up diner classics at her sidewalk table eatery; and the Toontown Farmers Market at Good Boy! Grocers, a friendly roadside stand, offering grab-and-go drinks and treats.