robinschroder

Mmmm... I like SNACKS! Speed Monster and Spin Spider were sooooooo good!! Hope you all continue to have a superfine time!

Big Mike, Glad to hear the pins are a hot item! And I'm also glad to hear you're all still having so much fun on the trip! Robin

Big Mike, sorry to hear about the bad weather today - it looks set to pick up at the weekend, though...

Glad you're all having such a great time! Thanks for all of the excellent updates so far, and really looking forward to seeing you all very soon!

Big Mike! Congratulations on 800! So glad to see you're all having such a great time and it's fantastic to see so many pictures from both yours and Robb's excellent updates! Really looking forward to seeing you all at the weekend!

Big Mike: The Man, The Myth, The Legend, On his Roadshow - 2009, Updating his valuable readership - Friends, Family & Loved Ones online.

Hi again, I have to be a bit careful, as I've personally not been to Kings Island (and I haven't been to all that many US parks either) - so I don't want to go putting you off or pointing you towards places / rides I haven't been to / on myself! All I would say is that El Toro is one of a modern breed of wooden coasters made (by Intamin) from pre-fabricated track which makes the ride a lot smoother than would normally be possible using traditional techniques. It was voted in Mitch Hawker's 2008 poll as the #3 wooden coaster in the world. So in a way, it's a hard act to follow! Son of Beast, on the other hand, has a bit of a reputation (again - I've not ridden it!) for being a little rough... granted it's a huge, tall, and fast ride but it's not going to be directly comparable to the 3 minute version of El Toro it sounds like you're hoping for... I live in the UK, and I've travelled out to the states over the years to visit Six Flags Magic Mountain and also Cedar Point. I had a great time at both parks and they just felt like some of America's 'must do' parks for someone outside of the US. I think Cedar Point is one of many good choices for somewhere fun to visit to go on lots of coasters in the US - so you're definitely not looking in the wrong direction. Bear in mind that Kingda Ka (not ridden it myself!) and Top Thrill Dragster are pretty similar rides at the end of the day (admittedly Dragster just has lap-bars so it maybe feels even more insane) - check out what else Cedar Point has to offer you (and there is a lot there); don't just go if your sole motivation is for a 'Kingda Ka'-a-like would be my advice. If you just want to head out and ride the biggest and best out there, for wood there are lots of interesting places to go in the Mid-West e.g. Holiday World is one of many very popular parks (e.g. The Voyage is #2 in Mitch's poll). Whilst there aren't any other Intamin pre-fab woodies in the US yet apart from El Toro, the GCI coasters dotted around the US are also definitely worth checking out - I really loved Troy at Toverland in the Netherlands! For steel, Superman / 'Bizarro' - yes, another one! - at Six Flags New England is very popular (#1 in Mitch's 2008 poll), Maverick and Millennium Force are popular at Cedar Point, also don't forget about the Florida parks like Busch Gardens Africa and Islands of Adventure, and for sheer volume of coasters all in one park there's Six Flags Magic Mountain. I've probably missed lots!! The good news is that the US is full of interesting parks to visit! I'm sure other US-based members will have some good and more focussed suggestions... Check out the TPR Park Index to read reports / see pictures / etc. to help you decide. Best of luck with your trip and don't forget to tell us all about it! Robin

After your experience on (universally praised) El Toro, I think you'll be in for a bit of a shock with Son of Beast (and Mean Streak)...!

^ Oh no, I believe the trims have always been on there... I just mean that I believe it used to run well a lot more consistently; if they were to remove the trims, maybe they could get it back to running like that again?

I agree that you shouldn't have to have such precise conditions for a ride to run well. Maybe it's finally time for Holiday Park to remove the trims and restore EGF to its former glory! Please do this, Holiday Park!

Sorry to hear you didn't have such a good time on EGF... You really do need a consistently hot day and, as hansrubens told you, to wait until right at the end of the day to get the best rides out of it. In all the times I've been there, I've definitely had amazing rides on it where you barely notice the trims at all, and also some where you really do, and it kind-of kills the second-half (but I'd never say I'd had a bad ride on it). Last year*, and also three years ago it was running really well, although I'm not sure that's any consolation... Robin *Although that said, Hanno wasn't quite so impressed with it on his ride last Spring, and then it came good for the TPR Europe trip in the Summer, and stayed good for my late Summer visit...

Big Mike, I'm going with 4 duckies - but as other people have already said, one of them really was a 'ghost' to my eyes...! Certainly a very tricky duck to find! Some more lock-ins:

My discs arrived this morning (- that was quick!) and I just finished watching Coaster Expedition Volume 12 disc 1. I have to say it's one of the best ever! Bonus credits are due to Robb, Elissa and all involved! The new camera and 16:9 aspect looked really great, and the music choices are getting even more eclectic (in a good way!) - that totally hardcore closing sequence is insane! Looking forward to checking out disc 2 & Raw 3 very soon! Great work!! Essential viewing!!!

Public transport is really excellent in Germany, so you'll be absolutely fine! I regularly travel from London to Germany by train - in fact I did London-Paris, Paris-Kaiserslautern and Kaiserslautern-Hassloch for another blast of EGF last year, although you'll most likely find that your flight version is a bit cheaper. You can easily get to Holiday Park via Hassloch (Pfalz) station - there's a shuttle bus run by VRN. Scan down to Bus Transfers here: http://holidaypark.de/en/infos/faq/ For any Deutsche Bahn train information you require, just go to the following website: http://www.bahn.de/international/view/en/index.shtml Robin (edited to remove unnecessary quote!)

Oh Hanno! You should've said you were coming to the UK! I would've come and hung out with you... Nevermind, see you in June! Robin

Big Mike - I really hope some of those rides open up for your East Coast Bash today! Unless they're going for an additional 'just like the West Coast Bash, with the exception of having any open rides'...

This afternoon I decided to head over to Thorpe Park for a second attempt at getting my Saw credit, after having been thwarted on its somewhat infamous public opening day. Fortunately I was in luck this time! I thought it was a pretty good ride overall - it certainly felt like there was a lot to the ride even though it's actually fairly short. The secret bits - which I won't spoil here - were really great, as was the trademark Eurofighter lift hill and drop. The inversions and their transitions weren't exactly B&M smooth, but neither was the ride particularly badly rough. There was pretty good airtime on the airtime hill too, which was a big plus (although the restraints made it tricky to fully appreciate) as well as when coming off the MCBR. It's probably Thorpe Park's best coaster now from the point of view of it being a really fun, well-themed ride with a few hidden twists. It bodes really well for Alton Towers' SW6 in terms of attention to detail and overall ride experience! They load 2 trains at a time in the station - I actually preferred my rides on the front train because it felt like the pace was kept up more (although, that said, having now read some spoilers, I don't think a key piece of theming was running as it should have been! So maybe stick with the second train like everyone else's advice suggests!). When I headed over to Stealth - which I was pleased to see up and running on this visit - the trains were often really struggling to make it over the top-hat. I joined the queue and kept my fingers crossed... Lo and behold, when it came to my turn we launched, neared the crest of the top-hat - but it quickly became apparent that we weren't going to make it over, so we rolled back! It was all over pretty quickly (much like the actual ride when it does what it's supposed to) - but definitely a fun experience! Plus now I too get to be a member of the exclusive Intamin Rocket Rollback club, if that exists. The train came to rest about a train's-length from the station. An engineer was called, and when he arrived he gradually brought our train back into the station. We all had to get out, the train was sent around empty (and it cleared the top-hat easily) and then everyone (well, most people) got back on. This time, we really zoomed over the top-hat which gave some excellent airtime a la Xcelerator (especially as I was sat right at the back); most unlike any other ride on Stealth I've ever had. I guess we must have had a slight over-speed launch... I seem to remember reading something along the lines that the launch system bases the next launch's power on what was required for the previous one, hence why they send half-filled trains around on Dragster when it re-opens, gradually opening up the rows further back once they're happy with the launch tolerance. (Maybe I'm wrong?) All in all, a great (short) visit! Apologies for the lack of pictures today, although other TPR members have already done a most excellent job of documenting the ride and the park this season - nice one! P.S. There seemed to be lots of rumours circulating of Lindsay Lohan wandering around the park with a VIP pass... Not really of much interest!

Even though Colossos is widely accepted as the 4th place Intamin plug-n-play woodie, it's an absolutely amazing ride - which is why I absolutely can't wait to get on any one of the others! If the 'worst' one is that good, what can that mean for the others...?

All of a sudden lots of UK cities have suddenly appeared on Google Maps! (Along with an increased number of European cities... I think) Here's the entrance to Thorpe Park Or have a wander around Trafalgar Square etc.!

This ride just looks absolutely incredible! There are so many great new rides opening up this year; watch out, the current top ten steel coasters!

I'm not convinced today will be going any better - I just read that Thorpe Park are currently experiencing power problems due to a power cut in the local area!

I was also there today - it was a little disappointing that so many rides (including Saw) were having so much trouble or were down throughout the day, but we had a really fun day nevertheless despite this (and despite all the queueing) - and the free return tickets plus fast-passes for Saw that Thorpe Park gave us at the end of the day were a really nice gesture. Plus all of the staff (including a couple of people we assumed to be park management) were very apologetic about the situation. When we arrived at the park, Saw was running which was excellent news, and we joined the queue. The start of the queue was far outside of the official entrance - as could be expected on the first opening public day - but it seemed to be moving along OK. As I'm sure you've already read by now, at about 11:30 one of the cars stopped on the MCBR which didn't seem to be such good news. Once they'd finally sent it on the rest of its way, it wasn't long before they announced to us that they'd have to evacuate the queue line, although they did hand out fast-passes in case Saw should re-open later on - which, sadly, it didn't; although they kindly extended the fast-passes to be valid at some point over the next few weeks. In the end, we had a ride on Rush (which also experienced a period of being broken whilst we were queuing - a bit over 1hr 30 queue) which was a rare treat for me as it was down every visit I made last year and it's probably my favourite there at Thorpe Park. We also got a ride in on Nemesis Inferno (we only waited 30 mins) and a ride on Colossus (1hr 30 queue) - immediately prior to which I bumped into Non-German Tom; it was nice to catch up briefly! ^It's interesting to hear why Stealth was down (and to be fair to Thorpe, its closure was listed outside the entrance, but still a shame not to be able to ride it today). Anyway, looking forward to riding Saw at some other point soon! Fixing Rush They sent a mixture of empty cars and cars with water dummies round for a lot of the afternoon. An empty Saw the ride area. ...still there... Not a good sign - the car stuck on the MCBR...

Sounds like a great year for the BMRS! Looking forward to all of your updates, and hopefully see you again at some point too! Robin

Congratulations on your first anniversary! Here's to the next year!

So, Big Mike - when's your waterpark going to be announced? Just joking! Looking forward to the next update!