ginzo

I think this is good news for all interested parties. InBev never seemed that interested in the AB parks to begin with.

Just to put shark attacks in perspective, at school we had a patient panel where one of them had actually been attacked by a shark. The surgeon in Hawaii had actually never even seen a shark attack before. Now I'm sure it's different in Australia, where you have to have no less than 25 children because 23-24 of them will be eaten by sharks, spiders, or crocs. But that's to be expected.

^ASO is a big joke anyway. They deal mostly in fear mongering and do nothing to actually improve safety.

Woah, it's getting hot in here.

We don't even have enough information to say that even. We don't know if the parks are following the maintenance schedule, nor do we know if they're even using the cables that the manufacturer suggests.

I remember that day. We kind of had bad luck that week with school trips. I remember getting it the worst at Efteling in queue for Flying Dutchman.

^You should call up Switzerland and tell them that. Maybe they'll hire you.

^Just do them all. Don't want to miss anything!

Only one coaster down? Last time I went to CP they had about 4 major coasters down for most of the day: Maverick, TTD, Raptor, and Magnum. Also, Skyhawk was only running one side and Max Air was down. Not that CP was doing anything wrong. I just went on a crappy day.

I'm somewhat torn between this viewpoint and the idea that we could produce better drivers through stricter licensing requirements. Cars are dangerous. I don't see a downside to having a lot more stringent requirements to getting a license. At the same time, how well is education going to sink in on those people that can't figure out that tailgating someone at 80 MPH is a bad idea?

^To what end, exactly? It's a massively successful project. The park loves the ride. It's very popular. They've won lots of awards. I'm sure that TGG is well aware that different people have different favorite rides. What's nice about TGG is that they've managed to come out with enough variety in their projects to appeal to different tastes. If you're not into Voyage that much, maybe you like Hades or Ravine Flyer II.

^I'm wondering about the impact of the T-bar on man junk. I couldn't imagine a t-bar on Indiana Jones. That would be like a free vasectomy with every ride. Is this ride as herky jerky as Indy?

Very good stuff, Robb. It sounds like Korey is particularly well suited towards his job. Must be very nice to actually like your job. I found the discussion on the Timberliners very interesting, particularly how they apparently ran better on Raven than the existing PTC rolling stock does. There really is a huge need for better trains on many woodies. I remember how poorly the 3-bench Gerstlauer trains navigated the turns on Der Mammut. You could hear the trains bashing into the track at almost every turn on a BRAND NEW RIDE. Horrible. Anyway, I look forward to more GG projects. Along with Intamin, they lead the way in thrilling woodies.

I'm all for this. I imagine aggressive driving is possibly even more dangerous than texting while driving. One of the things I notice while driving in Germany this summer was that the drivers were MUCH more polite in general. Nobody tailgated or passed you on the right. And this is because Germany hands out fines for these offenses. We should as well. Also, it's considered a cardinal sin to go slow in the passing lane over there. That's another thing we should honor.

Or to Bakken! Personally, I've had very good luck with my GPS devices. If you get a decent one with text-to-speech, you don't need to look at the screen that much. Seems a lot safer than trying to read a print out from Google Maps while driving.

If it makes you feel any better, Germans speak English a lot better than we speak German. Ultimately, the traveler should make an effort to learn the polite local words, but it becomes difficult to do this when you blitz a lot of countries in a few weeks. Those moments when you hit that complete language barrier, though embarrassing at the time, are usually memorable later on.

Cops don't determine fault. That's what the courts are for. Even the accident reports in court are considered hearsay as the cops usually don't witness the accident. At least this is how it works in my state.

I can't wait until they figure out the car that drives itself. This is just another example of why humans are inherently bad at driving. We can't even force ourselves to look at the road 100% of the time. Heck, I do stupid things driving myself, even though I take driving much more seriously than most. Just the other day I almost pulled out in front of a bunch of oncoming cars. For some reason I didn't see them at first, and then had to brake suddenly to avoid causing a wreck.

I like the S&S Swings just fine, but why would Grona Lund want to just copy what their main rival just put in? Star Flyers can be a lot of fun, especially when it's the tallest Star Flyer in the world and you're in a great setting like that. I think the reason the invert is on the table is mainly space. They don't have much to work with. I actually asked one of the owners why they didn't get an Intamin woodie and he said it would take up all the space of the new area. Not good. Anyway, this is far from finalized. So, who knows what they'll come up with in the end. Do you understand the fight the park is going through just to get this expansion put in?

You'll need more than nein und ja to order food at many snack stands in German parks. I've hit the language barrier many times in Germany. You're right that it's not a huge deal, but for a first time traveler the UK makes a lot of sense. In addition to an hour less jet lag, London is the easiest city to fly into from the US. It's also great for adding on some extra days and doing some sightseeing.

Yep, this is exactly what happened with me. Total bait and switch action.

^Have you been to Europe before? If not, UK might be a good place to start since everyone is generally friendly there and there's no language barrier.

^Mega Zeph?

19/20 This was one of the easier ones though.

I don't remember that specifically, but that makes a lot of sense. My riding technique with standard Gerstlauer trains involves trying to keep myself in that "sweet spot" between getting pounded by the rock-hard "padding" of the seats and getting impaled by the restraints. It's a delicate balancing act and makes for a not fun ride, particularly on really rough rides like SOB. With Der Mammut, there was none of that.