ginzo

Yeah, I think their ride collection has aged very poorly. There are much better versions of almost everything they have: Racer/Beast -> Almost every woodie in Indiana and several in PA. Vortex -> Basically every B&M sit down or floorless looper. Adventure Express -> BTMRR & Vekoma mine trains. Face/Off -> B&M inverts Top Gun -> BBW, Eagle Fortress SOB -> a tilt-a-whirl or a very slow carousel. Flight of Fear -> Intamin rocket coasters. Firehawk -> Tatsu. Nothing they have right now stands out that much. For a park with one of the larger coaster collections this is quite sad.

I was going to, until you canceled.

http://www.vrbo.com/vacation-rentals/usa/missouri#3625 I've had good luck using VRBO. You should be able to find something within your price range without too many problems.

More excellent photos Hanno. You captured that exact moment when the pain kicked in on that slide at Schlossbeck. It was a great slide, but it hurt like hell when you came down from the airtime.

I didn't have that problem with Maverick, but I've only ridden it in the very front and I'm tall enough for my head to be well above the restraints. Liz rode next to me and hated it for the reason you describe. She only likes very smooth coasters and also ranks EGF as #1. I still like Maverick a lot more than every hyper I've been on except EGF, which I like a lot more than Maverick.

I don't think any of us preferred Silver Star over EGF, except for maybe Big Mike, but he may have been kidding.

You can usually wear t-shirts to water parks. I often do to prevent myself from getting sunburned.

I think that Jimmy Hoffa is buried underneath Kings Island's new coaster.

Water slides cost a fraction of what big coasters cost. And water parks are frequently slammed with guests. Even bad water parks often get a TON of guests. It doesn't take a Harvard MBA to figure out that this situation = profit.

I can't disagree about the "kicked the crap out of any other steel coaster" part. My previous favorite steel is Maverick and the quality gap between EGF and Maverick is quite large.

Maybe so. I'm just pointing out the fact that the coaster doesn't always run as well as it did for us.

I don't know. I talked to someone who rode EGF a week or two before we did and said it wasn't running all that great. Just floater airtime mostly. Holiday Park knew we were coming and was ready for us. Did you notice the maintenance guys inspecting the train at the end of the ERT session? And the coaster wheels out in front of the ride?

It's possible that you just haven't ridden it on a good day. EGF apparently doesn't always run as well as it did for us this year. It's a big crazy ride and is therefore a real maintenance challenge to a smaller park like Holiday Park that doesn't have a big park maintenance budget.

Yep. Now if only Predator, SOB, J2, GhostRider, Voyage, etc. would join Villain in the coaster afterlife. OK, out of all of those, I've only been on Villain, Ghostrider and Voyage. If you're going to insist on putting Ghostrider and Voyage in the same category of hell as Villain, then I shall be forced to refer to you, sir, as a nincompoop. Maybe I caught Ghostrider on a good day. Yes, Voyage is too intense to ride 4,000 times in a row. But I wanted off the Villain before I even got to the lift. It was so bad it made me mad. My teeth ache thinking about it and I had low expectations to begin with. I actually added Voyage to that list as a joke.

Hey, they had us locked into the trains for the last several cycles. We were like prisoners of Expedition GeForce.

Same. Just a great, great, great ride. I can't say enough good things about it.

Thanks to Paul & Matt Damon. Maybe we'll just allocate more time to Niagara on Sunday then. Not sure yet. We're doing Marineland in the morning, but that looks like a 3-4 hour park max for us.

I'm looking forward to this event! It's going to be all new credits for me! Does anyone have any suggestion for things to do in Toronto on Sunday, August 3rd? I've tried to find Toronto tourist attractions, but can't come up with much. Any Canabians want to comment?

Yep. Now if only Predator, SOB, J2, GhostRider, Voyage, etc. would join Villain in the coaster afterlife.

Lame. I was looking forward to joining you this Friday. I hope you can make it out after all.

Offer him $5. Tell him you need the other $245 to take care of the termite problem you'll get from bringing that track inside.

Man, that sounds like my kind of movie.

I've got bolts from the Crystal Beach Cyclone. Only $500 each.

Anything a park can do to attract less of those highly articulate teens is a great idea to me. Ravine Flyer II is AMAZING at 2,900 feet. It's just the right length. I wouldn't want it to be any longer because I'd rather it finish on a high note than putter out at the end like many coasters do. RFII easily made my top 3 woodies and I think it'll break the top 10 this year on Mitch's poll. Some other top woodies that are under 3k include Cornball Express, The Raven, and Avalanche.

You mean the season after which they had to replace 1100 feet of track?