Skramp

I'd say it looks like the pendulum of a grandfather clock. Whatever it's supposed to look like, it's pretty cool and a neat idea.

In case you didn't know, today is The Cyclone's (Astroland) 80th birthday. Does that make it the oldest operating coaster? Or is there an older one? http://www.daytondailynews.com/search/content/shared-gen/ap/National/Cyclones_8th.html

I wasn't necessarily talking about trees, trash cans and "bench" the ride, I more mean theming on the rides themselves. CP has done a nice job on Maverick with the canyons and such and some other parks have too. But, I think it would enhance the ride experience to have some theming involved. Think about it Dueling Dragons at IOA. You go through this amazing que with great theming, only to ride a roller coaster in an open field that absolutely kills the whole pre-ride build-up. It just seems that there is no effort at all on the part of American parks to "showcase" the whole ride experience. CP's best effort though has to be Disaster Transport. As horrible of a ride as it is, you have the que build-up and then the ride itself follows the theming all the way through. It seems that we only have a few dark rides that give this full experience, DarKastle comes to mind. I just think that this would completely enhance the experience. Imagine TTD with a tunnel all the way up the spike then suddenly it opens up and you're 420 ft above the ground only to plummet back down into another dark tunnel and reappear on the ground, that would completely mess with your head.

I'm sure this has been discussed before, but why is that when we see these PTR of parks in Europe, Asia, South America or wherever, they always have such incredible theming? I mean the recent Europa Park TR shows some beautiful areas as does every other Europe TR with the exception of Blackpool (haha!), but there are very few parks here in the US that even attempt to put any theming into rides or their surrounding areas? Of course we have the Disney chain, Busch Gardens and a few select others, but for the most part we are blessed with asphalt theming and nothing else. My home park is KI and it's got pretty much non-existent theming. You have Tomb Raider who's que theming is good, Flight of Fear and adventure express. All the rest just seem to be placed randomly. It just seems weird that there is no theming existent at really any park. Is it cultural, geographical or just typical American laziness?

Don't we already have a thread about this? http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=36133

Dang!! This sounds like fun and something I've always wanted to ride, but if you check their website, it's $17 for ONE RIDE!! It's $11 for the Alpine Slide and $19 for the ZipLine. One could go broke. That's $47 for 3 rides that might take you 30 mins total. You can get into a theme park for a whole day at that price.

You know, I feel for you, but this is one of the few bad reports we've heard about KI for a while. To me it seems that your day started on a bad note so throughout the rest of your day all you did was notice anything annoying or bad that happened. The Adventure express thing sounds like the norm. I know at KI they usually have music blaring in the stations so the op may not have heard the girls until they were really close. Who knows. I agree taking that long to get a water is ridiculous, but 10 mins?? Come on, there's no way that happened. I think you were just nit-picking everything that happened that day. There's always been a problem across the "amusement park" community with some ride-ops letting people who were really close to the height limits to slip through, while otherops are hard-nosed about it. Not defending KI, but let's be a little realistic about what really happened that day, don't blow things out of proportion. Plus, many reps of parks read these boards so they will see what you said and take actions themselves. And to second, third or fourth what everyone else said.....take some time, format your response see it's legible. I lost my place at least 20 times and had to keep rereading the same sentence 6 times in order to get through it!! (See, easy to blow things out of proportion, really only took me about 5 mins to read the whole thing, but now my eyes hurt)

Nice TR, always wanted to go to HersheyPark. On a side note, good thing you're going to be a director and not a writer, because dang, that grammar!! Hurts my eyes trying to read it.

I started reading this post and all the sudden all the words turned into...WAH WAH WAH WAH PITY WAH WAH BOOHOO PITY WAH WAH..... I mean come on, do you think residents of Sandusky can just drop by their waterpark resorts for a day or people near Kings Island can just drop in the Great Wolf for a few hours? These resorts are offering amenities to their GUESTS!! Not to the general public. Would you swing by your local Hampton Inn to take a dip in their pool on hot days? These places are self contained, exclusive places. Yes, they are pricey, but get tons of amenities for staying there. Suck it up and deal with it.

Here's another local article about it: Children Injured At River Blast In Dayton The Dayton Fire Department said several children were injured at the amusement park ride at River Blast in Dayton Saturday evening. The ride was for kids smaller than 4 feet tall and featured cars and motorcycles. As children were getting off of the ride it started moving again and dragged some of the children under the vehicles, a few witnesses said. Some parents drove their children to Children’s Medical Center to check on their injuries. Sounds like a kid's carousel ride. Hope everyone is ok. My brother was there and he never said anything about it.

The theming looks amazing!!! Disney doesn't even compare to that. It's like you're in the middle of Hell. Damn, why couldn't Tomb Raider look decent like that, oh wait, it's a Paramount invention, where we pick a movie and then randomly try to make a ride around it.

That is hilarious!! But here is my question.....who is taking pictures of Nikki taking pictures of Tom?

I searched and searched but couldn't find this listed here yet so here ya go. Not much new info but a good summary of everything. Only giving the link because it's 3 pages long. http://travel.msn.com/Guides/article.aspx?cp-documentid=395332&GT1=10040

Hey, I'm trying to contact Tom Muller about a video he made in '05. IT was the Bobbejaaland video with the annoyingly catchy german(?) disco song in it. I came across that vid recently and want to know the singer and song title. Can anyone help?

I used my glasses from "America's Greatest Coasters" video -REALLY OLD!!!- but damn good job man. You should start your own post and post a new pic every few days, you could even take user submissions and work with them, would be great!

If you watch the videos really close, you can see people jumping around the fire and pushing the cars around. Almost looks like some of the workers are trying to get the people out before they get stuck in their car right in the fire. That's damn brave if it's the case. Can't be sure about it, but that's what appears to be happening. Anyway, still one of the scariest things I've seen as far as Amusement accidents go.

PKi has their waterpark, but amazingly The Beach has managed to survive for years being less than half a mile from PKI, but now with the opening of the Great Wolf Lodge, we will have to see. I think people love The Beach Waterpark because it's cheap, not overcrowded and has some very decent attractions. I really don't see it going anywhere. Check it out: www.thebeachwaterpark.com

Rumor has it that Wes and Lou have an incredibly ugly love child named Tatsu!!

Ok, I searched before posting and didn't find anything, but who knows the way people list things, so this may be here already, but here goes. I know it's not incredibly theme park related, but we talk about the Stratosphere tower, so could you handle this? I know I couldn't. "The world's highest swing has been set up on an 1,100ft TV tower in China. The swing is set on a 700ft high viewing platform on the tower in Harbin city. Thrill seekers can sit on the steel seat and swing out over the city, beyond the edge of the platform. The tower is the world's second-highest steel tower, after the Kiev tower in Ukraine. The swing is named "Game for brave people". You better be strapped in for this one." http://www.thenewsvault.com/cgi/news.pl?t=970

I'm sorry about this, but I have to post it. Friday at 4:30 my wife gave birth to our two beautiful boys, Keb and Bek. Just had to share this with everyone!! My sons!!

You should hit all the museums in Chicago, some cost more than others but are VERY worth it. Head down to Michigan Ave and just check out all the shops. There's stuff there you'll wont see most other places. (Like a 6 story Sony store) Hit a restaurant called Ed DiBevics, it's an experiences. A 50's diner where they wait staff dance, sing and are rude. It's great!! Take a walking tour and see some amazing architecture. Marina City, Sears Tower, John Hancock, House of Blues, anything in the financial district, and just some of the local stuff are beautiful. Tour Rainforest Cafe, Hard Rock, Planet Hollywood (Still in business?) and all the other cool eating places. You definitely have to have a pizza of true Chicago Deep Dish pizza, nothing like it. If you have a chance, go to a Cubs game. Take a ride on the El, just for fun. Visit the Rock N Roll McDonalds on Ohio Ave. Great memorabilia!! On your way, take the toll road across Indiana and stop in South Bend, walk around Notre Dame, feel like Rudy!!! How's that for some suggestions?

Another article in our local paper about the Simpsons ride, some repeat but extra news never hurts: http://www.daytondailynews.com/search/content/shared-gen/ap/National/Simpsons_Ride.html

What is the ride you miss the most? Might be SBNO (like mine=Flashback at SFMM) or completely gone (King Cobra). **Let's see if I can have a post that doesn't get locked within 5 minutes**

So let's start the rumor mill going. Where will Cedar Point put their next roller coaster and what will be torn down to make room for it? My bet is that we will see the first coaster completely over water. What does everyone else think? They really have no room to build anywhere else, so it's gotta go somewhere?

I know we all hate posts that link to other sites, but this you gotta see!!!! F&^%ing hilarious!!!! http://www.break.com/index/redneck_carnival_ride2.html