CoasterEricHP

Anyone have any pictures from this? I've.. uhh.. always been somewhat of a Trekkie ... and never got to check it out, and never will.

Thats awful! It really sucks that Kings Island would treat them so crappily. I'm really happy they went to the media with this to shed some light on it and hopefully get them to act on it. During my time at Disney and Universal we had a ton of International students and it was way better than this! Disney of course has the three pretty decent apartment complexes and the treehouses! You pretty much live ON Disney property. Universal was a little different because it was a little more of a hike to the apartments.. but they are building a brand new building pretty much on property for International students I believe. But both places the international students seemed to have an awesome experience and they were all easily some of the best workers and coolest people I ever met. Kings Island.. you suck!

LOL.. that is so true... sadly.. My parents live right by the Maryland/Pennsylvania border and it's really easy to tell where the state line is! Just watch that nicely paved highway turn into some gray patchwork half assed pave job. Yeah.. Bulbasaur was in my glovebox for a few years and Jackie found him.. upset over his treatment. Its a 2002 Celica by the way! And.... I'm not really sure why we skipped Talon. We only had a few hours and we spent pretty much all of it on the other side of the park. Talon's kind of in its own little world up there.

I love the Phantom's Revenge! But I guess I'm a sucker for traditional out and backs with airtime. If Phatoms Revenge had a straight section with some airtime hills then Steel Force would be dethroned easily. I actually used to live right by PNC Park in the North Shore to go to school a few years ago. My girlfriend at the time lived on Bouquet St/Dawson St so I've been around Pitt! We didn't have time to hit up Hemmingways, Peter's Pub, or Bootleggers this time.. I love the gothic architecture though.. I wish I could've seen some of the nationality rooms.. Also some other notes.. Voodoo ran pretty consistantly from 5-10. I didn't notice any downtime. Thunderhawk was AMAZING last year.. but this year it was pretty weak! I don't know if the brake was on too hard but it was pretty disappointing. Sigh.. anyone else have a comparison?

And here are some non park related pictures. But Pittsburgh's too nice to not add them! You'll be ok! Ending with.. TOM PETTY! He rocked.. everyone should go see him! Ok done. Ok.. that's actually the best view.. Best view in baseball! Makes up for the team.. one more urban bathtub! Heading over to PNC Park for the Pirate's game... but first.. How would you like to be a window washer? This fountain can sneak up on you. Jackie has found complete happiness. Meanwhile at PPG Plaza.. The Fort Pitt Bridge. One of the many bridges in the "city of bridges" Gateway Center is really.. Orson Welles.. "Big Brother" 1950's retro future looking. But the one in Gateway Center wasn't. I took Jackie on a fountain tour of downtown so she'd be happy! Point Park is under construction tho Pittsburgh is easily the prettiest city I've been in. In the Natural History museum checking out the rock candy. Very Night at the Museum'ish. Robocoaster!! Ok maybe not but close.. a basket shooting robot is cool too! Church. We're pretty hot.. We hit up the Art Museum in Oakland. Here's the Cathedral of Learning at the University of Pittsburgh. I swear every road in Pittsburgh is under construction.. it means lots of traffic! :[

Ok time for Kennywood. In June my girlfriend and my friend Mike and I went to Pittsburgh to see the closest person to a living god ever.. Tom Petty. So of course we had to hit up Kennywood.. and do some other running around in the beautifullll city I used to live in. We did the four hour drive into Monroeville and headed to Kennywood for the night. Again.. Kennywood has a great deal from 5-10pm! Plus.. free parking and really good food! I wouldn't recommend using Mapquest to get from Monroeville to Kennywood though. But then again, you also want to avoid I-376 from 4-7pm! Kennywood was awesome as always! On to the pics: and one last shot of the Racer before heading out. Great chicken. The original Carousel was housed here.. now its just a food court which makes ACE'rs happy. The Potato Patch! ... and the Thunderbolt. The really unique setting of Kennywood.. can anyone see the train? Ok time for some night shots while in line for Phantoms Revenge.. this one's kinda shaky.. but you can see how PR plummets into the ravine! some random guy, Molly, me, and Jackie ready to flyyyy. Our friend Molly met up with us.. we were always the "cut off group"! Thunderbolt picture! T-bolt was a little rougher than I remember.. but still great. Jackie has an abnormal love for fountains.. I wouldnt know anything about things like that. Lost Kennywood is awesome looking. Also.. the Exterminator is amazing! Six Flags should've rode that a few times before '08.. Every park should be required to have a screamin' swing! I hate losing classic rides.. but Ghostwood Estates is an INSTANT classic IMO.. Great theming and great job by the park! Jackrabbit has to be in your top 5 for coolest logos! gotta start with the classics! Hey Mike! Finally! Sometimes I hate Mapquest.. we did get to drive through some really interesting areas though! Norad.. or just a tunnel on the Turnpike. Some good ol' PA mountains! You Colorado people are probably so jealous!

Last night my girlfriend Jackie and I met up with my friend Carrie from Philly and did the whole sunset plan at Dorney Park. I'll keep my rambling as short as possible! Dorney Park is probably my third favorite park that I've been to in PA behind Knoebels and Kennywood! (sorry Hershey). I never understand why Dorney gets bashed occasionally! It's a beautiful park with a great assortment of rides! Plus $19.50 is a really good price for the sunset plan. The weather was PERFECT and the parks wasnt crowded at all. Our longest wait would've been 30 mins for Voodoo. Ok picture time! And so ends an awesome night at Dorney! Stay tuned for Kennywood and Pittsburgh! Now to end the night with some Steel Force! Once in the back.. and once in the front! It rocked! Oops.. missed a Voodoo Ferris Wheel shot! Better late than never.. they have a stupid way to load the Wild Mouse.. plus the ride's brakes were like being in a car crash! ..yay.. 25 minute wait.. yay.. Carrie and Jackie needed the Wild Mouse credit.. ugh.. Look out!!! Talon.. not like you guys didnt know that.. Time for the Ferris Wheel portion of the TR.. Here's an overview of the lower part of the park. It's so romantic.. Here is the concrete wasteland known at Dorney Park.. ?! It's a really nice park! Thought this looked cool.. We rode twice in the backrow, and once in the front. Both were awesome! Look at that beast!! Magnum has nothing on Steel Force.. On to the best steel in PA! ( I haven't been on Fahrenheit yet.. sadly ) There was a little wait for Dominator. Here I am being blinded and balancing my $3.30 camoflaged drink. Hey Carrie.. last year this girl rode a drop tower... Next up.. Dominator! I'd love to have one of these closer to York!.. Hersheyyyyyyyy....?!? Boo for the Holding Brake!! When it stops you it makes this... "SCREEEEEECHHHHH" you can hear on the train. It's almost deathly sounding! I think they should not use the brakes. Voodoo was great! It did have some weirddd noises going on though. Very reminiscent of S:UE at Geauga Lake.. which is kind of scary if you think about it! We see you Voodoo! We hit Hydra first. It was a walk on.. I just want to hug this thing for replacing Hercules! Talon looms over the entrance area. Amazingly we didnt ride it this year. Woohoo! Dorney Park! Hi Carrie!

Interesting! It makes sense that they'd get the groundwork done for some future slides during the original construction! Good find! I cant help but think that they'll get some kind of water coaster in the near future.

As much as most of us coaster/thrills people love to hate the Boardwalk, you have to look at the big picture. In 2007 Hersheypark saw a HUGE rise in attendance thanks in large part to the Boardwalk. I'd rather see Hershey build something to add on to the success of the Boardwalk (and Fahrenheit) and see Hershey continue to grow! More people = more money and that equals more great rides in the future (...even though I still cant believe how EXPENSIVE Hersheypark is now) Not many normal people are going to miss the Rodeo.. more people will miss Canyon River Rapids but that ride took up a huge amount of land. The new area seems to make really good use of the available space too. So in short.. I think it looks great and will be a great addition to the park!

Great pictures!! If I have my future wedding at Knoebels can I hire you to be the photographer?! Could I possibly request that first Comet one for a desktop background?! You Rock! Eric

Ohhh ok! I didn't realize the station acted as a storage area too. I was wondering what was with the extra track in the station but didn't want to look dumb and ask! Glad you got to ride it! I'm thinking next week I'll head up and get my first Fahrenheit ride! woohoo!

For Fahrenheit not being a HUGE coaster in terms of height.. it definately makes its presence felt and looms over Pioneer Frontier area and even the Boardwalk and Midway America! So pretty.. Well.. because I jumped the gun and figured there's no way they would seriously get the coaster back up and running (Hershey maintainance/engineer people.. you ROCK by the way!) and left.. I have a question... which may have been answered here somewhere.. How is the station and queue line laid out?

Awesome pictures and report! Especially the panoramic one of Storm Runner.. Oh yeah, the Wildcat was running great! We rode in the front and this year was probably the smoothest ride on it I've ever had. The lapbars seemed to have more resistance this year so they didnt crush you... unless you're my g/f who I tell to not pull it down a lot and what does she do.. pulls it down.. ha. Women..

WOw... ! I'm glad I wasn't raised like you! I'm sure security kicked everyone out of line in the morning because of the fact that uh.. the train was stuck in the cobra roll? When my g/f and I walked past we heard a lady ask if it was open and the security guard said "No its having technical problems" and she said "Oh.. Ok.. well.. I'll just wait then".. and then he said "if you go around the corner, you'll see what the problem is" and she just insisted that she'd wait in line! Many people are stupid and letting a huge line form for a ride they know is going to be down for many hours would be the WORST thing they could do! It'd just attract 100x more stupid people!

You REALLY need to write a novel! About ANYTHING. Your posts/blogs are always very entertaining. I'm really glad you got to ride yesterday! I felt bad for you. It was great to finally meet you! Sorry I didn't stick around for long. We rode Wildcat and Lightning Racer and then saw the line for the Great Bear, SDL, and the Comet and headed out! If you're ever back up this way let me know!

Wow.. that is a crazy good turn around time from a valleyed train to having people ride! Awesome! If anyone heads up to Hershey again in the near future let me know! If I'm not working it would be fun to meet up again. After seeing the overflowing queue for the Comet my g/f and I decided to head to the Harrisburg Arts Fest instead. Should've stayed apparently! Oh well! I really wished I would've thought to ask the Gary about Turbulence! Would've been cool to hear the inside scoop.

Wow! That's awesome news! I felt so bad for Natalie since she traveled so far to get to ride it! I never thought that a park could get a valleyed coaster up and running in less than a day! Go Hershey!

I'm starting to wonder if there could *POTENTIALLY* be a larger issue with Fahrenheit. Oh well, I might post a TR later from today, I didn't take many pictures. It was fun though even though we didnt get to ride Fahrenheit. The maintanance guy we got to talk to said they were going to try to get it open later today, but I can't see that happening until they are sure this thing isn't going to valley with guests on. I hope we aren't seeing a larger Maverick type incident! Thanks again to everyone at Hershey for today if you are lurking!

From what I hear from some old Universal friends, Dragons WILL be changed to fit in with the new Harry Potter theme. However the change won't be drastic. Just a new preshow, costumes, and the castle will be rethemed. I doubt they will touch the trains, but new molding wouldn't be a big drastic change either.. Also, judging by the concept art, it looks like the queue will start much closer to the castle and the dragons out front may be gone! I've heard that Unicorn will close down as early as July (but it makes more sense to close it after the busy summer season) and wont reopen until LATE NEXT year when the whole area transformation is complete. This makes sense because the retheme of the ride, but also because its location pretty much in a construction zone! What else.. Dragons will only be closed for a few months leading up to the opening of the new area. So probably Sept-Nov of '09? And finally and the coolest news is that rumor has it there is a temporary maintainance bay out behind dragons (out of guest view) that they will be using to assemble the robo train things (track above the car apparently) during the construction of the castle. Sounds pretty cool! Im still wondering if this is all part of "Phase One" for Harry Potter stuff, or if the expansion between Dragons and Sinbad towards USF was just speculation.

Great article. This guy is obviously very professional and understood what was going too far even if it was pushing "Disney standards". Disney isnt the easiest company to work for, I've been there, but to keep the image they work so hard to have, I can understand why they have to be "Nazi's in Mouse Ears". I can't even tell you how many of my team members at Universal I had to send back to wardrobe to shave or get on their case about not having a shirt tucked in. But the parks want everyone working there to be approachable to everyone and the unkept look didnt fly well! So yeah.. its EXTREME sometimes! I can't even imagine how insane it is to be a character! But at the same time you know what you're getting into. My g/f loves Jack Sparrow.. too much.. by the way.. so.. uhh.. sorry if she did anything to the guy who wrote this..

LOL! I love the on ride photo's.. Years ago (like.. 2000) I heard from Cedar Fair about some on ride pictures I posted on an old coaster website. I was honored they went through all that work to yell at me though! Great TR! I'll see you this weekend! Woohoo!

Your photo's definately capture SFA's good side! Good job on that.. haha. Maybe the park is only awful on hot, crowded summer days. Can't wait to see the KD ones! Ready for Sat?!

Im sure all parks have a bad day every now and then... but as far as consistant crappy overall operations: Six Flags America! Everythiing from waiting way too long to get into the parking lot, to getting into the park, to crappy attraction operations, and then waiting 45 minutes to get a slice of pizza in a line 4 or 5 people long. Awesome.. Only reason to go to SFA-- get a cheap season pass and use it at other Six Flags parks.

I rode Leap the Dips a few years ago.. probably at least 5-6, but it was a much better ride than I anticipated! You get some nice airtime on the dips! It's a must ride for any enthusiast if youre in the area just because of the history of it. I should've done more whoring at Lakemont tho.. sigh.

I always wonder why people are down on Dorney too! They have a great collection of coasters about to be made even better! Plus they have an S&S tower! The only ugly thing about the park is the area by Talon.. but that's not even the desolate wasteland that most people make it out to be. Dorney rocks! I feel like us PA people are pretty spoiled. ^PS.. I dont know what Hercules you're talking about! I was pretty close to suicidal after my last ride on that beast.