ernierocker

Right now it is like this: -East coast Trip forum then -Donkey forum then maybe -Random forum I usually only check out threads on the first page. But I check the forum at least five or six times a day so I do not miss much. The only time I go to past pages is to read all the locked threads I missed. For some reason, this is one of my favorite things to do on the forum. People are hilarious!

If they can figure out an efficient way to contain it in a vehicle, hydrogen might not be a bad place to invest in the future. This is an interesting thread. Im hoping to be able to get into some investing in a year or so. Im just now catching up on my saving after getting married and buying a house within a two month period.

So, not only did Spiderman break down, but it broke down, hard! That is funny!

I didn't realize Nagoya had that dense of a city. I love looking at views like that, so I would of been mad about the lights. I guess they didn't think people cared about the views, maybe because they don't get as many tourists as in Tokyo.

What building were you in with that night time skyline view? That is a sweet view, looks like the New York Bar from Lost in Translation.

It sure is fun trying to plan out your photos and comments in reverse order too. Looks like a pretty decent little park. Thanks for the PTR.

This will be by far my best year for amusement parks. Magic Kingdom MGM Studios Epcot Animal Kingdom Universal Studios Florida Islands of Adventures Dollywood Six Flags Over Georgia Carowinds (Huge Maybe) and on the East Coast trip alone: Busch Gardens Europe Kings Dominion Six Flags Great Adventure Hershey Park Dorney Park Knoebels Lake Compounce Dutch Wonderland Six Flags America Six Flags New England and a couple more parks that I don't know about yet

It was doing that we went. Thunderhead has always been a wild ride, but lately it has been flying through the course. I thought maybe it was because we were riding it in the backseat.

Here is a few: Terminal Velocity Point Break Night Flyer (An indoor suspended coaster) Red Dragon Maximum Overdrive Speed Demon Obviously some copyright issues with most of those.

How many parks is it now on the East Coast Trip that are opening new roller coasters next year? 6? Six Flags New England (Batman Dark Knight) Six Flags Great Adventure (Batman Dark Knight) Hersheypark (Fahrenheit) Knoebels (Flying Turns) Dorney Park (Voodoo) and probably Kings Dominion (Dominator) Add that to the fact that Busch Gardens just added Griffon, this trip gets better and better. Great choices and timing there R & E.

Now be honest, How long did you look for that Praying Mantis? Great captions by the way.

Where in the world does the line go when it is that long of a wait for Thunderhead? It seems it would spill out into the main pathway for a 30 minute wait. I didn't notice anything but clearing and dirt around the River Battle site. Its hard to see it too well though, because you have look between the breaks in the trees as the train goes by. You do get a great view now of Mystery Mine from the brake run of the Tennessee Tornado.

I just have not experienced the roughness on Mystery Mine that some people have. I can see where you could get some head-banging on the 1st half of the ride, but I usually just keep my head and neck forward and turned towards the way the ride is going. The last part of the ride I keep it straight back against the headrest. Ive sat in every seat, never had a headbanging problem. You liked Thunderhead a little huh?

Thanks. You are right about the pig. We were not about to eat that barbecue after seeing its source rotating around right in front of us!

I like these retro trip reports. Epcot has to be my favorite park. At least it was back then. Hopefully, when I go next year (for the first time in 9 years), the newer rides will not ruin it for me. You were definitely sporting a mean mullet, congrats.

Dollywood and Six Flags Over Texas.

Ahh the rookie mistake! Is there a way to switch the order of the pics? Ive got them backwards. Edit: Pictures are in the right order now.

Last Sunday (the 16th) my wife and I decided to take the short 45 minute drive over to Dollywood. I wasn't expecting large crowds today, but I was surprised when the parking lot was already full back to Lot D. There appeared to be a ton of people in the park as we headed towards Timber Canyon and as we checked out the queue for Thunderhead, we saw that it was filling the entire bottom queue. I make the assumption at this point that we should go for a Q-bot. Hey, its only 13 bucks or so with the Gold Pass, so why not? Well, it turns out that the only reason there was a wait for Thunderhead was because they were in the process of adding a 2nd train. When we make our way back there is absolutely no wait. We didn't have to use the Q-bot once! It turns out that the crowds were there for the Bluegrass and Barbecue festival. Everyone just wanted to eat and not ride the rides. We had a great day with no waits! I guess next time, I should wait to see more lines before jumping the gun. Oh well. On to the pics... First ride of the day was Thunderhead. What's that I see, could Timber Tower actually be operating today?! Thats the end. Thanks for reading! More shots of the excavation inside the train loop. Sorry dirt enthusiasts. We sat on the wrong side of the train for the non-blocked shots. It was explained to everyone that this excavation is being used as fill dirt for the connecting pathway next year. Oh, I guess they are going for that not so tranquil and natural look next year. Here is the steam train in action. We are about to embark on a relaxing journey through the tranquil and natural beauty of the Great Smoky Mountains. Tennessee Tornado from the train. Could you see it before they starting the pathway construction? Candace and I on the Dollywood Express. We are friggin excited! Sexy up-the-skirt shot of Dizzy Disk in action! Hot!! Good old Dizzy Disk. This is usually the only ride we ride in Country Fair. Keep scrolling. This was part of the festivities for the Bluegrass and Barbecue festival. Keep scrolling down vegetarians! The death of Spider Pig! All vegetarians move on, nothing to see here. Here is the pathway to Timber Canyon. I am going to love not having to use this every time to get to the rest of the park next year. Another one of Mystery Mine. Keep your head firmly against the headrest for this part please. Mystery Mine was our second ride of the day. No wait. Oh why did I buy a Q-bot?! Yes, Timber Tower is indeed operating. We didn't ride, its BORING. We rode twice, both times in the backseat. Thunderhead was running great today!

Thanks man. Yeah, I am taking the Civil Exam. My depth will be Transportation.

I am a Transportation Engineer/Designer and I work for the Tennessee Department of Transportation. I am about to take the Professional Engineers Exam in less than two months.

My wife and I are visiting my family in Dallas, so we decided to spend today at Six Flags. This was her first ever trip to a Six Flags theme park, so I figured it might as well be the original park. (Sorry for the lack of photos, I don't like keeping up with a camera at theme parks) We started the day with Titan. I unfortunately just missed being able to ride Titan on my last trip to Six Flags, as I came for spring break the year it opened. As a result, Texas Giant was closed and I was really disappointed because it was my favorite wooden roller coaster at the time. (We will get back to the Texas Giant in a moment) Anyways, we walked right up to the station and were on in two trains. We sat in the third row from the back. This was my first hypercoaster and I must say that the first drop woke me up! The rest of the ride is pretty good. There is a good floater hill on the way to the upwards helix and the 2nd helix has amazing forces on it. Overall, I loved Titan. The first drop is incredible. I don't really get coming to a complete stop on the Mid-course brake thingie, but hey I didn't design it, what do I know? Candace, my wife, loved this ride I give the ride a B+. After Titan, we headed to El Log Flume. It was right there, so we got on. We waited about five minutes. It was really meh. Not much to say about this one. I give the ride a S for satisfactory. Candace fell asleep twice. Next up was the Texas Giant. Man oh man! Remember when I said that this was my favorite wooden roller coaster. I probably last rode this ride in 1994. I can't remember the year exactly, but the ride was good. Evidently, wooden roller coasters get rough as they get older. Who knew?!! The ride hurt!!! I knew something was amiss when the turn out of the station was painful. The train was only going like 10 mph. How can that hurt? Anyways, Candace has two bruises now. I give the ride a fat F. (I give it a higher grade because there was no wait) After that letdown, we hobbled on over to the Yosemite Sam ride. We needed some TLC from some Looney Toon animatronics and we knew this was the place to get it. This ride is also a little nostalgic for me, as it was one of the first rides I rode back when I was a little kid. It was something else then, but I was always ride this and the Runaway Mine Train on every trip to Six Flags. The ride was okay, it was not in the sun which was a huge bonus as it was starting to get very hot outside. There was also only a five minute wait for the ride. I give the ride a C. The next ride of the day was Superman: Tower of Power. This was the first real wait of the day and also when we started to get hot. They had two towers running, which made the wait a tad longer than it could of been but the wait was probably about 20 minutes. I am not really sure why there has to be three ride ops for each tower and I am not really sure why they all three have to check your seats. This contributed to the wait time and would probably be REALLY annoying on a busy day. The ride was great. It is like two rides in one. It has the shoot up like The Big Shot in Las Vegas that Candace and I love, and it also has the free fall part like Acrophobia. I give the ride a B. We ate lunch at this point. It wasn't cheap. The next ride was Runaway Mine Train. This was the 2nd roller coaster I ever rode on. The ride was huge back in 1985. I think they shrunk it. Its not so big now. Candace and I thought it was cute. I think Candace called it "CUET!" I give the ride a C. Okay, it was really hot now! My fingers were starting to swell. I am skinny, my fingers aren't supposed to swell! We were in Gotham City now so we rode the Batman themed rides. Mr. Freeze had about a 30 minute wait. We JUST missed getting to be the first ones on the left transfer track. I mean it would only had shaved five minutes off our wait time but you should of seen how happy those first people were when they finally opened the left side. I think one girl was actually skipping she was so happy! I am a big fan of this ride. I love the anticipation as you're about to be launched into the tunnel. This was the first time Candace actually said she was a little nervous. We both loved the ride. It goes vertical a whole lot and it is fast. I give the ride a A-. We did Batman the Ride next. Its a good ride. I hate the queue stations for these rides, they are all the same. Hot, metal, and no air circulations. It was about 100 degrees now as well. We thought we were in trouble because we were in Sector 1 and this thing has 12 fricking Sectors! Fortunately, they had some Sectors closed off to the line and we were on the ride in about 30 minutes. Ive ridden Batman the Ride at four different parks. I think I like the ones that go left to right. Its a close call though. I give the ride a B+ Candace was really miserable hot now. She wanted some ice cream. Men, give your wives ice cream in this situation. Don't try to sneak in a ride on Judge Roy Scream first. We went to the Cold Stone Austin Ice Cream place and had a peanut butter extravaganza or something like that. She was happy. I was happy. We went to ride Judge Roy Scream. Judge Roy Scream is a good ride. Not much to it, just an out and back. This is the point of the trip I wish I had a camera. You can get a great panoramic shot of the park from here. The park really has an impressive skyline. I give the ride a B. We made our way across the park and rode Titan one more time. Candace said Titan was her favorite of the day. I have to agree. We left the park and sat in traffic for an hour. Thanks for reading. Sorry it was SO long, I like to ramble.

Copied directly from the Europe flyer... "Participants aged 15 and under as of June 22, 2008 must be accompanied by a parent or guardian."

Deposit sent! Hopefully I did that right. I haven't used paypal in a while.

Do we still need to add $5 to the deposit cost if sending by paypal? Or does paying by echeck take care of that?

The best thing about the River Rampage ride is when the rafts back up out of the station and one or two of the rafts get stuck underneath the waterfall. The worst thing about the River Rampage ride is being in the raft that gets stuck underneath the waterfall when the rafts back up out of the station. Nice TR.