robbalvey

Yeah, I have to say that we have had an overwhelming amount of Florida entries this year! We joked about it that last year we had *one* Florida video in the contest and this year there is like one every week! I guess that just goes to show you how awesome Florida really is! --Robb

http://cbs2chicago.com/contests/local_story_151125906.html I want to see some Theme Park Review members in the next season of Survivor!!! --Robb

It looks as though Wes is going to take this one. I'll give it until tomorrow before I close the voting and announce a winner! If it does end up being Wes, I have the *perfect* prize for him. I box set of the DVD "Spaced" which I will award to him at the BBQ on Saturday! --Robb

^ Yeah...there are quite a few things on my "to do" list right now: 1. BBQ this Saturday 2. Celebration City Photos 3. Worlds of Fun Photos 4. Shakira Video 5. Orlando Photos 6. Europe trip! 7. Send out T-shirt orders 8. Send out video orders And that all needs to get done in less than two weeks! And don't forget I have a "real" job on top of all that! --Robb "Running a website is like having THREE full time jobs!" Alvey

http://hawanja.com/polystation.htm#polystation Wow...so it's cool that they are making all kinds of wacky FamiCom (Nintendo NES) clones, but this is pretty strange!!! --Robb

While the article reports that this is a positive move, I hope that it doesn't impact the park in a negative way at all: http://sanjose.bizjournals.com/sanjose/stories/2005/05/30/newscolumn1.html

http://www.usatoday.com/money/world/2005-06-01-lego_x.htm Let's just hope they go to a good home. Legoland is probably one of the nicest parks in So Cal. I always reccomend people to visit there when they are in California! --Robb

What time does your flight get into OC? I'm a little confused by your original post. If your flight doesn't LEAVE CO until 10:00am, I can't imagine that you're getting into OC before noon. If that's the case, then by the time you get bags and your rental car...assume it's now 1pm, it will take you at LEAST 90 minutes to get to Valencia, so now it's 2:30...but you said you also wanted to check into your hotel? So let's say the earliest you can get there is 3pm. And during the Winter SFMM closes at 6pm. The chances of you getting in everything is slim to none if the above schedule is somewhat accurate. X will have at LEAST an hour line. Same with Deja Vu. So you'll almost have to choose..."Do I ride X and Deja Vu...or everything else in the park." Because during the winter, the lines for everything else shouldn't be more than 15 to 20 minutes long, because usually during the winter SFMM does the "bring a toy, get in for $10 deal." While it's a popular promotion, the park doesn't get as crowded as it does during the summer. Give us a little more info about your trip and we can help you plan a bit better! --Robb

Ok, I confused....this was BIG news everyone!!! ELEPHANTS RAMPAGED RESTAURANTS!!!! Why didn't anyone notice this???? --Robb "And it's amusement park related too!" Alvey

Wow! I just have to say that your TR is a PERFECT example of what Elissa and I wanted to do with the site and the forums! To give people a place to be able to post photo Trip Reports "TPR Style" and contribue as much or as little as they want! Great TR and thanks so much for posting all those awesome pics!!! --Robb "See you guys on Saturday!" Alvey

The T-shirts DID in fact come in today! We're going to post some photos of Elissa modeling them later tonight! They will probably start shipping tomorrow or Friday. --Robb

http://www.sentinelandenterprise.com/local/ci_2774628 I have to be honest, I visited this park a couple of times and I'm not sure what the big deal about it was. It was a dumpy little park without a real 'signature' ride. I know the preservationists will hate me for saying it, but I just couldn't see why someone would go through so much trouble to save this park. If the plans were to save it, and built a bunch of really kick ass rides, that would be one thing. But I just kept hearing that people wanted to preserve it the way it was. I'm all for preserving parks and coasters that DESERVE it, but this place just had nothing going for it, hence the reason I'm sure why it closed. I felt the same way about Miracle Strip and Starliner, and that place and coaster was 100 times better than Whalom! And just so everyone knows, I don't have anything against there being a campaign to save it, I just don't see the point in it. --Robb "Rant over!" Alvey

This shall explain everything: http://www.theonion.com/news/index.php?issue=4122

Hey everyone! If you are coming to the BBQ on Saturday, you need to RSVP today! Send an email to: robbalvey@themeparkreview.com and tell us how many are coming. We are making special "care packages" for everyone (and the will self destruct after you leave the BBQ) so we need to know the exact count. Details will be sent out tomororw to everyone who RSVP's. See you on Saturday! --Robb

It was crowded, but not unbearable. In my TR I talk about the crowds, so that should give you some idea. Just be prepared to get to parks as soon as they open, avoid parks on thier "Extra Magic Hour" because that seems to KILL the Disney parks, and try to FastPass your way around the parks as much as possible. --Robb "That's my advice!" Alvey

Day 1 - BGT and IOA Flew the redeye from LAX to MCO and got in at 6am. Picked up our rental car and went straight to BGT since we were scheduled to meet up with their PR dept an hour before the park opened. Met up with plenty of time to spare, and rode Shakira twice to get the footage we needed. The ride is much better than I thought it would be. Really quite a lot of fun! I would "kind of" compare it to the SUF's in that there are parts of it that are REALLY good, and parts that are just 'ok.' Overall, I think I liked it better than SUF and it was VERY well themed up! The splashdown ending, for example was just REALLY well done. Thumbs up of from all of us! Both drops were really good, and while it may not be as "forceful" as rides like Kumba or Montu, it delivered more forces, both positive and negative G's that we were expecting. And with the recent B&M's, we didn't think it would be. We did a lap around BGT - rode Montu twice, Kumba once, Cheetah Chase (finaly rode this after, what two years it's been there?), Scorpion and then we headed out. Got to our hotel, Universal's Royal Pacific, around 3:30, got our front of the line pass and got to IOA around 4ish. We managed to do nearly a complete lap including Hulk, Spiderman, Buzzsaw, Bluto, JP, F.U. (Flying Unicorn), and dragon hopped three times! The only thing we didn't hit was Cat In The Hat and 1 Fish, 2 Fish. We'll do those on Saturday. By now, we were totally wiped out and ready for bed! Day 2 - Epcot, & MGM Friday morning - we started out at Epcot. Went right to Soarin'. Nice queue, identical to DCA's other than that. We found it quite interesting that there was NO merchandise for this ride...AT ALL! We asked several leads in a number of different merch locations and they simply said "they just didn't make any." Odd. We did Test Track and Mission Space, then did the tour of the boat rides in World Showcase.' The "Mexican It's a Small World" and the "Norway - We have Trolls, Polar Bears, and Oil Rigs Ride." Ok so Norway isn't that great, but it's weird! Friday afternoon - Went to lunch at Big River Brewery. Good beer (says Elissa's dad) and good meatloaf. Next up...MGM! We managed to get in 4 rides on "Good Tower" (Jon was all...man this Tower craps all over DCA's!), 1 ride on coaster, Elissa got into the hot seat in Millionaire (again!), we saw the stunt show (which I actually think the Paris version might be a little better), and did a little shopping. The interesting thing about the Lights, Motors, Action stunt show is that they didn't have the guest participation that I remembered in the Paris version. And there was also a water ski part that was really lame, which I don't remember the Paris version having. Overall, though, it's a REALLY good show...and we don't normally do shows! Friday night - Back to Universal, went to dinner with some friends and just 'crashed' out in the lobby lounge with them chatting about the most random stuff in the world. It was SOOOOO much better than being at any theme park! Day 3 - Back to Universal! Today would be our 'all day at Universal/IOA day.' And it really did kick ass, especially with the front of the line pass. We did pretty much EVERYTHING! Mummy a bunch of times, MiB a bunch of times, Jaws, Shrek, Jimmy Neutron, Dragons a bunch of times, Hulk a bunch of times, Spiderman, Posiden's Fury, JP, Ripsaw, 1 Fish 2 Fish, Doom, Cat In The Hat, etc, etc, etc..... Lunch was at Mythos, and OMFG this is still the best food in any theme park EVER!!! And this time my normal entrees were not there! No Balsamic Chicken, no Spicy Asian Wings, no Tortillia Soup. But I had the most KICK ASS nachos....hard to even describe, and this HUGE Chinese chicken salad. Followed of course by the warm gooey banana chocolate cake! Yum! I give Universal kudos for allowing the resort guests to have unlimited express passes. I can't wait for Disney to implement something like this. As soon as they do, I guarantee we'll be staying at least one night in a Disney Deluxe hotel every visit! It's so worth it, too. For example, with our AP discount, Royal Pacific was $159 per night. You'd probably end up spending at least $60 in some cheaper hotel, and the book of express plus passes cost $30 per person PER PARK on that Saturday! So had we stayed off property and gotten the Express Plus tickets, it would have cost us $180 and you only get one ticket per ride. Staying on property was a much better deal! Day 4 - Back to Disney & a visit to Sea World! We started the day off at Epcot, mainly so that Jon could take the monorail and we headed over to Magic Kingdom. The park was PACKED...like I'd never seen it before! It looked like "Tokyo Disneyland" PACKED! But we did good FastPassing our way around the park. We got on Thunder, Splash, Mansion, and Pirates in about 2 hours. Space went down, but we got our fastpasses exchanged for rider switch passes so we can come back later. Then off to MGM for lunch at Mama Melrose's (yummy stuff!). Played Millionaire again and Elissa was #1 on the board the whole time, but she couldn't go into the hot seat since she was just there. Oh well. Tried to get on "Good Tower", but it was down. Boo... Next up was Sea World for a quick run in, and we got two rides on Kraken and one ride on Journey visit. Kraken still remains one of my favorite B&M's and Busch has really kept it up nicely over the years. Then we went BACK to MK again to use our rider switch passes only to find out that Space was down.....AGAIN! Luckily they let us use one pass on Buzz, and by the time we were out, Space was open again, and we got our two rides on it! Yay! Day 5 - Typhoon Lagoon and Epcot Crush N Gusher is AWESOME! I was really not expecting them to be that great, because we didn't think any of the Master Blasters at Schlitterbahn were anything that special. Fun, but not amazing. These were better than all three of those! They are VERY short, but each one of them is FAST, has a couple of good drops, and Coconut Gusher has this camelback hill that gives you airtime...TWICE!!! We rode all three of them and Coconut twice. They really were that good...although short. If you like good waterpark slides, we highly recommend getting out to Typhoon Lagoon! Make sure you get there first right after the park opened as we spent about 25 minutes at the Crush N Gusher complex and when we left the line was already about 20-30 minutes long. The rest of the park was pretty easy to do at this point, since most people were at Crush N Gusher. The Family raft ride wasn't as bad as Elissa said it would be. It's short...REALLY REALLY short, but then again it was one of the first family raft rides in the world. The wave pool is great with the 6 foot waves that it makes and the other body and tube slides were fun too. There isn't as much to do at Typhoon Lagoon as there is at Blizzard Beach, but Crush N Gusher is worth the trip alone. We got back to Epcot around 5ish and went looking for Jeremy at Turtle Talk, but he wasn't around, so off we went to go meet up with people. We found George, then met up with Kevin Yee and his wife and son and we went into our Imagination. After that we headed over to Japan for the TPR dinner meet, checked in with the restaurant and met Ted, Jeff, Justin, Reed, Stacey, and the whole group we were meeting up with. The dinner meet went pretty good. 13 of us showed up for dinner, then another 5 showed up for Illuminations, although not everyone made it through the show since it started to downpour about 10 minutes before the show was to start! The rain only lasted about 15 minutes, as typical Florida storms usually do, then the show went on. The fire barge was missing, which was a bummer, but overall Illuminations is still my favorite "nighttime" show. After the show we said our goodbyes and came back to the hotel and packed up. Time to head back to the real world. =( It was a GREAT trip and hopefully we'll have a photo update and a SheiKra video up soon! --Robb

I agree with Six. I'm NOT a fish person AT ALL...but I love your 'basic sushi' like Spicy Tuna Rolls. It doesn't taste "fishy.' It has a totally different taste to it all together. --Robb

Just a few comments about the most recent pics.... Ras - looks like my room from when I was a teenager....of course the posters were of bands like Oingo Boingo, The Smiths, Depeche Mode, etc, etc.... Jarmor - We need you to hang with us at parks and take care of all the line jumpers! Nursemelis - Wow! We have women on this board! (Calm down boys!) Jeremy - You look sooo cute in your Soarin' uniform! Now when can we get a T-shirt? Craig - Nice new jewels, man! Eric - Is this part of the mid-life crisis? --Robb

Ok everyone! This week's videos are UP!!!! START DOWNLOADING!!! http://www.themeparkreview.com/contest2005/contest2005.htm This week we get a video done by a 12-year old! Some of you might be very suprised to see what this young video editor can do! Be sure to check out Bernhard Wimmer's UK Parks Tour, Don Garrison's gangsta-like Universal segment, Holiday Park and a video that promises to be "Fun!!!" Lots of good stuff! Post your comments! --Robb "Only 10 more videos to go!" Alvey

OMG! Where were those tortoises at???? They are AWESOME! --Robb "Of all the coaster pictures...I comment about the reptiles!" Alvey

Awww, Eric. I'm so bummed that you didn't get to ride the Tornado. It really is one of the most bizarre coaster experiences! It's not rough at all, it's fun, but not amazing...but overall just very, very "Bizarre!" Glad you had a good time though! --Robb

It's fairly neck and neck between CoasterFanatic and Wes. Now that I'm back from Florida, I'll let this go a couple more days before we declare a winner! Then we'll take the best ones and add them to our avatar gallery. So if you haven't voted yet...do so now! --Robb

I finally got a chance to see some of the new Family Guy episodes this past weekend and I have to say that I'm really impressed! The whole opening bit from the 1st episode where Peter rattles off all the canceled shows on Fox was classic! What do you guys think? --Robb

So today ended our Florida Memorial Weekend trip. The TRP meet went pretty good. 13 of us showed up for dinner, then another 5 showed up for Illuminations, although not everyone made it through the show since it started to downpour about 10 minutes before the show was to start! So we had about 20 people meet up in total. Thanks to everyone for hanging out, even if it was for only a short time! We got back to Epcot around 5ish and went looking for Jeremy at Turtle Talk, but he wasn't around, so off we went to go meet up with people. We found George, then met up with Kevin Yee and his wife and son and we went into our Imagination. After that we headed over to Japan, checked in with the restaurant and met Ted, Jeff, Justin, Reed, Stacey, and the whole group. Dinner was kick ass like usual, but then it started to rain....HARD. A few others met up for Illuminations, but not everyone stayed since the rain kept coming down. We all snuck inside the margarita bar to keep out of the rain. About 20 minutes later, the rain stopped and Illuminations was on! Yay! Other than the fire barge not working (which was weird), the show was GREAT! After the show we said our goodbyes and came back to the hotel and packed up. Time to head back to the real world. =( It was a GREAT trip and hopefully we'll have a photo update and a SheiKra video up soon! --Robb "Thanks for reading!" Alvey

Thanks to everyone who met up and came to dinner tonight! And thanks to Ted for setting it up in the first place. It was fun throwing stuff back and forth between tables. Thankfully the rain storm only lasted about 10 minutes as we all got to know each other a little bit better as we huddled into the "Margarita Hut!" (too bad it wasn't open still!) Illuminations went off about 20 minutes late after it dried out, except without the fire barge, but it was still fun to meet up with everyone, meet new people, and catch up with people that we haven't seen in years (hi Jeff & George!) Hope everyone else had fun! --Robb "Until next meet!" Alvey