Philrad71

I would definitely love to check out UAE....these parks look amazing and I am intrigued about some of the other plans for parks. And of course the food and architecture all look amazing too!

Breakers is a great place to stay, regardless of the room. The old rooms were dated and crappy, but it was still awesome being on site. If this is like a once in a lifetime trip for someone, it's worth it, but if you go once a year or every couple of years, you may want to explore cheaper options off the peninsula. One thing I noticed you mentioned Conneaut Lake Park. Just so you know, the amusement park is about 2.5 hours from Cedar Point...not 40 minutes! Edit: Just for the record, I like hockey, football, heavy metal music...and guys too. Sorry that this happened to the OP at one of the best places on the planet, but yeah...America and the world in general still has a long way to go to accepting the LGBTQ crowd. A lot of good progress has been made in recent years, but I hope that things don't start to regress due to all the bad sh%t that's going on in the world right now. From CP to CLP

^ Thanks Chuck...appreciate the kind words! I have been e-mailing the parks manager and found out that she is also an amusement park enthusiast/historian. She told me a neat little story about the park's merry-go-round, which I thought was awesome... "Our carousel is a 1946 Herschell. However, it did not start it’s life at Midway. It started at another Trolley Park on Owasco Lake in Auburn, NY. An old co-worker’s father was the last owner of that park. In 1968, that county used eminent domain to take the park and annex it to the county system while removing all amusements making it green space. There were 3 carousels: one is at Hershey Park in PA, one is scattered in collections around Long Island etc, - they didn’t know where the 3rd ended up. Then, I came here 3 years ago… found it! The records here indicate is it indeed the one from Owasco Lake and I have old pictures of it there matching up perfectly. I had the family out and they were thrilled to see it again! One of those warm-fuzzies!! "

How about...."The Dark Side of The Force"...? Works for me!

^ Bill - I checked their website and came up with the attached photos. Looks like quite the workout for the little ones - kinda like pedal boats, but kids use their hands instead of feet to propel themselves. Rocket Jets...or are they called Skyfighter Jets??? Hmmm.... Borrowed from the Midway Park website. Borrowed from Wikipedia.

Once again, it's time to do something good for my community, so last Wednesday, my work team headed over to the local amusement park to perform some community service! For those of you that have never heard of Midway State Park, it is one of the oldest continually operating amusement parks in the country today and only one of eleven (5th oldest) remaining trolley parks. In looking at the photos, it may look like a very small park (it is) and perhaps even a little rough around the edges (it is). But that's why every year I coordinate a day with the park manager for our team to go over to pitch in and help get the park ready for it's opening day of the season. In the past, we have helped sweep and clean out the picnic pavilions, cleaned around the newly-restored Herschell Merry-Go-Round (made right here in Western NY) and helped cleaned out the decorative pond/fountain. It may not seem like much, but it's for a great cause and the manager certainly appreciates a few hours of free labor! This year our team got to paint! Two of us were asked to paint the recently overhauled Roto-Whip ride while the other two of my team members painted the Bumper Car building. There was also a group of four from my employer that resealed the go-kart track. Some of the major restorations projects done to the park in recent years (besides the merry-go-round) was a renovation of the parks Herschell train and "station", a complete overhaul of the park's miniature golf course and relocation of the Helicopters (2016) and a complete restoration of the park's Herschell Little Dipper kiddie roller coaster & Roto-Whip ride (2017). As mentioned by ejot in a previous post, Herschell rides are the prominent ride manufacturer here at Midway with kiddie classics like the Tubs-O-Fun (get your puke bucket handy), the aforementioned train and Helicopters, with boats and airplanes amongst several others. I really like the fact that the park is getting the needed funding to keep it open as well as funding to keep the rides safe, freshly painted and operational. I tried to pry the one of the park's maintenance managers on what would be on the horizon for next year's project, but at this point it sounds as if it is still a secret - playing the Cedar Point tactic, I see! Okay, let's get a little sneak peek at what's in store for 2017 at Midway State Park! Today's task...repaint the parks newly revamped Roto-Whip kiddie ride! Here are the inner workings of the ride. Certainly not hi-tech, but it gets the job done. Okay, I admit that we're no Monet, but the red portion hadn't been painted yet...we were doing the white portion first! My boss and engineer were tasked with painting the ride queue area for the Bumper Cars. Look - no island! We also got to leave our initials . Signage - I noticed that they don't mess around when it comes to casts on some of the rides. I believe every ride states whether they are allowed or not. Imagine seeing these signs at Cedar Point? Enthusiasts would be bringing pitchforks and torches. lol I really need to come back to the park this season to check these out. These aren't the really old model bumper cars like the ones at Knoebels, but I wonder if they are faster than the neutered versions at most theme parks? Time to check out the rest of the park - here are the nausea-inducing Tubs-O-Fun. Basically a smaller, stripped down version of a tea-cups ride. Loved this ride as a child. So simple, yet so deliciously evil! The aeroplanes. Looks like they just took the tarps off of the kiddie boats. The newly remodeled train and station. Please use the test seat so you won't have to do the walk of shame! I have some great memories of riding this Tilt-A-Whirl with my family. It was my mother's favorite ride of all time (this and Gemini) and I still recall how she used to laugh so hard on this that she would cry! Next to it, is a fairly recent addition: Tidal Wave, which I have learned is a 2000 Sartori Ride. In it's place, a Dragon coaster used to reside here and before that a Paratrooper ride. I still miss Paratrooper as I recall it having a fantastically fast program - like the thing was on steroids compared with other models that I have ridden. Love the job that they did with the Helicopter ride last year - they look great! In the background is the Fun Slide, although the old one they used to have was the king of all slides (mentioned in my previous report). Cleaning this out was last year's project. Tugboat Paddler with the revamped miniature golf course in the background. I was going to go snap some photos of the mini-golf, but they were doing some work back there and I didn't want to get in their way. And the newly renovated Little Dipper coaster! It boasts a new station, new paint, a cement pad... ...and a new coaster train! While not quite finished yet, I was very impressed with how these older rides are getting new lives here in the park! Here is the old location with the old train/station for comparison. The park is free admission - here are the ticket booths for the rides and mini-golf. Here is the Herschell carousel in all of it's restored beauty - it looks great! Signage for Larry. No brass rings like Knoebels, but still a classic. My hope is for a revamp of the old lakeside roller rink, but unfortunately that era may have come and gone. I still have great memories of roller skating here as a kid though! Thanks for reading - hope you enjoyed the report!

Personally, I would be thrilled if they got rid of it and replaced it with a Screaming Swing or a Giant Frisbee. Although they have been known to have their fair share of mechanical issues at some parks, the rides are a lot more fun (at least, I think they are).

That would be a shame to finally get Twister open after what, two years of SBNO only to have it break down just a couple of days after finally getting it operational again. Hopefully it's not some big mechanical gear driven failure.

I have seen the Stanley on TV, but would love to go there someday!

^ Bill - Yes, there are TON of beers to sample during the event. You know that I like beer and I didn't even come close to trying out all the ones that I wanted to. You just get to the point where your belly tells you that you've had enough beer and that's it time to go walk it off and go do some coasters! I would recommend if you see Southern Tier beer anywhere to give it a shout. This brewery is literally almost walking distance from our house! Edit: Just checked the list on the website and ST is not listed as a featured brewery. Ya never know though...they might still have it as I am pretty sure that they had it last year and it wasn't listed. Double edit: Having a Great Lakes Chillwave Double IPA. I like it better than the Flying Dog Double IPA that I had last night. Still not as hoppy as the Southern Tier IPA's, but if they offer this at CP this year, this will likely be my go-to beer.

To be fair, a big part of this site is trip planning/expectations/tips etc it's always been a big help to me and ya know, it's important to have an idea of weather to be expected. That could potentially ruin a trip. Also not the be that guy but is a new comment every day about the next piece of lumber added or the next 1/10th of a turn installed that critical? I love coaster construction but not much changes every day...hate to say but while the pics are great they all look kinda the same to me. I'll not really check too actively for a few weeks and see progress then. tl;dr not much is happening with Mean Streak on a day to day basis what's to be excited about right now? Yeah, but to be even more fair, to sum up talking about weather at CP you can just say: "The weather at CP changes rapidly, and is always pretty hard to predict. Just go, hope for the best, and enjoy what you can!", and then give that as a stock answer, and move on from the conversation. Seriously... Trying to predict the weather at CP is worse than trying to predict weather in Michigan, which is nearly impossible. I'm going to CP on the 25th. Right now it's calling for rain showers in the AM. Until that morning, the forecast doesn't really matter. And even then, it matters very little... As for RMC Streak, I'm all for as much talk about this amazing creation as possible! If someone is trying to predict the weather around the Great Lakes a week or two (or more) in advance, they might have just as much luck using this...

^ I agree...one of the best horror movies of all time. I'll be interested to see/read some reports when this one opens.

^ I'd rather see Cobra go to Darien Lake and rot in a field for 20 years.

I'd rather see Cobra go to Darien Lake and rot in a field for 20 years.

You mean Sweetwater 420, of course!

Sounds like the beer & BBQ is offering pretty much the same food selection as last year, but with desserts. While I absolutely love the HUGE beer selection that they have at this event. (really excited to try out a couple of the CP brews), part of me wishes that there were just a few more food selections to choose from. Not that that is a complaint, because I really enjoyed this event last year! Sure hope that I can go to the event this year, but it isn't looking like a go at this point.

Certainly a shocker there. Not a huge fan of Soundgarden or his other bands, but there was no mistaking his voice. Sad.

Flying Dog - Double Dog Double IPA 11.5% packs a nice little punch!

^ & ^^ Just make sure that you keep the beer within the Kings Dominion drinking jail guidelines, guys!

^ That or redo the Pirate ride by Blue Streak. The building is still there and with some significant modifications, would be a perfect place for a family dark/shooting ride.

Great report and extra points for food and booze photos! I didn't know that they served liquor drinks at this festival...that actually got me more excited than the food & coasters! I agree that the food looks kinda meh...like the spring bloom fest last year, none of the food was OMFG delicious and I wondered if that was why they ditched it and went with a different branding this season. Gotta say that the meatloaf looks a little....nasty though. I thought it was banana bread at first. lol And yeah...I agree that I-305 kicks total ass. I didn't care for the gray-out that I had on the first turn on the year it opened, but really enjoy it a lot more after the re-profile. Such a complete coaster, but I have yet to ride it at night...I need to remedy that in the future.

^ Interesting. I wondered that about the "trip" during launch because the ride undoubtedly has tons of limit/proximity switches (like TTD and KK). If just one of those switches doesn't properly function or even gets a small piece of debris on it, it's going to throw a fault and shut down.

^ Thanks for sharing that, Mark....good to remember the next time we think about heading to the Tampa area. As far as cheap deals and ways to save money on coaster trips, we did the tent camping thing for a few years and that was reasonable. If you decide to do something like this, I would recommend getting a Good Sam and KOA card as they can save you a little bit on rates. For hotels, we have the Choice Rewards and Hilton Honors cards. HH is nice because I use it for business travel and then can get free nights to use for vacation. Unfortunately due to Michael being sick for the past seven months, I haven't done any business travel - but then again, we haven't been on any vacations either. Off subject a bit (and might be better off in the "rant thread"), but here is an experience/warning/tip that I'd like to share with regards to IHG hotels.... We officially said "F-you" to IHG (Holiday Inn, Crown Plaza, etc) after they wouldn't reimburse the hotel that I had booked in Portland, OR last Labor Day (for a close friend's wedding) after Michael was sick and was diagnosed with cancer. I tried to cancel over two weeks in advance when we knew that he was too sick to make the trip. After unsuccessful attempts to get someone to return my call from the Crown Plaza in Portland, on the 3rd try, I finally got in touch with someone that knew WTF they were talking about. They informed me that I had chosen a non-refundable rate which I didn't see in the fine print until I went back and looked later. When I told them that my partner was recently diagnosed with cancer and that he needed emergency surgery on 10/14, they apologized and said that there was nothing that they could do. So in addition to dealing with everything that we were dealing with at that time, we lost over $900 to IHG because they couldn't see it in their corporate driven, greedy little f&cking minds to show a little empathy for someone in crisis. And I did try escalating and even went as far to write a review of them on Trip Advisor and Yelp advising people to really pay attention to that fine print. Their response was still the same stance, "You chose the non-refundable rate". So anyone that is looking at booking an IHG hotel, watch for that carefully when you book! I canceled our Comfort Inn bookings in Buffalo as well as a side trip to Seattle that we were doing on the same trip and I had no trouble canceling two weeks prior. And when I had booked two nights at a Comfort Suites in Buffalo so I could be near Michael in the hospital during a snow storm, I was called from the hospital early on the 2nd morning informing me that Michael was being transferred to Erie that same day. I explained the situation to the front desk and they apologized to hear of the situation and just removed the 2nd night from my bill without any charge at all. And they were kind enough to say "I hope that everything works out for you and your partner". Yeah, f#ck IHG - f#ck them hard. Not to sound like a crybaby because I know that this was originally my bad for not seeing the fine print, but it was a VERY hard lesson learned. Please make sure that you read all of the fine print when you make that hotel booking! This isn't a deal or program, but a tip on what to watch & look for when booking a hotel online when planning to stay near a theme park so that you don't get screwed like we did in the event of an emergency. That $900+ dollars lost could have came in handy while I was out on FMLA from work (not getting paid) while trying to care for Michael throughout this horrible ordeal.

Does anyone know if these closings are mostly related to the launched lift or just general mechanical problems with the ride overall? Just curious if they have ever came out and said why it is down so frequently or if anyone that works there knows.

Wow...$14 is getting up there, but hopefully that was for a 22oz Goose IPA or something similar?