larrygator

Also, when I was at SFStL in April (during Final 4) they allowed one reride on the coasters (except Mr. Freeze) for the first 2 hours of park operations. They just quickly stopped the train in the station before sending it out again.

September 2004 - 8 times on Xcelerator, 6 times on Ghost Rider Labor Day 2005 - 6 times on Skyliner at Lakemont July 2000 I went to Coney Island on a slow week day and rode The Cyclone 6 or 7 times without getting off with my wristband

^ same here on both counts

so you ask - the best eight parks outside of Florida. It all depends on what you want but here are my thoughts on a Top 11 lumped geographically in you take 3 trips. MidWest - SF Great America, Indiana Beach, Holiday World West - SF Magic Mountain, KBF East - Cedar Point, Kennywood, Knoebels, SF Great Adventure, BG Williamsburg, HersheyPark If I had to list only 8, I'd take out KBF, SFGAm and Kennywood, but if you are that close to these parks you won't go wrong visting these 3 also. To me Knoebels, Cedar Point and BGW are the ones that have all 3 qualities that you favor: great rides, quality staff, good food and scenery. here are the slight deficiencies i see at each other park if it helps you make a decision: SFGAm - Scenery Indiana Beach - Food Holiday World - coasters are great, but lack of quality flats SFMM - Food, Staff KBF - Scenery, lack great variety in flats Kennywood - Scenery SFGAdv - Staff, Food HersheyPark - Scenery

I'm glad that coaster05 and his wife are reserved as I know them and can vouch they are good people. Too bad I can't vouch for myself!

^damn Joe I didn't know you were here too. I can't keep track of all your screen names. Thanks for the comments on the time between Atlanta other places. Driving from Atlanta to North Florida always seemed to take forever to me. I'll update my suggestions per your notes

thanks another friend and his wife are supposed to be sending their deposit checks in to you this week, I will tell them to get out it

I'm new here (but not to coaster and APs) and just sent my check in for the UK trip based on the great TRs from the 2005 Europe excursion. Sounds like fun and I hope my check arrives to Robb in time.

my suggestion: this is based on minimizing driving time on the trip (less than 2-3 hours a day ideally but 5-6 hours max a day) Also, there are many smaller parks near these bigger parks but again I wanted to avoid hours of side trips. Day 1 - Coney Island and Lake Compounce (the Cyclone is better in the AM and Boulder is better at night) about a 2-3 hour drive between parks Day 2 - Knoebels (about 4 hours from Lake Compounce) Day 3 - HersheyPark (about 1-2 hours from Knoebels) this is an area where you could potential hit some smaller parks but only Williams Grove is within an hour of the itinerary) Day 4 - Dorney Park (about 1-2 hours from HP) Day 5 - Six Flags Great Adventure (2 hours from Dorney) Day 6 - Morey's Piers (the best of the Jersey's Amusement Boardwalks) (about 2 hours from SFGAdv) Day 7 - Six Flags America (about 3 hours from Morey's Piers) Day 8 - Paramount King's Dominion (About 3 hours from SFA) Day 9 - Busch Gardens Williamsburg (About 1 1/2 hours from PKD) Day 10 - Paramount Carowinds (About 5 hours from BGW) Day 11 - Six Flags over Georgia - (About 5 hours from Carowinds), if SFoG wasn'tan all day park I would suggest trying Lake Winnepesaukah also) Day 12 - Wild Adventures (only because it is along the way and prevents a long drive between Atlanta and Tampa) (3-4 hours fron SFoG) Day 13 - BGT (3-4 hours from Wild Adventures) Day 14 - hit Orlando the time between parks is based on my own recollections of driving and may not be accurate. Certain side trips could occur from certain places if you fancy such such Six Flags New England (less than 2 hours from Lake Compunce) or Dollywood (about 5 hours fron SFoG) but these would create longer drives on other legs of the trip. Rye playand is on the way between Coney Island and Lake Compounce, but not worth the money IMHO. Also, while Dania Beach Hurricane is a neat little woodie I would not suggest driving from Orlando to the Fort Lauderdale area and back just to ride it unless you were planning to drive to Miami anyway. This total trip should put you on quite few woodies that are better than DBH in my opinion (Cyclone, Boulder Dash, Phoenix, Twister, Lightning Racer, Wild One, Roar, Georgia Cyclone)