DerekRx

You're gonna have to beat me, Wally. I just pulled up my 6th grade essay on "Abe Lincoln, an important President". All I need to do is change every Abe Lincoln reference to White Water Landing and change Important President to Classic Log Flume. It got me an A in Mr. Smith's history and its gonna get me a ride with Tony and Tyler too!

Problem is Carrabbas doesn't open until 4pm, thus messing up our stay and scream ability.

Nice TR, Erik. I'm really getting excited for next week. Elissa and company can go to Pastamore, if I want extremely bland pasta and sauce I'll stick a pot of water on the hood of the car and wait for the Florida heat to cook the pasta thru. Worst....Italian Food.....ever! I'm willing to form my own faction of TPR HHN group who still wants to eat at Mythos. Or maybe Elissa can stop at Publix and pick up her own Balsamic glaze to be used in the dishes. Mythos better have my lobster stuffed potato!

Sidewinder at Hersheypark back in its opening year. SooperdooperLooper was closed that day, so I went from Trailblazer right to Sidewinder. Yes, its quite surprising that I somehow decided to ride another looping coaster after that.

Great TR. I wonder if Soren will receive the package though with just his name, some blurry lines, and Germany. Makes me curious what my packages from you guys end up doing before they leave MexiCali....

Awesome TR dude. Makes me sad I'll miss out on the Fright Fest theme. Well, not really

^Thats what I've gathered too, Ted. The blueprints they have will fit the area of Whirlwind perfectly, the only thing holding them back right now is the cost of the trains, which could cost way more than Knoebels would want to shell out. Hopefully they'll shop around though and someone will be able to make the trains for it. Maybe Premier would be interested, or Mack, since they already have something similar in their bobsled trains. Knoebels has been rumored to want either a flying turns, or a wooden wild mouse for years, of course with the lack of a manufacturer for the trains, it hasn't happened yet.

I voted no based on the quality of the current park and the horrible admission price. If they could turn the park around in its new location AND make the admission more reasonable, then maybe, but I'm guessing they won't do that. The Santa's Village in New Hampshire is SO kickass and worth the price.

Slap my butt and call me underwhelmed

Awesome POV and great music. I thought I'd really love Balder's POV, but I was more excited with Lisebergbanan. Then again, you guys know how I feel about POV. The only reason I watch coaster videos is for stupid antics, good music, and awesome editing. Still, the video will hold me over until next year's trip!

Booo! Oh well, at least now I don't feel as obligated to go to DCA in November when I'll be out in SoCal. First they take away my peanut butter and jelly pizza, now California Screamin is still gonna be "refurbed" until 2006. At least if I do have some weird random urge to ride Tower, I don't have far to walk from Disneyland. Maybe I'll go to Tokyo instead....

I'm still in ACE, have been for the past 7 years. But with the lack of events I actually attend, the number of buffets I get excited about, and the timelyness of the newsletters and magazines getting less and less, and the membership costs going up, I think this will be my last year. If I want to get an industry newspaper, I'll go for Park World

I'd be X:/No Way Out. Only a few people really "get me" but everyone who comes near me at least gets a nice fun ride, and most people leave saying WTF?!

I think you'd be fine with Geauga Lake and Kennywood. You could also include Knoebels, Dorney, and Hershey in that range, and SFGAd isn't too far away, especially if you have enough money for a hotel around 1 of those parks. If you had enough time off and money, you could probably even do them all on 1 big screwed up trip, driving down and stopping at Geauga Lake, then Kennywood, then Hershey, Knoebels, Dorney and finally SFGAd (you could include a bunch of little parks along the way, like DelGrossos, Lakemont, and Idlewild). Or if you don't have enough days off in a row, you could do what I did this year and break it into 2 different trips; Geauga, Kennywood, and Idlewild (or Waldemeer and/or Conneaut) one 3 day weekend, then Hershey, Dorney/Knoebels, SFGAd another. I know its tough doing trips in the summer while in college and having no money, but thats why you meet up with others to split the cost (its how folks like Elissa and myself managed to stay on top of the current thrill rides while still not blowing all of our college summer earnings)

Thanks for all the birthday wishes. I spent the day working, talking about how hard school used to be, back before the "inter-net", followed by some BINGO and finally I'm watching Matlock. OK, I'm not that old yet, but when I get there, I'll be sure to ask Jeff just how I can still manage to function While I didn't buy Kingda Ka, I did ride it twice yesterday with no wait, and got the gift that keeps on giving.....money! Now my England trip is paid off and I can focus on figuring out a way to get to Australia for a weekend trip. Its late now, better get to sleep if I want to get up before the sun. Thanks again all! See some of you this weekend at Knoebels, others in Florida soon!

Mmmmm, candy. Do you need to dress up in order to get the candy? I had a costume all ready for this year set up starting at PPP, but it looks like I'm gonna go as Dave Thomas's "man trying to keep warm". Maybe I should dress up as Dave to go to MNSSHP....or Guy's 4th dimension floating head. 8)

Beats me. I still think I lucked out on Sunday and there was some sort of 84 car 38 mile backup on the NJ Turnpike causing everyone to be late to the park. The only day I can think of going is the Sunday before or the Monday of Halloween. Most families will be home trick or treating and that means less people in line for KK. Ride it once as soon as you get there, and then try to get in line again before the park closes. No certainty that the ride will continue to run though, plus you gotta get the approval of whoever is driving you to the park.

I can't really give an expert reply since I've never done the Frightfest activities. I can say though that my friend's daughter went on Saturday night at around 6pm and the lines for most coasters was "pretty long" as was the hayride at an hour and a half. The walkthru sections though were fine, and she did ride a few coasters and other rides. Not sure what "pretty long" is to her though, as she's as spoiled as the rest of us and thinks 20 minutes is a long time for something like Nitro. If you're planning on staying the whole day, I think its more up to you and your body in terms of how long you can handle it. I used to be able to go to the park all day from open until close without stopping at all (hooray metabolism and energy!) Now at the old folks age of 26, I can hardly spend 5 hours at a park without needing a bench, an IV, and some oxygen. If you can handle having energy for the whole day, I recommend getting there at opening. I was there on Sunday and for the first two hours the park was opened, everything was a walk-on, including Kingda Ka, which I rode twice including a front seat. Shortly after 1pm though things started picking up a bit, as most people that go to the park now are planning on going for the Frightfest stuff, and therefore don't arrive until early afternoon. If you want to go solely for the Frightfest stuff and a few bonus coaster rides on a Saturday, you may want to arrive at like 4pm or so.

Nice photos and TR. I keep forgetting about this park, which actually has a lot of coasters and some awesome flat rides. Maybe sometime soon I'll finally make it up to Canadia. While its probably no Cedar Point, it looks like a really nice park, especially for Paramount.

I'm not a Floridian anymore, but I was when this thing opened. I was there for opening day, and even then it ran really well, lots of laterals and airtime. Definitely the best wood coaster in the state of Florida, not that it has much competition. If it wasn't so far away from Central Florida, I'd have ridden it a lot more. Its definitely worth the drive though, and if I ever take a cruise from Lauderdale, I'll be sure to add in an extra day just so I can get my share of rides on this again.

There's a bunch of parks within 3 hours of me, but based on trips I take at least once a year, I'd say my homeparks are Dorney Park (40 minutes), Hersheypark (55 minutes), Knoebels (1.5 hours), and SFGAd (1.5 hours). There's also Dutch Wonderland and Sesame Place, but I only go there for credit whoring (once and done).

Next year so far I have planned: WDW stuff SFOG Lake Winnie SFGAd Dorney Knoebels Hersheypark Myrtle Beach stuff TPR UK trip Holiday World Beech Bend PKD BGW Phantasialand Movie Park Germany Tripsdrill Europa Park Holiday Park Stuttgart fair Oktoberfest fair There's also a chance I'll get to Liseberg, Tusenfryd, Tivoli Gardens, Bakken, Kennywood, Conneaut Lake, Ocean City MD, Rye Playland, SFMM, SFMW, PGA, SCBB, Martin's, PCWo, and SFDL, but I won't hold my breath just yet.

I'm at 508 right now, should be around 515 by the year's end. Doubt I'll break 600 by next year, maybe in 2007 though...

Nice TR. I wonder what I'll have to eat on the 20th for lunch. Either Steak and mushroom sushi or the lobster stuffed potato. Oh, and the award winning clam chowder. I'm glad to see Mythos getting new food items, as for like the last 4 years its always been the same thing all the time. Glad they still are nice enough to make you stuff that isn't even on the menu anymore.

Hooray, this is totally what I was hoping it would be and more. Its location looks great right on the lake, and you just can't get much better than a 76 degree drop. The only "voyage" I'm interested in now is the voyage down the PA turnpike to the NJ Turnpike to exit 7A! As for "saving Astroworld and SFNO" this has NOTHING to do with that. Six Flags wants to sell Astroworld because of all the pressure from neighboring sportscenters and they don't have their own parking lot. The park hasn't gotten a major coaster since 1999 and its pretty landlocked. If the park wants to sell it, that's their choice as its their property. If you want to complain about anyone, complain that Cedar Faire isn't buying it up. They must have money, they bought Patriot for WOF. Its kinda hard to "save" SFNO when its still underwater and people in New Orleans have homes to rebuild before they decide to ride rollie coasters. Besides, contracts were signed for this new woodie long before SFNO went under and Astroworld went up for sale.