djcoastermark

This a hard one, and only time will really tell. Fun Spot has the space, but do they have the financial resources ? (I do love Fun Spot for their fantastic commitment to customer service ) Merlin and the Orlando Eye, has the capital to pull it off. Sea World parks also have the space and financial resources to do this at either BGT or SWO. Either way, this has an unbelievable potential to really set things off again in the coaster wars of this part of the century!! Wherever it is, I WILL BE THERE !!!!

Our local paper, The Tampa Bay Times, Printed up the recipe on how to make it, if anyone is interested. Being a "foodie" myself, this looks easy enough to try at home. It was quite good.

Sorry that this is a long post but,now that its passed, the Florida state fair had not 2, but 4 pleasant/unpleasant surprises. The first 2 involve coasters. First off, the disappointment. All the local papers were bragging about the "largest traveling coaster" in the U.S. At first, I was excited, then I found out it was an Anton Wildcat. Ok, so that's not really "fab" but, hey, Its an Anton ! HOWEVER, Anton would be rolling over in his grave seeing how they neutered his coaster. In its original location in Texas years ago, it was listed as having a height of 65 feet. However, something happened along the way and now its height is only 50 feet. while the ride still looks good, but it didn't look quite right. The slopes of the drops had changed and it just crawled through the course. So much so that we wondered if the cars would make it up the hills. Next up was RC 48. It was pouring down rain when it opened at 5 pm. Wow, what a surprise. It flew thru the course and felt like a real coaster that would be in a park. In fact, this is the one that was at Morey's in the early 2000's. (pic from RCDB) We rode it in all its duct taped glory 5 times. It was raining too hard to get a good pic so this pic is from when it was at Moreys. The next bad was that unbeknownst to us was Wilding Friday. As the night wore on, the kids there became very unruly, resulting in over 100 ejections from the park. The fair says they will address the problem. The last was a plus, the ramen noodle burger. Yum !! A square burger patty on a ramen noodle bun topped with green onion stalks and oriental cole slaw. OMG, it was great!

Not sure if this has been posted, but I saw that if you purchase a 2014 fun card for BGT between now and the end of march, you get a free fun card for Adventure Island waterpark good until Oct 12, 2014. Nice little perk, IMO.

I have found that the smoking areas in a lot of parks are in a nice secluded area that has the benefit of also offering a little escape and quiet from all the hustle and bustle of the main areas. I personally haven't seen smokers in a non smoking area, but I'm sure there are idiots out there who disregard others, although I have experienced more times than I care to count, linejumpers , loud, foulmouthed and spoiled brattish people more than rude smokers in the parks. Sadly, there is always going to some goof that will insist that rules , politeness and respect for others, don't apply to them.

Oh how cool !! Mickey and Minnie's FAAABULOUS ! Priscilla Parade. And just in time for Gay Days. How cool is that ? Oh wait

Neat theming on the River. I got a kick out of the monkey spitting water.

^ I did. Fun thing to watch on a lazy sunday. The second half of the ride has always been better, especially at night.

Cp has always had odd height requirements as far back as I can remember. Case in point, back in 1969, as kids, my parents took us kids to many parks during the summer. Earlier in the summer we visited Geauga Lake, Euclid Beach and others, and rode the Flying Coaster (aka, Kangaroo at Kennywood) and had no problems getting on the ride or coasters either. However, when it was our turn to ride the one at CP, we found out we were too short to ride it at CP. Kind of hard to believe as we had just ridden Blue Streak ( in its buzz bar only days) just a few minutes before. So I don't believe it has anything to do with state laws or insurance, it's just a quirk that CP has had on heights over the years for some unexplainable reason.

IDK, or is it just me, but it sounds a little pricey for a not "that" big of a wheel off the beaten path. Most people don't ride something like this by themselves, so you're talking 30 bucks for two people or 60 bucks for a family of 4 for a ferris wheel? Given the drawings and info released so far, it just sounds kind of tourist trappy and temporary to me.

Mine was RC-48, 2 Fridays ago in the pouring rain at the Florida State Fair. With their wonderfully sketchy 3 trains in full duct taped glory !! This is the one that originally ran at Moreys Pier from 2000 to 2004, was bought by Wade Shows and now travels the fair circuit. I tried to get several pics of it but the rain kept getting the camera lens too wet to get a good pic. Therefore posted below is a pic from RCDB when it was at Moreys.

Wow. Love the Scamper pic. That was one of my faves at the Point when I was a little kid. (as well as Tiki Twirl) Sure does bring back the memories.

As far as food goes, I really like the corned beef sandwich at Desert Grill. The meat is sliced hot and to order then stacked super high. It comes with a side and the 2 of us that get it split it as its that big. I have found though during my last few visits, that it's only served until 2 or3 most days and evenings during extended hours events like hallowscream and Christmastown.

Um, ok. As you all know, this has been going on for more than 4 hours.

As of now at 12:30, Busch is stating that it is still closed until further notice.

According to spokesperson for the park, Travis Clayton, as quoted in todays newspaper, "maintenance and operations were investigating last night and possibly today. Until then, it will remain closed." So, no concrete answer, but it sounds promising that it will be open again soon.

^aaww, you beat me to this. I saw it on bay news 9 here and they said something about a power failure during the lightning storm passing through now. It looks to me that spot is the turn right after the launch out of the station. Its a big downpour here so those folks must really be getting soaked sitting there.

Much as I really like Kraken, and lord knows I've ridden it plenty of times, (marathon riding at opening with flcc etc ) I think I still prefer Dominator at KD. However Dominator in its almost parking lot location doesn't match its original location in the swamp at Geauga Lake, Natural fog at night in the swamp cant be beat imo. But still, I really do like the layout , some pops of air and the forces of Krakan. It's good ole B&M !

I'm not sure if this has been posted yet, but here goes. You might be a coaster nerd if you decide to accept or turn down a job offer that requires relocating, by being dependent on the new jobs location and its proximity to a good coaster or park. Guilty of that here.

Found a picture of the Whip at Americana. photo from neg-g.com

I had many good times at Americana/LeSourdesville. A few rides that stood out for me were, Screaching Eagle, The Whip and the flume. Eagle has been described by some as a "barnstormer" coaster. Nice dips with airtime giving a barnstorming plane feeling. The odd concrete trough for the flume and strange cars on the whip, which they ran at in insanely fast speed unlike any I have ever been on. It was also my first Gay Days event back in 1980, and go to park for my partner and I with our 5! kids. Hey, it was the most affordable park to go to with that many kids. Too bad its gone, but I guess they couldn't compete with Kings Island so close by.

Wheeee ! Wheeee! Got my Bag O Crap this past weekend. It really made my day. Thank you TPR !

The kangaroo and walabi habitat is really quite fun. I did buy a bowl of a really yummy looking salad to feed them and I believe it was only 5 bucks. I was hungry at the time and it was really tempting to get one for myself, but alas, they had no dressing for it there. Some of the walabis were actually running free on the pathways in the enclosure and would come right up to you. I spent a lot of time in there. I have had friends do the other safari add on and they said it was worth it. You can get face to face with giraffes on it, something I would really like to do.

oooh yum yum yum !

Wow, FoF looks really cool. I've passed by it a million times and have never been there thinking it was just a bunch of old planes sitting in a building. It looks far more interesting. I do miss however, the old display they used to have along I-4 of the "crashed" airplane with the guy hanging out of it. I always found that to be quite funny, but read that the local sherrifs office found it to be annoying because of the clueless tourists who constantly called about a plane crash along I-4. Now the plane sits there as if its taking off. Oh well, so much for lost humor.