jzoole

Great trip report! I like when people actually "review" the coasters. Also, your girlfriend is cute as a button

^^ I see what you're saying. I'm an atheist and have no problem with Dollywood/SDC being a "Christian company". I'm referring specifically to companies that donate money or endorsements to a cause I'm opposed to, or do something discriminitory. For example, I will not spend money at Chic-fil-A, as they have donated millions of dollars to anti-gay organizations, they sponsored a "marriage conference" that sought to oppose marriage equality, and in 2002, they fired a Muslim employee because he refused to take part in an employee prayer. I feel that spending my money with them is like giving money to anti-gay organizations, or funding an entity that discriminates against people based on religion. So if a park were to do something similar, I wouldn't spend money there. Luckily this has never happened (that I know of!)

Haha! You've got some really cool ideas for Mud Island! If I never win the mega-millions and build my dream park I hope you do.

This is an interesting question. I would say that yes, I would boycott a park if their parent company did something I found to be reprehensible. I have given up Chic-Fil-A (even though it's soooooo good) because their anti-gay agenda is so at odds with my values that I can't justify spending my money with them. Same with Lowes. It would be much harder for me to give up an amusement park I liked, but the principle is the same so I'd just have to go without that park. I can see, however, why it wouldn't as simple for Elissa, for example, to make a decision like that as her involvement with TPR wouldn't really permit her being quite so picky. I certainly wouldn't begrudge her for that.

What is General Banks? does anyone know what he's talking about? Lol.

There have been a lot of proposed plans to repurpose the Astrodome, and none of them have moved along due to the astronomical cost it would take to even bring the Dome up to code (much less turn it into something else). The land AstroWorld sat on (besides not being for sale) would command a really high price per acre, and its location on 610 lended itself to the park becoming a babysitting park. I think the best option for a park in Houston would be to buy up some cheap land just north of Houston and build a full-blown park. Measures can be taken to provide lots of shade stustures/air-conditioned queues/misters etc to combat the heat. And anyway it's much more wooded up there and more bearable in the summer. Those are my thoughts on Houston. But I agree, it's insane for H-Town not to have a major park. Also, I think the Mud Island idea sounds awesome and very feasible for Memphis! I'd even go so far as to say Memphis could support a full-on medium scale amusement park (along the lines of Magic Springs/Silverwood size).

^I'm not gonna argue with you, but I just wanted to say that AstroWorld was WAY WAY better than Michigan's Adventure!!

29/40. A lot of guesses, but I think part of it was remembering which towns you had already guessed another park in correctly. Lol.

^Ah. That's a bummer. Atleast they're being pretty up-front about it. Lol.

As "too-good to be true" as this rumor sounds, it actually kind of COULD make sense. I mean, SEVERAL of their parks will be four or more years since their last coaster addition (CGA, CP, KBF, WoF, VF, KI, MiA). We already know pretty much that CGA is finally getting their GCI next year. Also, I wouldn't be shocked to see Cedar Point's 2013 addition include multiple coasters (Maybe one larger thrilling coaster and a new family/kiddie coaster or two) in an effort to keep up their "roller coaster capitol" status battle with SFMM. Who knows. I could certainly see WoF getting a new coaster soon and I hope it does! (I think the park needs a launched coaster!)

^ As soon as this thing went vertical I realized how much the towers resemble old west oil derricks. They so easily could have picked a different color scheme (since they repainted it anyway) and made it fit into Crackaxle Canyon. Oh well. It's still a good addition.

Awesome trip report! Somehow, I never knew that there was once a slide coming off the Oil Derrick! Thank you for writing captions that are actually funny!

I don't either. Just talking about fantasies.

From what I've gathered from the fairly knowledgeable people at SFNEonline.org, SFNE owns a parcel of land a few miles south, just inside the Connecticut state line. Some ideas that have been tossed around over on that forum have been to build employee parking on that piece of land and use a shuttle bus to take employees back and forth to the lot. That way they could expand into the existing employee parking lot. I think part of the problem with that plan however is that there is a 60 foot buffer zone on the western side of the park. That means that within 60 feet of the western border of the park, they can only build smaller/shorter attractions which meet a certain criteria. The wetlands are a whole other issue. From what I understand, it is technically possible for the park to get clearance to build in/around the wetlands, but they would have to prove that whatever they build would not in any way affect the wetland environment. I have no idea what that would entail. Personally, I wouldn't mind seeing Mind Eraser and Flashback both getting the boot in favor of some new flats or a launched coaster of some sort. I also wish the park had a log flume. Maybe a log flume that used and recycled water out the wetlands could get clearnace to go back there in those forbidden woods? Anyway, as has been said before, if the park wants to build something, they'll figure it out.

The last I had heard, that info pretty much fits the latest rumors to a T. Atleast the ones from Screamscape's sources atleast. They've been saying it would be a launched coaster from Premiere that would utilize the Metro tunnel and take the record for tallest inversion.

Some great endings: -Runaway Mine Train @ SFOT, surprise drop and turn under the lake. -Boulderdash, insane airtime that just keeps getting better and better until the brakes. -Greezed Lightnin @ SFAW (soon to be Cliffs!) awesome flying unbreaked through the station and up the back spike, particularly in the back row. Some lame endings: -Manhattan Express. I actually really liked this ride (I know, I'm weird) but the ending is like a weird wild mouse that just won't end. -Red Devil/Cliffhanger, slooowly mosies into the brakes and then a lifthill. -Leviathan, ten mile-long brakerun (just kidding!)

One hasn't been built yet but I feel pretty certain that the GCI Big Fun will be an awesome compact woodie! Also, I'm obsessed with Yamaha Racing Coaster. It's so cute. Mini Mr. Freeze

Last time I checked, Iowa and Missouri are two different states!

Perhaps they have plans to have Intamin come in and correct the problem sometime in the future, and in the meantime, they're just doing the best they can and trying to keep the ride operational as much as possible?

1. Little Rock, Arkansas 2. Baltimore, Maryland*** 3. Prividence, Rhode Island*** 4. Baton Rouge, Louisiana 5. New Haven, Connecticut 6. Hartford, Connecticut 7. Boston, Massachussetts*** 8. Portland Oregon*** 9. Chicago, Illinois*** 10. Worcester, Massachussetts 11. Washington D.C. 12. San Francisco, California*** 13. Orange Country, California 14. Oakland, California 15. Milwaukee, Wisconsin*** 16. Long Beach, California*** 17. Honolulu, Hawaii 18. Los Angeles, California*** 19. Albuquerque, New Mexico 20. Las Vegas, Nevada 21. Fayetteville, Arkansas 22. Sheveport-Bossier City, Louisiana ***Places I would actually not hate living in. I think this quiz needs to take into account proximity to amusement parks! Anyway, I was sort of hoping that Austin/Houston, TX, Buffalo, NY, or Columbus, OH would be on my list, as those are cities I actually think I'd most like to live. But I guess I know where I'd like to live better than this quiz does.

So what is the deal with their Wild Mouse anyway? It's the same model as Gotham City Gauntlet at SFNE, which has a continuously moving station and no 2-adult rule, and the capacity is just fine. Does anyone know why Dorney has this problem?

^ 8.5/10, sounds like something that would be on a ver hipster-ironic t-shirt from a thrift store. By the way jzoole is short for Jimmy Zoole, who is a character in one of my favorite books, (P.S. Your Cat Is Dead by James Kirkwood Jr.)

^9/10 Sounds very Monty Python-esque.

You might be a coaster nerd if.... ...when you were a kid, you pretended the cordless home phone was a B&M Stand-up car and played with it accordingly. ...anytime you hear someone mention the movie SLC Punk, you immediately think of having your head thrashed around by a horrible Vekoma piece of crap. ...you'll waste time watching Richie Rich on TV (atleast until the part where they ride Iron Wolf). ...when driving from Texas to Connecticut in the middle of winter, you tell your boyfriend to take a nap in the car for awhile so he won't get mad when you drive 30 minutes out of the way just to take pictures of a closed Hersheypark from the parking lot.

Oh my god, it took me several minutes to figure out that you weren't joking and that's actually the announcement they made. What on earth would make them think they should hype that up as a "big announcement"???