Bassdirt

Thanks! And yup, the the whole coaster's been tunnel tested and (to my surprise, actually) it all cleared. There's just a section at the end where some of the scenery I'm adding definitely clips into the train's path, but that whole area is a WIP (testing out different building styles and whatnot) so I'm hoping to iron that section out a bit later

Hey all! So I'm currently working on several no limits projects, but this is pretty much my main project at the moment. I started working on Gurubashi about eight-or-so months ago and I have many more ideas for the coaster--I'm a little worried about the finish date, but we'll see! Anyway, my goal was to create an unusual floorless coaster--whose layout and design still retain the Bolliger & Mabillard style--but built upon a thin, compact strip of land. I envisioned the coaster possessing a bit of Batman the Ride-esque "clone-ability", and so Gurubashi is *supposed* to be just one example of the various ways this floorless model could be integrated into a park. The coaster is far from complete so here are only a few shots of what has been done so far, let me know what you think and feel free to give suggestions/critiques: (I have yet to venture into custom 3ds scenery yet, but hope to in the near future.) Pre-lift. Lift hill. Drop through an Inclined Loop. Turnaround over the thoroughfare. And a glimpse of the queue & station By the way, you may recognize the name from a certain computer game that I (thank god) no longer play.

Ahh, that makes sense. For the past couple years I've had to always take my season pass photo at the little building to the right of the front entrance, but thats probably because I always end up procrastinating and buying it late in the season (like waiting all the way until Haunt last year ). Haha thank you! It's an app called Hipstamatic, but it basically does the same thing Instagram does without the social networking aspect to it and the photos are edited automatically right when you take them, rather than doing it yourself, which I personally prefer. And yeah the flower arrangement looked pretty crisp. I've always really enjoyed the aesthetics of that turn around on Vortex, and the arrangement only adds to that.

Hey all! Looong time reader, first time poster here. Anyway, went to the park on Saturday and just now finally found the time to post my trip report. The park was pretty busy actually—not to say I wasn’t expecting crowds on a Saturday, but I guess there was a band or choir competition earlier that day because nearly half the people I saw at the park were wearing their school’s band/choir t-shirts. Because of this, the lines ended up being pretty lengthy so we didn’t get a lot of rides in, but I didn’t really mind since I was there for my birthday and mostly to get my season pass since I go to school in Santa Cruz and don’t get up to San Jose as much as I’d like. I don’t know what they did last year, as I didn’t buy my season pass until Haunt, so correct me if I’m wrong, but it appears that they went back to using the building across from Celebration Swings to take your picture for your seasons pass, which I thought was a significant improvement over taking your photos at the building to the right of the main entrance. After getting our seasons passes, we hoped on Vortex, which was not as painful as I remember—which is saying something considering we rode in the back seat. It does appear that they are regulating all the lines now for the fast lane (or fast pass, I don’t remember) users, which I thought was actually quite nice as it really cleans up the stations (excluding Grizzly, but I’ll touch on that later as that was a-whole-nother experience -___-). After Vortex we headed to Demon, which we then ended up skipping because the line extended out past the tunnel where the life crosses over the Queue. I’m sure that was just a result of the line regulating at the stations, and I wasn’t able to see if they were using the switchbacks or not, but I wasn’t really interested in riding Demon anyway, so I didn’t really care about skipping it. So next we got to Grizzly... Let me preface this by saying that I didn’t get a lot of sleep the night before, and any of my friends can tell you how cranky and impatient I get when I’m tired, so take everything I say with a grain of salt, but Grizzly really brought me to my breaking point. So because they don’t have a way to regulate the fast lane users—as the fast lane path is still being constructed (photos below)—they had to have an employee right at the entrance of the queue and have the line extend out into the little plaza before the entrance of the queue. This would have been fine if not for the fact that several times I saw entire cars being left empty as the train was let out of the station. On a positive note, however, I can confirm that both trains were indeed running; although to be entirely frank, with the quality of operations that I saw, they might as well have been running one, as one train would sit on the brake run for a good five minutes before the other train would be let out of the station (I wish I was exaggerating). Anyway, so the first time we were in line, about one train-load before we were at the front of the line, the coaster broke down on the lift hill. We decided to wait it out, and after about 10 minutes they got the ride working again, but apparently they needed to run some tests before they were willing to let people back on as they started sending train after train through the course empty (not complaining, just an observation Safety first). After about another 20 minutes they told us it was going to be another 20 to 40 minute wait (I say 20 to 40 because we we’re getting all sorts of inconsistent numbers haha), so we just opted to grab a ride on Drop Zone, err, Tower in the meanwhile. Again, the line for this ride was also being regulated right where the line splits to go either to the left of the right side of the tower, which made the queue actually go by faster—or rather, faster relative to how fast one would have expected the line to move considering where people were backed up to. Grizzly was still sending out empty trains after Drop Zone, so we continued around the park and headed, IIRC, to Top Gun (we ended up just skipping many rides due to lengthy lines and since we didn’t have a very long time at the park, as we had a dinner reservation later that night, we just wanted to get our “must ride” rides out of the way first ). First, let me say that the sections of Top Gun that got a new coat of paint looked GREAT, especially the corkscrew as I believe they repainted not just the box track, but also the rails (correct me if I'm wrong haha, I didn’t get the best look at everything so I might just be imagining things ). Funnily enough, as my friend pointed out, they neglected to paint the one part of the ride that guests actually see before they see anything else (and I think one of the most visually striking parts of the ride): the zero-g roll. Anyway, the line for Top Gun was also out past the entrance of the queue, but having faith in B&M’s people-eater reputation, we hoped in line knowing it’d only be about 15 minutes. Ironically enough, Top Gun also broke down on the lift hill while we were in line, but contrary to Grizzly, they got it up in running again in a couple minutes and continued sending trains filled with passengers . Oh, and they also cleaned up the lake—which I’m sure they do more than just once a year, but this was the first time I actually noticed it as every other time I can remember the part of the lake under the helix was flooded with algae. Anyway, after Top Gun we headed back to Grizzly, hoping on a few of the flats on our way there. Fortunately, Grizzly was up and running when we got back; unfortunately, the line was, for lack of a better word, a clusterf***. I mean honestly the temporary queue that they set up was a mess and much too wide, making it awkward because there were many opportunities for people to—intentionally and even unintentionally—cut you in line. What really made my blood boil, however, were the painfully slow operations. We ended up waiting what felt like maybe 45 minutes to an hour for a line that should have taken maybe 20 minutes (this is for Grizzly, mind you XP). I tried to give the ops the benefit of the doubt, as I know they were implementing new policies—such as the little holes on the side of the cars that have to be green as well as the completely needless additional seatbelts—but once we actually got up into the station, it became obvious that the ride ops were not preforming at their best. Granted, I saw several instances where there were problems with either the lap bars or the new lap bar seat belts where the ride ops had to literally get on their knees and reach into the cars and seriously grapple with the lap bars to get them to lock, but I also saw several instances where ride ops would stop in the middle of checking restraints to have an entire conversation with a person while the other train was already sitting on the break run. I honestly can’t remember how Grizzly was running last season as I only rode it a once or twice during Haunt, but it was running pretty smoothly on Saturday. No real complaints about roughness, although everyone who posted above is completely right (we were discussing this while in line), it’s Grizzly’s layout that gives it its bad reputation, not so much its roughness. The ride does very little in the space it’s allotted and leaves much to be desired. I still think that the bottom of the first hill is awkwardly banked, but I find that it actually adds to the ride in an almost comical way lol. Anyway, I’ve got to start studying for a midterm that I’ve been putting off so I’m gunna wrap this up now Sorry for the WALL of text. Here are some photos from my trip. I should warn you that these photos are taken entirely with an iPhone application called Hipstamatic hehehe, although I apologize in advance for the poor quality. It’s the best I can do with my phone Enjoy! Got to the park a little before noon. Top Gun lookin' sexy in the distance. Vortex's new elevator! Long overdue. Somehow, I never realized that there are only stairs up to Vortex's station... Vortex's new fast lane. Mmm new wood. I was 100% certain when I took this photo that I didn't get the fence in the shot. Clearly I was mistaken... Closeup on the new paint job. Looks really great. Lookin' fine. On the turnaround. I suppose this could be considered artsy? Look! Two trains! The clusterf*** queue. I might be mistaken, but I'm assuming this is the entrance to Grizzly's fast lane--still being worked on. Its going to go up, wrap around the existing queue, and then up some more, meeting with the regular queue right before it makes a right into the station. New meets old: here's some pics of the new deck they put in place. While we were walking past here, there was such a distinct disparity between the feel of walking on the old section and walking on the new section, that I had to snap a few photos Looks pretty good! Top Gun! I mean Flight Deck! Just when you thought you found a nice place to sit down and relax... Heres that photo without the train. It actually does look quite peaceful... lol She already looked great without the new paint job, but now she really shines. Ruh-Roh. Looks like somebody had an accident on the lift hill... Strangely small pic... Quick shot of firefall. No, it wasn't broken I just caught it between loadings. Believe it or not, all the effects appeared to be in working order One of my favorite pics of the day. The gracefully painful Endeavour or Revolution or whatever they're calling it these days. Here's a pic of Grizzly testing with no passengers. And some creepy kid who was in the wrong place at the wrong time XP And now I'll leave you guys with a few pics taken from the Star Tower (or whatever it's called). I tried to get a pic of the 49 stadium construction, but you can't really see anything thanks to this being a phone photo lol. Top Gun from above. Vortex and some snoopy dance show Xtreme Sky Flyer, Demon, and Grizzly! Finally, I believe this is the prudential building in question. It is honestly an embarrassment how much these people have cried fowl. I never got a good look at the building until Saturday as I originally thought the building was backed right up to the park. But they have an entire parking garage between them and the park. I mean for goodness sake the bottom half of the building won't even be able to see the coaster through the parking garage. Hopefully this area will look very different in the next few years