Rai Fox

Well, I didn't expect to be front paged! I guess I better get this finished up soon now! Thanks! Yeah, it was a bit sad to be at a place founded by a candy company and not get any real treats, but...still a good day, in the end! Power Surge is one of those rides that I don't hear people talking about a lot, but I just love how out of control it feels. Downdraft is awesome too, too, though. That one feels like it's seriously trying to throw you right off. We definitely will. I've been there quite a few times, but usually just with family, and it's been a few years. I'm excited to take people who've never been before! I just need to make sure no one spoils Verbolten's little surprise before I get them on it The cave was a lot of fun, and yeah, I wanted to make sure there were things to do for people who weren't quite as enthusiastic about spending every day on roller coasters. Even for those of us that are, it's nice to have a change of pace. I'd have to really love a car to live with 18 mpg, I think. I average 25/26 ish, but the ST can break 32 on the highway even at 75-80mph. Not bad at all there. I thought about it! We went with that Old Forge brewery that we'd never heard of before in the end, which turned out pretty well, but Troeg's is still on the someday list! Definitely. It pretty clearly would have been a great ride in better circumstances. I'll get back for another try sometime. I'd have a hard time picking a favorite coaster at Hershey, but Great Bear is definitely one of the candidates. Ahhhh...That makes sense, there were ducks all over the area. Anyway, going through pictures from the last few days now; I should have the last part of the report up later on, as long as nothing else comes up!

It's definitely a blast to drive, and it has a decent amount of room inside, gets better-than-advertised mileage if I show a bit of restraint, and I haven't had to do anything but scheduled maintenance for it yet. It's been damn near perfect, really. I just do quite a lot of travelling lately, usually with lots of stuff to find room for, and between that, work, and generally being "group mom" when it comes to taking friends all over the place, I think something bigger is going to be in my near future. Might try to get my hands on a Flex before they stop making them; with the Ecoboost, they're a lot more fun to drive than they have any right to be. As for taking trips with friends, I'm very lucky that I'm able to! Trying to wrangle bigger groups can be frustrating at times, a lot of cat-herding, and compromises to be made, but in the end it almost always ends up being a lot more fun, if you have the right people. Going back to places I've been before is a lot more fun when I have new people to share them with, too. This time was great, one of the best trips I've taken in a long while. Next year's plan, Busch Gardens food and wine festival. Gonna get everyone fat.

Alright, day 3 and 4 update! My group didn't have any big plans for day 3. While I personally would have loved to get out to hit Dorney, or Camel Beach, or anything else along those lines, not everyone on the trip is as much an amusement park junkie as I am, and I wanted it to be fun for everyone, so this was going to be a "just hang out and relax with friends" day. That's nice enough when you have people from all over half of the country together for one of only a couple times a year, anyway. We figured we'd all be sleeping late, but one of our group thinks "late" is 7 AM, and most of us woke up earlier than we would have otherwise once we smelled bacon cooking. Sleeping late is great, but...priorities. While the plan had been for a mostly non-park day...we were at Knoebels, and everyone wanted to play games. Well, there's one game you can't play many places other than Knoebels anymore! That was a compromise we could work with. This ended up being the luckiest day I've ever had at Fascination. Won something like 5 games out of the 20 ish we placed, including a coverall game. By the end of the week, with my tickets and some donated by friends in my group, I picked up a toaster to complement the toaster oven I won there a couple years back. Better than rubber spiders and penny candy! And of course with Gelati right outside the Fascination parlor...well, I was there to show my friends all the great things at Knoebels, so we had to get some! Everyone else wanted to just sit and relax and people watch a bit after finishing their gelatis. Fair enough, but...I see something I'm a lot more interested in just a minute away. In fact, it's rather a travesty that it's my third day at the park and I haven't done this yet already. And it's just waiting there for someone to come ride it, too! Power Surge might just be my favorite flat ride anywhere. The others wanted to head back, play a couple games, and get ready to hit the pool. I'd meet them back there a few minutes later. After all, we'd hit Phoenix the first night, but there was still something missing. There we go. I'm still in the group that things Twister is just as good as Phoenix. Especially this year. It seems like they do at least some track work every year, but whatever they did this year made a big difference; Twister was running possibly the best I can ever remember. Fast, smooth, still out of control as always. The green train seemed even better than the purple one this year, but both were awesome. We all hit the pool and waterslides for a while afterwards. I wish I had pictures, but...phones and pools aren't really the greatest combination; especially an already damaged phone. There weren't a ton of people in the pool despite the hot weather; plenty of room to swim and relax. We had free passes to the pool that the park gives to people renting their cottages, and for $1.50 each they upgraded them to pool+slide passes; awesome! Knoebels waterslides are maybe not quite world class, but they're fun! The two mat slides are simple loops with a drop at the end, but they absolutely fly, and you can get legit airtime just hitting the water brakes at the end. The tube slides depend on how you ride them. On a single tube, they're pretty relaxing. Go down with someone else on a double and they're an entirely different experience, tearing down the slides and ending up nearly inverted in the tunnel corners! Before the trip, one of the members of my group had mentioned that the trip would be fun, but that it was too bad that middle-of-nowhere Pennsylvania wasn't likely to have any good brewpubs. I took finding one as a challenge, and...Old Force Brewing Company, not too far away in Danville, looked promising! Tonight was going to be the night to find out if you can get really good beer in Pennsyltucky. I have to admit, parts of the area were less than promising driving in... This definitely looks like high quality authentic food right here. Fortunately, the brewpub looked a lot better than John's Asian. This looks much more like my kind of place! The menu here is a little bit all over the place. Irish bangers and mash, falafel, crab cakes, and udon noodles. Huh. Pretty much everyone got something different, and different beers as well. We all were very happy with our beers. I had a black ale that was among the best I've had; between us all we tried porters, stouts, ales and ipas and every one was quite good. It turns out that yes, there is top notch beer to be had even here! Food was a little bit less even. Most was very good! I did a build-your-own-burger with bacon, mushrooms, and beer cheese. Burger and bacon all perfectly cooked, nicely sauteed mushrooms, and the beer cheese was fantastic. The other burgers at the table were well appreciated, too. A couple people had the Bangers and Mash and raved about them; the chicken and waffles was apparently good too. Unfortunately a couple of the dishes weren't quite as loved; one person ordered the shepherd's pie and found it to be a very odd take on the recipe, with a thick, heavy crunchy topping in place of any mashed potato, and didn't eat much of it. Another person tried the falafel and said it was terrible; I tried a bit of that and had to agree, it was very dry and almost entirely flavorless. Sadly, no one had room to try their honey lavender cheesecake or stout cake with coffee mousse. Perfect burger! Overall, definitely liked the place, and will probably go back someday. Just don't order falafel. Back to the cottage then to hang out with friends a bit. Red Dragon Inn! I don't really know why I had a picture of this, and didn't notice it in the batch upload, but any time I try deleting one out of the middle of a bunch, it causes weird issues, and I'm not re-doing the whole batch now, so it can stay. For the record, I lost horribly. As usual. Playing this character usually means you piss off the other players before 2 minutes into the game, and get everyone taking you out first. And on to things more interesting to most here! Day 4, back to parks! As I'm sure I'm mentioned other places, I've had terrible luck with Hershey Park over the last several years. Every attempt to get there has ended up being a miserable day due to weather and/or extreme crowds. The last time I tried the park, I spent all day there and got on four coasters and one flat ride all day, with the lines. I really want to like the park, but it hasn't been great to me...I was cautiously optimistic that this time might turn it around. Not everyone was, especially since the forecast called for heat and humidity and then possibly major thunderstorms later in the day, so half the group stayed behind, but several of us braved the meteorological threats. As it turned out, the major thunderstorms turned out to be approximately 6 raindrops over the space of 20 seconds around 2:00. The heat and humidity definitely made their appearance, but not to an unbearable degree. Not looking too crowded, probably because of the forecast. That's promising! In the distance, the biggest reason I wanted to be there! I'd never been on Skyrush yet! Weather holding steady, light crowds, Skyrush running. This might just be the seemingly-mythical great day at Hershey for me! And this was the extent of the line for Skyrush! Straight to the back left seat for me! ...and then the rather hefty young woman attending my side of the train came and threw her entire weight into the restraints to staple me in. I've never been so crushed into a restraint on any coaster in my life. It was painful before we even left the station. Those of you who've ridden Skyrush probably know what came after that. I want to love this coaster; the layout is great, it's so fast and aggressive and relentless, and forceful coasters like this are so rare now...but every airtime hill was excruciating. I am not someone to complain about rough coasters. I loved Wildcat even when it had its old trains (Actually, that applies to Hershey's AND Lake Compounce's Wildcats!). I got off Hercules at Dorney, went around and re-rode it. This was not the same thing at all. With the way the restraint fit me, and how unbelievably tight it had been forced down, there was nothing to do to ride defensively; just wait for it to end. I don't understand how these restraints could be designed so badly. With something along the lines of B&M's clamshell restraints, this could be one of the best coasters in the world. I got off it barely able to walk though, and 2 out of the 3 friends sharing the back row with me said they'd never ride it again. I wouldn't quite go that far; maybe with someone less determined to staple riders to death, it might be more tolerable, but...this was just not a good few minutes here. Crazy to have such a coaster so ruined by a restraint design like this. Maybe I'd give it another shot, but not that moment. On to something I knew would be a little nicer to me; one old classic that's stayed pretty smooth over the years. Sooper-Dooper-Looper doesn't have much to brag about in numbers or layout these days, but it's still a fun little ride, and surprisingly comfortable. One shot, three hills, and none of them even the coaster I'm about to get on. I love how tightly packed the coasters are here. A little iffy on the current trains. Not a huge deal, but they look like they're going for an almost futuristic look, for a very classic ride? They ride well though. And time to get a bit wet! I love a good log flume, and the old Arrow Hydroflumes are must dos with how rare they are now. I think Coal Cracker is one of two left, if I'm not mistaken? Certainly not missing it anyway. Especially with nearly no line! I don't know why more rides don't use this type of loading station. So efficient and easy. I literally spent more time waiting for my boat to circle the turntable than I had in the entire line. Not a huge splash, but that little hop of airtime is great Given how hot the day was, a wetter flume might have been nice; none of us got more than a bit of mist out of the final drop, but still such a fun ride. And over to Great Bear! Inverts are still my absolute favorite coaster type, and the bear might not be the best loved of them overall, but I've always had a soft spot for it. It's not forceful or intense, but it's graceful and smooth, and in a pretty awesome setting. If it were a little bit longer, it might just be one of my favorites. Again, the entirety of the line for the ride. The station for Great Bear also gives a great chance to see that little airtime hump at the bottom of Coal Cracker's drop. Fly, little boat, fly! Another game of count-the-coaster that would have been much better had I not failed to get Comet in the shot To get to the other half of the park, we had to pass the Zooamerica entrance, and there was no way my group was going to skip that, especially not when it was free. I debated cutting these pictures out since I've already filled a lot of space with animal pictures, but... HUGE snapping turtle. I wish there was anything for scale here. This guy had to be five feet long. And a much smaller alligator. They're actually kinda cute when they're small. These guys clearly knew that "human in the enclosure" means food. Not one bit shy about her. Snacking on a nice little salad, not a care in the world Ocelot! What an absolutely beautiful little cat. It looks a bit sad though. Aw. Yeah, I'd be pretty sad too. People suck sometimes. Poor kitty. Ringtail! Ringtails are cute...but do not hold still for pictures. More bobcats! This guy was having a little pool party for himself, and seemed to love attention and cameras These guys want to know why they're not getting Double Stuff Oreos like Penn's Cave's bears! Sentry duty This guy is staring us down just daring us to make some trite "Nevermore" comment Wolf! Not as pretty nor as interested in visitors as Chorro back at the other park, though. Pine Martens are absolutely adorable, but, but this guy was in having too much fun leaping around his home to pose for a flattering picture. You can just kinda see him running across the beam, center left. Okay, enough animals! That's the last of them for the week, I promise. Back to the park! It was getting close to lunchtime now, so time to find something good! ...And this was where we found one of the bigger problems for the day. I wanted a drink, and those BBLZ ones I'd heard about sounded good! Almost all of these look good. Which to try? Oh. None of them. The place was chained off and closed. Okay, how about one of those big super shakes? Ah. Closed. Hmmm. Ice cream? Nope...well, dippin dots? Not Hershey ice cream, but still nice...oh, closed too. Okay, so food is going to be a challenge...how about a break for some games? Wellp. Perhaps because of staff shortages after younger workers had gone back to school, nearly everything in the park other than the rides was closed. The only food that seemed to be open were the chain stuff; Subway, Chickies and Petes, Moe's, and a couple places near the gate. Not greeaat. Most of the rides were at least running, with a few exceptions. Given the problems Skyrides have been having lately, I'm not shocked that this wasn't...and it's so short as to be mostly pointless anyway... We ended up giving up and heading out of the park to try Hersheypark Place, the full service restaurant outside the gate. Somewhat to my surprise, it ended up being quite good, and far more reasonably priced that I expected. Sandwiches and burgers and such were in the $10-$14 range, which for a full service restaurant at a pricey amusement park...no complaints there. I ended up getting another burger (...I know. I really should branch out) and went with their specialty of the week one, with a red pepper cole slaw and spicy mustard on a pretzel roll. While it wasn't quite on bar with the pub burgers of previous days, it wasn't bad by any means, and better than I expected for the park. The raspberry lemonade I had, given how hot it was outside, was one of the most refreshing things I could even remember, and I may have abused the free refills a bit. This place definitely gets my recommendation for a meal at Hershey; almost normal, non-park prices, decent food, and air conditioning. We still had coasters to ride though, and I'd promised everyone I wouldn't keep them at the park all day, since half the group was waiting for us back at the cottage, so we hurried back in and down to the far end of the park. No one had much interest in the drop towers. For those of us that cared for them...basically just myself...Stratosfear was in the future, so these were pretty superfluous, and left me missing Condor. No need to bother with that area at all then...down to Farenheit! Vertical lift hills are still mildly intimidating for some reason! I love this twisted tangle of track. Always fun to have so much packed into a small area. The last time I was at Hershey, Farenheit was new, the park was horrifically overcrowded, and we waited hours for it. By time I got on, I was too overheated, dehydrated, and irritable to really enjoy it as much as I would have, and it didn't leave much of an impression. Fortunately, this time was far different. We walked right on and claimed the front couple rows. Turns out that Farenheit is a pretty great coaster, and I'm kind of surprised that it doesn't seem to get that much attention. It's a pretty big step up over a Eurofighter in size and intensity, smoother than anything along those lines that I've been along, and all in a pretty similar footprint. I'd expect to see more of these from Intamin, but given that the page for Intamin Vertical Lift coaster on wikipedia only goes directly to Farenheit, I'm guessing this is it? The day was getting hotter, and Tidal Force was looking pretty good, but...exactly how wet did we want to be? Maybe not that wet. Almost everyone riding it was wearing swimsuits and getting off drenched. With the humidity, we knew we'd never dry off, and didn't want to ride home still wet, so we ended up giving it a pass, somewhat regretfully in my case; I really enjoy those big flumes. On the other hand, just past it, a big old tangle of twisted wood track was calling my name. As I mentioned before, I always enjoyed Wildcat, and as its gotten a bit less punishing to ride over the years, of course I was getting on it. I love wild, twisty wooden coasters with lots of laterals; Wildcat is among the best of them, if you can take the beating it can sometimes offer you. I guess Hershey's given up on this ride ever being popular; as far as I can remember this wasn't just a product of the park being understaffed today, but had been closed the last several times I'd been here. I don't know if Wildcat had track work done recently, if the weather was just right, if we just got lucky or what, but it was running incredibly well today. I wouldn't even consider it rough at all; really not noticeably worse than Twister at Knoebels, and Twister's running smoothly this year! Maybe it's more the heavily padded trains than the actual ride, but it felt pretty great. If Wildcat always ran like this, I think it would have an entirely different place in the park, and in peoples' minds. Fast, crazy, forceful; at least that one ride put it way up in my top coasters list. I wanted to get back on it, but my group was pretty determined to get everything in the park once and get back; not how I usually like to approach a park, but...compromises, I suppose, so we headed on to Laugh Track. Laugh Track might not be the best in the park, and it definitely had the longest line...but it was a line that featured air conditioning for a good part of it, so no one had any complaints. It also had a Laughin' Sal. I always remember Kennywood's but I didn't know they had one here too. So nice that this coaster has this nostalgic, classic decor, instead of modern themepark advertising. *sigh* Nevermind. Mirrors, fun. Air conditioning, amazing. Sadly, we're going to have to give up the AC soon and settle for the actual ride. Laugh Track? Not bad! I wasn't expecting much, but having ridden Steel Dragon at Waldameer a couple months ago, the themeing in here does make a big different and make it quite a bit more fun than the basic ride. It's no Space Mountain, or even Exterminator, but as long as the line isn't too long to be worth it, it's a good time. Would have been even better with more spinning, but we had a well balanced car, unfortunately. Hey, these look good! Especially the jalapeno ones! We never actually found a place that served them, just signs for them. Wherever they are, it was probably closed...dammit Hershey) Well, speaking of tangled messes of wooden track, there's one more of those for me here. Lighting Racer has always been a favorite of mine. It's best at night, when you can crest the to of the lift hill and look down on that spaghetti-bowl of chaser lights along both tracks, but I wasn't going to skip any chance to ride it! We picked Thunder (green) side. Unfortunately, while in the past it seems like it's been pretty close and either train could win any time, that didn't seem to be the case today. Even though red had quite a few empty seats and we definitely seemed to have the fuller, heavier train, Lighting won by quite a bit. Watching afterwards, that side was taking every win. Not as much fun that way! Still, beyond that, the LR felt every bit as good as it did when it was brand new, and I still love the dueling elements. C'mon Thunder! Nope. Lightning wins again. After we gave up watching to see if Thunder would ever win, we got into what was probably the longest line of the day for us. Everyone wanted Ritas. We were hoping for Mistos, but they had everything but that. They did have watermelon cream ice though, so the line was worth it. We found where the rest of the crowds were; the waterpark was pretty well packed. No surprise. We found where the rest of the crowds were; the waterpark was pretty well packed. No surprise. Sidewinder! Even the less enthusiastic about coasters in my group had been on enough Boomerangs though. We skipped that and Trailblazer. We did head down to hit Storm Runner, of course, since it would be the fastest launched coaster at least one of my friends had been on. It's still a pretty great ride; obviously it doesn't have the intensity of Kingda Ka, but it's a nice change to actually have a ride after the top hat, too, and it has some really good interactions with the terrain and some of the other rides. Good stuff, still. ...And yet I entirely forgot to take any pictures there. Unfortunately, that was as long as I could convince my group to stick around; they all knew we'd be spending the next few days in the park at Knoebels, and wanted time to rest up first. I'd have loved to stick around Hershey for some night rides, but I couldn't entirely blame them. We were going to be on our feet quite a lot. Overall, a pretty decent day at Hershey, far better than my last couple attempts. It was a bit disappointing that most of their unique food and treat options weren't available, but even with the low crowds, the important rides were all up and running, and operations were for the most part very good. Only Farenheit was really stacking trains at all, all the other crews were getting them out of the station in impressive time. I still can't shake the feeling that a few things at Hershey just aren't quite as good as they could be, but some of it might just be bias going in. It does seem like, somehow, despite the amount of trees and scenery at the park, you end up spending a lot of time standing out in the sun without shade. Flat ride operations are still pretty sad, with very short rides for some reason. They still have a pretty awesome collection of coasters though, and some really deserve more attention than they get. I think I can withdraw many of my previous complaints about Hershey, and I'm sure I'll head back, but next time, I want to try one of those bblz drinks. ...and damn you, sadistic Skyrush stapler. Anyway, heading back Knoebels, we gathered everyone up and returned to Nickel Plate for the second time. This time, someone else drove so I could try the drinks (fantastic) along with the Santa Fe chicken salad (equally amazing). We got a bit of time to rest up then, since Friday would be the first "real" day at Knoebels. It had been painful waiting that long to really get into the park, but if we were going to get wristbands, we wanted it to be when the park was open until late. Next time!

Yes, it is! I love it, but not sure how much longer I'll have it; a small-ish car is becoming increasingly impractical for me these days. Holding on to it as long as I can though! Definitely. A plain, ordinary hotel room would be incredibly out of place there. Anyway, sorting through pictures for the next couple days now; will have Hershey up in a bit!

Well, we were told that in well over a hundred years of giving tours, they've never had anyone end up in the water...but if the absolute worst does happen...just stand up. The water's only two feet deep for the majority of the cave. That does help somewhat. It really is beautiful down there! My phone does pretty well in dark shots, for a phone, but it's definitely a "you have to really see it" kind of place. Or at least have pictures taken on a real camera. Not...sure what you're getting at? Now that you mention it...I'm pretty sure the microwave is the one that you could win in the Fascination parlor, too. ...makes sense.

Yeah, the cottage at Knoebels was just a nice central location for a lot of stuff we wanted to do. As it turned out, we ended up spending more time just hanging around Knoebels than we planned, and didn't get everywhere else, but...that wasn't a bad thing at all! And thanks!

Okay, on to day two! The forecast for Tuesday was scorchingly hot and humid, the worst of the week in that regard, so we decided somewhere OUT of the heat would be a nice idea. Several of the group was interested in Penn's Cave, and underground seemed like a great place to be, so that was the plan! But not before breakfast, and an excuse to wander into the park for a bit. I love being in the park early to watch it wake up for the day I've never noticed this guy before; looks like he's from the woodcarver in the back corner of the park! Pretty awesome! I went with the creamed chipped beef on toast, feeling daring and wanting to see how far Knoebels' ability to make everything good could go. Got some weird looks for that, but it turns out that yes, they can even make really tasty creamed chipped beef. And then, off to Penn's Cave. Driving out there seemed like we couldn't possibly be heading to a tourist attraction; even more so than Knoebels itself, this place is in the middle of nowhere. We literally passed three horse drawn carriages within a few miles of the place, and then had to take a road out behind a farm. No one was entirely sure they trusted my GPS, but then... Yep, this looks more like it. Penn's Cave has three actual attractions; the cave tour (a boat tour of the underground river), a walkthrough maze, and a wildlife exhibit. We figured the first would be the big deal and the others were afterthoughts, but given that it wasn't too much more expensive to get a combo ticket for all three, and we had time to kill, we went for that. Good decision. Heading down the winding path to the cave first... The cave mouth is pretty well hidden from view until you come around and down the cliff Rainbow trout! I found lunch! I wish. The tour guide told me I was free to try to go in after one, but the water is two to four degrees above freezing year round. These are the flat-bottomed boats for the tour. Nice and stable despite being narrow, they seem to work well It gets dark pretty quickly The cave's "Statue of Liberty" I forgot what they called this formation (bottom left of center) but it looks very much like a bunch of cloaked people up to something. Pretty cool. Some of the chambers are quite big here Closer look at that earlier formation On the left, in the spotlight, their crouching lion formation Foggy. Eerie. Fellow travellers! I'm not entirely certain what the point of this room was, except that they wanted to play with colored lighting underground. I don't blame them Apparently in some seasons this room is FULL of bats. Not this time, sadly (for me, anyway. I'm sure some were grateful) The cave opens up into this lake on the far side. Jurassic Park theme playing for anyone? It's rather pretty out here Okay, not quite dinosaurs, but at least they have distant relatives... No idea what this was. The boat turns around and heads back through the cave Of course there's a ghostly legend The closest I got to seeing any bats there. We had a little while before our wildlife tour, so we hit the maze first. This maze is a little different than most; finding the exit is easy, but the trick is to find four checkpoints and get a card stamped at all four before you leave. It looks very small from outside, but it's far more confusing than it has any right to be, and quite a bit more fun too. It took each of in my group between 7-12 minutes of frantic racing around to finish, so not too bad for the $3 or so it cost! We grabbed lunch at the Cave Cave afterwards; this was the only disappointing part of the place, I think. Their much-hyped bison burger could have been a school cafeteria burger; small, dry, and not particularly flavorful. I've had amazing bison burgers; this was not one of them. The one at the food court at Knoebels was quite a bit better, and even that's not up to most of Knoebels' food standards. Fortunately we didn't have much time to be upset about the food, because it was time for the wildlife tour. I was fully expecting a few little animal cages and stuff. I wasn't expecting a bus to pull up to take us around a 1,600 acre wildlife preserve. They have a huge area with a lot of beautiful, well cared for animals, most of them with generous enclosures; this ended up being one of my favorite zoo type attractions I've seen! Incredibly nice surprise here. Bison, first. Did I feel a little bad for just eating one? ...Nah. Bison are tasty. Elk! Elk are also tasty, but these guys weren't on the menu. And deer, which as we were told, co-exist very well with elk since they eat different types of vegetation, so they're fine with sharing space. Piebald deer, very cute with their white markings Cows. Well, how interesting are cows, compared to the other animals out here... Well, these are friendly, curious cows... Very friendly. They came up to try to get their heads into the bus and beg for treats. I missed getting a picture of the one that started licking the windows, sadly, since everyone in the front of the bus rushed to get that shot and blocked the view. The wolves have a huge enclosure, a small forest to themselves. Because of that, we didn't see most of them, but one of them came right over to investigate us when our tour guide called her. This is Chorro And Chorro is a very pretty wolf. She didn't stick around for too long though, once she was sure she'd gotten all the treats she could convince the tour guide to give her. The fox exhibit was next, but unfortunately, the foxes were having nothing to do with the temperature and humidity that day. We could just barely make out one hiding far back inside a log, but I couldn't get a picture of any. Of all the animals for me not to get to see...ah well. The bears were the only animals there that seemed to have an inadequete space, but the tour guide told us that this was a temporary space only while their permanent one was being set up. I forgot this guy's name, but he came out, according to our tour guide, to beg for Double Stuff Oreos. Bears, apparently, love Double Stuff Oreos. Yeah, me too, bear. Me too. Slurp This is a working wildlife preserve and farm; they grow a lot of plants to feed their animals here, or to sell and trade for what they can't grow. This area is a Monarch Butterfly waystation Fake kitty Real kitty! This is Apache. Such a gorgeous cat. And this is Seneca. You can just see her hiding in there. I don't blame her for wanting nothing to do with the sun. And over at the bobcat exhibit...this is Tom. Tom's sister Kit was in the airconditioned indoor part of their area, but Tom came to hang out with us. Bighorn sheep; apparently a carefully bred cross of four types that can survive Pennsylvania weather The farm's breeding horses have their own pen here The tour ended up being somewhere between 90-120 minutes, and while they don't have some of the exotic animals you might see at a zoo, the animals they do see are active, well cared for, and for the most part seem curious and interested in coming over to see visitors too. The tour guides are knowledgeable and fun, and see to love what they do. Everyone in my group agreed that this was one of the big surprises of the trip, and I'd absolutely recommend a stop there for anyone in the area. Once we were done, we needed food and air conditioning. Sounded like a good night to try the new (as of last year) Nickel Plate Grill at Knoebels' golf course! Reviews are good, and...well, it's Knoebels, so how bad could it be? It's fantastic. As good as all of Knoebels food is, Nickel Plate absolutely tops it all. This ended up being the first of three times we ate there this week. This first time, I went for their spicy Firebox burger. Well, not that spicy by my stanards, but juicy and perfectly cooked, soooo good. Tasty fries, too. Everyone in our group had something different, and from salads to tuscan ravioli, everyone raved about their meals. Several of the group got drinks; I didn't that night since I was driving, but those that did gave theirs top ratings too. On top of all that, it's incredibly inexpensive. The majority of the meals are under $10, drinks are mostly under $6...it's pretty much just...well, Knoebels. Affordable, delicious, and of course the service was flawless. If you're going to be anywhere near Knoebels...absolutely make sure to stop in here. And then back to the cottage to rest up and get in a little time hanging out and playing Jackbox games with friends. I wasn't technically lying when I said we didn't use the TV...one of my friends brought a nicer one that we used for this. Gotta have something to do after the park closes!

Yep, I had to call to ask about that. I don't remember for absolute certain but I'm pretty sure all of the larger cabins except the Glass House have two bathrooms. I know the Cedar Log does. I suspect that might be a big reason why the Glass House was the last one still available, when it's pretty good otherwise! (The Cedar Log also looks a bit more like Grandpa did the decorating instead of Grandma, so depending on your preferences...) They just might have! I took home a toaster from Fascination tickets last week, and we were all amused when we opened the box and realized it was the same toaster that was in the cabin! Well, depending on what part is out of your comfort zone, take a look through what they have - they're all very different from each other. Not all look to have the same grandma theme. https://www.knoebels.com/stay/knoebels-cottages I'm not sure any really count as "modern" though - the Evergreen and Cedar Log might come a bit closer.

Knoebels is the land of pleasant surprises, isn't it? The decor really did have me thinking of my grandparents' old cabins up in Maine. We stayed a full week, Monday to Monday. I have lots more to post about the rest of the trip, when I get around to sorting pictures and all! The cottages are each priced differently, from $515 to $1430 a week, and vary a bit depending on when in the season you want them. The Glass House is one of the bigger ones and ended up being just over $1200 for the week. Not bad for a place that can fit 10-12 people.

A while back, there was some mention of the Knoebels cottages, and at least at the time, no one in that thread had stayed in one or knew anyone that had. I'm lucky enough to be able to fix that problem now! I'm not posting this in the Knoebels thread specifically as the TR has other places as well, but if mods think it's better off there, feel free to move it! Anyway, for the last few years, I've tried to put one big trip together to gather friends from around the country for. Last time it was Disney World; this year we decided to do something a bit more affordable to save for the next big one...and, as it turned out, too many of my friends had never been to Knoebels! That had to be fixed...and of course everyone that had been there before was more than happy to go back. It isn't really Knoebels if you just stay in a hotel off site, but no one really wanted to tent camp for a full week, so...a cottage it was! I wasn't too afraid to give one a try; it's Knoebels, how bad can anything there be? Back in the spring, I reserved one; I wasn't able to get my first choice, the Cedar Log cabin, which looks awesome in the pics, but I did score the Glass House, which looked nice enough and was big enough for the group I was bringing, apart from the...slight...issue of having one bathroom for ten people. So....how did it go? As usual, apologies for the half-assed photos; I'm really not a photographer at all, and a lot of them are terrible, or I just entirely forgot to take pictures of some things I should have! Day 1 - Monday We headed down from Rhode Island a bit after 9, and had a nice easy drive...as far as the Connecticut border. At which point traffic immediately came to a complete standstill, because I-95 in Connecticut... almost 45 minutes of this, and we find out all the slowdown was caused by a car pulled entirely off the road, well out of everyone's way, that everyone had to stop and gawk at. of course. Once we got past that, things were fine until New Jersey, where a truck kicked up a rock that put a nice big hole in my windshield. The windshield that I replaced three weeks ago because a truck put a hole in it. Fortunately that was the end of the bad luck for the vast majority of the week...once we hit PA the drive was fine, and as anyone who's driven into Knoebels through the Delaware Water gap area knows, absolutely gorgeous. Unfortunately, since I was driving...no pictures there. Soon enough, we were turning down the road into the back side of Knoebels, and pulled up to see our cottage up close for the first time! Okay, not bad! A bit rustic, but cute! A quick run down to the main Knoebels office to get the keys, and we could take a look around inside and see what we were in for. The kitchen and dining area is pretty nice! Very airy and open with all the glass. Cheap table, but it did the job fine. All the basics included; refrigerator, stove, microwave, etc, and pretty much every kitchen tool and utensil you could think of, in a collection that apparently grows every time someone rents the cottage and leaves something else behind. That chair on the left was far more comfortable than it looked. Minor wars were fought over it. ...okay, I'm not really sure what I was trying to take a picture of here, but the high ceiling out here made the place feel bigger. Okay, I could maybe do without the Jesus clock, but...details. This was a little unfortunate, if understandable. Being a dog friendly park, it would have been great if they could stay in the cabins too. We had a couple people along who would have loved to bring theirs along. Only real issue out here...I have no idea what was going on with the flooring. It's so uneven it looks like it was once liquid and just frozen mid-wave. It's not sagging, exactly. It just has bumps, ripples, and valleys. A bit disconcerting, but no huge deal. Out in the living room...well, this is looking even better! Cozy! Sadly, visible-but-not-touchable, the incredibly soft carpet that we could have just slept on right there. Plenty of room, super comfy couches...it's not as if we're planning on spending a lot of time indoors here, but still, this is really nice! The pictures on the Knoebels website show an ancient tiny CRT TV. I'm happy to say that, in case of a rainy day, there is actually a real TV. Wait, why would you be staying inside at Knoebels and watching TV, just because of a little rain? This didn't get used. The decor in here was...interesting. As one of our group put it, it looked like someone let two grandmas into the place, lit their fuses, and ran. It was pleasant enough though. A bit odd, but I'll take her over the Jesus clock. Bathroom was fine! Modern ish shower with plenty of hot water (and pressure like a firehose), and...despite the website saying toilet paper wasn't to be provided, about a year's supply of it. Okay then. No terrible surprises lurking here either! So what about the bedrooms? Well, downstairs we find... Okay, so the place was clearly furnished by yard sale, but it has a sort of charm to it. Somehow I neglected to take any pictures of the bed situation, but it was fine. Mattress, box spring, nothing half-assed. Not a huge fan of the plastic mattress cover, but then, also not a fan of sleeping in a mattress with someone's kid's pee stains on it, so...the plastic was fine, I suppose. Only minor complaint here; we paid the extra for bed linins to be provided, but what we got for that extra $10 a person wasn't great. Two plain top sheets, no fitted ones, that all just slid right off the bed. We ended up making a run to Walmart anyway to get proper bed sets. I'd definitely suggest bringing bedding for yourself. And...upstairs! These are some interesting stairs...it's hard to tell in the picture exactly how steep they actually were. The steps were barely big enough to get a foot on. The upstairs bedrooms were a bit more...basic. Some beds had box springs, some were just mattresses on a wire mesh base, not much for decorations on the plywood walls. Still, they weren't /bad/, exactly, and no one spent any time up there except to crash after a long day. Maybe don't plan on a nice romantic rendezvous up there though. ...but you get to look out at Knoebels from them! So, cottage is for the most part a big win! No one had any real complaints, and we looked like we'd have every we needed for a cozy, content week! All settled in, we just needed to go get food. Definitely getting food first. Everyone's hungry, no time to stop for rides... ...just have to walk past here... ...yeah, no big deal, it's just a roller coaster, and we really should eat... Yeah, right. We're at Knoebels. First things first. At this point, I'm not really sure what there is to say about Phoenix. It's Phoenix, and everyone here has heard it all...and it's all true, of course. It was running as amazingly as always last week. I let friends have the magic third row, and settled for sitting behind them; there's a definitely difference in the airtime just moving one car back, but...it's still Phoenix. Okay, NOW we can get food. There's an Alamo hot turkey sandwich swimming in a lake of gravy in my future! Oh. Okay. Well...further in my future than I'd been hoping for. So, we hit Cesari's instead. They were out of their awesome Sicilian pizza, so I went with taco pizza and a promise to myself that I'd get back there for Sicilian later in the week...which I'm only now realizing that I never actually did do. A horrible failure on my part, but it's not as if we didn't get tons of other Knoebels food! Knoebels just looking pretty like always We had a few things we needed to pick up for the week, so a stop at the camp store was in order. Despite its small size, Knoebels' camp store manages to have nearly everything you might need for a week of camping; toiletries, charcoal and grilling tools, flashlights and batteries, hamburgers and buns, whatever you can think of. Also, most importantly, Catawissa orange cream soda. No one really wanted to end our first night early, so it was time to break out some board and card games for a bit. ...I don't actually remember why the stuffed corgi was at the table. It likely had something to do with one of the hex cards that "punish" players who lose a round in this game. Exhibit A And that was day one. The cottage lived up to expectations, and seemed a great value at that price, so I think I can safely recommend them to anyone, as long as you're not a four star hotel minimum type! I'll update later with Day 2, and Penn's Cave and Wildlife Park!

ALT2870 has a point. It sounds like you want to scrap your computer and buy a new one but if it's an upgrade-able desktop, don't think you need to go that far? While your CPU isn't brand new state-of-the-art, it's 90% as fast as you'll get in a most decent gaming computers now. It doesn't sound like replacing your entire machine is necessary. Get yourself a decent graphics card, at least 16 GB of ram, and a solid state drive if you can; it sounds like you should be able to add those into your current computer (assuming it's not a walmart grade off-the-shelf machine with no expansion slots) and get it up very close to what you'd get out of a brand new machine, for 1/3 the price.

That CPU is still fine; CPU advancements have been minimal the last few years and that one will still keep up easily. You could use a bit more ram for bigger parks, but it's really the GPU that's holding you back. A GT 635 was barely a gaming graphics card even in its time, and it's many generations out of date right now. Unfortunately, that's also the most expensive part of a gaming computer, so not a cheap upgrade. You're not going to get a meaningful upgrade for $100. Something like https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125906 is a good bargain and will run most games at decent settings and framerates, but you're still looking at $250 there.

Looks like we know what is replacing stinger at Dorney park ...I was only joking when I suggested that in another thread, but now I'm not 100% certain that they wouldn't actually...

Their twitter account just posted that a few minutes ago, so looks to be official. The uproar really is ridiculous. I admit I was hoping for /something/ to do with the posters and hints at CP, because I'm a sucker for those kind of little hidden clues and such (don't really care if it's RMC, B&M, whatever...I just love the little insider games), but people getting this worked up over it when it was obviously a long shot to start with, acting like the park owes them something... People just suck sometimes, I suppose?

The park's social media account just tweeted that tomorrow they'll be making an announcement about "what's returning to King's Island." Granted, there are definitely plenty of things that could "return," but, after those teaser posters and all...

I'm kinda surprised to hear that. Maybe I just got lucky! The elevator was slow, but I didn't think that was a big deal in a four story place. Operations were pretty good in my experience, but I imagine it depends on the staff, too. The pool was open when we were there, but I didn't know they even had a restaurant. You really should! It looks silly with how slow and clunky the boats are, but it's so much more fun than it has any right to be.

Just got back from a long weekend at Wildwood with a few friends. Despite a worrying forecast, it ended up being a pretty great weekend! Not many pics, sadly, since Saturday was rather wet with the rain, and Sunday was wetter with the waterpark, and I didn't really want to find out the hard way whether the cracked glass on my poor phone is still waterproof. ...and I kept getting distracted by Pokemon Go most of the time when I did pull my phone out. >.> I'm a terrible photographer anyway, so you're not missing out on much. My friends and I drove down early saturday morning, in a downpour most of the way, and bumper to bumper traffic that meant we got there several hours later than we planned. We checked into the Landmark motel, figuring we'd be stuck indoors for a while, but the very helpful guy at the front desk assured us that despite the forecast, the rain was going to blow over very soon. We were already soaked by then and not really worried about getting any wetter, so we went for a stroll down the boardwalk in the rain and to Grab a Weiner. I tried the one with their "homemade spicy green sauce," and while I have a different idea of spicy than they seem to, it was pretty good stuff anyway. By time we finished eating, it turned out to be weather forecaster: 0, Hotel front desk clerk: 1; the rain had slowed to a few occasional periods of drizzle and Morey's had nearly everything up and running. We weren't sure how long the weather would hold out, so we pretty much raced from ride to ride without any repeats, which maybe wasn't ideal, but we wanted to make sure we got in at least one ride on everything important before the weather turned against us again. By time we finished the last pier, and it was starting to look like the rain wasn't coming back, no one really wanted to go back to the others for more, so...not as many rides as I would have liked, but far better than the "none" the forecast had me expecting. All of the coasters were running amazingly well. Great Nor'Easter seemed even smoother than last year, and after the rain it was absolutely flying through its course. Best ride I've ever had on an SLC by miles. Rollie's coaster was...Rollie's coaster, fine for what it is I suppose despite the bizarre seats and restraints. We skipped Doo-Wopper, Flizter is still a fun little family coaster, and I still don't know what kind of blood sacrifice was required to make a boomerang run like Sea Serpent does, but somehow it still manages to be almost impossibly smooth compared to any other I know of. Great White was definitely running better than last year; I don't know if it had any re-tracking or work done, or it was just the weather, but after an after dark back seat ride, it definitely nudged its way up a few places in my wood coaster rankings. We got in all of the other big attrations; It, Maelstrom, Zoom Phloom, Ghost Ship, and a bunch of smaller rides. Since the under-the-boardwalk go-karts had been closed last year, we made sure to get them in this time; the track's not much more than a kinked oval with a hill at one end, not that impressive, but it was worth doing once. Ghost Ship was the only slightly disappointing thing this year; there were only a few actors working it this year, and several parts had the lights turned on higher this year, taking away from some of the scares. I hope none of that is a permanent change. Unfortunately we had a group of five, so one of us had to sit out from Boat Tag, and I was stupid enough to volunteer, as much as I love it. We planned to get back to it later on so I'd get a chance too, but that never happened. The operations on it were a bit odd this time anyway; they sent four boats out for a while, held the fifth, with two of my friends in it, back for a while, then let them go out, only to call the other boats back in a minute and a half later and leave the last boat on their own with no one to fight for several minutes. Still, everyone enjoyed it, and that's the last time I let myself sit that one out. After last year, we were eager to return to Cattle n Clover, and it definitely did not disappoint this year. Sadly the amazing Irish Torte wasn't on the menu this year, so I had to "settle" for a steak, which ended up just about matching the one I had a few years ago at Mama Melroses' in Disney for the best I've ever had. Their house Shep's Ale is still sheer bliss in a pint glass, too. I'd been hoping to get in some late night re-rides on Great White after dinner and drinks, but after our very early start to our drive, most of my group was all but falling asleep on the table, so we ended up heading back to the motel room and calling it an early night. We started Sunday off with donuts from Fractured Prune, of course, and then it was waterpark day, and again the forecast called for thunderstorms all day, but apart from a few drizzles in the morning, they failed to materialize at all. We had a day of bright sun, and while gray clouds hung on the horizon to threaten an early end to the day for hours, they never actually seemed to move an inch closer to us. That still seemed to be enough to keep everyone else out of the waterparks, so we had exactly zero line for almost everything. Morey's does have some great slides, too. Nothing particularly modern or fancy, but just well designed slides with some great speed and drops, and in the case of the Sidewinders, absolutely amazing/terrifying air time. We stopped between the two piers for treats at Dragon Lab; I got the taro and berries rolled ice cream; a little pricey but absolutely delicious. Taro ice cream really needs to be easier to find in the US. Or maybe not, I'd likely be ten pounds heavier if it was. After we were exhausted from climbing stairs all afternoon, we gave a local brewpub a try, Mud Hen brewing company. Beer was very good, appetizers were fantastic, food was a bit "eh"...chili was tasty but a bit watery, the burger that I ordered medium came well done and rather dry, and a couple of my friends order the "massive grilled cheese" and got their sandwiches with some of the cheese still not even melted. Not bad overall, but we'll probably try someplace else next year for a second dinner. Cattle n Clover, of course, will definitely still be first. I should probably mention the motel here, too. By time I booked our room, there weren't a ton of of promising looking places still available, and several had three night minimum stays. After agonizing over reviews for a while, I'd ended up giving the Landmark a try, and that turned out to be a pretty good choice. While it's still expensive for a motel, like everything else on Wildwood, and looked a little bit sketchy and dated from outside, it turned out to be a nice enough little motel. The room was actually much bigger than I expected, with a pull out couch in addition to the two beds, a table and chairs and quite a bit of floor space. The room did look a bit older, but well kept up and clean. Beds were on the firm side but not uncomfortable. The motel staff was very friendly and helpful the entire time, and apparently far better at reading the weather than the local meteorologists. If you're not comfortable around dogs, it's worth mentioning that the owner does have a big rottweiler that seems to have the run of the office area, but it's a very sweet, well behaved dog that seems to love attention from everyone, so I'm gonna put that in the "pros" column for the place. The Landmark is also in one of the best locations for enjoying the piers; just a couple blocks off of Mariner's Pier, behind the Splash Zone waterpark and Schellengers's Seafood. Overall, another great weekend in Wildwood; I'm definitely going to be making this an annual thing now. I'd be a little sad that it's over...except two weeks from now I'll be heading down to spend a full week at Knoebels! This was the sky after lunch, despite my phone's "current weather" insisting we were in the middle of a monsoon. I am absolutely 100% certain this place was "closing" last year too. Pretty sure at this point they just named the place "Store Closing" and I expect it to be there next year, too. As ridiculous as it is, I absolutely love Boat Tag. Sadly someone had to sit out this year... My kind of place St. Paddy's Day in August? I'm sure that makes a lot of people cringe, but it works for me! Worth paying a little extra for a motel with this view, maybe. And just to leave the report off with a healthy little bit of WTF, the mexican market around the corner from our motel had a huge portion of their modest shelf space set aside for...Gorilla Snot Gel?

Knoebels! An entire week at one of the Knoebels cottages! Hershey too while we're there, but...Knoebels!

So...the brakes failed and they had to wait for it to swing to a stop on its own...and people are making it out to be a horrific terrifying ordeal. Okay then. These people need to seriously consider not leaving their homes, and leave the big scary world for the adults.

It is far too early and there is far too little information to possibly start getting all excited about a reborn Son of Beast. That would be stupid. Beyond premature. Absolutely idiotic. OHGODS PLEASE GIVE IT TO ME PLEASE NEW SON OF BEAST PLEASE COME ON RMC SON OF BEAST I DESERVE IT WE ALL DO PLEASE *ahem* Yeah, would be a silly thing to even think about. ...please?

Morey's Piers in a week and a half, and a full week and Knoebels (and Hershey by extension, possibly Dorney as well) in a month!

It's an absolutely ridiculous comparison. It's not even apples to oranges, it's just...insanely stupid. It's like saying filet mignon is a poor replacement for an ice cream sundae, or bread is a poor substitute for water. If you're trying to replace one with the other, the problem isn't the replacement, it's you. So yeah, you responded the best way possible. Just walk away.

Great Nor'Easter is a really good ride, and even apart from the far smoother track, it's layout is more fun than other SLCs just for the way it weaves through other structures at the park. Definitely the best of it's kind by far.

Ehhh, maybe. We still don't know what's happening to Lakemont's old Chance Toboggan.

Several people have mentioned the Steelers paying for some of the themeing. IS that a thing that happens at all? I'd imagine with how big their brand is in Pittsburgh, the park would have been willing to pay quite a bit to use that themeing; it's definitely going to bring a ton of locals in. The park is really benefiting from it; the Steelers are just getting a bit of an ego boost, and I'm sure a cut of the merchandise.