All Clear

IMO, front row, far left (as you sit on the train).

But does it look as large as it looks?

Lakeside Park in Salem, VA. I'd ride the Shooting Star all day.

B&M Hyper Let's not get pedantic, shall we? At least not 'til we've googled it or something.

Your close-ups of Griffon are great. The one you referred to as your favorite is also mine. Very cool.

I think the all-white is kind of striking, actually.

I also think Shockwave at King's Dominion is hideous, but I'm so offended by that ride that I refuse to take it's picture. At least Sky Princess is fun while being ugly. Sky Princess at Dutch Wonderland

I've been on a few Millennium Flyers myself and I like them fine, except for their tendency to staple at the bottom of drops and on curves. They're way better for the super-twisty GCI designs, for sure. I'm looking forward to giving Hershey's Wildcat another try now that it's got 'em. All in all, though, my train of preference is the 2-bench PTC with no headrest like the ones at Holiday World.

I don't think it seems like all that great an idea. "Here, let's put TWO axels right under your butt." Robbie "Let's not muck around with the Voyage, hm?" Crockett

The first page of this thread makes my Firefox die. It opened fine with Safari, but I didn't try the video. Nice pics, though. It looks like you had a pretty good day.

^S&P Robbie "and I don't mean salt-and-pepper" Crockett

^Yes, but security wouldn't let people around to the side of the track where you could see them. You could see from the Grizzly station (where we were when it happened) that the train was full. The security lines also meant that you couldn't get over to ride Ricochet and The Hurter. We were horrified. Another phone pic of the Hypersonic Tragedy.

Hypersonic XLC got stuck at King's Dominion last Wednesday. I snapped a couple of photos with my phone. I guess it rolled back and they let the people sit on the brakes right there for about 20 minutes or so then they just released it, I guess, and let the car roll back into the launching area. I saw it get released from the Rebel Yell station. SWEET. Stuck coasters rock.

OK, so I looked at this thread earlier this morning. I especially love the shot of you guys from behind at the foot of Jack Rabbit's double down. Then this afternoon, I went to BGE. While waiting for the front row of Apollo's Chariot, I noticed a couple of ACE T-shirts, so I struck up a conversation. I asked this sweet little family where they were from and they said they were from Pittsburgh. I said, "Hey that's funny! I was just looking at some pictures on the internet this morning of where someone recently got married at Kennywood!" To which the matriarch of the family piped up, "That's our daughter!" Small world! Anyway, they were very sweet, which makes 3 positive ACE experiences I've had in a row. I may renew this year after all. Congratulations!

I love Idlewild as a "chillout" park. Spend the day at Kennywood, relax during the evening at Idlewild. It's a very relaxing atmosphere. (SpellCheck wanted me to replace "chillout" with "challot." I seriously doubt you'll find any challots at Idlewild.)

I heard they're not moving Flight of Fear to Canada after all.

I totally agree with the front-far-left being the "sweet seat." I had been on it about a dozen times or so and when I got a ride in that seat, it was like a completely new experience. The queue house is really small, but someone pointed out to me all of these little metal discs embedded in the walkway of that area. Each little disc apparently contains a little pole that pops up and has those retractable straps like on the queue at the bank, so they can add more waiting area as crowds increase, but completely get rid of it later on. Very smart! Operations on media day were very good. The crew worked very efficiently. The only hold-ups were due to the camera people and stuff. I haven't done Sheikra, so I can't really compare the two. I can say that it's a very good-looking ride (and great-riding). That whole area looks good now and will probably just get better as all the new shrubs and stuff fill in a bit more. Excellent addition.

The week of April 9-13, they'll be open weekdays (for spring break) from 10:30 to 6. This has always been my favorite week to go because it's typically not very busy at all, plus everything is sort of clean and fresh. Driving from DC depends heavily on time of day on weekdays. If you leave DC at 9AM, you could easily be at PKD by 11AM. If you leave DC at 7AM, you might not make it to PKD until 11AM anyway. Depending on what part of DC you're leaving from, it could be beneficial to use 301 instead of 95. It's a little less likely to be a parking lot.

Your pictures are great. I'm glad you got to see some sun over Griffon today. My friend had to work until 10:30 so we got a late start. We got there around noon and it was already freezing and threatening to snow. As hard as we tried to tough it out, we had to leave by 3:30 or 4. We enjoyed talking about how Alpie's theming was getting out of hand. Did anyone turn up for the ACE Mid-Atlantic informal meet up? We waited for about 15 minutes. Hunger won out and we skipped over to Trapper's instead and I put another tick on my mental column that's labeled "Reasons I should not renew."

I've heard that mystery track B takes you to a place where they explain all of the inside jokes. GEE DEE, I wanna go there.

I spent one day of pure hell as an area host in Old Virginia at King's Dominion in 1994. Basically, I cleaned up pee for five and a half hours, took a short break to gulp down some old rubbery pizza then went back to empty trash cans for another five hours. The only upside was that I had a couple of hours to kill before my ride was supposed to show up so I got to go ride Hurler, which was brand new and really fun that year. Then my ride never showed up so I had to hitch a ride back to Richmond with the last security guard who left that night. So I was there from 7:30am until about 1:45am. I did not return to the park at all for a couple of years, I was so scarred.

I was looking for more information on donkeys and found this site. It made rollercoasters seem so interesting that I decided to try them out. I haven't been on a donkey since.

I would like to see what it's like to change a stand up to a sit down on the moon.

Regardless of whatever hoops I may have to jump through, it's good to know that my CF pass (bought at PKD) could get me into Knott's this winter. There's still a remote chance that I might make it. I found it odd that I had to keep my old pass in order to go to PKI last fall. Had I gotten my Maxx Pass beforehand, I would have had to pay admission to get in, since PKD confiscated 2006 passes at the purchase of a 2007. OT: I thought Hurler ran much better this year than it did in 2005. And Rebel Yell already needs retracking pretty bad. If it warps any more, there will be some double-downs on the return trip. Sadly, though, I don't see the PKD woodies getting any major attention any time soon. I hope I am wrong.

"Welcome back, rockin' rockers. You rock the universe." I have never heard a spiel so gay in all my life. That's even gayer than the guy on Apollo's Chariot that says "Are you ready to RIIIIIIDE?LOLZ!!!" That video actually reminded me a lot of what I imagine hell is like.