Sue

Since we hadn't been to Disney in about 5 years, it was time for a return visit. As is our tradition, we visited all 4 parks in one day starting with Animal Kingdom at 9 am and ending at the Magic Kingdom at midnight. Even though it was a bit more crowded than we expected, we still managed to ride everything we wanted plus more. The only thing we passed on was Test Track due to the line(even the single rider line was long), but we had already ridden that on previous visits. We also had the expert guidance of our friend, Chris, who used to work there(he was also a Rolling Thunder operator at SFGAd before moving to FL). First stop: Animal Kingdom Ride Count: Expedition Everest(3x) and Dinosaur This was our first time riding Expedition Everest. It was fun, but nothing spectacular. Next stop: MGM Rides Ridden: Tower of Terror, Rock N' Roller Coaster, and Backlot Tour Next stop: Epcot Rides Ridden: Nemo(plus Turtle Talk with Crush show), Mission Space, Journey Into Imagination, and Gran Fiesta Tour boat ride in Mexico Chris and I in Germany--too bad it's not the real thing! I just had to take a picture of this! Next stop: Magic Kingdom Rides Ridden: Carousel of Progress, Pirates, Haunted Mansion, Barnstormer, Splash Mountain, Big Thunder Mountain, Space Mountain(2x), People Mover, Stich's Great Escape, Philharmagic, and Snow White's Scary Adventures

Yes, I plan on being at the tour. In fact, I'm going to be the one organizing it this year.

Has anyone else here toured any baseball stadiums? That's something we just started doing and really enjoy. Whenever we're by a stadium now, we try to take a tour. If anyone has any suggestions on good tours, please post them.

Since we were in the area on Saturday, we swung by LC to take a couple of pictures. Although we didn't see workers, we did hear a lot of hammering which I'm guessing was from them working on BD.

Since we were in Boston for a party, we figured we might as well take a tour of Fenway Park since we had never been there before. We've toured a couple different baseball stadiums and Fenway was the most disappointing. At other stadiums, we were able to pose for pictures in the dugouts and even go in the locker rooms. Fenway never allows the tour groups in the dugouts and only sometimes allows access to the warning track. Due to the off-season construction, we weren't allowed near the field. It was nice to be able to say we went to Fenway, but the tour itself didn't offer much. On to the pictures:

I just came across this website where you can buy food items that aren't available in your area. Pretty neat idea! http://www.hometownfavorites.com/

I know at Dollywood they close the coasters when the temperature falls below 40 degrees. I'm not sure about Silver Dollar City, but I'd imagine it's the same.

The reason that I say closing off rows is due to laziness is because we've been there multiple times where the line was half way down the ramp leading into the station and they still didn't open the rows on Lightning Racer. Here's a real example of their differing re-ride policy. There was an ACE event in May with ERT on Storm Runner. Although we weren't there, I know people who were there and they were allowed to re-ride the entire ERT session. We were at the WNYCC event at Hershey the following weekend and had ERT on Storm Runner as well. They wouldn't let us re-ride at all. They were sending out the trains with 2 people on them while everyone else was walking around. All that I ask is that they be consistent one way or the other. Thanks for the great 2 day TR of your Hershey trip! I think Halloween is definitely the best time to visit Hershey. I just wish they'd open all of October instead of just the last 2 weekends. It's sometimes hard to get there with only 6 days to choose from.

Hershey has a strange rule on re-rides. From what we were told, it's all up to the lead operator as to whether it's allowed or not. That's like saying they can let their buddies reride, but tell everyone else no. It should either be you can re-ride or you can't.

Hershey always closes off rows especially on Lightning Racer. It's just laziness so they have less rows to check and also to prevent people from reriding. They're not the only ones though. Dorney frequently runs 1/2 a train on Thunderhawk with the entire back half of the train chained off. People who have worked that ride in the past even admit it's due to the laziness of the crew and has nothing to do with the operation of the ride.

Are these rides still open for the rest of the season, or are they already closed down?

You should try e-mailing them. I did that last month and they answered pretty quickly. The only coasters closed according to their website are Super Saturator and Thunder Road Backwards. Top Gun was closed for a month, but I believe it just reopened this past weekend.

Top Gun at Carowinds has been down for a month now.

That was the first time we visited the Great Escape during this time of year. The park did look good and the Fright Fest decorations were excellent. I think the problem with Comet is that we caught it right after it opened for the day since it didn't open on time that day. It definitely wasn't cold out so it couldn't have been that. Our friends that were there on Saturday said it was flying so I guess we just hit it at a bad time. That's good to know because I've always loved Comet.

I just looked up your Glenwood TR. It looks really nice. So that one has the lift at the end of the ride? I would be way too scared to ride their swing!

Comet has always been one of my favorite coasters. However, it just was not running very well on this visit. From what I've heard it was closed for a couple hours after opening so we might've just caught it when it opened and it wasn't warmed up yet.

We headed to Jiminy Peak on Sunday to ride their Mountain Coaster. We opted for the 1.5 hour pass $33. In that time, we were able to ride Mountain Coaster 5 times, the alpine slide 2 times, and the Giant Swing once. The only bad thing about the Mountain Coaster and the alpine slide is that if you get stuck behind someone going slow, your ride is ruined. Luckily, that never happened to us. They do moniter the Mountain Coaster and if they see someone going slow, they either slow or stop the lift so that it doesn't get all backed up. Although it's pricey, it was worth it because the Mountain Coaster and alpine slide are both excellent. We then headed north to Vermont to eat at the Blue Benn Diner in Bennington. Based on a suggestion from our friends who have been there, we decided to try the pancakes with Vermont maple syrup and a cheeseburger with Vermont cheddar. Since the place is tiny with only 6 booths, we decided to sit at the counter to save time rather than waiting for a booth. It worked out well since we were out of there before we would've even been seated in a booth. On our way home, we made a quick stop at the Great Escape. We were only there for about an hour and had 6 Comet rides and 1 Alpine Bobsled ride. All of our previous rides on Comet including last year have been awesome, but it really disappointed this year. I don't know why, but it was running extremely slow yesterday. I really hope we just caught it on a bad day because I've always loved Comet. This is the type of line we like to see! It was a pretty crazy day with being in 6 different states in a matter of about 14 hours. We started out in CT, to MA, to VT, to NY, to NJ, and back home to PA.

Of my rides on Mystery Mine, 2 were in the front row and 1 was in the back. I also tried riding with my head back and sticking it forward--neither one helped! I really wanted to like the ride, but it just wasn't for me.

I agree with your opinion on Maverick. If it had lap bars, it would be a good or even great ride, but I just can't stand those style of OTSR's. I'd much rather spend my time at CP riding TTD, MF, or WT.

Thunderhead is a fun ride and definitely the best coaster at Dollywood. However, I don't think it's close to being the #2 coaster in the world as the Golden Ticket awards make it out to be.

This past weekend we headed to Dollywood for a Sunday and Monday visit to the park. Even though Sunday wasn't overly crowded, we decided to get a Qbot. We've always wanted to try one, but refuse to pay the rip-off prices that SF charges. At Dollywood, you can't beat a price of $16 for 2 people. Sunday was our relaxing day since we hoped Monday would be our crazy riding day just like it was the last time we visited on a Monday in September. Just as I had planned, Mystery Mine was coaster #700 for me. Unfortunately, it was a huge let-down. I had high expectations for it and they didn't even come close to being met. While the theming is excellent, the ride is not. It's pure headbanging from start to finish. It figures that it's made by Gerstlauer who are experts at causing pain with their wood coaster trains. Rich even rode it one more time than I did since my head was pounding so bad that I couldn't take any more. We made the rounds of the park riding everything a couple times and also took in the Dreamland Drive-In show. We're not usually big on seeing shows, but we did both enjoy this one. Sunday Ride Count Thunderhead-7 Tennessee Tornado-2 Blazing Fury-1 Dizzy Disk-1 Smokey Mountain Wilderness Adventure-1 Dollywood Express-1 Veggie Tales Sideshow Spin-1 Sky Rider-1 Mystery Mine-3 Total Rides: 18 Monday turned out to be everything we hoped for and more. Visiting on a weekday in the fall is the best time to go to Dollywood. 90% of the park guests on these days are senior citizens who are there to see the shows. For anyone that wants to ride, you pretty much have the rides to yourself. As I've mentioned before, the best thing about Dollywood is the employees. Everyone we encountered was friendly and efficient at their job. Not only that, but their employees seem to be there for the long-term. The employees working Thunderhead and Tennessee Tornado were mostly the same ones who were operating them during our first visit in 2004. We were only at the park for 7 of the 8 hours they were open and got to ride to our heart's content. It was an excellent day at Dollywood! Monday Ride Count Thunderhead-60 Tennessee Tornado-15 Blazing Fury-1 Mystery Mine-ZERO Total Rides: 76 Here's a couple pictures from our trip:

Our first plan for this day was to visit Ghost Town in the Sky. That was out the window when we learned their Cliffhanger coaster wouldn't operate this year. The next plan was Carowinds. However, that was also out the window when we learned that Top Gun(what we consider the only worthwhile coaster there) was closed for the weekend. What we finally decided upon was to visit World's Fair Park in Knoxville, TN. I was there 25 years ago as a child during the World's Fair so it was neat to revisit the area. We had no idea what we were in for when we decided to visit Knoxville on Saturday. It turns out that there was a University of TN football game that day which made finding a parking space a nightmare. Although it wasn't intentional, I fit in quite well wearing my orange t-shirt since everyone in the city that day was wearing orange. The first thing we did was go up to the observation level in the Sunsphere tower. After that we just walked around the park for a while before calling it a day. The pictures from the Sunsphere came out lousy due to the tinting on the windows:

The funny thing is that I noticed the message about it being closed on 9/15 and 9/16 listed on the website on Labor Day weekend. It seemed odd that if they needed to work on it that they wouldn't have closed it on 9/8 and 9/9. I would guess that they purposely held off on doing the work until the week after the ACE event so that they were still able to have ERT on it.

Even though their website still only lists Top Gun as closed on 9/15 and 9/16, I just got an e-mail from them saying it will still be closed this upcoming weekend. Guess we won't even bother going. With the Girl Scout Campout, the Christian Music concert, and the best coaster in the park closed, it's a recipe for disaster!

The IAAPA Summer Meeting starts tomorrow at Hershey. I know they had an optional day at Knoebels the day before so I'm sure that's why they were there. I think that's also why Hershey is closing earlier than normal this Sunday. The meeting starts off with a reception in the Boardwalk area at 6 pm.