twisterbret

Anyone know if Kings Island still does a morning Beast Walkback for the first ride? If so, does the person need to first go to guest services as it use to be?

Would love to attend. Do you need to be a TPR paying member?

My Favorite 2 pics of my visit to Hershey May of 2008 My two favorite of the day

I take it, the trains are the same old ones and they aren't using the new restraints?

I watch them a few times. I enjoy the onride footage. My son Conner is just so crazy for Roller Coaster dvd's! Even Mine! As a matter of fact from what I can see all the kids love the videos. In light of that, a few suggetions. Clean it up a little bit or make 2 versions. Some things slip right by him and that's cool. But Squishy balls and stuff ...there is no way he's not going to repeat it. I have to skip the carnival each time I'm not sure if others are having trouble but I have 2 dvd players and 1 blu-ray. They all stop in diff places on all of the disks. The disks are clean and have no scratches. My one player says the disk is in DVD+R. Do you have the option of DVD-R? It's still the standard of standards. It's compatible with all players old and new. Anyway keep making the disk so we can travel vicariously though you!

I posted a video of the event http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=622884#622884 Twisterbret

I'm so behind. I'm just reading this now. Great trip report. We enjoyed hanging with you and Derek. It took the kids 3 days to recover from all the walking and rides. I hope to post a video soon!

Derek and Beer

Finally some pictures of the High Roller. Very cool Log Flume lift The Mall looks way better then I thought it would be. Wouldn't take much to convince the family we need to go ..with Shopping high on the list of things to do. Thanks for sharing!

Just wanted to add that the lift hill is insanely fast for a mouse. It also sports some great lightning effects as you go up. I kept my expectations low since it's a "mouse in a box" but they really did a nice job. Makes me wish they would give Skull Mountain a work over. It's certainly a coaster you want to head to first since the throughput isn't going to be all that great. With that said, the platform moves like Hershey's mouse which helps things move a long. It's a great addition for park with lots of B&M's that you need 54" to ride. Conner who's only 3 can make the height.

Congrats guys!! We are super happy for you both!! Bret and Family

That was a lot of fun. Nice photos! Sweet Lens!!

World's longest inverted rollercoaster to run in Guangzhou 261 words 22 January 2008 Xinhua's China Economic Information Service English © 2008 Xinhua News Agency. All Rights Reserved GUANGZHOU, Jan. 22 (Xinhua) -- The world's longest inverted rollercoaster will start running during China's upcoming Spring Festival in an amusement park in this capital city of south China's Guangdong Province, offering the thrilling fun of falling 80 meters, the park said Tuesday. Xiong Xiaojie, assistant to the president of the Chimelong Paradise, told Xinhua on Tuesday that the one-km-long rollercoaster, designed by Switzerland-based Bolliger and Mabillard for the park, will be safety tested on Jan. 28, and has a planned debut in China's most important festival, the Spring Festival, which falls on Feb. 7 this year. "The 200 million-yuan (27 million U.S. dollars) rollercoaster is one of the world's most expensive and the first of its kind introduced to China's mainland. It would offer fun-seekers an experience of a vertical drop of 80 meters, as high as a 30-story building," said Xiong. Bolliger and Mabillard invented the world's first inverted rollercoaster in 1992. Since then, it has designed 71 rollercoasters for theme parks around the world. The rollercoaster it designed for Chimelong Paradise has three carriages capable of carrying 30 people at a time. Its highest speed is 120 km per hour. The Chimelong Paradise opened in Guangzhou in April, 2006, and has become one of the must-go tourist attractions in the city, for its sophisticated amusements. The privately-owned park, built for 1 billion yuan, covers 66 hectares, and can handle 50,000 tourists a day. (?)

You can clearly see some of the problems with the Bat in 4th picture down. The track is flat and the train is almost 90 degrees.

What's the back way out? Is it from the parking lot?

There were working on the lift hill closest to the Christmas shop. One of the test carts was pushed down by the lift so it won't be long now. The guy was added some layers pieces to this. http://www.coasterreview.com/twister/view.php?album=D70%202007/July%202007/Knoebels%20Brets%20Birthday&mode=&start=30&pic=DSC_7400.jpg&picindex=30

Sometimes people will ask you, “What would you like to do for your birthday?” Well my answer was Knoebels. So we drove up Friday morning and spent the full day at the park and spent the night at a hotel. Knoebels in the summer is such a treat. We normally go opening weekend and also PPP. While both are fun, they just can’t compare to a summer day. Every stand is open. Parades and shows are running and the pool is open for business. Every time I see that pool open, it makes me regret not bringing some swim gear, maybe next year? Conner our just turn 3 year old, just couldn’t wait to get on Old Smokie. In case your too coaster hardcore, it the small train in the back of the park. Old Smokie was great but Conner really took a liking to the Log Flume. He doesn’t make the height for a lot of the Log Flumes out there so this was his first and maybe the only one for a while. Had us ride it 3 times. We went with tickets instead of the ride all day. We spent about 65.00 in tickets instead of the 98.00 or more on a ride all day. A storm rolled through in the afternoon. The winds kicked up while the family was on the Pioneer Train. This knocked a small branch out of a tree and it brushed Rylee’s ear and cheek leaving a scratch. She was lucky it wasn’t her eye. It was a freak thing. With the rain and thunder started we ended up watching a magic show. After the show the sun came out and park was empty for a good bit of time. Conner was able to reride a lot of stuff. I was finally able to get Jill on Fandango. (it was my birthday wish)  She loved and it proclaimed it her new favorite ride. Having small children makes Knoebels a 2 day park. We only got 2 Phoenix rides and 0 Twister rides. 1 Flyers and 0 High Speed Thrill coaster. Well on to the pictures. Let's start things with an over looked Statue of Liberty Weeee! Please don't mess Kerri's hair up. I'll never hear the end of it! Not too wet unless someone pays .50 cents to get you. Rylee rode the train and Ferris wheel. She loved all the sites and sounds. Hard at work. I just love those lights. Wide view of the Flying Turns Test rolling stock Check out the broom handles used for clearance purposes I would guess. Jill really enjoying Fandango I think Conner found a diamond!! Know wonder he was excited. The diamond is bigger then moms! Even a 13 year old likes look for shiney rocks Kerri's Favorite ride in the park Conner better learn to swim! Taking a break Storm in the distance Kerri and Conner enjoying the Rockets Wish I had a green thumb Old Smokie in action

You know I honestly thought of going that week in 2008. I had no idea there was a Jersey week. Looks like I’ll go some other time. When I go away I like to get away from New Jersey.

Great TR. That's my son Conner and I on the front of the Dowopper. The Wildwood beach gets a little longer every year. The water use to be under a portion of the piers.

Great Report. We had a great time! Hey you got a credit I don't have an I;m local. I better get on the dragon. It could be the laptop but the pictures are showing a lot of noise. Were you on ISO 400 ? Turn it down to 100 when it's that sunny.

Sorry I don't normally read all the threads. I on;y have a few mins a day to myself. Why the heck did Ofelia eat grapes anyway? Bret

El Toro opening Vs May 29th Today my wife (Jill) and I were kid free for a few hours. We don’t dump are kids on anyone so it’s a rare moment. We started are day on El Toro, which opened with the park with 2 trains. We waited a total of 6 mins. It’s the first time I’ve waited in the queue. I was lucky enough to get a few rides at last years press day and that’s the last time I’ve ridden it. Jill and I took the very backseat. I rode the seat a few times and preferred seat over the others. But I do know there truly isn’t a bad seat on the ride. The lift was as fast as ever. I think it’s faster then Rolling Thunder  Down the first drop you can here the up stop wheels hit the track. To me that’s saying this first drop is STEEP! This coaster truly needs its upstop wheels or it would spell disaster. The out run was filled with all the air I remember and then some. The turn around was much faster but was a little bumpy. But I think the bumpiness gave it some true wood coaster qualities. On to the straight away, this was the only part I thought the coaster really slowed and I thought they could have done something better. Well that was last year. I was surprised with air not but once but twice. The crossover hill was just as crazy as ever and the finally S turns were intense and amazing. The proof was us flying into the brake run when last year we crawled over the last hills. El Toro has truly broken in. Just a reminder, there is an ACE Preservation Con in August 4-5, 2007, and they are serving up late night ERT on El Toro from 11:00pm to 12:00am. http://www.aceonline.org/flyers/PreservationCon2007.pdf This Con includes Coney Island which after this year will never be the same. Bret

Anyone try this Wideangle lens yet? http://www.flyers-pit.com/en-us/dept_1.html I've had this bookmarked for years but I just can't seem to get around to buying one. It's should elimitate those black edges on your video. It's also super low profile. Scroll down the page to compare with others.

I use Ulead Media Studio Pro. It was pretty easy to learn on my own but still very powerful. http://www.ulead.com/msp/runme.htm I've used a few versions of Adobe. I've found that Adobe has some weird not so windows type menu's from the MAC days. I believe the new version is better. I'm able to run Ulead on a P4 1.8 and 500 megs of ram on XP. Fast hard drives are super important but they are almost a dime a dozen now a days.