Erik Johnson

Great start, I can not wait to see the rest. As awesome as it was, how could you ride Whirlwind 25 times? That thing made me crazy dizzy after 3 rides in a row.

I recently earned my: #250 Predator (Dinn Woodie) at Darien Lake #300 Flashback (Vekoma Boomerang) at Six Flags New England

September is a great time to hits the parks since most of the kids will be back in school. As everyone has already said, I would spend a full day at Universal/Islands of Adventure. Are you really into shows and sealife? I think that really depends on how much you will get out of SeaWorld. If you are going there for mostly for the rides you could just spend a half day there or less, and finish up the rest of the day at Wet N Wild as they are pretty close to each other. It looks like both parks are open at 10AM and closes at 6PM. While Typhoon Lagoon and Blizzard beach are nicer parks, I feel that Wet N Wild has a better collection of slides. Aquatica is mostly made as a family park, there are hardly any slides for thrillseekers there. This will leave you a full day at Busch Gardens for Friday. http://www.universalorlando.com/tickets.html If you know that you are going to only do Sea World in a half day and go to Wet N Wild, I would recommend buying the Unlimited 2 Park Plus Wet N Wild ticket for $99. Even if you decide not to go to Wet n Wild, you can at least go back to Universal for a few hours in case you missed something. I think you have to buy these tickets online.

Oh heh heh heh. You know Natalie, if you never pointed that out in the photo, I bet nobody would have noticed it.

I had no idea that the Batman pen lights up. I shall now go and play with it for hours.

Screw Six Flags, the city museum is where it is at. That place looks amazing.

Mmmmmmm...Caterpillar. What was really sweet is that we got to ride two completely different ones in the same day.

Kingda Ka gets my vote.

Did you already forget that you DID visit the park this year?? Maybe it was better that you did forget it.

Great start for your first Photo:TR. I totally forgot that you were using a film camera on the trip. I can't wait to see the rest of them. Oh yes, I also loved Vortex as well, though I am such an Arrow suspended fanboy.

Of the three SLC's I rode on the trip, SFNE's Mind Eraser was the best one.

Awww...You included a picture of Albertsons, which is where I work my second job. Well, at least for another 2 weeks when it closes down.

Those drop towers are most certainly the scariest ones ever built. I just wanted to say that the Ravine Flyer 2 ERT was the highlight of the Behemoth trip for me. I remember sitting in the front row as it started to pour rain with lightning over Lake Erie as we went up the lift hill. Boy was that a super insane night.

Great collection of photos here. Why did I forget to ride the ferris wheel while I was in the park....doh!

The storm is supposed to come right back across north Florida today, but it looks like it has pretty much stalled in the Atlantic. It is going to pretty much flood any low lying area it touches now because of its slow speed.

I too think its important to have a good breakfast before heading out on and hitting the parks. This past year, I have noticed that I have been much more sensitive to motion sickness on rides. I think with age that the body does change and that is why my motion sensitivity has kicked in. It pretty much started while riding Kumba last October and I have been battling it ever since. People may remember I had to sit out for a while at SFMM's West Coast Bash for the same reason. While on the the Behemoth trip, I ended up having to sit out on quite a few flat rides and was not able to marathon certain coasters. I could not marathon Behemoth during our ERT sessions, and I have never had a problem with a hyper before. I could not go beyond two back-to-back rides on it. The worst day was at SFGadv where I could not ride El Toro more than twice during ERT. People said I was really looking green after my 2nd ride. Before my next trip to a park I am going to try some over the counter motion sickness medication to see if that will help.

Boulder Dash, Ravine Flyer 2, and El Toro are also in my top 5 woodie list. Boy, wasn't the Behemoth trip a blast? I am glad you had some really good rides on Boulder Dash in the afternoon as it has been running really well this season, especially after the retracking. By chance was the sky lift working while you were there?

Wow! Never heard about that, but, I did hear about the one of Valley Fair. Are you never going there again? Yes I will go, since I still need the credits there.

^ LOL. Just think that was the hand that is responsible for the Winnie the Crap Puppet show.

^ Hah. I think Little Titans was much easier to get in previous years. Superman certainly is a much better ride in the afternoon, but I still had fun during morning ERT.

The Superman: ROS queue line is a cess pool. We witnessed someone getting arrested on opening day for groping a bunch of underaged cheerleaders. It really was a bad situation as the poor/shocked/bawling cheerleader had to be brought out by her parents with security as the other guy was being led out of the station in the other direction. After two bad visits on two separate occasions in that park, I plan on never visiting it again. I honestly never feel very safe in that park.

The log flume was beyond awesome, it was very unexpected. It was cool to meet and hang out with you on the trip. I can't wait for the rest.

Marineland. Marineland was certainly a strange park. It really seems that they were way too ambitious when they first opened the park as that have an enormous amount of land space to work with in the park. Even after all these years, they still have a lot of empty space between attractions which makes walking a bit on the difficult side if you happen to be really out of shape. But they do have Dragon Mountain.......and yes I am such a fanboy for this coaster. #271 Lady Bug Coaster. Zierer Kiddie Coaster. What can I really say about this one? #270 Dragon Mountain. The Ultimate Arrow Custom Looper. It is simply a must ride as its the strangest Arrow coaster ever built. Its certainly one of the most ambitious coasters (in terms of theming and layout) attempted, so its too bad that even after 25 years its still not finished. At least the coaster crew maintains the ride well.

I hope that you do not mind if I use some of your photos in my park/coaster rating section of my trip report. I made sure to give you credit for your photos.

Canada's Wonderland.I think its the nicest/cleanest of all the former Paramount Parks. Well, I still need to visit Great America in California. While the park is really nice, they really do have one the most mediocre collection of coasters on the planet. At least they have a huge selection of rare flat rides to make up for this. I did not get to ride Taxi Jam because you need a kid to ride it. I also do not count powered coasters as a credit so I did not include Thunder Run (Which was a lot of fun). I did have to use other people's photos for some of the coasters since I did not have them. I hope that you do not mind as I do give you proper credit...at least I think I did. #264 Silver Streak. Vekoma Suspended Family Coaster. I have ridden this model at many other places, but I think this might be the best one so far. (Photo from rcdb.com) #263 SkyRider Togo Standup Coaster. I hate Togo Standup Coasters. That is all I can say. #262 Bat. Vekoma Boomerang. Pretty standard Boomerang with new paint. Why do these things make me dizzy? #261 Fly. Mack Wild Mouse. Ite pretty good with a custom layout. At least I think its a custom layout. #260 Flight Deck. Vekoma SLC. Maybe not quite as bad as SFA's Mind Eraser or T2 at SFKK, but pretty darn close. #259 Time Warp. Zamperla Flying Coaster. Oh dear, this thing scared me. I am not a real fan of these coaster cars, but it was fun chasing after it in the loading station. #258 Behemoth. B&M Hyper. REALLY GREAT! I was impressed as this is now my new favorite B&M Hyper coaster. Lots of floating airtime on this thing as well as forces. #257 Back Lot Stunt Coaster. Premier Launched Family. With this I now have finished the Italian/Back Lot Trinity. Its a real shame that many of the effects no longer works on these rides. (Speeddeamon128) #269 Mighty Canadian Minebuster. PTC Wooden Coaster. I did not hate it as much as others did, though its pretty average. (rcdb.com) #268 Vortex. Arrow Suspended Coaster. Those who know me know that I love these coasters, and this one is one of the best. It also has great atmosphere as well.(Speedeamon128) #267 Dragon Fire. Arrow Custom Looper. What a strange coaster, especially how shallow the first drop is as well as the long stretch of track before the first loop. For whatever reason you do go through the double corkscrew really fast so that section was pretty good. (Speeddeamon128) #266 Wild Beast. PTC Wooden Coaster. Wow was this really bad. You now you are in trouble when the coaster car steps up to the lift hill. Worst wooden coaster of the trip. (Speeddeamon128) #265 Scooby's Gasping Ghoster Coaster. PTC Family Wooden. They are all the same, its a good one for kids.