2009 West Coast Bash (And Solace) TR

[Jhcbiinoc]

Sorry this is kind of long and there are no photos, hoping I didn't forget anything but there was so much that happened!!!!!

 

I had been looking forward to this for a year; every year since 2005, I have been attending West Coast Bash and Winter Coaster Solace, and over that time I have seen both events evolve (WCB most dramatically). I have had a rough 2008-early 2009 with a pay cut leading to my having to take on a massive amount of freelance work, leaving me with little to no time to attend the parks as much as I would like, or even post as much as I wish I could. Fortunately, things have reached the point where I can once again take a weekend or two a month to head to Knott's or SFMM, and I was able to take almost 4 days this time (some of Friday and all of Saturday and Sunday) for a complete getaway.

 

The Solace leg of this TR will be relatively short. I was not able to do the Friday night events (one of these years, I am going to try) so I arrived at the park on Saturday morning about 7:30am and parked right up in the front. I took the maintenance tours for Silver Bullet, Sierra Sidewinder, and Pony Express-which were a new offering for this year and a nice addition and were interesting and informative and then noticed that Xcelerator was testing and people were outside the entrance. I ran into G-Force (Ryan) who was operating the ride, and said hello and then took an ERT on Supreme Scream, and walked back over to Xcel to see that it was open! Managed to get two rides on it before the park opened, both of which were very enjoyable (ride was running great and to me it seemed to have even more of a kick than usual) and then got in line for Silver Bullet and took a ride before the park opened.

 

Once the park opened, I took a few rides on Silver Bullet, La Revolucion and the Wave Swinger, had a coffee and a snack, and did the Scavenger Hunt which was extremely easy (especially for someone who goes to KBF a lot) before heading over for lunch. Met up with some of the crew from waydd.org/Westcoaster at lunch and sat at their table, and enjoyed the food as well as the presentation by the General Manager (Marty Keithley) which was followed by a brief Q&A session. The prize for the Scavenger Hunt was raffle tickets, although I did not win anything.

 

Not having had much sleep the night before, I was getting a bit tired after lunch. Knowing I had a late night and early morning, and since it was a few hours until night ERT, after going in to get my T Shirt and take another spin on Silver Bullet, I decided to go out to the car and crash for a few hours. I woke up a couple of hours later, shot some video footage from the parking lot across the street, and then went back in. Got some more rides in-the Log Ride, Silver Bullet a few more times, 2 for 1 on Screamin' Swing, Wave Swinger, La Rev, and Montezooma, went to the car for a heavier jacket, and got ready for night ERT. Enjoyed the snack by GhostRider and watched some very interesting experiments involving coffee and cotton candy, got some ERT rides in on Sierra Sidewinder and Bullet, one front row ride on GhostRider (a little smoother, but still a very rough ride) and then finished out the night on Silver Bullet with about 10-15 more front row rides before night ERT was done. Got in the car and headed up to the Holiday Inn Express in Valencia and got there about 1:40 (which would have been sooner had it not been for the 5 being one lane in several places on the way up) and once again, room was perfect and no problems checking in.

 

Woke up a little before 6am as planned, and made a pot of coffee. I then went to the window and looked out......only to have my spirits dampened to see that not only was it absolutely pouring down rain but there were high winds as well. I was frustrated thinking that this was not boding well for West Coast Bash (not to mention ERT) and ended up going down to the hotel gym for about a half hour to take my frustrations out with exercise-the whole time, hearing the rain coming down in buckets outside-and then went ahead and got ready to go as planned, hoping and praying for the best given the circumstances.....grabbed a coffee and a cinnamon roll and walked outside the hotel to the car with a bit of hope: the rain had stopped for the time being, and there was a hint of the sun through the clouds.

 

Got up front, got checked in (wow, there was a lot of people this time!) and said hello to Robb and Chris and then ended up taking to Ron over in the smokers area over in the corner, who had also come there solo and we decided to head up to X2 first (we ended up hanging out all day). About that time, the rain started coming down again, and being without a poncho, I sheltered my camera bag under my coat and stayed dry as best I could. In the midst of this downpour, Neal Thurman comes out and maintaining a great attitude despite getting soaked, tells us about the morning ERT which he confirms will not only include the expected rides (including X2 and Tatsu) but Goliath and a few others as well (they had hoped to have more open for us, including Deja Vu if weather had permitted.....) He welcomed us, and we were in!

 

We made it up to X2, and by this time the rain had stopped again. Got in line and we got a locker, and were assigned row three. Unfortunately, there was some issue from the restraints (I later heard that it was the rain getting into the restraint sensors) yet there were two maintenance guys complete with a drill unscrewing the back panels and fixing them as they happened and the ride was up and running with two train operation again in no time. We had an awesome ride on X2-fire and all and then opted to go up for breakfast and a Tatsu ride. Grabbed some donuts and coffee, said hello to Chris, Natalee, and Caroline (wow, she has grown!) and went up for a ride on Tatsu, walking on to row 2-again, with two train operation. Went back down for two more rides on X2 at that point-both times getting front row with little to no waiting prior to the park opening at 10:30. I have to say that X2 was running GREAT-these were three of the best rides I have ever had on it.

 

By the time we got off of there, it was time for the Terminator Construction Tour, so we headed over there. Waiting out front we ran into G-Force/Ryan and the group he had come with who also spent most of the event hanging out with us. I also said hello to Jay Thomas who was out front and confirmed that my health was a lot better than it had been at the X2 event last year (when I unfortunately had to make an unexpected trip to first aid after breakfast)! Walked back for the tour and as my still camera was malfunctioning, I took some video of the construction site and Tim Burkhardt's presentation which was both informative and entertaining. The ride looks fantastic, and I have no doubt that the whole package-ride, theming and all-will be another stellar addition to the park's line up. That double down after the first turnaround looks insane.

 

As we left here, it started to rain and then some of the biggest hail I have ever seen began coming down! We ran for cover and when it subsided we all headed over to lunch. Lunch was delicious, and both Mr. Six and Big Mike were there and taking pictures with everyone. Met up with EBL and talked for a few minutes. Then myself, Ron, and Ryan and his group decided to get in on the Scavenger Hunt and became "Team 16".

 

What a difficult Scavenger Hunt!!! It took all of us putting our heads together a while to get things figured out, but we managed to get our answers in pretty early and even had time to grab some rides on Scream and Goliath prior to the meeting for the group photo at 3:45.

 

The afternoon presentation was fantastic and one of the highlights of the event. After getting complimentary bottled water, the winners to the Scavenger Hunt were announced and we were thrilled to see we had taken second place! Our prize was a pick from some wheels from the now defunct Sierra Twist (mine is getting hung on my wall). After this, the presentation began, followed by the Q&A session, which was fantastic. I won't go into the details, save to say that it once again affirmed the park is still on a huge upswing and that it is in great hands with this team at the helm and that I think things will only get better. Not only that, they have a great sense of humor and I have not laughed that much in a while. (Wouldn't you know it-I finally think of a question AFTER it was over-I wish someone had asked Tim whatever DID happen to the old X trains.....) Finally, Mr. Six came out with the ERT announcement: All 14 coasters-in the dark-with a possibility that X2 might even be open a shade after 10! This definitely topped last year.....even though I had wondered how they would, they did. And as if that were not enough-we all got a piece of wood used in the Terminator Salvation: The Ride construction as we left, and Jay and Neal were out front signing them. Very cool.

 

Ryan and his group went off to the lockers, Ron and I headed over to do some other stuff before going to the lockers and we all met up in the front plaza and agreed to meet up later for night ERT. I bought an X2 keychain and a new coffee travel mug in Flags, and then we walked around for a few. We went to see if X2 was open again and it wasn't yet, and then enjoyed a very cold ride on both Viper and Revolution. We decided to grab a snack before night ERT and made our way down across the back of the park for one more look at Terminator, and said hello to Mike and Amir from waydd/Westcoaster who were on their way to Deja Vu. We finally ended up getting food at the Waterfront and I tried the Cheese Bread from Papa John's-not bad at all, pretty good and fresh out of the oven. I needed to get warm for a few so we ducked into Cyber Cafe where I ran into EBL again, and then we met up with the rest of the group in front of Tatsu and night ERT was on!

 

We heard that X2 was still not open and so we went for Tatsu, only to have it experience a delay as we were about to get on (there kept being some issue with 6-3 for some reason.....) We left and went down the hill for a freezing ride on Viper which left me unable to feel my face. Given the temperature and how the wind gauge was spinning out of control, I was thinking that it was probably very good that we had gotten X2 first thing in the morning.....as it did not look like opening it for night ERT was going to be possible.

 

We all decided to go over to try and get on Canyon Blaster then (although there was no one there) and then went over to Goliath.....had some incredible but frigid night rides on Goliath (now I know what it feels to go 80 mph in an icebox); first one front row ride which was too cold to do again and then some mid-train rides-the one with all the lights in the tunnel off being the best of those. We stepped over the protein spill at the exit, then got over to Scream for a few back row rides, and Colossus where Mr. Six was hanging out to take a ride We were going to head over to Batman and Riddlers, but as it was 9:30 we wanted to check one last time for X2 and when that was closed, we decided to make a front row ride on Tatsu the last of the night-and it was a good finish.

 

We got our stuff out of the lockers and went to the front. I was amazed to see not only Flags but the Funnel Cake place still open at 10:15! I ducked into Flags to see if I could see Robb anywhere to say thanks again for the event but didn't see him. Ron grabbed a soda and we did see Jay and Neal standing out front; they apologized for not being able to get X2 open for night ERT and we all thanked them for a fantastic time. The park even had the parking tram still running at 10:30 which I thought was nice.

 

We all parted ways, and I ended up getting back home at 1:30 am (thanks to the 5 South being closed at the 10 and my having to take the 10 to the 405 to the 55 to the 5!) I was exhausted, but it was a good kind of exhausted. I feel as if when I return to the grind of work tomorrow that I have had a great break and a great time.

 

Again, major thanks to TPR, RideWorld, and SFMM for making WCB the best coaster event I think I have ever attended.....I can hardly wait to see what 2010 brings!

[mcjaco]

Anyday with funnel cake is a good day in my book.

 

Great TR, even without photos.

[Thelegendarymatthew]

Thats one big TR, it was nice reading it, but it was quite long.

^Oh yeah, what he said

[derwood]

Sounds like the day I had. WCB was a blast. Glad you had a good time.

 

 

daron