King's Island and Holiwood Nights TR

[JEAPUgrad]

I typed this out on my blog originally so some of the content is not geared towards enthusiasts.

 

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As planned, I left Pasadena MD at 2 am and drove through the night.

 

The car was packed and I was off.

 

The drive wasn't too bad. In fact it lasted over nine and a half hours and I made a few stops.

 

I wound up crossing the MD/WVA border around 4:45 am and pulling over at a rest stop and took a power nap.

 

The highlite of the drive was driving through metro Pissburgh and hearing all the Steeler fans panicing about their upcoming season on local sports talk radio.

 

Today's forecast was cloudy with a 50% of rain and thankfully the weathermen were wrong on both accounts. As I drove through Columbus OH, the rain came and it came hard. I feared that I would know how Clarke Griswald and family felt in "National Lampoons Vacation" if I drove all night to find the park to be closed due to weather.

 

It was sunny by the time I got to King's Island and pushing 90 degrees.

 

I arrived at the park around 11:30 am and the parking lot was starting to fill fast! There were probably more school busses in the lot than there were cars. Not ever a good sign.

 

I've only been to KI two previous times....2000 for URC's day at the park and in the fall of '08 during one of the Haunt nights.

 

In the fall of '08, a lot of attractions were closed and the visit was a disappointment.

 

Well, I walked through the gates today and Invertigo was down. Diamondback had a train full of passengers stuck on the lift hill. Delirium was down.

 

Not off to a great start.

 

I really wanted to ride Invertigo since SFA's Two Face no longer exists. As much as I disliked that coaster, I still miss it a little bit.

 

First ride of the day was Flight Deck.

 

Flight Deck was a GREAT ride. This ride was closed during my visit in '08 and after four consecutive rides, I had my fill. The first was in the front row, second in the back, and the last two were somewhere in the middle.

 

Love the speed on this coaster and the swaying from side to side. Near misses with Son of Beast has always put this higher on my list than Big Bad Wolf. I know a lot of people will disagree with that statement.

 

I finished up my four rides knowing that Arrow Suspendends are nearing the end of their life span. Maybe today will be the last time I get to ride Flight Deck and I savored every moment of it.

 

Next up was Adventure Express.

 

Like Flight Deck, I hadn't been on AE since 2000.

 

I have fond memories of coaster take overs on this with other enthusiasts and chanting "You will pay" all day.

 

I didn't remember too much of the layout and I was pleasantly surprised how long the ride was.

 

For those not familiar with the coaster, the trains has to go up a lift hill which is located inside a tunnel before you get back to the station to end the ride. Inside the tunnel, there are animatronic type characters pounding their fists at you chanting "You will pay".

 

I really liked AE and just wished I could've enjoyed the coaster more. With my fat ass being crammed into that standardized mine cart, it was kind of like trying to squeeze your foot in a shoe and your foot being a half of size too short. Ouchies!

 

After AE, I went over and did Racer.

 

Racer is a racing woodie similar to King's Dominion's Rebel Yell. For years I've always given the nod to Racer's cousin back east but on this trip I think Racer may just have edged out Rebel Yell.

 

One ride on each side. Blue won the race both times.

 

Both sides had a distinct out of control feeling that I don't think Rebel Yell has. Racer, in my opinion, felt similar to KD's Grizzly with the out of controlness. I like that a lot.

 

There were pops of air in several places but nothing that made me giggle like a school girl.

 

Sat in the back on Red and in the front on Blue. Found both ends to be relatively the same ride experience.

 

After Racer, I encountered my first real line of the day over at Vortex.

 

While standing in line for Vortex, I Facebooked this little status message that I came up with on the spot. "skies cleared and i "racer"-ed into the parking lot. i got to the gate and i was told "you will pay". what an "adventure express" that turned out to be! i was so flustered i thought i'd hit the "flight deck" and found myself in a "vortex". i still have a "Beast" to tame and i gotta dodge "Diamondback's" venom." I thought that was cute and original.

 

Vortex was equally as rough at KD's Anaconda. Unlike the Anaconda where you get knocked around like the proverbial red headed step child on the latter portion of the ride, Vortex has no problems neck chopping you as you go over the first hill. I loudly screamed an explicative as I wasn't anticipating the pain.

 

I've never understood the "graying" out everybody complains about on Intimidator 305. I get it now. I grayed out in the first loop and don't recall going through the second loop.

 

I was "brought back" by the wicked jolt as we hit the 180 going into the mid-course brake run. So not cool.

 

I did like the corkscrews as high off the ground as they were and located between the two loops. And of course I'm a sucker for a Batwing element, though no coaster does the Batwing better than Montu.

 

So when put up against KD's Anaconda, where would I put Vortex? Slightly higher but not much higher. I like the layout better than Anaconda and that's the only resason why it's higher. Vortex should be renamed something to the effect of "Satan's Sadist". No a fun ride.

 

Papa was up next. That's the Beast for you non-coaster riding people. The world's longest (and flatest) wooden rollercoaster.

 

I griped a lot back in '08 as there was a noticable difference in the ride because Papa was trimmed to death. Thus killing the speed and making the ride a boring journey on a kiddie coaster through the woods.

 

Not today my friends. I could feel the trims catching but we were still hauling some serious ass.

 

Maybe I was spoiled a bit that on the URC ERT we were given unbraked rides on the Beast and the ride immediately went to the top of my wooden coaster list.

 

Was my ride today as good as my number one wood Voyage or number two El Toro? No.

 

Top five woodie? Probably.

 

I'd put Stricker Grove's Teddy Bear in the number three position.

 

Joking of course.

 

I was satisfied with my one ride as the queue house was packed.

 

Over to my most anticipated ride of the day...The Crypt. What? You thought I was going to say Diamondback? We'll get to that in a moment.

 

The Crypt is an attraction similar to KD's The Crypt only the ride is located indoors. When the ride opened, there were all kinds of special effects that made the ride a neat experience.

 

The Crypt is a Top Spin which is one of those rides where you sit down and it flips you end over end several times in short tight spins. The usually hold you upside down and point your nose directly on the ground.

 

HUGE DISAPPOINTMENT: They only flipped us once. The rest of the ride was going around in circles in the dark. No special effects. No flippy flips.

 

If you're not going to operate the ride as it was designed to operate, why even open it at all?

 

Next up was Diamondback.

 

Diamondback is the park's newest rollercoaster. For my non-coaster geek friend's, Diamondback is a B&M coaster which you all know is several screennames for me and is the url for this blog.

 

Diamond is a B&M hyper coaster meaning it's over 200' tall and have no inversions. It's designed for speed and airtime.

 

I've never been a fan of the B&M hyper as a product because I feel that they are over engineered providing little airtime and are forceless coasters. They are so dumbed down to the point that they do not live up to my personal expectation for B&M's that have made me fallen in love with their coasters.

 

I've previously been on only two other B&M hypers. Nitro at Great Adventure and Apollo's Chariot at BGW.

 

I was very happy that I fit the test seat with no problem. I jumped in the Single Rider Line and waited about fifteen minutes for my first ride.

 

The first ride was in row 10 and I was on the far outside left seat. Did not enjoy the climb to the lift as I always prefer to be on the lift staircase side. I have a fear of heights and would quirk out big time if I ever had to evacuate on the non-staircase side of any really tall coaster.

 

Row 10 was meh at best. No airtime and for a second year B&M the train shuffled a lot.

 

Loved the layout but in the middle this ride sucks.

 

I'd get back in line and received row three. Much better ride. Lots of pops of airtime but nothing substained.

 

Of the three B&M hypers, I'd give the edge to Diamondback but I wasn't impressed. Diamondback didn't "wow" me like Montu, Alpie, Medusa East, Kumba, Dueling Dragons all did on my first rides.

 

I've never felt secure in these seats since there is not a seatbelt. Maybe that's part of the problem for me. I just don't feel safe on the rides. They've never had a problem with the lap restraint popping open which would cause immediate death without a doubt, I just don't like that feeling.

 

Diamondback was my 167th coaster credit and 168 came just a few minutes later on the Flying Ace coaster. This ride was also not opened in 2008.

 

Flying Ace would go down as the ONLY Vekoma coaster that I actually have ever enjoyed. It may be designed for the kiddies but it was a smooth ride by Vekoma's standards.

 

Next up was my final ride of the day...my first Rock-N-Tug/Disk-O type ride. I'm not sure which product this is out of Zamperla's catalog but it was a really fun ride. I've looked on the Zamperla site to trying and figure out just what the ride is.

 

Unlike the products featured on their site, this model has a little hill between the two near vertical spikes. The ride goes back and forth along a coaster-like trough while the ride vehicle spins in a clockwise motion while the the main vehichle travels the coaster-like trough.

 

All an all a great day at King's Island.

 

I was only in the park for four hours before I decided to leave and head for my hotel.

 

Holiwood Nights tomorrow.

 

Can't frackin' wait.

 

Posted by BnM Lover at 10:49 PM

[JEAPUgrad]

This was originally posted to my blog, Halley's Comments. If you want the raw and unedited version visit the URL below. Please keep in mind that my blog's audience aren't all coaster enthusiasts so I really dumb things down in my reports. The blog version does contain content that probably is not considered to be "work safe".

 

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This time last week (this is being typed out Friday June 11th) I was in transit towards what would turn out to be a super awesome weekend at Holiday World and Splashin' Safari's Holiwood Nights event.

 

I arrived at my hotel in Huntingburg Indiana around 10:30 am EDT and was able to check in early. The service at the Quality Inn in Huntingburg was far superior than what I experienced the night before. I dropped my stuff off at the hotel and wandered over towards the park.

 

The hotel and the park were about fifteen miles apart which I didn't mind. Members of my group did say that they would rather stay closer to the park next year but that will mean paying nearly double than what we paid for our rooms this year.

 

As you enter the parking lot, you are greeted to the park's entrance and the park's first roller coaster, The Raven.

 

I picked up my event package complete with an event t-shirt and walked back to my car to safeguard these materials. I purchased a day pass to the park on Friday with the event beginning on Friday night.

 

I re-entered the park and went on a wooden coaster tour in the order that each of the park's three wooden coasters opened. I started with The Raven (1995), then The Legend (2000), and finally The Voyage (2006).

 

The Voyage itself was the reason for the trip!

 

During my only previous visit to Holiday World in 2008, I wasn't very fond of The Raven. Back then, the Raven was inconsistent in delivery of it's rides. Some were great, some were not so great. Friday afternoon's ride on Raven brought a smile to my face. Lots of airtime and Raven had found it's out of control feeling.

 

Raven was only running one train as Raven's other train was moved to The Voyage. The Voyage will be receiving new trains called Timberliner's later this season. These proto-type trains were not ready for the event so the park moved one of the trains to The Voyage to maximize capacity.

 

Some joked that they were "Ravaged" while riding Voyage. The Voyage originally opened with three blue trains. Two of those trains were sold to another park during the offseason. Since the new Timberliners weren't ready to open, The Raven train that was moved to The Voyage is red in color. Hence the phrase being "Ravaged".

 

The Legend was, and still is, too rough for me to handle.

 

Doesn't matter where I ride the coaster is simply put too intense. The laterals on the coaster kill me. I don't like being thrown around from side to side like a ragdoll and that's exactly what you get on The Legend.

 

Next up was The Voyage, the number one rated wooden roller coaster in the world! The Voyage is my favorite wooden coaster and in my opinion is a great ride. Some complained that it's becoming too rough to ride.

 

My Friday afternoon ride on Voyage would be my only "hands up" ride of the weekend. The night rides on this monster are far different and I have no shame in saying I was white knuckling Voyage at night.

 

More on this later.

 

After completing a circuit on the park's wooden coasters, I decided to try the park's new for 2009 ride, Pilgrims Plunge.

 

Pilgrims Plunge is the world's tallest water ride measuring in at 135'. This ride is tame in actual thrills department as the drop is only at a 45 degree angle. It's the climb to the top that makes this ride so much more than it really is.

 

I've admitted before that I am scared of heights. How I am able to ride some of these coasters, I have no idea. I also have a fear of elevators. I got stuck in one for four hours when I was a child and have no particular like for them now.

 

Anyway, you leave the station in a boat and you approach the lift structure. The lift structure is an open air elevator.

 

You can see how the structure bows out a little bit...this allows for the lift to operate two elevators to the top. In the wider sections of lift, this is where each elevator platform passes one another to maximize rider capacity.

 

What I've never read anywhere about this ride is that when the boat you are sitting in goes through the bowing out of the structure, your entire boat leans to the side, the side opposite of the lift structure.

 

Great.

 

Just great.

 

Me at over 100 feet in the feet with the boat leaning over like it's going to fall?

 

I may have had a mild anxiety attack.

 

We get to the top and down the drop we go.

 

The drop seemed like it lasted forever.

 

With most of the other attractions of this type, normally once the boat hits the water, a gigantic wave appears and crashes upon unsuspecting guests usually on a bridge or walking on a nearby path.

 

Not the case with Pilgrim's Plunge. Once the boat hits the water, you skim for about eighty yards across the top of the water before the "wave" is created.

 

I didn't get nearly as drenched as I thought I would. My shorts were soaked but my shirt was almost bone dry.

 

After walking around the park and soaking up the atmosphere, I decided to head back to the hotel and rest up a bit before the Exclusive Ride Time began.

 

I arrived back at the park around 6pm CDT, a half hour before the event's start time. I was in a weird time travel flux all weekend as the park operates on Central Daylight Time and just about everywhere else operated on Eastern Daylight Time.

 

This became a challenge on a number of occasions.

 

I met up with my friends KO and JM, and was introduced to KR. KO and JM were also hanging out with some friends that I had known through a message board that I posted on.

 

I handed out rainbow color Hawaiian leis that we all wrapped around our wrists just for fun. At some point in the night, we became the "Fruitty Pebbles" clan. KO was going to bring a princess tiara for me to wear but she could not locate one.

 

While driving out West, KO and I had been exchanging a number of text messages amongst ourselves. I asked KO if she would be up for a ride on Turkey Whirl, the park's Tilt-A-Whirl ride with JM and I.

 

You see, we're all a little bit larger than the average American.

 

JM quoted his weight and I quoted mine, but KO refused. I'm guessing between the three of us there was probably 850-900 pounds in this one Tilt-A-Whirl cart. I joked about our weight flattening one of the ride's steel wheels or having the whole darn cart come loose from the axle.

 

We flew.

 

Round and round and round and round. I've never been on a Tilt-A-Whirl that spun like that little fracker did.

 

Epic.

 

We had to wait in a pavilion so the park could clear out the general public before the event began.

 

The Koch family, Will and Ms. Pat, spoke to the enthusiasts in attendance while we waited. The Koch family owns Holiday World and Splashin' Safari.

 

Will held a brief three Question and Answer period along with one of the designers of the Timberliner trains from Gravity Group.

 

While I'm not one to speak in public, I kind of felt like my friend found the Genie's lamp and waste his three wishes. The three questions asked were:

 

1. The problem with the Timberliners isn't that they don't fit the track like a certain park to the north?

 

2. Will the park be purchasing Timberliners for the other two woodies?

 

3. If you rated The Voyage a 10 before the Timberliners, how would you rate them after?

 

Question 2 was a good question but 1 and 3 were softballs!

 

I'll paraphrase the answers:

 

1. Will admitted that there is a small problem with the trains not fitting the track and that small sections of track have had to be replaced. Though he was quick to admit that this is a very small issue on the larger scale. The guy from Gravity Group stated that they have had to make many more fine tuning adjustments to the Timberliner trains than they originally thought they'd have to make. That's why the testing phase is taking so long.

 

2. The park might consider buying Timberliner trains for the other two wooden coasters in the park dependent upon how well the Timberliner's run on The Voyage. Rider comfort and the popularity of the trains are one factor and another factor is if the Timberliners really do reduce the wear and tear on the track like they have been promised they will.

 

3. Simply put, an 11 is the rating with the new trains.

 

After the Q&A the park was cleared and we were set loose on the park for a couple of hours.

 

KO suggested prior to arriving at the park that I invest in some cheap sunglasses for the nighttime rides.

 

Great suggestion!

 

After the first drops on all three wooden coasters, I couldn't see a thing. I lost my sunglasses on Saturday night and not having the glasses made a noticeable difference in my ride experience.

 

After riding Voyage at night for the first time I posted on my Facebook page that I had just creamed my pants. The ride was that good!

 

The park made available the front car of one of the Timberliner trains for enthusiasts to sit in. I was very happy to hear about the design and introduction of this new train but once I sat in the train, I was like 'meh' about it.

 

The train is more forgiving to larger riders and is more comfortable than the PTCs and Millennium Flyer trains BUT my major complaint is that there really isn't anything to hold onto. The lapbar is a large piece of foam material and it's so bulky you can't really get a good grip on it.

 

I liked that the new trains had more back support than the PTCs and MFs as I think this is going to help make Voyage be more of a re-ridable coaster.

 

A meal was provided with Friday night's event that was all you can eat pizza, veggies, and of course sodas. Each event participant received a quarter pound of fudge as well.

 

ERT ended on Friday night and I joined my new friend KR and some of the other guys from the message board back at their campsite.

 

We sat around for hours on end drinking beer, smoking cigars, and just shooting the shizzle as guys do. We had a lot of catching up to do.

 

Finally around 4am EDT, I called it a night as we had to be back at the park for ERT in the waterpark at 8am CDT.

 

Drink a couple of beers and try and do that math as you fight exhaustion.

 

I drove back to my hotel and went right to sleep.

 

Woke up some two hours later and was back at the campsite picking up the gang and shuttling them over to the park.

 

Saturday morning's ERT was on the park's New for 2010 attraction Wildebeest. Wildebeest is an uphill waterslide ride that uses Linear Induction Motors (the same technology used on Joker's Jinx and the Flight of Fear coasters) to launch the rafts uphill.

 

Allegedly there are moments on Wildebeest where you can experience airtime but I did not encounter this. Wildebeest has only been opened a few weeks and has been a giant success for the park.

 

I thought the ride was fun and unique but otherwise did not "wow" me.

 

The park's "Tornado" style waterslide was open for ERT as well as one of their wave pools. Every waterpark now has a "Tornado" style waterslide. They are a lot of fun!

 

A breakfast featuring fruits and muffins were provided during Saturday morning ERT.

 

As ERT came to a close, the rest of the waterpark opened.

 

I really wanted to ride Bakuli, the waterslide pictured below. I've never been on a waterslide that simulates you being the toilet paper swirling around inside the toilet bowl. The ride itself was a lot of fun. We swirled and swirled alright.

 

After we splashed down, we were waiting for some friends to come down the slide when we witnessed a tragic event.

 

A raccoon was climbing up the raft conveyor belt when the lifeguard in the splash pool noticed the raccoon.

 

She hit the Emergency Stop button which caused the conveyor belt to stop but the poor little raccoon then bounced all the way down into the splash pool.

 

Unfortunately for the raccoon, he was a little too close to the pool's filtration system as the filtration system literally sucked the life out of the raccoon.

 

How many times in life will you get to see an animal drown?

 

The lifeguard was really upset.

 

She called for her Supervisor and once he was in sight, she began waving her arms emphatically. The Supervisor who had no idea what was going on, took his good ol time getting to the splash pool.

 

By this point the raccoon had been under water for almost five minutes. There was no doubt that the animal was dead.

 

They brought in one of those poles that you would associate a person working with Animal Control to use where it has the steel ring at the end of it to control angry dogs. They brought this pole in to fish out the raccoon's now lifeless body.

 

Adding insult to injury, the teenager that fished out the body managed to accidentally drop the raccoon's body on the concrete while trying to put the body in a black trash bag.

 

After the body of the raccoon was removed from the pool, there was a brief delay so the water could be tested before the attraction could be reopened.

 

Our friends were the next ones to ride the slide once it reopened. They had no idea what was going on until we told them.

 

The crew then took a ride together on Pilgrims Plunge.

 

Once was enough for me!

 

We returned to the waterpark for a few hours before heading back to the hotel to take naps. I wound up doing the "Man-kini" where you pull the end of your t-shirt through your collar and walking around like you have a bikini top on. Most people thought it was funny but I did get a few dirty looks.

 

Did it all in fun.

 

By the time Saturday night's ERT rolled around, KO and JM found a pink tiara for me to wear. Here I am pictured above wearing the tiara.

 

A lot of people got a good laugh out of me wearing the tiara. I had little girls coming up to me all night wanting one! One person thought I had lost a bet and a gaggle of gays asked me if I was the princess for the weekend.

 

Many of the park's employees called my tiara a crown and they had to be corrected that it wasn't a crown but a tiara. Will Koch even posed with me for a picture while I was wearing the tiara.

 

Without a doubt, Holiwood Nights 2010 was the most fun I've ever had an a park. I can't wait to return next year.

 

Saturday night after the ERT I returned to the campground for more beers and chatting though I only stayed for one beer. Everyone had different travel plans on Sunday.

 

I was able to arrange for a late check out and slept till noon EDT. I left the hotel around 1pm and made several stops along the way. I hit Sonic in Kentucky, Steak and Shake in Ohio, and even stopped back at King's Island for some bonus rides.

 

There were a lot of familiar faces at King's Island from the night before.

 

I gave Diamondback another chance after hearing so many people rant and rave about King's Island's newest thrill machine. It's still a 'meh' coaster for me.

 

Next up was the Beast.

 

I was asked by the guy who rode with me if I posted on TPR and sure enough I do! He was a member from Europe riding the Beast for the very first time! This was a special moment.

 

Beast on Sunday did not deliver like she had on Thursday. Maybe I was spoiled with all those laps on The Voyage.

 

I finished up at King's Island with a few rides on Flight Deck. Love that ride!

 

I left King's Island around 7pm and arrived back in Pasadena around 4am. I made several gas and rest stops along the way.

 

Great trip...can't wait for Holiwood Nights 2011.