Photo TR: The Kiwis Take On North East/Road to Cedar Point

[mattnz]

What can I say about Canobie Lake Park? It's another beautiful lakeside park of New England with a lot of character, including some very funny food stalls straight out of Roller Coaster Tycoon, trees everywhere, and some interesting, unique rides (a Rotor, very rare Caterpillar, Zamperla bouncy thing). And yet again TPR received star treatment with ERT on the park's brand new Euro-Fighter, Untamed, and the classic Yankee Cannonball. Untamed was a fun ride with Gerstlauer's signature beyond-vertical drop and speedy changes of direction, but surprisingly rough for a brand new coaster. Yankee Cannonball was a great, smaller-sized woodie that despite its age (1930s) ran very smoothly and had really nice airtime throughout the course. You really can't beat a classic wooden coaster!

 

Dark clouds were forming as we left Canobie Lake (the Intamin gods really did smile down on TPR this trip) and it was onwards to Canada for a very surreal night in a blacked-out hotel after a massive storm had hit Montreal. We had a lot of fun at TP Dave's international alcohol exchange but I won't say too much about it!

 

French Canada was fascinating. The thing that surprised me the most was that everyone spoke French! I'm not sure what I was expecting...but I kind of thought it was just a 'second language'. Very friendly people too - at least to those without conspicious American accents. I'd love to go back someday.

Canobie Lake, since 1902 - I'm guessing that must make it one of the oldest parks in the US.

And this morning we're here to ride the park's newest attraction - Untamed!

Untamed has an awesome station.

Gary can't WAIT to ride!

Beyond-vertical drops get me every time.

Zero-geee!

Love the paint job.

We also had morning ERT on Yankee Cannonball.

Looks like Robb enjoyed the ride!

Yankee Cannonball is the first thing you see when entering the park. An oldie but a goodie.

I was immediately struck by how beautiful Canobie Lake is.

One of the park's awesome food stalls. But...fried dough?!

The park has a cool dark ride - Mine of Lost Souls - with an amusing finale in ancient Egypt!

Nearby is the park's log flume.

TPR did a mini take-over.

It was definitely on the wet side.

This is the Cedar Fair portion of the park.

Alas, the Flyers were down for the count.

We had another credit to get...

Oh joy - an old Arrow corkscrew!

It had a very impressive station.

And required a little preparation to ride.

Canobie Lake has a nice-looking water park/play area.

Pseudo credit?

It 'kind of' coasted along.

One of the awesome things about Canobie Lake are all the rare rides - like this Rotor.

We also rode the bouncy-bouncy Zamperla flat, which was actually really fun.

I always love getting on rare flats - like this strange contraption, the Caterpillar.

Whee!

Psychodrome is the park's indoor Scrambler. Faster than the one at Funtown Splashtown but it would be hard to top their light/music package!

Just a beautiful place.

We took the train around the park to get some photos.

The train went right along the lakeside.

You may only live here if you're a Democrat and love gay marriage!

Down the far end of the park are the chair swings.

Very nice ones too.

I liked the bubbles pumped from the upstairs window.

Boston Tea Party is a...

...VERY wet ride!

The gift store had some interesting items.

What up?

Skee ball!

Looks like Texas won some random crap!

Yay - the park has a Double Shot! These are easily my favourite S&S tower rides and you won't find too many of them out there.

I spy TPR members.

The park did start to get quite busy and with one train on Yankee Cannonball it was very nice to have had that morning ERT.

It's Roxanne with some random crap!

I think this was won here (geez look at Neil - what a pro!).

I enjoyed the Janet Jackson show.

The park obviously has an affinity for the Jackson family. (Thanks Canobie Lake for treating us so well!)

Onwards to Canada and the scenery just kept getting more and more spectacular.

Alright TPR - time to behave ourselves...

We arrived at our hotel in Montreal just after a massive storm had hit - and by the looks of the building next door, it was pretty bad!

It must almost be a TPR tradition to have at least one black-out every trip. Fortunately we have TP Dave's alcohol exchange party to keep us entertained.

Edited February 28, 2012 by mattnz

[paiging_jen]

 

I totally forgot Neil did this!

[cal1br3tto]

I loved the atmosphere, customer service and mix of rides at Canobie.

 

Great photos and captions!

[mattnz]

^ Thanks Laura!

^^ Jen: I didn't even know gay people could throw balls. I certainly can't!

 

TPR successfully made it into Canada for the sole purpose of visiting La Ronde - which apparently got us a few looks from a Customs officer! I wasn't expecting too much out of La Ronde to be honest and had heard it was the least of the Six Flags parks...but now I'm not so sure. Operations were lacklustre and often of the one-train variety, but we had Q-Bots and the French Canadians were so polite I didn't mind waiting in the queues too much. Like all our stops on the trip the park certainly laid out the red carpet for us with ERT and a very nice lunch - and that made our visit thoroughly enjoyable.

 

Goliath has definitely rounded out the ride collection at La Ronde and was a solid, smaller-sized B&M mega coaster, and I overheard many TPR people rave about it. The layout doesn't look all that interesting but it's actually rather fun, with lots of nice floaty airtime. I found Vampire to be the most intense out of of all the B&M Batman clones I've ridden - it really took my breath away! Another highlight for me was the old 80s Intamin stand-up coaster, which had intrigued me for some time with its B&M-looking track and compact layout...well, at least I can say I've ridden it.

 

La Ronde's location on the island in the heart of Montreal was uniquely awesome. Onto the photos!

It's morning, and the building next door looks the way some of our TPR members feel today - wretched!

Montreal has some odd and interesting-looking buildings.

'Poulet Frit Kentucky.'

I do so admire our bus drivers.

La Ronde is on an island right in the heart of Montreal.

TPR got to use the super-exclusive entrance.

This way to early morning ERT!

Entrance to the best coaster in the park.

Are you guys ready for some floaty B&M goodness?

From the park's observation tower you can see the entire layout.

"Floaty!"

TPR gave Goliath two big thumbs up.

Gotta love ERT!

We also had ERT on Le Monstre, which had the worst graffiti and gum-covered queue I have ever seen!

Being all strategic TPR next hit up the Wild Mouse - Toboggan Nordique - with its inevitably slow-moving queue.

It was interesting to try out Zamperla's take on the Wild Mouse coaster, but like most other steel mice I've ridden it was just 'OK'.

Chris eyes up the elusive Arrow mini mine train credit, which was - alas! - just for the kids (and we didn't feel like stealing one today).

Old school!

I enjoyed the setting of La Ronde with the bridges and city looming in the background.

The park had quite a few flat rides which is always nice to see.

Canada wants YOU!

Next up was Vampire, the park's awesomely intense Batman clone.

It had some nice mist effects too.

Next door was an interesting credit that I believe came from Skara Sommarland.

The fast pass queue was interesting too!

It was cool to try out an old school Intamin stand-up coaster.

It had a good, tight layout but was pretty unforgiving. It even had a little airtime hill but yeah, you don't really want those on old school stand-up coasters!

We came across this cute creature and I'm still not sure what it is?!

I guess he's just another friendly French Canadian.

Another day, another S&S tower ride.

Moving through the park we found the impressive public entranceway.

Some art...

And a credit that was down for the count.

If there was ONE credit I didn't mind missing...this was it!

'Manitou' is also the name of a very funny, trashy 70s sci-fi/horror mash-up/monstrosity that I highly recommend.

Le Super Manège.

Sure doesn't look 'super' to me! (Though I will say the ride ops were super nice.)

Surprisingly, this wasn't too bad and really didn't give me an ear bashing at all.

Random shark!

I think every English-speaker must take this photo...

Anyone for a giant pink toy to carry around for the rest of the day?

So look closely at what they're selling here right out on the midway. Sangria, wine, beer... Canada is AWESOME!

The park's historic carousel.

Time for some panoramic shots courtesy of La Ronde's observation tower.

Looks like you just boat up to the park.

Le Monstre.

Vekoma junction.

Hard to beat that backdrop.

After lunch we still had some credits to get, including the park's newest coaster - Ednör - L'Attaque!

Even with Flashpass, we waited about 40 minutes.

I saw this person nearby and wondered, "Do I really NEED to go on another SLC? Why not just have a siesta instead?"

I guess coaster enthusiasts are gluttons for punishment!

Ednör l'attaqued me and was bloody awful!

Every park in North America must have a chair swings ride.

Dragon is the park's indoor coaster and quite far off the beaten path.

It had one train, one ride op and a 45 minute queue (though I heard others only waited 15 minutes or so).

We got another ride in on Golaith. Not sure if this girl's hair was this way before or after her ride?

We had a great day at La Ronde. Thank you French Canada!

[vuurvogel]

The Animal is phil, the groundhog. Did he see his shadow?

[Chrisrad]

I honestly couldn't do a better job of describing the parks/rides myself! Another fantastic segment of your TR!

 

As you said, Untamed was... kind of rough! Patrick and I kept changing seats to find the best one(s) - some were quite brutal. The right rear seat seemed the best to me.

 

And the picture of us after the log ride - AWESOME! I'm glad someone got that. I guess that's what happens when you put four adults in a log.. At least my camera/phone survived.

 

Keep the pictures/dialogue coming - loving every bit of it!

[mattnz]

^ Cheers! I'm on a roll today, so here's Great Escape!

^^ So THAT'S what a groundhog looks like!

 

If yesterday saw us visit one of the weaker parks of the Six Flags chain, today saw us visit one of its very best. I recall Robb describing Great Escape as the "young, gifted child" of Six Flags and thought that was very apt! I also thought Great Escape was a little like the rebellious child of the chain, as in many ways it just doesn't fit in with Six Flags and has its own character entirely. The park doesn't have the best selection of coasters but instead a well-rounded line-up of rides and attractions the whole family can enjoy together. Saying that, Comet was one of the very best coasters we rode on the trip - an incredibly smooth woodie with great airtime throughout. Alpine Bobsled is similar to Disaster Transport at Cedar Point and I'm really starting to love these types of rides. They're just so much fun.

 

Robb and Elissa had a surprise in store for us with a bonus credit run to Magic Forest Park up the road which was a rare treat as the park is usually restricted to kids and caregivers only. We got a few looks from the bemused locals especially when we took over the kiddie credit - which actually rolled back a few times before we realised we'd have to load it a little lighter. Thank you Magic Forest and I really hope we didn't permanantly scar your ride ops or your ride!

Final 'official' park of the North East trip. So sad! But it turned out to be a very nice one.

Even in the car park you can tell this isn't your average Six Flags park.

Inside the gate and it looks even less like a Six Flags park!

Wow!

First up today we got to ride Comet, the park's 1994 semi-relocated woodie.

Pics from later in the day: Fun for young and old.

Awesome airtime and very re-rideable.

Hands up fun all the way!

But only if you're sure!

You could walk right along Comet for great photo spots.

Whee!

Some just preferred to have a fag.

Next up was another Intamin creation.

This one is quite rightly themed to bobsledding.

I like how Intamin's version of this ride uses single cars - bit more authentic than the Mack version. God I'm a nerd...

We were lucky to get the kiddie credit in, as I believe they stopped letting the big kids ride after a while.

TPR loves kiddie coasters!

The old areas of the park were very nice.

Looks like they've kept most of the Storytown USA flourishes.

I'm guessing Six Flags added this thing.

Ker-chunk! Enjoy your ride!

They had a castle, pumpkin carriage and princess in costume out and about.

Very nice carousel.

The search for more credits led us up the hill...

...to Canyon Blaster!

It's an Arrow mine train that's really been around the block.

Yay! An Arrow helix!

"Nothing to see here, move along..."

Google were out and about doing some mapping.

I never did find out what they sold in here?

We have an Arrow loop/screw in New Zealand. Ours is white.

These people seem to be enjoying it.

Sasquatch is an oddly-named S&S tower ride.

It was a pretty tall one.

I like the S&S 'shots' but prefer Intamin to take care of my 'drops'.

Almost forgot about the swan boats...

Looks like another TPR take-over. Yay for unique Great Escape attractions!

The park put on a very funny penguin show spectacular!

The penguins were daredevil high divers.

Jump away from the Boomerang!

The penguins were very naughty.

If you were in the 'splash zone' you got VERY wet!

I really can't praise Great Escape highly enough and I know many TPR members felt the same way after our visit.

Just up the road was a bonus credit!

"Come, children!"

Our visit to Magic Forest Park was a brief one but I was immediately struck by how nice everything looked.

Umm...

Err...

Creepy signs aside the park looked like a great place to bring your kids and seemed to have some pretty cool old school kid's rides, like this junior Turtle.

They also had some nice walk-throughs.

Odd and awesome bits of themeing everywhere.

But we were here for the kiddie credit!

And yes our fat asses made the coaster roll back several times!

The park described this as 'the nation's only Diving Horse'.

The official North East trip ended with an official Carrabba's take-over!

Carrabba's = VERY nice Italian food.

What a great way to end the first leg of our epic two-part trip. Thank you Robb and Elissa! And North East trippers: we miss you!!

[deguy123]

Wow....as always great pictures and captions. Can't wait to see all the Road to Cedar Point pictures and what you thought about all those parks!

This girl was the only employee at La Ronde who in my opinion was nice and friendly...figures she is at the bar!

[sspaz1000]

Fantastic reports!

 

I wish I could have found those friendly people you experienced at La Ronde.

 

But you summed up every other park wonderfully. I miss this trip so much.

 

It was great meeting you and Andrew. Hopefully we will be on another TPR trip together.

[mattnz]

Thanks for all your comments!

 

I think I should clarify: I found the French Canadian general public friendly and personable - the La Ronde employees...yeah, not so much!

[grinch1313]

Great TR and photos of the North East tour. It brought back great memories and a few things I had forgotten about. Thanks so much! It was great meeting you and Andrew too!

[televisedconfession]

 

I totally forgot Neil did this!

 

That physically hurt me. It really did.

 

 

 

Great PTR so far. Keep it up!

[fatdaddy]

Great Escape might be my favorite park of the trip, so many little things that made that park special. Keep up the report, your pictures really make me think I need to get a better camera than my cell phone.

[mattnz]

Thanks all! Am currently going through the 700+ photos we took at Great Adventure...

 

Caesar - I've been enjoying your TR. Keep up the good work!

[shivtim]

A+, keep the pics coming!

[mattnz]

Road to Cedar Point began with an incredibly long day at Six Flags Great Adventure - which turned out to be my personal BEST DAY EVER at a Six Flags park. It was also an add-on for the North East trip and many took up the opportunity to hang out with us for one more day. I'm glad they did because Great Adventure really outdid themselves and every other Six Flags park I've visited - I was surprised and amazed at the operations here. Multiple trains on every coaster, speedy dispatches, polite employees. I hope those North East trip participants who encountered rudeness at Six Flags New England/La Ronde were pleasantly surprised too.

 

We had morning ERT on Nitro and the park ran THREE trains! I couldn't believe it! Andrew and I rode over and over and got to try out multiple rows which is always cool. I liked the ride a lot and would rank it high on my B&M hyper list - somewhere up there with Six Flags Over Georgia's Goliath. We also took an early morning spin on Dark Knight with the lights on which was a nice perk (it's definitely better with the lights off though!) and walked over to the other side of the park for ERT on the newly re-located and re-painted Green Lantern. It was a fairly painful ride unfortunately. Not too bad - just not all that fun. And then TPR got to ride Kingda Ka before the park opened. The ride is very impressive but has this oddly dragging launch - it's weird... It will still take your breath away though! And waiting zero minutes and being able to come back for re-rides with Q-Bots certainly beats waiting in one hour plus lines for Top Thrill Dragster at Cedar Point...hands down!

 

El Toro - oh my God! I can't imagine what the general public who don't know too much about the ride must think when they get off. It's completely insane! It instantly became my favourite roller coaster. The drop is amazing, the airtime really seems to want to throw you out of the train, and to those who complain about the latter part of the ride - seriously, shut up! Those final twists and turns are incredible. We finished out our day with night ERT on this beast and it was just...so much! I know some finally had to sit it out but I couldn't stop riding. Onto the photos...

Gloomy weather this morning...but forget the clouds, look at that coaster-filled skyline!

Walking to morning ERT and the park seems very nice. Lots of quirky buildings and trees everywhere.

Our day began with ERT on Nitro.

Very impressive lift hill.

The park ran THREE trains for our ERT session! Awesome!

Next up was Dark Knight - another 'mouse in a box' from Mack Rides.

Six Flags has done a pretty good job with the themeing.

The pre-show does get a bit tired after you've seen it several times.

The park has an interesting history and I think these buildings were probably part of the original ambitious design.

Onwards to Green Lantern - a coaster themed to a comic I've never read and a movie I couldn't be bothered seeing.

By way of explanation.

I like diving loops on stand-up coasters (especially the enormous consecutive diving loops on Riddler's Revenge!).

Green Lantern's controversial yellow loop.

Not a bad ride - but I don't think B&M stand-up coasters like to be relocated.

Heading over to Kingda Ka. The whole area was very nice.

They've kept some animals here.

Gotta love that non-existent queue.

Kingda Ka...wow! Amazing ride, if a little rough around the edges.

The park opened and it was already turning into a hot day.

Next we hit up the potentially slow-loading Superman Ultimate Flight.

I've been on all three US clones now. Compared to Tatsu...they ain't all that. Can't beat a pretzel loop though.

This corner of the park holds the best coaster in the park - can you guess which one it is?!

Bow down and worship the Intamin gods.

It's EL FREAKIN' TORO!!!

Amazing ride from start to finish.

We wandered through a kind of out of the way, forgotten corner of the park.

Friendly Great Adventure wildlife.

Who says Great Adventure doesn't have flat rides? In this area we found a pirate ship, round-up ride, tea cups, Ferris Wheel and others.

We found another coaster - Blackbeard's Lost Treasure Train. Not much of a wait with 40 riders per train!

We came across Skull Mountain. This was quite a fun family coaster in the dark.

We were on a credit roll - here's Road Runner Railway.

Andrew had to ride by himself. Ohh...

I almost forgot the park had a Batman clone. Can't complain - these are always excellent rides.

Not sure what the old Chiller station is used for nowadays.

After another amazing lunch (and yes, more beer!) we got ready for an exclusive backstage tour, which is something Werner takes very seriously.

Wow, where are they planning to take us?

Awesome! You cannot get these angles from the midway!

We got to walk under and alongside Nitro.

This was a very cool perk. Nitro is pretty much impossible to photograph from inside the park.

Fun ride.

The drop doesn't look very big in this photo - but it's huge!

You can see from the second drop how massive this thing is.

Due to great operations the trains just kept on coming.

People started posing for us.

Gurl, hold onto that weave!

Nitro's helix made me grey out toward the back of the train.

"I love B&M rides!"

Behind the scenes inspirational signs.

We also got a behind the scenes tour of Kingda Ka!

The ride is even more impressive up close.

Go! Ker-splut! Go! Go! Go!

Wow - what a ride.

This part is pretty intimidating.

It was kind of scary taking these photos - watch those loose items people!

I did see a loose article go flying from one train - and it must have landed a mile away. Quite amusing actually!

Almost time to breathe again...

Random behind-the-scenes shot of Rolling Thunder.

Thank you Great Adventure for the awesome photo walk-backs!

Moving on, and we had to try out the old school parachute drop ride.

I'd always wanted to go on one of these - glad the park's kept it around.

We still had more credits to get, including the park's pretty tall Arrow mine train.

Signature shot.

Our last credit to get was Great Adventure's version of Bizarro.

I found this surprisingly rough.

What is with the floorless coasters on the East Coast?! Scream at Magic Mountain was smooth and a lot of fun in comparison.

We took the sky ride to get some photos. Didn't get on the log flume, alas.

This corner of the park is looking very colourful.

Ooo, scenic.

Some kind of show was going on down here - not sure what...

The cheerful Dutch contingent of our Q-Bot group, Dennis and Werner.

Since I don't have any photos of our spectacular night ERT session on El Toro, here's the carousel instead!

After a very long day we ended up, exhausted, at our hotel in Atlantic City, which was a surreal and very cool place to stay. I heard some hit the games but we just couldn't do it! Thanks Robb and Elissa for an amazing day and an incredible start on our Road to Cedar Point.

[Chrisrad]

Great photos! It's awesome to see angles/shots that I never would have thought about getting! Plus, there were things at that park I didn't get a chance to see.

 

That backstage tour was incredible. If I remember correctly, the manager/tour guide (his name slips my mind) said they had recovered 11,000 items in just three months, excluding hats.

[odene497]

Great TR Matt, and some really cool shots of Kingda Ka! Glad you guys enjoyed yourself, I really miss Great Adventure. Hope to see you again soon!

[deguy123]

Those shots of Kingda Ka are amazing. Great Adventture really seemed to go all out for the visit with TPR. I knew I should have added that on after the Northeast trip but now I know next time. I love your review of Eltoro....definately in my top 3.

[xmichellex]

Wow, awesome pics! I love the expressions of the people on Nitro!

 

I agree about Bizarro/Medusa being pretty rough... It seemed like it had really declined when I rode it last summer. It used to be one of my favorite rides in the park and I would ride it a bunch of times in a row, but last year, once was enough... rattled us around enough that we didn't bother to go back. I wonder why this coaster is aging so badly?

[Groteslurf]

Really awesome action pictures. Great update.

[mattnz]

Wow, awesome pics! I love the expressions of the people on Nitro!

 

I agree about Bizarro/Medusa being pretty rough... It seemed like it had really declined when I rode it last summer. It used to be one of my favorite rides in the park and I would ride it a bunch of times in a row, but last year, once was enough... rattled us around enough that we didn't bother to go back. I wonder why this coaster is aging so badly?

 

Isn't it weird? I guess B&M are not without their own 'B&M rattle' on occasion.

 

Thanks everyone for your comments. Our photos are sometimes a bit variable but I like to give a good overview of the parks.

 

Nick: Hope to see you again soon too! We are already saving our pennies.

[fatdaddy]

Loved the Kingda Ka pictures, by the time we reached Ka my cell battery was about dead, so I got limited pictures. Not to mention that I was about to have a heat stroke, that was a long tour. Great pictures all the way around, and yeah El Toro was amazing, the more I think about it, the more it moves toward my #1.

[beatle11]

I definitely agree with you that El Toro is freaking insane! It was without a doubt the scariest coaster I've ever ridden, but it's an incredible ride. Also, I think it was mentioned during our backstage tour that they still use the Chiller station for the Haunt event. It was awesome being able to get such great pictures.

[mattnz]

^ I have GOT to get on more of these Intamin prefabricated woodies. I guess I'll have to prioritise getting over to Europe (or Korea).

 

Next up on our itinerary was a trip down to the Jersey Shore to visit Morey's Piers. We had beautiful weather and kicked off our day with some time in the water park. There are two water parks at Morey's Piers and Andrew and I opted to stick with the first (located on the 'SLC pier') and take our time. There were some pretty cool slides here, including a crazy speed slide with a massive airtime hill that left you with water up your nose, if not a bruised ass!

 

Morey's gave us ERT and other perks on a number of different attractions. ERT on Great Nor-Easter was good in one sense because we got to try out Vekoma's new restraints, but bad on the other because the coaster was still horribly rough! Much more fun was ERT on 'It' - the park's brand new gyro swing with lap bars only. Wow - lap bars can really make a difference, and this ride was hands-up-if-you-dare fun. Later in the day we experienced Ghost Ship, the park's walk-through haunted attraction with hands-on scare actors. We'd never been in a walk-through with live actors before so were a bit intimidated by it - but it was very cool. We'll have to try out a few of our local scare attractions downunder. I hear we Kiwis do them quite well... We also had ERT on Great White, a fun if not all that thrilling CCI woodie.

 

I enjoyed wandering along the boardwalk in the sun and checking out the crazy food options (deep fried what?!) and tacky t-shirt stores. Jersey Shore wasn't exactly filled with sterotypical guidos and guidettes either. Just normal people really - maybe a little tougher-talking and tan than usual.

 

After Morey's Piers we had a long bus journey and ended up with a surprise dinner stop...at Clementon Park, which meant bonus credit time! The park has one coaster - Hell Cat - a rare and out of the way S&S woodie, which I had never even heard of. It was a nice surprise, even if the coaster kind of sucked! More in the pics below.

Morning dawns in Atlantic City. Here's the daytime view from our hotel window.

We just spent the night in a casino, and didn't lose a penny!

Morey's Piers on the beautiful Jersey Shore.

We enjoyed some time in the water park.

Not everyone is 'tan' on the shore.

Morey's Piers were great and gave us so many different perks today. First up - ERT on Great Nor-Easter, which gets my award for 'roughest SLC ever'.

TPR are ready to try out Vekoma's comfy-looking new restraints.

They didn't make a damn bit of difference! (Though saying that I couldn't imagine riding this with the old restraints.)

Next up we got to ride 'It'.

'It' was awesome! The lap bars felt a bit like the restraints on S&S Screamin' Swings. You felt very 'free'.

Not everyone can fit in 'It'.

Also on the SLC pier is Dante's Dungeon, a fantastic ghost train with some cool tricks.

"Boogedy boogedy boo!"

Jersey Shore is a great place to get a coronary.

The SLC pier has two other credits. First up was Doo Wopper - another Zamperla 'Zig Zag' coaster.

This one had cute cars.

More fun though was the Flitzer.

These rides have been around for a long time.

They're old school and we like that!

Watch your camera David!

The pier also had a Condor ride - another flat I'd never been on before.

I liked how it slowed down at the top so you could enjoy the view.

Everyone back home was interested to know what we thought of the Jersey Shore...

Yep - it had it's tacky spots!

I liked the 'Warn a Brother' t-shirt.

I saw a couple of Snookie-ish people.

Generally, it was very nice though. (Here's the 'Boomerang pier'.)

How many signs can you see in this photo?

Not sure who would want to see a movie at a beachside boardwalk?

'Shoot Out the Star'.

Paintball with live targets...

Geez, they ain't kidding!

We saw these colourful shells you could buy.

They moved all by themselves...

On the Boomerang pier is Morey's fantastic walk-through - the Ghost Ship.

Lots of creepy stuff inside...

Alarms blazing, zombies whispering in your ear, hands reaching out for you - definitely not for the faint-hearted!

Afterwards TPR got an exclusive back stage tour. Here are some of the scare actors, who mentioned that getting 'sucker punched' was part and parcel of the job. I have a lot of respect for them!

One of the back stage halls for the actors to get from place to place and scare the hell out of you.

Example of how it's done - in this instance via porthole. You're not allowed to touch the scare actors but they're allowed touch you - kind of like a strip club!

Roxanne with the rubber sledgehammer. Safety first people!

Next door to the Ghost Ship is another credit - a non-looping Pinfari creation with OTSRs.

All I can really say is...ka-ching!

The Boomerang was down so we wandered over to the third of Morey's Piers - the 'woodie pier.'

We had ERT on Great White, a 1996 CCI creation.

It's location on the pier was fantastic, stretching out toward the ocean.

I found it OK - fairly enjoyable, and not too rough. I look forward to seeing what Morey's do with their new pier-connecting woodie.

I believe it was on the 'woodie pier' that we encountered the world's most ghetto dark ride!

Wandering back we noticed the Boomerang operating...

Surprisingly - not bad at all (for a Boomerang).

After a long journey north we had a quick dinner stop at Clementon Park for a bonus credit! Yay!

The last time I saw a sign rating a coaster as 'extremely agressive' was Hades. By now I was a bit worried.

The public seemed to quite like it...

TPR are ready to ride.

It was pretty bad. The back part of the ride with all the twists and turns threw you around a lot...but I will never turn down a credit!

It had the same name and same looking structure as Hell Cat at Timber Falls, which I didn't like either (other TPR members will disagree with that assessment!).

I had a very quick look at the rest of the park, which looked OK, kind of set up like a permanent carnival.

As night fell we drove through Philadelphia and onwards into Pennsylvania for many more awesome adventures!