GCI Wooden Posted June 11, 2015 Share Posted June 11, 2015 (edited) Hey everyone! We went on a trip across Wisconsin, Illinois, and Indiana. It was really awesome! The photos of Timber Falls by myself or biker6. The rest of the thread will be all my photos. Well, once I have the trip reports posted, I'll post the links to them on the front page here: Timber Falls: See Below Indiana Beach Six Flags Great America Well, we knew it was going to be a long drive if we were to go straight to the hotel on the first day, so we decided to make a stop at Timber Falls to ride Avalanche (Or is it Hellcat?). There was no one at the park. We walked onto the front seat on the coaster and were the only ones on the train. I can't imagine how crazy the coaster would be with a full train, seeing that we got pretty good airtime with only 2 people on the train. Onto photos: We didn't get many photos from this day, because we were only at the park for about 30 minutes. This thing is FAST, so it's hard to get a good picture of it. A ride does not need to be the biggest to be awesome, this is a prime example of that. You can see the lift hill in the distance, here. The ride circles around a log flume, which is practically the entire park! There is tons of airtime on this thing What exactly is a goat cone? This ride was actually really smooth, which was not expected from Wisconsin Dells. So we left Timber Falls and got to the hotel, which would be our home base throughout the trip. We saw this in the hotel elevator... Speaking of our hotel, this was the view from our hotel. Up next, Indiana Beach! The other Trip Reports are going to be longer than this one, i didn't have much time to take pictures at this park, and there wasn't much to take pictures of, either. Edited April 6, 2016 by GCI Wooden Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LiftThrill Posted June 11, 2015 Share Posted June 11, 2015 Great report so far! I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GCI Wooden Posted June 11, 2015 Author Share Posted June 11, 2015 ^Thank you! I'll try to post the next update sometime tomorrow! EDIT: Nevermind, I realized that I have a lot more pictures to sort through than I thought I did, and I have a busy weekend attending a family grad party and Coasting for Kids, so I'll have Indiana Beach up at a later date. Sorry for the delay. EDIT 2: I'm really sorry about not updating this quickly. The computer I use for trip reports is not working consistently, so I'll do it when I can. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GCI Wooden Posted June 26, 2015 Author Share Posted June 26, 2015 (edited) Day 2: Indiana Beach Indiana Beach was an interesting park, and that is a very good thing! It was a very nice place in the middle of a lake, which was in the middle of a corn field. The staff was kind and there was no one at the park. Well, I'll just let the pictures tell you about my day... We are at Indiana Beach! There is this big suspension bridge that you use to get to the park There was some land, but Indiana Beach outgrew the land they had, so they built stuff IN the lake! Here's Hoosier's turnaround I messed up the obligatory photo of Hoosier diving under the bridge! This twisted mess of steel is known as "Steel Hawg" It has 2 hangtime inversions, this being the first one. And this is the second one Here it is on the overbanked turn And into the brakes. I somehow didn't get a photo of the way beyond vertical drop, but that is a highlight of this ride. I think I ended up riding this about 6 times while I was here, it was THAT GOOD! Nerd Shot! Overhead shot of Hoosier's station. So, the park was low on space and they wanted to build a coaster, so they decided to just build it on top of this picnic area. Is that unload station just hanging off the edge? These were fun, but I wasn't able to snap them! Does anyone know what the support structure on top of the track on Cornball Express is for? It's always time for popcorn Did I mention that there was no one at the park? There are two awesome things in this picture, the drop tower and the Tornado ride operator. So, I was wearing a shirt with the Pythagorean Theorem on it, and whenever we got off Tornado the op would say something like "If A=7 and B=4, what is C?". Since I'm a nerd I found this very amusing. He also just seemed to enjoy his job at the park and was very cheery. I got a private ride on the Drop Tower, which is the BEST drop tower I've been on! Bigger does not always mean better! This was their waterpark... You can see "Action River" in this picture, which moved slower then any lazy river (There was times when people weren't moving at all)! We saw this fountain This was the fanciest amusement park restaurant I've been to. It had a wait staff, and they led you to your seat. And the best part is is that we got Italian beef sandwiches for less than Six Flags food! I wanted to now what all the fuss was about Fascination on this site because I haven't played it before, and now one of the main reasons I want to go on a TPR trip so I can play Fascination with all you guys. Thank you TPR for making me aware of this awesome game! We went on this a bunch. I didn't realize that it went up a level, so I was really surprised when we got to the outdoor portion! Hey, I didn't know that IB Crow was a pirate now! This guy talked to you and shot you repetitively while you stood in a non-existent line. I still can't get over the fact that they built a roller coaster on top of an eating area! There is actually 2 coasters in this picture. Hoosier Hurricane is on top, and Cornball Express is below that! It needs to be stated that Cornball Express is an awesome ride. A lot of the rides here are built on the water! The rides in this picture are all on water. We missed out on the World's Best Tacos! I guess we have to come back to this park sometime! Lost Coaster of Superstition Mountain! Unfortunately, they really meant this, because the ride was closed. Ok, I've seen this sign posted somewhere on this website before, but I felt the need to take a picture and post it here because of how pointless it was. Speaking of pointless signs, on the way to Timber Falls, we saw a sign that said "Water on road during rain". I'm really bummed that this wasn't open, but that just gives me an excuse, along with the tacos, to come back! Nerd Shot! You can live across the lake from Indiana Beach! It was a really nice day out, why was the park completely empty? I LOVE the mascot here. The swings were on the water, and you got to cross a bridge to get to them. This slide was engineered for pain. They designed it perfectly so that you hit the side of the slide really hard. Also, if you look in the upper right you can see a ride op enjoying the lack of crowds. I really like how this picture turned out. I rode 2 orange coasters today. One of them was Steel Hawg... And the other one was Dragon Wagon! I got the back seat and the entire train to myself! I think this is Cornball Express, but I can't be sure. We found this weird thing on top of on of the kiddie rides. Cornball's near-empty station. Shot of Cornball's first curve, right before the lift hill. And Cornball's brake run. As we were walking down the exit ramp, we found this little boat ride, which was in a really weird and obscure location. This was my first paratrooper, and I enjoyed it. Brought to you by Casey's Unfortunately, we did go home without one. And now it's time to head back to the hotel. Next stop, Six Flags Great America! Edited June 27, 2015 by GCI Wooden Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SFOG1991 Posted June 26, 2015 Share Posted June 26, 2015 Absolutely awesome trip report! I love the attention to detail. I was hoping to go to Indiana Beach during HoliWood Nights but obviously it's much closer to Six Flags Great America so I'll just have to make a separate trip and go to both (among other parks too!). I still think this is one of the coolest and most unique parks in the U.S. Thanks for posting!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
viking86 Posted June 26, 2015 Share Posted June 26, 2015 Cool trip report, thanks for sharing! I never fully realized how cramped Indiana Beach is. Sure looks like a very fun pakr! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GCI Wooden Posted June 27, 2015 Author Share Posted June 27, 2015 I still think this is one of the coolest and most unique parks in the U.S. Thanks for posting!!! I think that Indiana Beach is one of the more unique parks in the US, as well. Cool trip report, thanks for sharing! I never fully realized how cramped Indiana Beach is. Sure looks like a very fun pakr! Thank you! The entire area was really compact (Which I think is a good thing). We ended up accidentaly walking into some cabin rental area while we were trying to get to Steel Hawg. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IronWolfman Posted June 27, 2015 Share Posted June 27, 2015 Love that both Cornball Express and Hoosier Hurricane still have single-position buzz bars, reminds me of Timber Terror at Silverwood Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tanks4me05 Posted June 27, 2015 Share Posted June 27, 2015 With the looks of it, I'm fairly confident that the reason for those supports on top of Cornball Express are for Cornball Express itself. To really understand the reasons behind it would require knowledge of junior and senior level Structural Engineering courses, but the best summary I can give is as follows: It looks like that the same picnic pavilion they wanted to put Tig'rr over also gave CCI problems when they were designing Cornball Express. I can't tell for sure from the picture (I also have yet to visit myself, but I finally will next year as part of a 3 week college graduation trip) but it looks like the park had that hill that goes right next to Tig'rr also go over the picnic pavilion; since they didn't want to eat into the pavilion and take away picnic seats given the cramped park, they had to build a bit of a bridge over the picnic pavilion instead of having supports go all the way down through. The big I-Beams you see spanning over the picnic pavilion are likely too small to hold that hill and a fully loaded train without bending downward so much that it would collapse if they were just cantilevered out over the pavilion. So in order to prop up the far end from falling into the lake, they added those supports above the bottom of the hill because that is the only place they had the room for it. It doesn't appear to actually support the track directly under itself, as by looking at Picture 31 of your TR, the bottom of the hill seems to be adequately supported by the footers and such that go right into the lake. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GCI Wooden Posted June 27, 2015 Author Share Posted June 27, 2015 ^I didn't see that Cornball went over the picnic area, thanks for pointing that out! It also provides a fairly good head hopper effect! Love that both Cornball Express and Hoosier Hurricane still have single-position buzz bars, reminds me of Timber Terror at Silverwood Same here! I love buzz bars, especially when there is some pretty good airtime! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yay101 Posted June 27, 2015 Share Posted June 27, 2015 Great trip report! Indiana Beach is a great park, I have been there twice, I don't know how it is now since the last time I went, Galaxi was there, but it seems like it's still great! Excited to see your Six Flags Great America photos Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GCI Wooden Posted June 30, 2015 Author Share Posted June 30, 2015 Day 3: Six Flags Great America Today was very hot, the place was packed, and most lines were longer than an hour after 1:00. I still managed to have an incredible time, though. I did enjoy the old cartoons that were played in the queue, it made waiting in line not that bad. Onto photos. we found some geese, and since people like geese, I took a picture of some geese. We're at Six Flags Great America! Hi Superman! I found Porky Pig! I took a few pictures of the carousel that will pop up later in the report. It's time to ride Goliath! Everything about Goliath is awesome. Goliath has a sign! 15 minute wait for Goliath, sign me up! 15 minutes after we passed this sign, it jumped to 90 minutes, so we only got one ride on the beast. I love the minimal supports on the first hill. We got a boarding pass, which is a brilliant idea to easily stop line jumpers. we did happen to realize that it was for the wrong ride, but whatever. I like this. Here is a close up of the greatest thing ever created, topper track. 180 must mean something to someone, right? The supports structure for the dive loop was very impressive! Have I mentioned that Goliath is awesome yet? I forget if there were 4 or 6 people checking restraints, but they were dispatching trains pretty quickly. Our chariot awaits just outside of the station We passed on V2 since there is an impulse at our home park (Valleyfair). Batman was my first B&M, since Superman was having problems. Batmobile! The queue for Batman was pretty nice until it got to the hot black metal tube. We got a back seat ride on Batman, and it was really good. One of many awesome Snickers signs we would come across today. I see X-Flight in the distance. But it's time for American Eagle. They opened up the blue side once we got into the red side station, so we missed out on the double rides. X-Flight went down once we got to it, so we headed to the Demon next. Demon was actually better than I expected. It wasn't too rough and the tunnel was awesome! Demon has 2 loops. Demon has 2 corkscrews! Demon also has this fairly good first hill. X-Flight is open again! I will never understand why people complain so much about wing coasters. It's really awesome to sit way out on the side of the track! Here's a look at the station We sat in the back, so the first drop was awesome! I also don't understand why people complain about the vest restraints, I found them to be very comfortable. This drop is probably my favorite element on any coaster. I took a picture of a camera taking a picture. Yep, I see you Goliath Well, apparently we were hungry so we went to this BBQ place. Let's compare Six Flags to Indiana Beach, shall we? Six Flags Indiana Beach These doors control the gates on Whizzer Look at this, nature and empty switchbacks! I like this! Since Whizzer went down, we went to the observation tower and I got to take some photos from SFGAm's tallest ride! I think that it is awesome that they let you take photos from the tower! Raging Bull and viper are very good coasters. I think that this is the only picture I got of Raging Bull, even though it is now my favorite steel coaster. Whizzer is stuck on the lift hill This ride was a really big disappointment. Maybe it is because I waited over 90 minutes for it, but it was basically a pretzel loop and I don't remember the rest of the ride. X-Flight and American Eagle are also very good coasters. Also, Goliath is incredible. Carousel shot Lots of pretty flowers Love this! Viper was a fairly good wooden coaster. Whizzer is open again! Yay! Whizzer's famous spiral lift hill! I may have accidentally called him Snoopy, but I don't think he heard me. Stupid lamppost got in the way of my picture! This is what a pretzel loop looks like on the side. I can't really comment on the ride, because I only really remember the ride entering the flying position and the pretzel loop. I really like this entrance plaza. Artsy shot of the carousel. Superman's pretzel loop Goodbye Six Flags. Next stop, Harley Davidson Museum! Thanks for reading. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TBpony414 Posted June 30, 2015 Share Posted June 30, 2015 Liking this TR! I haven't been to either of these parks and they both look like a lot of fun. Your pictures and captions are fun to view. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GCI Wooden Posted June 30, 2015 Author Share Posted June 30, 2015 Liking this TR! I haven't been to either of these parks and they both look like a lot of fun. Your pictures and captions are fun to view. Thank you! It means a lot! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BackseatBoss Posted June 30, 2015 Share Posted June 30, 2015 Superman almost always has the longest line in the park. I can understand waiting 90 min since you had never been on it before, but I wouldn't wait more than 30 min anymore for it. Nice report! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GCI Wooden Posted July 1, 2015 Author Share Posted July 1, 2015 Superman almost always has the longest line in the park. I can understand waiting 90 min since you had never been on it before, but I wouldn't wait more than 30 min anymore for it. Nice report! Yeah, I will never wait that long for that ride again. I honestly can't even see myself even riding it if I ever go back to that park. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prozach626 Posted July 1, 2015 Share Posted July 1, 2015 Nice reports. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VF15 Posted July 1, 2015 Share Posted July 1, 2015 Thanks for the nice trip report of Great America! Makes me wish I could make another trip down there this summer since they have a wonderful lineup of coasters (especially Goliath, amazing ride). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
boldikus Posted July 1, 2015 Share Posted July 1, 2015 Great photos, thanks for sharing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GCI Wooden Posted April 6, 2016 Author Share Posted April 6, 2016 Ok, so I was doing some searching yesterday and came across this thread. It was then I realized, I hadn't finished it yet! So, to start off, sorry everyone! Day 4, Part 1: Harley Davidson Museum To start off the day, we went to the Harley Davidson Museum in Milwaukee. My Dad is obsessed with Harley Davidson, so when I first proposed this trip, he insisted that we stop and check it out. I'm not super interested in motorcycles, but it was still fairly interesting. I'd say that if someone was interested in motorcycles, I would recommend this place to them. It was a really nice building and highly informative. I will say, I don't have many photos, as the dark museum caused most of them to not turn out well. Anyway, onto photos: We've arrived! This place is absolutely gigantic. And the first exhibit Not really. We were not allowed in the exclusive cage-free zone. So, this place has TONS of bikes. This here is the oldest Harley Davidson Motorcycle in existence. Here's the sign full of info, if you're interested. This blue trike is one of the many trikes in the museum This sidecar looks like a boat. Hey Cedar Point Thread, it's a boat. "Help Stop Out Walking". A worthy cause. Someone was good at customization and had way to much time on their hands. This thing is huge. I'm super scary metal monster! FEAR ME! Next up, Bay Beach Amusement Park! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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