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SFO/Cedar Point/Kennywood/Lakemont Park/Hersheypark

Here's the background on me. I've loved rollercoasters since I was a wee tyke. Rather, I've loved the *idea* of rollercoasters. Truth be told, I just hadn't ridden on many of them. Trips to theme parks were a once-a-year activity, at most, with many years off. Before riding Manhattan Express last year, I hadn't been on one in probably ten years. Pitiful. But I still remember doodling in first, second grade, drawing rollercoasters, dreaming about what it'd be like to be at the top of this monstrous first hill I just drew.

So last year, out of nowhere, Hasbro makes this computer game which I really could have used 20 years ago when I was drawing those juvenile coaster sketches. It actually let you build your own coasters, and you could watch people get on it and have a great time riding it. Needless to say, I gobbled it right up.

But what are all these wacky rides I'm seeing in this game, anyway? This one wasn't around when I was a kid, and that one doesn't look like anything I've seen before. Have... have coasters *changed*? My curiosity was piqued and the adrenaline surging in my gut convinced me I had to get back into it and start getting out to see what the coaster world was like nowadays.

As luck would have it, I started a new job, and met a guy who had followed a nearly identical path. So we were both ready to go nuts and become coaster fanatics at the earliest opportunity. That earliest opportunity was this year.

Our home park is SFGA, and we tool around there from time to time, although after our recent excursions, it's becoming commonplace (and more than a little depressing, when one considers the state of Rolling Thunder, the only woodie we've got.) And we took a trip down to SFA (ROAR + S:ROS == too much fun.) And we hit Coney Island. And Morey's Piers. But it was time to get serious.

A full-on, five day trip through Ohio and Pennsylvania to just blast through as many parks and rides as we could. We got home last night, tired, bruised, but still with giddy smiles on both of our faces. One of the best vacations I could have imagined, and if I had the chance to do it all again tomorrow, I'd already be in the front seat queueing line.

And now, the trip report. I'll keep it as brief as possible, and focus primarily on the rides themselves. One caveat is, of course, that I'm relatively new to this, so when I say, "such and such was the best (something) I've ever been on!", I may not have been on too many "somethings". Everything is relative.

Six Flags Ohio
==============
After a seven-plus hour drive, I was just happy to see anything resembling a theme park. And Six Flags Ohio resembles a theme park. The twisty spine of Superman rises up into the sky like a gnarled, contorted finger beckoning you into the park. The park itself is on par with SFGA, which I was okay with until later in the trip when we got to Cedar Point, Kennywood, and Hershey, at which point it became abundantly clear that both SFO and SFGA are toilets. Oh well. Get me on the trains, that's all I care about.

Superman: Ultimate Escape (+4) - When the first ride of the day leaves your hands shaking and a dopey grin on your face, that means it's a good ride. This is a good ride, intense all the way through. We tried the front, middle, and back, and the back is by far the best ride. If you can zoom backwards all the way up to the top of the straight spine without at least getting a little zap of terror, you are a cold, unfeeling monster. No offense.

Mind Eraser (+1) - It's a Vekoma boomerang. They all get a +1 from me. Some are smoother, some are faster, some have nicer colors. Who cares. It is what it is.

Big Dipper (+3) - Rode this on two consecutive days. The first day was much hotter and nicer, and the ride showed it by being significantly peppier than on the second day. No matter, this is just a nice, fun out and back that delivers what it needs to.

Raging Wolf Bobs (-2.5) - It gets the extra .5 for being pretty and being nicely tucked into the woods. Other than that, the worst coaster I've ever been on, and by far the worst coaster of the whole trip. Boy does this ride suck. I tried to like it, really. I'd seen all the reviews, but I was determined to have fun and call it things like "quaint" and "quirky". But it just sucks. By the end of the first drop, I was ready to get off.

Serial Thriller (+3.0) - Vekoma SLC's usually get +3.5 from me, but both times I rode this one, I got hurt. I usually get banged around a little on these -- that's part of the fun -- but my ears got smashed and even bent back so much that it took a little of the fun out of it. So far my favorite of these is the Great Nor'Easter at Morey's Piers.

Double Loop (+1) - It's called Double Loop. It has two loops. It's not painful. It's short. Fine, whatever.

Batman: Knight Flight (+4.5) - With Medusa 45 minutes from my home, I'm pretty much obligated to compare this with that. I describe this ride as Medusa if you trade the zero-G roll for positive-G turns. And it's a little rougher. Well, I miss the zero-G roll, and smooth is best, but I just like this better than Medusa, darnit, if for no other reason than it LOOKS so much nicer. The colors are better, sure, but the scenery is so far superior that it's really a more fully enjoyable experience. Here's a quiz: Which is more fun, doing a big loop, a cobra roll, and two corkscrews over a lake and a midway, or doing a big loop, a cobra roll, and two corkscrews over a bunch of flat dirt? What good is a floorless coaster if there's nothing worth looking at underneath? This was the best B&M ride of the trip, in my opinion. Yes, including Raptor. Don't jump ahead.

Villain (+4.5) - Well, now we're talking. After experiencing Hurricane and Great White, two other CCI steel-support woodies, both of which are a lot of fun, but neither of which is overwhelming, I was expecting quite the enjoyable little ride. No dice. Instead I got a mind-blowing monster of a ride. Great air all the way through, and not a dull moment from start to finish. I realize as I was coming out of the first turnaround, out of my seat, and halfway over into my partner's seat just trying to hold onto anything to keep from flying out, that this was a good time. I've heard people complain about the "slopey" midsection here, so with all due respect, I must respond that you are bananas. Slopes are fun when you're going fifty zillion miles an hour and are still climbing back into your seat from the last hop. And then it heads into that flat section where you just wait and wait and wait for it to drop off the edge. And then it really starts to get fun. Are you kidding me? We came back the second day and basically spent the last two hours of the day riding and re-riding this. It got better every time. The best woodie of the trip, and the best woodie I've ever ridden on. The only reason I don't give it a +5 is because I don't know what else is out there. No, I haven't been on Shivering Timbers. Thanks for asking.

Three rides +4 or above? Yes, SFO is a toilet. But so is SFGA. And I'd switch the two in a second if I could.

Cedar Point
===========
Well, here we were, in Mecca, after reading the articles and looking at the pictures and watching the Discovery Channel specials for so long. Let's stand here a moment and just breathe it all in and apprec- nah, screw that, get in line for Raptor!

Raptor (+4) - It's bigger than B:TR. It's wilder than B:TR. It's cooler than B:TR. That's what gets it the +4. But I know I didn't like this as much as I was supposed to. I think the problem is that B&M, for all their technical wizardry, make rides that are FUN, and EXCITING, and make you go "Whee!" whereas I prefer rides that are WILD and SCARY and make you go "AUUGUGhghhh!!" instead. I had done all these elements before in similar circumstances, and while they were all very nice, and put together well, and I went "Whee!", when I got off, I thought, "Okay, that was cool. Next?" when I see that the more common reaction is, "WE GOTTA DO THAT AGAIN!!!" Lest this sound like more complaint than praise, it still IS a B&M inverted, and they're all pretty darn great.

Blue Streak (+2.5) - A right enjoyable little out-and-back, though the "out" is much more fun and "airy" than the "back", which didn't feel like it was taking full advantage of the ample bunny hops supplied to it. No matter. Short lines, fun ride, a good "default" ride if you're dying to get on a train and all the other lines are too full. Certainly the best woodie in the park, but that's not saying much. Or anything, really.

Corkscrew (0) - It did a corkscrew. And a loop. The only way this would get higher than a 0 if it was completely smooth the whole way. It wasn't. That being said, it sure is a photogenic little number.

Iron Dragon (0) - Just boring, is all. Can't really give it a negative number, because it didn't do anything particularly *offensive*, it just kinda sat there and rolled along. Ho hum.

Gemini (+2) - There's something unholy about running silently and smoothly on top of a massive wooden structure. It just didn't "feel right". What did feel right was the rest of the ride, which was pretty darn fun, all the way up until the helix at the end which I didn't particularly care for. The rest, I have no complaints with. Good hills, some nice air, and particularly if you come straight from Mean Streak, you'll appreciate the smoothness of those steel rails.

Mean Streak (+1) - You know, that first drop is just fabulous -- right up until the point that the brakes kick in and you literally lurch forward in your seat. After that, I was so irritated and disappointed, that it was hard to save this ride for me. And there's not much after the drop to save it, either. Some decent other drops, but other than that, just some plodding turns and shuffling back to the station. I'll give it a slightly positive rating just because it's a beautiful thing to look at, and it wasn't as rough and unpleasant as I'd been led to believe, and it's long, so it kills a few good minutes. Oh well.

Wildcat (+1) - Whee! Okay, it's over, no bruises to speak of, let's go. I've been on two of these since my "coming out". This was the better of the two.

Magnum XL-200 (+3) - Timing is everything. I can see this being the "best coaster in the world" ten years ago. But I can't tell you how underwhelmed I was. The drops of course are terrific, but the much ballyhooed pretzel turnaround I felt was surprisingly weak. It's banked too far for the speed, so entering the turns one feels as if one might fall out the side. That's not the kind of excitement I'm into, and I feel that Steel Force's big turnaround helix is much more exciting and fun. Anyway, the bunny hops back are a trip, as one would expect, but my complaint about these (as was my complaint about Steel Force's return trip) is that while they provide lots of good air, they really have no *soul*. It feels very mechanical. Up...air...down. Up...air...down. I am spoiled, though, by the kind of air that the Intamin hypers provide, which have much smoother transitions between "up" and "down", and the "up" just feels a lot more like flying. S:ROS's bunny hops back, while there are fewer of them, are tons more fun. You feel like you're soaring through the air, not like you are enjoying Airtime Ride Machine #92B. Everyone says this is one of the best in the world, though, so obviously I'm wrong.

Cedar Creek Mine Train (0) - I don't like mine trains. This one was fairly inoffensive. I don't like mine trains.

Mantis (+4) - I hadn't been on a stand-up since they were first invented. They've come along way, eh? The trim on the drop is a little upsetting, but after that, it's just a blast, going face-first into all sorts of B&M elements. My favorite is probably the "diving loop", which looks even better from the walkway than from the train. Standing up sure adds a whole new element of vulnerability, which kicked this ride up a notch in my little tattered book.

Disaster Transport (+2) - This indoor ride has two sections. One where you can see some stuff. One where you couldn't see the inside of your eyelids if you closed your eyes. The former is tolerable. The latter is fun fun fun. I'll take it. As people are too easy on Magnum, they are too hard on this. Only I am right. Bow to my irrepressible will. Please?

Hmm. Wait. What am I missing... Oh, right.

Millennium Force (+5) - I downloaded a picture off the internet last year when I first heard of this. It was a computer generated picture of the first hill and drop superimposed on an actual picture of Cedar Point from across the bay, showing how it was gonna look. I just stared at this picture for way too long. It didn't look like any coaster I'd seen before. That funny humpback shape looked alien and weird. And that track looked so tiny all the way up there in the air, that I couldn't imagine this thing was going to actually exist, and run with actual people on it. But there we were, walking past it to get to Mantis, staring in wonderment up at the top of that incredibly steep lift hill. Then we looked down, and noticed that there wasn't even much of a line. A glance at each other and a few moments of trepidation are all that preceded a meek, "Well... you ready?" between us, and we headed on in. Now, my problem was, I had read too much about this going into it. Read too many reviews, too many discussions about how this isn't great, and the other is weak, and how S:ROS is better, and, and, and. Know something? You can tell a ride is good if as soon as the train starts moving, you can't remember anything you've heard or read about *anything*, much less the ride itself. A sense of pure panic sets in as the train rockets up that hill with you almost flat on your back. And then the drop. Of course, there's nothing like it. And of course, now you've got 92 miles-per-hour of train, and it has to go somewhere. So it does, by way of overbanked turns, huge swooping ethereal airtime hills, and just straight out speed. S:ROS and the other hypers feel like big, massive, wild rollercoasters. MF feels like something else. It goes too fast, and the sensory overload is too great. A sense of detachment from the real world sweeps over you, so that when you finally get back to the station and return to Earth, the last two minutes seem foreign and blurry. There is no rollercoaster experience like this on the planet. I am confident of this. Now, that was the first ride I just described. We went twice more, the last of which was a nighttime ride, in the front seat, with a light drizzle falling. Putting this into words is pointless. Suffice it to say, the smiles didn't leave our face until the next morning, and we didn't hardly speak of the experience at all. It was that special. It is perfection and beauty. We like.

Kennywood
=========
Boy, this place would have been a lot better if it hadn't been for that stupid "Top Ten Coasters" special on the Discovery channel. It's a nice, clean park with obvious love for the history of the game, and it's the only park that got no less than a +1 on any ride from me. But, I mean, two of the "top ten coasters in the world"? Riiight. SFO had at least three that were better than any of these. But I'm moving ahead of myself.

Jack Rabbit (+2) - Sort of a "mini-Thunderbolt", a nice, short, pleasant little ride with not much to write home about *except* for the air in the backseat after it double-dips off the chainlift. This was the second-most severe air I experienced the entire trip (don't read ahead, that's cheating!) That was a blast. The rest was vanilla ice cream.

Racer (+1) - I forgot how this one was put together, so when we got back to the station on the "other track", we both said, "What?!" A pretty ingenious creation, it would be better if only the ride did anything noteworthy. But it don't. It goes down, and up, and around, and does it again, and then you're done. No air to speak of. But at least it wasn't painful.

Thunderbolt (+3) - Here it was! THE GREATEST COASTER ON THE PLANET! Tee-hee. No, no it isn't. But what it is is good fun. It's impossible not to like the drop out of the station. It's impossible not to like the dips into the gully, and the beautiful landscaping. It's impossible not to like the trains. It's possible, but improbable, to not like the way Steel Phantom zooms through the middle of it. It's possible, and perhaps a little more probable, to not like the helix section in the middle. It's very probably to not like how I lost my sunglasses on it somehow. But it's a good time, and I liked it enough to buy a T-shirt. That's all I ask for. Be good enough to make me want a T-shirt.

Steel Phantom (+2) - This I read WAY too much about, so perhaps I'd made up my mind before I got on it. I liked the first half more than I thought I would. I love flat, straight sections of track, and I had forgotten this had that. And the second drop is, of course, super-nifty. The rest just brought me back to Great American Scream Machine at SFGA, which I'm tired of. My partner was more viciously banged around than I, so I'm giving it the highest rating of the two of us.

Exterminator (+3.5) - A good stupid ride never hurt anymore. This ride is good, and stupid. An indoor mouse with spinning cars and mist and dark sections and weird cartoonish theming. I mean, come on. If you don't love this one, well... you don't love it. But I did. A repeat ride may not give the same thrill and sense of "what the hell is it gonna do now?", especially since an indoor mouse robs you of that "we're gonna fall over the edge" feeling, but for the first shot, it's a blast.

Lakemont Park
=============
It was Tuesday evening, and the sky was gray and miserable, and I will tell you that exactly 0 people were in this park before we got there. Even if that's an exaggeration, it's not much of one. I saw maybe two or three other groups of people during the entire time we were there. Is that how this always is? What if you built an amusement park and nobody showed up? The good news is, it gave me the first experience I've had of being on a major rollercoaster by myself. I owned that baby! The rains came an hour or so later and shut the place down, but before that, we managed to do...

Mad Mouse (-1.5) - One of the scariest parts of the trip, just because I didn't think the ride was gonna stay in one piece while I was on it. Old, rusty, shaky, and rougher than a crash landing in a 747, it was sort of fun to be able to say I survived it, but I had no desire to go on again. Ever.

Toboggan (-1) - I was expecting it to be worse than this, based on what I'd read. The verticle lift up the rocket ship (or whatever it was) was cool. Spinning down around it was boring. The dip at the bottom was painful. Who needs it.

Skyliner (+3) - Maybe I was in a good mood, or maybe I got to the ride just at the right time, but I dug this one seriously. A simple, mid-sized out-and-back (or more specifically, out and left and right and back), it didn't provide much airtime after the first drop, it didn't thrill and amaze, it just sort of did it's thing and brought you along for the ride. I could have stayed on it all day, that's how nice and fun it was. In fact, I was in the front seat for another go when they shut the place down. The ride that wasn't. Now, about that first drop. I took a spin in the front, and it was delightful. Then I tried it from the back. The first drop on Skyliner, from the back seat, was by far the scariest, most intense, severe moment of airtime I experienced in all five days of this trip. If I wasn't standing straight up in the middle of the drop, I was damn close. At that point I was glad there wasn't much noteworthy for the rest of the ride, because I needed that time to catch my breath. Holy cheeseburgers, was that something. Yes, yes it was.

Leap the Dips (+3) - I only wish I could have appreciated this more. Up until a month ago, I had no idea this existed. Since then, I've learned of the near destruction, the rallying of support, the 15 years of inactivity, the rebuilding, and then the reopening. I got off easy. I just show up one day, and it's running. But the history and importance of this was not lost on me, and it truly was a beautiful thing to behold. It's hard not to just stand next to it and smile, and appreciate the effort, the money, and the love that so many people must have given to keep it up and running, this ancient testament to man's pursuit of fun. It's a work of art, it's beautiful, it's a landmark, it's a monument to perseverence and dedication, it's all of that. But here's the thing. Turns out it's also a lot of *fun*! Smoother than a B&M on quaaludes, it shuffles back and forth through the figure-eights, dropping into valleys as deep as nine whole feet to remind you this ain't no pleasure cruise, and basically giving anyone in the luxuriously detailed and padded cars a reason to smile and appreciate this, one of the most special of all coasters. Yes, I bought a T-shirt.

Hersheypark
===========
First of all, this was the nicest park we visited, by a large margin. The faint odor of chocolate and roasting nuts permeates the park and fills your olfactory from the time you approach the gate until the time you leave. Everything is clean, and well-kept. Theming is lovely. Graffiti is all but nonexistent. The food was really good, and I don't just mean the chocolate bars. It's just a nice place to be. Even more fortunately, there are some right zippy little rides in here, which helped cap off our trip on a high note.

Wild Mouse (+3) - Without question, the best, most fun "normal" mouse I've ridden. It's faster, it's scarier, it's smoother, and it's just more enjoyable than any others I've tried. I can tell this, because it's the only mouse ride I've ever wanted to do twice. We ended up hitting it three times throughout the day, and would have gone for a fourth if they'd let us keep our seats after the third ride, which they didn't, even though nobody was waiting. I don't get it. But by the time we walked back around to the front, we saw Lightning Racer was operating again. Hey, it may be a great mouse, but there are priorities.

Comet (+2) - Got less enjoyable each time, but still inoffensive and mildly pleasurable. Disappointing were the rash of bunny hops which looked as if they should be great, but just sort of plodded along.

Sooperdooperlooper (+2) - The last, and only other time I was at Hersheypark was when I was very young, perhaps six or seven. (For those playing along, that's 22 or 23 years ago.) I remember seeing the SDL, and I remember being too scared to go on it. Fortunately, this wasn't a problem this time, and I was able to work up the nerve. The first half is the lift and drop to one incredibly smooth loop. After that, it strangely turns into a glorified mine train ride to get back to the station, complete with turns through the woods, a helix, and even a little theming. Weird, but fun, because it's always smooth and never bitter.

Sidewinder (+1) - I already said, I give all of these boomerangs a +1. Whaddya want from me, anyway?

Trailblazer (0) - A very short, inoffensive mine train. Oh well. I don't like mine trains.

Great Bear (+3.5) - A relatively short, tame, almost quaint B&M inverted, it got more fun each time as I was able to come to grips with the fact that this wasn't a Raptor, or even a B:TR. It has the sparsest, most widely dispersed selection of elements I've seen in a B&M inverted, and more straight-ish track than I've seen on any B&M coaster. But what it does have, it does right. Particularly enjoyable is the helix right before the first drop. That's a new one on me. Also new was the way the photo section is placed after the ride is already over, so at the photo booth, you see a lot of folks in "cool-down" poses, rather than "I'm gonna die" poses.

Wildcat (+3) - Having been to SFA first, I am forced to compare this with ROAR. I had read that this was better than ROAR. This is not better than ROAR. The first drop is nowhere near as intense, and the last dip before the brakes is rough, headache fodder. What's between, though, is just the kind of high-speed high-banked twisting craziness that first endeared ROAR to me. I do miss the little house tunnel, though. Overall I left mildly disappointed, only because I was expecting something as great as ROAR. That didn't stop me from riding that badboy a few more times at the end of the day, though. Even a disappointing GCI twister is a treat.

Lightning Racer (+4) - It had been a long trip. This was to be the highlight of the last day. But maybe all the stress of waiting in lines had gotten to me, and the long hours and Motel 6's had frayed my nerves a little, because when I rode this the first couple of times, I was doing nothing but analyzing the ride from a clinical perspective. This lap bar is too constrictive. There's no airtime here. Green seems to win more often. The second turnaround is slow. Blah blah blah. Then something amazing happened, as we tried it a few more times later in the day. I think it happened during the second trip out when the trains zip around and cross over and under each other in their mad dash. I forgot that there wasn't any airtime. I forgot that the lapbars suck. I forgot the dopey voice on the recorded warning message they play before each trip. All I knew is that I was having a whole heck of a lot of fun, looking around me for the other train, trying to push mine forward to go faster, faster, faster, while trying to keep my head from snapping off as we went into another brilliantly high-banked high-speed turn. And it just got better and better. By the end of the day, when me and my partner finished up with a one-on-one race from the front seats of each train, and my train winning by no more than a foot or two, I was so in love with the ride that not only did I get a *collared* shirt, but a postcard and a keychain as well. I mean, that's dedication, folks.

So, that's it. Five days, 37 coasters, and even the unpleasant parts were still pretty damn fun. Like I said at the beginning, if I could do it again tomorrow, I would. At this point I am a truly hopeless addict.

Please help me.

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