luff

Mine: 1. Beast 2. FOF 3. Adventure Express 4. BLSC (yes I like it) 5. Racer

I loved Showbiz! I think it was better than the current state of Chuck E

Alrighty, I will put together a cruise report whenever I get time this fall/winter. It will be very tough to follow up to yours and Avatar's trip reports!

Good Job on the trip report. Thunderhead also shot up to the top of my list when I rode on it the first time this summer. Did you get a chance to go on Dizzydisk? I am not a big fan of spinning rides, but had a blast on it with my son.

Great trip report Gator. With you and avatar creating such wonderful WDW reports, I won't even attempt one. Looks like GatorGirl had a good time with all the "Magic Moments". We only had one magic moment for each kid and my wife. (None for me). My girl got a Tinkerbell Pin for talking so much with a security guard, my son got a sticker for speaking "galactin?" while in line for Stitch's Great escape, and my wife, an animal nurse, got a personal tour of Rafiki's Planet watch.

I usually take pictures of the photo people when they make their approach. Their reactions can be humorous.

I have to second Avatar on this point. I first learned about MNSSHP 4 years ago, when our travel agent suggested it for the kids first trip. I thought what, pay $40 to get into a park that we already have tickets to? But she eventually convinced us and we had a blast. Between no waits for the rides, trick or treating, dance parties, the spooky atmosphere, the great parade and fireworks, all without a huge crushing crowd, I can not wait until my next opportunity to go again.

I took a backstage tour of Jubilee 2 years ago, and the "engineering and design" of that place is incredible. The stage is HUGE. State of the art for 1982. Oh and those steps down to the dressing room he talks about are horrible. Our tour guide was suffering from knee and shin problems because of running up and down the stairs 15 to 20 times a night.

Great detailed trip report Avatar. Its nice to see your insights to the parks, and remember what we did there two weeks ago. There is no way I could post my own trip report after such an excellent one, so I will just add a couple of my pics from the Disney Cruise Ship. After 4 days in the parks, and 3 days on the ship, both of my kids (5 and 8) said they liked the ship better than the parks! That could be because we had one rainy day and one rainy night at the Magic Kingdom. I have never seen the Spectromagic parade in the pouring rain. Back to the cruise ship. We had a cabin with a balcony. Great views every morning with the sunrise and every evening with the sunsets. Each kid was in a different kids club. We could barely get them out to eat dinner. They had so much fun with games, activities, the characters, and socializing with their new friends. This also allowed us adults to spend time in quiet relaxed areas. One of the great deck parties they had was a Pirates IN the Caribbean party. A lot of the crew and many of the guests threw on their pirate outfits After 11:30pm they started showing the Pirates of the Caribbean on the Jumbotron around the family pool The final day was spent at Disneys private island, Castaway Cay. When the kids went off to their clubs for some beach game time, we rented bicycles and rode to the end of the island, and looked at the view. Back in the middle of the island they put up an observation tower. You can see how big the island really is. Later in the day my son and I rented a Hobie Cat and sailed out to get a good glimpse of the Flying Dutchman. After it was over, we were all worn out, over fed, and wanting to stay longer

For anyone in Illinois or WI, a HUGE corn maze http://www.richardsonfarm.com/corn-maze.asp We had a blast last year and will be going again this year.

Wow. 3 trips in a row. It must be KIC month at Disney! XGatorHead - Great to hear you are going too. 3 Years old is a great time for Daddy and his princess. My daughtor (5) just picked Sams Club Tinker bell for her costume. For her, the beginning of the year was all about being like Giselle. Avatar - Great picture. How old is your daughter? Mine is petite for her age, but now that she is above 40 inches, we can do more riding as a family instead of splitting up. One parent on the bigger rides with the oldest while the other goes on the smaller rides with the youngest. One advantage we have for staying up late at the MNSSHP is the fact we live in the central time zone. 11pm is only 10 in the kids clock.

I drive through Somerset once every year and never thought it would be a place for a waterpark. When did it open? How big is it?

We are going down Oct 5th - 11th. Will be either at the Dolphin or Swan for the first half of the week, then the Disney Wonder for the 2nd half. Assuming that the number of tropical storms start to die down by then.

I was surprised when we first saw the parade 4 years ago. The horseman is rather scary for the young ones, and he comes through the parade route pretty fast. The kids favorite parts where the Alice trail and collecting all the candy.

That is something that is entirely possible. At my last place of work, we had discussed disabling systems on several occasions due to non payment. We never did it due to the moral questions it raised. The farthest we went was to stop servicing and supporting them. The question is, if the code was locked or erased, why hasnt HRP just downloaded their backup and disconnected the RSS connection?

What a coincidence We just got our MNSSHP tickets today for 10/7. Looks like we will miss each other by a couple of days.

Great trip report. My family went to HW last year for the first time. My kids loved it. The park has a lot of what I would call medium sized rides that have height restrictions that are much lower than the comparable rides at KI. Since my son is short for his age, and my daughter is very petite, they got to ride a lot more rides than usual. We also liked the diving show. I liked it because i was able to sneak off and ride the Raven with no lines.

I've got that map too. Except mine has large rips at the seams

What Bean..? The Bean is the big metalic er.. bean that is in Millennium Park, downtown Chicago.

Did you get any pictures of the Bean?

I have never had a great ride on the Eagle. Even though this year, some of the "washing machine" feeling was gone from the ride (I believe that they retracked portions), riders were complaining that it gets worse every year. Yah, Viper Rocks!

The best discount I have seen so far is $20 off at Dunkin Donuts. But the $35 adult same as kids admission promo going gets you in for the same price without the need for a coupon. I think you can order the promo tickets online and they are good for another month or so.

7/6/08 the family took a quick trip to Bristol. And why is a Renaissance Faire getting a Trip report? The Rides of course. Seriously, a couple of vendors mentioned that they compete directly with the regional theme parks. One said, we provide a better value, excellent food and better shows. Lets see how that works. Premium parking, $3. Adult ticket, $15. Child ticket.. Free for opening weekend. Food and Beverage pricing is about the same as a theme park, but has many more choices, and higher quality. The only additional cost is $3 per ride. On to the trip. We arrived at gate opening, met up with a friend and headed to the Thrill Ride area. This is my favorite ride. As you can see, all rides here are human powered. This is their Drop Tower. Two people push you around and then let go. You spin and drop, then when you hit the bottom, it continues twisting half way back up, and reverses. You get 4 or five twists by the operators per ride. The barrel ride is exactly what you expect. The girls had to get their hair braided. This boat ride is powered by the riders pulling on the rope through the middle of the boat which is attached to the stationary bar Davinci's flying machines has 4 people pushing in the middle to rotate the ride. The riders pull on ropes to actuate the boat's wings. Big brother is showing little sister how to do it. The hurlanator is rider operated too. You push and pull the handle in front of you which engages and disengages a ratcheting device on the middle axis. Depending on how heavy or strong the other riders are, the ride will be totally different Snack time at Kiddie Kingdom. Here is my favorite food there. Garlic saute'd mushrooms. Hmmm another bungee ride Swing! I couldn't get a good picture of the one operator who would hold onto the back bar when pushing, and go about 6 feet in the air on the backswing. The butterfly ride was too booring for my little girl. Renaissance roller coaster. You climb on the pegasys, grab your lance and slide down the rope trying to hit the knight on the side Got to have some jousting at the ren faire. During the day we saw 5 great shows, ate too much food and beer, Had a discussion with the sheriff of Nottingham, Played with a wood Nimph, and bought some stuff from the vendor. One last picture is of the last show we saw. What you can't see here is that one acrobat is on his back, balancing the ladder on his feet. The other two got on top of the ladder without any help balancing the whole time. Edit: Finished the pictures

Amen to that. For instance I Thought Thunderhead was wonderful to, but did not like Tennessee Tornado. I also loved the Dreamland Drive in. It even kept my 5 year old interested for 45 of the 55 minutes. The one thing I haven't seen in any trip report for Dollywood is the fact that the entire theme park exits through the gift shop!

The key must be the"15 acre" water park. Hurricane Harbor at Six Flags Great America is Free and in the Midwest too.