jcgoble3

^ I think it's been long enough that a new poll is not out of line. Tastes change over time, some posters have disappeared, and others (like me) have joined since then. There's no harm in getting a fresh set of opinions four years later. As for me, Gold Star all the way. Skyline is too watery for me.

Let's see here. Malfunction properly detected, safety mechanisms kicked in and worked like they were supposed to, train was safely moved back into the station so riders could get off, no one was injured. This is news?

Stand up for myself? Against who? Myself? That's the one person I have trouble standing up against (maybe because I don't have a decent mirror). Seriously, I've been saving for this vacation since last June when the convention was announced, and I'm almost there. I should be able to relax my budget in July or August, but not yet. Considering that I've already paid nearly $2,000 that's non-refundable, I'm committed to paying for the rest of it. Next year will likely be a much cheaper and smaller vacation, and I'll make a point of budgeting $100 or so for CFK donations. I just can't do it this year. See you (and everybody else on here that's signed up) Sunday as well!

Sometimes you can only wonder what goes through a kid's mind. I don't understand how the last lift hill on AE could beat 1-1 on FD, but hey: they're his rankings, and he can rank them however he likes. Any chance of seeing him at Coasting for Kids next year (or even this year, since it's not too late to register)?

Sounds like a great day! Like Terpy said, I can only imagine your excitement at your first trip without your parents. Glad you had fun, but be careful driving long distances on just two hours of sleep. Always make sure that you're awake enough to drive; sometimes you don't have trouble keeping your eyes open until you hit the highway, and often you can be fine on the morning drive but have trouble on the return trip in the evening after being on your feet all day. I personally would not have attempted a two-hour drive on that little sleep because I would be too tired on the return trip in the evening. You obviously made it home OK, but be careful in the future.

I was hoping to have the money to make a few donations this week, but my budget unfortunately just didn't work out in favor of that. Hopefully I'll be able to make some donations next year when I'm not forcing myself to pinch pennies for a mega-vacation.

A photo of the billboard would help, seeing as how not everybody here lives in Cincinnati.

Those boats are coming to Mammoth, but as of last weekend weren't being used yet, if they were even there. It's my understanding that they do NOT spin, though I'm at a loss to figure out how they'll do that given the method by which the round boats are spun (LIMs). I don't know how the LIMs will be able to sense which boat it's grabbing and thus know whether or not to spin it. Lines: I haven't the slightest clue. I walked on to both Friday afternoon because the temperature was only in the 60s, and Saturday morning was ERT. So I never got a sense of typical line length, and even if I had been there on a hotter day, I would have used the single rider lines.

That sounded like a wonderful day. I'm glad Korbin had a great time on the big rides, and you should be glad he's willing to attack those rides that eagerly; some would be too scared of them (I wanted nothing to do with coasters myself until just a few years ago in my 20s). I smell many more fun times for him and you at amusement parks. Congratulations! EDIT: I just noticed that he ranked Flight Deck below Adventure Express. I wonder why?

Thanks for the tips guys. I'll be posting a separate thread soon to gather more tips.

Mammoth is a different ride every time; you can go forward, backward, or sideways, possibly all on the same ride. The LIMs spin you around, but every boat spins differently; some boats will spin a lot, and others hardly at all. So you never really know what your experience is going to be. However, Mammoth also gets you a lot wetter than Wildebeest. On Wildebeest, you just get a few splashes on your lower body plus the light spray from above. Mammoth, on the other hand, will drench you, if not during the ride itself, then at the final whitewater splashdown. I don't think either one is clearly "better" than the other; it's a matter of personal preference. I prefer Mammoth, but YMMV.

I would assume it could be dispatched before then, just that it can't go over the lift hill until then (meaning that the train would stop on the lift hill temporarily if that occurred). In other words, I assume that the lift hill is a block of its own. meaning that a train loaded and checked ultra-quickly must only wait until the previous train has cleared the lift hill. Sometimes I've seen this happen in a power hour, where all ride-ops give the thumbs-up signal and the driver announces "train locked, five seconds" and then only gives "all clear" a few seconds later.

Yes, definitely let those of us who have never been to Disney World (e.g. me) know what Downtown Disney is like!

The final push is on! If you have not yet met the $75 minimum, you must do so by noon ET Friday, June 8, or you will not be able to participate. So far, a total of $73,641 has been raised across all 11 parks, beating last year's total of $62,000. You can go to Kings Island's event page to make last-minute donations.

This is why you never leave your bags unattended in a waterpark (or anywhere else, for that matter). Half the blame IMO goes to those stupid enough to leave their bags unattended in the first place.

^Definitely noted. I like croissant sandwiches, so I'll try them. Do you know if you can use the Dining Plan for them?

Nice report and photos! I'm looking forward to the IoA section of the report.

Nice! Glad you're having fun! I've got three months before I hit Disney, so I'm gathering information. Keep the reports coming!

Glad you enjoyed it!

Most, if not all, have shelves in the station you can leave things on. The three woodies, the three water rides on the dry side of the park, and Sparkler also have free lockers you can use for the duration of your ride.

got me thinking, last friday I took my neice to the park early so she would have someone to ride all of the big rides with, then my wife, mother in law 3 year old and infant meet us later that evening after my son's nap around 5:00 or so in the evening. At the end of the evening, after we were done with our nighttime beast ride, I casually (and kiddingly) mentioned that she had worn me out that day, wondered how many miles we had logged that day. So, anyone venture a guess based on this: parking to The Beast, to the stunt track, to The Racer, back to fight deck, to fest house for a lunch. From lunch over to Flight of Fear, only to figure out the line was pretty long, so back to The Beast. From The Beast over to Diamondback, then back to Flight of Fear to wait out the line. From Flight of Fear, over to Action Zone to grab her a blue ice cream cone, then over to Fest House to eat inside and await the wife. From the Fest House to the front entrance while we were trying to get a hold of my wife trying to figure out when they'd get there, only to find out they were running later than their estimated 4:30ish arrival time, so from the front entrace back to The Beast. Then back to the Fest house to meet the wife and rest of the crew (it was raining slightly back by The Beast, but pretty good in the parking lot, so they wanted to meet where it was dry). From the fest house to Boo Blasters, to the Train, to Shake, Rattle & Roll, Scrambler & Monster, back to the Fest house for dinner and feeding of the infant, from the fest house back to The Beast for her 1st ever night ride on The Beast, back to the parking lot as fireworks were exploding. That's essentially 8 trips to/from the front entrance/fest house and The Beast, plus some other walking, perhaps totallying about 10 trips b/w those points. About half a mile b/w the front and the gate to The Beast? Probably a little less than that, so about 4-5 miles total of walking? Wish I would have had a pedometer on, or even my nike+ and Ipod out of interest. Anways, just an example of why walking another 50 yards to non preferred parking isn't going to amount to much at the end of the day. I just measured your route with Google Earth. Assuming that 1) you were the first car to arrive in the morning and thus got the closest non-preferred and non-handicap parking spot, 2) you took the shortest route between each location you listed with no detours, and 3) you were able to take the shortest possible path through queues without switchbacks, you walked approximately 6.75 miles. Any deviation from those assumptions would increase the distance.

Yes, the Voyage was very smooth indeed. Enough that it stole the #1 spot on my wood coaster rankings from the Raven. I rode in the very back a few times, and it would have been difficult for me to figure out that I was in a wheel seat if I had not already known that. They did an excellent job with the retracking work.

Not one word was said about Bluegrass Boardwalk by any of the Kochs at Holiwood Nights.

^He's not saying that SOB is safe, he's simply saying that the brake run (non-)issue doesn't make it unsafe. That does not rule out the possibility that other issues may make it unsafe; it just rules out that specific behavior as a safety issue. At least that's how I read it.

That happens of Flight Deck, too, and nobody is claiming it to be unsafe. The Raven does that also. Comparing FD to SoB?? Really?? I think it's not meant to be a comparison so much as making the point that the track shaking when the train hits the brake run is not an issue preventing SOB from re-opening.