VortexBFForever

I am totally on the same page as ALL of you! Yep, she (Vortex) definitely has the nostalgia and the Arrow elegance. Don't worry, homestar92. I have a (very) soft spot for Arrow rides too. <3 PKIVortex, I also really LOOOOVE Magnum! Vortex and Magnum are my favorite Arrows. PhantomTheater, I so totally agree with the part of your post in the quote that I underlined. I'm always excited just to step on one of Vortex's trains, let alone ANY Arrow trains!

From 71 I also can see (along with the other mentioned rides) Vortex, Delirium, Sling Shot, Xtreme Skyflyer, Congo Falls, a tiny bit of Firehawk, and maybe even Flight Deck if I look close enough. I've even seen the very top of The Beast's first lift hill all the way from there. Quite a few of the rides can be seen from 71 and Kings Island Drive, let alone the parking lot itself.

Vortex definitely has the visual nostalgia! On my first KI trip in 2007 (three years before I became an enthusiast) I was so awed by Vortex that I watched it for at least 10 minutes non-stop. In fact, on every single KI trip of mine, I take about 5-10 minutes (at LEAST!) just to watch and take pictures of Vortex. It's always a part of my trip "schedule" and it always will be. <3

I KNEW you'd say that! I hope this is just a rumor, in my opinion, and I really hope Vortex continues to operate for at least a few years to come. It is actually a big dream of mine to work on Vortex when I'm old enough (16) and right now I'm 13, so it wouldn't be until 2015 that I would first be able to apply for and possibly achieve that dream. As one of Vortex's big big big fans, I would be CRYING if we lost Vortex.

^There's always Christmas! Nice TR, IndyGuy4KI!

Why is it sleeting outside my house? (it's only November 3...)

Just had one wacky dream on Sunday night, right after I got home from my Closing Day trip to KI. (yes, it had Vortex in it.) I was walking around to Vortex's entrance. The trees were only starting to lose their leaves, so it looked more like September than October. Vortex was operating like normal, with Train #1 (yes, I saw the numbers! xD) entering the station, Suddenly, #1 just stops in its tracks (no pun intended) with half of it in the station and the other half still out, and in the meantime, Train #2 had just arrived on the first set of the brakes! #1 wasn't going anywhere, but #2 was gaining on #1, FAST. Then, suddenly, I hear this BOOM noise. #2 had just struck #1 in its back side, forming this long, horizontal, deep cut that went straight across #1's back. I shouted, "Train #2! Why would you do that?!?" and then I jumped over the tall, black fence, running to #2 and the "hurt" #1. Maintenance had just arrived to investigate, so I helped them by measuring how long and deep #1's cut was. So we took out this tape measure, and found out that the cut was 9 inches long, and 2 inches deep. Right after that, the dream ended! Weird thing is, I didn't see Train #3 anywhere. Either it wasn't in the dream at all or it just didn't have as obvious of an appearance or any significance as #1 and #2 did. Could this be an indication that I might fulfill my dream of working on Vortex someday? -BFF, being dreamy and VERY imaginative.

Nice video, ohiocolts! My mom took a video of our ride on Sling Shot- I'll upload it soon.

2012 Parks: Kings Dominion (4/10) Kings Island (5/16, 5/24, 7/10, 8/04, 8/13, 9/03, 10/14, 10/21, 10/28) Coney Island (in Cincy) (6/19, 7/03, 7/31) Busch Gardens Williamsburg (6/26) Cedar Point (9/09) 2012 Kings Island Ride Count: Vortex: 60 Diamondback: 11 The Beast: 1 Flight Deck: 11 Adventure Express: 9 WindSeeker: 10 Drop Tower: 2 Grand Carousel: 7 Delirium: 3 Shake, Rattle & Roll: 1 Firehawk: 1 Flight of Fear: 3 Invertigo: 3 Racer: 4 Scrambler: 1 KI & MV Railroad: 1 BLSC: 1 Sling Shot: 1 Zephyr: 1

I can't believe I missed a Beast tour!! And eating in the Festhaus? I missed that too? Sheesh... Any ways, my first ride on Sling Shot was great. I was easily caught off guard by the rocking back and forth (when it wasn't flipping) but it was really fun! And it was really nice to meet a few fellow KICers!

I'm gonna go with Vortex. (this is actually my first time staying till close on Closing Day, so it's pretty exciting, at least for me )

Yes. In fact, if you look to your right on the ground just before you enter the station part of the queue, you can see one next to the entrance of the shed where they park the trains at night. There's also a few of them under the helix and the first four inversions. During any given cycle of mine on Vortex, I've counted at least 6 or 7, or maybe even 8, at the most.

Every single October I hear "Monster Mash," Werewolf," and "Abracadabra," which are probably the songs I hear the most out of all the songs that I hear. Of course, it's the month of Halloween, but somehow I tend to get easily annoyed by many of those Halloween-type songs at times...except for "Thriller." I've heard that quite a few times as well but I'm seemingly not annoyed by that one.

Awww man, I don't have the Food Network (let alone cable television). Phooey. But very interesting to know that one known from appearing in a show at the park will be on a television show.

Very interesting...It hasn't happened to me. Not even close. Things like this always leave me wondering what it would be like if I were one of the people involved.

Do I have to say this myself? It's Vortex for me. But don't worry, DB is close behind. I like tall hills and floater airtime just as much as I like inversions!

Did you get them hosted? To be honest, I don't really get what "host" means in terms of uploading photos. Well, anyway, here are the pics!

No the organ does not work, its just a speaker playing a short loop tape . Awww MAN! I thought there actually was one! Gosh, it sure fooled me!

Last Sunday (10/14) I heard "The Candy Man" by Sammy Davis Jr while I was walking through Coney Mall.

Finally, it came time to cap off my annual trip to the Point by doing my tradition of riding Sky Ride back to the area near the park entrance and riding the Midway Carousel. According to the picture above (taken while I was next in line) I rode Sky Ride in a purple car--Car #32. I took a few pics of the park from above, including the one right above this sentence. After touching back down onto solid ground (hey, it kinda rhymes!) I proceeded to the last CP ride I’d ride before 2013: the Midway Carousel. If I’m not mistaken, this particular carousel has a working band organ, which is pretty nice.I thought there was a working organ, but those recorded tracks sure fooled me! When I exited the gates and walked out into the parking lot, I was surprised to see a Revolution 3 Triathlon running race still going (It was also going on in the morning!). On the way to CP this morning I saw that not only part of the course was in Sandusky, but also up and down the causeway and through Cedar Point’s parking lot. After crossing the course, I grabbed my last skyline shots, knowing I would never see Space Spiral in person ever again. As the car drove away from the Point, I looked back at the whole park, Space Spiral and all, while going down the causeway back to Sandusky, then heading south. Once the park disappeared from view, I whispered to my self, “Goodbye, Space Spiral. Hope you have fun in the big amusement park in the sky! Also, bye to Cedar Point. I’ll be back next year, in 2013, to ride Gatekeeper and of course, all my other favorites…” Raptor: 1 maXair:1 Wicked Twister: 1 Overall: 2 WindSeeker: 1 Overall: 2 Power Tower: 1 (Drop) Overall: 2 (Drop: 1; Shot: 1) Corkscrew: 3 Overall: 5 Magnum XL-200: 4 Overall: 6 Top Thrill Dragster: 2 Overall: 3 Iron Dragon: 4 Overall: 5 Mantis: 1 Overall: 2 Millennium Force: 1 Overall: 2 Wave Swinger: 1 Maverick: 1 Gemini: 4 Overall: 5 Sky Ride: 1 Overall: 2 Midway Carousel: 1 Overall: 2

I'll be at KI tomorrow (Sunday) so I'll have the Eiffel Tower on my mental list of rides to ride so I can get some pics of what's left of SoB. edit: I got some pictures! Now all I have to do is import and then upload them... edit #2: The pics are now up!

After Mantis, I rode the ride that was my first gigacoaster—Millennium Force, where the future is riding on it. Last year, the wait for the Force was an hour. This time it was a sixth of that—only 10 minutes! I rode the Red Train in row 5-1, near the back. I greatly savored the airtime on the 300-foot drop! But as the train swooped up into the first overbanked turn, I started to gray out. I guess the lack of consistence in my drinking of water was starting to take its toll. The greying lasted for about 5-10 seconds; I could tell this was a symptom of dehydration. I tested myself by asking, “Where am I?” Opening my eyes, I saw the blue track and gray supports whizzing around me as the train wound its way through the course. I immediately responded, “Hey! I’m on the Millennium Force!” I felt well again, so I got even more happy as I greatly continued to savor the moments of the train going over the many more hills, through the last tunnels, and the last overbanked turn. A very interesting ride, indeed. As soon as I got off, I located the nearest water fountain and replenished myself with as many gulps of nice, cool water as I could drink in one sitting. Now that I was sufficiently hydrated again, I could continue on my annual journey through the Cedar Point amusement park. The next ride, with a delicate design, beautiful paintings and all, was Wave Swinger. I don’t remember exactly what color seat I rode in, but this cycle was interesting. First, all the other riders were either at or below my age, and second, we were all on one half of the ride! So one half of the seats on the whole ride were empty, while the other riders and I filled up the other half. It was interesting “having Wave Swinger all to ourselves.” As I walked closer to Cedar Creek Mine Ride (which I unfortunately bypassed) and Maverick, I saw more and more of the Western/Frontier style theming. I got to Maverick’s entrance, only to find out the ride had just gone down with a technical delay. In fact, it had been off and on all day since the park opened at noon. Ten minutes later, they started running empty test trains. It was cool to see the ride transition through the inversions very intricately and smoothly. I guess that’s an Intamin ride’s definition of “elegant.” 5 minutes after, they started letting riders on, but a few minutes later more empty trains were run and then the ride was down again. By this time, it had been 20 minutes since Maverick went down. The line that was forming outside the entrance had grown quite a bit, and I wanted to ride Maverick really bad, so there was no way I was forfeiting my spot! Finally, 5 minutes later, they ran more test trains; eventually, riders were let on again--and the ride was back up! We were let into the queue. The total elapsed time had been 30 minutes. I was greeted with a station wait of another 5 minutes. I ended up in row 1-2 on the bronze-colored train. In this pic I am in the seat on the left side of the train: Maverick is a really fun ride. Definitely one of my favorite looping coasters. The transitions to, from, and through the various inversions and elements were performed very smoothly and swiftly. The negative Gs were abundant on the 95-degree drop and airtime hill, and the 70 mph acceleration in the launch tunnel was nice. I wanted to ride again but the line had grown at such a ridiculous rate that it was just outside the ride entrance! I decided to move on. My mom had bought some potato fries with ketchup while I was riding Maverick, so we enjoyed this nice hot snack together. Then I noticed….Gemini. I hadn’t gotten around to it yet, and it was already the time that we had initially agreed on to leave the park for the 3 and a half hour drive home. But she still let me ride Gemini! Only the red side was running. practically because of fewer people being at the park, which made for a very short line, even with just one side open (Of course, Gemini is a high capacity ride.). Red Train #1 was waiting for me when I boarded in row 2-1. The station was so empty, in fact, that two of the five cars had been blocked off, leaving the first two and the last cars on the train open to those who wanted to ride. Therefore, the trains were running at at just-less-than-two-thirds capacity, or sometimes even less than that. Anyway, the ride was great. Since I had lowered my expectations of it due to when I greatly overestimated the outcome of the ride experience on the previous CP trip in 2011, I wasn’t expecting very much. But this ride sure packed a punch. The drops and the hills were pretty fun, along with the straightaway and the upward helix at the end. When the train arrived back, barely anyone was waiting for a seat in the last car. I headed back to row 5-1, which had no one waiting for it, and did a re-ride. I got a little airtime on the drops, especially the first one, which I really enjoyed. I decided to try the very back, row 5-3. I got my wish, as there was no one waiting for 5-3 when the train got back to the station. When I had buckled the seatbelt and pulled the lap bar down for the third time, I realized I had the entire last car to myself, let alone THE WHOLE BACK PART OF THE TRAIN!! During the ride several of the riders in the front glanced back at me, also realizing that I was the only one in the back of this particular Gemini train! I got a bit more airtime (and a bit more bumpiness ), making for a one-of-a-kind back seat ride. Upon re-entering the station, I finished my (mini)marathon back in row 5-1. This time I had a few more fellow riders riding in the last car along with me. Fun ride like the last three were! I wanted to ride Magnum again, but it was too late. We had to leave soon, since I had school the next day. Now I have to wait till 2013. Part 6 is on its way! (with a whole lotta photos! )

When I clicked it, it said "This video has been removed by the user." EDIT: It works fine now.