Steph88

They're selling tickets for $29.99 today only! Good July 28-August 16 IIRC. We got ours this morning and I could NOT be happier!!!

With something pretty underneath the areas where you'd be looking straight down toward the ground on the upswing, like some small fountains!

^ Where's that?

Agreed. They have to name it SOMETHING, and I kinda like coasters to have scary/unique sounding names. I hope they do use Valravn. Plus that area isn't TOO far off from Rougarou. And Iron Dragon. We could see a mythological creature theme area someday. Ya never know! (Coasters Drive In would be a little out of place though.) Edit: Capitalization

A few questions for debate: How much does it typically cost to modify the restraints like they did on Maverick? Is it even feasible for something like Vortex? And, do you think the park would consider it? Why or why not?

"We apologize for any inconvenience this causes" "Great, now I can't go to Six Flags. This is SO inconvenient!" I know it's a general statement companies add on, but it's funny in this case.

I forget, where is Cedar Point's Camera 1 located? It's currently experiencing an outage.

An RMC copy/clone would be super cool, but not at the expense of losing The Beast.

Why DID they get rid of backwards Racer?

Hm... Lightning Run, Thunder Run, Tornado, Hurricane Bay, Storm Chaser... Maybe next is Hailstorm? Tsunami? I love the storm theme.

What's TTD like? I've been to CP a few times since it was built but I've always been too scared to ride it. I'm considering doing TTD first thing after Gatekeeper because I want the experience, and if I spend the whole day seeing it without having ridden it I know I'll chicken out. Are people known to grey out on it? Does it bang you up at all?

Wonder what the plan is for CP's Turnpike Cars? Have they said if they'll be moved to another park?

"Pull the lever Kronk!.... Wrong leveeeeeeer!!!!"

I personally don't count Pirate's Cove as a dark ride. Edit to add: I consider it more like a fun house. In order for me to call something a dark ride, it must be an actual RIDE, and be 50 percent or more indoors. Light or dark doesn't actually matter to me, though dimmed lighting or total darkness is a plus. Not sure if that's an accurate assessment but that's just how I classify them in my mind. The important thing is, there needs to be more of them.

You always post such interesting reads! I loved the Natural Wonders one. Holy moly! So many places I wanna go now!

So in order to be a coaster, it needs to actually "coast" without needing power through parts of the ride? Makes sense.

It's a spinning car on a track. Is it not a coaster? Is it a flat? I'm legitimately asking. I dunno what it is. All I know is it looks like fun.

We caught a rare break from the summer heat & crowds Friday, due to some thunderstorms rolling in. I figured it'd be the perfect time to head out to Western Playland, as I haven't been since opening day on February 28th. I'm pretty much a recluse in the summer, it's work & home every day, so I was excited to get out and have some fun. The sky looked really ominous as we were making the 45 minute drive to the park. We're in El Paso, and it's in Sunland Park, New Mexico. I figured we were going to get rained out but we might get a few good rides in. They don't have season passes because nearly all their visitors are locals. We are not exactly a vacation destination out here! But weeknight admission is super cheap, I think it was 17 dollars a person. Military gets half price on weekends, as well, which is awesome. We arrived at the park and there was definitely some visible lightning off in the distance but the Doppler looked good and the rides were running. The first ride I wanted to go on was the Sky Ride, but the wind picked up as we were walking to it and just as we got in line they told us they were closing it down and getting everyone off. Understandable. So we moved on to the next. I skipped Scrambler, as I often do. It was once one of my favorite rides but now it just wreaks havoc on my neck. The Flying Eagles were also closed temporarily for wind, and they didn't open back up that night. But I did get a couple of pictures. I never saw the Eagles at KI or at least I don't remember, so back in 2011 when I first visited Western Playland was the first time I saw these Eagles. I jokingly called them "Angry Birds: The Ride". Next up was the Paratrooper. No line, and it was running as usual. We rode that a couple of times and had a blast. As we walked along after, I spotted a new addition that was not there a few months ago. On opening day a ride op had told us to expect a new ride next year but he couldn't think of what it was called. I took it with a grain of salt, and it appears we got our new addition earlier than planned. It's a Rock Star ride, similar to those Flying Carpet rides at fairs. We skipped it at first to see if Bandido was open, but we came back later. Bandido was closed. It is the older of the two coasters at Western Playland, and is a TON of fun. It's a nice little steel coaster that is surprisingly smooth for its age, and while formerly red, it recently got a nice green paint job. I don't know why Bandido was closed while Hurricane, the newer of the two coasters, was still running. I was a bit disappointed but I went into the park expecting some things would be closed, so no big deal. We got on Pharoah's Fury and rode that a few times. We didn't really have to wait in line for ANYTHING this trip. It seemed like there were just enough riders to fill it up, but not enough to where anyone had to wait in line. Which was SUPER cool. Normally Pharoah has the longest line of everything. During our several rides on Pharoah it started to rain, and within minutes we were soaked. They kept up operation as long as the lightning didn't get close. It was still off in the distance. Next we went to ride Rock Star. It was... An odd experience. The ride was half loaded, and people kept trickling into the line. He would lock the restraints and suddenly there would be more people coming on. He must have locked and unlocked the restraints six times. He made riders move seats way too much. It was awful. We must have been on the ride ten minutes before he actually started the thing. I'm a pretty patient person and I know the ride ops don't have an easy job. But this was kind of insane. It's a new ride, so I'm sure they'll figure it out eventually. The restraints aren't quite meant for larger and/or taller folks. Most parents weren't able to ride with their kids. I think we were two of like four adults on the ride. The restraints made me claustrophobic. They fit but were very tight. I'm used to Waldameer's Ali Baba carpet ride and the restraints on these are definitely smaller. After the six rider-shuffles, we finally got to actually RIDE the thing. It was a fun ride, but I don't know if I'll ride it again until the ride ops get the hang of things, and maybe once I lose ten pounds. :/ Next we went to ride Paratrooper again. I think most of my time at the park is spent on Paratrooper, Sky Ride, Pharoah's Fury, and Bandido. I just love those four rides. I ride the others occasionally, but those four are my favorites. Well, we got on Paratrooper and as he was loading some of the other "parachutes", a manager came and told him they were closing down the rides because the storm was getting closer. It was still raining and we definitely saw lightning in the distance, as we had all evening. Maybe it isn't smart to go to an amusement park during thunderstorms, but I figured we're at a low point in the middle of a bunch of mountains, and none of the rides are super tall, and they'd close down rides if there was any real threat, right? They unloaded everyone from paratrooper and they closed down all the other rides except Dodgem. That entertained kids while their parents got food from the snack stands. We did the same. My husband thinks the food there is overpriced. I don't, it's actually pretty affordable compared to some parks. They don't have a lot to choose from, but they have some good stuff. I wish they had soft pretzels, my go-to amusement park food. He ended up getting cheese fries, I had a hot dog, and we shared a drink. They also had things like pizza, churros (yum!), nachos, etc. There's also an ice cream shop, Price's, which is a subsidiary of the local dairy in the area. We hung out in the covered picnic area and the rain poured down. After eating I went off to take some photos, because I was already soaked so why worry about the rain. I came back and we talked to some employees wandering around, they said they were holding off actually closing the park til they see if the storm blew over. I looked at the Doppler and there seemed to be a slight chance the system may move north a bit more and the next storm cell would miss us. Unfortunately that was not the case, and they decided to close the park. When we were first entering the park, the guy at the gate and the girl at the ticket window told us "no rainchecks or refunds". I expected this, no big deal. As we were leaving, park employees told everyone to pick up a free ticket at the window as they left the park. They actually DID give rainchecks to everyone who tried to wait out the storm! So now we have our tickets for our next trip in our glove compartment, good for anytime this season. I'm excited to go back, just gotta wait for a cooler day. Maybe even another rainy day, because it was cool and there were no crowds. The summer heat here makes it hard to do much, but I'll be keeping an eye on the forecast. It's not the biggest park, it doesn't have the most coasters, but it's got great customer service, friendly ride ops, and great management. It's my one little happy place in this desert of blah. Here's some pics: Sky Ride Scrambler Flying Scooters Paratrooper Hurricane, Drop Zone, Tilt A Whirl and Yoyo. Our new ride, Rock Star Pharoah's Fury A sleeping Bandido.

I'm surprised they made a decision so quickly! That seems to be somewhat uncommon. Seems like usually a park says "we're shutting down the ride and going to evaluate for a while" and gives an announcement weeks, months, or even years later. Has anyone been to this park? What did you think of it?

Haha, that was awesome! Looked like so much fun to film!

^ Also Drop Towers.

The GP hears about things like the 2013 New Texas Giant incident, and I saw many commenters saying it should have had OTSRs if it went upside down. They perceive it as being safer because of incidents like this. Although, if a restraint is not properly secured or if there is a malfunction, it really doesn't matter if it's an OTSR or a lap bar. I have to admit it's more reassuring to me to have an OTSR or comfort collar with some handles on the front to hang onto, if it's a ride with inversions. Even if it's just for show. Kind of like how dogs who are afraid of thunder are calmed down when wearing a shirt.

I went to Disney World in 2001, and I vividly remember the thing about Skippy being fried in the teleport tube thing. I don't remember much else. Maybe I chickened out. Great article!! Very interesting read.

Wanna go skydiving? https://youtu.be/rayVPJ3maO4

^ I second that!