Day 4, PKI

Sorry for the week delay, I’ve just been kind of lazy lately. But onto my 3rd and final park of this wonderful trip. I think that this park had a lot more charm and management then PKD did, but that’s just me. I was somewhat disappointed with the coasters, so I’m only giving it a +2.5, which is a respectable rating.

Scooby Doo’s Ghoster Coaster 1 lap -0.5

This was a horribly lifeless ride. It gets my “Least Thrilling Coaster” award. All that it does it go up a vertical lift hill, and then glide along a very short track, without picking up any real speed, and when it seems like your going to pick up some speed, it goes into a mid-coarse block brake. I gave negative points because it always has long lines (which is why I rode it first).

Rugrat’s Runaway Reptar 1 lap +1.5

I decided to hit all of the kiddie coasters while I was in the area. This was an interesting coaster for it being for kids. It actually picked up some good speed throughout the duration. I couldn’t shake the feeling that it felt eerily like an SLC….. I also liked how there were TV’s in line, like there are in many of the rides here, this one was showing clips of a Rugrats episode.

Beastie 1 lap +2

An exact clone of Scooby Doo at PKD. It provides a lot of airtime and laterals for a kid coaster. It’s basically just a short woodie. I wanted to do Taxi Jam to add to the Count, but they wouldn’t let me on…fat heads.

Vortex +2

For some reason I found this coaster to be not as good as it looks. There was a little bit of head banging, but not as much as other Arrow Loopers I’ve rode. The best part of the ride was after the mid-coarse brakes when it went into he corkscrews, ironically, the brakes caused the coaster to have a 0-G feeling when going into the corkscrews, nothing else on the ride was anything special, though I did get to sit next to a hot girl…that’s separate.

Racer Forwards 1 lap +2 Backwards 2 laps +3

Ok, I count racers as separate coasters, so sue me. Well as I always say, coasters are better backwards. Racer and Thunder Road are much better then PKD’s Rebel Yell (too rough). I also liked how on Racer, both trains turn opposite directions, and then meet again. Well there’s not much to say on this coaster, so I’m moving on.

Tomb Raider 3 laps +4

This was an awesome ride, easily settled into my spot for #1 non-coaster ride. I don’t know what these people are talking about when they’re calling it, “A giant top-spin in a box.” I’m sure if they would just ride it, then they would appreciate the theming that this ride has. Sure, the lava doesn’t look real, but that’s ok. The theming consisted of a giant statue in front of you (with eyes that shot out light) some icicles on the top of the building, and the fire part. I liked the restraints that this ride has, they don’t staple you into the seats like most Top Spins, and they’re quite comfortable.

Beast 6 laps +5

Ah, my 100th coaster, and could not have made a better choice (well maybe if it would have been MF). For the first lap I hit the front seat. Gotta love this coaster, it’s constantly rated one of the best coaster in the world, and it’s always a walk-on. One of the weird things about this coaster is the lift hill. It goes up very, very slowly, and then when you get near the top it speeds up. But just when your about to go over, it slows down again. I guess they think that it adds to the dramatic effect or something. Onto the actual review. I like how even though this coaster is kind of a twister, it starts out with a straight drop into a tunnel. That drop is followed by a set of beautiful twists, and maneuvers that lay close to the ground, and seems to use the terrain perfectly, also there’s an additional tunnel in there before you hit the second lift hill. Now, I’m not a fan of dual lift hills in one coaster. But the second half of the ride is so awesome; I couldn’t tell you if the first half or second half is better though, they’re just different. Now, imagine going down about a 20 degrees angle, looking down into a tunnel that looks like it has a 2-foot clearance. But somehow you manage to fit in. This tunnel is so rough, but it didn’t even matter, I actually liked how it shook you around so much, and left you with no control over your own body. That was how great this coaster actually is. Well there’s so much more I could say about this ride, but this has already gone on long enough.

Flight of Fear 1 lap +3

I’m not going to spend that long on this coaster, because I’ll give you more in my PKD trip report, when I go in a few weeks. But for now, all that I have to say is: “Wow”, it is so much better with lap-bars.

Adventure Express 1 lap +3

This coaster easily kicks the Carolina Goldrusher out of its spot for number #1 mine train. I mean it just had such nice theming. You can’t see any of the real theming from any pictures that you find on websites. There is even theming in an underground tunnel, that you go in right before the end of the ride.

Son of Beast 1 lap +1

Ok, this was not that great of a coaster. Not only was it very rough, but also the elements were predictable and monotonous. I mean the coaster might have been presentable if it would have had normal restraints, like of most woodies. But no, they had to go with Premier. They were basically like the restraints for JJ and FOF, with no legroom. So your knees were banging into your stomach the whole ride, not fun if you ask me. I will give the ride the fact that the loop and the first drop were both fun, and for that it is out of the negatives.

Top Gun 1 lap +2.5

This ride had a crazy design for a suspended coaster, it could never match the Bat, but that’s another story. The only problem with this ride is that there was some slight head banging due to the stupid Arrow restraints. But it did have some nice swinging and it was pretty fun. It would be my favorite suspended coaster, if it would have more theming, so that it could compete with BBW.

Face-Off 1 lap +3

I like invertigos a lot. Especially in the back, your supposed to get 5 G’s, while sitting in the back. I actually though that this coaster was somewhat more intense then Two Face. Strange. Some big ways that it was different, was the line, the way that rather having the snaking part until the inversions, it was off to the side, the fact that there was an on-ride photo, and the color scheme.

Well those are my three trips. Bumping my Track record up to 105, it is amazing how your view of coasters can be changed by riding 35 new coasters. Also, it was cool seeing my top 10 list being twisted around, and disoriented.

Well I apologize for the confusion that I started earlier about the paragraphs, and I thank Jeff and the moderators for not deleting it!

*** This post was edited by coasterempire on 7/9/2002. ***

Paragrahps...

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Jeff - Webmaster/Admin - CoasterBuzz.com, Sillynonsense.com
"We used to hate people, now we just make fun of them. It's more effective that way." - KMFDM, "Dogma"

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-Sean Newman
88 coasters in Track Record!! Hypersonic XLC Coaster # 100 in July.
Nitro Laps:105
B+R Launches:28

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www.rockandrollconfidential.com

There’s also a difference between politely correcting someone and making fun of their mistake or even if they didn’t know any better along with name-calling. Not everyone can be as well educated or catch their mistakes as fast as the next guy. It is his site though and he can poke fun and do whatever he wants.

When I’m changing a sentence around, sometimes I accidentally forget to change to tense or have to correct usage as well if I’m in a hurry. All I was saying is that it shouldn’t be such a big deal if someone makes a little mistake. If they were deliberately ignoring them and not paying attention to the TOS, then that would be a problem.

I do understand that we all get frustrated sometimes as well, which could have been the case with Jeff, so I wasn't making a big deal about it to begin with. We're all not English majors and I have several friends(even in their 30s and 50s) that always use "your" instead of "you're" and "to" instead of "too". I never made a big deal out of it since they were never taught to do it the "correct" way. There are a lot of young kids on these boards, so it was possible he/she didn't learn that yet or didn't know any better. I doubt they were plainly ignoring the rules.

*** This post was edited by Koaster King on 7/8/2002. ***

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-Sean Newman
88 coasters in Track Record!! Hypersonic XLC Coaster # 100 in July.
Nitro Laps:105
B+R Launches:28