Hard Rock Park for sale

So today is Thursday and there is supposed to be an announcement about the sale. Any news?

I can't find any posts on the Eagle coaster at Hard Rock, so mea culpa.

Um, does this coaster have two side by side, same-size lifts? Can anything be dumber? The second half is just like the first. I can barely tell the two sections apart. The POV video on youtube features an offhanded rider comment "Is that it? Oh." And then the second lift hill ascends, the videographer looking down on the same buildings he captured on the first lift.

An aerial view should reveal the odd layout of this coaster's two halves, the first half almost identical to the second. I don't get it. What am I missing? Even if there's a thematic significance, it's still a disappointing design choice. Please advise.

Thanks.

Eagle layout

Thanks for the picture.

Was this supposed to be a duelling coaster with two trains? If not, what explains the side by side lift hill track layout concept here?

I would assume that yes, operation would be such that as train #1 hits the first set of brakes train #2 would be dispatched. Both would be on the lift and course at the same time.

FYI, it's a standard production model (MK900 M) offered by Vekoma. You can see a list of those currently operating here:

http://www.rcdb.com/ir.htm?model=218

There is also a 3-lift version as well:

http://www.rcdb.com/ig3689.htm?picture=22 (Gardaland's Mammut)

You see, that's one of the big problems hat I had about HRP. The park was themed to a great degree, but the rides were bare and plain, which made them look pathetic compared to everything else. the flat rides had more theming than the coasters.

That's what deterred me from visiting the park when i had the chance...well that and the overpriced admission fee.

Not theming the coasters show very poor planing for such a highly themed park, imho.

I truly regret not having the chance to ride the dark ride.

How were they not themed?

Or more correctly - how could they have been themed any more?

You're way off the mark on that one, LK. Theme was the one thing the park had going for it...including the coasters.

While I agree that marketing was the biggest problem with the park, ( I, personally, would not even have known about this park without being involved with sites like this) I also wonder how much the "theme" hurt the park with people who did know of its existence.

This park was built in an area intended for family vacations, then you put in rides and other attractions that are not "themed" family friendly. Gonch, your kids are probably too young to ask why is there a mushroom growing there? or why does that guy's cigarette in the painting look like that? My niece and nephew are full of questions like that. I'm by no means a prude, nor am I against the theme...after all, I'm a product of the 60's, I just don't want to explain the whole S,D & RR thing.

I still say location, location, location. This was a brilliant park with marketing problems built in an area that was wrong for the intended theme.

K

And HRC can say all they want about the park damaging their reputation, they should have seen this wouldn't work here. It was their license.

My kids are 11 & 7.

My take on such things is twofold:

1. If they're old enough to notice, then they probably know. The beauty of kids is that they're self-regulating. If they're clueless, it goes over their heads, if they're wise to something, they know. (like that image of people having sex that also looks like dolphins - kids see the dolphins because they don't know the image of sex while adults usually see the sexual positions)

2. On the off chance that a kid notices something like that and is still too young to be in on something but still asks - then be a parent and deflect the issue.

Why is there a mushroom growing there?

I dunno. It's a pretty crazy looking mushroom, huh? Probably just decoration.

Why does the cigarette in the painting look like that?

That's the way the artist painted it.

Follow both up by asking your kids what they think. It's a good way to get an idea of what they do and don't know. Open a dialog, talk to your kids and listen to what they have to say.

It's not that hard. How sheltered do we really want our kids to be? Myabe I'm a little more lenient in my parenting?

I stand by my previous assessments - the park was PG at worst. What was implied in most cases made it seem more adult than it really was. It went over the heads of those too young to know.

I agree, Gonch. Take for example RenFairs...99% of the humor at those are filled with double entendres. Parents laugh, kids laugh - both for different reasons.

One example that I can think of from a show called "The Sturdy Beggars Mud Show"...they separate the crowd into two factions, one Sparta and the other Troy. The Troy side's chant is, "Trojans, Trojans we will never break! (hip thrust)"

Katie asked us about the line last year, we told her that they were referring to the castle walls around our town...she accepted it without question because, as you said, she had no idea of any other possible meaning.

Still can't help but think if the name of the park had been "Rock-n-Roll Heaven", they'd have had less baggage in terms of the people who didn't go out of fear that the park was something it wasn't. Also want to note Gonch made two EXCELLENT points about children's psycho-social development. First, they DO regulate themselves so that stuff that SHOULD go over their heads, usually does. Second, if you think something is a little "adult" for your kids, heck, do something crazy and TALK to them about it. Abstinence-only education is a perfect example of what NOT to do - more pregnant kids, more kids with STIs, and fewer who know the actual science. Ignorance may be blissful, but only if it's ignorance out of CHOICE. Anyhow, there's my two cents... :)

I completely agree with Gator. What's wrong with teaching your kids about mushrooms and blunts?

It is kind of like the humor in a show like "The Simpsons" or any of the other adult cartoons which are on tv currently. It came out when I was in junior high. When I watch it in reruns I pick up on a lot of "adult" humor that I didn't understand when I was 12 yrs old.

Both Gonch and Gator are right. With any given issue or concept, there is a certain minimum level of development necessary to explain that issue. Maybe it's cognitive development, or maturity, or "worldliness", I guess, for lack of a better term. And parents (or at least I think I do) have a pretty good feel for where their child is on that scale. When the child reaches that point, the parent has the freedom to teach the child -- perhaps at the limited, rudimentary level required at that time, but then building on that foundation as the child grows. Before this point, there simply is no way to explain it to a child who has lacks the framework to contextualize the information.

Case in point. When my daughter was four, we visited the candle shop on Frontier Trail at Cedar Point. The one candle, out of the hundreds they sell there, that she absolutely had to have, was this trippy, fluorescent, rainbow-colored magic mushroom dude. It was obviously a stoner accessory (and what it was doing on sale at CP, I have no idea!). This litle guy was quite clearly in the middle of a freakin' amazing trip, but there wasn't any easy way to explain it to her at that time.

I rapidly played out the possibilities in my head, and each one led to a twenty-minute long discussion, at the end of which she still wouldn't have 'gotten' it. So when she asked me why the candle was so happy, I used the tactic Gonch described and simply replied, "Maybe because he's at Cedar Point? What do you think?"

Since then, as she's grown, we've been able to begin discussing the whole concept of drugs, what they do, why people use them, their legality, and so on. But below a certain age for some concepts, the best parenting response is sometimes simply to feign ignorance.

Gonch, I only know what pictures tell me when it comes to theme of the parks coasters. Compare the eagles coaster to others like it at other parks. Eagles looked plain. That kind of coaster just doesn't look right to me without a mountain or some trees.

The wheel lift on the other coaster was the only thing that made it any different than the Eagles coaster, as far as I could tell.

I wasn't foaming at the mouth to ride a roller skater either...

Suspended water coasters are fun, but not something to plan a trip around...

Which brings me to Led Zepplin. Looked like a decent ride, but I have already been on many B&M loopers before. It was nothing special, as far as I could tell.

So as far as coasters, if the park had done a little better with planning and selection, I may have gone there this year.

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I really like the idea of asking the child what they think. It has never came to me to do that, but now that it's pointed out to me, it seems very useful in better understanding the child.

I am with Gonch here, which is rare. I have always understood that kids will overlook what they don't understand and to shield them from some issues makes a bigger deal about them and could cause necessary attention to them.

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(begin rant)

That's not to say that I agree that kids should see what adults see. Their is a line that shouldn't be crossed. "A History of Violence", for example, is a really good movie (imo), but I wouldn't allow kids to watch it because of the practically softcore pornography that it contains. The sex scenes are just a little too graphic to allow kids under a certain age to view, imo. The film is rated R, by the way.

Also each child is different. Some of you may remember an incident some years back in one of my few trip reports about Lakemont Park where my 6 yare old nephew received a toy bow-up hammer that read "Get hammered!". I politely asked if we could have a different toy and the games worker refused.

I then had to go to the park office to ask for a different toy, and was rudely mocked by the lady who worked at the counter. it seemed that she just wanted an argument and all I wanted was to exchange the toy. The park's manager, who is a regular poster here on CoasterBuzz (and is awesome), then got involved , was very understanding, and allowed me to trade the toy for one with another message.

The point of that story is that some parents may not object to their child carrying around a toy hammer that reads, "Get hammered!", but I did for good reasons. He knew what "hammered" meant because of family problems he was having at that time in his life, and I didn't want to promote drinking to him at such a young age. (I actuially took him to the park that time to help get his mind off of his family problems, which was being solved at the time.) It could have been a perfectly allowable toy for another kid to have, because they may have had no idea what message mayt have been implied, but not him.

It's up to parents (and uncles, in that case) to know what the child's threshold of understanding is, imho.

I was at Spencer's in the mall last October. A Dad pointed at an erect penis costume and loudly asked his son, who may have been ten years old, what it was. The son started laughing uncontrollably for a few minutes and later pointed it out to his mom. she began to laugh to...

I tought it was not appropriate that they showed the kid the costume, but it's not my kid, and maybe they have regular talks about errections for all I know. So while it bothered me at first, I realized that it was none of my business.

(end rant)

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I always thought a hard rock theme would be awesome, seeing that I am a rock musician myself. I would have eventually got to the park sooner than later. It is the ride offerings that made me rethink the urgency of visiting. I am disappointed that I didn't go last summer when I had the chance, but I believed that I would have a chance to go later. While it is a shame that the park didn't last, blame could be put onto many different reasons. I am not surprised because I took one look at the parks offerings and said, "It can wait until another time".

Sorry so long...thanks for reading.

LK...Thanks for including us 'Uncles" in your discussion. Again, I'm not a prude, I actually own a small music store where we specialize in educating young musicians. I have seen and heard most everything, both from the students and, sometimes inappropriately, from the parents. The drug scene is alive and well even in my small town.

To all parents, I respect your judgment, though I still don't think that properly and, when the time is right, educating the young ones negates the fact that HRP was an adult themed park located in a family vacation spot.

Am I the only one who feels this way?

I will somewhat disagree, obxKevin. HRP was a "rock" themed park, not a drug and sex themed park.

I wanted to take my cousin with me when I did get the chance to go to HRP. He is 13 and a better guitar player than a lot of pros out there. He would have loved a rock themed park for the theme, but like me, I'm not so sure that he would have been impressed with the rides there.

* Baggy pants came about because of gang members hiding weapons in them, which then became a trend made popular by rap artists.

* Ozzy is so burned out on drugs that it isn't easy to understand what he says a lot of the time. As a result of that he appeared in a recent commercial about text messaging.

* Tie dye wearing hippies and magic mushrooms came from the 70's drug movement, but the style is common today even for people eho are not drug users.

And the point I am trying to make here is that even though some activities are illegal or adult oriented, some of the trends that result from them can be much more innocent.

With a few exceptions, like the pot leaf, I don't view some styles as promoting illeagle or adult activities.

obxKevin said:
..HRP was an adult themed park located in a family vacation spot.

This past summer was my first visit ever to MB and to be entirely honest, I was felt the shops and going ons on the strip near the beach around the Family Kingdom area was way more adult than anything at HRP.

I'm still not sure what was supposed to be so 'adult' at HRP. There was some innuendo, no doubt, but nothing worse than your average animated movie from Dreamworks or Pixar or whoever.

^^And don't forget Tang. Also a product of the drug culture.

Oh, wait, it was from the space program. Never mind.