Time for my second installment of the trip. This time, it's going to be a bit longer. As many of you know, this was the best Live that we have attended yet. I'm going to start the report with a bit of the behind the scenes, which should really show just how much fun we had on the trip.
It's still the 29th and we're just leaving Holiday World. We have a very long drive ahead of us. We put on a radio station, and we heard Kesha about 5 times, Bulletproof 3 times, California Girls twice, and a few other popular songs a few times each. The station we were listening to was playing the same seven or eight songs over and over. Driving down the road, Marcus, Aidan, Brad, and me start to point out hot girls, which led us to quite a lot of fun later on in the trip.
We're just passed St. Louis and we need some gas. We pull into a gas station and it was similar to our gas stop in North Carolina on Dixieland Doozy. We saw a guy almost drive away with the nozzle still in his gas tank. We also found that we hit a butterfly:
We get back on the road, still listening to the same radio station. Finally, we arrived in Boonville, MO, a small town that was currently hosting the little league midwest championships. There were kids up the wazoo. We got hungry, so we wanted Wendy's at the truck stop next door. Instead of taking two lefts to the building, we drove around back through the truck stop, constantly avoiding trucks and other obstacles until we got there. Later that night, we wanted to go swimming. The pool's water level was about a foot lower than it should have been and the hot tub was probably 110*. We ended up splashing, dunking eachother, and making fun of Taylor. We then ended up relaxing before going to bed.
The next day, we hit the road again. We started listening to morning radio, which was extremely stupid and funny. We turned it off and started listening to Lil Wayne:
As we got closer to Worlds of Fun, we narrowly avoided an accident(we actually just barely scraped another car) and got some Krispy Kreme. It was then time for credz:
Worlds of Fun was a surprising park. We were expecting another Carowinds, but luckily, the park turned out to be fairly nice and had some decent rides. Our only complaint was the lack of shade in queues. We did get to meet Tom though, which was awesome:
We started with Prowler, which was quite a wild ride through the woods.
It was full of airtime and got better and better as the ride went on.
We each took turns in the front. First was Brad, Marcus, Taylor, and Gavin:
Next was Jerry, Aidan, and Matt:
We rode Prowler about five times before heading to Spinning Dragons. We waited a little, but got on just fine. Tom went with Taylor and Aidan and they spun the entire ride:
Patriot was up next, and ended up being the surprise of the trip. The whole ride was butter smooth with a good variety of elements. The drop, loop, and immelmann are forceful and the 0-g is the best 0-g that any of us have been on. The helix is awesome and the hill over the station has a very nice drop. The corkscrew has the traditional whip and the final helix finishes off the ride with some positive Gs and a bit of airtime. I have a lot of Patriot photos so I will save them until later.
Timberwolf was next, and it wasn't as bad as we thought it would be. We heard crap, and it wasn't too bad.
After Brad got his big apple credit, we went to Mamba.
The ride is alright. The drop and first two hills have good air and the helix has some awesome supports. The rest of the ride is pretty meh though:
We headed for the last cred, which was Boomerang. We thought it was pretty bad, but we laughed at its Barbie colored train and its milk carton as a storage bin.
We went back for rerides, which included Mamba, Prowler, and the photogenic Patriot:
We then headed out. Tom recommended a smokehouse for dinner, so we headed across the state line to Kansas for Jack Stack. We got an incredible amount of meat and it ended up as one of the best meals on our trip. We then said good bye to Tom, who had a ton of fun. We were all glad to meet him and hope that we can again soon.
It was time to drive to Springfield, MO. about two hours into our drive, we stopped for drinks at a gas station. Marcus sees a hot girl walk out of the station and get into her car. He thought the person sitting in the car was her hick boyfriend. They get on the highway before us and we pass them only to find out that her hick boyfriend is actually her even hotter brunette friend, so we waved at them. Two minutes later, they drive passed us waving. The first thing we thought was "PEN AND PAPER!" We found a pen right off the bat and we were scrambling for paper. We couldn't find any, starting to feel glum when we looked at eachother and exclaimed "KRISPY KREME BOX!" We started tearing it apart just so we could write "What are your numbers?" on the box. We drove passed them holding the sign and they returned the message with a number. Unfortunately, they gave us a land line, but the fact that we got a number was great.
We arrived at our hotel a little confused about how to get to it, so we ended up off roading over the grass into the parking lot. We relaxed a little and saw Gavin get frazzled because the attendant at the Kum and Go station wouldn't let him buy beer with a copy of his passport. After more laughs, we went to bed.
The next day was Silver Dollar City.
We got to the park and found a line to get into the parking lot. The entrance was full of old people, but we got in and headed straight for Grand Exposition Coaster. We got our kiddie cred and headed for the bigger rides. We also took in the park scenery:
They had some interesting stuff, including this stone water ball thing:
The park had a swinging bridge as well:
And just like Dollywood, they had the giant skillets filled with delicious smelling food:
Our next ride was Thunderation. Nobody really knew much about this ride, and we found out that the third and fifth cars face backwards. We all had to try it out. The ride starts off at the top of the hill which the park sits on, and meanders down to a giant helix. After a few turns and hills with some airtime, a lift hill takes you up to a fairly large drop which then rises up into the brakes. It's the best mine train that I have been on:
Up next was Wildfire, which was my 250th coaster.
It turned out to be a good choice for 250.
The ride flowed well, had great forces, and was fast paced. If only the ride was a bit longer, it would probably be ranked a bit higher.
Just like all the other coasters, Wildfire sits on the side of a hill. The station and viewing platform are basically half way between the ground and the top of the lift.
We stopped to get some drinks by this lovely waterfall:
Powder Keg was next. It was our longest wait at the park and was one of the more unique coasters of the trip.
The unique part of Powder Keg is its sliding track section. After rolling out of the station, the following piece of track slides to the left and about ten feet upwards to the launch track.
Powder Keg then launches into a series of hills and turns before the lift hill. After the lift hill, you drop down into a forceful helix before the brakes. Personally, I found that the lift killed the flow of the ride.
Our last cred was Fire in the Hole, a clone of Blazing Fury at Dollywood. Not much to talk about here. We then headed to a buffet for lunch, which was absolutely awful. We checked out Flooded Mine, which was a pretty cool shooter. After walking around and grabbing some rerides, we headed out. I'll end this part of the report with a photo of the cutiepies, Brad and Taylor:
I hope this part of the report shows just how much fun these trips were and how much fun all of them can be. I hope that this also inspires/encourages other members to join in on the fun next year.
Enjoy! Six Flags St. Louis and Indiana Beach come tomorrow.