Guess what? To the shock and awe of absolutely no one, Henry caved and agreed to go see The Home Team in Columbus with me! I know what you’re thinking: “Erin go by yourself you’re a big girl” or “Erin just ask a friend.”

Well, I don’t want to drive at night because I have the eyes of an octogenarian looking through a kaleidoscope.

And…who would say yes to that, LOL.

But I kept pouting and begging and finally Henry was like, “Oh for god’s sake, fine.”

Here is why he was really horrified when I first asked, may I present to you a very professional calendar page of our concerts this September:

I know, it doesn’t look all that bad! Like, there are so many empty boxes with no obligations! But the reason Henry is proactively exhausted is because three of those are out of town, one is a three day festival, and one is a one day festival (it’s actually two days but I spared him and only bought tickets for one day, I am the most considerate!).

9/11: BIGBANG in New Jersey! (I’m the most amped for this one CLEARLY)

9/16: The Home Team in Columbus (a week night, no less!)

9/18-9/20: Riot Fest in Chicago (+ driving Thursday and Monday)

9/24: The Black Queen (in Pgh, calm down Henry!)

9/26: Four Chord (also in Pgh but it’s all day long and he’s annoyed about that)

So basically what this calendar is telling me is that I need to fill it up with more local shows, probably ones I’ll be attending alone!

Oh and at some point we have to go to Philly to help Chooch move into his new apartment.

I’m so excited for Riot Fest and also Four Chord to a lesser extent but I will tell you one thing: nothing has ever been able to fill the void left in my heart by Warped Tour. Oh I know “it still happens!” blah blah. But that is NOT Warped Tour. Not the one I used to know and love.  When we were out over the weekend, I got REALLY sentimental and choked up talking about how it just hasn’t been the same since Warped Tour as AN ACTUAL SUMMER TOURING FESTIVAL hung up the towel. I never had a bad experience at Warped Tour. We never fought at Warped Tour. It was always the best day of the year for me, 100% my Christmas in July. I would go to bed on Warped Tour Eve so fucking giddy and barely able to sleep, then wake up positively rearin’ to go.

I just know that if I went to one of these “new” Warped Tours, it would break my heart. I mean, Hoobastank was at the one this year, and that feels wrong on so many levels.

But anyway, The Home Team reminds me of the stuff I used to go so fucking apeshit over at Warped Tour. It makes me feel kind of young again and excited, GENUINELY EXCITED, for a non-Kpop concert. And I think Henry gets that, because he knows me better than anyone.

OK I have to go. because I’m genuinely crying again, thinking about Warped Tour and how special it was to me. (You know, in case some stranger just came here after thinking to themselves, “I wonder if that Oh Honestly bitch I used to hate read ever grew up” and then landed on this post, the answer is NO, SHE HAS NOT. Emotionally still 15, block me.)

We had planned to go to Kennywood after work on Thursday and ALMOST changed our minds because it was supposed to rain. I’m so glad we stuck with the original plans because—although it DID rain briefly—we had such a glorious evening!

I feel like no matter how many times we got to Kennywood, there is always a need for a recap. But first, look at these rainbow snaps! It did rain briefly while we were there, bringing out a rainbow and then the rest of the evening was rain-free and beautiful.

Can you see it behind Phantom’s supports?

Over Musik Express.

The whole reason for our visit! A dipped cone from Golden Nugget is a must on every visit but the last time we were there, they were doing some sweet potato thing and I got a sweet potato sundae instead which was fine, no regertz I guess, but Golden Nugget is the GOAT when it comes to Kennywood sweet treats.

My Gemini shirt was just collecting compliments from the Kennywood employees left and right (and by that I mean 2 people were like GEMINI! NICE SHIRT! to which I responded both times with a thank you like Gemini is a child that I made or something).

I have new Kodak Charmera – this one is part of the Millennium collection which isn’t too different, just different designs and some new filters but I never use the filters unless it’s by accident, like below (LOL):

OK, here is a bulletpoint collection of things I want to remember from the evening (it was only three hours that we were there so you’d have to hope I don’t have much to say):

• literal walk-on for Steel Curtain. I do like this coaster but it’s just not something I would marathon. Henry thinks it’s rough—I mean, it does shake, but not to the point that it distracts me from enjoying the ride. I still hate that it’s Steelers-themed, though. And I hate the slow AF ops and the slow AF lift hill. But you can’t beat the views if you sit on the right side.

• rain ride on Phantom!!! I haven’t had a raid ride on that in years and it slapped (literally, cold and wet slaps). I was so excited because the ride attendants let us stay on for another ride but then there was some weirdness at the front where some kids were standing on the platform arguing about where to sit (someone wanted to sit with their cousin, I don’t even know what was happening) and NO ONE WAS TELLING THEM TO SIT DOWN OR LEAVE THE LOADING PLATFORM. I couldn’t believe it, like what kind of amateur ops was this?! You don’t let people mill about on the platform like that. Anyway, by the time they got their shit settled, the person in the operating booth got the dreaded PHONE CALL saying they had to shut it down because of storms. I WAS SO FUCKING PISSED OFF AT THOSE KIDS.

The iconic collection of hair ties under the Phantom queue line.

• It was all good though because from there, we ran through the rain to Exterminator – ANOTHER WALK-ON. For some reason, this was one of the best rides I had ever had on this! I was cracking up so hard that it felt like I broke a rib. It just felt like the first time riding it, if that makes any sense. I LOVE EXTERMINATOR and will die on the “It’s the second best coaster in the park” hill. Fucking fight me over it, I don’t care.

• From there, possibly had the WORST ride ever on Musik Express. The ride ops were so anti-fun and serious and the music could barely be heard. Also, they assigned seats. They never fucking assign seats on the Musik Express!! I always like to pick one of the seats that’s at the top inside the “tunnel” portion, but they made us sit in one right by the entrance. It was so lame and weak. Even exiting the ride, one of the attendants was waving everyone to SLOW DOWN as we walked through the exit. It reminded me of my  helicopter Aunt Sharon saying CHEW CHEW CHEW to my brother when he was a baby.

• As mentioned above, the actual longest, most excruciating wait for a Golden Nugget. There was NO LINE. Two people working. Yet it took us probably 7 minutes to get our cones. They were just working at a snails pace, I couldn’t believe it, like we were being punked. Especially toward the end, when the one worker finally made it to the end of the process which requires a few maraschino cherries to be speared on a toothpick for the cone topper, and she realized that the toothpicks were in a brand new package that hadn’t yet been opened so we had to watch in anguish as she slowly and calmly worked the plastic with her fingernails while staring absentmindedly into the distance. I wanted to snap my fingers and yell, “FOCUS, HONEY, FOCUS” but I can’t snap. In the end, of course it was worth it BUT SHEESH.

It’s almost impossible to hear but one of my favorite songs (and greatest songs ever written) was playing while we were eating our cones faster than they were made: JACKIE BLUE.

https://www.ohhonestlyerin.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/MOVI0033.avi

• We had 30 minutes before the park was closing to run back over to Phantom (“I’m not running, you’ll be riding by yourself if you don’t slow down,” Henry said). All that speed-walking was for naught because a family got to the entrance right before us AND WALKED THE SLOWEST WALK IN THE WORLD the entire length of the queue line. If you have never been here, just know that even if there is no one in the park, there is no fast way to get to the station of the Phantom – you have to walk the whole length of the queue. These people were clearly not thoosies by any means–they were STROLLING. I was so close to the back of the mom that there is no way she couldn’t feel my HOT-HEADED BREATH ON HER NECK. I was fuming!! I kept doing a little “temper tantrum stamp” with my fists clenched. I was making dramatic “MOVE” motions with my arms and at one point, the daughter turned around to say something to her and caught me LOL. MOM WAS TOO BUSY SAVORING HER VAPE TO BE BOTHERED TO PICK UP THE PACE and I was ready to stroke out. I AM ALWAYS IN A HURRY, ESPECIALLY WHEN IT’S ROLLER COASTER RELATED.

• Aside from that, we had the BEST RIDES ON PHANTOM!! Back row, and they let us stay on three times in a row. Henry was trying to get out after the second ride but I wouldn’t move. “I don’t want to ride again, I have a headache!” he cried, and I was like, “Bitch, tell that to your mom because I DO NOT CARE.” So he had to ride again, LOL. Plus, we were sitting behind two Kennywood worker who were done for the night and they were so much fun! WE ALMOST GOT TO STAY ON A FOURTH TIME but I gave Henry a reprieve and got off since the park was essentially closed at that point anyway. (It was 8PM.) I will never stop singing about how much I love the Phantom, though. IT’S SO GOOD.  

• I finally got good Phantom merch!! For YEARS I have been waiting for a good Phantom shirt design and they finally have one. I also got a keychain <3

I mean, that was a pretty great way to spend a random Thursday evening, if you ask me. I love Kennywood.

The other day, the rumor that Fun Spot America is closing was confirmed as true. I have been quietly sitting with my feelings on this one. We had such a fun time visiting this place three summers ago to ride ArieForce One and I am so worried about what will happen to this coaster now. Please please please let someone buy it and relocate it — this coaster is too majestic, too elite, TOO YOUNG to be scrapped.

We were just out with our friends Jess and Shawn and I was telling them about this because their nephew has recently gotten into coasters. I was like, “TELL HIS PARENTS THAT THEY NEED TO GET HIM HERE BEFORE AUGUST 3RD!!” I realized while talking about it that I had a lump in my throat. I think I’m starting to really comprehend that it’s not fully about the roller coasters, it’s about the fact that this has been something that me, Henry and Chooch have bonded over for the last 10+ years. We have had so much fun and made so many memories traveling the world for coaster credits and this one coaster was so highly ranked by all of us.

Ugh. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t so emotionally connected to every little fucking thing!

Anyway, I’m bringing this old blog post back in honor of FunSpot and ArieForce One. If you’ve ridden it, you get it.

July 2023

I know sometimes it sounds like my brilliant ideas are born from late nights rolling in a kiddy pool of cocaine, but I swear to BETTY FUCKING WHITE that my “It’s so easy” plan of driving a billion miles from Pgh to Atlanta to ride one goddamn rollercoaster actually ended up being something that was enjoyed in equal parts by ALL.

(OK, maybe more like 50% me, 25% each to Henry and Chooch – they don’t get excited about shit.)

By now, you know (and still don’t care) that my favorite roller coaster manufacturer is ROCKY MOUNTAIN CONSTRUCTION (RMC). When it was announced that they were building a brand new ground-up coaster (they are mostly renown for taking already-standing wooden coasters and making them insane feats of engineering) at this tiny family entertainment center outside of Atlanta called Fun Spot America, the coaster community went wild with confusion, speculation, and of course excitement falling in clumps out of cargo-pockets.

In America, RMCs generally only go to the big name parks, the Cedar Fairs, the Six Flags. This particular Fun Spot (there are two others in Florida) is essentially an arcade with some go-kart tracks and flat rides in an old, repurposed parking lot. The only coasters they already had was a janky jumble of track called Hurricane (the kind of coaster you’d expect to see in a traveling parking lot carnival, actually) and a standard kiddy coaster.

And now, a fucking beast of an RMC called ArieForce One, which just opened last March. I know we’re going on this big trip in a month, but I was like, “HENRY WE HAVE TO RIDE THIS THING BEFORE THE TRIP BECAUSE ALL THOSE THOOSIES ARE GOING TO TALK ABOUT IT AND I WANT TO BE IN THE KNOW!!!” Henry tried to talk me out of it, but in the end, I won.

Oh, and “Arie” is not a typo. It’s an homage to the surname of the family that bought this park several years ago, Arie. LEGEND HAS IT (it’s not a legend, it’s right there on FunSpot’s website), the patriarch of the Arie family was/is very into airplanes or whatever. Love it or hate it, RMC built a BEAUTIFUL ride to go along with the theme of flight and when you see this bad boy looming along the side of the road before the full park comes into view, how do you NOT gasp?? I mean, I imagine even if I wasn’t an enthusiast, if I knew NOTHING about this hunk of red and blue track, I would at least be inspired to look up WTF it was and probably start nagging Henry to pull over so we could ride it.

Obviously, we went straight to ArieForce One upon arrival. IT WAS A STATION WAIT. Actually, it could have been a walk-on if we weren’t trying to get either the front or back row, and even then, we barely had to wait because they were running two trains and we were next!

AHHHH!!!!

Chooch was like, “Oh boy, here we go with the station selfies. I am so excited. Yay me.” I ended up ditching Chooch and running up to the front to ride with Henry because otherwise, we’d have had to wait more cycle. So Chooch ended up riding with the single rider / enthusiast that was in front of us in the backrow.

Dude. I don’t know what to say other than IS THIS MY NEW FAVORITE RMC?!?! Holy shit, the things this coaster does seems illegal, honestly. There is this one part where you do a zero G roll / barrel roll over the arcade and it nearly gave me whiplash every time. It was my favorite moment but holy shit, the way you twirl between the structures, talk about head/limbs/everything chopper. Hoo boy!

DO YOU SEE HOW EMPTY THIS TRAIN IS?? It was like this all night! Walking onto an RMC is unheard of at any other park. I mean, for Christ’s sake, we’re lucky if we can get ONE RIDE on Steel Vengeance every time we go to Cedar Point because the line is usually consistently at 90+ minutes. (When it’s not breaking down.)

But on this day, it was us, maybe about 5 or 6 thoosies, and a handful of GP who caught on to the sheer majesty of this ride and knew that it was worth the multiple re-rides. The ride attendants were so great too!! The one guy asked us at one point how many rides we had gotten in so far and I honestly had lost count. I mean, we would ride 3-4x in a row, walk around and do some other things, and then go right back.

I will say that this coaster is tough to marathon though because the very ending has a quadruple double-down that is VIOLENT. And then it just slams you into the breakrun. Parts of my thighs had red marks on them from the sheer force of the restraints crushing into me every single time we reached that element. VERY EXTREME. I think this could be a one and done for the casual rider. You have to be a psycho to beg the attendants to let you stay on when you come back to the station and see no one is waiting for the row you’re sitting in. They allowed it every time!!

We got really lucky too because the weather forecast was calling for storms all evening. And actually, after we had gotten in our first two rides (front and back –  I think I actually preferred the front because it hurt less, lol), we had pissed around a but, checked out the arcade, rode some other rides, when we overheard the ride attendant for the janky coaster, Hurricane, get a call that said some of the rides needed to stop operations because lightning was spotted.

I was literally screaming, “Nooooooo!!!” thinking that we were only going to get those 2 rides on Arie, and were probably going to have to leave the park altogether if it started storming. This was only about an hour after we arrived too! I was big sad.

But then I was like, “Well, let’s just walk toward Arie just in case, you never know,” and right as we were walking that way, we passed someone who looked like he was In Charge as he was telling another park employee, “All clear of lightning” so then I was like “LET’S GOOOOOOOOOOO!!” and yep, just as we ran up the steps to the Arie station, they were just about to start sending trains again!

On one of our many rides, Chooch told me, “As we go over the hill, don’t look down, just look straight ahead. It makes it better,” and I thought this was just some dumb thing he had made up to see if I’d fall for it, but I did it and it made the butterfly sensation amplified by a lot, which made me crack up uncontrollably and then spit all over myself. So, then I was laughing even harder, which resulted in me being in tears by the time we careened into the brake run.

At one point, Henry and Chooch wanted to ride go-karts and I said, “OK, I guess I will just go walk around while you’re doing that” and walk around is exactly what I did – straight to ArieForce One!! I rode in the back by myself and one of the loner thoosies was in front of me, so we started talking on the brake run (ops were kind of slow so every time a train came back, it would idle on the brake run for a few minutes while the train in the station was loading). He was really cool but I’m not used to talking to people who actually care about this stuff so WORDS WERE JUST SOMERSAULTING out of my mouth at a pace which made me gasp for breath like an asthmatic. Honestly, I need to come up with a way to tap out of conversations, like putting a paper grocery bag over my head, askin a bee to sting my tongue, or just you know, saying, “Excuse me bye” and walking away.

As it was, we somehow ended up walking out of the station together, super awkwardly, and when he asked what my favorite park is, I BLANKED AND THEN SAID CEDAR POINT??? Cedar Point is NOT my favorite park!??! I feel like if I hadn’t been short-circuiting, I probably would have said Universal / Islands of Adventure or Busch Gardens Williamsburg?!?! And then I was telling him that Kennywood is my homepark and he said he had never heard of it so I was like, “Yeah, you should go sometime and ride Phantoms Revenge, it’s amazing” and he goes, “Who is the manufacturer?” and this is the part that you won’t care about if you don’t like coasters, but I was now in the position where I said to say, “Arrow….and then it was reworked by Morgan” and I could hear myself saying these words while watching the look of skepticism befall his face.

“Oh, OK,” he said.

“Yeah….you should look it up. Well, enjoy the rest of your night!” and then it’s a wonder I didn’t trip and fall into a garbage can in my haste to exit this conversation.

(Arrow is notorious in the coaster community for making pretty shitty, rough coasters and is now defunct. And Morgan is just whatever. So to try and sell the merits of a coaster manufactured by these two companies is pretty insane, but Phantom’s Revenge is the exception, ISTG. LOOK IT UP – COASTER ENTHUSIASTS COME TO KENNYWOOD FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD TO RIDE IT. IT’S CONSIDERED AN ELITE COASTER AND MOST THOOSIES HAVE IT IN THEIR TOP 25-50 LISTS. SO THERE.)

The night rides on this were masterful. CHEF’S KISS, BITCHES.

That ride attendant there in the front was my favorite!!! He never stapled us, he let us pull down the restraints ourselves and then only (GENTLY) pushed until the light on the screen turned green. Bless your heart, sir.

CAUGHT A CHOOCH SMILE. CAN YOU BELIEVE IT.

I love that you can see the ferris wheel from the back of the station!

That other ride attendant over there on the other side of the track is the one who kept permitting us to stay on for re-rides. I loved everyone associated with this ride, you guys. It was an EXCEPTIONAL experience.

Family selfie that only I will forever cherish!

Anyway, I will do a full FunSpot recap another time, but we all were in agreement that as usual, I have the best ideas and that this was 100% worth the 11 hour drive.

I think this was Chooch’s and my 11th RMC, and Henry’s 10th?

1. Lightning Rod
2. Storm Chaser
3. Steel Vengeance
4. Twister Timber
5. Outlaw Run (the one Henry doesn’t have because his back hurt, but we still made him drive us to Missouri lol)
6. Wicked Cyclone
7. Twisted Cyclone
8. Iron Gwazi (ugh this one MIGHT still be my fave??)
9. Goliath
10. Jersey Devil
11. ArieForce One

There are two more that we will potentially add to this list this year: Wildfire in Sweden next month, and hopefully at some point before the end of the year, I’d like to make it back out to Hershey to ride the brand new Wildcat’s Revenge but we’ll see how destitute we are upon return from this August trip hahaha ugh.

Present Day Erin here with an updated RMC list!

1. Lightning Rod
2. Storm Chaser
3. Steel Vengeance
4. Twister Timber
5. Outlaw Run (Henry now has this credit since we went back to Silver Dollar City last summer)
6. Wicked Cyclone
7. Twisted Cyclone
8. Iron Gwazi (ugh this one MIGHT still be my fave??)
9. Goliath
10. Jersey Devil
11. ArieForce One
12. Wildfire
13. Wildcat’s Revenge (Chooch’s fave)
14. Fire Runner

Imagine Chooch’s excitement when I produced my Charmera from my purse as soon as we walked into Waldameer :) At least Zakk was a good sport!

Obviously, this camera isn’t meant to take award-winning photographs so you have to expect extremely low-quality, but I learned on this day that the Charmera doesn’t seem to like sunny days.

Entrance of the Whacky Shack!

This babe.

Comet is such a cute and smooth woodie. This is the perfect first coaster for little kids, honestly.

He’s smiling genuinely here because he didn’t know I was taking his picture WITH MY TINY BABY CHARMERA.

In case you were wondering, I engaged in no hand gesture activity because my hands will white knuckling the safety bar the whole time. Ravine Flyer was HAULING ASS.

And here’s an ear-splitting video:

You’re welcome.

You guys, the greatest thing happened last week. Well, it wasn’t great at first. We had planned to go to Waldameer on Friday because I had the day off and wanted to ride Ravine Flyer II. We were going to go after Henry came home from work. I even told Chooch to bring a friend.

Then, the day before, Henry the Killjoy came home from work and said HE WOULDN’T BE ABLE TO GO WITH US NOW. Something about how HIS JOB IS THE FUCKING WORST AND HE GETS THE RAW END OF THE DEAL EVERYTIME.

“Great, it’ll just be me and Chooch then, fuck off,” I said, but Chooch, overhearing this, said, “Zakk said he can go.”

So then I was like GREAT NOW I HAVE TO BE THE THIRD WHEEL WTF?! And I was so upset about this, thinking that, I don’t know, they were going to exclude me and I would have to walk 20 feet behind them and eat alone on a bench near a putrid garbage can. Probably. I decided to just not go. I was really going to just not go!

But then Henry THE TRAITOR said, “You know he’s not going to go if you don’t go. So just go.”

And you know what? FUCK YOU HENRY YOU’RE NOT GOING TO RUIN MY DAY, DAMN RIGHT I’M STILL GOING TO GO!

(I even half-jokingly suggested that Zakk ask his mom if she wanted to go too but then I would have to be fake-nice all day because I don’t know her well.)

Aside from Chooch’s driving scaring me (I stay fixated on the speedometer from the backseat), it wasn’t a very eventful drive there. Waldameer is in Erie and that’s about a 2 hour drive, but we did run into some traffic which had Chooch extra-surly.

Oh!! There was one point where Zakk mentioned Sleep Token. Chooch and I locked eyes in the rearview mirror and he mouthed, “Go ahead,” with an annoyed eye-flick, so I popped my head up between the seats and said, “I RECENTLY STARTED LISTENING TO SLEEP TOKEN.”

Whew. That felt good! Ever since Chooch told me that they’re like Zakk’s favorite band, I have been dying to say something in an effort to RELATE to the younger generation. I am so desperate for to be liked, clearly.

Anyway, we arrived around 1:30 and, after Chooch was being ridiculous about choosing a parking spot, we entered the park and IMMEDIATELY passed Josh from Coaster Crew who was on his way out with a small group.

“Hey, that’s Josh from our Norden coaster trip,” I said to Chooch. “Go say hi!”

“Why me?!” he cried.

“Because he hated me!” (honestly I truly felt like he did after I deigned talk to him on the bus on our first day about T-Express in Korea. GOD FORBID a woman had a coaster credit that a MAN DIDN’T.)

Chooch actually ran over to him and they exchanged pleasantries! Chooch said he was about to tell him who he was but that it seemed like he actually knew, and even from where Zakk and I were standing, I got that same impression based on Josh’s friendly facial expressions.

Ugh, why can’t anyone ever be pleased to see ME? Or even REMEMBER me?

Chooch really does have it all.

Anyway, Josh is mentioned in this post, if you care. Actually, he wasn’t too bad but it was the guy sitting with him who TRULY despised me and even went so far as snubbing me (no, he did — it was intentional) the next morning when I said hello to him before breakfast. YIKES. Yet another space for women to feel uncomfortable, thanks men!

Zakk had never been to Waldemeer before so I was like WE HAVE TO RIDE RAVINE FLYER II FIRST HE WON’T KNOW WHAT HIT HIM. We’re in the reflection in this mirror. Hello.

It was a beautiful June day, blue skies, mid-60s. So the park had a healthy crowd but even then, it was only about a 10 minute wait. I don’t think we waited longer than 10 minutes for anything all day, and most of the stuff was a complete walk-on.

Since I was the third wheel all day, I had to ride alone on everything—except for this. As I was putting my stuff in the drop box, some man slid into my seat which totally took me by surprise. I tried to ask him if he was excited but he was very clearly on the spectrum (is this bad to say? I do not mean it in a bad way!) so he turned his face away from me and that was the end of that.

Anyway—Zakk loved it! And Chooch said he forgot about how crazy it is. I agree—it felt like it was flying faster than it ever has?! Rag doll city! But damn, the fact that this crazy ass coaster is in some small family park in Erie, PA. Insane.

This ride was new for 2025, I think. A few American parks have these family rides in them now but I have only ridden one in Sweden’s Liseberg. They look so good but they’re not that fun, honestly. And Waldameer wasn’t stacking it so I don’t understand the point of that.

I won’t ride these anymore because sometimes they make me sick.

I don’t have any pictures of this but we had pizza for lunch. Well, Zakk got pizza and Chooch and I each got a pizza boat which was made to order apparently so I had to be the person who waited forever while Chooch and Zakk got to chill at a table and for a small moment of time, I kind of understood what it feels like…to be Henry.

Also we almost only got one pizza boat because the cashier kid didn’t hear me say I wanted one too and it wasn’t until I was standing alone that I felt the sudden inspiration to do mental math when $11-something seemed….kind of cheap for 2 pizza boats and a drink. I mean, cheap by American amusement park standards. So I looked at the menu and noticed that one pizza boat was almost $6 so I had to run over to the guy and ask, “Hey, I ordered 2 pizza boats—” JUST AS SOME OTHER GUY WAS GETTING A PIZZA BOAT OUT OF THE COOLER. So the cashier had to yell for him to get a second one and that is how I saved myself from having to wait 20 minutes instead of 10 for a fucking pizza boat.

(Yes, I paid for the second one at that time!)

(It was pretty good, actually.)

Then we rode Comet and some kid got yelled at for standing up when the coaster was coming back into the station. That was pretty exciting.

I own’t ride this either. You can put me on something that flips me upside down mercilessly a la the Zipper, but anything that has a back and forth motion? It’s a good way to see regurgitated pizza boat.

I waited while Chooch and Zakk rode it and then afterward, I wanted to go talk to this dad who was wearing a SEVENTEEN shirt but then I just felt weird because he was sitting with his family and eating. I wanted to say, “I’m a Carat, too.”

:(

Oh, not pictured but we also rode the log flume there — Big Thunder — and I think it was actually only the second time I’ve ridden it. I forgot how good it is!! First of all, god bless log flumes. I am still so pissed at Kennywood for getting rid of theirs. (Oh it was past its shelf life, OK great, REFURB IT ASSHOLES!)

ANYWAY, this was hilarious because I wanted to ride in the same log but obviously not in the same compartment as either Chooch or Zakk so I made them squeeze into the front together while I had all the room in the world in the back. I was all stretched out, super comfortable, while they looked like they were going to need the jaws of life to remove them from the log.

At one point, we were going up one of the lift hills and a log of young girls below us drifted by, One of them made some strange flipper-like gesture with her hand, while looking up at us.

“What was that?? What does that mean?” I yelled up to Chooch and Zakk. Zakk was like “tf if I know” while Surly Chooch was super irritated by this. Were they making fun of us?

When we reached the top of the hill, the track was curved into a horseshoe shape so there was another log ahead of, facing the other direction, about to go down the drop. The kids in that log looked over at us and did the same thing!!!

“I AM NOT DOING IT,” Chooch growled.

“Doing what?? What do they want you to do? Is this a local gang thing!?!?!” I screamed.

“No, worse! IT’S A TIKTOK THING.”

Oh.

Zakk and I both said that we were not aware of this phenomenon and Chooch was shocked that I hadn’t seen it because it seems like something “stupid Jake and Johnny would do,” Chooch said in disgust. Wow, he hates everyone I follow on Insta and YouTube!

I guess it’s some scuba thing? I asked him if it was supposed to be like a reimagination of the 1950s/1960s swimmer dance thing and he said it’s not a dance at all so I’m even more confused now. Basically, anything that comes from TikTok, which I do not watch, confuses me. If that makes me an out of touch hag, so be it. I’m good with that.

But now that I know this is a thing, I kept seeing it ALL DAY LONG. It’s so fucking weird?!

“Is this like an elementary school kid thing?”  I asked Chooch later after seeing someone do it on Ravine Flyer while we were in line.

“No! It’s elementary all the way to like, college. It’s everyone and it’s stupid and I hate it,” he muttered.

I love that he gives off such agitated dad vibes. It kind of made up for Henry not being there.

I bought us all cookies from the Cookie House! I actually wanted a M&M one like Chooch and Zakk got but I went for the snickerdoodle just so I could send Henry a taunting picture of it to make him feel bad for ditching us (me).

When I was waiting for Chooch and Zakk to ride this, some bitch lady was screaming at her son for being too scared to ride this and then FORCED him to get in line with his brother. I muttered “cunt” under my breath and should have hit her with the scuba thing too. Make her wonder all weekend if I cursed her.

OMG this is genuinely my new favorite carouselfie because Zakk clearly had no idea what was going on and I cannot wait to get this framed and on the wall with the rest of them!

Oh, also not pictured but we had a fantastic ride on the Steel Dragon coaster, maybe the best ride I’ve ever had on it. It was spinning to perfection! But right before this, idiot bitch Chooch told the ride attendant that there were just two of them and she almost put them in a car with two other people, until I leaned forward and cried, “Hey!” and he said, “Oh yeah,  three.” So we got to go on the next one together :)

Also, right before this when we were standing in line, I was looking a tree and thought to myself, “That tree is really beautiful. I feel happy today” and then I started to briefly cry because EMOTIONS.

Lol.

Ugh.

They have all these creepy kid statues scattered through the park.

I’m desperate to get one of these for the house. I have wanted a clown trash can for ages!

Ew, we went on the Swings and there were these two little Jonny Craigs who were being so stupid and one of them was LIFTING HIMSELF UP OUT OF THE SWING as it was starting and I was like OMG MAKE HIM STOP but no one said anything?!!? Then he and his hooligan friend were screaming about how they were going to die and people on the ground were looking concerned.

I think we ended up riding Ravine Flyer 4x – two of those times were back to back and my brittle bones were crying. GodDAMN does this coaster fucking haul. I walked away with souvenir bruises as usual.

And obviously we rode my beloved Whacky Shack <3

What a fantastic day! We left a little after 6pm because they had plans with their friend Simon later that night and this is not a full day park anyway, but I actually think this might have been the longest we’ve ever stayed there. Even Chooch was like, “I don’t remember ever staying here this long.” We were having so much and they didn’t shun me or exclude me either (minus the time Chooch wrote me out of the equation by saying there were just 2 of them for Steel Dragon, sigh). I’m so glad we ended up still going even after Henry rudely abandoned us.

(Don’t worry, I had my Kodak Charmera with me so I’ll have another post with those pictures!)

Taking the day off last Wednesday and going to Cedar Point ended up being an A+++++ idea, you’re welcome, Henry. The thing with Cedar Point is that you truly have to plan for the day you want to have. You want to be royally pissed off and get to ride maybe 3 coasters all day? Go on a weekend. Otherwise, you’re gonna have to take a day off and go on a weekday. Preferably in May or end of August once kids are back in school. Then you have to pray for decent weather because even one rain drop or the slightest breeze will shut the whole place down, I swear to god.

We didn’t renew our passes this year because it’s still kind of confusing with the Six Flags merger + without Chooch, we don’t anticipate going to very many parks. That being said, now that we had to PAY FOR PARKING, we were totally grossed out to see that it was $42!! FOR PARKING. Let that sink in. So what, we’re paying daycare for our fucking car? It’s not enough that they price gouge you at the gates and every subsequent place you get food & drinks from therein? Fucking racket.

Once we were in the park, we went straight to the dreaded Tope Thrill 2 because the last time we were at CP, it was 2 summers ago and that was the season the new TTD debuted and then proceeded to be shut down for the whole season for maintenance. One thing to know about me, I might LOVE rollercoasters, but I hate strata coasters. I hated the OG Top Thrill and I SUPER HATED Kingda Ka. It’s the anticipation of the diabolical launch, and then the launch itself. Not the height of the top hat. I just get NO thrill (top or otherwise) out of it. But I felt like I needed to do this new-fangled one at least once, especially since the wait was FIFTEEN MINUTES, LET’S GO.

“What row do you want to sit in?” Henry asked and I quickly said, “Literally wherever they assign us, I just want to get it over with.”

Bro. They put us in the front row. :(

The worst seat for me on these types of rides.

I literally just screamed FUCKFUCKFUCKFUCKFUCKFUCK the whole time and then as it hit the brake run, “Oh. That wasn’t that bad.” Somehow less bad that Kingda Ka, even though this Top Top 2 has three launches now: one that launches you forward and halfway up the tophat, one that launches you backward up a spike, and then one that launched you forward again but this time with enough speed to send you over the tophat.

I texted Chooch about it and all he said was, “You’re at Cedar Point?” I know it’s just words over text but IF IT DIDN’T SLAY MY HEART. I felt so guilty being there without him and also missed him so much! Even though had he been there, he would have been Mr. Miz.

We headed to the Frontier section of the park after this and got in line for Steel Vengeance. I kept saying the line was long and Henry was denying it but it was at least 60+ minutes, so I made the executive decision to leave the line and come back later. These situations are a lot like gambling! I was going to make a poker reference but then remembered that I barely know how to play Solitaire so we’ll just leave it at a vague gambling reference and move on.

Maverick’s line was long AF as usual so we skipped it completely (all day too, actually!). I realized that I actually hate Maverick moreso because of the annoyance and frustrations that go into riding it. We had one good experience EVER. And that’s usually the one line where we experience the most line jumpers too and it makes me want to Hulk out.

LOL I took this picture just for Chooch – and the Internet. This was in line for Millie (Millenium Force for all you GP) and I was panicking because there is all this drama this year with new seatbelts that are significantly shorter than the originals, preventing 60+% of previous park-goers from riding now. I was so afraid that Henry was going to be affected by this. We watched as people were getting turned away, ride attendants unable to get the belts to buckle. Henry was pointing out other people who succeeded, saying things like, “Oh come on, if HE can still ride it, so can I.”

And phew – he was fine. We sat in the backrow (I will only do front or back on Millie, thank you) and I am happy to say that this was one of the smoothest rides I’ve had on it. I grayed out, too! (I mean, I was also super hungry and probably half dehydrated, so that always does it.)

The only downside was that this should have been about a 10 minute wait but because of the seatbelt drama, ops have slowed drastically and it seemed like it was taking them a good 5 minutes to send some of the trains. And they only had 2 running instead of 3, which makes sense with how slow the ops are now. They’d be stacking trains on the brake run.

Oh, the other downside was that, until we made it into the station, we were stuck behind the MOST ANNOYING/TRASHY MOM who was eating a bag of BBQ chips with absolutely no couth or regard for those around her, spraying crumbs out of her bitchy Karen mount every time she started complaining about something, anything. Meanwhile, the three girls with her were all fighting over who was going to sit with her?! Like, they all actually WANTED to ride with this bitchy cow. And they did my most pet-peevey thing of all at an amusement park — they passed through the turnstile into the station and proceeded to JUST STAND THERE instead of choosing a row to stand in.

I. Fucking. Hate. That.

When you enter the ride station, YOU DISPERSE, PEOPLE. Move it! I gotta get to the backrow and you are BLOCKING MY ACCESS.

I kept saying, “Let’s go eat, I have to eat” but then we ended up riding Millie and then I said, “Oh we might as well ride Siren’s Curse too since it’s right here.” LOL. Coasters over food.

Siren’s Curse was AMAZING!! The line was only about a 20 minute wait. Similar to SteVe, once you get closer to the station, there’s a free locker area. I don’t know what Henry’s deal was but he was taking FOREVER punching in PINS and whatnot but overall the experience wasn’t too hectic. It was about a 5 minute wait from that point on.

We just let the attendant assign us a seat because I truly just wanted to ride it once and see what all the fuss about – the first tilt coaster in the US! We were pretty much in the middle of the train and even then it was a crazy fun experience! I LOVED the onboard audio. I will tell you now that we went back later and, after having an annoying experience with some lone kid (maybe 11 or 12) who just casually skirted almost the entire line—Henry actually tried to trip him LOL–I asked the ride attendant if we could have the backrow. He was like, “YES, JUST MOVE ASIDE AND I WILL GET YOU ON THE NEXT ONE”–sometimes all you have to do is ask and unless it’s an over capacity weekend and the crew are dicks, they will usually say YES. Sometimes with attitude, but this was a good day and the guy was super nice.

Also, not me automatically adding “do you care?” to the end of my “back row” requests like it’s my vocal stim. I hate myself sometimes.

BACK ROW, BRO!! I can’t explain the sensation of being that high up once the train does the total vertical tilt, but it is INSANE. Even Henry REACTED and he usually is very “arms up yet stoic” on coasters, not even a single scream. But he was like, “THAT WAS REALLY GOOD” when we got to the brake run. Yeah, you’re welcome! It was so good that I had to buy a t-shirt!

I had to get a Youth version because the adults only had sizes too big for me, what is up with theme park merch sizing this year?

Satisfying pizza and bean side salad at Hugo’s – I really miss the food truck area because there was some place that had a “sunflower veggie burger” and it was one of the best veggie burgers I have ever had. I used to look forward to inhaling one of those just as much as riding SteVe! But this pizza did the trick and I felt super powered up and ready to ride.

Immediately after eating, we went right next door to Raptor and it was A STATION WAIT.  I have had actual miserable experiences waiting in this line in the past so this was a real treat. I LOVE RAPTOR SO MUCH. B&M inverts are some of my absolute favorites and this one is one of the best. Plus: the color scheme!

The ride ops were so high-energy and fun, too. It really does add to the overall experience when you see the crew members legit having fun and enjoying their job! These guys kept pantomiming that they were kicking the trains out of the station and it brought me a dumb level of joy.

Gatekeeper station selfie!

This was probably the longest line we stood in all day. It was at least 45 minutes even though the line barely came out from where it splits into two lines – one for each side. But turns out, they were only running ONE TRAIN and ride ops were slow AF. They also seemed to be having major malfunctions with the station recording – it kept playing the “train is entering the station” part or whatever, over and over, and one of the ops in the control room thingie was hilariously losing his shit over it. It was making me crack up so bad. Then he was playing rock, paper, scissors from the control room with the people in line for the front row.

Since we were in the backrow, we got to be privy to the comings and goings of the people with the ADA passes, etc. The ride attendant at the exit on our side took the pass from this one family and told them to go back down, around, and to the other side and the attendant on that side would get them on the train (Gatekeeper is a wing coaster so there are two sides/lines). Our guy went over to the train while it was still loading and handed the pass to the attendant on the other side, would made my control room op boyfriend get on the mic and drolly say, “Hey. No passing notes in class.” I LOL’d but Henry of course missed the whole thing because he was probably wishing he had some candied prunes to suck on.

The crew makes all the difference, I’m telling you! Instead of this long-ass wait being the lowlight of the day, it ended up being a pretty funny and memorable moment!

The Boardwalk is my forever favorite area. I’m still bitter that Spaghetti Noodle was removed in order for this area to come to fruition, but at least it wasn’t all for naught?? They are always playing the most fun retro pop over in this bitch too.

Henry finally succumbed to the cold (the “feels like” temp was 40 degrees!) and went into the gift shop to buy a hoodie. I tried to get him to buy this one but he started crying about how there was “too much going on.”

He did end up buying one that I picked out, and then we went next door to get our one Cedar Point non-negotiable food: COOKIES. We got a lemon and snickerdoodle and split them. I love their cookies!

LOLOL. Hoodied up.

In line for Wild Mouse! The one downside to CP is that because they’re always trying to maximize the thru-put, they will pair you up with other people on this one to make sure each car has 4 people in it. So, we ended up riding with two giggly boys that could have been Chooch and one of his friends, honestly. It’s fine, but it does prevent me from wildin’ out as much as I typically would on a Wild Mouse! I don’t know why—some weird “sharing a car” shyness comes over me or something!

BRUH THEN IT WAS STEVE REDEMPTION TIME AND HOLY SHIT HOLY SHIT HOLY SHIT. I can’t say this was my BEST experience on SteVe because NOTHING beats on a night ride, but this one was close. First of all, the line stopped right where the line splits—people who need a locker vs people who don’t. If you have never been to CP before, this is essentially so close to the station that it’s nearly a station wait. Almost unheard of. On any regular day, you’re waiting at least an hour for SteVe. We waited MAYBE 10 minutes. And then I used my charm to ask the ride attendant if we could have the backrow and he very nicely said yes.

The ops were ON SPEED. They were running all three trains and the efficiency was admirable. I think it’s a prerequisite—if a park is going to have an RMC, they need to train their crew to know how to run that ship. RMCs are always the CRAZIEST station shows. I’m pretty sure most crews even time themselves. It’s so good, so fast, you are in that train and then OUTTA THERE.

THE MIDCOURSE TRIMS WERE OFF. I was practically having an out of body experience over this. Every time I think that maybe SteVe isn’t my #1 anymore, I ride him again and it’s like…how could I ever have any doubts?!

AND THEN WHEN WE GOT BACK TO THE STATION THERE WAS NO ONE WAITING FOR THE BACK TWO ROWS SO THEY LET US AND THE PEOPLE IN FRONT OF US STAY ON.

THAT HAS HAPPENED TO CHOOCH ON STEVE BEFORE BUT NEVER TO ME!!! I WAS FUCKING FREAKING OUT!

Afterward, I kept saying, “WHAT A BLESSING! WHAT A TREAT!” over and over.

Henry, meanwhile, offered up this great review that I think should be put on a banner near the entrance to entice new riders:

“It was no stopping. All fast, no slow.”

Siren’s Curse is genuinely so sick. I’m very glad that we were there on a day when we were able to easily ride this twice. I wish Chooch had been with us though :(

OMG I love Iron Dragon but Henry and Chooch are always like “….” when I say I want to ride it. It was a walk-on though so Henry was like, “JFC, fine.”

These kids were in front of us yelling at someone on the coaster — it sounded like JANNA but was probably Jada or Jana. I was cracking up though, thinking it would be funny if actual Janna popped up as Iron Dragon entered back into the station, making these kids the New Gen of Janna hecklers.

CALYPSO TIME! I LOVE CALYPSO! HENRY DOES NOT LOVE CALYPSO! But he rode it anyway, even though he kept complaining about his stomach hurting lol.

I always forget how diseased this Hipstamatic filter is on skin tones, lol

And then we left around 7, an hour before the park closed, because we had a three hour drive home ON A SCHOOL NIGHT. It was such a great day, PTO perfection, never too old to take a day off to go ride roller coasters. (Well, in Japan you can’t ride coasters after the age of 65 or something, so…)

There were only two bad things:

• Chooch wasn’t with us and I missed him terribly;
• Magnum was down all day. :( (Henry was happy about that, though. “Maybe they’re replacing the square wheels,” he muttered.)

Henry surprised me the other day with a Kodak blindbox and this cutie keychain camera came out of it! I love love love using cheap cameras, toy cameras, film cameras. Anything where you don’t really know what the output will be because it takes the pressure away when you expect imperfection. It puts the fun back into taking pictures! I already tested it out at a concert Tuesday night (more to come on that!) and yesterday I took it with us to Cedar Point! I figured, I have so many of the same pictures from Cedar Point, why not get a new perspective?

I’ll have a more comprehensive run-down of our day at CP (god forbid I skip an amusement park recap!) but I wanted to put the Kodak pictures here by themself because they’re fun! Also, it was hilarious how many times passers-by would give me a double-take and ask amongst themselves, “is that a CAMERA?” It is TINY so that’s a valid question! You can barely see out of the viewfinder, TBH, so a lot of these were shot with a hope and a prayer.

Top Thrill 2.

In line for Gatekeeper.

Leaving Siren’s Curse.

Intentional hand shot, lol.

Baby geese!

The Boardwalk is my favorite area of Cedar Point. The vibes are always vibing, even on overcast days in May with a “feels like” temp of 40 degrees.

SteVe <333333

In case you ever want to know what the ground looks like in Cedar Point.

Experimenting with camera-placement for selfies, lol – this was a fail.

Better, except for my face.

CALYPSO IS ONE OF MY FAVORITE RIDES!

Intentional shoe shot.

Dreading Calypso, lol.

I conned Henry into getting us Kennywood season passes again this year even though last year we just barely broke even on them. But I just feel very motivated to get out there more on weeknights, something to do, get us out of the house!

Since we had the passes, we decided to stop by in the late afternoon on Saturday because it was the last weekend to get this sweet potato sundae that I kept hearing about. I love sweet potato things. Plus, I haven’t treated myself to a sundae in a good long while.

I WANTED IT.

So, that was the first item on the agenda.

Bruh. It was…OK. Perhaps my view of sweet potatoes has been altered by South Korea, but for some reason, I thought it was going to be something like a halved candied sweet potato with ice cream on it, sort of banana split adjacent? But that’s my fault for having lofty visions, I guess, because in reality it was simply sweet potato softserve (and very liquid-y soft serve at that) topped with whipped cream, graham cracker crumbles (I had no idea that’s what that was supposed to be until I just now read the sign in the picture up there) and marshmallows. I mean, it was fine! Not $9 fine though.

I regret not getting the cupcake instead.

Henry got the sweet potato fries. They were OK as well.

On the train. I have thoughts:

• love that they got rid of the Thomas theming, and I used to LOVE THOMAS but not when they fuck with a classic train ride to incorporate it in the theming – and lame ass theming, at that
• please bring back the tunnel
• glad they added some historical shit to the route but I feel like they could do even better
• LAUGHING SAL NEEDS TO COME BACK TO THE ENTRANCE
• also speaking of the entrance, please revert to the old entrance

Durrr. I like how my lipstick is smudged and Henry never said a thing to me. GOSH (hate when adults say that, SO JUST SO YOU KNOW I am using it ironically!!), I sure hope it was like this all day.

Other than that, great fun!

This lady in front of us was joyfully repeating all of the facts being blasted out of the speakers to her son, who stayed hunched over his phone the entire time. :( Also, FUCK YOU AND YOUR STUPID ARM, HENRY!!!!

OK I understand that the Log Jammer was super fucking old and they had to remove it because it was too costly to maintain or whatever the fuck, but it was the best water ride in the park and they just replaced it with a coaster that didn’t really live up to the hype and is CONSTANTLY NEEDING MAINTENANCE. Just bugs me. I hope Herschend doesn’t continue the trend of dumb moves.

This could have been a walk-on but someone puked and then the ops were slower than Spencer Pratt’s crystal sales.

Bae’s 25th birthday this year!! They were sending trains with a quickness on this day! Ops were a well-oiled machine. Had to laugh at the new air gates though, lol. I thought they were adding theming/audio to the station for the Phantom’s birthday glow-up but I guess I was wrong? I did like how they alternated the green/purple cars on both trains though.

This baby was running BUTTER SMOOTH. I will never not be in awe of the fact that we have THIS BADDIE in our home park. And they finally have decent Phantom merch! Except every shirt was 2XXL so I didn’t get anything but I think at some point this summer I will be snatching a keychain at least.

I still cannot ride the Swingshot without thinking about the time I went to Fright Fest with Kara way back in…2006?? 2007?? and was so terrified on my inaugural ride of this thing that I vowed to NEVER ride it again, and now it’s probably my favorite ride there after Phantom! BOTH OF MY FAVES IN ONE FRAME!

I’m always trying to get out of town friends to come to Pgh so we can go to Kennywood because I love seeing the faces of people after they ride Phantom for the first time but no one ever wants to come here lol.

We were in line for Jack Rabbit and saw some little kid nearly fall off a paddleboat and into the water because he kept getting out of his seat and climbing all around and the other passenger was his marginally older brother who was NOT in any position to be a responsible guardian. The paddleboat lady was screaming for them to paddle their asses back and it was very entertaining, honestly. Henry missed the whole thing because he’s a screenager.

I…don’t remember the carousel being this fast?

Carouselfies don’t hit the same without Chooch :(

(Because he’s always so pissed off about it and I derive great joy from that!)

Basically, we just kind of strolled all around during this visit. We didn’t even ride Exterminator, now that I think about it! But, we will be back v. soon.

Oh you guys, to be back in Busch Gardens after 4 years! What a dream, what a blessing, what a…oh, who cares. It’s just an amusement park, what do you guys care lol. It was unseasonably hot that day – mid-80s in March! I hate winter (well, I guess technically we had reached the milestone by this point) but it seriously scares me when we get weirdly inappropriate warmth so soon. Like, legitimately terrifies me. Luckily, it wasn’t humid so the sunshine and heat was very enjoyable.

After choosing the wrong ticket-scanning line (always have to pick one wrong line, whether it’s the parking booth lane, security, or ticket-scanning) and standing for an eternity behind two people who didn’t have their tickets ready on their phone and then couldn’t find them (and hello ticket-scanning lady, did you think to maybe have them step aside and scan us while they got their idiotic selves sorted??) we speed-walked straight to Darkoaster and by that I mean first we had to stop at a restroom so our token Old Man could pee (fine, we all took the opportunity) and then walked for a good fifteen minutes around the sprawling park before finally reaching our destination. I always forget how freaking giant Busch Gardens is! And for as many times as we’ve been there, I cannot get the layout to stick in my memory so I’m always like, “Is this the right way? Shouldn’t we have been there by now?” It’s not great when you’re in a hurry. (And we always are!)

Durrr.

This was one of the new coasters that arrived on the scene after our last visit. It used to be a dark ride – Chooch and I went on it the first time we ever visited way back in…2013? 2014? and it was super fun and unexpectedly “high tech.” Kind of like a precursor to what Universal would eventually do with the Harry Potter dark rides. Looking back, it seemed kind of ahead of its time. I had to google it – it was a 3D motion-based dark ride called Curse of DarKastle. So, BG kept the building and themed an indoor coaster around the original lore.

We were making Henry take pictures of us in the BACK ROW line. We actually had to wait quite a bit for this one – maybe around 40 minutes? And we were dying the whole time because Henry stupidly got in the same line as us rather than choosing another row where he could ride on the same train as us, and it was looking like he was going to be riding with a young girl (maybe 10 or 11) who was very forlorn-looking AND had a bandaid across her forehead. Her dad and sister were in the row next to us, leaving her relegated to single ride status. Henry was NOT amused by our giggle fits.

I was just so giddy to be back at an amusement park, waiting for a backrow ride on a new-to-us coaster!

I mean, it wasn’t that great of a coaster – the thoosie reviews were correct in that the lack of theming was very sad – but it was still fun and I was doing my hyperbolic screaming much to Chooch’s chagrin. Then we were DYING when our train rolled back in the station and we saw that Henry was gone…but BANDAID GIRL WAS STILL IN LINE! She opted to NOT RIDE WITH HENRY which meant that she actively chose to ride on an entirely different train than her dad and sister too LOL. We were cracking up so hard over this that people in line were probably like, “Wow, they thought this was a really fun coaster, maybe they’re Amish.”

Busch Gardens makes a killing from parking ($35!!!!!!), admission, and food prices so I do not feel bad ONE BIT that I didn’t pay for this picture.

LOL, Henry the Lone Rider.

From there, we headed over to the other new-to-us coaster that Chooch needed for his coaster count – Big Bad Wolf. (I think?) It’s a family suspended coaster and another long-ish wait. Probably 45 minutes? I need to state for the record that the park was NOT crowded by any means – it was just the park was only running ONE train on nearly every coaster, paired with slow-ass ops. Obviously I’m not an expert on the fiscal aspects of this industry but when you’re charging astronomical prices (it was just under $300 for us, not including parking!!!! and food) you should be running all of your trains no matter what.

At least there weren’t annoying people (not including us) in any of the lines we were forced to spend time in. And blessedly only one line-cutting incident during the entire day.

Speaking of theming, this coaster got some nice treatment on that front! The station was cute and there was also some little village scenes built out along the course. This ride is supposed to be an homage to the fan favorite coaster that was removed years ago to make room for Verbolten (my favorite coaster in the park but it was closed on our visit because it’s being refurbed / reimagined so I’m excited to see the new version of it someday!). Oh, sorry, I just realized the full name of the coaster is THE BIG BAD WOLF: THE WOLF’S REVENGE and clearly the OG coaster was The Big Bad Wolf. So, a very original name for the revenge coaster lol.

(KENNYWOOD ALREADY DID THIS, BTW. TRY AGAIN, OTHER PARKS.)

Henry had a friend to ride with this time lol.

“Are they talking??” I cried to Chooch.

“I think so!” he said, holding up his phone to take a picture.

We asked Henry later what they talked about and he said, “Nothing. The guy sat down and said something about his neck.”

THAT WAS ALL?

Papa H did his dadderly duty by waiting on the exit ramp to take pictures of us returning to the station. What a fucking peach.

Anyway, this was a cute family ride. Nothing to write home about though which reminds me, I wanted to get some postcards to send to friends BUT FORGOT.

I still love Busch Gardens with my whole heart but I need to stop ignoring the fact that I have miserable food experiences there 100% of the time. Look, I get it – it’s because I don’t eat meat, etc etc. but come the fuck on. This isn’t the 90s.

I wanted to go to the place that has the veggie burger (this was CLOSED the last two times we were there) but Henry was being a dweeb and taking way too long looking at the map or whatever on his phone and we were sitting right across from the dumb Festhaus – where we eat 109% of the time so tell me if that has anything to do with my 100% miserable food experience rating. I mean I didn’t take Statistics in school but…

So Chooch was like “Fuck it, we’re here let’s just eat at Festhaus.”

Ugh.

The veg options are cheese pizza or salad. Or a small selection of sides. The one time I got the pizza, I became instantly “with cheese” and spent the rest of the day with crippling gastrointestinal pain and the inability to poop for like 2 days. So I was NOT getting the pizza. The salad looked gross. So I got a thing of three small rolls and Chooch grabbed a basket of fried pickle sticks to share with me.

He and Henry both got pizza, Henry also got fries, Chooch got a small salad. Plus two waters and a Coke.

Can you guess how much this cost?

Ok if you read my post from Spoonwood you already know (cheater) but it was $98!!!!!!!’

And that didn’t include the two beers that Henry and I got which was another $30!!!!

And I immediately got sick. Barely ate anything but I started the day with a headache and Henry conveniently only keeps advil or whatever in the car when he knows HE will need it so I was like “I will be a real woman and push through it” because to be honest I don’t usually take anything for headaches. I am STRONG.

(Forget the fact that I tried to run away from the hospital when it was epidural time in 2006.)

I was sick but not so sick that I couldn’t obnoxiously participate in the Festhaus lederhosen battle cries with the LIVE PERFORMERS. I was born to be on the “you say” end of the “When I say <x> you say <y>” bits. I am so good at repeating in a loud and boisterous manner! Henry and Chooch were glaring at me. Especially when it was the chicken dance time and I was too sickly to stand up and do it but not too sickly that I couldn’t perform a seated version.

Also, we were there at peak lunch hour and more than 1/2 of the tables were empty so THE PARK WAS NOT CROWDED, EVERYTHING SHOULD HAVE BEEN A WALK-ON.

He was so bored, you guys. So bored.

Meanwhile, I was like, “Holy shit, I might have to throw up” and also “but this beer cost almost as much as parking so I must finish it.” I ended up taking to go

Most of the rest of the day was spent with me holding my stomach and moaning. But here is this iconic shot of Loch Ness Monster.

We took our good old time walking over to the Italy section, in hopes that my stomach would be OK to ride Pantheon. You know what’s hilarious? We couldn’t remember if there were small item baskets in the station and a sign near the steps to the station was like ABSOLUTELY NOT, GET A LOCKER so we thrust our stuff at Henry who dejectedly left the line, only for us to run to the back row queue, see that there ARE baskets up there, and then get slapped with the ATTENTION RIDERS, THIS RIDE IS NOT OPERATING AT THE MOMENT announcement.

WHAT IS IT WITH US AND PANTHEON??

Chooch and I opted to wait it out since we were like, 3 trains back in the queue. It was the right call because they started testing it immediately and there is something so perfectly voyeuristic about witnessing these types of things from the station. It makes me feel like I’m in the know. And it was only about a 25 delay anyway.

I want to say that I still love Pantheon as much as I did when it debuted in 2022 but…I quickly realized that perhaps I shouldn’t be riding coasters at the mo’ because I immediately felt worse and the entire last half of the coaster was physically painful. So what did I do after this? Immediately get in line for Apollo’s Chariot!

Again, this is another coaster that is usually a walk-on or a station wait at most every time we go there, but we actually HAD TO STAND IN A LINE that snaked out from the station and down a set of steps.

BECAUSE THEY WERE ONLY RUNNING ONE TRAIN!

I will spare you the details but good lord, I really thought this one was going to break my record of “never puked at a park” lifetime track record. I was so clammy and cold by the time we returned to the station and began a frantic search for a shaded bench to hopefully not die on.

Found a bench here and plopped down while Henry – finally – set off to find me something for my head because that was the ROOT ISSUE. This fucking headache went on too long.

So thrilled to be sharing a bench with me. Oh wait! Henry went to get me a cookie first. Then I sent him back out for Tylenol, lol.

We stopped to watch a wolf performance on our way to Griffin. In case you didn’t know, both Busch Gardens (Williamsburg and Tampa) also have numerous animal things/shows/etc. But now you know because I just told you. So, we watched some wolves get fed treats for sitting and stuff. They were so precious.

Then Henry and Chooch rode Griffin while I sat on another bench and let the Tylenol do its thing. I was nearly cured by the time they came back! (This one had two trains running and they barely had to wait at all.)

I really hate Henry’s phone. This was me and Chooch on Alpengeist WHICH WAS A WALK-ON because they were running  2 trains. The first ride, we were in the back and I was like, “OK! This is fine! I forgot how much I loved this ride!” and then when we got off, the station was still empty so I was like “LET’S RIDE AGAIN” so we did and this time I was in an outer seat and yeah – no bueno that time around. I came off feeling like I was green in the face.

Chooch and I then rode Invadr which always looks like it has a short line until you realize it’s one train plus the ops are slow AF. It’s a family coaster so you get lots of annoying little kids in line too. There was some – OK I’m saying it – white-trashy grandpa and his grandkid a few people behind us. The kid was being really bad, so the grandpa kept yelling his name, which was….BANIYA?? I don’t even know how to spell it. I kept expecting him to say “banana” and it was catching me off guard every time.

Then there was a little boy and his sister behind us. The little boy strapped on his Go-Pro at one point and started giving his sister prompts.

“Say what ride this is,” he stage-whispered.

“Um, Ok. Yeah. So. We are, um. We are standing in line, um, for, uh, Invadr.” It was excruciating to watch. Chooch kept trying to squeeze past me because the boy fixed his camera directly on him several times. “I do NOT want to be in this kid’s vlog,” Chooch muttered.

Meanwhile, there was a solo guy in front of us in line wearing an Iron Gwazi shirt. He looked kind of familiar to me but I didn’t think much about it until we made it to the station and he was in the queue for the back row, with us right in front of him. He kept sighing heavily and at one point, I thought, “Is he trying to get our attention?” I couldn’t really figure out what was going on – if anything even WAS going on – but then during the actual ride, hearing his backseat reactions, a memory was unlocked and as we exited the ride, I whispered to Chooch, “I THINK THAT GUY WAS AT FUN SPOT ATLANTA THE DAY WE WERE THERE.”

Literally, you guys, I think it was the guy that I bonded with on the brake run of ArieForceOne???

Chooch thinks that is where he knows him from too! We pointed him out to Henry afterward and he was like, “Go ask him!” and I was like, “NO THANK YOU!” I spent almost all day trying not to vomit and now he was trying to push me into a SOCIAL INTERACTION?

Mm. Hard pass.

Then it was Loch Ness Monster time! They revamped this one since the last time we were there and I was excited to see the changes. They added more theming and the tunnel portion got a big audio/visual glow up! I just wish there were less head-banging moments, but this is still such a classic coaster. And so visually pleasing too!

I can’t even remember the last time we rode this. It’s my least favorite coaster in the park. We didn’t ride it this time either but I always like to take a picture of the lights in the queue! Anyway, this was after we rode Pantheon one more time, this time with Henry in tow. I was able to enjoy it so much more this time around too, now that my headache was gone, taking my nausea with it.

“HE WAS WAVING AT YOU!” Henry cried after I stood up from taking this picture.

“Wha—who??” I cried back, heart racing, thinking I missed a Kpop idol sighting or something.

“The conductor!” Henry yelled.

Oh.

I just want to say that is this tree was in Korea, there would have been a crowd of nature paparazzi, aggressively snapping pics, with influencers lining up for selfies.

The last picture of the day, right before we left. The park closed at 8 and we made it until a little after 7. Chooch was already wanting to leave by 4 but I was like WE PAID A LOT OF MONEY TO BE HERE, BOY, SO YOU ARE GOING TO RIDE COASTERS AND LIKE IT!

Overall, it was a really nice day once you factor out my illness and food fails. I was just happy to be there again with those two, after 4 years! To be at an amusement park in general!

Back in 2001, I went to Buffalo with my friend Shawn for a music festival called Edgefest. We decided to also go to Niagara Falls since it was RIGHT THERE and this was pre-9/11 so you could just randomly cross the border with no passport back then. Simpler times. Safer times. :(

Anyway, on the drive there, I remember so vividly looking out of the passenger window and seeing an amusement park over to our right. I screamed, “OMG CAN WE GO!?!?” and Shawn, sounding like Every American Dad, said, “Certainly not right now!” It cracked me up so much at the time because it was so out of character for him.

Well, we never did go to that park. And eventually, I forgot all about it. But then I became a coaster enthusiast and it came up in my feed back in 2020 when it announced that it was closing and I thought, “OMG that park!”

Around the same time, Indiana Beach (which we just recently visited for the 3rd time!) also announced its closure and our community was so sad. Then!! A businessman from Chicago – Gene Staples – swooped in and bought both properties and has been working to restore them both ever since (well, moreso Niagara because that one definitely needed/needs more TLC than Indiana Beach).

The wooden coaster, Silver Comet, has been fully restored, and they brought in a little steel family coaster from some other park, which was up and running by the end of last season. So yeah, only two coaster creds to be had but I wanted to go here and show support so that they will continue to put in more rides and make this place shine. I mean, it makes sense to have an amusement park in that area! It’s actually close enough to the Falls that you can see the mist from the top of Silver Comet’s lift hill.

So yeah, we stopped here last Sunday after our super-quick jaunt in Canada for the Frank-n-Coaster, and I’m so glad we did! Chooch was not a fan, I will tell you right now, but Henry and I both thought it was a cute little park with potential. I wish I was a Gene Staples-type of person and could go around saving parks from shuttering.

Right off the bat, we walked through their littler Western area and it was so cute! Of course Chooch just shrugged and said, “It’s alright.” Ugh. They have shows here, I want to say 3 times a day. We caught the tail end of one later that afternoon and it was a real sight to behold lol.

A pretty little swamp area thing that we passed on the way to Silver Comet, which was a station wait BUT it was one-train ops and the ops were slow as fuck. Great and friendly crew, but the riders were total GP (except for the one guy we saw in an American Coaster Enthusiast shirt who was there by himself) and doing weird shit like changing seats at the last second and then suddenly realizing they wanted to put their phone in the bin and making one of the ride attendants come over and do it for them. It was wild.

Henry sat this one out – he makes Chooch and I ride all wooden coasters first and then we report back if it was rough or not. We both surprisingly LOVED THIS ONE. I wanted to immediately go right back on but Henry was like LET’S RIDE THE OTHER THINGS FIRST. Ugh.

There was this one broad who got onto the station as we were already in the train ready to go, but there were a ton of open seats and one of her kids was already on it so they were trying to get her to come on and she screamed I WILL ONLY RIDE IN THE VERY FRONT OR THE VERY BACK and then she offered to hold our stuff if we had anything we needed held. It all was happening so fast.

Other things like this seriously shitty dark ride called Flying Witch lol. It was relocated there from Rye Park also in NY and I was really excited for it because I love dark rides so much, but yooooo. This was so terrible, lol.

The facade was amazing though!

And those cars! I would kill to have one in my house as a love seat.

But this was another ride with super slow ops. I don’t think it’s the fault of the ride operators though – there appeared to be some reason why only one car could go through the house at a time. So, the next riders would just sit there until the car before them came out of the exit. Also, the door is kept open so you don’t get the thrill of the car bumping it open as it goes in.

I think that this can be good someday if they get it to look like something more than just K-Mart Halloween displays. And add some atmospheric music – they have music playing in the line but not inside! I dunno, I was disappointed BUT at least this was salvaged and given new life in another park. That is all that we, as dark ride lovers, can ask for. There is always the possibility of improving it, which can’t really happen if it’s in a salvage yard somewhere.

The next weird ass ride was the Serpent, which was ALSO running on just one car. As soon as we started to walk up the entrance ramp (just Chooch and me because Henry had gone to the bathroom and hadn’t caught up to us yet lol), one of the ride ops leaned over the railing and asked us how many we had. I said two because I ALWAYS forget about Henry, and dude goes, “Unfortunately, you need 4 riders to ride this” and I was like, “Oh damn I meant 3 but I guess never mind” and he said, “Oh, that’s fine then! I can ride with you.” I was like, “……………………ok” and we continued up the ramp and then Henry caught up to us and I was like “LOLOLOL YOU HAVE TO RIDE WITH THE RIDE OP” and he didn’t believe me until we started to see the kid jump into the car with other 3-people groups ahead of us.

You can see him here in the front looking so thrilled to be riding this thing, lol.

There’s my bae SILVER COMET over yonder.

Anyway, Henry almost got out of riding this because when it was nearly our turn, the ride op (I wish I could remember his name, I looked at his name tag purposely and totally forget it now) asked the people behind us how many they had and they just had TWO so he was like YOU CAN’T RIDE and then Henry the Martyr was like, “NO! I will get out of line and you two can ride with my family” and the dad of the duo behind us was like, “BUT YOU WAITED IN LINE THIS WHOLE TIME!” and Henry was like, “I promise you, I do not care.” It wasn’t a long line, but — one train ops, you know? Maybe about a 25 minute wait. So Henry had to go through this whole hassle of getting out of line JUST AS A MOM AND DAUGHTER APPROACHED and the ride op, already forgetting that Henry got out of line, told them that they could jump the line and join the dad and son who were supposed to ride with us!?

Henry was starting to walk away but I screamed, “HENRY! YOU CAN RIDE WITH US AGAIN!!!!” and he was like, “GODDAMMIT” and had to cut all the way through the line to rejoin us. It was chaotic. You don’t care.

YOU HAD TO BE THERE.

Anyway, it was actually SO GOOD?? The ride op sustained casual small talk with us the whole way up the lift hill. I asked him how many times he has to ride this during the day and he said, “If I had to guess….27 times.” Pretty specific guess.

But yeah, I was actually shocked because I expected this to be a lumbar cruncher, but it was pretty smooth and genuinely fun – the one helix made me extremely giddy!

I wish this was running – I’ve never seen a Musik Express themed like this!

Baby cone!

OK, now it was time to get in some re-rides on Silver Comet! Henry joined us this time and there was actually a line. Not a big one, but because ops were molasses, we probably waited in the station for about 15 minutes. We ended up sitting near the front and um….what a completely different experience from earlier. It was so rough and Henry was PISSED! I was fucking laughing so hard that I was trying to not pee my pants while also screaming in pain because WTF WAS THIS??

It had to have been because the train was completely full as opposed to just 4 rows being filled when Chooch and I rode it earlier but Jesus Christ it was running like a completely different coaster. Henry was like I’M DONE as soon as it came back to the brake run and Chooch was like, “Yeah, I hate this coaster now. It sucks.”

But I was like, “NO. We have to give it another chance. Let’s go ride it again in the back.” Henry waved us off in a dismissive “you do you” manner and sat on a bench while Chooch reluctantly followed me back into the line. We got to go right to the station this time and I asked the one ride op if we could wait for the back row because someone was already standing there and I like to be polite and ask because sometimes parks want people to fill the rows!

The guy was super nice and said, “Absolutely!” and I smiled smugly at Chooch.

“You’re so cool,” he muttered.

SILVER COMET A/S/L.

Yeah, this was just as terrible in the back now that the train was at capacity, LOL. But it was somehow SO FUN for me and I was cracking up so hard in spite of the possible internal damage it was doing on me. I honestly wanted to ride it again before we left and Chooch was like, “Ride it by yourself.” :(

The greenery was so lush here!

I made Chooch ride the Scrambler with me and they were playing really shitty country music over a crackly speaker, which is the first thing that came to mind as I recalled this moment.

I was telling Chooch about the time me and Blake took him on the Scrambler at Lakemont Park when he was TWO and you can’t even see him in the picture and then I dropped him (in slow motion) when we were trying to get him off the ride and the ride operator who was probably the same age as Blake (like 15!!) had to come over and help as he slowly slid out of the car, down my leg, and onto the pavement LOL. What a great moment for me as a mom.

The aforementioned tail end of the show which was fucking hilarious but also rife with fake gunfire that was so loud it was causing young kids and babies (and maybe me) to cry.

I’m pretty sure this was 90% of the people at the park that day.

He rolled off the roof!!!

Carouselfie time! The ride operator was some young kid who was very strict and yelled CELL PHONES AWAY, YOU CAN TAKE ALL THE PICTURES YOU WANT AFTER THE RIDE ENDS but I had already put my phone away by that point and the ride hadn’t started yet so HE BEST NOT HAVE BEEN CALLING ME OUT.

The kiddieland area was so adorably creepy!

ALICE’S FACE GOES SO HARD.

Train time!

Oh yeah, the wristbands just reminded me of this: we bought our tickets online but only got two ride-all-day admissions and Henry got the $4.99 “walk-around, no rides” admission, but the guy at the gate gave him a wristband anyway! “Yay, that means now we can do a carouselfie!”

“Mmm boy,” Henry and Chooch mumbled in unison.

Henry wore his G-Dragon Ubermensch hat and Chooch periodically reminded us of his disapproval of how much we paid for it. Chooch is basically our parent at this point. Everything we do is so disappointing and irresponsible to him. I love it.

The train took us along my bae, Silver Comet!

There is one vantage point where the track looks like a smashed hornet’s nest, just the most inexplicable tangle of track. Henry said he actually thought it was two coasters.

On the way our, we stopped at the cafe near the entrance for boba tea. As expected, it wasn’t the best.

Our “so so” boba.

Overall, I personally had a blast at this little park. There is so much potential here and I’m going to keep my eyes on it for future additions – it’s only about a three hour drive from Pittsburgh so I would happily go back.

Chooch did not like it at all and Henry was on the same page as me except that he hated Silver Comet and never wants to ride it again, but meanwhile I came home and was watching videos about it on YouTube the next day because I missed it so much.

When I think of Labor Day Weekend 2025, I am going to always remember it as the weekend I got a good drivers license picture taken, we had a fun day trip to NY / Canada, and there was brewing hope and excitement that fucking Trump might have been dead. What a great and giddy weekend. Too bad the Trump part wasn’t true though.

Ideally, Chooch would have gotten his 400th coaster cred on our dumb road trip this summer but there is always the unpredictability of ride closures so there were some parks where not all the coasters were running, and he ended the trip with 399 credits, oof! He suggested going to King’s Island because they rebranded I305 and re-profiled part of it so it technically counts as a new credit but I really didn’t want to do an overnighter and leave Penelope home alone. So, my counter-suggestion was to do a day trip to Niagara Falls and do the Frank-n-C0aster because what a stupid milestone coaster!

We left the house around 7:30AM and trust me, I was really reevaluating my life at that moment because as much as I love going places, I absolutely hate the “morning of.” I wake up early regardless but there is something so diabolical about early morning drives for some reason. It’s only about 3.5 – 4 hours away but ugh. I was so drowsy and it was so boring. Pretty much the whole way, I “hopescrolled” on Threads, waiting for absolute confirmation that dear leader had finally bit it.

Eventually, we made it to the Canadian border and this happened:

Canadian border guy: What brings you to Canada?

Henry: the coaster on top of the Burger King. Canadian border guy: 🤔 How long will you be here?

Henry, sighs: As long as it takes to ride the coaster on top of the Burger King.

The border guy was NOT amused by this and was like, “whatever, have a nice day” as he shoved our passports out the window. A totally different vibe from when we were going to Toronto in June, that’s for fucking sure. Chooch and I were so embarrassed too because Henry was giving up way too much detail. A simple, “Visiting the Falls” would have sufficed.

LONG STORY SHORT – we made it to Clifton Hill around noon and Henry kicked us out of the car so that he could just drive around and not have to park. Trust me, this dumb coaster was not cheap and Henry 100% did not care about missing out.

Dude I used .5 on this picture and Chooch looks like a fucking giant. Anyway, the coaster is part of the Frankenstein House thingie and there are combo packages to do everything but luckily you can also pay just for the coaster which was like $25 USD for both of us I think??I was actually too afraid to look at the receipt. I also immediately forgot the instructions that the ticket booth lady gave us and Chooch was like JUST FOLLOW THE ARROWS FOR GOD’S SAKE. It was dark in there!

“I hope we don’t have to wait in line!” I cried and Chooch was like, “Yeah, I doubt there will be a line.”

There wasn’t a line, lol. But we did have to wait for the current cycle to run its course. It was basically just a bunch of kids and families.

Probably none of these people traveled to Niagara Falls just to ride this dumb coaster and leave.

That distinction went to me and Chooch. (This is some stupid-ass thoosie behavior.)

OK first of all, we were assigned to row 2 and they don’t let you make requests even if only three cars are being used, like it was on our ride. I didn’t hear the explanation they gave Chooch when he asked if we could sit in the back and then he was mad at me for making him ask because HE TRULY DIDN’T CARE WHERE WE SAT HE JUST WANTED TO GET IT OVER WITH. Wow. Someone revoke his thoosie card because his spirit is gone.

Anyway, this dumb coaster was pure chaos. First of all, you’re almost ejected out of your seat at the top of the lifthill when it makes a sudden stop, almost like the wheels are getting snagged on a Burger King wrapper. It jolted me so hard that I tweaked my neck a little bit. Then the rest of the ride is just clankety-clanking around the track and I swear to god some of the turns were squared.

And they send you twice.

I actually felt unsafe, careening around this Jank City track that feels precariously perched on the BK rooftop. Yet I could NOT stop laughing. Just straight-up cackled through both cycles to the point where the ride op laughed at me when I got off and asked, “Enjoy the ride?” Oh brother, not sure “enjoy” is the right word but that was QUITE memorable.

Then we had to go from the bright sunshine back into the blacklit stairwells of Frank’s House and I had to be led by my Seeing Eye Chooch. At the very bottom of the steps, he was in the process of telling me to watch out for the very last hidden step when a fucking STRONG and LOUD blast of air got me so good that my best “being chased by the chainsaw guy” scream came hurtling out of my lungs.

Not many coasters come with jump scares, I’ll tell you that much!

What a weird little coaster, lol. It’s not thrilling by any means but if you’re into gathering “coaster creds” – do it. It’s hilarious AND there’s a pretty cool view of the Falls from up there, too. I personally thought it was fun but Chooch was a big walking MEH after that one – he’s that “not easily impressed” “age, you know.

After this, it was back to New York for Niagara Amusement Park!

Friday, August 2 was our last day of what was hopefully not our last family vacation! I think we were all ready to wrap it up, to be honest. Not in a bad way! But we vacation hard and there was very little rest, plus that fucking heatwave in the first half of the week really drained us big time.  But Henry had proposed that we stop at Indiana Beach on the way home because they put in two “new” coasters since we were last there in 2022. So, hey why not right? Indiana Beach is always a good time.

Except when your period starts that morning and you’re suffering some really terrible cramps which has you doubled-over in pain at times and urgently needing to sit the eff down. Needless to say, I was content spending lots of time in the Fascination room watching Chooch waste our money.

EW.

There was one lady down there who had just learned to play Fascination and was such a sore winner that I legit couldn’t take much more of her big-ass mouth.

Chooch is pretty good at this and won a fair amount of times but not enough to win me one of those JAWS PLUSHIES!!! I WANTED ONE SO BAD.

This coaster is “new” to Indiana Beach but it actually came from another park in Mexico and that part of its history ended in tragedy so I was very not stoked about riding it here in Indiana.

Can you tell?

It actually wasn’t too bad though.

The last car is actually facing backward and I wanted to get that one but not enough that I was willing to stand in line again.

There was a little girl in front of us who cried her face off when she was too short to ride it and this was the second time that day that people in front of us had to leave a line after standing in it for 30+ minutes because they didn’t bother to measure their dumb kids at the entrance of the rides. On the other coaster (the other “new” to the park coaster which was just one of those rinky-dink Galaxi things) the one mom was like YOU SHOULD HAVE A SIGN THEN!!! and the ride op was like, “We do” and pointed way back to the entrance of the ride. Haha. In your face, mom.

Honestly, there wasn’t too much that happened during our short stint at Indiana Beach aside from me complaining about menstrual pain and bitching about the crowds – it wasn’t even THAT crowded but compared to the vacant parks we had experienced up until then, it was SHOCKING AND APPALLING. I had my Karen sun visor on. You just can’t see it.

So, what I’m trying to say is let’s just look at some random pictures from the park. I’m pretty sure Hoosier Hurricane was the last thing we rode (three whole rides!) before Chooch played more Fascination and then we left to begin the last stretch of our drive back to Pittsburgh.

Chooch made friends with this seasoned couple next to him. They invited me to play too but I was like, “No thanks, I’ll continue to sit in the corner and bleed out.”

Something must have inspired me to snap this picture. Who knows.

Indiana Beach is truly such a quirky park. Usually, we do the dark rides too but one of them is an upcharge and the other one, all adults have to ride alone in their car and the line was long. Since this wasn’t our first time there, it was a hard pass.

The layout here makes no sense. It honestly looks like something that I would have designed in Roller Coaster Tycoon – rides on top of each other, interwoven coaster track, etc.

And that’ll do it for my long-winded, super drawn-out vacation recap. Overall, it was a really fun way to turn 46, I loved spending time with Chooch (ugh and Henry), I loved going to new places (and one new state!) and I loved all of the idiotic inside jokes we picked up along the way. I really value these chaotic road trips and the memories that we make, and I hope that Chooch does too!

Thanks for limping along with me!

As usual, I am such a snail at vacation recaps. But we’re almost to the finish line! I just have to get my mind off the G-Dragon track so I can knock this one out – I have therapy tomorrow and the way I am so excited to have someone other than Henry to talk about the G-Dragon concerts this past weekend. I am so pathetic, truly.

Before we get into Lost Island, I would be remiss to not mention the BEST gas station I have ever been to (nope, not Buckees, sorry but fuck Buckees, it’s not for me fam). It’s a local Iowa joint called Marker 126.

(Henry was more partial to KUM & GO, ugh.)

(Also the way it took me a hot minute to think of the word “partial” makes me think I need to do more brain games or something, sheesh.)

It was absolutely beautiful – had amazing food choices, a cafe, A BOUTIQUE. In fact, I had spent the whole trip lamenting the fact that I left my sunglasses at home and refusing to pay $30 for those shitty MAGA shades at other gas stations / truck stops, like I’m cosplaying a hunter or something, so fucking disgusting.

“THOSE ARE ACTUALLY NICE SUNGLASSES THO” Henry tried to red-neck’splain at a Love’s gas station when I was practically vomiting over the display because they were so hideous, constructed specifically to cover ICE agents’ eyes. Or Marjorie Taylor Green for when she’s fly-fishing for conspiracy theories and orange bronzer to gift Dear Leader.

By “nice” I don’t think Henry meant “lookin’.”

But at Marker 126, I found a pair that was EXACTLY MY STYLE, and they were only $13!! Now I regret not buying several because there were a bunch I was (bare) eyeballin’.

First though I used the restroom which hello, was in a gas station mind you:

Yeah. Marker 126 had my heart. I loved its whole vibe.

Oh, and this was all after we went to that religious grotto thing!!

But then! Lost Island.

This is a new theme park in Waterloo, Iowa. They already had a waterpark that is very popular and decided to build a theme park to go along with it. Enthusiasts have really been trying to spread the word about this place because it is so beautifully-themed but severely under visited because most general public don’t know about it and even if they did, who is going to visit Iowa for a theme park other than crazy-ass coaster heads like us?

There were barely any cars in the lot which was sad. It was already mid-afternoon when we arrived so you’d imagine that it wasn’t going to get any busier than it already was at that point of the day.

I was expected it to be so flat and widespread for some reason??

The park is divided into four different lands and you really do feel like you’re not on Earth anymore. Or at least not in the States. I can’t explain it but there was a vibe, lol. I felt uncomfortable in a way but also intrigued? I think maybe because it seemed so exposed there.

The main reason I wanted to go here – and even planned this trip around Lost Island – is because they got a brand new RMC! It was making me nervous though because their website kept saying COMING SOON even after we officially made our vacation plans, but then it opened ONE WEEK before we got there!

It’s a single rail which isn’t my favorite type of RMC and it was definitely not operated as efficiently as the one in Six Flags Great America where they have numerous trains constantly cycling. This one also had the moving station but the second time we rode it, they brought the train in and stopped it for everyone to get on so I don’t. The ride ops were very friendly but didn’t seem like your typical WE ARE OPERATING AN RMC DO NOT FUCK AROUND ride ops that I’m used to. These ones were like, “HEY LET’S CHAT” to everyone standing in line which was nice and I liked that.

I liked Fire Runner but it hurt my thighs.

I forgot to bring a Yuta photocard with me on this trip in preparation for the Yuta land of Lost Island so we had to improvise. IN CASE YOU DIDNT KNOW, Yuta is Henry’s NCT127 bias.

(Chooch, observing this photo being taken while being perpetually embarrassed of us: “THIS is why you were crying in the car about not bringing a Yuta photocard? You actually PLANNED FOR THIS?” Um, yes I did, duh.)

LOL my new sunglasses.

Also, the ride attendant made us listen to his whole safety spiel before opening the gate. Then he asked us where we were from and said, “Wow, that’s a long way to come” and we just laughed like buddy you have no idea the lengths we go to for the stupidest shit.

I really fucking loved looking around this place. There isn’t much to do there (yet) but hopefully this new RMC will bring all the coaster boys to the yard so that the park is able to put more rides in. It was actually creepy how few people were there. Aside from the RMC, we were legit walking on to everything and sometimes we were even the only people on the rides.

So, this purple coaster is supposed to be on the worst coasters in America. I was literally reading someone’s shit post about it on Reddit on the way there, saying it was the worst coaster they’ve ever ridden, of any style, and I was like OH BOY LET’S GO SPINAL FUSION. Henry decided before even getting there that he would not be joining us on it.

First of all, for anyone not in the coaster know, it’s a Vekoma SLC (suspended looping coaster) and they are so notoriously shitty that it’s actually hilarious. They’re headbangers and backbreakers. Not fun at all. Painful. NO ONE CARES when they get removed from parks, and here’s Lost Island BRINGING ONE to their park.

First, we had to walk past the drop tower and look at the station for it!! Do you see what I mean – this place has their theming game on point and I can’t wait to see what else they do!

OK so we rode it. Every comment on Reddit was like AVOID THE FRONT so we sat in the back and actually that scared me too but you know what? NOT THAT BAD. I mean, not great either, it’s a fucking SLC and the only good one I’ve ever ridden is the Great Nor’Easter at Morey’s Piers (god love Wildwood), but this was not as bad as I was expecting. I wasn’t trying to get a re-ride like the little boys in front of us, but I didn’t mind it.

Henry seemed shocked when we didn’t come limping back to him and instead walked regularly and said “Not that bad” with a shrug. OK LOST ISLAND, I SEE YOU.

YOOOOOO, YOU KNOW I LOVE ME A WACKY WORM!!! We actually did have to wait in line for this one, lol. Henry got to stand with the other dads to take pictures of us.

LOL.

Sorry I was taking this picture into the sun but we walked past some cast members doing a performance. We didn’t watch the whole thing but what I gathered is that each land of Lost Island has their own characters and they were working together to do a thing. It seemed cute.

You guys seriously though, did I mention the theming?

We rode Matugani which was a fun and whippy launch coaster (the launch was expectedly forceful) and fun fact – this was actually removed from our beloved Liseberg to make room for the dive coaster that’s there now so that was fun to get to ride a coaster from there! Henry and Chooch didn’t seem to care about that fun fact though.

The area surrounding the park made me uncomfy. I think that’s what I couldn’t put my finger on – the way it’s so out in the open made it feel less immersive. They need to build like a forest or some faux mountain range around the perimeter so you’re more boxed in and free from the outside world. THAT is what felt off to me. And also the fact that no matter where you stood, you could see across to all the different sections. I’d like to see them continue to develop the landscape portion of the park too so when you enter a new area, you really like you’re in a new place and you can’t see the other lands.

Henry said he just felt like he was out in the desert. I guess I can see that and if we were still in the HEATWAVE PORTION of the trip, I definitely would have FELT that too.

Honestly – the darkride was the sleeper hit of the whole trip though. It was unexpectedly good and I wish we had ridden it more than once, in hindsight. But we were getting HUNGEE and trying to zip through the place so we could go eat.

UGH right before we left (the park was actually closing in about 30 minutes I think), Chooch talked me into riding this and we got SOAKED. Usually these ones aren’t that bad but this one cooked us. I would love to see them add more theming to this one!! Also, again I didn’t like that this was on the perimeter of the park so we could see partially developed land and a small river thing that Chooch was like “what if we’re on this ride but then we end up in the river” and I couldn’t stop thinking about that and it was not something that I was OK with.

LOL my ugg face.

Chooch and I were about to ride whatever the Musik Express ride there is called when an announcement came on throughout the park alerting us that UmmiUmmi was closing in 15 minutes and Henry was like PEACE OUT and came the closest to a light jog than I’ve ever seen him do in effort to get there before his hopes of acquiring a soft pretzel were dashed.

(Oh LOL I just went to the Lost Island website to find the name of the Musik Express and just realized they don’t call them LANDS, you guys, THEY ARE REALMS.)

(P.S. It’s called Zulawa Wave and I distinctly remember that there was no music playing, lol.)

Chooch also rode this thing but I don’t these rides because they frustrate me. I can’t ever get them to flip!

I sent this to my mom and she was like IS HE THE ONLY ONE ON THAT RIDE??? and I was like, “Yes, we were in the middle of Iowa and only 20 other people are here it seems.”

I mean, it WAS a Thursday so maybe the weekends are more crowded I hope?

GUYS PLEASE GO TO LOST ISLAND SO IT CONTINUES TO GROW, OK???

Looking for somewhere to eat dinner, and probably also a hotel.

We left about 30 minutes before the park closed and it made me feel sad. I liked it there and wished we had more time. Oh wait – one thing to note is that their merch is not as cute/cool/quirky as you’d think! They only had one magnet and it does not represent the vibe of the park but I had no choice but to buy it. I was hoping to get a shirt too but they were all kind of ugly :(

Next up: DINNER IN WATERLOO. SEE YOU THERE.

After we left Adventureland, it started raining and I was frantically checking the weather because I did not want my birthday evening at the lakeside park to be ROONED by RAIN.

I legit have no idea why I took this picture.

Chooch finally took one for the team and got behind the wheel! For someone who loves taking our cars for joy rides at home, he is shockingly resistant to helping us drive on road trips. Little bitch.

*chews nails feverishly*

Once we got to a certain point in Iowa, it was all back roads and small towns. Chooch and I thought the WEASER PLEASER sounded gross. Could have been the most decadent meat-free grilled cheese for all I know, I was too repulsed to even look it up. Why don’t you find out and tell me in the comments. #commentstarved

We made it! And it wasn’t raining!!

I legit was not expecting this. I don’t know what I thought it was going to be, but it was actually a cute little park nestled next to LAKE OKOBOJI and the area was apparently a big vacation spot?? I even saw some broad wearing a shirt that said it was…wait for it…the Cancun of Iowa.

I mean….

I haven’t even been to Cancun but I don’t know about all that.

Remember how I was saying that parks should offer discounts if you get there and rides are down for the day? Well, THIS PLACE ACTUALLY DID THAT! Sadly, one of the rides was the wild mouse, meaning there was only one credit to be had here, but I was happy for the discount. These places are such rackets, honestly.

We came here for Legend and I am happy to tell you that this old ass coaster did not disappoint! I mean, it wasn’t the most amazing woodie, but it was smooth as butter and 100% re-rideable. And we definitely got a bunch of rides in!

The carousel was super tiny. Everyone was thrilled for this portion of the day. TWO CAROUSELFIES IN ONE DAY, OH THE HORROR. I AM SO MEAN!

Thanks for looking, Henry.

I was unhappy with all of these and made them ride it again later, LOLOLOL.

Honestly, the Legend was fun but this place would not have been worth it if that goddamn lake hadn’t been there. But apparently, this is where the upper-middle class Iowans vacation?! Like, it really had a snobby air to it. I remember thinking that this was going to be vibe last summer at Old Orchard Beach in Maine but it was very blue collar, actually. This place though. Like, calm down guys. You’re in Iowa.

It was also a nightmarescape for vegetarians, and oh vegans my heart really goes out to you because at least Chooch and I were able to eat pizza after finding legit NOTHING ELSE within walking distance along this lake resort hot spot. There was one restaurant that was right next to the park and a glance at the outside menu showed that they had pasta which sounded divine at that moment but then a man in a suit walked out and that’s when I realized that EVERY DINER INSIDE WAS D R E S S E D. Like even the “casual” attire was a fucking Lilly Pulitizer sundress on the broads and boat shoes on the mans. Chooch said, “So?” and I was like, “I AM NOT GOING IN THERE WE LOOK LIKE RAGAMUFFINS COMPARED TO THESE LAKE BITCHES.” Like they probably BOATED THERE.

Henry had us walk about 10 minutes down the lakeshore to a more commercial area full of restaurants and shops and this section did remind me of Old Orchard Beach a little bit. Henry tried to get to this restaurant called MULLETS or something by like, walking down a hillside and scaling a fence while Chooch and I kept saying, “OK you do that but we’re going inside this galleria thing because surely that is where the entrance is???” And it was too – you had to go down like two levels and there it was.

We were seated outside which is what I wanted, but some broad was singing acoustic versions of already acoustic adult pop hits and it was so loud, and then no one came to get our drink order even after 15 minutes, plus I don’t know WHAT version of the menu Henry was looking at but the only options for me and Chooch were french fries or pizza. I eventually threw in the towel because it was 7PM, I was hungry, and the park closed at 9PM. So, I voted that we just go back to the park, get pizza there, and then lap Legend some more times.

LOL – this was after THE SPILL #1 happened.

There’s a little crazy house thingie that was moderately fun to walk through but Scandinavia ruined us for fun houses. There were few opportunities to die in this one.

I saw other people taking pictures here so I had to do it too.

LOL the full cycle.

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We did mostly get along but there was one moment when we were still looking for somewhere to eat when he decided to be contentious and was growling about how he didn’t want pizza and I said, “WELL IOWA HATES PEOPLE WHO DON’T EAT MEAT, MY FRIEND, SO IT’S EITHER PIZZA OR A FUCKING PRETZEL” and he was still being a little brat so I started screaming about how he was ruining my birthday and then we made eye contact and started laughing. That’s just how our mother/son relationship is OK.

I truly adored this coaster.

This Nutty Bar joint seemed like the traditional OKOBOJI experience so we all got one. Mine was the OG, Henry got a peanut butter one, and who  knows about Chooch.

Real time discussion: I just zoomed in on this picture and cried, “WAIT I COULD HAVE GOTTEN A NUTTY BAR SHIRT? A COFFEE CUP? AN APRON????” I didn’t see any of this stuff at the time because OLD EYES.

“What would you do with an apron?” Henry scoffed as he’s standing at the dining room, doing his chores (folding laundry LOL). “You don’t even know what an apron is.”

OK WOW.

Anyway, a Nutty Bar is basically a Golden Nugget ice cream from Kennywood but on a stick instead of a cone. Just as frustratingly drippy and while it’s got Kennywood beat when it comes to atmosphere, Golden Nugget all day long!

I mean, it was charming there but I can 100% promise you I will never be back.

Look at the blue skies! The sun chased the rain away on my birthday! I was really feeling good. New favorite coaster, cute little park, Chooch was being semi-decent to me. The first half of my birthday was really nice.

Even Chooch was kind of being nice to me. OK maybe not NICE per se, but…not mean? Don’t worry, that would change later that night lol.

Monster! Isn’t it gorgina?

I wanted to get ice cream from here from Henry and Chooch kept walking while I was crying out, “Under CONEstruction, get it??”

It’s a very very very small park, smaller even than Kennywood. Yet somehow they still crammed in 7 coasters! (Well, that Underground one barely counts as a coaster, in my opinion, but whatever it was still fun!) The insane part though is that even little amusement parks are so expensive!! It for sure cost over $100 for all three of us. This trip was actually very costly lol oops.

C: I can’t wait for her fucking birthday to be over. This is so annoying. I miss my computer.

H: I can’t wait for this whole trip to be over. My back hurts and I ran out of my supply of individually-wrapped prunes.

This little family coaster was cute. It intertwines with a newish water ride which we did not ride.

THIS WAS CLOSED BECAUSE APPARENTLY CORN WASN’T IN SEASON??? Iowa, you have failed me. I still bought an Iowa Sweet Corn t-shirt though because it was on sale and this birthday bitch decided to treat herself.

Nothing too memorable about the ferris wheel but I did think this whole area was very nice and clean.

See also: the ferris wheel wasn’t memorable but she took 10 pictures of it.

Cutesy.

This park had vibrancy on POINT. The flowers, the paint. Just such a dopamine rush.

Then we rode the train! It was so-so. Very smol.

Gotta go all in at this point and take a picture from the vantage point of the train.

Not CONEstruction ice cream but we did stop by the ice cream on Main Street and got some Blue Bunny scoops. Mine was salted caramel and it was divine. Who cares what the non-birthday people got.

And then our day at Adventureland came to an end. We had more driving to do because I had my heart set on closing out the night at Arnolds Park in OKOBOJI, Iowa – I had never heard of this town before but turns out it was a whole thing. More later byeeee.