Sunday October 6, 2013

I drove to the park expecting horrendous weather, but feeling optimistic all the same. I walked to the Marina entrance then headed straight to Millennium Force, scoring a seat on the first train. The threat of rain obviously kept alot of people away, because I was able to ride Millennium 20 consecutive times, with the access gate open most of those times. This is a record for me for consecutive rides, but I finally managed to peel myself away and...

I went to see a Gypsy Fortune Teller. Momma told me some good news, but I don't really wanna share it. Momma was very entertaining.

Next I literally walked on Top Thrill Dragster. The trains were not even filling up completely. It was a great ride and went nice and slow over the top...

On to Magnum, which turned out to be my longest wait of the day. They only had 2 trains going and a few rows were chained off. I waited 3 cycles to get on. I was a bit disappointed to see a well-known rider riding continuously in one of the closed seats. I saw him go by twice while I and everybody else waited our turns. At least the spiel dude made the wait entertaining as he was trying to guess the names of people in line.

Lemme speed it up a bit. Dragster again, Power Tower, Gatekeeper front row(woo!), Raptor, and then it got a bit windy and Raptor closed just as I was exiting. This was shortly after 2pm. There was just a slight drizzle at this point, and I ate some pb&j and a banana.

I moved my car back to the Soak City lot and took a nice walk along the beach and Hotel Breakers. I went thru Eerie Estate, and being a single walker, I always seem to end up at the back of a group. I get most of my entertainment watching other people get scared.

Anyway I tried to watch the parade, but was getting swarmed by bees so I headed to Zombie High School. The cheerleader in there screamed at me and had horrible breath. I'm trying to decide if that was part of her act...

I went thru Eerie Estate once again, then headed back to Millennium for 2 more quick rides, giving me 22 for the day. My plan was to close out the day later on MF, but it wasn't meant to be...

For all the riding I'd done, I'd only seen about half the park at this point, around 5:15 so I headed up Frontier Trail and went thru Eternity Infirmary. The people in my group kept clapping for the clap. Many of the screamsters were clapping along with us, since, we were told, most of them had the clap. This was pretty funny, though took away any scare factor.

I took a ride on the Antique Cars, did a quick lap on Maverick, then went thru Eden Musee, which felt about 100degrees inside. Headed up to Mean Streak, and got right on the front row despite 1 train operation. Henry showed up, so I stuck around and rode a couple more laps with him. While we were riding, the drizzle became a steady rain. This was shortly after 6pm, and I felt nothing but gratitude for the great day I already had! I told Henry I'd see him next Sunday and moved on. One more quick walk thru Eden Musee. Some chick kept grabbing my shirt, which I thought was cool until I turned around and noticed her boyfriend walking right behind her. Oh, well.

Now it was raining heavily. I decided to go thru Eternity Infirmary again, then made the fateful decision to ride Skyhawk. I had to put my hands over my face, because the rain was just pelting me on the upswing. It was really fun, and the other riders were loving it, but when I got off, I was completely drenched and cold.

It was 6:50 and I bravely headed back down Frontier Trail, determined to close out the park. I did a 180, however, when I made the sensible decision to walk back to the car, and grab my rain gear. I was walking at breakneck speed at this point, the clock was ticking. The area around skyscraper in Challenge Park was completely flooded, I think I walked thru about 6 inches of water to get thru there.

Anyway I was kinda changing into Superman. I stripped my shirt and shoes off, and threw on a raincoat, sandals, and rain pants which I haven't worn in about 6 years. Feeling much more comfortable, I took a surreal walk along the beach again. It was dark, raining heavily, and I didn't pass anybody. The beach entrance gates were wide open at about 7:20pm.

Back to Eerie Estate. I went thru all by myself this time, and most of the screamsters didn't see me coming. I even apologized for interrupting a group of 4 that were hanging out in the money room. Ah well, a different experience every time. The rain actually let up a quite a bit, but the only rides that seemed open were Troika and Cedar Downs. I headed to Zombie High School and was actually relieved to see about 10 people waiting at the entrance, so I had some company. I went thru twice, and even tried reading the menu in the cafeteria, but got scared along, in a manner of speaking.

As you can imagine, the main midway was a ghost town at this point. I decided yet another walk thru Eerie Estate would be a good way to finish up the day. This time I was joined by a group of employees who were screamsters from Eden Musee, which apparently closed early. I took my usual position in back of the group and enjoyed walking thru a mixture of scares and casual conversation between fellow screamsters.

In case you haven't picked up on my love of Breakers and the beach, I walked by one more time on my way back to the car. I'll be checking into Breakers in 5 days. Can't wait!

'What a day!' To quote the Charlie Brown and Snoopy t-shirt(actually I got the towel). I had more fun than a person should be allowed to have. Now back to reality until next time...

You must have been riding Skyhawk while we were sitting in front of the museum wishing we hadn't left the ponchos in the car. We couldn't believe Skyhawk ran even when it was raining buckets, it never closed until the lightning started.