Okay, guys! Ready for Part II?
After a looooooong day of flying, driving, dangling, coasting, swinging, and spelunking, Michael, Steven and I got up nice and early to help with ACE Preservation Conference 8am registration. Our day at Glenwood Caverns was a Conference "add-on", so today marks the official start of Preservation Con!
ACE hosts a Preservation Conference every year to celebrate parks that work to preserve historically-significant amusement paraphernalia. Our first host park, Elitch Gardens, has made many preservation efforts as of late, but back in 1994 they sort of threw up in the face of preservation when they bulldozed their original park & re-located to downtown Denver. Many classic artifacts and rides were moved, but their two old woodies were lost.
*moment of silence*
Fast forward 10 years later: Elitch Gardens is a filthy, 3rd-tier member of the Six Flags family. Based on testimonies, Elitch's was nothing short of the wart on Six Flags's ass during the later end of it's Six Flagshood. Fortunately for Elitch's, Six Flags crumbled under the weight of its own BS and the park was sold to some park chain that no one had heard of, who later sold it to some other park chain no one has heard of.
Ownership isn't actually what matters here. What DOES matter is that the park was placed in the hands of World-renowned Herschend Family Entertainment in 2011. Now receiving attention from the same nurturing individuals that have made Silver Dollar City and Dollywood the show-stopping amusement destinations they are, Elitch Gardens has done a complete 180º!! My expectations were moderately low based on the horror stories I had heard during the Six Flags era, but Elitch Gardens blew me away! The Herschend-ification of Elitch Gardens is well underway, and I suspect the park will eventually return, in some shape or form, to its former glory.
Ok. Picture time!
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| Did my lengthy intro wear you out? It wore me out just to write it. lol |
The park has a lovely entrance with great curb appeal. Their tower looks suspiciously similar to a certain amusement landmark in Southern California.
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| You know you've been in ACE for a while when you hand people their registration packets before they tell you their name. |
Once 9am rolled around, the boys and I attacked Elitch Gardens. Our first stop: Half Pipe!
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| Elitch's has two front entrance plazas: an indoor one that houses the park entrance, and a traditional entry midway outside. |
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| A refugee from the original Elitch Gardens is this older-than-dirt Philadelphia Toboggan Company carousel. |
Upon entry, we saw that Eltich's scenery was very nice...
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| Oh dear. I seem to have completely forgotten how to do math. I'll just have to hire a tutor or two. |
...very nice indeed!
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| Betty, Charles, and Anna are very pleased to be at Elitch Gardens! Michael is judging them. |
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| This lovely Intamin specimen greeted us as we neared the back of Elitch's. |
Something some of the old 3rd-tier Six Flags parks had in common (Six Flags America and Astroworld come to mind) were Intamin 2nd generation drop towers. Six Flags for some reason invested in these fabulous drop towers for Elitch's, Astroworld, etc., and yet flagship parks like Six Flags Magic Mountain and Six Flags Great Adventure got squat (maybe their respective 400ft+ intamin launch coasters are supposed to suffice, but I don't like that logic). After their old 1st gen. Intamin towers rotted away, Magic Mountain was left drop-towerless for 5 years and Great Adventure still doesn't have one.
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| Today's trip report is brought to you by the letter "U". |
Michael and I rode an Intamin Half Pipe at a park called Särkäniemmi in Finland while we were there with ACE in 2011. It was love at first slalom.
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| A little rumbly compared to its Finnish twin, but Elitch's Half Pipe certainly did not fail to deliver! |
Credit #4 of 2013: Achieved! Credit #5 is not even a foot away...
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| "I'm here too!" said the Boomerang, though a considerably smaller number of people cared. |
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| Actually, Michael and David looked pretty excited about it! |
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As far as Boomerangs go, this one was pretty fun! I'd give it a 9/10 on the Boomerang scale.
The Vekoma Boomerang was part of Six Flag's "Welcome to the family, we hope you like scraps!" Care-Package. A Boomerang found residence in about half of the parks that Six Flags left fingerprints on.
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| Put your feet to the fire!!!...oops. Wrong ride. Whoever can first name the ride to whom that slogan belongs gets a free rock! |
Intamin 2nd generation drop towers just have such a great rip. That feeling in your gut that makes you think you might die. Intamin's follow-ups to these towers just don't feel as good. Don't get me started on the Drop Zone at Kings Island. It's like they strapped a parachute to that thing or something...
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| Sea Dragon is present in this Trip Report, but it was not ridden. I've gotten to the point now where I'm just as satisfied with taking pictures of a flat ride as I was to actually ride one when I was little. What have I become?!! |
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| Not a bad skyline. The Intamins assert dominance while the Vekoma submits. The Sea Dragon looks on in amusement. |
Next on the docket was Elitch Garden's wooden coaster, Twister II. Twister I (or Mr. Twister, rather) was unceremoniously demolished in 1994 & designed in its image was the new Twister II.
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The ride's slogan is, like, "Wilder the 2nd time around!*" or something.
*(Not actually the case) |
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| The ride's 3-bench trains are new! Never before had any incarnation of the ride ran 3-bench trains, but they sure do look purdy. |
Overall, my first impression of Twister II was underwhelming. Perfectly smooth, but about as forceful as a wet napkin. Credit #6. Woo.
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| It would seem that the Herschendification of Elitch Gardens hadn't *quite* made its way to each corner of the park. These lovely-looking buildings from the new park's earlier days look to have been shuttered for some time now. |
Having taken care of the day's credits in the back of the park, the boys and I worked our way back to the front, where we would then leave the park for brunch.
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| There's something special to me about Arrow airtime, and Sidewinder has a ton! |
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| One of 3 Arrow Shuttle Loops still standing, the Sidewinder is now one of Elitch's most unique & classic rides. Hooray for preservation! |
Let us now discuss a roller coaster that maybe shouldn't be preserved...
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| Maybe if we ignore it, it will go away...? |
Mind Eraser, Elitch Garden's other Vekoma coaster, has the distinct honor of being one of the worst-regarded inverted coasters in the country. Even among the inferior class of Vekoma Suspended Looping Coasters, Mind Eraser has a reputation for being particularly awful. Michael, Steve and I decided we procrastinate and take care of this one later.
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| Not all notorious Vekomas are bad: Elitch Gardens is home to the last remaining Vekoma Flying Carousel. Or at least, they claim it's the last one from Vekoma. Other resources say Zierer. The park's website says the ride ran in France for a while, so take that for what you will. |
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| An element inconspicuously absent from Elitch Gardens during the Six Flags era was the "garden" aspect. Herschend's green thumbs are hard at work taking care of that issue. |
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| After a few hours at Elitch's, it was time for some culture credits in Denver! |
We left Elitch Gardens & headed for Snooze, a breakfast restaurant that Beth and Deb were raving about. Of course, we show up and the wait is 45 minutes. We put our names in & then run around town a bit.
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| Here we are at some beer-making-place underneath the baseball stadium in downtown Denver. :} |
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| Here are the brewery's different beers. Michael was beside himself with delight! |
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| They served beer samplers on flights here at Blue Moon. I tried this Agave-nectar one that Michael got. It was pretty sweet by the standards of beer, but not sweet enough for me. :} |
After Michael finished his beers, we headed back over to Snooze for our much needed brunch. I'm pretty sure those 4 little beers were the only thing in Michael's belly at the time.
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| Snooze: A breakfast-type place! |
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| Livelier than your local nightclub, with much better food ta'boot! And all without that annoying nightclub aroma of beer, piss, and squashed advances. |
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| Why stop at giving your guests menus and refreshments while they wait for a table? Snooze gives their guests board games and playing cards! (Yes, I asked these girls if I could take their picture. What? Did you think I just sat there taking pictures of them from a few feet away?? I was all, "Hi there. I'm documenting this restaurant for a photo blog. Can I photograph you playing cards?" and the girls were all "Oh my gosh yes!--Wait!--Hold On!--Lemme fix my hair--And I wanna sit like this!--And then you can take picutres of this side of me--you ready!--Ok--Ok?--Ok, ok." They were both good sports about it. They probably thought I was a blogger with some actual presence in the interwebs. lol |
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| Our feast! *devours* |
Like the brewery, Snooze also offers flights. PANCAKE FLIGHTS!!! (we know you have a choice in pancake travel so we thank you for flying with Snooze Airlines. We hope you enjoy your post-meal sleepiness here in the Denver area or wherever your final destination may be.)
Michael and Steve's meals were a combination of Sweet Potato Pancakes, Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Pancakes, Special of the Day Pancakes (Chocolate-pecan pancakes topped with baked apples and whipped cream) and Elvis Presley Pancakes (Red-velvet pancakes with bananas and cream). My meal was called "OMG French Toast"(Fresh mascarpone-stuffed brioche topped with cream, salted caramel, toasted coconut shavings and agave-dipped strawberries).
I'm going to let all of that set in before we move on.
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Ok, you ready?
Back to Elitch Gardens!
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| The newest addition to Elitch Gardens is Blazin' Buckaroo! It's an *adorable* new kiddie coaster with very nice-looking fixtures. Again, the Herschendification is manifesting here. |
We didn't have to borrow children to ride this coaster, but there was a mom with 3 kids who needed an adult to ride with each one. Naturally we obliged & had the privilege of enjoying a kiddie coaster with an actual...well...kiddie! #8--DING!!
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| Now it's time for a ride on Elitch's sporadic & unnecessarily-fast ferris wheel! |
We tried to get a feel for what exactly constituted one cycle on this Ferris Wheel, but we just couldn't seem to figure it out. There was a lot of stopping and starting & the full revolutions we made were out of succession.
I got some decent pictures, but the Ferris Wheel seemed to be working against me. The ones from the Observation Tower would end up being much better.
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| Here we have a vast majority of Elitch Garden's dry attractions. |
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| Facing in the other direction, we have a lovely view of the main midway. |
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| You didn't think I only had ONE picture of Blazin' Buckaroo, do you?? Of course not! :} |
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| *groan* |
The more we looked at Mind Eraser, the more the ride seemed to screw with us. It was just sitting there, tantalizing our minds & mocking us. Our eyes played tricks on us. Just looking at it started to warp our perceptions.
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| Oh God.....I do not want to go over there. |
Umm....
uhhh......
RAPIDS. YES! WE MUST RIDE THE RAPIDS! LET'S GO!!
*flees*
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| The Disaster Canyon rapids ride provided a much needed distraction from Mind Eraser. |
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| Plus, the cool-off was probably beneficial for our brains. |
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| The queue for Disaster Canyon provided some lovely views of surrounding attractions. And we had plenty of time for pictures because the loading process for Disaster Canyon was slower than two snails fornicating. |
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| After our Disaster Canyon ride, we just had to ride Sidewinder again because...ya know...it's just right there. Here's a view from one of the flights of stairs. |
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| Backseat and front seat rides on Sidewinder vary greatly. There's some violent airtime in the front seat, but the backseat has some obnoxious g-forces. |
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| Ok. For real. We need to suck it up and go get our Mind Eraser credit. |
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| Ok.....ok! We made it to the area of the park where Mind Eraser lives...so far...so good. Look at how pretty Dragonwing is! |
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| ............ |
.....GHOST BLASTERS!!! WE MUST RIDE THE GHOST BLASTERS. YES. LET'S GO.
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| The ex-Scooby Doo shooting dark ride was re-branded & rides great! We'd be having a tournament with ACE later. |
Okay.....enough shenanigans. Time for us to face the music.
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| "Why are we riding this? In fact, why am I riding this? I think I got this credit here 12 years. Can't I just wait for you at the exit?" Steve, Steve, and I (yes, there are now multiple Steves) ended up getting Michael to ride with us anyways. |
As our proximity to the ride drew closer, the effect it had on our minds got worse. Thoughts blurred. The ability to perceive color and depth was blocked from our occipital lobes. Deafening screams rang out & reverberated into infinity, echoing and multiplying on top of each other.
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| Here we see the Steves and Michael discussing their final wills & testaments. |
OK. Story time. DISCLAMER: STRONG LANGUAGE. If bad words offend you, fast-forward to the next picture because stuff's about to get real.
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Michael and I sit down. We pull the massive restraints down. Michael grabs the extra-padded handlebars and says, "good thing they have these 'oh-sh*t' handles". So I say "Yeah, more like 'oh-f*ck-my-life' handles". One of the ride operators comes around and says, "This is a no-swearing ride". He looks at me all serious-like and then cracks up laughing. Then Michael and I laugh and I'm just like, "You have been on this, haven't you?" He smiles and says, "Well, for real. No swearing. There's little ears around."
This sort of confuses me. Why in God's name are "little ears" in line for this travesty of a ride? I mean, Hell. If they're old enough to handle this abuse, then they're sure as sh*t old enough to tolerate a few f-bombs.
As for the ride it self.....well.....many an f-bomb we did indeed drop. It went something like this:
*lift hill*
Oh God.....Here we go....
*first drop*
AAAAAAHHHAHAHGAGHGAHGAGAAAGAHAHHHAAAA-OHH-MYYY-GODDD
*kidney-bean loop*
OOHH-OH-OH-OH-OHHH-FF**********CKKKKJESUSCHRISTOHHHHMYGGODDDDJESUS-OHH
*over-banked turn*
AAAAHGAHAHHGGAAAAAAAAAA-F****CCCCKKMYYYYYLIIIFEEEE (this was right next to the station, mind you. That one's for you, Mr. ride op)
*sidewinder & turn*
OHH-AOUUWWWHH-OOWW-OW-OWW
*double roll*
OOHHHHHHHOHOOHHHHHHHHOOOHHHHOHHHHOOH
*home stretch*
AGH-AHHHH-JESUSCHRIST-OHHH-OH-OH-OH-OH
*break run with a sudden complete stop for no reason*
OOOOOHHHHHHHHHHH--UGHMPH!!
*sitting in the break run*
Oh my sweet Jesus. Oh my f*cking God. Wow. That was really bad. REALLY BAD. Wow. Does anyone have a cigarette?
Survived credit #9. Hey-ohh!!!
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| So yeah. Wow. That was really something. |
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| After conquering the Mind Eraser, the spell was broken and our perceptions returned to normal! |
After we finished up with our Mind Eraser endeavor, we headed over to the pavilions for the opening ceremony for the Preservation Conference, which included food, speeches, and a silent auction of things Elitch Gardens fished out of their boneyard. After a couple hours of that, we were whisked away on a tour of Elitch Garden's entrails.
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| "...and on your right, you'll see our mediaeval torture device, Mind Eraser." |
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| Lo and behold, we walked directly under Mind Eraser. I could feel twinges of PTSD coming on. |
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| Yes, that is a school bus. We sat in the back because we're cool. |
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| Oh Mind Eraser. You look so pretty. Why can't you be good? |
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Fresh off the bus, we come to Stop #1: The Sign Shop!
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| Every sign 5 ft or smaller in Elitch Gardens is made here in the sign shop. There's many old retired signs in the shop, including a handful from the Six Flags era. |
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Stop #2: The Machine Shop!
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| The left side of the Machine Shop is the spare-parts bin. Here we see back-up shoulder harnesses for Sidewinder!! Oh what I wouldn't give to take one of these babies home! Maybe fasten it to a chair somehow. |
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| Looking for polyurethane wheels? Try the Vekoma aisle. |
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| Next up: The Nursery! Here you can see where we are in relation to the park. |
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| Yes, Herschend has definitely helped put the garden back into Elitch Gardens! |
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| This is a happy flower. "Hello!" says the happy flower. :} |
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These topiaries are transplants from the original Elitch Gardens. The nursery specialists have been caring for these plants since they moved to the new location. The park has yet to find a place for them, so for now they are harbored here in nursery.
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| The Giant White Birds of Paradise are also quite happy! All of the park's tropical plants spend about 7 months of the year here in the nursery. In the summer months, they are moved out into the park. |
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| On the ride back we got a good view of Elitch Garden's boneyard. Here we can see parts of the old Chance Chaos & Huss Rainbow, both of which were retired after identical rides at other parks suffered severe mechanical failures. |
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| We can see that the park also had a motion simulator at one time. |
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| After our tour, we were ready to check out the Observation Tower. We wanted to get some good pictures while we still had some sunlight. |
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| Just LOOK at this view! It's like RollerCoaster Tycoon up here! |
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| Signature shot of Mr. Twiser. I'm sure everyone in Denver has this on an SD card somewhere. |
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| Elitch Gardens definitely gets the "Obnoxious Color Explosion" seal of approval! :} |
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| Ew. |
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| The oldest coaster at Elitch Gardens is still one of the stars! |
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| Shake, Rattle, & Roll, the park's Huss Top Spin, had been closed all day. As seen here, the ride finally started testing. We decided we'd head in that general direction after we were done up here. |
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| It's like a rainbow sprung a leak down there! I definitely approve. |
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| The guy in the little booth at the far end of Sidewinder has the best job. Just sits and wave at riders as the come and go. What I wouldn't do to sit in that little booth and and take pictures of riders as they fly by! |
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| Here we see the water park still asleep. It wouldn't be open for the season until the following week. |
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Denver.
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| The Elitch Gardens entrance comes complete with its own metro stop! |
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| While we were there, we hitched a ride on the park's classic carousel. |
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| My only complaint is the carousel's lack of organ music. |
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| These were quite cool. I'd never seen chariot horses on a carousel that actually move up & down with the rest of the horses. Unfortunately, they cannot be ridden by park guests. |
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| The flower clock is another lovely touch. |
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| GO AWAY Mind Eraser. Nobody likes you. |
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| Not to be outdone by the baseball stadium, Elitch Gardens has some Blue Moon goodness of its own! |
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| This has easily been the most beer-laden trip report I've ever composed. |
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| I love a good Top Spin. Too bad this wasn't a good Top Spin. |
Story time:
Shake, Rattle, and Roll had only been open for a few cycles when we got there. We noticed that the ride was only being filled about 3/4 of the way. When the operator was asked why by a group of teenagers, she said something about the ride's inability to flip properly with a full load. Now, the boys and I know that a functional Top Spin has no issues completing revolutions with a full load. Rides don't simply come with an excess of seats. As we watched the ride, we noticed that some ride cycles had the usual flipping business, while other cycles mostly swung to and fro. There was something apparently wrong with this Top Spin, but we weren't really sure what. Evidently, neither were the ride ops.
We sat in our seats & readied ourselves for our ride. Sure as sh*t, the ride for some reason was unable to complete a full rotation. In fact, the ride was really struggling in general. It made a lot of creaks and moans, even by the standards of a Top Spin. The ride's "face-slam" move at the end of our cycle seemed to throw off the ride's alignment. Once we were level and stationary, the ride operator wasn't able to unlock the restraints. The sensors that allow the ride to set us free weren't engaging.
So we sat there for a while. Perfectly still. The teenagers around us were immediately impatient & started saying saying lots of stupid teenager things. The ride operator looked frantic & started making calls. Soon there were about 7 ride experts milling around the ride and the control panel. One of the operators did a manual override on the Top Spin and re-positioned us so that the sensors would engage. Finally, we were set free. The ride proceeded to close once again.
So basically, we broke the Top Spin. Either that, or this Top Spin is not really fit to run in general.
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| When the time came to ride the Spider, we deposited Michael into the Beer Garden (he hates these rides) and set out. Sadly, we managed to break this one too. We'd have to wait 'til morning & try again. |
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| Elitch's is quite beautiful at night. |
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| Soon the park closed & ACE hosted their Ghost Blasters Tournament! Ghost-blasting shenanigans ensued. |
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| This part of the park looks rather spooky at night. |
After the tournament, we hit the coasters that were open for Exclusive Ride Time. We rode Twister II several times, but I don't have nighttime pictures of it. Sue me. For whatever reason, the park had a series of lawn sprinklers suspended from the woodwork near the base of the lift hill & the ride's tunnel. The operators said,"The ride needs those sprinklers in order to run. They are for your safety."
Umm. Okay......?
To the ride's credit, my nighttime rides I got were MUCH better than the ride I got this morning. I have determined that the water sprinklers are magical & they make the ride 10x better somehow.
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| Just LOOK at that 90s neon goodness! As you'll notice later in this report, neon is quite popular in Denver. |
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| WARP SPEED. |
Wanna hear something funny? Tom still didn't have his Mind Eraser credit, so we decided to be good friends and join him for his ride. Isn't that funny? Ha. Haha. Ha.
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| We were literally the only people in the station that didn't work for Elitch Gardens. |
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| What Michael and Alec's facial expressions tell me is that the ride has officially succeeded in erasing their minds. |
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| Whew. I'm tired. Are you tired? I'm tired. |
After our 2nd ride on Mind Eraser, we decided to quit while we were ahead.
Tune in next time for Part III of my Denver Trip Report, where Michael, Steve, Tom, and I hit up FOUR amusement establishments in a single day! It's raining credits here in Colorado!! :}
