The American Thrill Ride Association

The ATRA Tour Continues...

Cedar Point

Sunday, September 9, 2007

Dave and I were setting off to take my brother Mike to CP for the first time in 7 years. Pete was going to meet us there. Arrival time at park approximately 1:45pm

As always, entrance was made through the Magnum gate. We proceeded to Maverick when we ran into Raptorman Dave and Ron from Michigan (Ron is an ATRA member.) April, Mike, Dave, and Ron rode Magnum while Raptorman Dave (hereafter known as Dave #2) went to his car to drop off his coat.

Magnum was only running one train, most likely because it just stopped raining and they did not want another accident like a few months ago. Luckily we got up there at a good time before the station got packed and only waited 5 minutes. The brake was on pretty good and the ride was only decent, not really good.

Afterwards the 5 headed to Maverick, where the line was about 30 minutes. They were only running 4 trains at first and then, of course, as luck would have it, they stopped the ride for about 30 minutes to put the other two trains on. Apparently they were having some sort of technical difficulty and it took them extra time to do this.

The wait was well worth it, as Mike LOVED this ride!!! He rode in the front seat with Dave. Ron and I rode in the very back seat. I had been wanting to get a back seat ride for some time, as I had only ridden in the front so far. The first drop in the very back seat was nothing short of awesome!!! As far as the infamous head-banging I had been hearing about, well, it was non-existent for me. Go figure.

The front seat on-ride photo of Mike and Dave turned out really well. Mike bought it for me to have. We will be scanning it to put on the ATRA website.

After Maverick we took my brother on his first-ever S & S swing. He loved it! He had never even seen one of these before! He was laughing and having fun while I rode with a frozen face, scared to death, as I always am on this swings. Fun, though.

It was about 4:15 when we got off the swing, just in time for Pete to meet us like he said he was going to. He arrived at the park a little later.

The 6 of us then headed back to Millennium Force. My brother had ridden this ride back in 2000 when it first opened, the problem is, he was there on closing weekend Saturday and the line was like 4 hours for MF at that time, so he only got one ride on it. This time it was like a 10-minute wait and he rode it twice with Dave, Dave #2, and Ron while Pete and I went to ride Wildcat, as we personally do not like to mess with MF belts and I personally think M F is boring anyways. My brother likes the ride, but he pretty much said that all it really is is speed.

After MF we all headed back to Dragster because up to that point in the day it had been down. We saw it testing from MF area. However, as soon as we got there, we saw that it was down. We waited a bit while the maintenance guy got his ladder and got up on the launch track to mess with it. When he went to get the cherry picker that is when we knew it was not going to open any time soon and we moved on. We went back to Magnum to see if we could find Pete because he was going to ride Magnum while we rode Dragster. We could not find him, so we headed to the front of the park.

We knocked out Wicked Twister, Disaster Transport (heading for Alaska yet somehow ending up back in northern Ohio), Raptor, and Blue Streak. My brother was very neutral about Wicked Twister and, as always, loves his Raptor.

We met up with Pete again on Blue Streak and told him we were going to Dragster because we saw it was running again from the front of the park. He went off on his own to ride and said he would meet up with us at closing.

By the way, I should mention that while Blue Streak has been running really well over the last few years, it was not running all that good today. Dave said he thought it was because it rained. [Editors note: Pete vehemently disagrees with this assessment. Says Pete "The Blue Streak was running great!!!"]

So the group then went to Dragster. The line was only down to the end of the ramp. This is really the first time it had run all day, and it was 7pm. The park closed at 8pm. The front seat only had a 4-train wait, and since my brother was a first-timer, we decided to wait. He LOVED it! His exact words as we crested the hill were "holy f***!" I am glad he got to ride it because about 4 or 5 trains after that, as we were walking back for another spin on Magnum, it broke down again! So with the 8-hour operating day, it w as up for about 45 minutes tops. Since my brother had to pay to get in and does not have a pass, I am so glad he got to ride it.

After Dragster we took another spin on Magnum and then me and Mike headed back for one last ride on Maverick. He rode in the back with me but said he liked the front better. The ride was walk-on!!!! They were sending trains half empty during the last 15 minutes! The ride ops told me they never saw it walk-on like this all season! And MF and Dragster were NEVER walk-ons their first season!!!

At closing we all gathered in the parking lot next to Gemini and then proceeded to Applebee's for a nice dinner of eating and socializing.

It was truly a fun day!

April

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