Aloha and Hau'oli Makahiki Hou! We wish you a very happy and prosperous New Year. We send special mahalos to our readers and to Ed Sugimoto of Time Warner Cable. We appreciate all of your comments and your shared enthusiasm.
We especially wish to thank Mike Buck of KHVH Radio AM 830 in Honolulu for his encouragement and support. We enjoy our appearances on his show and love talking to his radio audience.
Joni, Mike, and Shredley in the KHVH studio (Photo by Ed Harnas)
Our warmest regards go out to Carole Sanderson, President of American Coaster Enthusiasts, Director Mike Nelson, and Mallie Millis of Cedar Point Admissions, and George Richmond, Animations Manager of Cedar Point.
We thank our talented photographers for the wonderful photos we use in our columns. They are Gonchar of coasterimage.com, Joel Rogers of coastergallery.com, Joe Schwartz of joyrides.com, Robb Alvey of themeparkreview.com, Eric Gieszl of ultimaterollercoaster.com, Ryan Brietzke of xtremecoastin.com, Rick Davis and Joel Styer of dafe.org.
One of the highlights of 2005 was meeting Duane Marden at the ACE (American Coaster Enthusiasts) Convention in Illinois. Duane is webmaster of www.rcdb.com. RCDB stands for "Roller Coaster Data Base". This website has been a tremendous research and photo source for our columns. Throughout the amusement park industry, Duane Marden is one of the top authorities on coasters.
Shredley, Duane, and Joni at the ACE Banquet (Photo by Joyce Harris)
Our roller coaster adventures began April 2005 in Las Vegas and Los Angeles. In June, our next foray took us Midwest to Illinois and Wisconsin. At the end of August and early September, we went to Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana. In November, we returned to Las Vegas for the Thanksgiving weekend as a last hurrah!
Las Vegas is Hawaii's premier vacation destination, and we wanted to check out the coasters for the local folks. There are four coasters in the city, and we ventured to a fifth roller coaster in Primm, Nevada. See "Joni and Shredley Do Vegas", September 2005 column.
You haven't lived until you've been dangled nine hundred feet above the Las Vegas strip!
X-Scream front seat, Joni flies while Shredley shows white knuckles (On-ride photo by The Stratosphere Tower)
After Las Vegas, we flew to Los Angeles. We drove North on 405 towards Magic Mountain in Valencia. We checked into the Best Western on Monday night anticipating outrageous thrills for the next day. We got up bright and early in order to beat the crowd for the "run of the bulls" to their fourth-dimension, one-of-a-kind, roller coaster X.
X first drop - it spins riders upside down and backwards (Photo by Joe Schwartz www.joyrides.com)
For the next two days, we sank to decadent depths of falls and thrills on the many world class coasters at Six Flags Magic Mountain. See our November 2003 column "Taking It To The Xtreme". There are sixteen roller coasters at this park, and some of our favorites are Viper, Goliath, Riddler's Revenge, Batman, Colossus, Scream, and Ninja.
Goliath, the train heading down the giant first drop (Photo by Shredley)
On Thursday, we headed South to Knott's Berry Farm in Buena Park. See our October 2003 column "Going Knott's". The highlight of this venture was to spend two days at Knott's accompanied by Andi Edmunds, daughter of Lanikai, Hawaii residents Dana and Ginger Edmunds. At age 15, she was the perfect partner for extreme roller coaster crimes. She took to it like a duck to water, and we were delighted to share her many first experiences.
We met Andi and her grandmother Gloria on Friday morning in the lobby of the Knott's Berry Farm Hotel. Snoopy put in an appearance.
Snoopy loves Andi and so do we (Photo by Shredley)
A new roller coaster addition since our Knott's column is Silver Bullet. It is a mammoth inverted steel ride designed by Bolliger and Mabillard. This coaster turns riders upside down six times and features many swizzles (heartline spins). It is smooth, fast, and fun. This was our first ride on this coaster, the first ride with Andi, and her first experience on an inverted coaster.
Silver Bullet as viewed from the observation tower (Photo by Shredley)
Shredley and Joni, speeding on Silver Bullet (On-ride photo by Knott's Berry Farm)
One of our favorite people at Knott's is Charlene R. Parker. Also known as "The Queen of Ghost Town", Charlene excels at making Revolutionary Period crafts and clothes from scratch. She spins her own yarn from lamb's wool. It was great to see her again and to introduce her to Andi.
Joni, Andi, and Charlene (aka/Abigail Adams) (Photo by Shredley)
In Ghost Town is the wooden roller coaster Ghostrider. We rode it five times. It was heavenly as always, and spectacular in every way.
Andi's favorite ride, by far, was Xcelerator. It's a hydraulic launch steel scream machine built by Intamin that accelerates from 0 to 82 miles per hour in 2 seconds. It reaches a height of 200 feet in the blink of an eye. Andi referred to Xcelerator as "my baby", and she wanted to ride it continuously.
Xcelerator, the train cresting the summit (Photo by Shredley)
In June 2005, we attended the annual convention of the American Coaster Enthusiasts. This year the event was held in Illinois and Wisconsin. Since we hadn't been to any of these parks, all of the roller coasters were new to us.
The festivities kicked off at Six Flags Great America in Gurnee, Illinois which is located about an hour's drive North of Chicago. This park boasts twelve roller coasters. One of our favorites was Raging Bull, a giant Bolliger and Mabillard steel mega twister, built in May of 1999.
Raging Bull's first drop framed by the old mission (Photo by Shredley)
Coinciding with the ACE convention, was the presentation of a plaque honoring Batman The Ride, the first inverted looping steel roller coaster. This ride has been enormously successful, and can be found in eight Six Flags Amusement Parks around the world. ACE President Carole Sanderson and the management of Six Flags Great America were present for the dedication and the unveiling ceremony.
Carole Sanderson, President of ACE, officiates at the dedication (Photo by Shredley)
Plaque dedicated to Batman The Ride by American Coaster Enthusiasts (Photo by Shredley)
One of the highlights of the convention is the Awards Banquet. Our friend, Tim Baldwin, ACE Publications Director, was given a lifetime achievement award for his hard work on the organizations' magazines, newsletters, calendars, and guides.
Tim Baldwin on right, with Jeffrey Seifert, Secretary of ACE (Photo by Shredley)
Our friend, Lee Ann Draud, is a contributor to ACE News. She is a very skilled writer, and a staunch devotee of roller coasters.
Lee Ann, Shredley, Joni, and Joyce
The convention headed North to Wisconsin. The first stop was a small park called Little-A-Merrick-A. After spending a couple of hours there, we drove to the Wisconsin Dells. These parks will be covered in future columns.
The convention continued at the Mount Olympus Theme Park. Everything is Greek including the architecture, music, food, and even the names of the rides. Our destination coaster was a new wooden scream machine Hades, which is featured on the current cover of RollerCoaster! magazine.
Hades giant drop into the dark tunnel (Photo courtesy of American Coaster Enthusiasts)
Hades redefines the wooden roller coaster. It's enormous, steep, and fast. It tunnels underneath the parking lot. When first viewed, the ride's far extension can be misconstrued as another woodie. It's sheer chaos on rails!
Hades - the train roaring uphill from the dark tunnel (Photo by Shredley)
Add-on parks in the area that we visited during the convention Riverview and Timber Falls.
Joni & Shredley on Speedy Gonzales at Riverview (Photo by Joyce Harris)
Our friends frequently ask us about the food we find on our travels. Chicago and Illinois are known for quality beef. In Gurnee, we found a jewel called the Backyard Steak Pit. The steaks were extremely ono at a very reasonable price.
In Wisconsin, known for its cheese, we went to Carr Valley Cheese, a small factory which produces an excellent product in many varieties.
Carr Valley Cheese - a cheese lover's delight (Photo by Shredley)
In August, we flew to Cleveland and met sister Joyce and nephew Scott. We drove into Pennsylvania to experience two small amusement parks in the Northwest part of the state.
The first park was Conneaut Lake Park. Its claim to fame is the Blue Streak, an out and back roller coaster that is gentle, but provides lots of airtime. It is an ACE Coaster Classic built by Edward Vettel in 1937.
Blue Streak - its first drop surrounded by woods (Photo by Shredley)
We drove north to Waldameer Park in Erie, PA. We were met by Joni's sister Linda, and brother-in-law Norman. This park has three coasters, one wooden and two steel. The park is beautiful with many tall trees and is situated on a lovely river.
Norman & Linda - happy on the tram at Waldameer (Photo by Shredley)
Waldameer's first coaster, The Comet, was built in 1951 by Herb Schmeck. We rode this ride three times, and then, all six of us headed Southwest to our home away from home, Cedar Point, in Sandusky, Ohio.
Next month we'll take you to Cedar Point and two parks in the state of Indiana. We'll also reveal our plans for 2006.
Much Aloha!
-Joni and Shredley
Next Installment: Chapter XXX: A Wonderful 2005, What's Ahead for 2006 - Part Two
Related Links:
www.coasterimage.com
www.coastergallery.com
www.themeparkreview.com
www.ultimaterollercoaster.com
www.dafe.org
www.xtremecoastin.com
www.joyrides.com
www.rcdb.com
www.aceonline.org
