- March 13th, 2005, 11:52 pm
#11096
Paramount's Carowinds
Sunday, March 13, 2005
I awoke at 6:04 after turning of my 5 alarm clocks as to not have a repeat of the Construction Tour incident where I overslept by about two and a half hours. At 6:30 I was in my car getting ready to leave when Dave (coasterdave) gave me a wake up call.. a little late but I still greatly appreciate it nonetheless. I arrived at the park around 8:10, about 30 minutes early and met Dave and Jonathan when they arrived.
We walked over to Security Post One where Scott Anderson had us sign in, then sign release forms. After some waiting we started to walk over from out behind the park. Maybe it was just me but it was extremely cool walking back next to the park offices and maintenance area, places 'normal' people like us rarely see.
Following a bit of confusion from our guide, we finally were in Nick Central, right in front of the Flyers, which as we all know were relocated from Kings Island. This was the first time seeing all this for me, so I just took it all in while we waited.. and waited.. and waited.. while they set up the cameras and actors, for the first ride on the flyers were to be had.
10 or so of us were chosen for the first two rides, while Me, Dave, Jonathan, Mark(forseer), Ken (KenB), and Jarvis (coasterbruh) 'waited' in line and others were looking on from the midway. No one got *too* crazy the first ride, but it was definitely apparent that snapping was possible. Some more waiting while they fiddled with the cameras and the same 10 got to go again while we watched. Scott came over and assured us that the next ride was ours.
Then the time came, I hopped into purple tub #5 and we were off. To the outside, then inside, outside, inside, outside, inside.. then finally.. *KA-CHUNK* then another, and another, and yet another.. then we started to slow. I was so happy. I had been wanting a set of Flyers at Carowinds ever since I rode Kings Island's Flying Eagles in 2002. 2 more rides (and a lot of sitting around) later we were finally made to get off. My only complaint is that there could be a bit more padding as I had massive back cramp upon getting off. Of course that was probably due to staying in the tub for about 45 minutes so that isn't likely to happen again.
After one more run with the first 10 riders we went down to the other new spin-and-spew, Flying Dutchman's Revenge. It was already test running, moving pretty fast or at least quite faster than what the others said they had seen at the Construction Tour 2 weeks prior. I was really surprised at the amount of landscaping that they had put into this area, which just used to be a concrete pad. After more waiting, and trying to find shade, we finally climbed aboard to ride. I wasn't quite sure what to expect, maybe a Tilt-A-Whirl on crack kind of thing. It turns out that that prediction wasn't too far off, and after 2 consecutive rides I felt a bit on the queasy side.
That quickly went away though as soon as we got off we could see food from McCallister's Deli being set down for our lunching pleasure. I grabbed a ham sandwich and a bottled water and went to go sit down in the shade over next to the Nick-O-Round. After I finished eating I noticed lots of people coming into Nick Central, as I was not aware that it was Employees Family and Friends day as well. This made me unpatient, as we had to be walked out to our cars for some reason, and our guide was nowhere to be found.
When our guide did return we hauled *** back to our cars and over to the parking lot. Once we got our group of 6 back together we went over to Top Gun for the first ride of the year. Top Gun is running pretty much as excellent as it always is, so it was good to see that, despite rumors, nothing had changed..
As we were working our way around the park we noticed that Scooby Doo (hmm, seems odd not specifying which) had a little line, so we decided to go on it. Jarvis thought it would be a great idea to film, but got shut down by the ride op. No less than 5 seconds later he had it back out again, and actually filmed about half of the ride before the same op comes over the loudspeaker saying "PLEASE PUT AWAY ANY CAMERAS OR CAMCORDERS." It was also about this time that Ken, Mark, and myself did not have working guns, but as soon as Jarvis shot anything he scored. Got around 500 points in just half a ride. Figures, the only working gun in the entire car goes to the one not using it!
Continuing our circle we hit up Cyclone for a ride. I was noticing while in line that Cyclone is really a myriad of colors, from the deep purple that I think it's supposed to be, to faded purple, to a blueish hue, to a black sort of dust on the rails, to even some red peeling through. Not sure when the last time it was painted, but it could use it again. Since Jon and I were on a train ahead of the others, I went down to check out the new Happy Days Diner since I had missed it previously. All I can say right now is that it will definitely take some getting used to, but if they really do have milkshakes, it will help a lot more!
After unsuccessfully trying Drop Zone, we noticed that the first turn of Hurler had been completely retracked, I mean every single layer.. now if they could do that for all the turns.. Of course seeing new wood we had to try it out, and I must say from my ride in the 2nd seat it was better than in 2003 and 04 from what I recall. Hopefully we can get a night ride in soon and compare it to those imfamous late season 2002 rides.
Back over to the Nick Central area, minus two members, Mark and Dave, to do a bit of exploring of this new area. It looked like a few things were still missing like perhaps a sign for TVLand Road Trip and some of the paintings on the upper part of Nick-O-Round and maybe some other things I missed. The new path connecting the former Zoom Zone dead end over next to the flyers is really nice and provides some great shots of Fairly Odd Coaster.
The last thing for the day was of course, more rides on the Flyers. This time Jarvis, Jon, Ken and myself had an audience, not to mention one that was not prepared for the action that we would give. We all talked about how peaceful they look when there is no enthusiasts on them, and how we would shock the daylights out of everyone in the queue after we were finished. It was about that time when some 12 or 13 year old guy in a tub by himself, snapped by accident. Needless to say his expression was PRICELESS. After our first ride the guy riding behind me was like "ARE THESE SUPPPOSED TO DO THAT? MAN YOU SCARED THE CRAP OUT OF ME" etc etc, and it was all I could do to not laugh. We then took one more spin on our new favorite toy before the park closed for the day.
I went to go process my Season Pass and left around 4:35, I stopped at the Jeepers at Concord Mills for about 5 minutes to take some pictures for my site(re-opening 3/22 BTW), and I arrived home at exactly 7:00. I was of course horribly sunburned from the day, but other than that, I am still waiting for someone to awake me from this perfect dream. I mean I still can't believe we now have Flyers, even after 5 rides on them today. That's all for this TR, can't wait for Friday..
EDIT:.. how could I forget.. BIG BIG Thanks to Scott and the rest of the Carowinds crew for making this possible as well as Jon, Dave, Mark, Jarvis, and Ken for being awesome to hangout with all day.
It also features a great surprise.
