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Yesterday, my friend, was an adventure. I alluded to it in the Friday Five yesterday, because on Fridays, I'm just too damned lazy to bother with posting something original or fun. Friday is my Funday. Not like Monday. Er...wait. That's a song, isn't it? I digress.

Yesterday, we packed the kitties into their kitty condo. We made sure they had lots of fresh water, and three bowls of food. They had their toys (note: I think the kitties have almost as many neat toys in a week as Ax had in his first month with us...gah!). We made certain the parrot was properly provisioned and the Elder Cat was fed, watered, and ignored from where she was sleeping in the coat closet.

We got in the car. We remembered to buy sunscreen before we got too far out of town. We hit the open road. Tha's right folks, the Captain had a ROAD TRIP!

Okay, so we only went as far as the local amusement-and-water park. First stop, the water-park section. That's when we discovered that they will NOT allow you into a pool with a tshirt on. Excuse my French: WHAT THE FUCK? No offence, but the Captain is showing his middle age...and is rotund. And slightly hairy...and completely and utterly untanned....I am NOT showing off my fat, hairy, WHITE body to the jeers and mockery of the teens. Well, they were firm, No T-Shirts in the pools. They even publically de-shirted some poor shy girl who was overweight, and she just about cried. Asswipes. But I digress. Shaking off our disappointment at being unable to swim, because we were unwilling to scare the swimming public with our bods, we headed for the amusement half of the park. Things were better there.

First stop, something gentle. Something fun. Something to warm up on.

"We're not going on the roller coaster first thing," intoned the other half in a meaningful voice. Darn.

We stepped up to ride the 'Hang Glider'. This was a bit like the old 'Parasol' type fairground rides, except you lay flat on your belly. With your chin on a rubber pad, like a massage table. With a hard plastic block the size of a shoebox pressed up against your groin. NOT like a massage table. With a CAGE clamshelling you to the car. Um. Now I know how GI Joe feels! And honestly, that get up would be at home in certain basements...but I digress. The ride itself was gentle and fun...up and down, round and round...we get off. First ride accomplished!

"I feel sick," intones the other half.

Yup. It was gonna be one of THOSE trips to the amusement park.

The park used to be owned by a family, and was somewhat...dorky, but amusing with its Camelot and Fairy Tale Land themeing...but Six Flags bought it, and now it's kind of half Wild West half Outer Space...kind of strange, in a final frontier sort of way.

But, after a bit of rest and some wandering around taking pictures of the stuff that won't be there in a year, he felt well enough to try another ride.

We agreed that the "Sky Coaster" was out of the question. For the uninformed, this new sort of ride consists of you being tied into a gunny sack, hauled to the top of a 100 ft tower, and then dropped on two bungy cords...sort of a human slingshot effect. Like hell. And you have to pay extra to do it! Blood and bloody ashes, I'm not THAT stupid!

So on we went...only to discover they've built a Wild Mouse type ride. I LOVED those as a kid, but you just didn't see them anymore like you used to...but they seem to have some sort of resurgence since the Roller Coaster Tycoon game came out...or maybe it was just a coincidence. This park's version gets an A+...it was great! Just jolty enough, and just fast enough to get a few good whoops in. And it gave a good view of what passes for the flume ride at this park...but more about that later. I agreed that I'd ride it...I don't know why, but I promised I would. But LATER.

After the Wild Mouse, we headed down and had some amusement park food. You know, over priced and nasty...but this wasn't too bad. Chicken strips and fries, and it was a big enough portion I couldn't eat all the fries...amazing! So Six Flags improved SOMETHING when they took over. Too bad they can't be bothered to maintenence the simple stuff, like fresh coats of paint...I know paint's expensive, but some of that stuff hadn't been repainted since we were last there, nearly three years ago! But I digress.

After lunch, it was time for some serious ride ridin'. We tackled the Pirate first (sees appropriate, no?), and a good time was had by all...old fashioned fair-ground fun in the great rocking boats. Next? The Paratrooper, which is (as I described above) a bit like the Hang Glider ride we tried first, and an old favorite of mine ("I feel sick," said the other half).

We dedcided to go and ride the kiddy train, but they wouldn't let adults on. We wanted to see their silly dioramas, so we walked around the ride and became highly dismayed. They didn't want adults to ride, but they had Freddy Kruger dressed up in cowboy clothes hiding in 'the gold mine' section! It was scary! It was inhuman, to send little kids to be shot at by bad-guys, intimindated by the Sheriff, and then to face Freddy Kruger alone in a spooky old abandoned mine. Man, whoever does these dioramas should be taken out and horse-whipped....then it was on the the bumper cars, and I bounced over to have a spin on the Roulette Wheel (they called em Mexican Hats where I grew up)...the other half declined to go on the spinning, whirling discus, so I got stuck riding next to some small child, who acted like I was going to eat her or something, but the ride operator wouldn't let either of us ride alone. Ugh! And to add insult to injury, I threw my upper back out of whack on it...just my luck! But the Captain was not to be deterred. Going down the hill, the other half decided to take a flying ride down the Giant Slide. I declined...he swears it's fun, but all I get is scared stupid...uncontrolled free fall? No thanks!

We passed the Ring Of Fire, another fair-ground standard (did I mention that this used to be a family owned rinky dinky park? I wasn't kidding. Most of the rides were once of the sort you can find in your average traveling carnival), and I passed. I can ride the scariest coaster of your choice, but I cannot get on something that ONLY sends me in loops. Ugh. My stomach turns just thinking about it.

We stopped and had some Dippin' Dots (ice cream of the future! Told you it was the final frontier), and then headed for the Falling Star...which scared me at first, but really wasn't too bad...this is sort of like the 'hammer' rides, but instead of going upside down, you ride looking out sideways on a giant platform that stays upright...scary in its own right, but a marvelous view of the park! Then it was on the octopus, which was more in theme with the waterpark side of the park, and about as freaky looking as you can imagine. It was just your old fair-type octopus, but it was so built up with fiberglass dragons for the arms, with weird fish-faced cars, and a monsterous Giant Octopus glaring down evilly atop...it was weird, but one of the smoothest riding examples of that particular ride I've ever been on!

Afterwards, we found the Antique 1905 Carousel. This was a big let down. I know carousels are not exactly the high tech thrill rides, but if you have an honest to goodness antique one, still intact, please...do a LITTLE to maintence it? The paints was probably from the mid-80s...many of the horses were cracked, some were missing legs! And there was NO CALLIOPE! Can you imagine? A carousel with no music? It was a travesty. It also made me realize that there had been NO MUSIC in the entire park. Ugh. Definately led to a bit of a bummer. Music really adds to an amusement park's fun level, and mine went down a notch or two as I realized it.

But we persevered, and headed for the Main Attraction. Standing thirty minutes in line to ride the new signature wooden coaster. Thank goodness, the ride was actually worth it, and if the line hadn't been quite so long, I'd've ridden it again. The first drop is a thing of beauty! And the rest of the ride is roaring, growling, and fast...lots of ups and downs, and banked turns, though sadly, not much actual air-time...but still over all, I'd give it a 8 out of 10...much better than their steel coaster! Downside, I threw my LOWER back out to boot...so I was cripplin' a bit as we headed back down the hill.

After that, the day wound down. We rode the ferris wheel, and got some carmel apple slices, then headed for the 'flume ride', which is really more of a 'get your ass soaked in thirty six seconds' ride...you know. Stand in line forever, get into the boat, ride up the big hill, go around the corner, splash the hell out of yourself, and then to add insult to injury...people can PAY to squirt you some more! The Captain, by the way, HATES BOATS. What a sorry, disillusioning thing that was. I don't know why I promised to go on the thing! ;) My only satisfaction, after being soaked to the skin and having half the water from the ride squelching in my tennis shoes, was to hear the shrieks of dismay as the other half, who came through dry as a bone...get the full-force of the water cannons as we floated past. All. Four. Of. Them.

So, in the end, the final score was a mixed one. We had TONS of fun on the rides, but not being able to swim was a HUGE blow. The rides were all in great operational order, but there was no music, the carousel looked like a slaughter house, and many of the 'small rides' desperately needed new coats of paint or just to be hosed off to get rid of the dust. There were some other maintainence issues, too, but we'll forward those in an actual letter of complaint to the management and the owners. The other thing was a more general complaint...we didn't get smiled at by a single ride operator or employee. Most of the employees were too busy chatting with each other to give a hand if you needed it, or too busy flirting with their opposite gendered co-workers to ring you up. We could've walked out of most of the stores with serious loot if we weren't such law abiding pirates! And I came out of it with my back out in two places, so I'm cripplin today, but that's my own fault!

Still, in the end, it was a great time (and the first time we'd been able to go out and do an amusement park since the other half got sick, nearly four years ago), and we'd do it again...and probably will, for their Halloween Fright Fest this year.

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