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Sandman goes Stateside

Sandman

Giga Poster
So about 5 weeks ago I finally got my first taste of the US with a trip to NYC. This wasn’t really a coaster orientated trip as we were celebrating my other half graduating. Luckily we agreed to spend a day at both Six Flags Great Adventure and Coney Island to ease my cred withdrawals.

We flew out of Gatwick and landed at JFK on a pretty hot Friday morning. Didn’t do too much on that first day after all the airport/travel faff, we did manage to have a wander through Midtown and Central Park in the late afternoon though.

Central Park (or the small section we saw of it) was very nice; not too busy either as the sun began to dip behind the giant buildings surrounding the area. We nipped through Times Square to get a glimpse. Yeah, looks okay. Just a huge tourist trap really, so we wandered further out past Broadway and grabbed a bite to eat.

Here’s a photo of some guy we met on our walk through Central Park:

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We heard him drumming from about a mile away and he sounded pretty impressive - so we walked over to watch. My girlfriend pointed out that the guy who presents Catfish on MTV (Nev) was also sat beside us with his family watching this guy smash out a 15 minute solo. I’d never seen Catfish before so I was confused - but it explains why a few passers by kept gawping over.

Saturday

Woke up surprisingly early on Saturday morning. I’m awful at getting a good sleep on the first night away.

Anyway, despite being a bit tired and confused, I managed to get a good view of the sunrise over Manhattan; it’s certainly one of the most impressive skylines I’ve seen in person.

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But although the sunrise was fab, weather forecasts indicated that we were about to endure a week of heavy rain and some pretty moody storms. Ugh.

We decided to start the day by heading over to Coney Island. The sky was looking pretty fine by the time we got ready and left the hotel. 5 minutes down the road was our closest Metro station, which then got us directly to Coney Island 45 minutes later. We exited the station at Coney Island at around 9.40am - the place was predictably deserted at that time of morning. I kind of enjoyed it though, that ghostly ambience.

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We had a bit of time until Luna Park opened its doors at 11am, so we took our time with breakfast and had a quick stroll round the perimeter to get a feel of the place. I’m one of those people who absolutely cherish the tack and grittiness of the British seaside, and this has all of those qualities in spades.

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To be fair, once Luna Park opened and the retail units started trading, it felt a bit less harrowing than say, walking past Ma Kelly’s in Blackpool at midday. I don’t think I saw anybody drinking around Coney Island, come to think of it. No cocks on a stick either.

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As soon as we got onto the boardwalk we headed over to Thunderbolt which was running trains mostly empty at this point. I nipped over to the kiosk and took the $68 plunge for an unlimited ride wristband, which I figured would be necessary for all the creds plus re-rides.

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Walked straight on to Thunderbolt and got my first ride in the front centre seat. Not all that bad really. I was expecting it to be a bit rough for some reason, but the worst I can say in that respect is that it’s a bit clunky in areas. Not particularly rough though. The first drop and vertical loop are fun, as is the overbanked curve which actually has a reasonable amount of force.

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Lowlights are probably the seats/restraints, which aren’t that comfortable. I walked straight back on again for good measure and then we moved down towards the 2 Scream Zone creds. Aaaand they’re closed… damn.

Right then, back over to the Luna Park bit. Did Tickler first then the kiddie cred, Circus Coaster. Both very unsurprising, so not much to say there. Had a few rides on a some of the flats, which were also okay. Luckily it wasn’t too busy so there was no faffing around waiting ages for rides I didn’t really want to be queuing for.

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Next up it was time to tick off The Cyclone. Obviously the most anticipated coaster here, a basic’s rite of passage. I started off with a solo ride on the back row, which was pretty wild to say the least., Due to the retrack work it’s fairly smooth, the kidney battering laterals are fortunately neutralised by huge cushioned seating. Those seats are a real saviour, you can enjoy the out of control laterals without it actually hurting. Also, this thing hauls from start to finish; there’s no real downtime, the layout is always chucking you about in some way or other. I thought it was great fun… well worth riding alone just to be thrown about like a ragdoll.

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Had another 4-5 rides on Cyclone including 2 front row rides which were equally as enjoyable. Loads of great little airtime moments too.

Enduring the front row...

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Afterwards we took a walk further down the boardwalk and out onto the pier. The weather was getting a bit darker and moodier by this point. A storm seemed to be heading in over the horizon and coastguards started patrolling and advising people to make a move before 4pm.

Just prior to said weather change...

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We decided to grab a few drinks and some food then do another quick lap of Luna before heading back. I got a few more photos around the place, jumped on Cyclone a couple more times then we headed back out towards the station.

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As we came out of the park I noticed the freak show bar was open so with curiously entered and ended up staying for the 20 minute ‘freak show’. Essentially it’s a small theatre room with tiered benches and the act included a sword swallower, bed of nails and a fire eater. It was okay, some of the performers were pretty good at crowd interaction and knew how to get people worked up - which was quite funny to watch.

So, Coney Island/Luna Park. I would say on the whole, the place is greater than the sum of its parts. Obviously it isn’t a modern coaster mecca or anything remotely close to a top tier park, but when appreciated in the context of the whole ‘Coney Island’ package, it’s a fun, characterful place with plenty of history and charm.

Sunday

Another fairly early start, again no plan in place. This time we were a bit worried though because having checked forecasts once more, it looked like Monday was going to be torrential rain and thunder and that’s the day we were aiming to do Six Flags.

After a minor panic and some slight faff, it was decided that we’d quickly get ready and try to get to the Port Authority in time to catch the first bus to Six Flags today instead, since the weather looked slightly more promising. On the Six Flags website, it looked like the opening hours had been altered in accordance with the weather and the park was now due to close at 7pm.

It took about 25 minutes to travel to the PA terminal and navigate our way to the correct window where we bought our tickets and headed to the gate. The only other people there were 3 goons who were all talking about Mirabilandia.

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Eventually a queue formed and the NJT driver lead us onto the bus. We set off fairly quickly and actually skipped the stop at Newark, which meant we arrived at the park about 20 minutes earlier than expected.

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At around 9.55am, the bus finally pulled into Great Adventure’s somewhat quiet car park and we rushed off for our first view of the park.

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I think my girlfriend would have looked more enthusiastic had I shot her in the face. Only kidding, she was just ****ting her pants over Kingda Ka to put it lightly. It is a pretty epic view though to be fair.

Met a new friend along the way

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Took us less than 5 minutes to get through the security and gates, and once we were in we chucked all our stuff in a locker and headed towards Nitro. By now the sky was coming out blue and the temperature was scorching despite it being early in the morning.

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Our first ride on Nitro was on back row, followed by 3 re-rides on the front row straight after. Each time was also walk on. Thoughts. Very enjoyable first drop, which I definitely preferred on the back. From that point onwards it very much becomes a front row ride for me. That initial hill into the second hill/twist was great as was the hammerhead turn (which I prefer over the ampersand on Shambhala, oddly enough). The helix is good but not as intense as I’d heard prior to riding and the fairly standard mini-airtime hills returning back to the station are, of course, great fun. It’s only my second B&M hyper, but I thought it was solid overall. Love the colour scheme too, so loud and garish… and coupled with the shameless copyright infringing Mortal Kombat station song it’s a real tacky treat. Great start!

Next up we decided to knock off Skull Mountain whilst it was still quiet. Again it was a case of walking straight onto the train with this one. In and out within about 4 minutes, nothing to write home about here. Standard dark ride format really… use complete darkness to compensate for lack of theming. Wasn’t offensively bad at least.

Moving swiftly on to the other B&M in the vicinity, Batman. Been on one of these before in Madrid and actually really enjoyed it. Another walk on, this time with a bit more of a substantial queue line leading up to the station. Not quite as good as Madrid’s version though - which is a really good take on the theme.

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The ride experience. Firstly, we only rode once and we were on the front/right of the train. It somehow feels faster than it’s Spanish relative - and a bit rougher with age. Both are intense though. Not so keen on how snappy the corkscrews are… especially on this version because it’s just a lot more fierce in terms of pace. I enjoyed it - more specifically because these models always have fantastic turns and helixes, that’s where I do love a snappy transition.

After conquering the first 2 B&M’s we decided to tick off the rapids which were close by and also empty. It also gave my partner a chance to breathe before her next heart attack. They were pretty tired looking rapids, perhaps not that popular and thus, slightly neglected? That’s just a bit of an assumption on my part. The redeeming factor is that they actually are quite rapid… the current is much more turbulent compared to many other rapids rides I’ve done. It may have little to no theme or water features, but you’ll still get wet. Silver linings and all that.

Went back to the locker and collected our stuff. We got one of those locker-to-locker tickets which are well worth the few dollars they cost. The plan was to head over towards Kingda Ka/El Toro and get those done along with Bizarro & the mine train before lunch.

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Got there quite fast and got a few photos/had a drink before diving into El Toro’s queue. Ahh, so this is where the crowd is. 40 minutes later and we’re finally in the station section of queue. We watched on as employees desperately tried to staple at least one big guy unsuccessfully into each train going out. I swear, every damn train had one guy who delayed the process by an additional 5-6 mins. 1 train operation too. Ugh, re-rides were going to come at a cost.

Finally our time comes and we buckle up and roll out of the station. My first thought was probably quite pessimistic considering I was going up the lift hill of one of my most anticipated coasters. “These seats are a bit naff”. A moment later and boom, we’re plummeting down the insane first drop and flying high over the airtime hill. Wow, okay.

Lots of speed, force and airtime all the way through the layout. Fairly short though. I didn’t enjoy those low, banked turns as much as I thought I would, either. But that’s probably my only criticism. Oh, and the seats are really **** as I’ve said. But it’s a real beast of a woodie all in all. Definitely a top 10 contender for me, but perhaps surprisingly not my favourite woodie, which I was almost sure it would be.

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At this point we’d expected to get KK out of the way, but low and behold the bugger is down. Well, annoying but not quite surprising. Moving on.

Bizarro. I actually love the look of this, despite its dumpy “theming”. It just looks kind of badass, tucked at the back of the area, inversions poking out from different angles. The sun was back out and the few people who were riding looked like they were having a blast. I sat on for 2 rides.

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I quite enjoyed the first section of the layout up to the cobra roll. Once you hit the MCBR, the ride pretty much runs out of steam. The low to ground bits are a bit naff and don’t do much, and corkscrews on old school B&M’s are a bit tedious to me now. Fair enough, this thing is the original floorless so I guess I can cut it some slack.

In terms of how I rate it against the other 2 floorless coasters I’ve done, it’s probably bang in the middle. Doesn’t touch Superman at Parque Warner in terms of quality, whereas it has more substance than Daemonen at Tivoli.

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We headed back down to check on KK which was still down, bugger. Decided to tick off the Arrow mine train whilst we were nearby. Just as average as the likes of El Diablo at PA for those who are unaware, not particularly rough as some have stated, although I did feel a bit of a jolt during one of those awful unbanked turns.

Afterwards we nipped on the log flume very quickly in the hope it would be extra meandery (love a long, winding loggie). Turned out it was suitably meandery, which we approved of. No theming or anything though, so it’s not quite in the premier league of log flumes with Chiapas, Silver River Flume and Menhir Express.

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Still no life round by KK… time for some food then. Good timing actually, as once we stepped into one of the restaurants the heavens decided to open.

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It started to calm down after about 10 minutes so we finished up and joined the 5 minute queue for Superman. Was looking forward to trying this to be honest, having only ever done Air at Alton Towers. How would a pretzel loop actually feel?...I wondered. This one looked pretty small so I was somewhat cynical.

The ride is pretty **** to be honest. I know it’s a fairly standard opinion amongst enthusiasts that flying coasters are super restrictive and thus much less enjoyable than other B&M models. Thing is, I hadn’t been on one for so long that I’d forgotten that was the case. But yeah, staring down at grass is boring, alternatively you can lift your head and stare at someone’s shoes which really doesn’t make me feel like Superman. In the case of the pretzel loop though, turns out it was actually pretty intense and I experienced my first grey out in about 12 years, yay?!

So after a fairly disappointing ride on Superman, it was time for a pick me up. That came in the form of Green Lantern. Alrighty then...second stand-up cred after Shockwave at Drayton, and that’s gross enough to be honest.

Walked on, just me and another poor soul on the train. The first drop and loop aren’t so bad, but the remainder of the ride is a mixture of head bashing and leg buckling, it’s horrid. Definitely at the bottom of the wrung in terms of steel coasters I’ve done, somewhere with Goudurix. I think that says enough.

As we were coming towards the last couple of hours of the day, the plan was to mop up the remainder of creds and see if we’d have time for re-rides. Took the cable car across to the other side of the park, waved goodbye to KK with my mind preparing for a spite of the largest variety.

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First I got the Dark Knight out of the way. Standard wild-mouse style coaster in the dark with some funky UV effects. Eh, definitely not the worst one I’ve been on by a long shot. Then hopped onto Harley Quinn, and finally over to The Joker.

The Joker was short and fairly fun. I was expecting not to like this ride type, but in actuality I thought it was something a bit different - for its size it’s pretty thrilling and out of control. The downside is probably that the duration means it’s not really worth queuing for on a busy day. A nice ride if you ain’t hanging about for ages to get on at least.

And so that was it, my first visit to a Six Flags park over. We headed back out in order to catch the NJ bus at a reasonable time, still a bit annoyed that KK hadn’t been experienced. Little did I know (I should have done my research) that there was another cred in the kiddie area, which we didn’t enter. So, in the end I came away with 11 of the 13 creds.

So long, Great Adventure!

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And where it gets a bit more annoying…

Hung around on the bus for ages, what we didn’t realise at the time is that Six Flags scrapped their early close and decided to stick with their original closing time. The NJ transit driver basically told us as we were sat there, that he won’t be heading back until everybody is back on the bus… what’s that all about?

We sat on there for ages until everyone came back and it turns out that KK ended up operating for the final hour or so… whaaat? I actually hopped off the bus quickly and got this photo:

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I realllllly wanted to run back in the park to get it but I didn’t know when exactly the bus might leave and it was still quite a walk through the park plus queueing. Most people were also sat on the bus waiting, so we were literally being held up by one or two people. I was already pretty tired so I just accepted defeat haha.

Six Flags was a good experience for me. It is by no means my favourite park, but as an enthusiast who has been interested in this hobby for years now, it’s one of those parks I felt I had to try at some point. Yes, it’s a huge park filled with huge coasters at every turn… but in a way, this place has made me even more appreciative of parks closer to home. Why? Because lots of those parks have bucket loads of quality, despite the coaster line-up.

Six Flags Great Adventure (for me) had 2 very good coasters (Nitro, El Toro) then a lot of fairly average coasters that I could take or leave. It’s the kind of park I’d imagine I’d thrive in, but actually I’ve realised that I don’t really care for a **** load of coasters or trying to cram them in over a limited time. I’m more the sort of enthusiast who enjoys a park with half as many creds and that has a creative consistency, a sense of atmosphere and its own unique charm.

I’d definitely visit again if I was ever in the region, but I think I’d prioritise new parks since there’s only 2 solid creds there for me until a new coaster/attraction is announced.

Monday

After spending the last 2 days on rides it was time to explore some more of Manhattan, and we decided to start Monday around the Lower East Side and work our way up and around some more of Downtown.

We took the subway down to Washington Square Park and meandered around for a while. My partner wanted to go and check out the Stonewall Inn, so we spent a bit of time there and then had a walk around the neighbourhood before moving on.

Spent some time over at Molly’s Cupcakes in West Village, gorging on cupcakes and brownies whilst playing Connect 4. Nothing crazy, just took our time and had fun.

At some point in the evening we decided to try Chelsea Market, mainly because we had heard about the food at Los Tacos No.1 and we wanted to try it for ourselves. The line was funnily enough longer than most of those we experienced at Six Flags previously. I got 3 different taco’s, 2 steak and 1 pork. Very cheap and very, very tasty. If you haven’t been then I’d highly recommend it. Chelsea Market is a pretty good place to kill a few hours if you’re into your food and drink/bespoke outlets.

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As the early hours creeped up, we wrapped up our night with a walk through an eerie Chinatown and the surrounding neighbourhoods, which was slowly shutting up for the night. Very surreal once the streets are suddenly empty. Maybe the rest of NYC never sleeps, but Chinatown certainly does.

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Tuesday

Tuesday involved some more typical tourist activities. We kicked things off with a visit to the observation deck of One World Trade Center. This was something we booked in advance, so unfortunately we didn’t realise the morning would start off really dark and cloudy… but it did. Not much to look at from floor 106, the poor tour guide was trying his hardest to convince the group that the view was still spectacular. I’m sure it is on a clear day anyway.

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The elevator up/down to the observation deck was probably my highlight. It was very immersive and provided an interesting perspective on the growth of New York as a city over time. Also thought that the dude up on 106 who gives little talks on NYC was really fab… you could tell he was really enthusiastic about his work and educating people in general. One of the nicer people we interacted with on the trip.

Once we were done mooching about in the World Trade Center we moved over to the 9/11 memorial to take a look around the area. I know I probably sound like a moronic tourist pleb but it was actually a fascinating place to be. 9/11 is something I’ve always paid interest in because of how much impact it had on a cultural scale. We headed into the museum and spent a good 3-4 hours there just taking in everything. It’s not something I really need to go into detail about but I enjoyed and was moved by many of the pieces on display. The fact the museum lay in the foundations of the towers is mind boggling and somewhat haunting. Well worth the few hours it takes to see it all.

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After we left the museum, the weather was back to scorching so out came the factor 50 in preparation for a walk over Brooklyn Bridge. We were on the hunt for some good pizza, and a few reliable people had recommended one in Brooklyn to us. Apparently Juliana’s was the place to go, and we were hoping so as the walk was draining. Got there a while later and ordered a large pizza. Wow, it was delicious!

Here I am focusing intently on delicious pizza.

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After finishing up our food and almost napping there and then at the table, we thought we’d better make a move. Took a boat back across to Lower East Side and from there we wandered around and took a look in some shops and whatnot.

We finished our evening later on with a trip up the Empire State at dark. Very windy but a much better view than we had at the WTC earlier. I really enjoyed seeing all the art deco interior design as you work your way up to the deck.

The lobby was very classy. Thought I might actually get told off walking down here being the only person doing so. Apparently it’s okay though!

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Finished up again with some more late night wanderings...

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Wednesday

Our last day in the city had soon arrived, so we opted for another early start to get the most from it. This time we took the subway to Astoria, Queens to visit the Museum of the Moving Image. I think we paid $15 each for entry, and spent around 2-3 hours in there tops.

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This one is definitely worth a trip if you’re a film buff or want a deeper insight into film production. Lots to see, and the Jim Henson exhibit that was on during our visit was very interesting. I was surprised by just how big the exhibit was, we were walking through for ages looking at loads of different pieces on a variety of his work.

After the Henson exhibit we managed to see loads of other cool bits, the highlight of which are as followed:

Robin William’s mask from Mrs Doubtfire.

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Original Taxi Driver shooting script by Paul Schrader and Martin Scorsese.

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Totally forgot this one, but it looks satisfyingly creepy.

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Tut’s theater.

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Couple of other bits off the phone:

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Also had a section at the beginning of the museum which was all about the moving image in the internet age, with a variety of tv’s playing different genres of YouTube vids. Sadly didn’t see the coaster vlog/POV section. Soon, my friends. ;)

We enjoyed our time at the museum and took the subway back into Manhattan shortly after leaving. First stop: Katz’s Deli, the kosher style delicatessen made famous by the film ‘When Harry Met Sally’. I was expecting the place to be rammed, since we were arriving in the early afternoon. Nah, it was reasonably quiet. Went through the slightly manic order process and got my pastrami in rye bread soon enough.

Once again, glorious food… can’t expect any less here. Somehow on this trip I managed to destroy large meal after large meal, but when it came to Katz’s, I actually struggled to finish. But ****, I did try. The pastrami is so tender and juicy... I have to thank DelPiero for actually throwing it out as a suggestion somewhere on one of these threads. Glad I took it up now. Been itching for more ever since.

To be truly honest, we didn’t do that much more after lunch, just did our usual routine of walking ridiculous distances and people watching etc. Took a few more photos along the way.

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And that’s your lot, folks!

I appreciate it wasn’t a 10 day park-to-park credfest but I thought I’d write something for my first time in the US. I’m all out of juice now, so there’s not much left to say. I thoroughly enjoyed my trip… consider my toes firmly dipped in the water. Next time I’m in the US I promise it will be with the intention of whoring myself out to the decent creds. I want at least one RMC next time. Thanks for reading.
 

Sandman

Giga Poster
Thanks david, I actually recall in one of your previous trip reports that your camera randomly ceased operation before your trip... I actually had exactly the same incident with my own camera prior to this trip, so I had to go and buy a new one. Good chance to play around with it in NYC though...
 

Howie

Donkey in a hat
Excellent stuff, Josh, some great photographs in there. Truly gutted for your KK spite mate, but overall sounds like a fab trip. When's the next one then? :)
 

Hixee

Flojector
Staff member
Administrator
Moderator
Social Media Team
Quality words and quality snaps, what more could we ask for? Thanks for sharing, I enjoyed that one.
 

DelPiero

Strata Poster
Excellent report, gutted about KK but it is just a big green penis after all. Glad you loved Katz's, I have to go back now for more of that sweet meat.
 

Sandman

Giga Poster
Thanks dude, I've been thinking about Kat'z so much since returning. Gutted there's nothing remotely similar in the local vicinity, I want to gorge on their food!
 
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