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Strata Poster
Headed to Virginia for a few days, hanging out with Joey's boyfriend, who is a cool bro.
Anywho, let's get to the PTR:
I got stayed up all night to make sure I could leave for the airport at 5:30am for my flight at 10, since I nearly missed it last time.
Always remember where you parked:
Weird tunnel between concourses...
No one's there 3 hours ahead of your flight:
Tiny plane:
Finally, got to Virginia about noon, waiting for Kyle to get me:
And I looked like a mess:
In case you forgot:
Serious Kyle is driving:
Hung out with his friend the first day, ate at some restaurant (I didn't like the food...). But she had the coolest neighborhood:
Afterwards, we got back to his house and watched cops till we slept.
Day 1: Busch Gardens
We got up about 8 or so, and headed out for Busch:
I must mention...
...there is...
...so many...
...god damn trees.
Good morning Busch!
I love how you get to see Apollo as you drive in:
Soon...soon...
It just screams "Ride me!"
Kyle's friends who came along. They're awesome and swag:
So nice and clean...and I'm not even in the park yet!
Entrance Plaza, and I'm amazed.
First ride here? Loch Ness Monster:
But might as well take a picture of 3 of the 4 awesome coasters there.
Anywho, right to the ratings! First time in a long time I did something brand new:
Loch Ness Monster
Standard for me is to hate any arrow I touch, with extremely few exceptions. This will make the list of exceptions, as it wasn't extremely rough. Sat in the very last row, so I got some nice pops of airtime from the drops right off the bat. The only rough bits were after the loops, and the loops themselves were very forceful. The whole loops interlocking is weird, but doesn't change how it rides. It does make for a stunning coaster.
Overall, very fun classic. I could ride again if I had a chance, which is more then I can say about any arrow:
7/10
Pictures (Since I won't caption them all):
Since Mach Tower just opened, we headed that way next:
...and up these staircases of DOOM:
And now: Mach Tower
...it's terrible. Likely one of the worst, next to Power Tower. The brakes start halfway down, so the air you do get is short lived.
5/10
Good loading system though: colored sections over numbers:
Next up was DarKastle:
Which was quite awesome, I didn't get many pictures, sadly. It was nice ride.
Then on to the next coaster: Alpengeist
This coaster was straight up awesome, mostly due to my first ride being front row. From the first drop to the brakes, it's nothing but intense forces and flips. The layout uses the terrain quite well, even though the cobra roll uses the same area as 2 other coasters. Speaking of, holy hell that cobra was intense. Everything about the coaster was done smooth and excellent. Possibly my favorite invert:
9/10
Next on the list was one on my "I have to ride this" list: Griffon
I came on the ride with very high expectations. And it filled all of them. Riding Front row and second on the left on the outside, I got to face straight down with only my harness holding me from going down. And only 2 words I could say, and loudly: Holy ****. I've down straight up, down, and beyond vertical. But this tops them all by far. Nothing has scared me as much as this. And once that holding brake let go, I was taken on a forceful flip, another vertical drop, another flip, and got a bit of airtime. Nothing about this coaster was bad, and made it somewhere on my top ten list:
10/10
We ventured through Ireland (more on that in a bit):
And rode Europe in the Air. Or, as they like to call it: Screensaver the ride. I couldn't agree more. It wasn't fun at all, and nothing was good about it. It actually hurt.
Across the tacky bridge:
...really tacky...
We got to Escape from Pompeii.
This was by no means bad. Just not my cup of cream. I really don't like water rides, and hate walking around wet. It was well themed at the very least.
One walk later, we find ourselves crossing a bridge...
...onto Apollo's Chariot
This is definitely one of the best hypers I've been on in a long while, made better by NO WAIT. Bringing up the rear, each crest of every hill got a lovely whip on ejection. The helix was fun as hell and got some kick to it. Lots of fun, even if you accidentally staple yourself...
Overall, excellent coaster. If not Top Ten, somewhere in the top 15.
10/10
The lot of us head more into Italy:
Which had these cool statue...things...
And had some of the best food in a long time:
And had a fun show to boot!
We passed over a bridge:
And saw the remains of Big Bad Wolf, which was sad:
Had a venture on the river cruise thing (I can't spell the river), which was very nice and relaxing, giving us a break from the coasters, and gave me the shots of Apollo:
And Deer. There were deer.
Still wanting to relax, we saw a Celtic show...that was actually kick ass:
Yeah, we're men and such.
And then, Kyle and them wanted to get a beer sampler. I passed on it, knowing what alcohol does to me. Beer-glass-ception:
Took another ride on Griffon, this time in the back with airtime galore!
Another walk over to Apollo's Chariot:
We started heading home:
In summary, Busch is now my favorite park in terms of general appearance. Everything was clean and beautiful, and the rides were either good or excellent. I'll have to come back sometime and ride their new coaster (which better be amazing!)
Ride count:
Alpengeist: 2
Apollo's Chariot: 2
Griffon: 2
Loch Ness Monster: 1
DarKastle: 1
Europe in the air: 1
River Cruise: 1
Kings Dominion tomorrow!
Anywho, let's get to the PTR:
I got stayed up all night to make sure I could leave for the airport at 5:30am for my flight at 10, since I nearly missed it last time.
Always remember where you parked:
Weird tunnel between concourses...
No one's there 3 hours ahead of your flight:
Tiny plane:
Finally, got to Virginia about noon, waiting for Kyle to get me:
And I looked like a mess:
In case you forgot:
Serious Kyle is driving:
Hung out with his friend the first day, ate at some restaurant (I didn't like the food...). But she had the coolest neighborhood:
Afterwards, we got back to his house and watched cops till we slept.
Day 1: Busch Gardens
We got up about 8 or so, and headed out for Busch:
I must mention...
...there is...
...so many...
...god damn trees.
Good morning Busch!
I love how you get to see Apollo as you drive in:
Soon...soon...
It just screams "Ride me!"
Kyle's friends who came along. They're awesome and swag:
So nice and clean...and I'm not even in the park yet!
Entrance Plaza, and I'm amazed.
First ride here? Loch Ness Monster:
But might as well take a picture of 3 of the 4 awesome coasters there.
Anywho, right to the ratings! First time in a long time I did something brand new:
Loch Ness Monster
Standard for me is to hate any arrow I touch, with extremely few exceptions. This will make the list of exceptions, as it wasn't extremely rough. Sat in the very last row, so I got some nice pops of airtime from the drops right off the bat. The only rough bits were after the loops, and the loops themselves were very forceful. The whole loops interlocking is weird, but doesn't change how it rides. It does make for a stunning coaster.
Overall, very fun classic. I could ride again if I had a chance, which is more then I can say about any arrow:
7/10
Pictures (Since I won't caption them all):
Since Mach Tower just opened, we headed that way next:
...and up these staircases of DOOM:
And now: Mach Tower
...it's terrible. Likely one of the worst, next to Power Tower. The brakes start halfway down, so the air you do get is short lived.
5/10
Good loading system though: colored sections over numbers:
Next up was DarKastle:
Which was quite awesome, I didn't get many pictures, sadly. It was nice ride.
Then on to the next coaster: Alpengeist
This coaster was straight up awesome, mostly due to my first ride being front row. From the first drop to the brakes, it's nothing but intense forces and flips. The layout uses the terrain quite well, even though the cobra roll uses the same area as 2 other coasters. Speaking of, holy hell that cobra was intense. Everything about the coaster was done smooth and excellent. Possibly my favorite invert:
9/10
Next on the list was one on my "I have to ride this" list: Griffon
I came on the ride with very high expectations. And it filled all of them. Riding Front row and second on the left on the outside, I got to face straight down with only my harness holding me from going down. And only 2 words I could say, and loudly: Holy ****. I've down straight up, down, and beyond vertical. But this tops them all by far. Nothing has scared me as much as this. And once that holding brake let go, I was taken on a forceful flip, another vertical drop, another flip, and got a bit of airtime. Nothing about this coaster was bad, and made it somewhere on my top ten list:
10/10
We ventured through Ireland (more on that in a bit):
And rode Europe in the Air. Or, as they like to call it: Screensaver the ride. I couldn't agree more. It wasn't fun at all, and nothing was good about it. It actually hurt.
Across the tacky bridge:
...really tacky...
We got to Escape from Pompeii.
This was by no means bad. Just not my cup of cream. I really don't like water rides, and hate walking around wet. It was well themed at the very least.
One walk later, we find ourselves crossing a bridge...
...onto Apollo's Chariot
This is definitely one of the best hypers I've been on in a long while, made better by NO WAIT. Bringing up the rear, each crest of every hill got a lovely whip on ejection. The helix was fun as hell and got some kick to it. Lots of fun, even if you accidentally staple yourself...
Overall, excellent coaster. If not Top Ten, somewhere in the top 15.
10/10
The lot of us head more into Italy:
Which had these cool statue...things...
And had some of the best food in a long time:
And had a fun show to boot!
We passed over a bridge:
And saw the remains of Big Bad Wolf, which was sad:
Had a venture on the river cruise thing (I can't spell the river), which was very nice and relaxing, giving us a break from the coasters, and gave me the shots of Apollo:
And Deer. There were deer.
Still wanting to relax, we saw a Celtic show...that was actually kick ass:
Yeah, we're men and such.
And then, Kyle and them wanted to get a beer sampler. I passed on it, knowing what alcohol does to me. Beer-glass-ception:
Took another ride on Griffon, this time in the back with airtime galore!
Another walk over to Apollo's Chariot:
We started heading home:
In summary, Busch is now my favorite park in terms of general appearance. Everything was clean and beautiful, and the rides were either good or excellent. I'll have to come back sometime and ride their new coaster (which better be amazing!)
Ride count:
Alpengeist: 2
Apollo's Chariot: 2
Griffon: 2
Loch Ness Monster: 1
DarKastle: 1
Europe in the air: 1
River Cruise: 1
Kings Dominion tomorrow!
