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Maine Coasters! Aug 31st + Sept 1st

Chris Coasters

Strata Poster
A couple of weeks ago I went with my grandparents and little brother up to New Hampshire and Maine. It all started because my grandmother has odd feet and only buys her shoes at one place and that place is in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. I mentioned that it was pretty close to Saco, ME which is where Funtown Splashtown USA is. Then I said that Palace Playland was right near Saco plus a bonus cred that was not planned and we found on our way for my grandmas favorite thing, ICE CREAM. So let the fun begin. We left early morning on August 31st for the shoe store which I was not looking forward to at all. Me and my grandpa walked around the town of Portsmouth which is a pretty nice town on the water for a while. We waited for my grandma to spend $800 worth of shoes. I'm not exaggerating she literally spent $800 on shoes. Once she bought all the shoes we grabbed lunch and headed to Funtown Splashtown USA in Saco, ME.





We paid our admission and went in. My grandparents and brother went on the kiddie rides while I went for the creds! The park has 2 coasters. A regular maurer sohne wild mouse and Maine's only wooden coaster a CCI woodie, Excalibur. I wanted to hit Excalibur first but I had a hard time getting to it and the mouse was first so heres the mouse.







Never have I seen a ride op so pumped about there job. This dude was a legend and I knew his routine from waiting in line. People would sit in the car and thend it scooted forward towards him. He would start chatting you up and then ask you if you were ready to ride. When you respond he would yell in a deep voice YEAAAHHHHHH! and he would do it three times. I planned on messing with him. He was like you ready I was like no then he did the first yeah then I said possibly then he did is other yeah, then I said okay I might be ready and as I was going up the lifthill he was like YOUR LAME! FUNTOWN! One of the craziest theme park moments of all time for me. As for the coaster its a wild mouse. Very basic standard normal wild mouse.

Now it was time to try to find my way to Excalibur. This park is so darn impossible to get around without a map. Very different walkways and zig zag paths but I kept following signs for Excalibur.



Then alas I found it!



I rode it about 5-6 times. Everytime was a walk on. Everyone wants the front or back so I easily got a seat somewhere in the middle every ride. It has that nice roughness to it and has a great layout and close interaction with the trees. I love the theming and the layout a lot. It has great speed and a nice drop and select good spots of airtime. In my opinion it is a very underrated coaster. I think mainly because not a lot of people have been on it. I can see if people may not like it but I think it is one of the best wooden coasters I've been on and is a solid coaster.















It is a very good coaster and was easily the best out of the 5 coasters Maine has.

After riding Excalibur I met back up with my grandparents and my little bro went on more kiddie rides. I rode some flat rides but nothing but steriotypical theme park rides. The park felt so tiny. It was probably the smallest park I've ever been to. It just feels like you could jump from one side of the park to the other. I felt like they didn't have a lot of rides. The waterpark looked pretty sweet but we didn't do it. Next was the Log Flume.



Honestly, I'm a huge fan of flumes. Other then coasters and maybe rapid rides, Log Flumes are my favorite. I just love the big drop, the splash, and the sharp turns that bang the boat into the sides of the ride.

Overall I would go back to Funtown Splashtown USA and do the waterpark and ride Excalibur again. I find it to be a great park for families with smaller children but if you are looking for thrills its the wrong place. We spent about 4-5 hours at the park and then we headed to our hotel in New Hampshire. We stopped for Ice Cream at the best ice cream in Maine. Brown's Ice Cream in York, ME is flawless and if you are in that area you have to go. They have some pretty unique flavors and is near this famous lighthouse.



Maine is one of my favorite states because of how beautiful it is. This was only my second trip to Maine but both times I absolutely loved it.

Tomorrow will be Palace Playland, A bonus cred that was not intended, and the end. Thanks for reading and stay tuned for tomorrow! :--D
 

Youngster Joey

Strata Poster
Great report so far :)

Glad to see someone else who likes Excalibur on the boards. Also I definitely agree the park is really hard to navigate without a map. As for The size, you could fit probably 2 Seabreeze's in their. Probably 1.5 if you include Seabreeze's water park.
 

Chris Coasters

Strata Poster
Thanks man and wow Seabreeze must be tiny because Funtown just felt so small. We didn't really go in the waterpark and I don't know how big it is but the section of rides just felt small. Compared to other parks I've been to it probably is one of if not the smallest one.
 

Hutch

Strata Poster
Cool! I have to add that to my list of little parks not too far from where I live!

Excalibur does look fun, and it looks like it fits nicely in the park.
 

Chris Coasters

Strata Poster
Part Two: Palace Playland & Bonus cred!





When we drove by the park to go to the parking lot I had flashbacks of Coney Island but I didn't think it would be as good as Coney Island was. When I went to Coney Island in April I loved it and had a great time. Palace Playland is right on the beach in Old Orchard Beach, ME. It looked pretty ghetto driving by it and I didn't have very good expectations about it. The park has 2 coasters. A galaxi coaster that use to be in Nebraska and a Orient Express that use to be at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. I went in before my grandparents and bought enough tickets to ride both coasters once. There is no general admission unlike Funtown Splashtown USA, you just pay for what you want to ride. First up was my first galaxi coaster.











It wasn't as horrible as it looks. I actually quite liked it. It was fairly smooth but the lifthill was awful. It was the slowest lifthill of all time. You actually pick up some good speed on it to. You go up the hill and go down two drops and then there is two sections where you just go around in circles. Overall it wasn't half bad and I'd say out of Maine's 5 coasters it was right behind Excalibur. Next was my 4th Orient Express named coaster.









I have been on the one at Funworld Game Center in Nashua, NH and two different traveling ones. One from Fiesta Shows and one from Rockwell Amusements. If I can order Orient's I'd say this was third best out of the four. I rode it twice. The first in the very front was good and not rough but my second ride was in the very back and it was incredibly rough. Just a normal cred and nothing really special about it.

I rode Galaxi I think 3 more times then rode some flat rides including the worlds most ghetto log flume!



I believe Luna Park has one very similar to this but I didn't ride it. I got more soaked on the smaller drop on the ghetto log flume then I did on the bigger one. It was pretty crappy and the water was gross. I rode some more flats including a himalya/matterhorn whichever you prefer to call it and some spanish hat ride called Fiesta Loca that I'd never seen before. You sit in this hat and then they spin around. It was very boring but still a unique ride that I can't say I've seen/noticed at any park before.

My brother rode kiddie rides until he was tired and cranky so then we headed for day 2 of Browns Ice Cream. We were driving through York, ME and my grandpa says "Hey Chris its the zooquarium." For a second I was like what the heck is he talking about and then I realized it was York's Wild Kingdom!

I didn't even think about going to York's on the trip because I didn't know where York was and didn't know Brown's Ice Cream was in York until this. After searching RCDB tons of times I knew they had a coaster. My grandpa parked the car and I went up to the gate.

I always thought you had to pay admission and then you get into the park and zoo at York's but I was wrong. I literally walked right in to a slew of ghetto rides. I always thought yorks was a fancy-ish zoo heck it still might be I only got the cred and left and didn't even see the zoo but the park portion was ghetto. You walk in and see a ferris wheel, some small rides and some weird walkthroughs. I didn't take a lot of pictures because I wanted to get the cred and leave but you will know what I mean if you have been or ever go. I walked to a ticket booth and got 4 tokens which is how much it costs to ride the ride. Money wise the tokens are 50 cents so it cost 2 bucks to ride. I walked down a path past a bunch more odd rides and then I see it. My 97th coaster and first ever WACKY WORM!











Okay so techincally its called Wacky Mouse but the layout is identical to Wacky Worm coasters. I was honestly very happy about this coaster because I knew it was in Maine and had no idea I would possibly be riding it this trip. It wasn't planned it was just spur of the moment and my grandpa parked and grandma said well go see if you can get in and if you can ride it. It was a pretty standard Wacky Worm coaster and a good +1 coaster.

After York's we got our Browns Ice Cream again which to emphasize is awesome. 1st day I got Planet Earth which is a blue vanilla ice cream with oreos and marshmellows and the 2nd day I got Cookie Dough which is 98% cookie dough and 2% ice cream it is awesome. Rule one of traveling with my grandma is you must eat ice cream. She is addicted and strongly encourages you to have some with her and she will be very disappointed if you don't let her buy you some. Basically throw any diet plans out the window when your with grandmommy!

Overall if you read through this then you read the word ghetto a lot. I honestly felt like both Palace Playland and York's were both pretty ghetto and dirty. Funtown Splashtown USA is for sure the best park in the state of Maine. Absolutely blows the other two out of the water. I was happy to get the 3 coasters at the two parks, York's and Palace Playland but I don't think I would ever go back. I know I wouldn't go back to Palace Playland but I would like to go to York's again to see the zoo. In general, I had a great time and its always an adventure when you go places with them. They've traveled all over the world and grandmommy has been to every European country at least once. They are great people and I love going places with them. A big thanks to them for letting me tag a long and drag them to all 3 of Maine's parks. We all had a great time. Untill next time thanks for reading. :--D
 

furie

SBOPD
Staff member
Administrator
Moderator
Haha! US Kiddy Cred run! Fantastic!

Really loving the reports actually, brilliant :)

I can't see the front of the Wacky Mouse. Is it actually a mouse? I've never seen that model with the mouse on it before. The cobra head and of course worm, yes, but not a mouse.
 

furie

SBOPD
Staff member
Administrator
Moderator
OMG!!! So excited! :lol:

Of course, I know DPV Rides make the Mouse head model, I've just never seen one in situ!

Day made ;)
 
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