amigasat
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USA Theme Park Road Trip 2008Well what can I say. The trip started a day early with a flight down to Heathrow from Newcastle on Friday. From Terminal 5 we needed to get to our Travelodge.
To save time we went to the Taxi rank to be told minimum fare is £31!!
We found a hotel hopper bus charging £4 a head so off to the Travelodge we went. Waiting for us was Bob so we all settled down for a pint. Ralph joined us later on.
Next it was off to the Airport Bowl where we met Nev & Charlotte. What a nightmare, the lanes we were on kept breaking down and we were paying for these by the hour. They must have went off 8 times in a quarter of an hour. We finally got moved and time added on but these were awful.
Anyhow as 3 of us were on a seperate flight booking because we travelled from Newcastle I went online and checked all 6 of us in together. When we got to the Airport they had moved us again, but to World Traveller Plus!! Unfortunately they didn't move Carl, Harvey or Bob so we were seperated for the flight.
Dan was given a questionaire about the flight etc and he filled it in wrong, surprise surprise!! He put the city of departing as London and the arrival city as London!!
We had a roller coaster of a landing! I knew we were going to have fun when it came over the tannoy that Washington Airport was closed due to a severe thunderstorm. We were circulating high above Washington for 25 minutes before we were able to land and what a bumpy approach it was.
Anyhow we got through immigration and customs in record time, picked up our hire vehicle and down to Williamsburg we travelled stopping off for refreshments at, you guessed it WAL-MART!!
We are currently taking a half hour break before heading to a restaurant for something to eat and of course some ALE!!
I'll try and get the photo's up from today and yesterday later on tonight. Have fun and check back later.
Dave
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Rough Rider
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Great to hear from you guys, glad you all arrived safely.
Glad I wasn't on the same flight as you, especially with that storm 
GULP!!..........My turn next week  Hope the American beer is still as good as ever..............Can't wait for that 
Saying that I might try a few BUDS in the bar at Heathrow, just to make sure
Can't wait for next trip report guys. Try and get some photos downloaded Dave....................especially in the bar with Dan sleeping HA!! or better still...............Dan buying a round HA!!
More chance of getting Magic to ride the RATTL~R!!
Take care
Ryan
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amigasat
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Just off to Busch Gardens, photo's are up from the Friday and Saturday!!
Dave
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BAGuru
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Hey guys. Good to see that your trip started off well. Looking forward to reading more of your reports and looking at your fotos. See y'all in a week now (fingers crossed!!) 
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amigasat
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 Just a quick note we went to a Italian restuarant as you saw and Dave and I had a pitcher of beer each. To the shock of the hostess which was expecting we would have a pitcher to share. THE BRITS HAVE LANDED!!!!! Harvey 
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USfriends
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Is that a pizza that Carl is scared of? Its Huge!
Did you eat the whole thing?
( That is Carl, yes? We only met once.)
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coaster-andy
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I could not stop laughing when I saw the Pizza that is just not normal. I understand the Americans go large but come on.
Nice to see some face's on the trip I will know.
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Rough Rider
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Great update guys................. Keep em coming
Especially the photos
It's like we are there with you guys ...............Till next wek
Ryan
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BAGuru
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By 'eck Carl, were you hungry or what after you landed!!! I know that airline food comes in small portions - but that pizza shud keep ya going all week
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Nimmykins
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That was some pizza.
It could feed a family of eight.
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superman
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Hey Carl that should teach you not to be too greedy 
Have fun guys will be waiting for further trip and FOOD reports.
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Andy Hine MBE
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| coaster-andy wrote: | | I understand the Americans go large but come on. |
Thats not 'large' that's normal size for Americans!!
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amigasat
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Hey, it's WildMouse here!
I shared half the pizza with Craig, and even that was too much!!!!!
Won't be making the mistake of ordering large again, thats for sure
So today was my first experience of an American theme park (Busch Gardens Europe). And what a fantastic park it was. Puts all of our park to shame in my opinion.
Highlights were:
Bobs Reaction when he saw Griffon for the first time.
Alpengeist - Worth the hype and then some. B&M goodness at it best.
Apollo's Chariot - Lots of loverly airtime and the hilarity of Bob screaming his head off down the first drop!
Curse of DarKastle - Best dark ride I've been on period. Charlie and the chocolate factory aint got nothing on this.
Dan's multiple soakings throughout day - I swear he has a fetish for getting wet
Dave putting ice cubes down Dan's back.
Lowlight was a water ride Escape from Pompei. I'm not a fan of wet shoes ya see
Anyway, I won't waffle on any longer. Six Flags America tomorrow (yay, wood!!!!).
I've been informed that photo's up in an hour.
Over and out.
Carl.
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amigasat
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SIX FLAGS AMERICA - Monday 2nd June 08`
Six Flags America was a smaller park, very friendly staff and a good selection of coasters to try out. The park had a good feel and great music playing around the park.
The funniest moment had to be on The Jokers Jinx. Bob was putting his hat between his legs whilst waiting for the ride to start, Harvey was half way through a sentence and Carl was just wowed when the ride suddenly without any warning took off into it`s course. Bob thought this ride slowly climbed a lift hill before the gravity took over. Of course Dan was a good sport and got soaked once or twice or three times again!
Overall we were really pleased with the park and rides. The two wooden coasters were wonderful and The Wild One is incredible for an 1917 coaster!
Thanks for reading and we will keep you updated with the tour!
Craig Smith.
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amigasat
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Dutch Wonderland later today when we also meet up with The Coaster Police Posse..........
Dave
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amigasat
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Well today we went to Dutch Wonderland and arrived within 2 minutes of leaving our hotel. We met up with the Coaster Police Posse but they were LATE!! stuck in traffic so we had already ridden the coasters before they arrived.
The woodie was great, what you'd expect from CCI, and it was their first one too.
We joined the Coaster Police for more rides and they left the park just before 12PM. We had a group photo and these along with the park photo's will be up later.
Off to AMF Parkway Lanes for a bowling and amber nectar night so taxi is booked!! Hopefully it'll be better than The Airport Bowl at Heathrow.
See you all soon at Newark........!
Dave
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Coaster Chick
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Great seeing you all at Dutch Wonderland today and have our own 'take-over' sessions.
Encountered lots of rain after this but we just keep on moving - off to Waldemeer tomorrow.
Coaster Chick aka Senior Police Cadet Heather
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amigasat
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I forgot to add, Heather said to me in the front row of The Kingdom Coaster, that she just realised it was a woodie when returning to the station!, CCI's first woodie and Heather think's it was a steelie!! Too may Margueritas!!
Photo's are now up, enjoy...!!
Dave
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coaster-andy
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I noticed no report today, no problem though as the photos where good. My partner as asked me to ask a question. The question is how much is a pitcher of beer?
As you lot seem to have a few. I assume that this is cheaper.
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amigasat
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Some of the restaurants charge $2.75 a glass, a pitcher costs $8.75 and you get 4.5 glasses so it's much better value. Prices vary by place but pitchers are generally a lot cheaper!
See you at Newark.
Harvey is doing the report from the last 2 days soon.......
Dave
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Wildthing
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Wednesday 4th June 2008
Were at Dorney today, my 3rd time here. New for me was Hydra a BM floorless with an inline twist out of the station then the lift hill, not a bad coaster, also Voodoo a Intamin impulse coaster EX Geauga Lake, same as all others BUT lots of downtime. Other coasters there were Steel Force a great Morgan hyper and Talon agreat BM inverter. Plus a few others, wood and steel. The beer there was not bad too!!!!! After we left here a huge thunderstorm happen lucky we had done the park. We also had a Walmart session in preparation of a RCCGB trip.
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amigasat
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SIX FLAGS GREAT ADVENTURE - Thursday 5th June 08`
We had a good day at this park. The park was something like of Roller Coaster Tycoon. So many coaster types and a sight when you first arrive at the park. The best place to film Kinda Ka is from the car park. You are only allowed to film off ride on the paths in the park! You will be arrested if you are caught filming on the rides! Be warned!!!
We rode most of the coasters and the lines were not too long. I really enjoyed Batman The Ride, a B&M Inverted Coaster and the whole group agreed the best rides were Nitro and El Toro. El Toro was something else and i was really impressed by this and the whole feel of the ride and the area. Bob lost his camera on Medusa, a B&M`s first Floorless Coaster. We got to the brake run and he discoverd his camera was not in his pocket. We thought we could see the 3 week old Samsung Camera by the mid course brake section on the grass area shining away! We reported it to the lost and found. Good Luck Bob in finding your camera on this Sunday coming!!!
Kinda Ka was really good and i was suprised by how the loading station worked. I believe there may have been a roll back that afternoon as i saw a train slowly being rolled back into the station.
Can`t wait to be there again with The Roller Coaster Club of Great Britain this Sunday coming! See you then!!!
Craig Smith.
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