Frontier City!!!
I don't know. I've wanted to go here for some time and I'm not really sure why. Nothing really stands out at first glance outside of the parks Looping Star. I always knew I'd end up here someday but always kinda assumed it would be paired up with a Six Flags Over Texas trip or something. The day started with a waayyy too early wake up in Hot Springs... followed by an annoyingly long six hour drive to Oklahoma City... almost all of it on county roads and passing towns along the way until crossing into Oklahoma itself, from Arkansas. It wouldn't have been so bad it not for random stoplights in the middle of NOWHERE and a few rain showers along the way (also kinda bummed we passed an Eli Ferris Wheel in some city square but it was like 7am and clearly not open...)
Anyways, onto the photos... and stuff.
Frontier City, or...
"I used to be a Six Flags park but you would have never guessed..... until you spend a little time walking around"
Frontier City is kinda.. funky, in the sense once you enter the park you have to walk into a gift shop to get to the park itself, you also have to be inside the gift shop to access the parks shuttle loop... poor planning? (But I guess Silver Dollar City is the same way... as far as the shop goes) Its also highly themed still and it's consistent and comprehensible!
Once inside... and feeling a bit crabby from driving still...I headed right over to....
Geronimo Sky Coaster!
At 113 feet its the same height as SFNE's former Sky Coaster... but built with a neat "half arch" design due to lack of space. To date, its the only one that's been built this way
(true skycoaster at least, Funtime's model looks like this as well)
Didn't care it was short... I suited up and after a "3,2,1" I flew... and took Rob along with me
He hadn't ridden the one two days before in Branson and last summer we both rode the one at Mt.Olympus but independent of each other. So this was our first tandem ride. yay!
It was getting pretty hot in OKC, so we rode Mystery River Log Flume after our flight. Its pretty ok as far as flumes go and even has a little "dark ride" part at the beginning. We rode it a second time later in the day as well.
Walking around the park there's a few signs of neglect... While this was a Six Flags (Premier) park for nearly 25 years it still seems to have retained its theme / homely feeling... Unlike say the massive transformation that was Riverside into Six Flags New England.
Walking around you'll also find a few rides that are SBNO. This is The Hangman. Based on what I've found online its been sitting closed at least three summers.... And while I love me some drop towers... This being a TERRIBLE Chance model... I wasn't too upset.
There was also a Rotor that's been closed, pretty sure for good... seeing is how its queue has been walled off and turned into a smoking section, i doubt it'll be running again. It used to be called Terrible Twister.
And for some reason... Eruption is still mostly standing, although the car has been removed and tossed to the side (you can see it to the right of the right most tower) this was one of the last two S&S Sky Slings built, both being shorter than the original 4... While I didn't get to ride it here, I did ride Great Adventure's... So again, I knew I wasn't missing anything. (ZzZzz, BORING!)
The parks Chance Trabant, Casino, was also closed and missing a seat... But I believe this was just down temporarily for maintenance.
Ok, I'm done complaining... for now, off to the open rides! And oh yeah, the four coasters we rode...
We had tried to get on Diamondback, the parks Arrow shuttle loop first.. but it was closed for the moment....
(oops, I said I was gonna talk about the open attractions)
Renegade Rapids! It was open.. and ridden twice. yay
Wildcat, the parks star coaster? And the only wood coaster in the state.
Having watched POV's of the ride when it was still new here... vs POV's of what it looks like now... I wasn't expecting much. The ride isn't that bad. Rob and I rode it 6 or 7 times over the day, I just wish I could have ridden it before the numerous reprofilings.
Also, this should never be seen in a park....
Yeah, a dead bunny floating in the parks fountain....
Super classy GUM TREE in the queue for the raft ride...
Bitching and dead animals aside, the park does have rather nice areas and some pretty fun rides... like.........
Silver Bullet! The last remaining Schwarzkopf Looping Star in the states.
And its still kicking ass, at 35.
Mindbender is the parks Chance Inverter... There rides are getting harder and harder to find now but I still managed to ride two "new for me" ones this year! While the restraints on Inverters pretty much...suck.. I still enjoy the ride and I'm glad a few are still around.
We also rode Steel Lasso, the parks family Vekoma invert. It was pretty fun for what it was, although the one at Fun Spot America is better. I was still pretty mad knowing the park removed its Vekoma Air Jumper, Tomahawk... for this. :'(
Walking back to the front of the park to check on Diamondback we checked out the kiddie area, home to Wild Kitty
Wild Kitty was new for 2013, replacing an identical model removed over the past off-season... We were denied a ride.
So I made nice with this baby goat!!!
(that was for sale, along with the other barnyard animals!)
I enjoyed this bear, also for sale... But had no way of flying him back to Orlando... So he had to stay put.
Diamondback had opened at last, so we made our way into the parks gift shop... to enter the queue.
Most people hate on the Arrow Shuttle Loops because you have to climb some 50 feet of stairs to get to the loading platform... and then you have to climb back down to exit. Frontier City at least replaced most of the steps with a easy to climb ramp.
(People also hate on them because, well, they arnt so fun)
We still rode it a couple times, finding it much more enjoyable in the front.
This was my third Arrow shuttle loop, and first with six car trains. Blackpool's and Riverside's only had four car trains. yup
Uh, general overview of Frontier City from the parks Ferris wheel.
Oh, and, umm.. Downtown Oklahoma City as well.
You can see the Capitol-dome to the mid-right and Devon Tower in the center, the tallest building in the whole state.
YOOOOOOOOOOOOL-NO!
Again, this needs to stop.
After doing everything we wanted to do at Frontier City, including like... 20 rides on Silver Bullet... We set off on an adventure to Pops!, something I had wanted to do since the planning of this trip. Originally it was planned for the next day but because we had some free time we made the 20 mile trek to Arcadia, Oklahoma and its famous Pops on Route 66 after leaving the park.
AMERICAN NOSTALGIA
But oddly enough, it was kinda neat to me, to be driving down Route 66.
Woo! Pops!
Pops is one of the largest soda-shops in the world... At any given time they have over 600 kinds of soda for sale! .....Anyone who knows me.. knows I don't even drink soda. So uh, why did I wanna come here? I'm not really sure (I've been to both the original World of Coca-Cola and the new one in Atlanta as well??)
Out front they have this giant 66 foot tall soda bottle, covered in LEDs and at night provides a light show, but we left before seeing it turn on.
(maybe next time?)
Here's a shot of some of the soda's available. For the most part they're stocked by type... So if you wanted a Root-Beer they were all in a line, although with 50 brands to pick from. Same for some of your off flavors like, uh, cake? bacon? and, uh mashed potatoes?
In the end I caved and tried these six flavors (although, to be fair I've had the sweet corn one in the past!) Banana, Black Cherry, Cucumber, Lemon Lime and Bitters (nonalcoholic), Sweet Corn, and Pomegranate. And that's pretty much more soda intake than I had in all of 2012... even worse, I only had about 36 hours to drink it all before flying to St. Louis! (ugh)
Oh yeah, and they also have a restaurant, lined with soda bottles.
Uh, we ate there. Yup
So after all that, we drove back to OKC and our hotel near the airport and I pretty much passed out. Day four had been the 'longest' yet and had the most driving up to this point... but tomorrow would be worse, uh, better?
(Possible the worst run enterprise, ever)
Also, if you're flying in/out of OKC... they have a Pops express inside the airport with a large, although more limited, selections of soda (and a mini version of the LED bottle!)
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362238768469639168
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362365823467282432
Bonus random tweets -
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362166264711487490
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362259986618912768
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362289008946057217
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362358801631936512
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362416656967929856
Up to four now?! I'm amazed I've gotten this far!
Huh. And as it turns out, when you got home, Mr. Chocolate was waiting for you. Who knew.
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