The James show. PT.6

 The Rob and James show. PT.6!

Er, I guess its just The James show now! 

 This update is gonna be pretty straightforward. After my initial plans were set for my summer trip... I decided I did wanna add a side-trip to St. Louis, Missouri because it was in the area. Too bad from Oklahoma City I couldn't fly direct and had to layover in Atlanta... After an assumed and present delay at both OKC, due to fire alarms going off.... and in ATL because, well, its Atlanta.... I made it to St. Louis, picked up my new rental and headed downtown to the Gateway Arch.  I'd passed the Arch back in 2005 as part of a whirlwind Midwest trip but this would be my first time really getting to see it, as well as go to the top! After being annoyed at how to find the parking lot and driving around the block a few times... I made it to the Arch.

 Woo, the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial 

Home to the Gateway Arch, Old Courthouse, and the Museum of Westward Expansion.

 The 630 foot Arch and the flags of..uh.. 

St. Louis... Missouri.. and America?

 It's pretty massive, and also just kinda pretty.

The lame amusement park fan in me tried to imagine it as a 600 foot SkyCoaster... Lame, I know.

Yup, the Gateway Arch.

 Once inside the base of the Arch you can buy tickets to visit the observation deck at the top as well as access to the 

Museum of Westward Expansion.

 This.... is a model of the terrible car that brings you to the top. Each one sits five people and they make sure to fully load them. On the ride up, I was awkwardly placed with a mom, dad, and two very small girls.... so it was pretty uncomfortable for me (I'm pretty sure the dad wasn't to thrilled I got placed with his family either but neither of us had a choice...)
 Coming back down I was placed with two sets of couples so it wasn't as bad.... although one was freaking out about A. being inside the little car.. B. the height of the Arch.

 At 630 feet its the tallest building uh, thing, in the state of Missouri

 Looking to the west, you can see all of St. Louis

 As well as the Old Courthouse, part of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial

 Looking east isn't as impressive.

 You can see the Mississippi River, as well as the Illinois countryside.

(and in the late afternoon, the shadow of the Arch?) 

 They try and cram as many people as they can up in the observation area.. Its not too hard to get a window spot but that doesn't mean awful children wont push you aide to look. Also, you can feel the whole thing kinda... sway.

 Back down in the basement is the Museum of Westward Expansion. Its not very big but its nice for what it is. Mostly photos/paintings/diagrams of what it was like at the time of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.

 Uh, map of the Louisiana Purchase and a line showing the route of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.

yaayyy history!

apparently there were Grizzly Bears along the way

 And Texas Longhorns!

(Mooooooo)

Also on the grounds are a few reflection ponds, a fountain, great lawn, and access down to the Mississippi River itself.

 One of the ponds on the parks grounds... Seems like a good place to find a duck or two.

Yup, quack.

After hanging around and just kinda... taking it all in, I headed off to my hotel. Someplace midway between the city of St. Louis and Six Flags (Eureka) but closer to the St. Louis side. I was shocked and horrified to find my hotel was straight up in the hood. Ready to cry, I went over to the Pizza Hut next door, was informed they were running behind and that it would be nearly an hour for food... placed my order and walked across the street to a gas station for for some SoBe Lifewater's and a candy bar to hold off my hunger. I ended up spending the night at the hotel er motel...er craphole (hellhole?), anyways... (hoping my rental would still be there in the morning!) and while I had originally booked this as a double stay I quickly checked OUT in the morning and booked myself into a classy hotel for the next night. I didn't even care about the money at that point.

Also, I had planned to go to the St. Louis City Museum (home to an Eli Wheel!) but because of delays in my flights I only had enough time for the Gateway Arch and that was more important to me anyways. I'm sure if I had rushed at both places I could have managed... but I enjoyed just sitting out by the Arch and along side the stinky river, just relaxing...... And because I never made it out to Grant's Farm... I can always just do both  

next time.

Bonus photos via twitter -
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/363047329613373440
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/363072891060899840

Bonus random tweets -
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362941165512822784
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/363004685479059456
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/363085056077611008

Woo, part six was a small update... Part seven will be longer.

The Rob and James show. PT.5

Woo, the Oklahoma City Zoo and Botanical Garden and Wonderland Amusement Park... Or, the unnecessarily long drive for a stupid looking Hopkins coaster. Today was originally meant to be a slow day exploring around Oklahoma City. A trip to the Zoo and maybe the science center with a stop at the Oklahoma City National Memorial and maybe a trip to White Water Bay, the Frontier City water park (we drove past the damn thing 4 times!) but a day before leaving for the trip... Rob still wanted to do something more than just hang around for the day....

Anyways, lets go...

Woo, the Oklahoma City Zoo and Botanical Garden

(also Science Museum Oklahoma but we didn't go inside)

Damn, I didn't know how big this place was gonna be....

This might just be my favorite 111 year old zoo 

(same age as Canobie!!)

Happy Happy Hippo?!?

Too bad we didn't get to see them

Sad sad James :(

This adorable little meerkat wanted to know what was over there...

IT WAS A GRIZZLY BEAR!!!!

:D

And a super playful black bear! :3

This almost makes up for not seeing the hippo!

This giraffe... I don't know... it was being a giraffe.

The OKC Zoo is pretty big and has two modes of transportation within. One can either take a boat down the shores of "Zoo Lake" (Northeast Lake).. or you can hop on one of these...

Uh, road trams?

In the little history museum within the Zoo it shows they once had a Sky Ride as well.

We passed on the tram and just walked on our own.

Miss Cheetah was giving us the "bitch please" look...

So it was about time to leave

But not before taking a quick ride on the "Centennial Choo Choo", a Chance C. P. Huntington train to nowhere.

Ok, here's where things get fun. If you read the PT.1 introduction you'll already know what happens next... if not, well, now you will... At the start of this update I mention how along with the zoo we were gonna sight-see around the city

--------------

""at this point it's like 2 weeks till take off and Rob starts pestering me on "do we really need a full day in OKC?" So I head to the internet in search of something more adventurous, a fair? a waterpark? an overlooked amusement park? I didn't really see anything and just let it go..... Flash-forward to pretty much.. the day before leaving. I jokingly say "we can go to Wonderland in Texas.... Its only 4 hours... each way"  "oh, and the park is only gonna be open for 3 hours" I guess I wasn't really ready for Rob's reaction to be "LETS DO IT!"""

--------------

Ok, so there you have it. We were about to set off on a 270 mile drive to Amarillo, TX for an amusement park that would only be open for 3 hours and then have to immediately turn around and drive 270 miles back to OKC for our hotel and maybe 3 hours of sleep before our departing flights early that morning!

So four hours later and some pretty neat landscapes seen in passing.. Also a neat looking indoor water park, we arrived in Amarillo with a just over an hour to kill before Wonderland's opening. Wonderland is located within Thompson Memorial Park, a large city park also featuring a golf course, a "water park" (if you can really call it that), a mini golf course, open land, picnic pavilions, and the Amarillo Zoo. Oh... and did I mention some 170 miles into the drive my rentals "service engine immediately" light came on, FANTASTIC! Miles from any sort of civilization and fears of being stranded.... we continued on (having no real choice at this point) with a much needed pit-stop... some lunch.. and a car now in working-order we hit the road once again.

We had rushed here for the chance of making it into the zoo before closing, sadly not being able to find the zoo's hours online... we arrived just 15 minutes before closing and were unable to enter the facility. lame!

Driving into the park itself you drive right along side the bizarre looking Texas Tornado.

This ride is straight up someones first NoLimits or RCT coaster! But more on that later...

Uh, the Amarillo Zoo?

While we couldn't go inside, we decided to walk the perimeter and as it turned out able to see 10-15 different animals, including the tigers and bears! The zookeepers were in the process of moving the animals to their sleeping quarters / backstage areas at the time but we still made the most of it.

While not the most flattering shot, it was still nice to see some of the animals before the amusement park opened for the night.

Mr. Horse was not amused.

And the Black-Handed Spider Monkey was ready for bed

(ignore the coaster in the background)

Ugh, well.... that was a waste of maybe 20 minutes, just an hour or so until the park opened. So we opted for a round of mini golf.

Wonderland Golf opens an hour before the park and we were the first (only?) players.

Had to pass the time somehow....

HIPPO THEMED HOLE!

Annddd I got my one-and-only "hole in one" on it!

((and even got it on video!!))

ugghhh! This was super annoying. Even worse was the fact that there were thunderstorms in the greater-Amarillo area and we could see them rolling in! At this point Rob and I were kicking into Fight or Flight mode with a game plan to RUN to Tornado first and make sure we got on it..... seeing that as the one key to making this side-trip worthwhile. Too bad things didn't work out that way.... 

Anyways...........

Wonderland Amusement Park...

Open 7 to 10 yet by 6.30 there were a good 100 people standing around waiting to get in... I don't see why they couldn't just open at 5. I guess the park knows what its doing, its been around some 60 years... Seeing how busy it was getting at the entrance we agreed it might be better to knock off the parks low-capacity wild mouse, Cyclone, first... due to our extremely limited time and my want to leave as soon as possible so we could get to our hotel before 2AM

Once the rides opened Rob and I were first in line for Cyclone. I've now been on 4 of these old school Miler mice (only 2 are still operating), I'd take them over any MS or Mack mouse any day...

After Cyclone we jumped on the parks Big Splash Log Flume, due to lack of line and the fact it was Hopkins' first flume (New England pride, yo) We raced off to Texas Tornado... to find it closed.

So we jumped on "Big Coaster" or is it "mouse trap coaster" or is it "Zyklon", the park seems to use all 3 names!

Its one of five operating Zyklon Z64 and rather fun.

(I've been on three of them)

After seeing that Tornado was stilllllll closed.... we still quickly made our way over to the parks newest coaster, Hornet.

Ah, Hornet... the stupid-fun Vekoma from the now closed Six Flags AstroWorld. It was built over part of the parks former parking lot.. as well as some grass and a sidewalk, but it was fun nevertheless and we rode it twice. With Tornado still not open and hope fading we took in a few of the parks other rides to pass the time. 

Rattlesnake Rive Raft Ride didn't seem to get riders that wet... and much like the flume was a Hopkins first. In this case it was their first raft ride... So New England pride kicked again and we took a ride. Oddly enough this ride lacks any sort of seat belt or grab bar. (not that they were needed, it was just surprising in this day of even Ferris Wheels having restraints.)

OH LOOK, ANOTHER HOPKINS RIDE... and another first for them....

Sky Rider was Hopkins' first monorail.. and I really wanted to ride it for obvious reasons... but it moved incredibly slow and we really didn't have time (but I have ridden Hopkins' other Monorail, at Santa's Village)

blah blah blah Shoot the Chute blah blah another Hopkins built ride, but for once.. not their first.

I wanted nothing to do with it... looking at the four hour drive I was about to make and really not wanting to do it wet. 

Somehow Rob talked me into it... Ugh

At this point we saw Tornado making test runs but it still wasn't taking riders so we rode a few flats in waiting... Texas Intimidator, a Moser Flipping Action Arm (run fantastically!), the Huss Pirate Ship, and the Chance Yo-Yo (also moved from AstroWorld)

And then we saw this...

Texas Tornado was now open!

OH and guess what, it was the first Hopkins Coaster!!!

The funky-est looking double-loop coaster... ever. It was surprisingly smooth despite looking like something a kid could have drawn on a piece of paper... OH WAIT, taken right from the parks own website!

The original design was discussed and drawn on a napkin at a cocktail party at (IAAPA)

Yup....

It's also the only steel coaster running with these bastardized PTC "steel coaster" trains!

But again, the ride is actually a lot of fun and both loops are pretty intense and due to their misshapen-ness  provide awkward forces and definitely made the effort involved with getting here... worth it.

Sadly, Tornado (along with a few other rides) are not included with the pay-one-price pass and require extra tickets along with the entrance fee and rideband, so we only rode it twice. Taking both a front and back seat ride. I would have gladly ridden it more but those storms were still in the area and getting closer. 

Before heading out we took a pretty good ride on the parks Huss Rainbow and Ferris Wheel.

Woo, the Wonder Wheel. I wonder where the roof for the car at the top went?

Ah, Wonderland Amusement Park, Amarillo, Texas.

A small, but amazing park in the middle of nowhere. Someday I hope to get back here. This park is a true gem as far as I'm concerned and well worth the time and effort it took to get here (including the drive back to OKC and unfortunate events that took place along the way) Oh yeah, and the fact we were outrunning thunderstorms the whole way back! Seeing nothing but clear skies ahead and massive amounts of lightning in the rear-view meant it was time to get out of Texas.

Come 3AM we made it back to our hotel, packed our stuff up, and tried to get a couple of hours of "sleep" before it was off to the airport. Rob was flying back to New Jersey in the morning... and I was off to St. Louis by way of Atlanta!

I guess this is the end of the The Rob and James show. Part 6 will just be "The James Show", I guess.

Conclusion PT.1
With the main part of my semi-epic adventure with Rob across Oklahoma, Missouri, Kansas, Arkansas, and Texas over I was soon to be on my own. I had driven some 1,570 miles (I took a before and after photo of the mileage!), racked up some 41 new counties, 5 new parks, and some 17 new coasters, including a new top 3 woodie! As well as visiting a zoo, finding some good old fashioned roadside America, drove down one of the most famous roads in the country and I took one of my first coaster-friends along for the ride with me. <3 good times.

Bonus photo via twitter -
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362670379434668032
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362689868842815489
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362749376285790208

Bonus random tweets -
https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362578555558830082

https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362612018869567488

https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362671080755834881

https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362773243809112064

https://twitter.com/CanobieFan/status/362832535983632386

Part to five is now finished, just four more to go?

The Rob and James show. PT.4

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.

(if you watch these 3 videos taken from 1991, 1995, and 2011 you can kinda see what I mean)

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?

Bonus POV of Rodeo Round-Up, the Huss Enterprise at Frontier City
(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!)

Bonus photo via twitter -
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!