'It' at Morey's Pier
2011 was a pretty good season for fair and park-going here at The DoD3. While I posted a bunch of trip reports from fairs and theme parks, there were some that didn’t get mentioned because either they weren’t all that notable or I simply didn’t get around to posting them. That’s awful isn’t it? It’s like I’m withholding information or something (because, you know, carnivals are ‘srs bsns‘ here.) Well here’s those trip reports in a nice, condensed, short attention span form.
Middlesex, NJ Carnival
I honestly have no idea who puts this carnival on (Middlesex High School maybe?) but I stopped by for maybe fifteen minutes on April 27th. The only reason I remember the date was because it was the same day as the 2011 Super Outbreak and being a weather weenie (along with coaster/carnival dork, attractive combo right there) tracking the once in a lifetime tornado outbreak pretty much trumped the fair. Anyway the fair was being run by Campy’s Midway and had Scat, Gravitron, Big Eli wheel, Bumper Cars, Octopus (maybe?), a bunch of kiddie rides and a lot of food. I did a walk of the fair, grabbed a delicious kabob from the Chinese BBQ stand and hightailed it back home to pour over radar and live streams.
Feast of Corpus Christi Carnival
This fair took place a hop, skip and jump away in Chatam, NJ in the cramped parking lot of the Corpus Christi church. My visit to this fair is always less of a carnival excursion and more of a trip to pick up zeppolies, snap a few pictures and leave…this year was no different. The main attraction of the fair was a Trabant with a casino theme; it looked like the old ‘Wave’ Trabant ride owned by Tommy’s Midway only with a new theme/paint/lights. Other rides included a Sizzler (being worked on that night), some swings and a Ferris Wheel along with a handful of kiddie rides.
Middlesex County Fair
This really isn’t even a trip report. Basically I drove down to where the fair was, got caught in a massive traffic jam on the road leading to the fairgrounds and ended up turning around after moving 1/8th of a mile in 45 minutes. I have the feeling I didn’t miss a whole lot anyway.
Morey’s Piers
Took a day trip down to Wildwood late in the summer to hit some of the rides. I must have hit a bad day as Great Nor’Easter and Great White were both closed that day (Great White was actually being re-tracked that day, a photo is in the gallery below.) I also almost got on Condor but was turned away as an approaching storm closed the ride; little did I know that was the last chance to get on Condor ever! Here’s some photos from the day:
Saint Demetrios Greek Festival
I saw a pamphlet for this at a local shop so I decided to check it out as it was close by in Union, NJ. I walked in, walked over to the rides section and found it to be a bunch of rag-tag looking inflatables and a “train” ride (no tracks, just a drive around the parking lot.) Another miss for the The DoD3! Instead I bought a bottle of some Greek beer called Mythos (not all that great by the way) and milled around looking at the vendors for a little bit. Good place to eat and drink your ass off but not much for the carnival fan.
Doylestown Oktoberfest
This fair was just a bit over the PA border with Reithoffer running the show, how could I not check it out? The fair was postponed quite a bit due to flooding before finally opening, I should have took that as a warning. The fairground was an absolute mud pit to the point where I don’t even know how some rides even stood up without sinking. Some places were so bad that it felt like walking though a swamp and was slippery as hell to boot. The fair was also amazingly dead the night I went with probably more carnival workers than patrons. The result was every single freaking game worker attempting to get me to play their game. You know it’s bad when they’ll beg a lone guy with a camera to play a game with stuffed toys as the prize!
Attractions included: Speed (KMG), Zipper, Super Himalaya, Giant Wheel, Vertigo, Starship 2000, Fireball (Larson) among others. I think Reithoffer’s Stinger was originally supposed to be at the fair as well but didn’t show up, probably because of the lot conditions. I’ll probably go again this year if they have it, they really just got a bad break in 2011.
Wildwood, NJ: The somewhat iconic Condor is 
Wow, it feels like ages ago since I opened the 2011 Lead Ticket Awards poll. I let it run from mid-September to Halloween (Oct 31st) to let a respectable amount of votes trickle in but this year most of the votes were cast early on with nearly 300 of you casting ballots! I want to thank everyone for participating in this year’s LTA’s! Now, let’s get to the results!
Family of five walks up to an admission gate and after handing over their wallets, they are gained entry to the park. This scene has figuratively (I hope!) played out the most at…
Halloween has become a pretty lucrative ‘holiday’ for some businesses. Theme parks began cashing in on the festivities in the late 80s and now most major theme parks in the US have some type of Halloween event such as Six Flags’ ‘FrightFest’ and Cedar Fair’s ‘Halloween Haunt’ and ‘HalloWeekends.’ Some parks really go all out with numerous walk throughs and copious amounts of ghouls while other parks do the bare minimum just to claim that they have some sort of Halloween festivities. The park that falls in with the latter is…
Six Flags America! Unseating the 2010 winner, Chicago’s Six Flags Great America, is Maryland’s Six Flags America. With nearly twice as many votes as any other park, SFA won pretty soundly as well. All the ire may stem from the park’s coaster lineup, which hasn’t seen a new coaster since 2001. Never fear though, the park announced that it is adding Apocalypse, a B&M stand up, for the 2012 season! Uh…oh wait, what that? Oh, it’s just Iron Wolf from Six Flags Great America…
Roller coasters need good names today. Not only will the name define the ride to a degree but will also be the focal point of any marketing campaign. A good name could elevate hype while a bad could potentially kill it. For instance, Nemesis is a cool name while a bad name is…
Well, wooden coasters are rough…unless it’s an Intamin laser-cut special. Typically, being rough is part of the wooden coaster experience, giving the ride a more out of control feel. However you’ll also run into wooden coasters that are so rough that one might wonder how the damn thing even rolls anymore. The wooden coaster that’s made of beatsticks is…
Green Lantern: First Flight! Six Flags Magic Mountain’s Green Lantern variant gets top dishonors this year after being hyped mercilessly in the offseason for being the US’s first Intamin ‘ball coaster.’ Complaints about the coaster seem to revolve around it being way too short as well as being a slightly painful ordeal. The coaster seems more like a glorified flatride really.
