Event: Warren Lions Expo
Where: Warren, NJ
Date: 6/19/09
Primary Ride Operator: McDaniel Brother’s Shows
The day before I was talking to one of my friends and suggested that we stop by at a carnival on Friday. I had wanted to check out the North Brunswick Youth Festival but after hearing …
Event: Corpus Christi Carnival
Where: Chatham, NJ
Date: 6/12/09
Show: Tommy’s Midway
The Corpus Christi carnival is a church fair that occurs every June. It’s a pretty small event with about 4 ‘big’ rides and a bunch of kiddie rides; the parking lot isn’t that large so they really can’t put too much in …
I took an impromptu trip to Keansburg Amusement Park in Keansburg, NJ on Saturday night. My sister ended up not having to work so she called me up, suggesting a quick trip down to …
Event: OLP Parish Carnival
Where: Our Lady of Peace Church; New Providence, NJ
Primary Ride Operator: Blue Sky Amusements
Dates: 5/13/09 – 5/16/09
If you want to check out some setup pictures of this fair, hop on over to this post.
I’ve been going to this fair every year since before I can remember. It used to be a little rinky dink affair featuring atrocities like the Skydiver, Scat and Cobra…sometimes even at the same time! However in recent years it’s been getting progressively better and this year it was probably the biggest fair to date. This year’s line up was…
Zipper
Himalaya (Wisdom version)
Riptide (an ARM Ali Baba)
Round-Up
Gravitron
Scooters
Sizzler
Chair Jet Swinger (or just Swinger)
Big Wheel
Berry Go Round
Super Slide
Two funhouses
A myriad of kiddie rides
A selection of greasy treats stands
A bunch of ‘chance wheels’ and carny games
Several vendors
So yeah, there was quite a bit there! Blue Sky Amusements brought nearly every ride they own actually. The rides were packed into the medium sized lot with little room between them but still enough room to not disrupt the flow of fairgoers.
Where to start…well, the Zipper was a nice addition this year. The Zipper used to make regular appearances at this fair back in the early 90s but it’s been absent ever since then. On Friday and Saturday night, I noticed that the Zipper crew had a duel queue line going where riders would file in both entrances so two cars could be loaded at once.
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I took a solo trip to Six Flags Great Adventure on a cloudy Saturday, May 2nd so that I could do whatever I pleased and stop for as many photos as I saw fit. I got to the park at around 2:00pm and found that the lot wasn’t too full (yay!) As I walked in, a song with the lyrics “It’s gonna be a good day” (or something similar) played over the speakers; foreshadowing maybe?
I had heard around that May 2nd was cheerleader day or something like that and feared that there would be throngs of annoying cheerleaders around. I was partially right, they were kind of annoying but they didn’t over run the place.
The first order of business would usually be to get my season pass validated, but I had the piece of plastic all ready to go so instead I made a beeline to El Toro. Upon arriving at The Bull, I noticed that it had a line that took up the entire far switchback and into the closest one. That’s not too bad of a line, but I decided to pass as I knew it would be less later on.
Instead of bull riding, I walked over by Bizarro via the re-opened bridge route, over the stagnant creek that runs through Frontier Adventures. Towards the end of last year the bridge was closed for repairs, resulting in a dead ends by El Toro and Medusa. There really wasn’t a whole heck of a lot to see over by Bizarro; I was hoping to see maybe a test train, or some workers, or maybe even Lex Luthor himself. All I got was Mr. Six with the word Funstruction screamed out next to him.
Next I walked through Frontier Adventures and saw that the Saw Mill log flume was open; an original attraction at Great Adventure. I thought about riding until I saw the steady stream of people using the “a-hole devices” next to the flume. Of course I’m referring to those sprayers that cost a quarter or so to use. The sprayers on this flume are pretty bad, dumping a nice robust stream of water right into the log; I didn’t really want to risk my camera with those.
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Many parks in the northeast US opened on April 4th, but I got my first taste of theme parks in 2009 on Sunday the 5th with a visit to Coney Island, NY. It was pretty nice out, probably around 65F with only wispy clouds decorating the sky. The drive to Coney Island was hectic as always with annoyingly narrow road lanes, aggressive drivers, and sudden lane changes.
Upon arriving on Coney Island, I drove down Surf Ave, hoping to find street side parking, but to no avail. I then ended up on Brighton Beach Ave, which is this sucky, crowded, pedestrian filled road that travels under an elongated subway overpass; I eventually managed to escape down side street to turn around.
I finally pulled into the Keyspan Park parking lot, resigned to paying whatever to park there. However I found no one manning the gates or patrolling the lot so I just pulled into a spot and hoped that I was allowed to do so for free!
The boardwalk was fairly crowded with everyone enjoying the unusually great weather. I strolled down the boardwalk, past the vacant lots that are Sitt-land, past Deno’s Wonderwheel Park, and past the remains of Astroland on my way to the Cyclone.
I took a few pictures of the Cyclone before purchasing a ticket to ride which cost $8.00 bucks; expensive but then again it is the Cyclone. Hey, it’s better than paying $10 bucks to cross the Verrazanno Bridge! The Cyclone was great as always with it’s abrupt drops, turns that toss you to the side of the seat, and its out of control style.
[nggallery id=17]After riding I scoped out the old Astroland site to see what was left…which isn’t much. The Water Flume sat there in pieces, some parts stacked neatly with others seemingly strewn about. All of the flatrides like Breakdance and Scrambler were gone, stored somewhere in Staten Island. The only remaining ride is the AstroTower, which is probably very tough to remove. To be honest, the AstroTower is practically a Coney Island icon along with the likes of Cyclone, Wonderwheel, and Parachute Jump; I can’t imagine seeing the Coney skyline without it!
After attending the Golden Nugget event the day before and going on a little self guided sightseeing tour, I left the house in Brick at around 10 am. I picked up a breakfast sandwich and coffee at a Dunkin Doughnuts and ate while driving to Seaside Heights, NJ. I took route 35, a scenic north/south highway to get to Seaside, and was met by only a few cars traveling around as I coasted through the shore towns of Ortley Beach and Lavalette among others. I arrived in Seaside within 15-20 minutes; during the summer, this same trip would have taken a good 45 minutes do to the explosion in seasonal population.
For anyone who doesn’t know, Seaside, NJ (which actually consists of two towns, Seaside Park and Seaside Heights) is a very popular shore point in New Jersey. If I had to name three big shore locales where Jerseans typically vacation, Seaside would probably rank at #3 with the Wildwoods and Long Beach Island as 1 and 2 respectfully. Seaside Heights is packed full of motels and typically caters to a younger crowd with an abundance of bars and clubs.
I parked in a large parking lot in Seaside Park and was flagged down by a dude just leaving his spot who had about 40 minutes left on the meter (yes you still have to feed the meter here in the winter!) I put in a quarter to make it 55 minutes (15 minutes per quarter too! I’m still young but I remember when a quarter would get you an hour!) It was about 50 degrees out, so there were quite a few people on the boardwalk; as opposed to Saturday when only a few crazies (like myself) braved the boardwalk. Here’s the first set of photos from around Funtown Pier.
[nggallery id=8]Aside from more people on the boards, everything else was about what you’d expect from a winter day ‘down the shore;’ most of the boardwalk stores were closed (except for one or two) many of the arcades were open, and barely anything was going on off the boardwalk. I ended up walking from the parking lot, to the very north end of the boardwalk and back. Along the way I stopped in both of the pier owned arcades, Funtown Arcade and Casino Arcade. Here’s the photos from the end of the boardwalk to Casino Arcade.
[nggallery id=9]Casino Pier arcade had a decent amount of people in there, and they actually had their indoor carousel running with someone behind the controls, but I didn’t see anyone get on…then again I was only there for like five minutes. Funtown Arcade also had a good amount of people around, and their carousel was also running but with no takers. Something I like about Funtown Arcade is that it has an entire section devoted to 80s arcade games. Some of the games included Super Mario Bros, Kung Fu, Pole Position, Pac Man, like 12 pinball machines including one called ‘Hercules’ which is about twice the size of a normal one! This next set of photos are from the arcades…
On 1/31, I went to the Golden Nugget farewell ceremony in Wildwood. However my trip down there turned into basically a weekend long trip. While I could have just driven all there and all the way home (a nice three hour drive each way…) I decided to stay at my family’s summer house in Brick, NJ on Friday night, which is about an hour and a half from Wildwood. On Saturday morning, I headed down to Wildwood and then decided to stay over at the summer house on Saturday night again. It was kind of like a mini weekend vacation! So, with all the time I had to screw around, I decided to take a little off-season sightseeing tour up the Jersey coast!
After leaving the old Hunt’s Pier, I took a walk down the boardwalk to Mariner’s Landing only to find some orange construction signs and a chain link fence blocking the way. Apparently they’re doing some boardwalk replacement in front of Mariner’s Landing and the old Midway pier (photo). From what I’ve seen in the past, this section doesn’t really need to be fixed up as much as some areas between Mariner’s Landing and Surfside Pier; some of the boards there are all loose and would rock up and down when traveled across.
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With not much of an option, I turned around and proceeded to walk down to Sportland Pier. This side of the boardwalk is never as crowded as the other ends in the summer, and the same was true in the off-season…actually, no one was there! I probably could have wandered about the pier since it wasn’t locked off or anything, but I decided not to. Here’s a few pics near Sportland Pier and Surfside Pier!
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Next I went back to my car and drove up through Wildwood Crest. To my total non-amazement, the place was absolutely dead; I only saw a few cars the entire time while there. I know this one guy who works at a restaurant on the Wildwood boardwalk (Olympic Flame for anyone who’s been to the ‘boards’) and he once said that “Wildwood gets so dead that you could roll a bowling ball down the street.” I’m not exactly sure what that means but if I had a bowling ball, I’d certainly do it in the Crest! Then I decided to stop once more at the boardwalk, on the other side of the construction, to see if anything noticeable was going on at Mariner’s Landing and Wild Wheels. I didn’t see much activity save for a person taking pictures of the boardwalk construction; here’s the pics of the Crest and the boardwalk!
 Remembering Action Park |
 White Trash Carnie Ride #3: Zipper |
 The Un-PC Park |
 EPCOT 1983 Park Map |
Shtuff!
Quick Lynx
