Friday, July 27, 2012

2012 AM/CAN Golf Tourney



The 2012 AM/CAN was hosted in Oneonta NY, 19-20 July. Oneonta is about 21 miles south east of Cooperstown NY where the Baseball Hall of Fame is located.  Here's a picture of the attendees.  It was great seeing many of our Deer Creek friends again.    We stayed at the Susquehanna Trail campground near the Oneonta Country Club where the event was being played.  Kathy and I were captains of the Blue Team. Go Blue!  The format for the event was a two person scramble.  We shot 68 net on the first day and 71 net on the second.  The approach shot to the green was very demanding as many of the greens sloped front to back.  To the satisfaction of all players the competition was declared a draw, however I do believe that the Canadians out drank their American friends.  A great time was had by all!

Friday, July 13, 2012

Cedar Point Amusement Park July 2012




Cedar Point, Sandusky Ohio. People throughout the entire world know it's the number-one roller coaster capital of the World. It's also the second oldest amusement park in North America. This picture was taken from the Sky Ride at the midway. 


The history of thrill rides at Cedar Point began in 1892, with the introduction of the peninsula’s first roller coaster, the Switchback Railway. The addition of the 25-foot-tall, 10-mph scream machine would forever shape the future of Cedar Point.  Here we are in our campground located right next to the park.


They also have have cabins you can rent right on Lake Erie.   


  You can see here that Ryan is ready to go!  Ryan, Ryan, Wake Up Ryan!


I think we are finally ready to hit the park!  That is Karyn's car parked in the front of the RV.  She drove the kids from Baltimore to Cedar Point, which took about six hours.   She did an excellent job getting everyone here safely. 


You can see the campground directly behind the group as we walk to the park.  If you stay in the RV Park or one of Cedar Point Hotels you get to enter the park one hour earlier than daily visitors. 


Here's Kathy checking Jake's height.  Since he is more than 54 inches he is cleared to ride all attractions at the park.  


Here's Ryan and Dave sizing up the thrill ride "Dragster" They both rode the Dragster twice on the second day. They were the first riders of the day!  On the third day Jake decided to add his name to the list of riders.  


Here's Jake waiting patiently for his turn on the Dragster.  I wonder what's going through his mind? Ryan chats with two girls who were a little scared since this was also their first Dragster ride.  Ryan, can I borrow your comb?


The Dragster takes you from Zero to 120 MPH in 3.8 seconds.  You go up 420 feet at 90 degrees. You go over the top, then you start back down, again at 90 degrees, with a  270 degree turn, again at 120 MPH.  The ride start to finish takes a whole 17 seconds.  As Tom Cruise once said "I feel the need for speed" To open video full screen, click on the square, bottom right. To play, click on the arrow, bottom left. 


A picture is worth a thousand words.  The left side is a photo of us at launch. The right side is a photo of us immediately after descent.  All smiles! Notice everyone's hair is straight up! 


The Mantis was designed for people to stand up while riding. It set several coaster records when it opened in 1997, including height 145 feet, speed 60 MPH and steepness 52 degrees. 


Here is Jake at the Iron Dragon.  This coaster features cars that hang beneath the track by a chassis allowing  the coaster to swing side sweeping towards Cedar Point Lagoon. 

 

Here we are waiting in line for our favorite ride "Millennium Force".  It opened in July 1999, with a track length of 6,595 feet, and a speed of 93 MPH.  It was the largest investment in Cedar Point history.  The coaster won 6 Amusement Golden Ticket Awards since 2001. Although I was impressed with the Dragster, I think this was our favorite coaster.  Although Kathy is taking this photo she rode this coaster on Day 1. 


Here's Kathy relaxing during our Sky Ride to save some foot traffic during our departure. You can't tell by looking but the Sky Ride scared her more than all the coasters she rode.  For the record, Kathy did ride more coasters than me, but she could not bring herself to ride the "Dragster".



Here we are waiting to ride the Maverick.  This coaster goes 70 MPH.  During the ride the coaster goes into a tunnel and you think the ride is over but you accelerate again to 70 MPH doing a twisted horseshoe roll.  Maverick has the steepest drop angle (95 degrees) of any coaster in the park


In addition to our daily park passes, we also purchased "Soak City" water park tickets so we could cool off after a hard day of riding!  The water park included a wave pool,  water slides and  Eerie Falls.  

This is a list of coasters we rode during our 3-day adventure at Cedar Point.  The Mean Streak, Blue Streak, Gemini, Raptor, Maverick, Mantis, Iron Dragon, Top Thrill Dragster, Disaster Transport,  Magnum XL-200, and Millennium Force. Kathy and Jake also rode The Cork Screw and Witches Wheel.  We also rode water rides; Shoot the Rapids and Snake River Falls.  I can tell you no one had anything dry on them after riding Shoot the Rapids.  It was a great time had by all.

Pulling up Anchor at Acadia National Park

 I thought it would be nice to add a few facts about Acadia National in each of the photos below. We decided that our last trip here at Acad...