Cedar Point

Today was about one thing and one thing only: ROLLER COASTERS. So apparently Cedar Point is on a peninsula and was built in 1870, making it the second oldest operating amusement park in the U.S. I did not know this. But this place is known, not only for having the most roller coasters, but for having some of the best in the world. And so we begin.

Driving into Cedar Point over the Causeway

To start off the day we hit up Raptor. Honestly, it was a pretty fun, run-of-the-mill steel coaster.

Next, we rode Blue Streak. This coaster was built in 1964. It's 48. Years old. And it's made of wood. So this was Jaimie's first wooden coaster. It wasn't a disappointment, but it wasn't anything spectacular.

This, however, was. So Gemini is two coasters side-by-side that, unlike every other park that has one of these, they actually run at the SAME TIME. It's a shame that these are only wooden coasters. Wait, did I say shame? Forget that. These coasters were AMAZING. We rode both of them in the front car. Sure, they were almost exactly the same but hey, it was only a 10 minute wait. And for roller coasters this awesome, I think that's the real shame.


We continued on to Mean Streak, another wooden coaster (are you seeing the pattern?). I had no idea you could do with wood what they made this thing do. First of all, it's HUGE. Also, that first drop? Damn. The added bonus was that you could see parts of the structure sway and wobble as the trains pass over. I didn't tell Jaimie about that until after we rode. The line for this coaster was embarrassingly short, too, as most are for wooden ones. But I'm not complaining.

From here on out, we rode steel coasters. The first one was Magnum XL-200. I didn't know anything about the roller coaster but it was FUN. Possibly the most fun I've had on a roller coaster. Turns out the thing held a bunch of records and won a bunch of awards. Not surprised at all.














Corkscrew. Corkscrew sucked. To be fair, it looks really cool, with all those, well, corkscrews. But with the way I was crunched into that harness, I was afraid of getting a spinal cord injury.

Of course I dealt the with the fear of a spinal cord injury by going on a stand-up roller coaster next. Mantis was cool up until I felt my legs start to swell and tingle from all the downward G's.

You would think at this point, I would quit while I could still walk, but Millennium Force beckoned. I won't bore you with the ridiculous stats; you can read them here. We waited on line for almost two hours. They stopped the ride twice in that time due to overheating. Some parkgoer kept asking ride occupants if they 'had fun' every time a train pulled in. None of that mattered during the ride and afterward. It was incredible.

Josh and Snoopy were very happy to see one another 

Somewhere between Blue Streak and Gemini we ate lunch at Joe Cool Cafe. The food was good and there were a bunch of Peanuts comics on the wall. That's a win in my book.




Overall, the food and water were overpriced and it was quite hot out, but this place is great. I can see why it gets high rankings year after year. Oh and some dude in the parking lot gave us a coupon so we only ended up paying $56 for the both of us to get in. Boom. Tomorrow we hit the road early for Le Claire, Iowa to visit Antique Archaeology.