davidm
Strata Poster
Apologies first; I've been back from this particular "T" for 3 weeks and have neglected
to do the "R" - although the keener eyed of you might have noticed various "P"s (which will
probably get reposted herein) in the photo-thread that rather gave the game away!
Also this is a bit of a mixed TR; since the "T" in question was part-work related,
part general-hols and part-coastery stuff.
So apologies for my tardiness and any subsequent content that may belong more to the
"Life Outside" board - tough!
--
So every 18 months or so, one of the IT companies I do work with has a big global user
conference. The one in 2008 was in Las Vegas and afterwards I took off around the Grand
Canyon (etc) for a looksee. Well this years conference was meant to be in Los Angeles, but
all the customers complained and so it was moved back to Vegas.
Sorted out comped admission to the conference, sorted someone to pay for my airfare/hotels
and set the expectation at work that I'd not be returning straight away from the conference
and away I go!
So the conference is here; pretty darned posh place I'd say.
The view from my room was not bad;
Although this is a bit more representative of the actual view;
Dull-conference stuff;
Got there late on Friday 14th May; spent all of Saturday in some training courses, but managed
to wander up and down the strip in the evening to grab some pics.
Well these have a coaster in them, I'm sort of on topic?
Sunday was another training session in the morning, but I had a few hours in the afternoon to
play around, so despite me knowing much better (since I've been to Vegas twice before and
been on it both times), I made myself have a go on thr Roller Coaster at NewYorkNewYork
(you know, the one in the pics above that is also called Manhattan Express depending
on where you look).
It was not good.
I only had a bit of free time on the Sunday, because the conference proper (the training
sessions were a few pre-conference freebies) started inthe evening with the keynote
(dull, all to do with clouds) but followed by a bit of a jolly ; free food & beer at the
confernce and then more free food and beer in the Shark Reef aquarium place at Mandalay
Bay - no pics of that though, mainly because it was pretty dark and would have just been
a faff, and did I mention the free beer?
The next 4 days were all the conference proper; you don't want me to tell you about that, but
there was an interesting speaker at the one session, James Cameron giving a bit of a history of
his career etc. Pretty interesting really - a well motivated man!
Crap pic, pocket camera, no tripod etc, but it really was that James Cameron.
The other big jolly at the conference was on the Tuesday night, when they took over the beach
area at the hotle and filled it full of IT professionals, lots of free food and beer, and a couple
of bands. Maroon5 were the headline, who apparently are notable, can't say that they did
much for me, but they were bland enough to keep 5000 IT geeks happy enough (or maybe that
was the free beer?).
Really crap phone pic;
--
OK, conference finished at lunchtime on the Thursday, so grabbed my hire car and set off down
the road.
Stopped here after a bit;
but Desparado doesn't run on Thursdays apparently (I hadn't checked before I left - d'oh)!
Never mind, I rode it a few years ago, and I was driving past really.
Carrying on down the road, the temperatures peaked at 97F, glad of the air-con then!
And a few hours later I'm in Valencia, sat in my hotel across the road from the Mountain,
holiday starts now then!!
...only it does't quite go to plan...
Get myself some food (nothing dodgy, from a Mexican in downtown Valencia; seemed OK).
But a few hours later I'm getting cramps, and a nice case of food poisoning. Spend the
night hardly sleeping and visiting the bathroom far too much... roller coasters in the morning
anyone?
With nothing else to do, I get up in the morning, head to a pharmacy, stock up on Immodium
(too much info?) and head to Magic Mountain anyway. Thats dedication for you!
---
Friday 21st May
SIX FLAGS MAGIC MOUNTAIN
I've been here before; July 2002 and November 2006. Both times X was down, which annoyed
me somewhat. This time X2 is running, but I am down (physically), which also annoyed me a lot.
Sod it though; straight up there for the first ride of the day, 30 mins Q and I'm on!
I get the front row, outside seat (having been on Eejanaika a couple of years ago, I rather
think that the start of the first drop of these things on the front row is the single best
"coaster-moment" there is). X2 does the business on that first drop too (all to the strains of
Metallica's Sandman and Aerosmith's Elevator - not sure how that really adds to the experience
much?).
First drop from a bit later in the day (when I rode I was on the far-side of the train)
OK after that sublime first drop, it starts to go wrong... the rest of the ride was brutal to
my poor ill body and I exit the ride feeling like I'm going to well-you-can-imagine! :-(
I expected X2 to be a little painful, especially in the outside seat. I don't think I got thrown
around quite as much on Eejanaika though, I recall "floating" around the ride a bit more on that
than on X2.
I walked past Tatsu (not goin to be a good idea at the moment) and made may way to my
other missing credit; Terminator Salvation.
Feeling a bit calmed down now, and with zero queue, made my way through the pre-show;
pretty good, but would get really annoying on mutiple rerides I think! Liked the fact that
they shot the pre-show bits seemingly on/around the ride itself!
As for the ride, really good! I've been on a number of the recent GCIs, and those guys
are really hitting their stride with fast, exciting, smooth wooden beauties; and Terminator
is no exception. (Stupid theme/name for a wood coaster though)
So now I foolishly think I'm going to be OK for the rest of the day, and have go on Deja-Vu.
Turns out I'm wrong, and leave the ride about to throw up what is left in my system. Time
to calm down I think.
Spend a while wandering around, and after an hour or so I think I'm OK so I'll brave
another ride.
Park is pretty-empty, so its walk-on to this;
Which I really like, and I have a nice ride, really good, no ill effects at all. Excellent.
Feeling all confident after my Goliath-success, I wander around the corner to Scream. A
nice B&M I think, thats going to be OK isn't it I think, you've just done the nasty big coaster
- surely a super-smooth B&M is going to fine I think.
Clearly I am horribly mistaken.
Walk-on to the front row - a good start. But half way around I'm feeling very ill indeed. This
could be a problem for me (and the poor unfortunate guy sat next to me, and any clean-up crews
needed).
Luckily I manage to escape with all my internal stuff remaining internal and I decide to just
give up, got my missing credits (geek) and I should be happy with that.
I get my camera from the car and decide to spend the rest of the day wandering and snapping pics.
Make my way up to the Sky Tower (which also has always been closed for me here until today)
and spend a while up top enjoying the view.
Nice view.
Look theres my hotel room.
A little later in the day I brave a ride on Ninja (which is fun) and I was fine, but by 3pm I've
just had enough and I call it a day. :-(
Took lots of pics though - which I'll get around to sorting at some stage!
---
Saturday 22nd May.
Drive up to San Luis Obispo, where I planned to have a look around and maybe have a play down
the beach at. But I still feel like crap and I haven't eaten food since Thursday, so I just
crash in the hotel watching the Champions League final on the TV (well done US-TV!) and then
Lost on the internet. Manage to eat a sandwich, but apart from that, pretty dead-day. :-(
---
Sunday 23rd May.
This was a planned day. I planned to be up early, go to Hearst Castle, then drive up the coast
road snapping some pics as I went. Still feeling pretty ill though, but when you have a plan
you might as well stick to it.
Got to Hearst Castle before 9 and did "the tour". Really interesting, and really spectacular
place.
World's most photographed swimming pool they say (and its pretty cool indeed).
Nice castle (house anyway).
And its all on top of a hilltop, miles from anywhere.
Just think of the logistics involved. Phew!
Continue the trip up the coast, the road gets pretty sketchy in places, down to a single
land in a couple of places (with appropriate traffic controls of course) and the views are
pretty nice too.
The trip up the coast didn't take me as long as I thought (or I didn't stop for pics as often
as I thought I would?) and I make it to my next stop by 3pm. I had thought I'd go to
Monterey Bay aquarium the following day (I'm stopping in Monterey that night) - but since
I get there early enough I do that now instead.
I'm a bit of an aquarium geek as well as a coaster geek - if theres one around I'll try to
have a visit and Monterey Bay's is apparently one of the best on the world. Cool.
Its in an old cannery factory on the docks in Monterey, and a rather cool building indeed.
Pretty good then, perhaps not as large as I had imagined it to be, but was definately a
classy place. For the record I think Sydney's aquarium was better though.
---
Monday 24th May
Drive the 40 minutes or so up the bay from Monterey to SANTA CRUZ BEACH BOARDWALK then.
Quite liked this place actually. Clearly has a bit of the Blackpool / Jersey shores feel
about the place, but nicer that either of those places I think.
Just the two operating coasters here though today (the kiddie rides were not operating and
I try (but don't always succeed) to avoid lowering myself to riding them anyway).
Hurricane, which was OK.
and the 1924 Giant Dipper, which was great stuff! Really enjoyed that.
(rubbish pics though, taken from the pier later on).
So after playing on the coasters, and having some time to kill, I spent a while the pier taking
some shots of the sea lions and birdlife.
And you can get under the pier to see the sea lions chilling out on the substructure.
After than, I get in back in the car and drive for a few hours to Oakhurst, which is almost
the other side of California from where I started.
Oakhurst is of course, at the southern entrance to Yosemite park and just about the nearest
place you can stay if you aren't in the lodge in the park and don't fancy camping. I am of
sufficient age and wealth to not ever have to sleep in a tent again, so a hotel in Oakhurst
is my option!
---
Tuesday 25th May
High hopes for today - been to Yosemite before and had a great time so was looking forward
to taking a lot of nifty pics here.
Unforunately the day was really overcast, and worse of all some of the roads were still
snowed in so I could not get to the vantage point over the valley itself - boo, stupid
snow.
Spent the morning wandering through a grove of giant sequoias, which was very nice, if a bit
of a long walk;
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariposa_Grove)
and then made my way into the valley proper.
Even with the poor weather, its still a rather spectacular place so I managed to entertain
myself for a while wandering around.
---
Wednesday 26th May
Half planned to go back into the valley today if the weather picked up, but it was even
worse than the previous day, so just headed back out towards San Francisco instead (bit of a
drive that!)
Grabbed a hotel, went to the movies, nothing spectacular. Didn't even take any photos today.
---
Thursday 27th May
You'll no doubt be be pleased to hear that the food poisoning side-effects have just about
cleared up by now, but its not been a great few days for my system!
Anyway, been to San Francisco a couple of times before, but its a cool place so despite the
rain (LOTS of rain) I spent the day wandering around the city before heading up to Vallejo
for the evening.
---
Friday 28th May
SIX FLAGS DISCOVERY KINGDOM
Stayed in a hotel just across the freeway from here (I think the walk from the hotel was
actually less than the walk from the SFDK car park - this always makes me happy being able
to walk to a park from my hotel!)
Quite liked this place, really felt like the (defunct) Worlds of Adventure in Ohio with its mix
of rides and animals.
This whale even came from SFWoA;
Medusa is clearly a stand-out ride.
Wacky element in the middle too.
Tony Hawks was a good spinner;
But Roar was my favourite ride of the day... only I don't appear to have bothered taking
any pics of it? Clearly was enjoying riding it too much? Pah!
Park is a bit let down by having one of these;
and one of these as well;
;-)
---
Saturday 29th May.
Get up (at 5am), go to airport, get on plane, fly to Philadelphia, get off plane, get on another
plane, fly to Machester. home by Sunday morning. Nice way to spend a Saturday.
Thats it, all over now, lots of pics yet unsorted so I might drop some choice ones in here later on.
to do the "R" - although the keener eyed of you might have noticed various "P"s (which will
probably get reposted herein) in the photo-thread that rather gave the game away!
Also this is a bit of a mixed TR; since the "T" in question was part-work related,
part general-hols and part-coastery stuff.
So apologies for my tardiness and any subsequent content that may belong more to the
"Life Outside" board - tough!
--
So every 18 months or so, one of the IT companies I do work with has a big global user
conference. The one in 2008 was in Las Vegas and afterwards I took off around the Grand
Canyon (etc) for a looksee. Well this years conference was meant to be in Los Angeles, but
all the customers complained and so it was moved back to Vegas.
Sorted out comped admission to the conference, sorted someone to pay for my airfare/hotels
and set the expectation at work that I'd not be returning straight away from the conference
and away I go!
So the conference is here; pretty darned posh place I'd say.
The view from my room was not bad;
Although this is a bit more representative of the actual view;
Dull-conference stuff;
Got there late on Friday 14th May; spent all of Saturday in some training courses, but managed
to wander up and down the strip in the evening to grab some pics.
Well these have a coaster in them, I'm sort of on topic?
Sunday was another training session in the morning, but I had a few hours in the afternoon to
play around, so despite me knowing much better (since I've been to Vegas twice before and
been on it both times), I made myself have a go on thr Roller Coaster at NewYorkNewYork
(you know, the one in the pics above that is also called Manhattan Express depending
on where you look).
It was not good.
I only had a bit of free time on the Sunday, because the conference proper (the training
sessions were a few pre-conference freebies) started inthe evening with the keynote
(dull, all to do with clouds) but followed by a bit of a jolly ; free food & beer at the
confernce and then more free food and beer in the Shark Reef aquarium place at Mandalay
Bay - no pics of that though, mainly because it was pretty dark and would have just been
a faff, and did I mention the free beer?
The next 4 days were all the conference proper; you don't want me to tell you about that, but
there was an interesting speaker at the one session, James Cameron giving a bit of a history of
his career etc. Pretty interesting really - a well motivated man!
Crap pic, pocket camera, no tripod etc, but it really was that James Cameron.
The other big jolly at the conference was on the Tuesday night, when they took over the beach
area at the hotle and filled it full of IT professionals, lots of free food and beer, and a couple
of bands. Maroon5 were the headline, who apparently are notable, can't say that they did
much for me, but they were bland enough to keep 5000 IT geeks happy enough (or maybe that
was the free beer?).
Really crap phone pic;
--
OK, conference finished at lunchtime on the Thursday, so grabbed my hire car and set off down
the road.
Stopped here after a bit;
but Desparado doesn't run on Thursdays apparently (I hadn't checked before I left - d'oh)!
Never mind, I rode it a few years ago, and I was driving past really.
Carrying on down the road, the temperatures peaked at 97F, glad of the air-con then!
And a few hours later I'm in Valencia, sat in my hotel across the road from the Mountain,
holiday starts now then!!
...only it does't quite go to plan...
Get myself some food (nothing dodgy, from a Mexican in downtown Valencia; seemed OK).
But a few hours later I'm getting cramps, and a nice case of food poisoning. Spend the
night hardly sleeping and visiting the bathroom far too much... roller coasters in the morning
anyone?
With nothing else to do, I get up in the morning, head to a pharmacy, stock up on Immodium
(too much info?) and head to Magic Mountain anyway. Thats dedication for you!
---
Friday 21st May
SIX FLAGS MAGIC MOUNTAIN
I've been here before; July 2002 and November 2006. Both times X was down, which annoyed
me somewhat. This time X2 is running, but I am down (physically), which also annoyed me a lot.
Sod it though; straight up there for the first ride of the day, 30 mins Q and I'm on!
I get the front row, outside seat (having been on Eejanaika a couple of years ago, I rather
think that the start of the first drop of these things on the front row is the single best
"coaster-moment" there is). X2 does the business on that first drop too (all to the strains of
Metallica's Sandman and Aerosmith's Elevator - not sure how that really adds to the experience
much?).
First drop from a bit later in the day (when I rode I was on the far-side of the train)
OK after that sublime first drop, it starts to go wrong... the rest of the ride was brutal to
my poor ill body and I exit the ride feeling like I'm going to well-you-can-imagine! :-(
I expected X2 to be a little painful, especially in the outside seat. I don't think I got thrown
around quite as much on Eejanaika though, I recall "floating" around the ride a bit more on that
than on X2.
I walked past Tatsu (not goin to be a good idea at the moment) and made may way to my
other missing credit; Terminator Salvation.
Feeling a bit calmed down now, and with zero queue, made my way through the pre-show;
pretty good, but would get really annoying on mutiple rerides I think! Liked the fact that
they shot the pre-show bits seemingly on/around the ride itself!
As for the ride, really good! I've been on a number of the recent GCIs, and those guys
are really hitting their stride with fast, exciting, smooth wooden beauties; and Terminator
is no exception. (Stupid theme/name for a wood coaster though)
So now I foolishly think I'm going to be OK for the rest of the day, and have go on Deja-Vu.
Turns out I'm wrong, and leave the ride about to throw up what is left in my system. Time
to calm down I think.
Spend a while wandering around, and after an hour or so I think I'm OK so I'll brave
another ride.
Park is pretty-empty, so its walk-on to this;
Which I really like, and I have a nice ride, really good, no ill effects at all. Excellent.
Feeling all confident after my Goliath-success, I wander around the corner to Scream. A
nice B&M I think, thats going to be OK isn't it I think, you've just done the nasty big coaster
- surely a super-smooth B&M is going to fine I think.
Clearly I am horribly mistaken.
Walk-on to the front row - a good start. But half way around I'm feeling very ill indeed. This
could be a problem for me (and the poor unfortunate guy sat next to me, and any clean-up crews
needed).
Luckily I manage to escape with all my internal stuff remaining internal and I decide to just
give up, got my missing credits (geek) and I should be happy with that.
I get my camera from the car and decide to spend the rest of the day wandering and snapping pics.
Make my way up to the Sky Tower (which also has always been closed for me here until today)
and spend a while up top enjoying the view.
Nice view.
Look theres my hotel room.
A little later in the day I brave a ride on Ninja (which is fun) and I was fine, but by 3pm I've
just had enough and I call it a day. :-(
Took lots of pics though - which I'll get around to sorting at some stage!
---
Saturday 22nd May.
Drive up to San Luis Obispo, where I planned to have a look around and maybe have a play down
the beach at. But I still feel like crap and I haven't eaten food since Thursday, so I just
crash in the hotel watching the Champions League final on the TV (well done US-TV!) and then
Lost on the internet. Manage to eat a sandwich, but apart from that, pretty dead-day. :-(
---
Sunday 23rd May.
This was a planned day. I planned to be up early, go to Hearst Castle, then drive up the coast
road snapping some pics as I went. Still feeling pretty ill though, but when you have a plan
you might as well stick to it.
Got to Hearst Castle before 9 and did "the tour". Really interesting, and really spectacular
place.
World's most photographed swimming pool they say (and its pretty cool indeed).
Nice castle (house anyway).
And its all on top of a hilltop, miles from anywhere.
Just think of the logistics involved. Phew!
Continue the trip up the coast, the road gets pretty sketchy in places, down to a single
land in a couple of places (with appropriate traffic controls of course) and the views are
pretty nice too.
The trip up the coast didn't take me as long as I thought (or I didn't stop for pics as often
as I thought I would?) and I make it to my next stop by 3pm. I had thought I'd go to
Monterey Bay aquarium the following day (I'm stopping in Monterey that night) - but since
I get there early enough I do that now instead.
I'm a bit of an aquarium geek as well as a coaster geek - if theres one around I'll try to
have a visit and Monterey Bay's is apparently one of the best on the world. Cool.
Its in an old cannery factory on the docks in Monterey, and a rather cool building indeed.
Pretty good then, perhaps not as large as I had imagined it to be, but was definately a
classy place. For the record I think Sydney's aquarium was better though.
---
Monday 24th May
Drive the 40 minutes or so up the bay from Monterey to SANTA CRUZ BEACH BOARDWALK then.
Quite liked this place actually. Clearly has a bit of the Blackpool / Jersey shores feel
about the place, but nicer that either of those places I think.
Just the two operating coasters here though today (the kiddie rides were not operating and
I try (but don't always succeed) to avoid lowering myself to riding them anyway).
Hurricane, which was OK.
and the 1924 Giant Dipper, which was great stuff! Really enjoyed that.
(rubbish pics though, taken from the pier later on).
So after playing on the coasters, and having some time to kill, I spent a while the pier taking
some shots of the sea lions and birdlife.
And you can get under the pier to see the sea lions chilling out on the substructure.
After than, I get in back in the car and drive for a few hours to Oakhurst, which is almost
the other side of California from where I started.
Oakhurst is of course, at the southern entrance to Yosemite park and just about the nearest
place you can stay if you aren't in the lodge in the park and don't fancy camping. I am of
sufficient age and wealth to not ever have to sleep in a tent again, so a hotel in Oakhurst
is my option!
---
Tuesday 25th May
High hopes for today - been to Yosemite before and had a great time so was looking forward
to taking a lot of nifty pics here.
Unforunately the day was really overcast, and worse of all some of the roads were still
snowed in so I could not get to the vantage point over the valley itself - boo, stupid
snow.
Spent the morning wandering through a grove of giant sequoias, which was very nice, if a bit
of a long walk;
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariposa_Grove)
and then made my way into the valley proper.
Even with the poor weather, its still a rather spectacular place so I managed to entertain
myself for a while wandering around.
---
Wednesday 26th May
Half planned to go back into the valley today if the weather picked up, but it was even
worse than the previous day, so just headed back out towards San Francisco instead (bit of a
drive that!)
Grabbed a hotel, went to the movies, nothing spectacular. Didn't even take any photos today.
---
Thursday 27th May
You'll no doubt be be pleased to hear that the food poisoning side-effects have just about
cleared up by now, but its not been a great few days for my system!
Anyway, been to San Francisco a couple of times before, but its a cool place so despite the
rain (LOTS of rain) I spent the day wandering around the city before heading up to Vallejo
for the evening.
---
Friday 28th May
SIX FLAGS DISCOVERY KINGDOM
Stayed in a hotel just across the freeway from here (I think the walk from the hotel was
actually less than the walk from the SFDK car park - this always makes me happy being able
to walk to a park from my hotel!)
Quite liked this place, really felt like the (defunct) Worlds of Adventure in Ohio with its mix
of rides and animals.
This whale even came from SFWoA;
Medusa is clearly a stand-out ride.
Wacky element in the middle too.
Tony Hawks was a good spinner;
But Roar was my favourite ride of the day... only I don't appear to have bothered taking
any pics of it? Clearly was enjoying riding it too much? Pah!
Park is a bit let down by having one of these;
and one of these as well;
;-)
---
Saturday 29th May.
Get up (at 5am), go to airport, get on plane, fly to Philadelphia, get off plane, get on another
plane, fly to Machester. home by Sunday morning. Nice way to spend a Saturday.
Thats it, all over now, lots of pics yet unsorted so I might drop some choice ones in here later on.
