Sacrifice to the Coaster Gods://Virginia Parks Spring 2022

               Date:4/22/2022-4/24/2022

Destination: Virginia

Goal: Busch Gardens; Kings Dominion

Distance: 444 Miles

Means of Travel: Driving

Potential Credits: 3

How does this trip report thingy usually start? Particularly the type where I travel to ride a long-awaited new coaster? I think I'm supposed to post the concept art and my initial thoughts on it?

In 2019, it looked like 2020 was going to be Seaworld Parks & Entertainment's year hands down. RMC Gwazi, two launched coasters, you name it. Every park in the chain had either just gotten something nice or would be getting a new coaster. I anxiously threw on the livestream for whatever crazy launched Intamin was going to Busch Gardens Williamsburg to listen to at work, moments before my lunch break...and the stream went out. But when I got home, I cracked my phone open and saw what was in store for America's most beautiful park: an equally beautiful golden Intamin multi-launch called Pantheon, featuring a layout composed of elements inspired by five Roman gods. Among this divine-inspired collection of maneuvers was a high-speed switch track, reverse vertical spike, RMC-esque wave turn and stall, a massive top hat with a beyond vertical drop, and a seemingly innocent floater hill built into the launch a la Copperhead. While this was planned for early 2020 for me, wanting to get out to Virginia as soon as it opened...COVID-19 decided to pull a Fullmetal Alchemist and swallow god (five of them, actually) and Pantheon sat two seasons totally dormant before its opening was announced in 2022. It was settled. I would be going to ride Pantheon!

But here's a twist! Two pieces of concept art for two new coasters!? In one of the worst-kept secrets in the industry, rival park Kings Dominion was  revealed to be getting a little S&S Free Spin called Tumbili, rocking a monkey temple theme and bamboo-themed supports. Cool replacement for The Crypt, brought a nice little retheme with it, but not enough to get me out there alone.

When I wanted to ride Pantheon, I naturally hit Drew up and saw if he was down, and he was, but had another idea: he was missing credits at Kings Dominion, and wanted to see if there was any way we could work at least a little bit of our home park's sister park into there, and the next thing I know we hatched this crazy crackhead plan to gate crash Tumbili and poke around Kings Dominion for an hour or so before driving the remaining 8 hours back. What's more is that Drew was only 8 credits away from hitting 200, and wanted to do it at Busch Gardens. But I was excited! That's two New for 2022(-ish) coasters in a weekend, let's knock 'em out!

Fitting into Pantheon was a concern for me so I intermittent fasted the week before, and I had joked that we should sacrifice a goat to the Roman gods for good luck on the trip. Little did I know how poorly that joke would age...

Day 0- Oh Deer!

I dipped out of work at noon and went home, changed, and waited for Drew. Once he got to my place, we got in my car, snagged Subway, and hit the road. The drive was a bit chaotic until we got a bit down 35, which takes you through bumfuck Southern Ohio into West Virginia. We chatted a bit, he had recently talked me into watching Cobra Kai so that was some new common ground for us, and a comment about how pretty the forest looked in the springtime led me to tell him the story about Gimble, the naked thieving pissing perverted 3-foot gnome I play in Dungeons & Dragons, taking his armor off and crossing a creek naked to the horror of the party, so that was fun. But further into the drive, we got into Charleston, WV, and things got...interesting.

West Virginia is notorious for being my least favorite state in America for a plethora of reasons, but these are a few of them. We were taken off the highway through the city, which was annoying, but the entertainment couldn't be beaten. I knew we were in West Virginia when we saw a crackhead riding a little Mini Moto pocketbike down the street towing a lawnmower behind it. Drew sadly couldn't get a photo, but he did get this guy that looked like he was on Day 27 of Survivor running across a busy road to the gas station. And while in that jam, Drew accidentally spilled the peanut butter pretzels I got all over my car, it made a huge mess and smelled like Mr. Peanut blew his load getting road head in my car. Further down the road, we got back on the highway, sped up, rounded a corner...and nearly rear ended the guy in front of me as he tried to pass some jackass in a U-Haul going 30 on the Interstate. Like, I had to slam my brakes on and dodge into the shoulder to not hit the guy.

Drew and I have a sort of running joke between us of singing Dueling Banjos every time we see some hillbilly driving like an idiot on our trips. This is why.

Further along, things smoothed up, we got gas, Drew got some snacks and bought me a chocolate bar because he didn't like the total ringing up as $6.66 (thanks again if you're reading this!), and I continued to smash my ETA. At the stop, I cleaned up some of the pretzels that had spilled and put them back in the now empty container that held them...but poor Drew wasn't aware I did this and when I looked over he was snacking on pretzels picked up off the dirty floorboard of my car! We made one more stop for Bojangles (which I had never had, it's delicious!)and continued on. Our initial ETA leaving the driveway was 8:44, Waze was putting us at Days Inn right at 10, making my goal easily.

CW: Blood, Gore, Death of Animal

Well, later on, the worst of it happened. Drew was on the phone with Jules, his girlfriend, and they were talking. Meanwhile, my partner Beth called, and since I couldn't tell Beth to call back, Drew hung up on Jules and told her he'd call her back, which she was fine with. So I'm on the phone with Beth and just as we're switching highways, my headlights pick up a bunch of red on the road. Like, the asphalt was painted red. And just when I realized what it came from...

CRUNCH!!!

The mutilated remains of this deer, with its head separated from its body and ribs sticking out, come out of nowhere. I have no time to react, my tire rolls right over it, and the sound it made was absolutely horrendous. And worst of all, my partner was on the phone to hear it and Drew and I's reaction to something that horrific and disgusting. I can still hear it when I close my eyes. Fortunately Beth was totally cool about it, but Jules was the one to luck out not even having to be a part of the deer carnage! But at least we had our animal sacrifice out of the way, Pantheon better operate like fucking clockwork with my fat ass crammed into the restraint!

Just as Waze said, we rolled in at 10, and I was strangely beat, but strangely...not. Like I got out of the car and jumped a few times ready to roll, maybe all the Mountain Dew I had consumed on the drive was finally catching up to me. But I got my stuff up, hopped in the shower, snuggled up to the stuffed dog that Beth had given me, and fell asleep. Pantheon needed me tomorrow!

Day 1- Ride First, Run Hard, No Saying "Lets Go Skiing"

Drew accidentally woke me up a bit before our scheduled time by turning on a hotel light that could leave Toph Beifong seeing spots and trying to talk to me after I rolled over to get back to sleep. But he got started on his schoolwork, and by then I was wide awake so I threw my park clothes on and headed down to get breakfast.

This seemingly innocent cereal dispenser was straight up triggering.

In 2007, when I first went to Busch Gardens Williamsburg with my family, we ate a hotel continental breakfast before we went as well. The line to get said breakfast was obnoxiously long and spilled out of the hotel and into the parking lot. What did we see upon getting inside? Parents, with their crotch piglets, asking their brat kids, "HONEY, WOULD YOU LIKE APPLE JUICE OR ORANGE JUICE? ...APPLE JUICE OR ORANGE JUICE? ...APPLE JUICE OR ORANGE JUICE?" while the little bastard just stood there like a deer in the headlights. And then a few spots down the line, there was this same cereal dispenser, kid still looking like a deer in the headlights unable to answer, as mom grilled him over, "HONEY, WOULD YOU LIKE CHEERIOS OR CORN FLAKES? ...CHEERIOS OR CORN FLAKES? ...CHEERIOS OR CORN FLAKES?" Indecisive children and their parents that didn't think to ask them before they held the line up made that breakfast a living hell and my family still jokes about it to this day.

Traumatic childhood flashbacks aside, I chowed down on some Froot Loops and milk and headed back up to the hotel room with some goddamn motherfuckin' Pecan Pinwheels for Drew to snack on while he worked on his class.

After he packed his shit up, we hopped in the car and darted down the highway to our main destination on the trip: Busch Gardens Williamsburg! This is not my first time at the park at all, I went once on a family vacation in 2007 (and skipped Big Bad Wolf and to this day I'm bitter about it), and once in 2018 on part of a Virginia enthusiast trip. But I always loved how the park's colorful coaster skyline pops out of the green treeline as you drive up. We ended up in the crazy people crowd waiting for them to move the cones, so I did the social media thing, watched them test Apollo's Chariot, and texted Beth to kill time.

Was not aware Busch Gardens Williamsburg was haunted but I took what's clearly a ghost picture in the toll plaza. I mean, look at it! This ghost is in the person's truck!

And just like that they opened up! I wanted to set up to be that guy and blast Ready To Go to kick the day off right, but before we knew it, we were paying and parking and waiting to hop on the tram, with the Pantheon anxiety starting to really, really set in.

We got in and made our way to the ropes, and Drew was instantly taken aback how beautiful the park was, even just from the UK section. I used the time to find a map, show Drew the park's layout, and strap my GoPro on. And then they did it and dropped the rope! It was Pantheon time!

Fitting into Pantheon was a major concern of mine. I fit into Velocicoaster after losing all that weight I lost last year, and I had heard of people bigger than me riding both, but considering I had a few close calls at Kings Island, I was understandably worried I wouldn't fit, so I did 16/8 intermittent fasting the week before to maybe get a few more centimeters out of the restraint. But when I tried the test seat, I fit just fine with a little nudge from Drew on the bar, I was good to ride! Let's go experience the power of five Roman gods!

Watching them dangle it in front of our faces...

Fuck it, I'll say it. Pantheon is tied with Griffon for the worst-themed coaster in the park. Sure there's two cool signs, and five posters in the queue, and a layout map, but beyond that and the flags hanging in the station/maintenance bay, there's no theming on this thing. No smashed columns in the low zones, no dramatic godly music around it, it's just concrete. Fortunately by the time we got in line it was just a stair wait, so pretty successful gate crash if you ask me.

Time to ride! This moment has been in the making since 2019, before the pandemic was even a thing. Let's do it!

Change my mind: Pantheon is Diet Velocicoaster.

There was always parallel between these two rides in my eyes, if not for being the same ride system then for sharing a few elements. And while not all of the ride is fully reminiscent of the nonstop insanity of its crackhead older brother in Florida that keeps getting arrested for throwing people, there are a few standout moments that are, as well as its own uniquely Pantheon flavor that gives the ride some individuality. It's a pacing, airtime, and aggression machine through and through, which I do like in a coaster. It's like they took everything I like about Maverick, removed all the faff, and tried to combine that with Velocicoaster.

So let's break it down!

Pantheon starts out with a slow dispatch through a series of S-curves a la Cheetah Hunt (not sure what these are for) before launching up into a step-up under flip, where the dive out of the roll dips below station level. The roll gets you some decent hangtime, but once you come up, there are two off-axis air hills that surprised me with how much floatjector I got going through them. Train then enters the launch and the track switches behind it before it's launched partway up the top hat, before rolling back. Launching backwards onto the spike is insane and you get all kinds of airtime as you're rocketed backwards over that little speed hop in the launch, getting all the ejector airtime that Copperhead couldn't with the same maneuver. The ride backwards up the spike feels exactly like an impulse, which isn't a bad thing, but unique to see a sensation I always thought of as gimmicky on a quality coaster like Pantheon. Falling out of it, the train absolutely rips over that bunny hop, this time reaching Skyrush levels of ejector for a split second before rising up into the top hat, cresting a beautiful view, and going down a crazy airtime-filled drop down to the Rhine, actually managing to outdo Velocicoaster's top hat. Rising back up, the coaster does a wave turn (not a Teresa, that's so 2018) not unlike Twisted Cyclone's before entering a stall that feels exactly like Velocicoaster's, but over grass instead of the midway/jungle. After that, the ride does a few twisty maneuvers before sailing over another crooked airtime hill into the brakes that feels a little weird, but there's airtime so I'm not complaining.

Personal thoughts? It is what it is, which is a smaller, inferior version of a coaster that's quickly achieved legendary status among enthusiasts in the short year it's been open. You can tell they're the same manufacturer, same ride system, and same timeframe, and while one is clearly better, Pantheon is amazing as well. Lots of good, unique airtime on this, some of which rivals the stuff RMC is doing right now, and its pacing varies from solid to ballistic the whole ride and it never really dies. My favorite part of the ride, and its associated god to boot, is probably Mercury with that crazy repeated acceleration over that hop that not only tosses you out of your seat, but breaks up what would otherwise be a fairly weak LSM launch into something really awesome. However, Zeus's top hat which exits into a 95 degree drop into the Rhine is a very close second, and it combined with the launch gives this ride a very clear climax, full of speed, airtime, and a very cool visual.

Ultimately, Pantheon would go on to place 8th in my combined rankings and 7th in my steel. The closest comparison I could make to something near it in the top ten list is probably Iron Rattler, which shares its mix of high and low momentum airtime, hangtime, and a really cool and dramatic drop incorporating a natural feature. Couldn't quite place it above it, maybe I'll come around and do it, but the two are virtually neck and neck in my rankings. But for further comparison, Velocicoaster is way higher in second place only behind Railblazer for my #1 spot. So while it's not quite the phenomenon sweeping the industry that its Floridian cousin is, it's still a high quality ride that's among the best in the United States, and you should get here to ride it if you like launched coasters with ejector such as Maverick, Copperhead Strike, or Velocicoaster.

Not sure Florida Man's bipedal pet alligator should be outdoing millennia-old divine fury, but Intamin just designs the coasters, they don't theme them.

Drew didn't do too well with the backwards launch (he's gotten motion sickness since day one in this interest, it's a running joke at this point), so I took us to something more mild: InvadR! I rode this once on my last trip here, and thought it felt like a milder Mystic Timbers, so I figured it was a good chill ride. We got in line for my wooden coaster, and I attempted to look at my Pantheon POV on my GoPro, but it started acting up and wouldn't connect to my phone or record anymore, so not sure what was up with that but I had no GoPro for the rest of the day. Fortunately, the coaster was just as fun as I remembered, not doing anything too crazy but flying around those corners with some gusto and giving us a few pops of car-over-hill airtime around the course. But the unique thing about this coaster I think is simply the cool interaction with the terrain, diving into trenches and climbing up onto those steep hillsides. Battering ram and station are pretty cool too.

France was our next stop to take our first bite out of the dining plan, and let me tell you, going from real France to Busch Gardens France is outright depressing. I never really cared for what they chose to do with my family's homeland. If Germany can get two regions represented with uniquely German-themed coasters, and Italy can get both a cute hamlet and a gaudy midway with three coasters sharing similarities stacked on top of each other, France deserves better than a parking lot coaster with no thematic connection to French culture, putting Canada in your European-themed park, and giving Canada a ride with horribly anachronistic theming. Mont St.-Michel, Parisian catacombs, Jules Verne, wine country, City of Lights, Tour de France, lots of opportunities for really cool stuff there they didn't take.

Rant aside, "French" food at Busch Gardens is supposed to be French Fries (totally not a Belgian thing) cut out of russet potatoes topped with like taco stuff and barbecue and the like. Real French frites are nothing like this, they're often made with waxy potatoes, they're smaller, and they're served as a side to a croque-monsieur or something with no topping. I went with their poutine and it was good flavor-wise, gravy could've been a bit hotter to actually melt the cheese curds but that's a minor complaint. It's definitely more American theme park food than the actual food we had over there but that doesn't mean it's bad.

This got a laugh out of me because the Peugot logo looks like a monkey doing the Thriller dance, and all the beat up French cars were an inside joke on the trip.

On the way around, we popped into Ireland and did some shopping, both of us walked out of there with something for our partners, for me it was two matching Battle for Eire boxes with dragon eyes in the lids.

We circled around to Loch Ness Monster next, but the wait was atrocious, so I made the call to cut across the ravine and get Alpengeist instead. There was only a station wait so we locked our stuff up and decided to do it. Drew declared, "let's go skiing," so I had to explain to him not to say that because skiing is a euphemism, so that was funny. 

And you know what? I really like this invert. It gets a lot of flack for being forceless, which I don't think it is even though I'm mostly indifferent to positive Gs, but it does really well what I like in an invert. Good, tall inversions that leave you with a flying sensation, and the visual impact you get in those hills is incredible. Add in the beautiful, unique theme this ride has and you have a winning combination. It was always an upper tier invert for me and this reminded me why. Love me some Alpengeist!

Busch also repainted Rhinefield for the season and it's a huge upgrade from how it used to look. One thing I always respected about this specific park in the chain is that even though Seaworld loves to go super vibrant and colorful and artistic with what they do, Busch Gardens Williamsburg is really good about getting that but in a way that seems to maintain the traditional look of the park without being jarring at all. They've adapted their art style masterfully to work in a more serious-looking park.

After Alpengeist, we circled back around to take a stab at the kiddie credit in Sesame Street, but the second we saw the length of that line combined with hearing the loud annoying song Big Bird was singing, we did a total 180 and decided to do Loch Ness.

Also paid the Clydesdales a visit because it's Busch and that's what you do. Idk why, but this made me miss Zoey back at home...

Loch Ness is one of those coasters that isn't bad at all, just aggravating to wait for, and she barely even had much of a wait. But the acoustics in that queue house/station are terrible, and the family behind us had rowdy annoying kids, and there was a school group full of unsupervised teenagers, just a lot of little things snowballing into an annoying wait. My auditory processing is shit as is and I couldn't even understand enough to hold a conversation as we waited.

Oh, but man was it worth it...

This is one of the better Arrow loopers, honestly, and it's one I tend to forget about. It's a little rough around the edges, but compared to some of the really bad ones like Vortex and Corkscrew, this is actually pretty damn good. Little headbanging in the transitions but nothing that can't be handled by defensive riding, that helix in the dark is hilarious and goes on forever, and of course both of these loops are super smooth and have some great Arrow whip through them. This beautiful park wouldn't be what it is today without it, and not to mention it's gorgeous to look at.

I had never done Busch's train and honestly, it was really nice. Not a lot of theming, not quite on par with Dollywood's, but some of the views you got of the park were super nice. Loved this ridge over the Rhine. We rode it to New France and then walked back around to Oktoberfest to grab some food.

Germany's Festhaus is my favorite place to eat in the park. Get the sausage sampler, the knockwurst on there is one of my favorite individual things to eat at any park ever. They changed it a bit and not for the better, the cake used to be Black Forest and the German potato salad used to not be so mustardy, but it's still delicious and the number one thing I recommend eating when at Busch Gardens Williamsburg.

In my Saturday Dungeons & Dragons group I played a perverted little gnome named Gimble that liked to steal things and run around naked to the horror of the party, so I had to send them this and tell them I found Gimble.

Playtime's over, let's hit another coaster!

(Also just now noticing that the girl in the front row on the left looks like a pineapple)

When I first came to Busch Gardens Europe in 2007, Griffon was kind of the big daddy. It was new, it was big, it was bad, and it was unlike anything I had done up to that point. I loved building these in Rollercoaster Tycoon, so I was excited to ride it IRL, but let's be honest: it's intimidating as hell to a 13 year-old that's new to the whole vertical thing. But I did it, it was my favorite in park, and I still have the coffee cup I got from it to this day.

While I no longer have the taste in coasters to think that highly of a dive coaster, I got a much better ride on it than I did in 2018 and I think it's my new favorite US dive coaster. Don't care for the name and lack of theming (the griffon has nothing to do with French mythology) and I think the catacombs would have been a much better way to brand a coaster that dives into the ground, but I have more respect for this coaster now than I did on my most recent trip. Not a dive coaster guy, but we were getting good floater down the drops, it was nice and smooth for its age, and I really enjoyed it. 

Next up we headed to the front of the park for Apollo's Chariot, sadly no photos of it because it's so hard to photograph from inside the park, but we took advantage of the single rider line and still got to ride together towards the front. And like the other coasters on this trip, Apollo's Chariot really redeemed itself! I never saw why it had such high rankings but this is one of the better rides I've gotten on it. It's smooth, we got floater over almost every hill (usually it misses at least half the airtime moments), and the setting in the forest is so cool.

But sadly, Drew did a Drew and after holding it down all day, projectile vomited all over the brake run. Props to him for not hitting the train and making them clean it, though!

Since Drew no longer had food in his system, we went to use our dining plans again at my second favorite in the park: Marco Polo Marketplace! I love international food and this place does it in a way that celebrates something else I love: history, so I always loved it for that reason. Last time I got the Mediterranean pita thing, this time I went with the Chinese/Mongolian and it was delicious. Also snagged a beer to go with it, shoutout to the guy that scanned his pass to get me a discount on it!

After eating, Drew was at 198 credits, so we needed to get two more, and Sesame Street closed in twenty minutes, so we hightailed it over to Forest of Fun and got in a much shorter line for Grover's Alpine Express, with both of us needing the credit.

The line was shorter and we saved a ton of time doing this, and honestly the coaster is kind of cute. Sesame Street is one of my favorite IPs for kids and I'm all for anything that introduces them to love, acceptance, learning, and diversity from a young age, so honestly SeaWorld's kids areas are something I've always had a soft spot for. And the line didn't even look to be that hateful...until that god awful Big Bird song started playing again. Drew about wanted to vomit again, but remembered it was for his 200th credit that day, and he really really REALLY wanted to get it on Verbolten, so we stuck it out, waited in the line, and sat down in those seats with the threatening crotch fins. And to be honest? It wasn't bad at all. I've ridden much worse kiddie coasters, and considering this one also had the positivity and nostalgia factor of Sesame Street tied in, I didn't find it unpleasant at all minus the fin.

And now, the moment we've all been waiting for...

Drew's goal as an enthusiast this year was to hit 200 coasters, and it was going to happen on this trip, so he wanted it to be special. He wanted it to be Pantheon, I didn't want to wait til the end of the day with it being an Intamin and all, so I told him Verbolten would also be a good choice. He knew about the German Autobahn theme, he saw the bridge from the water, and I told him that there's some pitch black indoor action, that was it. He knew nothing about this coaster beyond that...

We get in line, we wait in line, and to celebrate, I told the station grouper my friend Drew was hitting his 200th coaster and asked if they could make an announcement for him. Well we get to the front of the line, they ask me for our names again...but tell the whole station that it's me hitting the 200 not him! Next thing I know everybody is chanting "JARRETT JARRETT JARRETT!!!" while I'm shaking my head and pointing to Drew telling them to cheer for him instead.

But given the general chaos this whole trip had had, we weren't even mad haha.

What a coaster!

Whatever vibration it had last time I rode it was very much mitigated, and it's a lot smoother now. It booked it through the event building, even in near pitch black darkness you could tell it was flying through the elements with gusto, sadly they took out the moon box in the helix but everything else was working fine. We hit the brakes and this ride took on a whole new kind of special: Drew's favorite animal is the wolf, and we got wolves for his 200th credit! It rounded the bend, we crept onto the drop track, I have my hands up knowing what's up, Drew is just looking around at all the cool wolf stuff, and then out of the blue...

CLUNK!!!!

Track Tower of Terror-style drops us right as we're standing, I thought Drew was gonna shit himself, and then we dipped onto the launch, rocketed towards the climb, dropped us down to the river, and raced back to the station! Both of us were floored, this is the best ride I've ever gotten on this and Drew was absolutely in love with it. It became his favorite at the park and #4 overall and he walked away a total Verbolten Stan. It's a wonderful machine, it's so unique, and there's certainly argument it's the best ride in the park even though I prefer Pantheon's ejector air.

Speaking of, I wanted to go take another lap on Pantheon, but Drew wasn't up to it, so he took a break and walked around to shop and see if he could find a Verbolten nanocoaster. Wait said an hour but it went faster than that I think, and I waited with a really cool couple that loved to talk in line so they made things go by faster. I rode again in the back and while it had warmed up a bit, it wasn't that different from the morning ride. However, it's still phenomenal, I love this coaster, that top hat and backwards launch are insane, and it was worth the trip out here alone.

I got off and reconnected with Drew for the last ride of the day: Tempesto! The line had been at least an hour since the morning so we were pleased to see it at only 15 minutes, and it was a bit longer since ops on this aren't the best, but we still got on reasonably. Wasn't sure about Drew's motion sickness and the volley launch, but he did fine and we ended up loving the ride. Dangling upside-down is awesome at night, you can see the lights of Festa sort of spin around you slowly.

Also was amused by this sign in line considering I just got back from France myself.

We went to go check on Pantheon's wait and maybe snag another ride if it was dying down (it wasn't) but on the way there, some stupid unsupervised teenagers stopped us and took fake ass karate stances and asked us if we wanted to fight them. Why? Because Drew had on a Cobra Kai shirt. He fucked with them back a bit and I told them I didn't realize teenagers were as stupid as the show made them look, and one of them blew his vape smoke at me, but I told an employee and she radioed security so the park was at least aware it happened.

With this in the books, we did some souvenir shopping, I snagged a Pantheon cutout, and we left the park after a long, exhausting, crazy, but successful day.

Busch Gardens Williamsburg is one of those parks I don't get to often enough, honestly, and every time I come back it gets better and better. It's very much a "Jack of all trades, master of none" park where nothing really stands out as the be all end all best in the industry, but they're very good at a lot of things. Solid ride lineup, park looks great, food is good, lot of reasons to come here but not a specific single one. It's just a good, well-rounded park with a lot of factors that'll ensure that you have a really good day, and I can't wait to see how it looks in two years once two crazy new launch coasters are ready to go.

Leaving the park wasn't too bad at all, but we stopped at a gas station because I was really thirsty for some reason so I got some Angry Orchard and milk for the hotel room. After getting back, I cracked open one of the Angry Orchards and shotgunned it in three chugs I was so parched. After I took a shower, I enjoyed the donuts Drew had gotten us from the park over my beer and then just passed out like a light, exhausted after the day we had and ready to have even crazier tomorrow with Kings Dominion and the drive back.

Day 2- Not Flipping Out

I had no issues waking up today for some reason, Drew had his schoolwork to do again so I grabbed breakfast. We hit a bit of a delay because he snagged a rough spot but thought his way out of it, and then we checked out and hit the road for our second destination on the trip: Kings Dominion!

Drive to Kings Dominion had a bit of traffic but not much, and we got there at the asscrack of dawn and managed to get a great spot to gate crash Tumbili. We had so much time to spare I was able to check the park's Build-A-Bear for the Leafeon sleeper that Beth wanted as we waited for the rope to drop.

Plan was to get in, ride Tumbili, ride Reptillian (Drew needed the credit), ride Twisted Timbers, use our dining plans, and be out of there by 1 to get a good start on the drive home to Ohio. I thought it seemed a bit ambitious, but I think it was a reasonable strategy as long as we outran the crowds. As is usual for the park, they kept an eye on the Running of the Bulls and ensured it didn't turn into a mess like at Cedar Point.

(Seriously, a guy waiting with us said he once saw someone run full speed into a Cedar Fair trash can sprinting to Steel Vengeance not watching where he was going.)

Jungle X-Pedition looks way better than the Congo area used to, not to say the former looked bad, but this elevates it to a new level. You definitely get some major Orion vibes that everything you're seeing was somehow repurposed, and that's probably the case, but I'm not complaining because it works. Honestly, there's a lot of leftover byproduct from running a business that can work with multiple themes. Pallets, vehicles, crates, lots of stuff that can work to tell a story if paired with more specific props.

And then the coaster of the hour: Tumbili! It definitely is noticeably smaller than the other Free Spins at the Six Flags parks, but it looks better. Maybe Kings Dominion just did a great job theming it, I loved the bamboo supports, or maybe I just like this better as a small coaster. Not sure but I preferred the visual impact of this over, say, a Joker clone.

We were almost first in line, and luckily there were cubbies for phones and sandals and stuff, so we dumped our pockets and got on the ride! Also loved the catchy music, I was rocking out as we waited to be let on.

Well...at least it looks nice.

Honestly, it let me down. Disengaging the lift into a near flip, getting bucked around the first pass, and even fully flipping on the raven turn was awesome. It felt exactly like it's supposed to. But after that first raven turn, we were upright the entire time. Like, it was sitting in a chair getting bobbed up and down with zero rotation at all. And what kills me is that we had the momentum to get something really insane going on. So yeah, it's the best-looking of the free spins, I love the theme on it, but it's also the weakest ride-wise. But hey, I wonder if Kings Dominion can slap a few more fins on the second and third levels of the layout to fix this easily...

Feel the rhythm, feel the rhyme, get on up it's bobsled time! Cool Runnings!

Heading next door to the superior coaster, we found ourselves at Reptillian, the newly rebranded Avalanche to go with the new Jungle X-Pedition retheme, and the better of the two coasters we rode in the area. It was sad to see Volcano's plot all torn up, but this now looks better, rides smoother and faster, and has some really cool theming on it. The transfer shed now has archaeology equipment in it, the supports are surrounded by these boxes with art on them, the pass through Volcano's rockwork is still there (and now covered in cave art), all in all I'm glad Drew talked me into stopping to ride this. 

We even popped into the gift shop to see all the cool stuff they had and it looks a lot better than your typical Cedar Fair shop. I know that exit gift shops are going the way of the dinosaur in the Cedar Fair chain, but I do like that they're focusing on making just the general ones in the areas nice-looking such as this one.

Cutting across the park to knock out another coaster, we stopped for Twisted Timbers, which reigns as my favorite Virginia coaster, sitting two places above Pantheon at #6. First time ever able to take my phone in the queue and get pictures of this lovely RMC, since they added Steel Vengeance's free lockers to the queue. I love walking through here at the edge of the woods and watching this thing shred all around the trees and destroyed shit while happy fifties music plays, it's the perfect mix of dark imagery with happy music, gives me major Atom Bomb Baby vibes.

This thing was a walk on, but it had enough traffic to fill trains and give us the weight we needed for a fast ride, so we waited for the front!

We got a bad apple over here! Bad to the bone! HOLY SHIT!!!

That is the craziest ride I've ever gotten on Twisted Timbers by far! It hit every airtime moment, but unlike in 2018, it hit every one of them really hard! Those three camelbacks felt like Steel Vengeance's first giant few hills, and the whole time it felt like we were just getting more and more ridiculous with tiny airtime hills shoehorned in spaces too tight for them, and we got the full brunt of every one of them. This RMC is straight up incredible, and hopped two places up in my rankings, now outranking both Lightning Rod and Twisted Colossus, sitting pretty at #4 to close the trip out.

I stuck around to take pictures, but with us making more progress faster than we expected, Drew decided to go snag the Apple Zapple credit, which he hated.

We popped into the Twisted Timbers gift shop, and then headed for Mac Bowl where we used our dining plans to pig out on mac and cheese. After enjoying this, I snagged a Tumbili shirt in the gift shop on the way out, and we made our way to the car to drive home.

We needed gas stat, so I found a Shell that had a poorly designed parking lot, and when we couldn't get into any of the tanks because everybody was driving like this, we went to an Exxon that had a cheaper price anyway. So we got gas, I went to the restroom in a murder bathroom, and we hit the road for a super smooth drive home where we made great time.

We got hungry in West Virginia, so I took Drew to Tudor's Biscuit World so I could get their Politician bologna egg and cheese biscuit, and he'd never been there before and loved it.

And then we crossed into Ohio, and drove off into the sunset singing along with the late great Chuck Berry's My Ding A Ling for an immature laugh.

What an incredible trip! Virginia's gotta stop adding good stuff because it's not cheap or easy to get out there, but it's a great way to kill two days or so, and I'm so glad I went. Not sure when I'll be back out here, it depends on how much I want Drachen Spire and when and what replaces Volcano, but I know this won't be my last time in the Old Dominion State for coasters.

Oh yeah. Anyone know how to paint this?