There's a way to recognize him, let me tell you how
At Cedar Point this Sunday, apart from the exercise of walking all around the loop of the park, we stuck pretty much up near the front. Indeed, besides Cedar Downs and Iron Dragon I don't think we rode anything that was farther back than the Sky Ride cable cars. The cars were themselves closed, I imagine for weather. There was a small craft advisory for winds and Windseeker, to name another wind-sensitive ride, wasn't running.
But most of our time was spent in the Boardwalk --- well, the Bonewalk --- area, just as we'd been confined to for the Eclipse Day. We didn't end up riding all the flat rides in the area. bunny_hugger wasn't interested in the Giant Wheel for one, and the Matterhorn was closed and doing test cycles when we tried to get on. Wild Mouse had lines of 45 minutes that, by the end of the day, rose to a mere hour. But we did well with the other rides. Troika's always fun. Calypso was a good ride and we discovered that we can too both fit in one car; I'd somehow got the impression we had just a bit too much hip between us to make it. (I forget which ride it was but one of them we were in danger of not being able to ride together, or at all, because the seat belt was jammed and I couldn't get it either to pull out or retract. bunny_hugger managed easily.)
Also we rode the Dodgem cars for the first time in, I don't know, 117 years? It's been a while. The cars felt slower than I remembered, possibly because they were all in use and it was straining the electrical grid. Also just before our ride started a kid waiting in the queue --- and it was a busy enough day there was waiting time for the bumper cars --- lost his superball onto the Dodgem floor. A ride operator picked up the ball, which had rolled near to bunny_hugger, all part of the routine safety check. Part of me did wonder what might happen if a bouncy superball were to get hit by the cars, although since it'd probably be underneath the rubber bumpers there wouldn't be much worth seeing.
Near Iron Dragon --- by the way I loved that bunny_hugger in her dragon kigurumi rode the Iron Dragon --- was a section closed off by construction fences. This is for the roller coaster they're planning to open next year, Sirens Curse. Or Siren's Curse. The signs are inconsistent. They announced it the middle of last month, and it's something that uses the land cleared out by the demolition of the Cedars which had been the ancient and much-neglected dorms on the island (which was done in, what, 2018?) and also the land cleared out by the closing of Wildcat (in 2012). That area inside the park grounds had never quite found a solid use. Sometimes it had bleacher seating for midway shows. Sometimes it would host grease trucks to be a little food court. It makes sense that they're finally putting rides in there. A roller coaster --- Siren[']s Curse is to be a ``tilt coaster'', with the coaster coming to a stop on a segment of horizontal track that itself rotates until it faces down, and then gets released --- wasn't on anyone's radar.
Possibly because until the Six Flags merger it couldn't be. Rumor is that the ride had been destined for Six Flags Mexico and, Wikipedia claims, the Mexico City government refused to permit the tree removals that it would have needed. As to why Cedar Point might be getting a third roller coaster in three years --- as opposed to, say, some family rides or even a thrill ride --- well, the answer probably lies in how Top Thrill 2 opened in early May this year, closed in mid-May for modifications nad testing, and they claim it'll reopen next year. (Has Cedar Point ever opened three roller coasters in three successive years?) Nothing like a good distraction from a ride that's had a cursed 20s.
Anyway Siren['] Curse seems to be going for a mermaid theme so I'm willing to listen to what they're proposing.
For something to eat we went to the Grand Pavilion in the Boardwalk area. We'd only gotten snacks there on Eclipse Day before. Turns out they have a meal, on the meal plan, that's three side dishes and their Syracuse salt potatoes really are as good as the hype that bunny_hugger had heard. The other things we went for --- steak fries, a cucumber salad (she ate) and the fresh fruit cup of strawberries (he ate) --- were fine. Hard to go wrong with fries. I feel like they need cole slaw, though, that'd be a good option. Maybe next time we'll ask if we can get two sides of the potatoes, or whether that breaks a rule that they're not being paid enough to care about.
The meal was served on a ``Great Lakes Gazette'' mock newspaper, pretending to be a 1905 announcement of Cedar Point's grand 25-year history and the attractions it had, like the 25-foot-tall Switchback Railway coaster or the sea swing ride that spins you around until you drop into the ocean. I'll accept that bit of semi-fiction, but the copy insisted on writing the word as ``today'' and no, you have to do that as ``to-day'' if you want to be credible. I have other quibbles with the layout (an actual newspaper of the time would have vertical rules between columns), but that's getting into excessively fussy stuff. A casual person would know to do ``to-day''. If you're not going to commit to the bit why do it?
This might be the lowest roller coaster ride of any all-day visit we've made to Cedar Point, with just Blue Streak, Iron Dragon, and Raptor under our belts. We could have gone for more but this was a happy, comfortable day, and it felt good to do it this way.
On the way back, for the first time since the pandemic began, we caught up to the present on the Greatest Generation podcast and now we're free to listen to whatever we want in the car. Well, not now since Monday they published another episode, but for a couple hours there we were free.
Next in the photo roll: Easter! And particularly Easter spent with bunny_hugger's parents. Ready?
Dyes getting ready to be ready for egg-dipping. On the right is my tea, in the mug labelled coffee, and not used for any eggs directly.
Dogs waiting eagerly for whatever it is was outside. Possibly someone walking past the house.
Pookie here lays down and hopes I'll go away.
Stickers and egg wraps! We always use the egg wraps although this year I managed to buy eggs that were very tight fits into them. The stickers we keep thinking are cute and then forgetting to use.
bunny_hugger is not happy with the pincushion distortion of this camera angle.
Some of the finished eggs. These are ones made with oil in the dye so they'd get this spotty distorted effect.
Trivia: In 1916 the entire United States Army Signal Corps consisted of 1,212 enlisted men and 42 officers. By the time of Armistice fifteen thousand Bell System employees would enter the service. Source: Telephone: The First Hundred Years, John Brooks.
Currently Reading: Lost Popeye Zine, Volume 45: A Great Mystery, Tom Sims, Bela Zaboly. Editor Stephanie Noelle. Somehow miles out at sea they're getting fresh milk delivered every morning. Good mystery to set things off; it'll be exciting to see how this story kind of peters out.