DJ's Stuff - Six Flags May 2002

Six Flags Magic Mountain - May 2002

It took a little work, but I convinced 3 of my friends to make a trip down to Six Flags in Valencia, CA. After being in Disneyland with the family, and driving by Six Flags on the way to and from, I got a hankerin' for some big coasters. Then lo and behold, some coupons for Six Flags came across our paths... including a reduced rate at the local Best Western. It was kismet. It had to be done.

Originally, we planned on taking Friday, May 31st off work... driving down all day Friday, playing at the park on Saturday, then driving back all day Sunday. Jesse kept mentioning leaving on Thursday instead and eventually that became the plan. What a life saver. In retrospect, the trip would've been a complete bust had we left on Friday. Big thanks to Jesse for his subversive mind-control abilities.

Everything started at about 4pm on Thursday, May 30th. Aaron parked at my house and we trekked over to Jonathan's house in the minivan. The last pick-up was Jesse and then we were off! We made a quick stop at Burgerville to eat before we started the long journey. Fiasco ensued. Not being familiar with the parking lot, I got corralled into the drive thru by an SUV hot on my rear! Note: that was not our intention. Then, when in the drive thru, I misinterpreted the guys' saying I should just order for myself and they'd go in and get their own. They were kidding. I didn't get it until after I rolled past the order mic. :-) As the fellas exited the minivan, Jonathan stepped on a retaining wall that proceeded to fall apart, losing at least 7% of its retaining ability.

I drove for a good long while and then handed over the reins to a formerly napping Jesse to do the hard middle-of-the-night stretch. I caught some shuteye and then took back over about an hour before sunrise. As the sun came up fully, we arrived in Valencia. I think it took about 13 hours of driving at speeds ranging from 70 to 110 MPH. (Naughty Jesse!)

It was pretty easy to figure out how to get over to Six Flags, but finding the Best Western was a bit difficult. We wandered about for a while, never really finding it. Then we started looking for a place to eat breakfast. Mimi's Cafe. Good ol' Mimi didn't let us down. A call to the Best Western and then we were off to the hotel... only to find out we couldn't check in... too early. So, back to Six Flags... waiting for the park to open at 10am. We parked "in line" with all the other cars already there as early as 8:30am. Wacky.

The first day in the park was awesome. We were probably in the first 100 people to get in, no lines anywhere, hardly any waiting at all (until after lunch) and tons of coaster riding. We rode on 9 coasters... some multiple times: Goliath (x2), Colossus, Batman The Ride, The Riddler's Revenge, Superman The Escape, Psyclone, Viper (x3), Ninja and Revolution. By far, Goliath and Viper were our favorites, with Batman and Riddler's Revenge being next. Ninja and Revolution were fine, but typical. Superman wasn't worth it. I liked Psyclone, but others said it hurt too much. And Colossus was the biggest piece of crap ever. The only bad thing about Friday was the X and Deja-Vu, the two new coasters, were closed. X was probably the main reason for our visit! (For me anyway.) Around 5pm we checked into the hotel, rested up, washed up and then made a slightly less than 1 hour trek to Storyteller's Cafe in the Grand Californian Hotel at Disneyland. (If you read about our Disneyland trip, you'll see why I dragged the guys there. It delivered, yet again!) The only way dinner could've gone better would've been if Aaron didn't harass the waitress. :-)

Saturday was a completely different experience. We were heading back to Six Flags to see if X was running. It was. We didn't get there at the crack of dawn, instead opting for another breakfast at Mimi's. Total time invested in riding X: 4.5 hours!!! We waited in line for at least 3.5 hours when we finally got up to the loading area. Then, the ride broke and we waited for nearly an hour before it got going again. But I have to say, it was unlike any other coaster... unlike anything else you've experienced. The design is elegant and simple and allows for some really intense motions. Very cool. And if it's any indication of how good it is, it made some poor 12 year old girl pee her pants in front of everyone. I'd like to provide a link to you... and there even used to be a movie that would demonstrate what it does (in a computer animation), but going to Six Flags' site, I don't see X mentioned anymore!!! Probably one irate customer too many. One park attendant said it was down 80% of the time. We fully believe her. Great ride, but they gotta get it working! That goes for Deja-Vu as well. It wasn't working the whole time we were there. (I notice it's front and center on the website now though.)

So, after blowing half our day on 1 ride, we decided to go to Hurricane Harbor, Six Flags' sister water park. It was an absolute blast. Two things of note: 1) There's this one ride called Lost Temple Rapids where you all ride together in a raft. As the guy pushed us over the edge, the last words we heard were "You're gonna go fast..." Oh my head! We road it a few more times and at some points, our raft was clearly at a 90° angle with a small portion of it clearing the sidewall of the slide chute. You'll notice in the picture on the site that the family in the raft is horizontal to the ground. Uh huh... not us... no way. 2) Funnel cake. Never say you're going to get funnel cake and come back without it. It may force one of your friends to ask a stranger to taste their funnel cake, and then knock said stranger's 4 year old son into sharp, jagged rocks. Right Aaron?

Later that night, we went to Claim Jumper's (a steak house) for dinner. The meal was good, but the coolness was that we didn't have to pay for it! They lost power and the lights went out. They came back on for a moment, but then went out again and we noticed some kind of transformer seemed to have an issue a few meters from the restaurant. The ball of flames engulfing it was a clue. They told us we could evacuate the restaurant, but we just got our food and were still hungry. Hell, we even ordered some dessert. The fire department came, put it out, and we got a nice $200+ meal for zilch. And we had a hottie of a waitress to boot. Sweetness.

We spent all of Sunday driving back to Oregon. We stopped at the Oregon Vortex to debunk all the voodoo science, but it was closed. We didn't get back until 1 or 2am. It took a lot longer to drive back, because of additional traffic, daylight speeding isn't as easy and we were stopping for food now and then.

All told, it was an awesome, super-dense, power vacation. Check out the lame pictures from our funky camera that never left panoramic mode. D'Oh!

This is the first night of driving. Here you can see the spacious and fricken' uncomfortable innards of our transportation: the minivan. Jonathan is sipping a Red Bull in the hopes of staying awake.	I'm trying to look awake so people don't get nervous about me driving off the road.	There's Aaron. I'm not sure what his issue is. Do we ever know?
In the very early morning on Friday, we finally see the tops of roller coasters.	You can see X, Goliath and Superman in the pictures.	I think this is our first night in the hotel. That's me on the floor, Jonathan on the left, and that curvaceous form in the far bed is Aaron.
This is the second day at the park. We're getting ready to ride X!	Aaron, put your shorts on! Dammit, can't take him anywhere. We're actually trying to get ready to go to the water park.	As we departed on Saturday, we took a picture of what seemed like a beautiful sunset at the time.
One last shot of the coasters... Goliath, Superman and Colossus.	As we were heading home Sunday, I made an error. You have to kinda exit to the right to stay on I5N. What you can't tell from this picture is that I missed it, and this is us getting back on I5 after driving on a dirt road for a while. :-)	A nice view over some river on the way home. I think this is still in California.
A nice relaxing rest stop for Jesse. Doesn't he look well rested?	Aaron left something special in California.	Dammit Aaron! Once was enough!
A friendly (frightened) girl took this picture for us. Can you say hooligans?	A solemn Jonathan contemplates the hours still before us... in those damn chairs.	Mt. Shasta. Yup.