I started the day by having Enterprise Rent-A-Car pick me up so as to get my rental car for this leg of the trip. I would get a 2015 Hyundai Sonata this year. This car had a full redesign for 2015 and the car was quite nice! I then headed over to Walmart to pick up some food and beverages for the hotel room and had lunch at Lee's Famous Recipe Chicken (a chain we don't have in Buffalo, good eats!). I then headed back to the hotel to continue this travelogue and back up some pictures I took since last night. I also wanted to get a head start on color-correcting the pictures because I knew there would be a lot from this trip! For HalloWeekends, Cedar Point opens at 6:00pm on Friday nights so I would eventually drive to the park to start this part of the trip! The plan was to spend both tonight and Saturday in the park.
Now having booked this trip 8 months prior, I had no idea what kind of weather I would encounter. The biggest reason why I booked this trip so late in the year was because part of it would have me in Florida and I was trying to minimize the risk of a hurricane throwing a wrench (as well as lots of other debris) in my plans! Well, I arrived at the park only to find the weather was really bad! Strong wind gusts and heavy rain, which caused all the outdoor Halloween-themed attractions to be closed along with most of the big rides. I don't come here only to get up and leave so I took a walk around the park in the heavy wind and rain and though most rides were closed, it was actually quite a neat experience walking around the park like that, something I won't soon forget. I did ride a couple rides and walked through three haunted houses in the park. I also ate dinner at Chick Fil-A in the park, home of the best chicken sandwich on the face of the planet!!! By 9:30pm Friday night, the weather hadn't improved so I decided there was no way I would be able to do any night photography in this weather so I left the park, stopping at Dairy Queen on the way back to the hotel for a Blizzard (yes eventhough the weather was really cold and rainy, I still want ice cream!), and would call it a day.
Saturday, November 1st would be a first for me, going to Cedar Point in the month of November! I arrived at the park to find the rain had stopped from the night before but it was still very windy and cold! I walked around the park taking pictures, then had lunch with a friend of mine who works at the park and would end up seeing something in the park that I've only seen once before in 23 years of coming here...SNOW!!! Yep, light snow was falling periodically throughout the day, nothing that was even sticking to the grass but you could easily see it was snow! I would walk around the park, get more photos and would also spend some time sitting in my rental car warming up. I had lunch in the park at Famous Dave's and dinner at Chickie's & Pete's Sports Bar which is new for 2014. After seeing a show inside the Jack Aldrich Theater in the park, I headed back outside and drove back to the hotel around 8:30pm as the wind just wouldn't die down so there was again no way I would get any photography in tonight.
Now one might think that not being able to get much riding in and walking through the park in bad weather might not be a good thing, but then again, we're talking about Geno Dailey here! I had an idea that I came up with as I was walking up the Frontier Trail in the pouring rain on Friday night! The trees along the trail had these neat neon lights shining up through them which gave them lots of different colors against the backdrop of the night sky! I knew, some way, some how, I needed to get pictures of this, and ultimately I did, and you'll see them later as I would end up making an unplanned trip back to the park on Sunday, November 2nd to get those photos!
For 2014, Cedar Point opened two new family friendly rides in an area of the park that was revamped for the new rides. It's called the Gemini Midway,and its located next to the Gemini twin-racing coaster. The new rides are "Pipe Scream" which is a ride that consists of a vehicle you sit upright in, that then runs along a piece of track and spins you around while moving! The other ride is called "Lake Erie Eagles" which is a spinning ride that each ride vehicle has a rudder that you can move back and forth and it allows the ride vehicle to twist while spinning! Both of these rides were a lot of fun! I had the privilege of attending Media Day back in May 2014 so I had the chance to sample both rides then and I will say they are a lot of fun! Included here are photos of these two rides taken mostly on Media Day back in May 2014 but since they were new for this year, I wanted to include them here. Enjoy...
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