My Annual Visit To Cedar Point - September 24th-26th, 2004

Fall Amtrak Vacation Trip 2004:

My Annual Visit To
Cedar Point Amusement Park

Friday-Sunday, September 24th-26th, 2004

Cedar Point's huge entrance sign at the base of the Cedar Point Causeway
welcomes millions of people every year to "America's Rollercoast"!

This year’s HalloWeekends event was great as always! New this year is CarnEVIL, a carnival sideshow gone horribly bad, along with Magician Tim Hill at the Centennial Theater doing an excellent magic show. There is also a display that pays tribute to rides that once operated at CP from Schwabinchen to Vertigo, to the Skywheel to Frontier Lift, just to name a few. The ever popular Fright Zone was back, along with Warewolf Canyon, Pharaoh’s Secret and Undertaker U. for haunted houses, along with the Magical House On Boo Hill for the kids as well as the popular Camp Spooky. Once again, as in every year I've visited this place, Cedar Point has lived up to it's title of "Best Amusement Park In The World"! Everyone needs to visit this park at least once, but be warned, you'll probably fall in love with this place and like me, be back every year!!! I'll let the pictures tell the story, enjoy...

Above Left: Mantis, Cedar Point's huge bug of a coaster that takes you through 4 inversions while standing up the entire time! Above Right: Cedar Point's HalloWeekends Events were in full swing, shown here is a game of "Skull Ball" in progress!

Among this year's HalloWeekends Displays was a dedication to Cedar Point's
Rides Of The Past, featured here are "tombstones" and relics of past rides such
as Swan Boats, Schwabinchen, and who could forget Frontier Lift!

New for 2004 is "Carn-Evil" a carnival side-show gone horribly bad!
This was an after-dark attraction that's really scary, but in a cool way, really!

The Fright Zone, another after-dark attraction that's made it's return again
this year for Hallo-Weekends. Cedar Point converts the entire park to probably
the world's biggest fun house every year, something worth making the trip for!

Sporting a new paint job for 2004 is Cedar Point's Iron Dragon. Built in 1987,
this ride features 2 lift hills and lots of tight turns along with some cool fog effects.

Opening in 1976, the Corkscrew coaster was the first in the world
to have 3 inversions and at one point, there were waits as long as
8 hours to ride this coaster when it first opened!

Above Left: Another view of the Corkscrew with the "Dead Rock Buffet" on display in front. Above Right: The world famous Millennium Force giga-coaster. Measuring an unbelievable 310 feet and reaching top speeds of 93mph, this coaster opened in 2000 as the tallest and fastest in the world at that time! One ride on this train will give you a new found respect for the laws of physics, as well as a few mid-air collisions with flying insects!

Above Left: Another view of Millennium Force's 2 enormous air-time generating hills! Above Right: Currently the tallest and fastest roller coaster in the world, Cedar Point's amazing Top Thrill Dragster! New for 2003 at 420 feet tall, and reaching top speeds of 120mph in just 4 seconds, there is nothing like it ANYWHERE on the planet, seriously!!!

As you pass this sign, it tells you your speed, at least 120mph every time!

My all time favorite roller coaster, the Magnum XL-200. I guess I'll always have
a special place in my heart for this coaster since I worked on it in 2001 for extra
hours while completing my internship at Cedar Point as a Marketing Assistant!

Having opened in November 2004 is Cedar Point's Year-Round Indoor
Water Park "Castaway Bay". The above photo was taken from the parking
lot showing the final phases of construction on this huge indoor resort!

I had a rental car this year to use while in town. I rented a 2004 Chevrolet Impala from the local Enterprise Rent-A-Car in Sandusky. I was actually offered a pickup truck for the same price but politely declined and opted for the Chevy since I regularly drive a 2001 Ford Taurus SE and wanted to drive a similar vehicle while in town. I also visited some former co-workers from Cedar Point while in town. My sister and her friend from college drove down that same weekend and a bunch of us met at the Ryan's Buffet in Sandusky for dinner on Saturday. I spent Sunday just visiting people and doing laundry. There was no Buffalo Bills game this weekend as the Bills had their bye week so I sat around the hotel and eventually fell asleep as the next leg of my 8 day journey was fast approaching...