Kennywood Sky Rocket Construction

Most shots did not come out too well in this because we were just using our phone cameras, yeah I don't know why we did, but it is what it is. We went just about every week to see the construction. It is always fun to see the huge, permanent skyline changes with new coasters. In this project, they opted to not move the track pieces and place them except for when I was there. They decided to not use cranes and just use me and a ladder to lift and place each individual support and track piece.

For some reason, the bulk of the photos have gone missing, I will update this later once I find the photos, but I will leave you with the final beauty of this project. 

Cool thing to do for the holidays: Koziar's Christmas Village

While this may not be an amusement park in terms of rides, the walk through exhibits and miniature train area make this an awesome place that is not that far off from a theme park style attraction. In short, Koziar's Christmas Village in Bernville, PA is one of the coolest things I have ever seen. There are thousands of lights and all of these lights are actually classic big bulbs. It may be the most wonderful thing I have ever seen. I get as amazed now as I did when I was four years old when I first visited. It is set on a farm in northern Berks County PA, very rural and as you drive you see absolutely no lights, hardly any buildings with lights on and all of a sudden, as you pull up close, you see this onslaught of brightness that is impossible to fully describe.

The spectacular display is located in a valley and as you drive in, you come in through the top of the hill and you see this spectacular beacon of light!

There are handpainted figures throughout the display and lots of little exhibits of them and holiday scenes and cultural displays that represent different nations and cultures along with other holidays too.

The whole thing is set in front of a little pond and the area also contains the farm's barn, farmhouse and other buildings. 

It is hard to tell in this shot, but here is a larger scale miniature train village that is relatively new and in the background you can see one of the barns and another little building all decked out.

Here you see some of the trees and buildings all decked out and you can see a silo up there as well. 

Most decked out, pretty farmhouse I have ever seen. Around this area they have their delicious hot chocolate building where you can warm up for a bit midway through the display. 

Simply wow!

Towards the end of the display, they have a beautiful and large miniature train display with very cool little city scenes in addition to a very large concession stand. I could sit and watch this train display for hours. It is so interesting

I highly recommend checking out this display. It is located north of Interstate 78 in Berks County, PA. This is a very offbeat attraction that is worth a visit as often as you can. Nothing says Christmas better than a visit to Koziar's. They are open now! Until Thanksgiving they are open on weekends and then daily after Thanksgiving! Visit their website at www.koziarschristmasvillage.com It is also extremely affordable and it makes for a wonderful evening.

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First Generation Knoebels Flying Turns Trains

This little tidbit shot came from 2006. it is one of the first generation Knoebels Flying Turns Trains. There would be two more generations of trains after this, with the third generation being the trains that would come into usage. It is a shame it did not work out with these trains though, they were beautiful. I can't complain about the trains they settled upon because they are pretty beautiful in their own right.

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Dorney Park "Mixtape" 2006 with Laser Footage

Here is an oldie but goodie from my relatively small collection of videos. Included is a video of our sadly long lost Anton created Laser. I really miss having an intense Anton creation within a day's drive of Pennsylvania. *Hint, Hint any park within 8 or so hours of Pittsburgh!*

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Six Flags Worlds of Adventure (Geauga Lake)

So I was shuffling through an old VHS tape and found this little tidbit. This was from the year/period in which Six Flags ran the park into the ground, having overbuilt it with 5 new coasters and purchased the Sea World side of the lake. This commercial was from a Pittsburgh area Weather Channel broadcast.

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A look back: 10 years of Dragster!

With all of the fanfare and attention on front of the park, newborn sibling, Gatekeeper, Dragster, as popular as ever as seen in the frequent full queues, especially during this October's Halloweekends Saturdays. People just cannot get enough of the 120 MPH launch, 420 foot tall height, freedom given by the lapbars, the roaring sound and amped up feeling you get from that and the christmas tree Dragster lights and view of Lake Erie, Canada and looking down at Millennium Force. There is nothing quite like the rush of Top Thrill Dragster. I made this video a little while back commemorating this tenth season. It is not much, but it really shows the rush of this ride.

The 2003 opening season of Intamin's Dragster and first few seasons were plagued with some serious reliability issues, but the ride was that good that people still waited for it for hours, as they do today. I remember opening season I waited 3 hours with my family, through two break downs and a full queue just to get an opportunity to ride this giant. It was all worth it! Still to this day I recall the anticipation of waiting for the ride. Thankfully the waits on it today are not nearly that long with many of the kinks worked out from it.

Nothing still quite replicates that thrill, even younger near clone of it two states over in New Jersey. Placement, lapbars and theming say it all for this wonder. 

Dragster is built as the center of the park, making it stick out perfectly among the many coasters the Point has to offer. 

Rumor is that next year this bad boy will be receiving some paint. This is not confirmed, but I heard this so we will find out. It is definitely due. 

All in all, Dragster is a great ride, even if it is super short in length. That rush is worth waiting for and pretty unbelievable. I hope we see a full length ride with that sort of height at some point, but that is pretty unlikely. All in all, after 10 years, Dragster still delivers. I can't believe it has been 10 years already!

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NAD Census Final Results?

The beautiful Conneaut Blue Streak NAD Train

Here is the running count we have on the remaining NAD trains. Add to the list please if you can! Sadly, it seems our count has come to a finale although I wish this were not the case. 

In operation: (Feel free to make corrections)
1) Thunderbolt - Kennywood - 3
2) Blue Streak - Conneaut Lake - 1 remaining after the Beach Club fire burnt the other remaining NAD Train
3) Valleyfair - High Roller 1 train
4) Camden Park, West Virginia - Big Dipper 1 train (Century Flyer)
5) Camden Park - Lil Dipper 1 train (Junior Train)
6) Rye Playland, Kiddie Coaster, 1 (Junior Century Flyer train)
7) Montana Rusa, 2 Trains, Mexico


Sitting Rotting/in a Boneyard: (Feel free to make corrections)
1) Geauga Lake Big Dipper 2 trains

Sitting on display
1) Excelsior Museum, Minnesota. Single car from defunct Excelsior Park coaster 
 
Photo Credit to Aaron Lesko

Sitting in storage
1) Little Americka has the two Lincoln Park NADs waiting to rebuild their coaster

Unaccounted for/status unclear
1) Lesourdsville Lake Screechin' Eagle trains
2) Cascade Park, Pennsylvania trains. Previously vandalized and left for dead. Person said they saw them at the former park site on display. Status unknown
3) SFMM Colossus original trains are thought to be somewhere

Photo Credit to James Green

We are hoping to find about more, please help us out! The main discussion page is here https://www.facebook.com/CoasterTalkNoBsZone/posts/375636709232996 or you can post what you know on this post. Any corrections on this information would be appreciated and any possible additional whereabouts of NAD trains. They are quickly going towards extinction and we want to know where all of the trains are at.