Last Night's Wonderful Adventure

The kids worked hard on schoolwork yesterday, so we decided that this would warrant a ride to Darien Lake. Darien Lake is a Six Flags Amusement Park that isn't too far away. The sad news is that the future of the park is totally in the dark. Six Flags is closing six parks this year, and Darien Lake is on the list. The even worse news is that we bought season tickets, thinking we could visit throughout September and even into October. Well, the park is basically closed all throughout the week now. The hours are cut to 3 hours on Friday night and all day Saturday and Sunday. We decided that if the kids worked hard, we will try to make a couple of Friday nights, as we heard that weekends entailed hours of waiting in line to ride one of the few rides still open.

The first ride of the evening was the UFO....

Going up...........

and up a little more.........

and then straight up!

And on the way to the Twister, of course they had to stop by the Pirate's Ship to ssssssswwwwwwiiiiiiiinnnnnnngggggggggg back and forth...........

Ah yes, the Twister. This thing is amazing to watch, but I cannot imagine riding it! The bench goes WAY up in the air, then swoops down, doing multiple 360's. Oh, and sometimes it goes in a forward swoop, and sometimes backwards. UGH!

We didn't get a picture of the ferris wheel. Gads, were they ALWAYS that large? Guess I am getting way old, as my feet are getting to the point that they refuse to leave terra firma! Then, there was the Ranger...

and finally, a ride I forgot the name of...

The most wonderful part of this outing was that there were very few people there! The evening was absolutely GLORIOUS. We could not have ordered a more PERFECT evening. It was warm and not humid. The kids rode several of the rides multiple times as lines were totally non-existant.

Just before the sun was fully set, Mark snapped a pretty picture of the lake located just outside the park. It was so nice....quite a contrast to the noise and hubbub inside the park. The fountain really added to the scenery, with the roller coasters in the backdrop. Hmmm...the kids never rode any of the coasters!

And once the sun had set, the moon graced us with its fullness, making the experience even more memorable!

And now we have yet another fairly simple event etched into our memories. This was such a fun time, and since the amount of time spent walking around was greatly reduced, it was much more bearable than walking around in 90 degree weather with the sun beating down! The culmination of the fun was going over to watch the Laser show. Even though we saw it earlier this year, the kids enjoyed it once again. Tonight, the moon is covered by clouds and it has rained, making it feel so chilly and damp. I am so grateful for the memories made last night!

As an aside, I am NOT an amusement park person....going there requires a great deal of sacrifice on my part as I would rather be doing something else. When my parents were visiting last month, I asked my mom if perhaps I had always disliked parks. She said she wasn't sure, but then went on to tell Mark a rather amusing story about me....

Seems when I was about 4 years old (remember the "Good Ole Days" when there were no "safety provisions" required?) I was riding on the Merry-Go-Round.....My mother said she was watching when I suddenly got up on the saddle, standing upright, trying to look graceful and elegant, and "performed" just as I had seen the circus riders do on TV! Mom said she was totally mortified, going between wanting to wring my neck,to concern that I was going to fall on my head! Unfortunately, or, perhaps not, this particular performance totally evades my memory!!!!!