He's got the red, white, and blue flyin' high on the farm
Semper Fi tattooed on his left arm
Spend a little more in the store for a tag in the back that says ‘USA’
He won't buy nothin' that he can't fix,
With WD40 and a Craftsman wrench
He ain't prejudiced, he's just made in America
Semper Fi tattooed on his left arm
Spend a little more in the store for a tag in the back that says ‘USA’
He won't buy nothin' that he can't fix,
With WD40 and a Craftsman wrench
He ain't prejudiced, he's just made in America
- Toby Keith
Thursday 2 June
One of my favourite things in the world, alongside talking
and eating, is riding roller coasters, and America is famous for having some of
the most exciting and gut-wrenching ones, most of which reside at Six Flags
parks, a mammoth franchise of parks all over the country.
Chicago’s own Six Flags is up in Gurnee, Illinois, about an
hour from Wheaton up the highway towards Milwaukee. The route involves going
past O’Hare International Airport, which is often a bad traffic area, but
because we were at the back end of the morning rush hour, it wasn't as
disastrous as it could’ve been. Matt drove all seven of us up in his Suburban. We
stopped at Starbucks on the way for some much-needed caffeine and were up at
the park a little before it opened, which was perfect.
I’ve always maintained that it’s not what you know but who
you know, and that was the case with our Six Flags experience. Via a friend, we
were able to secure some Flash Passes, which basically allow you to skip the
queues – the website says you lessen waiting time by 90% - and get straight on
the rides. On some of them, you can ride twice without getting off, which was perhaps
a bridge too far for my stomach. It also made us somewhat unpopular with the
people next in the line who thought it was their time to get on.
Regardless, it was fantastic to not have to stand in what
turned out to be mammoth queues for everything. Is any 90-second ride worth 90
minutes standing in line in the hot sun? A few people thought so, but I’m not
sold. The best part of the Flash Pass was that it freed up so much time to get
on all the rides we wanted to – monstrosities with names like Goliath, Demon,
Raging Bull and X-Flight. Some of the twists and loops were absolutely insane,
lending further weight to my assertion that roller-coasters are engineers’ way
of getting revenge on the rest of the world!
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| Some of the roller-coaster madness at Six Flags Great America |
Matt reckons we’ve wrecked amusement parks for him in
future, because the kids will expect the VIP treatment every time. Our friend
Scott Weller reckons that the Flash Pass at Six Flags is as close to being
royalty as you can get in the United States.
Unfortunately, the traffic home was horrendous, and we ended
up being on the road for nearly two hours. So, we headed straight to Hawthorne (via
Qdoba Mexican Grill) where Brooke was playing her softball game. It’s her first
year of sport, and I love that they don’t actually keep score. It’s all about
the kids having fun, and they really seem to!
Matt is the team’s coach, and he
seems to be having a fun time with it. I was his first base coach for a while
there, and I am pretty certain – like, actually 100% certain – that the kids
who reached first a) had no idea who on earth I was and b) couldn’t understand
a word I said. The looks I got from them were priceless. A heap of fun, though!
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| Pre-game catching practice |
So, from the combination of Six Flags and softball, I am absolutely
stuffed. Dead on my feet! Looking forward to a big sleep.
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