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The Canobie Lake Park steam train is safe
Oct. 14th, 2018 11:42 pmThey didn't take the train out; they just re-routed it, removing the loop that used to go past the Corkscrew and through what is now the waterpark expansion, and moving the station closer to the lake.
We didn't ride the train today, but we did get in some activities we hadn't done before. We tried and failed at one of the puzzle rooms in the Old Canobie section, a six-minute challenge called "Find the Gold" that I think we got about 90% of the way to solving. If we did it again we'd probably beat it. Our daughter had to be prodded a bit to participate, was worried it might be a scary experience (it wasn't).
I didn't get around to checking it out last season, but finally spent some time in the new home for Canobie's pinball collection, in the Big Bear Lodge building at the far north end of the park by Untamed. It's basically the same collection, with a few more new-ish Stern machines, but it's a nicer place for them than the old midway arcade. There have been times when most of them were in an unplayable state. They seem to be putting more effort into keeping them up now; too many of the classic 90s Williams/Bally machines were out of commission, but they were at least marked as such, with tape over the coin slots, and the machines not so marked generally played very well, without a lot of weak flippers or broken components. Their Monster Bash was playing really well. The kid was attracted by the Shrek machine, because she and her friends have developed this ironic in-jokey fascination with everything Shrek. Personally, I don't like the Shrek pinball very much, but she appreciated it.
I spent the most time playing their AC/DC, which I think is my favorite latter-day Stern pinball, a Steve Ritchie design with gameplay modes themed after different AC/DC songs. Racked up a bunch of replays--it was set really low. One thing I do miss is that when it was the star attraction of the midway arcade, they had the music volume cranked up to house-shaking, and just playing the game was a spectacle that would attract a crowd rocking out to "Highway to Hell" and such. They can't practically do that in this space.
Sam and I also rode the park's highly touted new-ish ride, Ice Jet. It's nice having the kid be old enough that we can finally leave her there and go on rides she doesn't want to do. Anyway, Ice Jet is a pretty fun basic flat ride, a fast Matterhorn/Flying Bobs-type thing with cars that whirl around in a circle with up-and-down waves, and can freely swing out to the side as they go around. At top speed, they're banking far beyond 45 degrees. Halfway through, the ride reverses and the cars whirl around backwards. The capacity is good--the line moved fast, with big crowds getting eaten up with every cycle. We both liked it, but it made Sam pretty dizzy and she was done riding stuff for the day. This video shows the Canobie Ice Jet, and since it's from about a year ago, it also features the wonderful Halloweeny music program for the band organ on the vintage carousel next door:
The other big thing was that my daughter was finally willing not just to ride, but to drive her beloved little Autopia-style car rides, the Antique Cars and the Canobie 500. These have always been a bit frustrating to me because, ever since she was a little kid, she always wanted to go on them, but wanted me to drive--and driving a car is not something I consider an amusement ride, it's a daily bane of my existence. But at Disney World last year I finally convinced her to take the steering wheel on the Tomorrowland Speedway, and this time she worked the pedal as well (to be fair, this is actually pretty hard for a young kid, because on these old 60s-70s Arrow Development car rides the single pedal takes a considerable amount of force to operate). I guess she'll be driving a real car in just a few years; might as well get in some practice.
We didn't ride the train today, but we did get in some activities we hadn't done before. We tried and failed at one of the puzzle rooms in the Old Canobie section, a six-minute challenge called "Find the Gold" that I think we got about 90% of the way to solving. If we did it again we'd probably beat it. Our daughter had to be prodded a bit to participate, was worried it might be a scary experience (it wasn't).
I didn't get around to checking it out last season, but finally spent some time in the new home for Canobie's pinball collection, in the Big Bear Lodge building at the far north end of the park by Untamed. It's basically the same collection, with a few more new-ish Stern machines, but it's a nicer place for them than the old midway arcade. There have been times when most of them were in an unplayable state. They seem to be putting more effort into keeping them up now; too many of the classic 90s Williams/Bally machines were out of commission, but they were at least marked as such, with tape over the coin slots, and the machines not so marked generally played very well, without a lot of weak flippers or broken components. Their Monster Bash was playing really well. The kid was attracted by the Shrek machine, because she and her friends have developed this ironic in-jokey fascination with everything Shrek. Personally, I don't like the Shrek pinball very much, but she appreciated it.
I spent the most time playing their AC/DC, which I think is my favorite latter-day Stern pinball, a Steve Ritchie design with gameplay modes themed after different AC/DC songs. Racked up a bunch of replays--it was set really low. One thing I do miss is that when it was the star attraction of the midway arcade, they had the music volume cranked up to house-shaking, and just playing the game was a spectacle that would attract a crowd rocking out to "Highway to Hell" and such. They can't practically do that in this space.
Sam and I also rode the park's highly touted new-ish ride, Ice Jet. It's nice having the kid be old enough that we can finally leave her there and go on rides she doesn't want to do. Anyway, Ice Jet is a pretty fun basic flat ride, a fast Matterhorn/Flying Bobs-type thing with cars that whirl around in a circle with up-and-down waves, and can freely swing out to the side as they go around. At top speed, they're banking far beyond 45 degrees. Halfway through, the ride reverses and the cars whirl around backwards. The capacity is good--the line moved fast, with big crowds getting eaten up with every cycle. We both liked it, but it made Sam pretty dizzy and she was done riding stuff for the day. This video shows the Canobie Ice Jet, and since it's from about a year ago, it also features the wonderful Halloweeny music program for the band organ on the vintage carousel next door:
The other big thing was that my daughter was finally willing not just to ride, but to drive her beloved little Autopia-style car rides, the Antique Cars and the Canobie 500. These have always been a bit frustrating to me because, ever since she was a little kid, she always wanted to go on them, but wanted me to drive--and driving a car is not something I consider an amusement ride, it's a daily bane of my existence. But at Disney World last year I finally convinced her to take the steering wheel on the Tomorrowland Speedway, and this time she worked the pedal as well (to be fair, this is actually pretty hard for a young kid, because on these old 60s-70s Arrow Development car rides the single pedal takes a considerable amount of force to operate). I guess she'll be driving a real car in just a few years; might as well get in some practice.