So yesterday my buddy Jim & I took advantage of the 2 for 1 Great America tickets through Pick n Save and we trekked up to Gurnee, IL. Neither of us wanted to deal with the hassle of driving, so we decided to take the L train from downtown Milwaukee to Chicago.



We enjoyed 9 hours of roller coaster thrills. It was a beautiful day, and the park was not that crowded, which was a bonus.

I love roller coasters. I used to be scared to death of them when I was younger. I remember the first time i went on raging bull, I cried. I was so scared, tears actually ran down my cheeks. But now, strangely enough, there was no ride that could evoke such emotions in me. I was calm on every ride, including batman and raging bull and even the giant drop, which I've never done until last night. It's so intense. You settle into an outward-facing, open-air seat with your feet dangling below. Rise 20 stories for a spectacular view of the park-before the seats release and drop you to the ground at 62 heart-pounding miles an hour.

The newest attraction at the park is Dark Knight. The wait for that ride was something like 2 hours! No thanks. I here it sucks anyways...more of a kiddy ride than a roller coaster.

Superman was the next attraction we went on. It's a roller coaster where you're in a flying position. It's an interesting idea, and all, but it doesn't go all that fast...a mere 60 mph compared to raging bull's 73 mph. We waited the longest for this ride (like an hour). The other rides went pretty quick. I'm talking 15 minutes from start to finish for batman, which is unheard of during peak crowd times. We did the whizzer, the orbit, the demon, raging bull (twice), the viper, de ja vu, the eagle (twice), batman (twice), iron wolf, superman, the condor, and the giant drop...15 rides for $35 since we got the ticket online (remember its a 2 for 1). If we had waited to buy the ticket at the gate it would have cost us 54.95, so $35...not bad at all.

The price of food at the amusement park was unreal. For ONE slice of pizza it cost $10 and a soda was $6.50!

I have to say though the best deal in the entire park was the foot massaging machines for a quarter. You sit in these chairs and put your feet on these vibrating foot pads, and it feels absolutely heavenly after walking around for hours.

Anyways, it was fun...

Here is a photo of my buddy Jim on the Condor ride. I think this was actually one of his favorite rides at the park -- which he'd never admit. :)