After the rain and food and eagle delays we finally --- and seriously, this was something like 3:30 by my camera --- got to Blazing Fury. This was one of the two roller coasters we hadn't gotten to the day before. It's also the oldest roller coaster at Dollywood; it opened in June 1978 and the Roller Coaster Database knows of only one coaster, a wooden coaster relocated(!) from Cedar Point(!) they had before that. It is one of the park's two fire-fighter-themed coasters, which probably makes sense if you know more Dolly Parton lore than I do. It's got many charming touches, like posters extolling the heroism of old-timey (fictional) firefighters, and a hand-painted sign explaining it ``is an indoor roller coaster consisting of special effects in a dark environment''. That is, it's got dark-ride elements, much like Mystery Mine.
Arguably it's a dark ride that has a couple of roller coaster elements; the Roller Coaster Database says it's mostly a powered incline, but the three drops make it roller coaster enough for them. There was a modest line for this, and there would be when we came back later. It is fun, though, just what we're looking for in dark rides --- moving props, gags (I think this is the one where a spinster-y woman chases after a man who calls her [ something ] hit in the head), fake-outs about where you're going to fall beneath something. Apparently until 2011 there was a water splashdown, but that was removed to reduce wear on the ride. It didn't feel like there was an obvious lack in the ride, although knowing what had been there makes some more sense of the end of the ride. (Though, oddly, its duplicate at Silver Dollar City in Branson, Missouri, kept its splashdown, I'm told.)
And then it was on to the last coaster we hadn't ridden. This was the Tennessee Tornado and it was weeks since a tornado hit the Lansing area so it's tasteful to ride. And an exciting one: it's among the last roller coasters constructed by Arrow Dynamics, the company that made steel coasters coasters practical. It's not the sort of crazily overdone string of loops like Kings Island's Vortex was; it's a more restrained thing with, I think two loops and a sidewinder. It's also got a nice element of the track going through the center of one of the loops, which feels like more of a novelty than it really, truly is.
With that, though, we'd gotten to all ten of Dollywood's roller coasters, and enjoyed rides, often front-seat rides, on all of them. We would go back to various coasters, starting with Wild Eagle, and get better looks at things such as this sculpture in the Wildwood Grove that looks like a lyre, with ribbons of dripping water as the strings.
Also an attraction in Wildwood Grove? The Black Bear Trail, a long steeplechase-style ride with bear mounts. It looked like the Moose on the Loose that delighted us, and still delights us, from Darien Lake. Also La Chevauchée de Guillaume at Festyland. At Dollywood, the ride figure is a bear, following a level path around scenery. There was some music but not, as we were hoping, an unending monologue from the bear delivering cornball jokes, the way Moose on the Loose did. The ride operator welcoming us back was good for it, though. I forget just what he told ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bunnyhugger and what he told me, but it differed from what he told the guy behind me, too, so he's got at least three bits of schtick for riders having a bear time. Fun stuff and I hope more parks get this kind of ride in. It's merry.
Had enough of the Merry-Go-Round Museum? Because I haven't, quite yet, and you're going to get to look at the results!
The Wurlitzer band organ that the museum occasionally plays, and that convinces people band organs are hecking loud. Also the huge banner that explains all the parts of the carousel.
Photograph of a miniature (but still, like three-foot-wide) carousel that my recollection is they'd love to get working but it's really hard what with everything being very precise when it's that small.
Sign for Gustav Dentzel's late-19th-century carousel carvers. Also, evidence of how loose people have been with the spelling of ``carousel'' over the years.
One of the penny press machines the Merry-Go-Round museum has. Sadly they have the ones where you just push a button to start things rather than grind them but at least it takes actual change and not a credit card. Note this is not the one that's next to the Wurlitzer, photographed above.
Peeking in the back of a penny-press machine. It's ... about like you might expect, really, but I do appreciate the schematic diagrams so people have a fighting chance of fixing the thing.
Another of the crayon drawover pieces, with a horse's head and carving tools.
Trivia: Neil Armstrong's Model A-7L space suit, for the moon walk, was serial number 056; his backup suit was 057. Buzz Aldrin's was serial number 077; backup, number 076. Mike Collins flew intravehicular model suit, serial number 033. Source: Lunar Outfitters: Making the Apollo Space Suit, Bill Ayrey. It doesn't say what (trusting there was one) Collins's backup suit serial number was. I imagine there was one, from the waste-anything-but-time conditions up through the first landing, but can't confirm it without, like, trying.
Currently Reading: Lost Popeye Sundays Supplement Volume 9: 1947, Tom Sims, Bela Zaboly. Editor Stephanie Noelle.
