Cedar Point, Put-In Bay, Kelley's Island, Soak City and the Thirsty Pony

2005 REWIND - THE YEAR IN DRINKING

JUNE

I'm the third wheel on a car trip with my roommate Jason and his girlfriend Melinda to Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio. I'm an overgrown child when it comes to amusement parks, and Cedar Point is almost universally agreed among theme park and coaster enthusiasts to be the best of its kind. It's three times as big as our local Six Flags, with fifteen coasters (including a 310-foot-tall, 93-mph blue monster known as Millennium Force, to which that I would willingly vow roller coaster monogamy) and a mix of old-school and new-school spinning, gravity-defying rides.

We stay at room 3655 of the Sandcastle Suites, which is on the corner of the park property itself and grants us the right to enter the park an hour before its official opening time. We spend a solid, hot, beautiful day at Cedar Point and ride damn near everything, and we take several extracurricular trips away from the resort itself.

Take a ferry to Put-In Bay, a touristy island on Lake Erie, and sing karaoke at a bar called the Boathouse. Take another ferry to Kelley's Island, rent a golf cart and sputter our way to wineries and breweries while amusing ourselves with the coin-operated Breathalyzer machines that are hanging on the wall. I jump from a .10 to a .12 in a half-hour.

Spend two evenings at the Thirsty Pony, an enormous eatery/drinkery that features gambling on closed-circuit horse races from three Ohio venues. I lose two bucks on horse six in race eight, and we drink Leinenkeugel Red from a 120-ounce draft beer juggernaut known as the Giraft. This thing is about three and a half-feet tall and has its own tap and everything. Requires a $300 credit card deposit, just in takes it takes a shattering plunge from the table.

Spend the day at Soak City, Cedar Point's waterpark, where I learn that after spending two hours drinking frozen margaritas at the Swim-Up Bar, your heart pounds straight through your chest the next time you climb the tower to the body slides. But that, under the influence, the waterslides seem twice as fun and you don't even give a fuck about chlorinated water shooting up your nostrils.

Spend three drunk, ghost-town, twilight hours by myself back at Cedar Point in a rainstorm, gambling that the rain will let up and I'll be able to ride in the front car of all the roller coasters without having to wait in line. Indeed, through the lightning and showers, the park stays open and the staff hangs out in rain slickers, but only one ride appears to be open, in a tiny open-air building housing a '60s carnival throwback called the Matterhorn.

This is a 360-degree uphill/downhill spinning ride, and it's a lot of fun if you're ten years old or intoxicated (and probably especially if you're ten and intoxicated), and I'm the only one riding. The straight-faced ride operator curtly informs me that he thinks the ride should be closed and that someone's going to get hurt in this weather, but his bosses won't let him close it down. So I take a seat next to the operator's booth as he delivers his scripted pre-ride announcement over the intercom even though I'm three feet away, staring him down.

HIM: Welcome to the Matterhorn.
ME: Thanks.
HIM: Please keep your arms--
ME: Got it.
HIM: --and legs--
ME: Uh-huh
HIM: --inside the car at all times
ME: No problem, man.
HIM: Please secure all loose articles--
ME: I don't have any loose articles.
HIM: And enjoy your ride. Dick.

I do enjoy my ride, and as instructed by the ride operator, I walk safely to the exit, then I weave back through the empty line and get back on the Matterhorn. I also ride the Scrambler in the rain and climb into a Monster car before a particularly frightening bolt of lightning cracks the sky and the operator comes around to kick everyone off the ride. At 9:52, with eight minutes to close, the weather is suddenly beautiful and I'm stuck in the back of the park riding the mine train. All those famous roller coasters from the Travel Channel, and I've walked several miles in soggy shoes and socks to ride the goddamn 1969-vintage mine train.