King's Island Amusement Park

Figure 1. Group shot midway through the day. (From Left to
        Right: Naveed, David, Lindsay, Pablo, Me, Stella, Casey, Stefani,

        Josh, Harrison)

On Friday night we left for Cincinnati for the weekend. As part of the REU program we received tickets for a day at the King's Island amusement park near Cincinnati. When we arrived in Cincinnati we ate dinner at a shopping mall-movie theater combination. We then checked out the water and the purple people bridge. When we got to the hotel we watched some winning Gamecock Baseball vs Arkansas and played cards. A few of us went to Walmart late that night where Pablo bought himself and Stella fanny packs. The next day was bright and sunny, which meant the shortest line was right as we arrived there. We waited for about 30 minutes to ride the Diamondback (Figure 2), a mile long roller coaster with 3 massive drops.

Figure 2. The first hill of the Diamondback Roller-coaster at King's Island.

After that, things became less exciting as we waited in line for 30 minutes for an indoor roller coaster only to have it break down before we could ride it. Every coaster line after that was at least an hour long. After an all-you-can-eat buffet, we met up with more of the REU students (Figure 1) and rode a few more roller-coasters and then checked out the waterpark. Compared to Noah's Ark it was very tiny. We went down a few regular slides and tried boogey-boarding, which I was unable to do. Half of our group left and I met up with the rest to ride a couple more roller-coasters before closing. We rode the Beast after dark, which is the world's longest wooden roller-coaster. It was quite thrilling to plunge into complete darkness and be whipped around random turns. The Beast lasted over 4 minutes. Then we walked past the Eiffel Tower on the way out (Figure 3).

Figure 3. In front of the Eiffel Tower near the park gate.