Monday, August 5th, 2014
The stars lined up and we were able to organize a two day trip to Cedar Point to celebrate Jack’s birthday, and more importantly to get a way for a few days of mindless fun. I haven’t been to Cedar Point in three or four years and have been hoping that we could work it in this summer. Me, Jack, Rachel, Grace, Nicole and Sophie (Courtney was still not up for roller coasters just yet post surgery) took off from Euclid at 6:45AM. We were splurging and staying at one of Cedar Point’s hotels on Monday evening so were taking advantage of the early entry. We arrived at Cedar Point after an easy ride at 8:00 AM. Checked into the hotel and got our early entry passes. We grabbed some (nasty) coffee and took a stroll around the grounds of the hotel and down to the beach and then headed to the entrance around 8:30 or so to be ready to storm the gate at 9:00 – already probably 100 people in line when we got there. We hit the Maverick first – walked on, then went to Millennium for about a 20 minute wait, and then decided to do the Maverick again – as it is awesome thank you very much. So we were able to get in three big rides in that
first hour. We would have had to wait probably five hours to do it otherwise. We spent the rest of the morning in the back of the park – old fashioned cars, Gemini, Magnum (25 years old this year – still awesome!!) all with little lines. We got a text around 11:00 that our room was ready so we headed back for lunch as we were starving and dying of dehydration already. We stayed in the Sandcastle Suites which is way on the northern tip of the peninsula. It was pretty nice – nice grounds, nice pool, standard suite. We brought lunch meat, rolls, chips and lots of soda and hung out and relaxed for about an hour and a half. We then took the shuttle to the front of the park to check out the Gatekeeper – the new coaster from last year that I’ve never been on. Very cool looking. Unfortunately we decided to wait in line for it and ended up waiting almost two hours in hot hot hot hot HOT HOT HOT line. Really bad. The ride was OK – nice first hill – but not as good as Maverick or Millennium or Dragster. Definitely not worth waiting in line for two hours in. We then went on a couple more rides and headed back to the hotel to relax. We hydrated and then spent an hour or so at the pool which was perfect. We had chili for dinner that I brought along, heating it up in the microwave. We hit the park again at 7:00. After going on Raptor and and some others we split up – Grace and Nicole went for the Dragster while Jack, Rachel, Sophie and I hit Mantis, Magnum and a
couple of other other things. We ended the night, right at 9:55 in the dark on this crazy new huge 300 foot swing ride that I have never been on before. OMG terrifying. Going over the lake with the wind blowing and dark out – what was I thinking. Give me a 300 foot coaster any day. We finally stopped and ate some amusement park junk food and then walked back to the hotel getting back around 11:15 quickly crashing after a long day.
Tuesday, August 6th, 2014
I woke up around 8ish or so and went out to the pool deck to relax while the kids were still sleeping. After about an hour and a half I went back and woke Jack and Rachel up and we went for a walk along the campground, down around the water park and then along the boardwalk behind the park. The girls were STILL sleeping when we got back but got them 
up and got organized, cleaned up and checked out around 11:00. We stopped in Huron on the way back at a place called Berardi’s that turned out to be great. We all had a big late breakfast. I had some awesome blueberry pancakes and bacon that hit the spot. We then hit the road and made it home before 2:00. A great day and a half away.
Eat On Edgecliff 