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April 11, 2001
Senior Trip: Day 2
Busch Gardens, Tampa
Group: Ross, Adrienne, Chen, Chemen, John
Park Rating: 
Busch Gardens was my least anticipated day, since I have been to this park more often than I've used public restrooms. But that was also a plus, since having the park memorized meant that I could skip all the crap and go right to the good rides. This actually turned out to be one of the best days though. First of all, it was the only park we went to with Strawberry Mirages. If you ever go to Busch Gardens, buy the Strawberry Mirages! I can't stress that enough. Secondly, it had the best coasters and best food of all the parks. And thirdly, there must have been a blue light special at K-Mart because there were no lines on any of the rides! It only took about 20 minutes to get front row on a coaster, and these were really great roller coasters1.
It was kind of fun being the group guide that day. I felt like I should have been wearing khakis and a pith helmet, then I could have gone around saying, "Croikey! Luke et tha soize a' thet Bugga! Oi bet she'd nip off ya ahm in one boit!"
One thing I'm glad I didn't miss is the bird show. Yeah, I see it every time I visit Beer (oops, I mean Busch) Gardens, but it's good all the same. There's just something special about seeing a group of sun conures poop all over their trainer's arm. After the show we went looking for the spot where you get to hold macaws, but we ended up wandering into the bird aviary instead. This, I can tell, was Adrienne least favorite part. As soon as we got in, two birds that looked like a mix between chickens and vultures came up and start biting my toes! I don't know, I guess they looked like worms or something, but I ran away from them, so they cornered Adrienne. She didn't really like the idea of being attacked by vulture-chickens either, so she tried kicking them, but that didn't work either. We all ended up running away from them.
| The best part of Busch Gardens (for those of us under 21, anyway) is the food. They have a big German festhouse called (appropriately) "Das Festhaus." Using my meal vouchers, I got 2 bratwursts, 2 knackwursts, 2 full plates of saurkraut and boiled cabbage, a whole pickle, cherry cheesecake, and lemonade for only 2 bucks. Not only was the price sweet, but it also held a party afterwards in my intestines that lasted all through the next day (as you will read about below) until Easter morning. |  |
(This is a great action shot -- you can see the water coming to smack us right in the face.)  |
 |
After Busch Gardens we headed back to the hotel for some swimmin' and some singin'. God, do I love karaoke! As Dave Barry put it, "the term comes from two Japanese words, 'kara,' meaning 'amateurs,' and 'oke,' meaning 'getting up in bars and singing for your entertainment until you want to punch them.' . . . One of the most popular karaoke tunes is 'My Way,' which has been proven, in U.S. government studies, to be the most obnoxious song ever written." Sure enough, someone sang "My Way," but the highlight of that evening for me was singing "In the Still of the Night" with Mike and Ross. And that was the last I heard of my voice for a long time...
1. Unless, of course, you're Chen, in which case you'd never been to an amusement park before, and you decided to make your first roller coaster the Montu, a really fast, twisting, inverted coaster. Then you throw up.
Posted by dminky at April 11, 2001 09:48 AM
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