Chris' Christian Blog

My Amusement Park

"My Amusement Park" 

The 30 DBc prompt for 1-20-17 is"On this day in 1885, the roller coaster was patented by L.A. Thompson. Tell us about a time you visited an amusement park."

I am just a poor man who grew up in a family of nine kids. Amusement parks were something we never went to because we couldn't afford them The closest I have ever come to an amusement park was a carnival that came through every year. Eventually we couldn't afford that.

I did have the opportunity to go with a squadron of the United States Air Force Auxiliary (Civil Air Patrol) to Space Camp in Huntsville Alabama, Universal Theme Park in Orlando Florida and Walt Disney World. However the only ride I rode in any of them was a ride at Space Camp which was a giant gyroscope with seat. You would strap in and each of the rings of the gyroscope would be separated then set into motion. This caused you to spin in many different directions and simulated a flat spin in a space shuttle or air craft. You had thirty seconds to line each ring of the gyroscope up by moving the stick the right way. Aside from that I rode no rides because I was on duty as a chaperone. The squadron was a composite squadron meaning we had juveniles who held enlisted ranks. I was a second lieutenant, squadron public affairs officer and observer on the flight crew. If another pilot was not along I flew right seat, second in command. I also operated the radio and search equipment looking for missing aircraft. So the fact that I was on duty prevented me from riding any rides. One ride my captain did let me go up on however was offered by a colonel at Scott AFB in Alabama. He heard I was part of the flight crew with my squadron and flew Cessna 172's. He offered me a real ride - in an F-16 Fighting Falcon! As a member of the Auxiliary the Air Force recognized me as regular Air Force. (It took awhile to get used to being saluted.) Therefore the Air Force treated me as such. As a member of a flight crew it was customary for a pilot to take flight crew officers up on check flights in the fastest jets. So he took me up. He fooled me though. He taped a one hundred dollar bill to the canopy and dangled it in front of me. He told me that once we started rolling, if I could grab it I could have it. I couldn't have grabbed it if it had been a million dollars! My whole body was pressed so hard against my seat I couldn't breath yet alone move. We went from ground level to angels three zero thousand (30,000) feet in under two minutes! His money was perfectly secure. He gave me fifty for trying though!

We flew for nearly an hour out over the Gulf of Mexico where I got to experience a top speed of mach 1.5 or about 1,000 mph, though in the air it doesn't seem like much. The sound barrier is a little weird because the air distorts momentarily. Aircraft must be two hundred miles off shore to break the sound barrier except in war time do to sonic booms. We were flying at mach .95 most of the way, which ate up two hundred miles pretty quickly.

So while I never got to ride amusement park rides, I did have a ton of fun. I had an opportunity to ride the roller coaster at Universal but turned it down. I like adrenaline as much as the next person but dive bombing would never have been my cup of tea. Besides my stomach was still churning from doing barrel rolls and flying inverted through the clouds at over 700 MPH!