My favorite photo story yet…

The entire family was having a pretty rough opening day at California’s Great America and we were only halfway through the park when we spotted Psycho Mouse. Since I’d ridden it years ago I didn’t need it to further my Coaster Quest so we sent Gavin and Zaira to ride while the adults rested on a convenient bench.

Suddenly Zaira comes running back towards us yelling and pointing. It took a full thirty seconds or so for either her mother or I to translate that she was saying they had an on-ride photo. She was so excited that she was essentially shouting gibberish! You can’t really see the photo booth from the outside because it’s tucked along the exit ramp on the left side of the building. This is a bad habit evidenced at Great America’s log ride as well.

Obviously I went on the ride with the kids (and loved it, BTW). Although they only had a generic, starred cardboard frame and no digital frame at all, they were still displaying the old Paramount’s Great America ride photo poster so we were able to get a shot of that as well. I absolutely love that digital frame and am really hoping Cedar Fair will revamp it without the “Paramount’s” so we can add it to our collection at a future date.

Photos #065 & #066

Without a doubt, hands down, my all-time favorite on ride photo. Z and her friends had decided that we we’re all going to dress up as Mystery Inc. for Halloween in 2006. Since I always wanted to be Scooby Doo when I grew up this gave me the perfect opportunity. And Z just looked too cute in her Velma outfit for me to pass up this opportunity. We took a quick run up to Santa Clara, changed in the Great America parking lot, then enjoyed the attention as we walked through the park in costume.

In fact, while we were waiting at the Vortex Photo Booth to purchase this picture a group of teenage girls asked to have their pictures taken with us. It was quite a treat

We chose not to have the digital frame applied to this picture in order to more fully show our costumes. It did come in the semi-generic cardboard frame, though.

Photo #008

I’m not really sure why we chose June 25, 2006 to explore Bonfante Gardens (now Gilroy Gardens), but it is located less than 10 miles from Zaira’s apartment. We still weren’t officially collecting ride photos yet, but this one was just too exciting to pass up. Particularly when you take into account that the Timber Twister is really just a kiddie coaster. Obviously that doesn’t stop us from enjoying ourselves

A couple of notable pieces of information on this picture: not only is it the only ride photo I’ve seen to have the Paramount Parks name running around the inner border of the frame, but the picture itself is actually glued to the cardboard as well. This is wonderful as it keeps the photo from sliding around as so many of our pictures do.

Zaira and I have been to Gilroy Gardens a couple of times since this photo was taken in hopes of acquiring a new one with the new logo, but the photo booth has been closed.

Photo #003

Not exactly sure on the date of this pic, but I’m sure it was still the summer of 2005 and I know it was the second photo in our collection.

I took Zaira to Paramount’s Great America for the day. It was our first outing entirely on our own. The Vortex has always been one of my favorite rides at Great America and it’s relatively near the front gate, so I recommended it for our first ride. It wasn’t until we were walking down the exit ramp that Zaira informed me that not only was this her first stand up coaster, but also that it was the first time she’d ever gone upside down on a coaster. Purchasing the photo was a no-brainer at that point.

As a side note, I received all kinds of grief from Z’s mother about my “stealing” her first inversion. Oops…

Photo #002

Obviously, that’s not us riding Psycho Mouse. in fact, that’s a photo of a poster that we found in the Psycho Mouse photo booth on the opening day of California’s Great America in 2008. However, in the spirit of this blog we felt the need to share it with you.

Isn’t that a great digital frame? Unfortunately, Cedar Fair has abandoned it in favor of a simple logo placement on the photos. But at least we have this copy to remember it by.

Should you have a copy of an on-ride photo from Psycho Mouse during the Paramount era please leave a comment or drop us an email as we’d love to get a copy of it from you!