Pokematic's 2026 Cedar Point Adventure, and a little Halloween

It's that time of year again, where my mom and I go to Cedar Point for a mother-son trip. I was able to get a season pass for basically the same price as a ticket and parking, and it's good through this and the next year, so I got one for me and then got a day ticket for my mom and all day dining for both of us. I tried to find my bright yellow hoodie, but I couldn't find it, so I just wore a bright yellow t-shirt to make it easy to find me. My mom showed up at our condo around 8:30 and we arrived around 10:30, 30 minutes before the park opened. We got in line, and were ready for things to start. It was a bit brisk, but nothing too cold. We were able to get in at 10:50, so I booked it over to Hugos Italian so I could start the meal plan at 11, because if we timed it right we could eat 9 meals with 1 hour of buffer. I get in before they officially open, so I wait right at the start and get my pizza and salad right at 11:05. We split the pizza and salad, not very filling but that's to be expected with the first meal of the day. Mom also checked the park starbucks to see if they had a park mug like Disney and Universal, but they didn't so oh well.

It's now time to start the rides. Normally we like to star with Ocean Motion since it's right there at the front of the park, but for some reason it was closed today. Not a problem, we can ride the cable car, which was also closed. Dang it. Whatever, let's ride Raptor. That was open, so boom that's our first ride of the day. It's a roller coaster, and we like to start out with something a little tamer, but we'll take what we can get. It's a fun feet hanging ride, and it got us going well. Since Blue Streak is right there, I went and rode it. Mom says she can't ride it anymore since it's a vintage wooden coaster, but I was able to ride it. It's a little jerky, but not too much so, just lots of hills and dips. An interesting thing was the ride train flexed with the track, and I didn't notice that previous times. That was kind of wild. Pretty fun little ride. Since we were kind of right there, we went on Valraven, a pretty new roller coaster that has a 90 degree drop. In the past we do this later in the day since it's a really fun night ride, but there wasn't much of a line and we were right there. The app said it was a 20 minute wait, but it was more of a 30 minute wait. Still REALLY fun, and as we were waiting we saw the tops of the snoopy's tricks and treats adventure show, knowing we wanted to see the next performance. After this it was time to eat, so I power walked over to the Pavilion so we could get our next meal. I got us steak and lobster bisque; I meant to get the new fried rice, but I muscle memoried lobster bisque. Oh well, still good. We ate overlooking Lake Erie, and only consumed 5 more minutes of the buffer having got it at 12:40. While I was in line I overhead a funny thing, there was a family with smaller children in front of me and one of them said "I'm not hungry," and the mom said "too bad, we have the meal plan."

Now was time for our first show of the day, Snoopy's Tricks and Treats Adventure. It's nothing super spectacular, just a little juke box musical about the Peanuts gang going trick or treating and looking for Snoopy, a simple kids show. It was still fun to say "we did something." After the show we rode Max Air, a swinging spinning ride that's really fun. After this we made our way back to scary land in the back of the park. If you've been missing my other blogs, Cedar Point Holloweekends has various scary thrill things in the back half of the park in the evening, and we don't like that stuff, so we do the back of the park rides before it goes scary. We walked through the old Berenstain Bear Land, remembering the different things they had, and walked by windseaker to see that it was closed. We also walked by Iron Dragon, a hanging coaster, and saw it was closed as well. Then there was Sirens Curse, the new roller coaster, and saw that the line was like an hour and decided to pass on it for now.

How we got to scary land was kind of fun. At Cedar Point there's a train that goes from the middle of the park to the back of the park, and from the back of the park to the middle of the park, and it's a real steam powered coal fire locomotive. Vikingpolak loved that when he was little and into trains, and it's a fun little easy ride. In scary land there's supposed to be a restaurant with a bratwurst burger, but it was closed. It wasn't like "just locked, no one there," they had garbage cans in front of the doors so no one was getting in. Oh well, we went to Farmhouse Kitchen where we got Brussel sprouts and I got this seasonal chili. It was really good. Our first ride after eating was Skyhawk, a large swing ride, and after that Wave Swingers, an amusement park swing ride with the big seats that spin around. We wanted to do Steel Vengeance, but it was closed down because it does that a lot. We also considered Maverick, the ride with the 95 degree drop, but it had a 75 minute wait so we decided to pass. So we just decided to leave the back of the park and walk our way through frontier land. There's normally a water ride I think, but it's closed for the season. There's also a glass blowing demonstration and shop for the items, and in the past we watched the demonstration, but they weren't doing it yet so we didn't watch it. The only thing that was really able to do was the petting zoo. They had goats, llamas, alpacas, sheep, and ponies. I tried taking pictures with the animals, but they didn't want to cooperate. I don't know if they were camera shy or just didn't like me, or what, but they ran away every time we tried to take pictures.

Now that we're out of frontier land and scary land, we're right by the Millennium Force. It's a really fun roller coaster that's really fast, but the line was like an hour so we took a pass. We were also right by Rougaru, but that was closed, which was annoying. This is when we decided to go back to the back of the park on the other side of the center. Cedar Point is kind of a loop, and while it normally makes sense to go around the loop in the trip, riding the train kind of put us at the midway of the loop, so we would have to kind of backtrack. Not a problem, on the way there are a lot of good rides, like power tower, which was closed, and Top Thrill 2, which had like a 2 hour wait time. Kind of annoying, but that's what happens when you go at the end of the season I guess. It was about time to eat again, which this time was Backbeat Cue, a barbecue place. It was mom's turn for food, so she got her chicken tenders and fries, which were really good.

We're now back in scary land, which includes Camp Snoopy. There's not a whole lot here for us, but they did have a tilt-a-whirl which mom really enjoys but I don't, so I just sat it out while mom enjoyed. After this we had our meet and greet with Charlie Brown dressed as Frankenstein's Monster and Sally as a Princess. After this we rode Pipe Scream, a spinning wave ride that one year we were "the adult rider" for a boy that was too short to ride alone and didn't have an adult. It's a really fun ride where it goes over hills while spinning around. After that we rode Lake Erie Eagles, a ride where you're in a bird and control the head which determines if the bird goes up or down. After the ride I had to help my mom out of the ride bird, and the ride operator noticed my goofy crocks. It was kind of funny that he was the first to notice or comment. We would have rode Magnum XL 2000 and Gemini, but again, closed. We were just striking out left and right on rides. After working our way back up to the middle of the park we went to Panda Express for our next meal, beef and broccoli on lo mien noodles. It was quite good, though I was getting pretty full.

We're pretty close to Iron Dragon at this time, and it was running this time, so we rode it. It's such a fun calm roller coaster, like a good "newbie coaster." Instead of doing another ride, it was time to watch the skeleton trampoline show. It's trampoline acrobatics with a bit of comedy, and is really fun. Our next meal was nachos at the pavilion; taco meat, lettuce, jalapenos on my side, on Doritos. I started feeling very full after this, and not in a good way. Thankfully for me there was a show going on outside the pavilion, the ska-letons, a ska show where everyone is dressed up like skeletons. As we were coming around the stage to the front the keyboard player waved to us, which was kind of cool. We watched what was left (we missed maybe the first quarter), and that was very good for letting the digestion happen. As the show was ending we went to Trokia, a spinning midway type ride that was close enough to the show to hear the end of it, which was really fun. Our next ride was Calypso, another midway spinning type ride. Due to our size my mom and I normally ride in separate ride vehicles when it's not a roller coaster, but the ride operator was all "you need to ride together, you'll fit." We did, and that was kind of funny.

Now is when things took a turn for the worst. With my season pass I got a free "secret menu item" at coasters, and I wanted to get it with this next meal. Well apparently it's only available on Sundays, and it was Friday, so no free secret menu item for me. One year for the side we could get a half portion of onion rings and half portion of fries (called frings) and mom was looking forward to that, but they no longer had onion rings at coasters, so it was just fries. I had the burger because mom didn't want much, and that was a mistake because that was over eating, and I felt kind of nauseous. With that in mind, we said "well let's do Siren's Curse and wait in the line to let my food digest, it's a long line after all." Well...that would have been a good idea, if I had a jacket and wasn't feeling cold, but I couldn't find my hoodie in the morning so all I was wearing was a t-shirt and I felt too cold. After waiting for like 30 minutes, I'm like "mom I'm feeling sick with the cold and over eating, I need to leave." It was only like 9:30 PM, but I just wasn't going to make it. As we were leaving we saw the ring toss game, another free thing I got with my season pass, 10 free rings to toss. I wanted to play, but I was just too far gone, so we got in the car and drove to the hotel. I normally drive, but mom had to drive since I was not feeling well. Once I got in the car with the heat on I started feeling better, but I still just had to go to bed. I showered, watched a video, and went to bed. Mom and I drove home the next day and it was uneventful, and so I went to help mskate and dad-in-law move.

Fast forward a day to Sunday, we get all our moving done and mskate takes her dad home, leaving me home alone. Well, it was the last day for my secret menu item, and about the last week to do my ring toss. I said to myself, "I'm still young, it may be a work night but I can get down there with enough time to still have an hour and I can get home before it's too late, it's not the most responsible thing but I'm going to do it." I drive to Cedar Point and get there around 7PM, 1 hour before park close, and do my things. I scan in, and park, and go in the entrance. I make my way right to the ring toss and scan my pass to get my rings. I play, and lost, so I'm glad I played for free. Because the line for Gatekeeper wasn't too long, I jump on that. It's a really fun ride that has you off the side of the track, and it makes you kind of feel like flying. As a single rider I got paired with a random person, and the guy I was paired with had some fun with it, introducing himself and then introducing me to his party that was 1 row ahead of us. I went to coasters and got my secret menu item, a souvenir Top Thrill 2 cup, that is normally served with a milkshake that is sold separately, but I was able to get it with just the cup for free, which worked good for me. Since there was still some time before the park closed, I rode Atomic Scrambler, the midway ride where it just spins you around and pushes the person sitting on the inside into the person sitting on the outside (a fun date ride). I also managed to make it on Matterhorn, a ride that spins around a circle that goes up and down. The ride operator asked me how much I had drank after looking at my cup, and then was a bit confused when I showed him it was just an empty cup, but then he was like "working with the public you see weird things." That was the last ride of the night, and they kicked us out after that. It took me like an hour to get out of the parking lot, which was really annoying, and made it so I got home around an hour later than when I normally go to bed, which made for a kind of rough Monday, but I survived.

Fast forward to next Sunday, November 1st, the final day of operations, and one of the options for $20 bring a friend day. Mom said "we can get a cheap ticket, we can ride rides we missed, we can get food again, and we can get home the same day, want to do this" and I said "yes let's do it." Since I'm here, I might as well talk about Halloween. On Friday the 30th I wore my Mr. Incredible costume to work, and everyone got a big kick out of it. I also went to Chuck E Cheese for their VIP night where I got cheap pizza and extra tickets and play points, and since it was Halloween Friday I wore my costume there as well. I got a fun picture with Chuck E in my costume. On Saturday I went up to my parents and in-laws area to go to church with my mom on Saturday so we could go to Cedar Point on Sunday, and then hand out candy at my in-laws while mskate, her mom, and IRA were down in Disneyland for a Friends For Life conference. If it wasn't for the fact that we were trying to save money to buy a house and wanted to be all set there, I decided not to go, so it was just dad-in-law and I. I watched Bob's Burgers as I handed out full size candy bars and playdoh if the kid was young enough. We didn't get a lot of trick or treaters, but those we did get were really happy with us. There was a group of 5 girls that got REALLY excited when I gave them playdoh and full size bars. They said "best house ever." I drove home after that to rest up for the big day tomorrow.

OK, it's now time for our make-up day, our cheap bring a friend, final day of operation, Sunday. Mom got to the condo with enough time for us to get to the park before it opens. We drive down, get gas while on the turn pike because it's cheaper than back home, and are dressed warmly so we don't run into the same problem as last time. We wait in line, and go right to Hugo's when they let us in. Today they had hot honey pepperoni pizza, and I would have gotten that since I like hot honey, but that wouldn't have been Mom's thing so we just got normal pepperoni.

After eating our first ride was Gatekeepers since mom missed it last time and the line wasn't too long. After Gatekeepers we rode MaxAir since we were right there and it was a literal walk on (we got on the ride that was in the process of being loaded). With the "we've ridden before but want to ride this season" rides done, we went to the first "real new ride," Siren's Curse. It had about an hour wait, but we said "that's OK, today is to fill in the things we missed," and that was not a mistake. The queue line is REALLY cool, there's all this theming around the beach and pier, and it's pretty immersive. Then because it's one of those "no pockets, we have metal detectors" ride, we had to put our stuff in a locker. Lucky for us they have "load on one side, unload on another side" lockers that you unload into right before going on the ride. This roller coaster was so cool. What they do for the drop is put you on a track, raise the track and tilt it down at a 90 degree angle, and drop you. While this is going on, there's sound playing in the speakers on your head rest that conveys a story. The story from what I could gather is that you're a sailor going out to sea, you hear the call of the sirens, they call you over to their trap (which is the tilt and hang), and when they drop you there's a rock song. It's really cool, and with the 90 degree hold you're held in place just by the restraint, which is pretty crazy. So much fun. After the ride we went to coasters where I had a cheese burger and fries. Mom had a couple bites to say she did and some fries.

The next stop was Millennium Force and the Millennium VIP lounge. Millennium Force is a really fun high speed roller coaster and I really love it, but the seats are a little small for mom so if I ride it I ride it alone. Lucky for mom there's a VIP lounge right next to it, where they have TVs and lounge chairs, and in the cold times outdoor heaters. It's supposed to be an extra charge where you get drinks or something like that, but mom just kind of walks in through the exit like she's supposed to be there and keeps a very low profile; doesn't ask for anything, sits in the least desirable seats, and doesn't draw any attention to have someone say "ma'am, can I see your admission?" I also only do it if the line is less than an hour, and it was, so I went on and really enjoyed myself. After the ride it was about time to eat again, so we went to the restaurant I was smelling in line, Panda Express (it's right close to Millennium Force). I was pretty full from Coasters, so I let mom pick what she wanted, and that was orange chicken on fried rice. I don't like chicken so this was all her, but I do like fried rice so I had some of that. The kind of funny thing is Panda Express was really crowded with all the seating taken, except for this table where there was a single man watching the football game on his phone. My mom asked if we could sit across from him and he said it was fine. Fried rice was a bit of a mistake, because it was really messy (kept falling off the fork), but it lead to a really funny thing. Where we were sitting there was a flock of sparrows just waiting for people to drop food, and some got really bold coming up close to where we were sitting because there was so much spilled rice (it kind of reminded me of Hawaii). Mom threw a couple fork fulls out to them to see what they would do, and they were pouncing on it and cleaned up the rice real quick like. It was pretty fun to watch.

On normal "open till midnight" days scary land gets scary at 8PM, but on "open till 8PM" Sunday scary land gets scary at 5PM. Since there were still some things we wanted to do back there and the lines weren't too long as reported by the app, we went back to frontier land to do those rides. The big ride we did was Maverick, a horse themed roller coaster with a 95 degree drop. Since the app said it was only going to be like an hour we decided to do it since it's quite a fun ride. We got in line and waited our time. While we were in line we saw someone open a bottle of sprite that kind of exploded on them, and were a little worried for them since that would attract a lot of bees, if it was regular, but I saw the black cap which means zero sugar, so hopefully it wasn't too bad. This is a REALLY fun ride, really fast and that 95 degree drop is really cool, except that it kind of pressed on my berries. After the ride it was time to eat again so we ate at farmhouse kitchen. I got us steak and Brussel sprouts, which was really good.

It's now 3:50, and we have a choice to make. Steel Vengeance was working, a ride that normally is down whenever we go, but it had an hour wait (which is almost always longer), which would get out either right when scary was about to start and we'd have to make our way out quick to beat it, or it would be scary time. We decided to wimp out and skip Steel Vengeance this time, saying that next year we'll just go right to it if it's open and make sure we do it since it's eluded us every time. Instead we rode the train out and got to enjoy "the boneyard" displays. This is a funny year round thing, where they have a little town and settings with skeletons doing activities like playing in a band, having a shoot out, and putting out a fire. Just a fun little thing.

After the train the big mistake of the day was made. I looked at the app and it said that Top Thrill 2 had only a 30 minute wait. That was quite the deal, it's normally over an hour since it's kind of a slow loader and long ride, so I said "heck yeah let's do it." Mom said it hurt her heart last time so she sat it out, meaning I was able to leave all my stuff with her instead of needing a locker since this is one of those rides that requires empty pockets. Well...the empty pockets was where there was a problem. The stand by line was 30 minutes when I entered, because there were no fast passes or disability passes in line as well. While I was waiting, lots of fast pass and disability pass people came in, which made the wait 2 hours. Apparently the app updated while I was in line, and the wait time went to 75 minutes. I wouldn't have waited if I knew that, and since I didn't have my phone I didn't know it did that. It was just very deceptive, because there wasn't like the big snaking queue full of people, it was a pretty straight line and I could see the end, it's just that my line wasn't moving much. Very deceptive. I eventually made it to the front and rode it. Funny thing is the ride went up so high my ears popped. Turns out I wasn't the only one that ran into this error. My mom was talking to someone else outside the ride and apparently her daughter did the same thing. I'm not going to do this again, and I wrote to cedar point telling them "you need to have a way to tell people the wait time changed while they're in line." We agreed that no more Top Thrill 2 after this.

This all resulted in us missing a meal and not having much time left to do things. We went to the pavilion where I would have gotten the steak with fried rice, but they were out, so my mom got the funnel cake shrimp. I was going to get the fruit cup for my side, but then they ran out, so I got a salad, and I got some malt vinegar to dress it. They closed like right after I got our food, I couldn't even get another packet of malt vinegar. After eating we had to pick our final rides. We rode the Cadillac Cars (the old timy cars) since that was my grandpa's favorite. It's just a simple 10 MPH ride around a track, but still kind of fun. After that we rode Cedar Downs, the horse race ride that's kind of like a carousel but moves really fast. It's almost 8, so we try to get on one more ride, the normal carousel at the front of the park, and we do, the very last ride of the season. This was kind of cool, because it's Halloween time they have the ride spin backwards, which was pretty cool. The ride operator announced "this is the last ride of the season." Woo hoo, quite the day. Thankfully leaving wasn't too difficult this time, it only took about 20 minutes to get out of the parking lot, and then we both made it back nice and safe.

So this was quite the adventure. I used my Cedar Point pass 3 times in quick succession. On our first trip we ate $139.93 worth of amusement park food and rode a majority of the park while also seeing every show we were interested in, and on our 2nd trip we ate $102.95 worth of amusement park food and basically finished what we missed the first time around, and on my own little thing I enjoyed the full benefits of my pass, and each time I saved like $40 on parking. Such a fun time, and we're already looking forward to next year. Well this has been Pokematic, signing off, and bu-bye.

Pokematic's Zoo Boo Adventure

Hey everyone, it's spooky season which means different places are doing things for the season. My in-laws got some free tickets to the Zoo Boo last Sunday, an event where you can dress up in costume and get treats while also enjoying the animals. Unlike the wild lights or just going there, I haven't done the zoo boo in forever; my mom remembers doing it when I was real little, but we haven't done that since. Since it was Sunday mskate had to do learn to skate beforehand, and then we went right to her parents afterwards. Since there's a Chuck E Cheese close to the ice arena she teaches at I went there for about 40 minutes and used our 40 credits with our pass. The cool thing is on the Minion card drop game there was a rare peanut butter and jelly card that was next to drop, so I played until I got it. Before I left I checked the balance and we had 9,857 tickets, 143 away from 10K. After CEC I went to the ice arena and watched mskate teach. I sat in the stands around where other parents were sitting, and I kept thinking "mine is the really tall one in the light blue jacket."

Now that skating is done we went to the in-laws to get ready. I had some pizza circles for a dinner while I was there; they're kind of like bagel bites, but a much higher quality. I was Mr. Incredible and mskate was Zenon, and IRA was Ben 10 from Alien Force. Normally the in-laws park right outside the zoo for free parking, but the event had free parking so I parked us up at the 3rd floor of the parking structure so I could go down the bridge. I don't know if I've said it somewhere before, but when I was little we liked parking on the 3rd floor of the parking structure because there was a bridge to get to the main side with the zoo, and I would like to run down it. I ran on it a little with mskate, for nostalgia. The check in was pretty simple, just present the tickets.

When we got in we skipped over the penguin house and butterfly house to go to the special event tent, because that's why the in-laws got the tickets. On our way to the tent we got our first treat, rice krispy treats. The event tent was not very exciting, they had some free donuts and cider, but all the speeches and stuff were over when we got there. Oh well. Around where we were there were some pumpkin displays, which were kind of cool. Some had fog machines and were fogging, and there was this one with a face that was talking that was kind of creepy. The first real animals we saw were the river otters, and this is when it was clear tonight was going to be more interesting. The river otters were really active, and they were fighting. That was pretty fun to see, and everyone was crowded around watching them. It was really cool.

After the otters we made our way further into the zoo. We saw some cool Star Wars pumpkins, with the real characters. We also passed by the vulture and camel enclosure, but they were just kind of there. We passed by Rackam Fountain, which is kind of a big photo op, with many pennies of mine in there from back in the day. We also saw some cool marvel pumpkins, and got some candy from the treat spots.

Now for a real experience kind of thing. We're about halfway into the zoo, and that's where the arctic exhibit is, with the polar bear tunnels. There weren't a lot of people there so we were a little concerned it was closed, but it wasn't. The polar bears were not out, but the sea lions were, and they active. When we were in the underwater part we saw the toys they had for enrichment, and they were dog toys. IRA thought that was pretty funny, because they were basically the same toys that his dog had. While we were going to the arctic base station part of the exhibit we saw our first free roaming peacock, because that's what they do at the zoo. I was able to get kind of close, which was kind of the boldest I've been, except for the time there was one that stole my peanut butter sandwich when I was little. In the base station thing they have a thermal camera to show how they track things, and dad-in-law was making a big deal about how his head was the high heat red, and I made the joke about how it was because he's a hot head, which got a good laugh. That was basically all for the arctic exhibit.

After this we went to the farm section. On the way we saw the wolverines, and the wolverine was running around in circles, very active like. Again, this is very rare, most of the times the animals are sleeping or otherwise not very active. We also got some popcorn bags from the treats. The farm kind of changed since I was little. Now there's a play place thing, and they got rid of the barn owl and horses, but they have donkeys, alpacas, and chickens, as well as goats that were kind of off in their own area. The fun thing is the goats were making noises, and I would have tried to record them for my second stock audio library, but there was faint music and the family wouldn't have been able to wait around for me to try to do that. Oh well, still lots of fun.

I don't want to say "it was getting late" because it really wasn't, but some of the family was getting tired, but IRA and I were ready to do some more exploring, so we went ahead of everyone deeper into the zoo while the others rested. I wanted to do the kangaroo experience, because it's really cool. Unlike a more traditional exhibit where the animals are separated from the humans by a big fence, glass walls, or chasms, the kangaroo exhibit is an open walk through exhibit where the kangaroos are walking around with you. I don't know why they're different from all the other animals, maybe they've evolved to not interact with humans but know how to push a human away without seriously injuring the human, but for whatever reason it's a walk through. Unfortunately though, it must have been past the kangaroo's bed time, because they were closed. Oh well. We continued on and there was sloth bear in it's exhibit, and it was just sitting against the wall looking kind of derpy. It was really funny looking, and there were a lot of people looking at him. IRA and I decided to maybe start making our way back to catch up with the family, and as we were walking back this toddler kept staring at me as he was walking, trying to make sense of me while also keeping up with his mom (and kind of falling behind). I let my presence be known by rather loudly saying "yeah I'm something aren't I?" I wanted to let the parents know their baby was getting very distracted by me and was struggling to keep up, and I could tell they appreciated it as they friendly pulled him back to their attention.

As IRA and I were walking back we caught back up with the rest of the family, they were on their way to the sloth bear with us. Unfortunately the sloth bear decided it was time for bed and was lying down like it was asleep. Oh well. Right close was the giraffes and they were really close, which was pretty cool. As we made our way forward we saw the ostrich and rhino. The ostrich wasn't doing much, but the rhino was kind of active. It was walking around, maybe on it's way to the night house. IRA and I both reminisced about the loss of the elephants, because they used to be here but aren't anymore. We also saw the zebra off in the distance, would have gotten closer but the in-laws were a little tired.

Now for something pretty fun, the lions, or as I kept saying "the kitties." Typically the lions aren't very active, just kind of sleeping off in the distance of their enclosure. Well, that wasn't the case this time, they were still mostly asleep, but they were sleeping right against the glass real close to us. Everyone was gathered around, and that was why. The male lion was sleeping on the rock that was close to us, and I think his favorite lionesses were sleeping with him, and the other lionesses were sleeping right against the glass barrier, like if we it wasn't for the bullet proof glass we could pet them. That was really cool. As I was walking away IRA got to see one of the lionesses walking around, drinking water, and jumping onto a platform. He got it on video and showed the family. That was OK by me though, because there was peacock walking around where I was, and I like the free roaming peacocks. It was a great experience.

After the lions it was time for one of my favorite things, the great apes. I like them because their mannerisms are so similar to humans. Last time it was the child chimps playing with each other and the baby chimp trying to keep up, and this time it was building a bed. The chimps weren't doing a whole lot, just kind of walking around, with one climbing all over the ropes, but still fun to watch. The gorillas on the other hand, they were trying to get ready for bed it seemed. One young gorilla was climbing on the ceiling, swinging from the reinforced vent grating, because of course the adventurous nature of gorillas would have one thinking "what if I climbed on a functional part of the habitat." The adult gorillas though, they were gathering up straw to make a bed. There was a mom gorilla holding a baby with one arm while gathering together straw down on the base floor, and another adult gorilla gathering up straw on one of the upper levels. Not the most "human mannerisms," but the way the mom was carrying the baby with what was probably the non-dominant arm while trying to get bed ready with what was probably the dominant arm, while walking bipedal upright, that was pretty human. Then at the exhibit there's a pretty cool thing where they have the hand print and skull of a chimp, gorilla, human, and orangutan (at least I think it's an orangutan), with it to show off how similar we are. It's a really cool thing, and while the in-laws were kind of "I'm tired, I just want to be done," they were like "OK, that was fun, I'm glad you dragged us to the great ape exhibit." Close to the great ape exhibit was the flamingos, so we just kind of looked at them real quick, because the flamingos are kind of funny with the rapid looking around, but they don't really do much.

The great apes were kind of close to the entrance to the artic exhibit, which is close to the center cafe area. I hadn't had dinner, so I decided to get a little something, cheese fries. Seeing that this was a "sit down and rest" kind of activity, the family was open to taking a little break. Mskate and IRA each got a fountain drink, and everyone else just enjoyed having a little break. After our little break we started making our way to the front, and as we were walking we came across a really cool pumpkin display. There was a thing where it was Miyazaki with most being Totoro and the skull things from Princess Mononoke, The Muppets, Project Hail Mary, Toy Story 5, Coraline, and Angry Birds. They were really cool.

My next stop was the event building where they have the 4D theater, because they sometimes have art exhibits on the top floor. Unfortunately they didn't have it this time, but oh well. Outside there was a treat stop where they were giving out Pepsi and juice boxes. Everyone got diet Pepsi's for mskate since they were out of regular. This was also right by the reptile house where there was a fire spinner doing tricks. That was really fun, and right afterwards we went to the reptile house, where they had a warning that said "decorations may be scary for younger guests" on the door. That peaked my curiosity. What did they do? They put Halloween decorations inside the habitats. You had novelty skeletons with the snakes, dragons with the lizards, haunted swamp signs with the alligators, and all sort of stuff like that. That was hilarious. I loved it. The funniest thing was a snake just chilling on the head of a novelty rat. It was great.

There's not too much else after this since it was getting late and was kind of close to the entrance. We went back up the main track to the entrance, passing by a cemetery thing with novelty head stones, things like "here lies Morgan who donated an organ" and "my name was Nate, and my problem was I was late." We stopped at the 2nd to last candy place and got some apples. We tried to do the butterfly house and the penguin house, but unfortunately they were closed for the night. That was a bit of a bummer since both of them are pretty cool. Oh well. As we were leaving we got our final candy from a stop at the exit. We went back to the car after going up the ramp to the bridge, took the family home, and then made our way home. All in all, great time, we'll probably do it again. Well this has been Pokematic, signing off, and bu-bye.