Julie's Beech Bend "Talk about Ghetto!" Photo TR

Beech Bend is only a little more than an hour north of my house, yet I hadn't been there since it was revitalized as an amusement park. My mom and I (once again) packed up the car on a Saturday afternoon and made the quick jaunt to Bowling Green, Kentucky so we could both see this park. We got the half day pass which was good for unlimited rides from 4:00pm to close (8:00pm today). When we arrived I saw a sign saying the Looping Star was closed, which meant a credit missed!! Being so close to home, I figured I'd be back at some point to pick that credit up later.

The first thing I did was the Rockin' Tug, which I'd never ridden before. It was such a fun little ride, and I can definitely see why so many parks have bought them up. They are fun, but not dizzying or nauseating. After that, I had to try my hand at the ultra ghetto Hillbilly Shootin' Gallery, and managed to get three gags out of 12 shots. Crazy stuff. The ferris wheel was loading, so I jumped on, but it was the ricketiest, scariest ferris wheel ever! It seemed to be straining under my weight, and I was the only person on it! I went around maybe twice before I flagged down the op and asked to get off. I picked up my Dragon Coaster credit next, then we both rode the Starship 3000, where the ride op was eating a hamburger while loading people into the ride!

Next for me was the Octopus, which had a really great horror paint job. What was even scarier was that it had a view of goats! Not petting zoo type display goats...but just goats that live on the land next to the park! Ghetto!! From there I rode the White Water express, which is like a log flume with two lifts and two drops. It was fun, and just my kind of log flume since I wasn't soaked when it was over!

We decided that it was time to grab a bite for dinner and check out the park food. The line for dinner was the longest we waited in all day (there hadn't even been a five minute wait to this point) and we waited probably 15-20 minutes for it. For $6.00, I got a cheeseburger about the size of one from McDonalds (and made with the same burgers they served in one of the meal plan cafeterias at MTSU...horrid!!!), a bottle of water and half an order of fries. When I was done, I told mom that we'd have to stop for a snack on the way home since that wasn't nearly a "dinner sized" meal.

We walked over to the other side of the park to check out the new Wild Mouse, and we found it surrounded with police line tape! How much more ghetto can you get, really? I must say, despite the ghetto surroundings, this is probably the best Wild Mouse I've ridden. I'm generally not a fan of that genre of coasters since they tend to be painful. But this one was smooth as glass, spun just enough in all the right places, and was heavily braked so I didn't end up with a bruised ribcage. It was really really fun! A great redeeming point for this park! And I must give kudos to Pat the Santa Clause looking ride op, because he saw a girl step over the police tape, and he woudln't let her ride until she walked back out and came in the right way down the path.

We then stopped to play some skee ball and a "toss the ball in the goblet" game, and I won a medium sized Patrick Star. I gave my skeeball tickets to a girl who appeared to be there by herself with her dad since I didn't give two flips about the low end prizes. Minigolf, which is included in the price, was next, and by the time we were done with the course, mom and I were both swearing and cursing the course, proclaiming our hatrid for mini golf hahaha. Ok, the course really wasn't that bad, but minigolf is really frustrating when you suck at it!!! Minigolf has to be the most frustrating pastime in the world.

After that mom wanted to do the chairswings, so we headed that way, where we found a ride op apparently taking a nap in one of the chairs! When I was done there, I went next door and did the happy fun slide of death a la Robb and Elissa hehe. Then I went one more time to ride the Wild Mouse while mom rode the Tilt-a-Whirl. I convinced mom to ride the Rockin' Tug with me, which she did, but she claimed it tipped her stomach, and she didn't like it. Whatever.

Next up was the Power Surge. I'd never ridden one and figured it looked like fun. It was ok...a little too high up for my comfort, and too disorienting. As we were walking out, the Flying Bobs was loading, so we got one last ride on that then headed for home. On the way home, we stopped at a Sonic for mozzarella sticks and a strawberry slush...nummy.

Overall the park isn't bad. The park has a great collection of flat rides, but oh...my...God...it is the most ghetto park I have ever seen in my life. Inattentive, preoccupied ride ops, rides plopped down on asphalt, and nasty, white trash, redneck looking people everywhere. At closing time, people had begun emptying the trash cans...but just left the bags to line the walkways! And the shirt and shoes required rule was absolutely not enforced outside the water park.

I'm not positive what impact a full sized woodie would have on this park...it'd be great to have, but I suspect people would leave thinking like I did..."They have a great woodie and a great wild mouse, but everything else is *so* ghetto!" I'm sure I'll be back since it's close to home, and the lines were completely non-existant, even on a Saturday in June. And for $10.50 I feel like I got more than my money's worth.

-Julie

This attire is obviously deemed completely acceptable at Beech Bend (and no, I wasn't in the water park when I took this).

Here is the ride op taking a nap in the chair swings.

Here is the ride op eating the hamburger while loading the Starship 3000.

I kick butt at skee ball

I'm not sure what's more ghetto...the fact that the nice, shiny new Wild Mouse sign is laying in a field, or that it's laying in a field *in front of a trailer park*???

Probably my favorite coaster picture to date. I was pretty much speechless when I first saw it, and still am.

Julie on the Happy Fun Slide of Death

Here's the Rockin' Raceway Diner. Ironic name aside, they were so slow in this place that that is probably a 30 minute line in that picture.

When I went to wash my hands, the dryer was so powerful, this is what it did to my hand!

The horror octopus with goats in the background.

Me getting my Dragon Coaster credit.

OMG! A man on a toilet in an outhouse! And that was my prize for shooting the target?!?! hahaha

The Hillbilly Shootin' Gallery. Looks disturbing enough on the surface, but lets take a closer look...

Julie... You have got to have some of the best "observation pictures" I have ever seen.

Shari "that park reminds me of Americana before it closed" Shoufler

... and this place is getting a GCI!

I had no idea about this place. Where did they get the money to pay off Clair? Did they rob the local 7-11?

Yes, this park is ghetto but I have to give them credit for REALLY trying to turn it around. Next year, when they have their GCI it will be a pretty good little park.

that last guy is a cops episode waiting to happen.

Whoa! Awesome TR! I picked up a brochure for BB on the way home from Chicago today and it actually made the park seem nice. HAHA! That makes my home park, Libertlyland, look better than that! I liked the wild mouse pics too!

^^That would explain the police tape!

That park was definetly ghetto. I stopped on my way home a couple weeks ago.

The looping star was just as ghetto. It's kind of nerve rattling when you go to get on a coaster and the ride op specifies which seats have working restraints(only a handfull).

I didn't get the mouse credit though(it wasn't yet open when I was there).

Though I'm kind of curious what the GCI is that they are getting. From the layout of the footers it doesn't look too big. It could very well be a family model, and not a super intense one.

But it was a bit hard to tell from the few looks I got.

What park will Julie visit next? What's around Nashville? Magic Springs? Holiday World?

It has really improved since I was there in 2002! I think in a couple of years they might have it looking like a real park. I hope to get there next year when the wooden coaster opens, I only live 2 hours away. From 1997-2001 I lived in Bowling Green, but I don't think Beech Bend was even open. Also the Looping Star is up for sale on Ital.

Heres a link: http://www.italintl.com/detail_page.php?record_id=448

-Jake

Sucks about missing my credit, but it was looking kinda beaten up anyway. It looked as though they were clearing land behind the Looping Star, so they might be getting rid of it to make way for the woodie. It's kinda in this odd little corner of the park anyway, and it doesn't face the pathway like it should.

What would help this park tremendously is to, first, tear up a lot of the asphalt and put down sod. A little more landscaping would make a big difference for this park. And second, to make a real restaurant where people can go in and sit in the air conditioning, instead of using carnival food stands and snack bars. Also enforcing a "must be in regular clothes when leaving the waterpark" rule like most other parks do would be geat for lowering the ghetto factor.

Oh, and as for my next park, you can expect a Nashville Valley Amusement Park report later in the week

-Julie

Wasn't Nashville Valley Amusement Park closed down? I only live half-an-hour away from it, and for some reason I've never been there . Ghetto parks, like NVAP, make me miss Opryland even more . I'm still hoping that Nashville will get that park full of giant Huss rides; I think it was going to be called Thrillopolis 8) .

I'm not sure if it was closed or not. The website is still up, but that doesn't mean much. Last I drove by it I thought I saw that the buckets had been put back on the ferris wheel, but I could have been wrong. Yeah, it's an even moe ghetto park than Beech Bend, but it has a credit that I don't have! Trying to get as many credits as I can before my major coaster trip in less than 2 weeks!

-Julie

^^ NASHVILLE VALLEY has gone out of business. That's what a Nashville local told me.

I don't know, maybe because I've been to a few really bad Six Flags I didn't think too badly of Beech Bend!!! LOL

It's not somewhere I'd go all the time, but I enjoyed my time there.

But the park was empty on a Sunday morning when I went in May so I could ride everything multiple times.

Surprisingly the little looping star or whatever it's called wasn't too rough. It's a traveling model, so I wasn't expecting much. The loop is pretty intense since it's so small.

The gravatron though felt like it was going to fly apart during my ride!!! Not the kind of scary I like on a thrill ride!!