Great America

We took our kids to Great America for the first time in August.  My husband loves roller coasters but we purposely waited to take them until they were big enough to go on some of the big rides.  Little Reader is officially tall enough for everything.  Little Hugger can go on some, and Little Man will go on some of the more adventurous little kid rides.  If your kids are close to the height minimums you can get them measured at the ticket counter and they get a wrist band proving their height so they don't need to be remeasured at each ride - saves a little time.  We didn't bother with any of the fast passes and don't think it would have been worth the money.

We got there shortly after the park opened and went on the Whizzer first.  It's a roller coaster tame enough for Little Man to go on, but fun enough that the rest of us enjoyed it too.  The drops weren't huge but it was fun.  He was a little scared in the beginning but asked to go on it a second time.





Little Reader went on X Flight with my husband while I waited with the younger ones.  It looks like a cool ride but the line was pretty long and even though Great America lets you do a kid swap (wait in line with your kids and then the parents take turns riding while the other waits with the kids) I wanted to save that for the rides I really wanted to go on - like Batman.

Little Hugger was very excited to go on the Demon - her first upside down roller coaster.  Little Reader had gone on it with my husband first and she went with us, sat in front and warned Little Hugger as to what was coming up.

We happened to bump into Little Reader's best friend when we went to lunch.  She had mentioned to her friend that we were going, and she had asked her parents if they could go to.  We stayed together for a little while but since her friend is a little shorter she wasn't tall enough to go on some of the same rides that our new coaster enthusiast wanted to go on.  Also I think she was a little scared to go on some of the bigger coasters.  She made a point of telling one of the park employees that she was too short to go on Vertical Velocity

I took Little Man and Little Hugger on the Little Dipper while Little Reader and my husband went on Vertical Velocity.  Then it was finally time for my favorite ride - Batman.  The line was long, but the kids were pretty good while waiting and Little Man was excited about seeing the batsuit at the end.  We did spend some time letting them run around at the play areas including the Hanna Barbera section.  There was really only one coaster that we didn't get to go on - Superman but we ran out of time.  The kids all agreed that they liked the rides better at Great America but Tivoli was a nicer park : )