Green Mountain Amusement Park is the “detour” to which Mr. Hendersen had alluded. It has some of the biggest, fastest, and scariest rides in the state, and here they are, wandering around the fair grounds . . . huddling close together like a family of meerkats . . . as they plow through the normal Saturday afternoon amusement park crowd.
They come to “The Drop Tower” ride, where a “cage” holding twenty or so thrill-seekers is slowly raised up to a height of one hundred and fifty feet . . . and then unceremoniously dropped to the ground. As the ride is now in “mid-drop” our group stops to watch. One of the passengers on the ride lets out a loud high-pitched scream as she drops . . . prompting Missy to turn to Laurie and say:
Missy: G-sharp.
Laurie: Definitely.
And they move on. The first ride they decide to try is “The Jungle Rapids” ride, where they are given life preservers to put on and then are helped onto two large inflated white water rafts. They are soon bouncing around in the rafts as they surge over water swells and are rocked by waves. A bend in the river brings them to a relatively calm jungle habitat. Missy reaches over the side of the boat to splash the water a little when . . . a crocodile emerges from beneath the water’s surface and comes right at her . . . sending Missy recoiling back into the boat, where she knocks herself and Laurie over.
A couple of hippos can be seen wading in the river up ahead, and they spray water at the girls as they pass by. Sadie turns to Sandy and asks, “Can you spell hippopotamus?” Gorillas too accost our group, and there is another crocodile attack before they reach the end of the ride.
Next they try “The Screaming Swings” ride, where they are seat-belted into bucket-style swing seats that hang down from a large circular steel roof. And, as the carousel spins faster and faster, everyone is swung out to an almost horizontal level. Celeste is hoping that her swing doesn’t detach from its wires. Rachel looks out over the scenery and sees the Barclay bus in the parking lot . . . when the ride comes around to that side anyway.
After the screaming swings, they board “The Cosmos Ferris Wheel.”
The Ferris Wheel is generally regarded to be the first amusement park ride, and it is still . . . after all these years . . . a park favorite. This updated version of Mr. Ferris’ invention has medium-sized enclosed cars for the riders to sit in, and, as the giant wheel lifts them over two hundred feet above the ground, the cars are rocked to-and-fro. Laurie is afraid to look down . . . and for a good reason. This is the farthest she has ever been away from the good old earth.
Our group is in between rides now, and as they are walking along, a Hispanic woman and her young son brush up against them.
Son: Meta prisa a la madre . . . apresurar. (Hurry mama. Hurry.)
Mother: No tan Diego rapido, los paseos, ellos no van en ninguna parte. (Not so fast Diego. The rides, they are not going anywhere.)
And the girls sort-of improvise on this conversation.
Sadie: Pero los paseos, ellos van muy rapido. (But the rides, they are going very fast.)
Sandy: Y si usted no una muchacha buena, usted no conseguira ningunos paseos en absoluto. (And if you are not a good girl, you will get no rides at all.)
The girls: (laughter)
Missy: Y ningun algodon de azucar tampoco. (And no cotton candy either.)
The girls: (laughter)
Brooke: Entonces usted deberia hacer caso de sus maneras. (So you had better mind your manners.)
Jody: Aye Caramba! Mis pies me matan! (Aye Caramba! My feet are killing me!)
The girls: (laughter)
Our group of twenty-six fun seekers now try “The Pendulum” ride. The pendulum ride is, well, a pendulum . . . and a big one. The passenger car is attached . . . by swivels . . . to an arched frame just above it, and this frame is attached to a humongous steel girder, and the girder is attached . . . at its far end . . . to a giant counter balance weight. The riders are strapped in and the car starts to rock back and forth . . . looking like the pendulum of a grandfather’s clock. Soon, however, the car . . . and its passengers . . . are making the complete circle around . . . and that is when the screaming starts.
Carol, waiting in line as twelve of her classmates practice for their flight on Apollo 18, has second thoughts about going on, but decides “What the heck.”
The final ride of the day is “The Silver Streak” giant roller coaster. It isn’t the high-speed ride down the mountain-like slope that bothers Mr. Hendersen the most. Oh, it’s scary enough . . . and he screams right along with the girls . . . but it is the slow climb up that unnerves him. It’s the suspense that gets to him.
After the rides, everyone enjoys some “junk food” as they walk back to the bus. On the bus ride back to the school, the girls realize that . . . in all the excitement . . . they had forgotten all about the big exam they had taken earlier in the day. “I guess” Carol says out loud, “that everybody will know how we did come Monday morning.”