Upchuck on the Viper

Upchuck On the Viper

One of the greatest lessons I learned as a teenager, one that my family and hundreds of strangers will never forget, is never, never ride a roller coaster on a full stomach.

As a young child and teenager, our family spent four weeks every summer visiting my father's relatives in sunny California. I sometimes feel as if I grew up in Modesto, seeing that we traveled there every summer for sixteen years of my life. As dreary as it sounds (like who wants to vacation in California every year?), we had some really great times. In fact, every summer my sisters and I anxiously awaited for the one day the whole family visited Six Flags Magic Mountain near Los Angeles. Magic Mountain is our favorite theme park. It is filled with a variety of different rides, food, and entertainment that come together to make a day with our family worth remembering.

Before arriving at the theme park that morning, my uncle Rod who managed the Denny's near the park invited the family to a free breakfast at the restaurant. My father, never one to pass up a free meal, dutifully accepted his offer. Since the meal was free, and we could have "anything we wanted," according to my uncle, I decided I would sample all the pancakes with unique toppings on them. My mother, hearing what I ordered, told me that it was foolish to eat so much food before going on the rides at the park. I told her not to worry because I was young and I could handle it. She just smiled and said, "Ok." Little did I know that I would soon live to regret that statement and all those pancakes.

As we entered the park, my mother barked out "the rules" which included a check in every two hours in which "we had better be there or else", threat. Rolling our eyes and testily saying "yes mom," my sisters and I were free to have fun. We strolled through the park looking for new attractions and games since our last visit just the year before. Inspection complete, we made a list of rides and attractions to see first, rating them from greatest to NOT! Then off we went for a day of ecstasy.

About the time we truly started to have fun (with the long lines and all), it was time to rendezvous with the folks at the covert location programmed into us when our mother was barking out the rules. Although I had only been on approximately three rides, I was neither nauseous nor tired from my pancake gorge.

As was tradition, every year at the park, my family and I would get together and ride what we thought was the scariest, most death defying ride the park had. Today, like last year, we rode ‘The Viper." While we waited in line to ride the viper, my sisters and I made bets with each other on who would scream first or the loudest while navigating the steel beast. Annoyed with our endless teasing of each other, my mother would yell at us to be quiet and act like ladies. As we approached the head of the line, my dad jokingly asked me if I would be ok, knowing that just a mere three hours before, I had stuffed myself at Denny's courtesy of my uncle Rodney. "No, I'm fine," I announced.

At last our turn came and one by one we climbed into the viper's car. The ride was designed to carry its riders in pairs so I decided to sit next to my younger sister knowing she would suffer defeat and scream first. Behind us sat my mother and older sister along with my father and a nice stranger at the rear of them. Nestled and locked into our seats nice and tight, the Viper began to roll.

Higher and higher, we rose up this seemingly endless track of the Viper with the car making a squeaking and clanking noise as we ascended up the glaring red track until we reached the top of the steel giant. With the sun shining in my eyes, I didn't know how high we were until the coaster reached the top of the peak, and I saw everything within a ten mile radius. My jaw dropped to see how high we were. Even though we had just been here the year before, I had forgotten how high up it actually went. The car made a slow eerie right turn and approached the first drop of the roller coaster. The drop is a heart-pounding dive that takes one ninety degrees straight down two hundred feet on a steel track. It is a fall of death for some and the thrill of a life time for countless others.

Inching closer and closer to the drop, I began to regret my decision of getting on this ride. Seeing my sister's eyes widen as the red and yellow car met the tip of the fall, I felt the ride suspending us hanging on the end of the drop for a few seconds to add to the suspense. My heart rate increased and then in a blink of an eye, we went soaring down the track. The screams of the people on the ride made my ears ring as we soared farther down the track. Air was blowing my hair back and drying my eyes as if someone was holding a hair dryer to them. Then the roller coaster made a hurling upside-down loop into a swift sharp left turn causing my stomach to churn