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im pretty sure there is a skunk living under boulder dash. i thought i smelled it while riding, but sure enough during my sunset stroll down the footpath along the ride not too far from the turnaround was the undeniable olfactory twang of a skunk. it shouldnt come as too much of a surprise because the setting of boulderdash is not unlike the setting of a nice hilly hiking trail. how our little coaster skunk can get about to general foraging business with all that racket goes to show the ingenuity of animals and im sure that with the exception of the growling PTC trains that pass through the area this skunk is the master of that side of the mountain. and speaking of ingenuity, damn was i impressed with boulder dash, holy smokes! what a unique work of ride engineering. while indeed the park may have saved money on timber costs, im sure they put in quite a bit extra for R&D. it would have been a hell of a lot easier to put a big fast woody on a flat midway somewhere. not only is the coaster magnificently paced and virtuistically engineered in terms of pure ride experience, but the custom fit into the hillside is downright clever and without peer, IMO. it is no small feat that they built and continue to maintain this ride on a steep and jagged, rocky glade. there are no obvious roadways or footpaths under the ride as on the beast and grizzly, and it may have just as well have built by beavers (though the cement piles may surpass beaver technology). while the engineering prowess of the creators and the formidable skills of the construction team may not eclipse the classic marvels of structural innovation as the taj mahal and the brooklyn bridge, it is still damn awesome. and unlike the two aformentioned architectural masterpieces, grueling slave labor was not necessary to complete the project and no lives were lost (i assume). although im sure that many people from BDs construction team at the very least got poison ivy, cause i definitely saw a bunch of it from the lifthill. the ride itself is a decidedly modern wooden coaster ride. it does not have the crude ejector drops of the cyclone or the spasming burps of the phoenix. like most modern woodies ive been on, it isnt really about flatulent seat launches (exception being el toro). it is much more in line with the turn-of-the millenium woody style of rambuctiously agile swooping lines and designs that seem to unfold into deeper and deeper layers of profound speed and ultimately careen into cathartic finales. the old, raunchier style and the new, more precise extreme speed designs both have their plusses and minuses and boulder dash certainly has many plusses. the first drop is fantastic from the rearmost seat. i dont love curving drops off of chainlifts but this one snaps the back car over into a nice hand-chopper with several trees hanging just over the track. the first two curves, especially the one that buzzes the station, are outrageously forceful and f**king ridiculously fast. these two curves rattle and pulsate like a wooden coaster should and they feel more than any other part of the ride that the train could rip itself right off of the rails, fly through the air and then roll down the hill taking out the restrooms, carousel, and theatre before rolling into the lake and splashing all of the water out of it. this ride is certainly not the smooth snappy fox it was in its inaugural season. there are multiple lateral slams and a few potholes and jackhammers on boulder dash that are extremely brutal and gloriously painful. i both hit and WAS HIT BY other riders on each ride i took. my brain was still quivering inside of my skull each time i came drifting back into the station. it may not be easy maintaining this ride, and time is slowly taking its toll, but with that said it still screams into the final brakes and the park at this point has not trimmed the ride at all. in spite of the nasty ride you get on boulder
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