How strange to be shooting upwards at 100 m.p.h., looking down on what used to be the tallest coaster on the planet. Looking down upon it as if it were a pile of lincoln logs.

The park's new thriller, Superman: The Escape, opened up to the public in March of this year after a highly publicized year-long delay. The LSM-powered ride (Linear Synchronous Motors) was only operating at half-performance for some time. But all thoughts of that period seemed to be banished from my head upon first seeing one of those cars rocket up that huge tower.

Upon entering the Fortress of Solitude, one has the choice to head left or right depending on which of the two tracks you wish to ride. They're perfectly identical, but the left side will give you a great view of one side of the mountain while the other will give you a great view of the other side of the mountain.

If your eyes are open, that is.

Deep within the misty, icy confines of the enclave, you're greeted with a hologram effect, music cues from the films, a bizarre sort of ice sculpture and finally--the pre-loading area. It's here that the adrenalin anxiety kicks in, if it hasn't already done that in the parking lot upon first site of the towering 415 foot beastie.

The designers have cleverly isolated the launch area from the queue, though they made no efforts to sound-proof the chamber. Few coasters have distinguishing sounds like the dramatic turbine roar of Superman: The Escape.When the doors finally open, we filed into the launch chamber to find four rows; three that accomodate four bodies and one (the front row) that will take three. The cars are no frills vehicles with huge wheels and a flat red coat of paint. Rivets stand out along the sides of the car. It looks like the coaster-train equivalent of a Humvee. The seats and headrests are incredibly comfortable though. I suppose they have to be when you're screaming along from 0 to 100 m.p.h. in a little over six seconds.Once I had set aside everything that didn't need to go with me on this journey, I looked at the guy next to me who was sort of hyperventilating and said--"here we go".

It's a sort of sick, pneumatic whine that accompanies your screaming exit from the station. A smooth acceleration that nails the 100 m.p.h. mark just about at the base of the tower. With head pushed firmly against the head rest, we soared straight up towards the big Superman figure that stands at the top of the tower. I didn't want to see Superman though, I wanted to see how high we were--so I turned my head to the side and that's when I saw Colossus, looking completely and utterly insignificant down below.

Koolacious.

Then, we were falling back and hitting the 100 m.p.h. zone again before the LSM reverse-thrusters took hold and we cruised backwards into the launch area. The guy next to me looked over and we both agreed that the hour-long wait was worth the thrill.

The stats on this monster have been thrown around so much that they're practically committed to memory--but you don't think about stats as you're shooting forward to say "howdy" to the tallest steel coaster tower on the planet.

I worked at this park for a year before moving out to Florida and had a lot of fun working on rides like Psyclone, Ninja, Jet Stream, Metro and having a great load of friends who, I discovered, have gotten themselves married with kids. How some things change. The park has changed quite a bit too. What used to be an idea for a country-club sort of resort turned into one of the hottest coaster parks in the world, with screamers like Revoloution, Viper, Freefall, Flashback, Batman to add to the list of others mentioned above. The new Superman plaza allows even better viewing of the classic Arrow mine train The Gold Rusher.

On a surprisingly breezy day, I gathered up the equipment, got some more glamour shots of the newest SFMM acquisition and headed south to San Diego. It would be a long-drive.

But my heart was still pumping from my kiss with the sky.