Finding family fun at Frontier City

Posted by brandy

on June 20, 2009M at 11:27 pm

frontier-city-steel-lasso-chris-landsberger

Frontier City’s Steel Lasso (Photo by Chris Landsberger/The Oklahoman Archives)

My family and I spent about nine hours today at Frontier City theme park at Oklahoma City. The amusement park was the chosen spot for my husband’s company’s annual picnic for its employees, so we started out with a complimentary hot dog and brisket lunch and from there took in a day of rides, classic rock and overpriced refreshment.

It was our first trip to Frontier City in a few years, so it was the debut outing for my younger son, Gabe, 2 1/2. Frontier City is a nice local theme park, with about 50 rides, games and shows. It fills that need for close-to-home amusement park thrills, but we’re not sorry we sprung for Disney World last summer in Florida.

My husband, Patrick; older son, Chris, 14; and I rotating Gabe-sitting duties while we rode the roller coasters: the Diamondback, Silver Bullet, Wildcat and Steel Lasso. It was our first time to ride the Steel Lasso, the suspended track coaster that was put in last summer, and it was a fast, fun jaunt. (Since Chris doesn’t care for dangling his legs while speeding through a coaster, my husband and I strapped in for the Steel Lasso.)

Gabe took great pleasure in trying out the kiddie rides, especially the Tom-Tom swings and Flying Dragons. He didn’t much care for the Wild Kitty, the bumpy child-size version of the Wildcat, a rough and rugged wooden coaster.

We were able to ride together on the ferris wheel, carousel and the Tin Lizzies (old-fashioned cars that run on an electric track, so Gabe was able to live his dream of driving). Gabe even braved the log flume and absolutely loved it, which was wonderful, since we all wanted to ride that together.

All four of us also enjoyed the new sharp-shooting ride Quick Draw, in which you and your fellow passenger compete to see who can hit the most targets. Chris beat me, which is not surprising considering the huge difference in the amount of time and experience we invest in playing video games.

Quick Draw takes the place of the old, outdated haunted mine ride that I might feel a bit reminiscent about in a few years but was happy today to see replaced. However, as much as I think the Steel Lasso is a good addition, I still miss the giant swings (the grown-up version of the Tom-Tom swings Gabe loved so much) that were torn down to make room for the coaster.

Of course, the worst part about spending the afternoon at a theme park (or a festival, movie theater or pretty much any special event) is the high cost of food. We paid $5.75 for a funnel cake, $3.50 for iced tea and $3.50 for a waffle cone of soft serve. Sheesh, it’s almost enough to make you lose your appetite, which is why we actually decided to get a late supper outside the park rather than selling all our worldly possessions to eat dinner on the grounds.

But we didn’t let hunger or lighter wallets deter us from sticking around for the summer evening concert featuring ’70s rockers Grand Funk Concert. My review of the show appears in the next post.

-BAM

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