John has given me permission to share his narration of our trip to Dreamworld. At the time of writing, John was 12 years old and has had no to little formal writing instruction, although he is quite widely read for his age. I have left it complete with grammar and spelling errors but I have removed the names of the friends that accompanied us, for their privacy.

(Be warned…this is long although you won’t see me complain! 😉 He enjoys writing, which is good. It means I have something to work with. As yet, we have not gone over this writing and edited it…it was more of a freewrite than a formal exercise. He makes a common mistake, just like me, in that he changes tenses.)

DreamWorld
28th October, 2007.

Yesterday, the 28’th of October, 2007, we went to DreamWorld. Today, the 29’th, I’ll tell you about it.

We woke up, got ready, and piled the Esky into the car. We get in our seats. Dad turns the keys. The tension builds up! Dad turns the keys a bit more, and the car doesn’t start. So, Dad and Mum went to buy jumper leads. We rolled the Van down the driveway, then the Ford, and we connected the batteries together. Then, Dad turned on the car and it starts. Finally, after forty minutes, we start moving. We stopped of at a petrol station, fueled up, and set off again. We stopped at the Heston’s house, picked up Nathan and Lauren, and we set off for DreamWorld. The seating places were simple. Girls in the front-back, boys in the back-back. In a van, you have three sets of chairs. We call the front ones the “front”, the middle ones the “front-back”, and the back ones the “back-back”.

We got to DreamWorld uneventfully, and parked in a lone park somewhere near the gates. We got out, walked up to the gates and prepared ourselves for the lineup that was sure to come. And it did come. After fifteen minutes, we got into DreamWorld, and we split into three groups. ‘Master C’ , Mum and Dad together. ‘Miss A’ N and L together, and Beck and myself (that’s John, by the way) together. Beck and myself traveled to the Giant Drop, where we waited in-line for ten or so minutes before we got on. On the Giant Drop, you travel 120 metres at a slow rate, and then you wait for around two minutes. After those two minutes have past, hold on tight. You plummet to the ground super fast – fast enough to leave your stomach at the top, anyway – and scream till your mouth bursts from the pain of having it open to long. After falling for around thirty seconds, it suddenly slows down and then you’re at land again. You walk off feeling pale and scared, then you go toward a gift shop to see your silly picture of you holding on to the rails for dear life. Now that it is over, you laugh at your picture. You weren’t laughing when you came down, I would like to guess! At the gift shop, you can either print your photo or just look at the silly faces you and your chair mates were bound to make. This ride is fun when it’s over, fun while it is at the top, but not fun while going down. Going on this ride after lunch is a stupid idea, unless you like the taste of vomit.

The next ride Beck and myself went on was the Tower of Terror. I had my eyes closed the whole time on this ride, so I will not be able to explain much, but I’ll do my best. First, we walked through a skull door and into a airconditioned metalic room. Waiting inline wasn’t too bad with the airconditioner. When the line started moving a bit, we saw ourselves walking over a city (a city out of clay/cement, of course) on a small glass platform that looked like it would break any second. But hey, if it could hold the person infront of us (who was rather weight challenged), it could hold us. After walking over that, we found ourselves in a red “spooky” room. It wasn’t spooky, but that was the effect they were trying to get across. In here, the airconditioning ended. It was boiling in this room, and we couldn’t wait to get out of it. We were in there for over twenty minutes. That’s the thing with DreamWorld. More time inline than inride. Once we finally got out, we walked onto some red chairs, strapped ourselves in and then suddenly the cart we were in sped off at 160 kilometres per hour. After three or more painful seconds, you get to the rise. You start climbing up a tower almost thirty eight stories high. This was freaky. Actually, it wasn’t freaky for me, because I didn’t see a thing. Sorry I can’t explain better, but I just couldn’t open my eyes or take my hands of the bar to wave them in the air like the “idiots” on the side of me. I only thought them to be idiots because they were screaming in my ear louder than my sister, and she screams loud. Too loud, in my opinion. Anyone who goes to DreamWorld has to go on this ride. Also, if they could please send their picture to me, I would be happy. My picture wasn’t too happy, though. This is even worse than the Giant Drop.

After we went on that one, that freaky one, we traveled into the Wiggle World. Uhh…lets just say, we were out faster than the Giant Drop drops. I can still hear “potato salad! Yeah, potato salad!” in my ear. We found ourselves in the water area. Having no bathers, we walked out, but not before a ride on the Reef Diver. Beck and myself thought this would be a nice relaxing ride. Hah! Relaxing my…err, hat. We thought it would only spin around, like a merry go round. It didn’t, it span around peacfully then rised itself to almost the hight of a three story building. Here’s the description of it on DreamWorld’s website:

“Forget the flippers, you won’t need them on this giant vertical whirlpool of fun”

They really could have taken the time to get a better description for one of DreamWorld’s best rides.

After we went on that, we went to Mick Doohan’s (or something like that.) “moto-coaster“. Actually, we didn’t go on till over an hour of waiting inline. Ridiculous, to say the least. After our boring one hour of waiting inline, we finally got on. I had my leg in the wrong way, so the whole fifty seconds (you heard me right. One hour waiting for fifty seconds) was painful more than you could imagine. This ride was, I’m sorry to say, pathetic. Too slow, too painful, and not worth the wait. After this silly ride, we went back for lunch, and found everyone else there. We bought a Frozen Coke, and sat down. The frozen coke was nice after three or more merciless hours in the hot sun, but it was expensive in comparison with the MacDonald’s one.

After lunch Dad took all of us to the Tower of Terror. ‘Master C’ started crying and crying because he was scared of the ride, even though he went on it before. Finally we got him to go on it (he didn’t really have a choice) and again, I closed my eyes. If I ever go on that ride again, I will keep my eyes open, I promise! Then, I will give you a good description.
After that blood thrilling ride that almost made me vomit, Beck, L and myself went out together and we went on the Claw twice, then we went on the Reef Diver. The girls wanted to be by themselves, and I wanted to be by myself too. This time, it wasn’t as scary. Last time, Beck must has been rocking the carriage, because this time I was fine except Beck and L screaming in the carriges infront of me.

After that, we went into the Vortex, whereupon we found ‘Miss A’ and N inside. The Vortex span around rather fast, I don’t know how fast though. It span around so fast that you couldn’t remove your hand from the side of it, though I’m sure it was the shape as well. It was shaped like the classic “UFO” that aliens drive in sci-fi movies.

After that, we went on the Cyclone. “Cyclone is one of the tallest high-speed gravity roller coasters in the Southern Hemisphere.” is a good description for this ride. I had my eyes closed this whole ride, so I can’t exactly tell you what it was like, but I can tell you I had my head bashed around quite a bit especially on those 360 loops. got off this ride uneventfully, and the pictures the computer took had my eyes open! I must have blinked them open suddenly. If I can do the Cyclone, I can do anything!

After the Cyclone, we went on The Claw again. I should probably explain this ride, as it is one of the “thrill rides”, so I will go on about it now.The Claw is a 360 swinger and spinner that often swings you to over nine stories high, and pushes you around seventy-five km/h in ten or so blood curdling swings. This is not as bad as the Tower of Terror, and it is no where near as high, but it is still not one for after a meal.

After we went on The Claw for the last time, also the last time The Claw would go around that day, we went back to the center of DreamWorld. It was nearing five-o clock, so we headed for the car. We got to the car and drove to the H’s house. We dropped off N, and L came home with us.

Well, that’s about all that happened yesterday, and I hope people can understand my weird style of writing and spelling mistakes.

Here’s an overall summary:

I think DreamWorld was a fun experience, and I am glad that Dad took us there. Thanks, Dad! At the end of the day, we were all tired but content.

My favourite rides were the Tower of Terror, The Claw, and the Reef Diver. The Giant Drop comes close in fourth.

I liked the Tower of Terror for it’s blood thrilling, freaked out type of style. I liked the Claw for it’s swinging motion, that made me feel sick but freaked out when I looked down. I liked the Reef Diver for its very small line up and peaceful but “scary” ride. And it should be obvious why I liked the Giant Drop. If it’s not obvious, I like the Giant Drop for its adrenaline rushing, blood-pumping fall.

Freewriting: Bravewriter and Heart of Wisdom