The first weekend of June was a REALLY BIG DEAL.
Let me explain.
My husband has been obsessed with roller coasters ever since he was a little boy. In fact, we joke about it now, but 13 years ago, on the day we met, one of the very first questions Derrick asked me was if I liked roller coasters. Thankfully, I said that I did – otherwise, our conversation would have ended right then & there and we would have gone our separate ways.
Fast forward a few years – we had gotten married & every once in a while, I liked to play this little “game” with Derrick. I would pull up the hashtag #rollercoaster on Instagram, and find the most obscure photos I could find. I’d show these photos to Derrick & I was constantly amazed that 99.99% of the time, he knew the name of the coaster & where it was located.
This little game led me to encourage Derrick to start his own roller coaster Instagram account. It was the perfect outlet for his roller coaster knowledge. I had been taking photos of roller coasters for him since 2008, but now I kicked it up a notch as he needed new content for his Instagram on a daily basis.
One thing led to another & a short while later, Derrick started his own YouTube channel. It was just another outlet to share his knowledge & his passion (some might say: obsession) with roller coasters.
And so, for the past 5 years, Derrick has been carving his place in the roller coaster community. His knowledge & consistency in sharing content have been constantly pulling him higher & higher among the “roller coaster influencer” ranks. (In other words, more and more people recognize Derrick when we go to amusement parks! He’s like a celebrity & it’s both weird & really fun!)
I’ll never forget – while we were traveling last year – Keys to the Kingdom (a roller coaster enthusiast event put on by Kentucky Kingdom) took place & photos of the event flooded our Instagram feeds. I said to Derrick: “Did you want to go to Keys to the Kingdom?” and he responded, “Sure that would’ve been fun – but truly: I’d really love to be on the panel there instead of just attending.” We both kind of chuckled: wouldn’t it be amazing if next year (in 2021), Derrick COULD see that dream become a reality?
Well, spoiler alert: it happened.
Derrick was invited to be on the panel to chat about roller coasters & so we very excitedly made plans to attend Keys to the Kingdom! Because we would have our kids with us, we decided not to get tickets to Holiday World’s coaster enthusiast event: Holiwood Nights (which takes place the day before), but we did visit Kings Island on our way down to Kentucky Kingdom.
My sister, Ruby, came along with us to help out with the kids (since we knew that Derrick would be tied up most of the day with Keys to the Kingdom stuff). And we had a blast! The kids loved having Auntie Ruby along for the trip!!
I am SO proud of Derrick & how far he’s come – from just sharing endless roller coaster knowledge with me – to now sharing his knowledge with the whole world. It was SO exciting to have so many people recognize him, to want to talk to him, to snap photos with him – it was a HUGE highlight of our 2021 so far!! Enjoy a little peek into our weekend!!
Click here to watch our vlog and then keep scrolling to see some photos!!
[…] “home park”) this year, but he was also asked to be on a panel of roller coaster enthusiasts at Keys to the Kingdom – a big roller coaster event held at Kentucky Kingdom every year! It was mind-blowing to see Derrick sit in front of a group of hundreds of enthusiasts […]