One hot summer day my friend’s family and I decided to take a day trip to Buffalo to go to Darien Lake. While we were at the park everyone was urging me to ride the roller coasters with them but I was so scared. We eased ourselves into the roller coasters by riding smaller rides first. After we had ridden all of the small rides I couldn’t hide any longer, I had to go on a roller coaster. We spent forever trying to decide which one would be the best one to ride and eventually we chose the Viper. After a while of watching the roller coaster climb up the hill only to fall back down again and loop around I decided to finally ride it. As we walked down the long winding path, my heart began to beat faster and faster. I finally made it down the path where I was hoping there was going to be a long line, but we only had one group of people before us. My friend and I watched them leave then it was our turn to get on. When we got into the seats my heart felt as if it were going to beat out of my chest. We pulled our lap bars down and heard them lock into place. I checked the harness over and over again until we finally left. The ride workers gave us the thumbs up and we were off. The climb up the hill for what felt like ages and hearing the clicking of the ride made me even more nervous. When we finally got to the top of the hill, I had never been so scared in my life. All of the riders went down the first drop and went upside down twice! All you could hear was the roaring of the cars on the track and the screams of people (including me). We went through a dark tunnel came out and went around more loops where they took our picture. All I could think the rest of the ride is “how stupid do I look in that picture?”. We finally pulled back up to the ride entrance and my friend asked me how it was. Surprisingly, I enjoyed it so much and wanted to ride it again. The ride was exhilarating and so much fun! I got off and looked at our picture and laughed so hard. Both me and my friend were screaming in the picture and it was hilarious. After riding the Viper, I gained the confidence to ride every single roller coaster at Darien Lake. When I came home and told my parents that I had actually gotten on a roller coaster they couldn’t believe it. After riding the roller coaster at Darien Lake, I was so happy that I had made myself ride it. To this day, roller coasters are one of my favorite things at theme parks. Riding all these roller coasters made me realize that fear is mostly an illusion and most of the time you work yourself up for no reason. Now I know that the roller coaster was never going to hurt me, but I had the idea in my head that scared me. Clearly, riding the Viper at Darien Lake was a good decision.