Parents' Outrageous Backyard Roller Coaster Goes Viral
Forget about begging your parents for a trip to Disney World, all the two children of one Ohio couple have to do is ask their mom and dad to play in the backyard.
There, they have their very own roller coaster at their disposal, built by hand by their parents, Jon and Natasha Cain. The Lancaster, Ohio, couple engineered and constructed the ride on their own using just wood, concrete and PVC pipe.
They built the coaster in the summer of 2009 for their daughter, Olyvia, and son, Samual, and captured them on camera enjoying the thrill of the ride two years later, they told ABC News.
The Cains posted their video on YouTube earlier this year, and it has now become a viral sensation with more than 500,000 views.
The video shows Jon Cain pushing Samual through the 12-second ride as he lets out squeals of delight.
The 12-foot-high roller coaster, full of twists and turns, took the couple three weeks to build, they told Yahoo! News.
The total cost of $700 more than doubled an original estimated budget of $300, but still clocked in at far less than a family trip to a theme park.
In an interview with ABC News, Cain said her children enjoyed the homemade attraction.
"My daughter was three when we built it and she loved it. At first, she was hesitant, but not scared," she said.
Now 6 years old, Olyvia is too big to go over the roller coaster's highest point, but she can ride over the smaller hill, Cain said.
The Cains are now building themselves a new home. It's a log cabin and, not surprisingly, they're building it themselves.
Neither of the Cains - Jon is 29, and Natasha, 23 - has an engineering background. They run a car dealership, but enjoy putting things together, Natasha Cain said.
"We did talk about doing a Ferris wheel at the new house … not like a ginormous one, just one that you could manually do," she said.