10 Favorite Dutch Wonderland Attractions

Just the other day, Fox News posted their list of 10 Best Attractions at Dutch Wonderland. It seems like an odd choice for an article by a national website and just like the Fox News we're all come to love and admire on television, the story has more than one factual inaccuracy. Either way, the article made me think, "Well, I should do a list of favorite DW attractions!" Just about every attraction at the park is hit with one member of my family or another, but this is a sampling of the things I enjoy most at the Lancaster park...

Astroliner  Long before every theme park had a motion simulator ride and even before Disney perfected the art by taking us on a Star Tour into the Star Wars universe, the Astroliner would provide similar thrills by rocking back and forth while a movie showed an out of control space mission on the cockpit screen. This ride would pop up at carnivals and beach-side amusement areas and I loved it. Whenever I saw one of these set up, I would beg my parents to let me ride it. I even have fond memories of riding it at Dutch Wonderland when I was little.  Dutch Wonderland installed the ride in the 70's and tried to sell it shortly before 2000. When they couldn't find a buyer, DW decided to spruce up the ride and present it as a piece of amusement park history. Now the ride serves as one of the parks more unique attractions.  The 8mm rear projection film has been replaced with a wide screen TV and a DVD of the original film, but the experience is still good old fashioned fun. (There's a more modern version of the ride, the VR Voyager, housed right across from this amusement park antique.)

Decades of Dutch Wonderland Dutch Wonderland offers quite a bit of live entertainment for a park of it's size. As season pass holders for three years I've probably seen at least a dozen different shows in the park. To celebrate the park's 50th Anniversary in 2013 they added Decades of Dutch Wonderland which offers a brief history of the park but a pretty darn good soundtrack of hits from the 60's through today. Most of the musical show offerings at DW consist of a two person cast, Decades benefits from four live actors as well as Duke The Dragon (who doesn't sing, but he can dance!) The show basically plays like a mini-concert and if you look around in the middle of the show, you'll see more than one parent tapping their feet or bobbing their head to this great collection of songs.

Double Splash Flume This is a fairly standard Log Flume style ride but it is a nice one, where the track sits in the ground instead of above like most others. The ride has two drops, the first one is small but produces a surprising splash. The ride out to the main lift is enjoyable. There used to be statues of animals and a mist tunnel along the way but the animals have retired and the mist shut off. You still get a nice scenic trip with great views of the roller coaster and a nice way to cool off without getting drenched. It's also nice that there is no height restriction so the whole family can ride together.

Dragon's Lair This is one of the park's earliest attractions, even though it has been altered greatly since opening day. Little log boats, similar to the ones on the log flume ride, take you on a nice relaxing ride around a small lake in the front of the park. There's not much action here, just an experience similar to renting a boat for an afternoon and peacefully cruising the local lake. The boat is guided by an underwater rail, but steering wheels on each log boat give kids the opportunity to drive. There are a few animated and non-animated pretend animals along the way before entering the dragon's lair itself. The dragon in question, is Duke, the park's lovable mascot represented by a huge audio animatronic that pops up out of his mountain home every so often to laugh and sing. Once you are greeted by Duke, you boat takes a quick tour of inside his mountain for a brief glimpse and a look at Dutch Wonderland's own "back side of water."

Exploration Island Last year, Dutch Wonderland took a neglected portion of their park (a large island along the back end of the park) and spruced it up into one of the most modern and heavily themed areas of the entire park. Exploration Island is now the home to 20 audio-animatronic dinosaurs that you can visit along Prehistoric Path, a short walking trail with great views of the various dinosaurs. Some of them are animated, some of them make noise, some you can ever control. None of the dinos are too tall or frightening keeping the parks target audience in mind. A nice touch is that similar attractions at other area parks have an additional entrance fee - but at DW, the dinosaurs are included with every admission ticket. The dinosaurs are also visible from the islands two other rides; the Gondola Cruise and the newly renovated Sunoco Turnpike - which was moved from the middle of the park to the island and expanded to triple in length. Exploration Island is also where you will find Dino Dig, three large sandbox areas where kids can use excavation tools to uncover dinosaur fossils. The entire island experience is enhanced with terrific atmospheric music and sound effects as well as it's own dino-filled gift shop.

Kingdom Coaster  You wouldn't expect a real, honest-to-goodness roller coaster at such a little kiddie oriented park, but Dutch Wonderland's wooden coaster is the real deal. A family coaster that provides every bit of fun as a bigger coaster, just minus the first drop. Kingdom Coaster was the first project of Custom Coasters International back in 1991. Since then, CCI has gone on to be the largest manufacturer of wooden coasters in the world. The coaster hits speeds of 40 MPH and features plenty of air time, sharp curves and a pretty intense helix near the end of the ride.  In the evening hours of the park, it's not uncommon to be able to stay on the ride and go multiple trips without getting off the train. Sometimes they don't even slow the train down through the station - and that's a unique experience you'll never get at a bigger park.  On more than one occasion, the kids and I rode 5 times without stopping - nowadays one trip around at a time is enough for me!

Monorail Not many parks have a monorail, in fact Dutch Wonderland was one of the first to have one after Disneyland.  Dutch Wonderland's monorail leaves a very vintage looking station in the middle of the park and travels a loop around most of the grounds. You'll get a bird's eye view of the adjoining Mill Stream Campground as well as some of the behind the scenes areas of the park. The monorail also travels through the park's wooden roller coasters at a couple different points. The ride also takes you out of the castle walls and into the parking lot through an old abandoned monorail station and out along Rt. 30 in front of the park. Kids often have a fun time finding the family car in the parking lot. This is another of the park's great relaxing rides and I'm happy to announce that as of mid-2015, there is a new (updated) recording that plays in each monorail car to accompany your ride.

Tug Boat Sadly, the Tug Boat (and it's sister vessel the Lady Gay) has been out of commission for the entire 2015 season. The park's website listed the attraction as temporarily closed until recently when it stated the ride would be shut down for the entire season. The Tug Boat was just another boat ride, that actually traveled the same path as the Gondola Cruise, just along the outside of the island. What set the Tug Boat apart from all the other boat rides at Dutch Wonderland is that it was a free floating boat that did not ride on a track or rail, and required a real boat captain to pilot the ship alone the Mill Stream Creek. It was a great ride though, that allowed you to take in more of the surrounding nature than the other boats allow. This ride was a favorite of my kids as well, and we hope it makes a comeback before our season passes expire.

The Wonderers Music plays such a key role in the theme park/amusement park experience and few things can top a live band strolling the grounds. The Wonderers are a 4-5 piece band that stroll throughout the park playing classic kiddie tunes, a few hits you might recognize from the radio and they have more than one Disney song up their sleeves. The best place to catch the guys is in front of the One Room School House, next to the Off-Road Rally. There they often stop a play a few numbers before continuing a loop around the park. We've also seen them stop in front of the Celebration Theater. One of our favorite bits is a TV theme song medley they do, where guests shout out the names of the shows to each theme. The Wonderers also make an appearance at the daily 5:30 Funsation Celebration show and every night at the exit of the park at closing time. This is a group of talented guys you won't want to miss.

Wonderland Special   Man, I loves me some amusement park trains! Dutch Wonderland has an especially nice miniature train ride. The excursion starts off with a trip through an abandoned diamond mine before making it's way out into the park and zig-zaging through the grounds showing off most of the park's offerings. The train even goes over an old fashioned authentic Amish covered bridge. The station for the train is the very first thing you see upon entering the park, so the lines can get quite long at the beginning of the day. On days where the lines are long, DW is able to run two trains at a time to cut down on the wait.

My 10 Favorite Hersheypark Attractions



The WWoB Staff

A few weeks ago I took my boys to Hersheypark in nearby Hershey, PA. We spent the whole day there, arriving just as the gates opened at 10:00am and returning to the parking lot after the park closed at 10:30pm. There's a lot of great stuff at Hersheypark, even though the majority of the rides are typical carnival style rides you can find at dozens of other parks - Hersheypark does have plenty of charms that are all their own. I'm a fan of old school and more traditional theme park attractions as well as goofy things in parks too. Here's my list of 10 favorite attractions at The Sweetest Place on Earth!

Capital BlueCross Monorail First of all, the fact that Hersheypark has sold the naming rights to a handful of their rides is just a delight. Second, I love monorails. From Disney's world class transportation system down to ever the shuttle at an airport - monorails are good times in my book. Hershey's monorail serves strictly as entertainment purposes, with open air cars that travel not just around the treetops of the amusement park but also beyond the park fence and into the city of Hershey itself. The monorail makes a loop outside the park, offering riders a view of the town's famed Hershey Kiss street lights and the former Hershey Chocolate factory that Milton Hershey built over 100 years ago. Another highlight for an amusement park nerd (such as myself) is the ride past the mysterious unused Monorail station that sits outside of Hersheypark about half way through the ride. The station is almost a carbon copy of the one used inside the park - I assume at one time the monorail was used as a preview of Hersheypark for those not yet inside the park. Who knows!? (Nearby Dutch Wonderland once employed the same method with their monorail.) The monorail also glides over ZooAmerica, Hersheypark's separate but connected North American Zoo. The entire trip is accompanied by a delightful recording that not only tells the history of Hersheypark and the surrounding area, but also extols the virtues of Capital BlueCross health insurance.

Carrousel Hersheypark's carrousel is the real deal - a beautiful antique merry machine made up of all wooden hand carved horses and chariots. The ride was installed in 1944, it was bought used and actually dates back to 1919! The music is provided by a 1926 Wurlitzer Band Organ, which is a real treat. As someone who pays attention to such things - most parks not use prerecorded carrousel music, but there is nothing like the sound of one of these actual machines in action. The carrousel is not only beautiful but large and fast. It's a great ride, and the first one you'll encounter when entering Hersheypark!

Chevrolet Music Box Theatre  Hersheypark puts on some top notch live entertainment in their huge indoor theater. This season they offer two different shows; during the day is a rock oriented song and dance revue and in the evening hours three pianist duel it out. In addition to seeing a good show, it's also a nice opportunity to take a load off your feet in the air conditioning.

 

Comet  The Comet is Hersheypark's oldest roller coaster. Commissioned by Mr. Hershey himself, the classic out-and-back style coaster was built in 1946. It's amazing that a ride built that long ago can still hold up against any ride built today, but it does! The first drop and it's subsequent climbs and dips provide just as many thrills as any of the parks other coasters. This old timer won't make you sick or leave you hanging on for dear life, but it will make you scream and it will put a smile on your face. The layout of the track provides a nice long ride. This is a great coaster!

Dry Gulch Railroad  Bob Howdy, I do enjoy me some amusement park trains. Hershey's is a cute little miniature railroad which doesn't circle the park, like most theme park trains, but instead travels over it's own terrain. There's a miniature recreation of a classic train bridge and a little western town which you travel through. The town even has a few gags and animations that are still performing after all these years. You also get to ride past the engine yard where the train is stored and cared for. This is an above average amusement park train experience.

Hershey's Great American Chocolate Tour  Perhaps the most unique ride at Hersheypark, isn't actually inside Hersheypark. This elaborate and massive ride through of a simulated Hershey Chocolate factory is technically inside Chocolate World, just outside of Hersheypark's admission gates. Chocolate World is the largest corporate welcome center in the county, consisting of shops, eateries, shows and this great ride. The ride takes you on an Omni-mover tour of the chocolate making process from cocoa bean to the wrapped and ready to eat delicious final product. After the tour, everyone gets a free piece of chocolate! Any ride that gives you free candy is just begging to be put on a Top 10 List. Chocolate World is an attraction unto itself and is open year 'round, but you'll also pass it on your way in and out of Hersheypark. (It's usually open an hour later than the theme park so you can visit on your way out.)

Kissing Tower   Named for it's windows in the shape of the famous Hershey candy, and not for randy teenagers making out high above the park - this observation tower/ride takes visitors to the top of the 250 ft. tower for a rotating panoramic view of Hersheypark, ZooAmerica and downtown Hershey, PA. The view is spectacular and the height is just enough to be considered a mild thrill ride. There used to be a recording that played during the trip that featured the classic "Hersheypark Happy" theme song but sadly it was not in use on our recent visit.

Lightning Racer  Here's a fantastic roller coaster, built in 2000 that features two identical tracks with trains racing to a finish line. What stands between the station and the finish line is a 90 ft. drop and over 3,000 ft of twisting and turning roller coaster track. The ride seems like it's never going to end as the track cross over itself and back and forth several times before speeding through a tunnel and lining right up with the opposing train before crossing the finish line. This fantastic wooden roller coaster is a blast and has been ranked in or near the top 10 wooden coasters in the country every year since it's opening.

Reeses' Xtreme Cup Challenge Currently the only dark ride inside Hersheypark, Xtreme Cup Challenge has riders using backwards laser guns to zap various targets as you ride through scenes of extreme sports.  What's great about this ride is that it makes very little sense. Sure, you're just ridding through a shooting gallery but why are we shooting at defenseless, innocent extreme athletes? And why are there so many different types of Reeses' Peanut Butter Cups all over the sporting arenas? Most of the characters in the ride are flat two dimensional drawings except for two creepy sports anchors who are complete audio animatronics. They look like department store dummies who were brought to life by an evil curse. I don't know, this ride is a mess of things going on but in the end it's fun and completely different than anything else offered in the park.

Twin Turnpike - Sunoco Classic Cars - Twin Turnpike gives you the option of driving a classic Model T style car or a fancy little sports car. Whenever given the option, I always go for the classic car mostly because the sports car always means tiny and uncomfortable. The Twin Turnpike tracks follow the same pattern around a cute little area landscaped and decorated with faux highway signs. Fake highway signs make or break an amusement park drive-your-own car ride.

 

If you've been the Hersheypark, comment with your favorite ride, show or attraction...

The UTZ Potato Chip Factory Tour

The closest thing we have to a tourist attraction in our sleeply little town is the Chip Trip or UTZ Factory Tour as it is most commonly refered to. If you're not familiar with UTZ chips, then you aren't from this region of the country. They are some tasty snacks only distributed to Pennsylvania and the neighboring states. They are a common missed item of home sick people who have moved out of the area. My personal favorite is their crab chip, covered in Chesapeake Bay seasoning. My brother, who moved west is a big fan of their BBQ flavor and always makes it a point to pick up a couple bags when visiting home. 

 It's somewhat of a tradition for the kids and I to hit up the tour near the beginning of summer. Sometimes the tour can be packed with a bus full of people but most of the time you get the whole place to yourself.

On this late June day, we were just about the only people at the tour. The tour gallery is located at the UTZ High Street production plant, the largest of their four facilities in Hanover, Pa. You're visiting a real working factory, not a visitor center like some other tours so you need to be careful in the parking lot for trucks coming and going.

The tour gallery is made up of two areas:

The first area consists of displays and memorabilia relating to the UTZ company. 

Here is also a small room....er, theatre that runs a 15 minute video about everything UTZ. On the day we visited, the movie was not running.

The main attraction in the first area is this giant display of everything UTZ makes. I'm not sure if this is what the company makes right now, or if it's all their products over the years. The display is very up-to-date so I'm guessing it represents what is currently/recently in production. 

The next part of the tour is the actual factory itself. Photography is not permitted of the factory floor. I tried not to snap a pic of any of the proprietory elements of the tour. The tour is self guided and one big long hallway with windows looking down on the actual working production lines making potato chips. Although the plant also makes pretzels and cheese curls, only the Chip manufacturing is visible from the tour.

Each stop on the tour is narrated by pushing a red button to activate a recording. The recordings walk you through the entire process from raw potato to bagged and boxed product.

Each of the stops along the tour also feature a little ramp for the little chip fans in your party to get a better view of the factory floor. 

The tour ends in the giant warehouse that stores all the chips waiting to be delivered the next day. From there you return to the main room where a free bag of fresh UTZ chips is on the house! There is seating and a soda machine also available to compliment your snack.

We've been to the factory several times, but this past trip we were able to see a huge shipment of potatoes being delivered in a pretty cool custom designed truck. The kids were particularly enthralled in this. 

Two blocks away from the High Street facility is the UTZ Factory Outlet Store filled with incredible deals on a wide variety of snack items as well as UTZ merchandise and plenty of free samples.

The tour is free and open Monday - Thursday, the store is open 7 days a week. 

Antique Autos Part 1: Herbie

Easily one of my favorite film franchises of all-time is the Herbie The Love Bug series of films from Disney. I've seen plenty of Herbie cars in my travels, mostly cars used in the newer 2005 movie or the Disney On Ice production from the 80's. But to see a real honest to goodness Herbie used in one of the original movies is a real treat. So, when I learned that the REAL HERBIE was going to be in my neck of the woods I got pretty excited.

This past weekend I dragged my kids up to the Antique Auto Club of America Museum in Hershey, PA to see two authentic Herbie The Love Bugs used in the filming of the 1974 sequel Herbie Rides Again. The original movie, The Love Bug, was the highest grossing movie of 1969 and apparently stayed the top box office grosser of all time until a little film with some spaceships, robots and lightsabers showed up in 1977.

The AACA Museum has two Herbie cars on loan from the William E. Swigart, Jr Automobile Museum in Huntingdon, PA. They are on display until April 24, 2011. The first Herbie is in beautiful condition:

The original Herbie was a pearl white 1963 Volkswagen (VW) Model 117 Deluxe 2-door sedan equipped with a sunroof.


Also on display is this beat up Herbie:

The beat up interior

Poor Herbie, he's been through a lot.

And for extra nerdy fun, here's the registration for Herbie:

This is a sign that was used when Herbie made public appearances back in the day. Since the original four theatrical films, there has also been a TV movie in 1997 and a 5th theatrical production, Herbie Fully Loaded in 2005.

Herbie is awesome!

Check back later in the week with some pictures of another neat car on display at the AACA Museum.

Trip Report: Kings Dominion 2010

We made it out to Kings Dominion this past week. Anybody who reads this blog with any regularity knows that it's one of my favorite amusement parks. It's the park I grew up going to and so many things that I love about the amusement park industry I first got a taste of at Kings Dominion. Nowadays, I live much closer to Hersheypark but every couple of years or so, we made the 3 1/2 hour journey out to Doswell, VA to visit KD. Every visit brings a different set of mixed emotions.


The most exciting news...for me, at least, on this trip was I was able to go on rides that I haven't been able to for many years. Around the mid-90's, my careless lifestyle had caught up with me as far as amusement park rides were concerned and my size prohibited me from fitting into the safety restraints on most thrill rides. After a few trips to various parks where I wasn't able to ride roller coasters I pretty much closed the roller coaster riding chapter of my life and settled for the merry-go-round instead.


After having a heart-attack in November, I severely curbed my eating habits and added exercise into my life for the first time. I've been able to drop 70 pounds in the past 8 months and one of the most exciting benefits is that I had no problem fitting into any of the rides at Kings Dominion. I was able to revisit old friends like the Rebel Yell and the Grizzly. (I estimate I haven't been on any of Kings Dominion's coasters since 1993.) In addition to the Anaconda and the Hurler I also got on the Backlot Stunt Coaster and the Ricochet. All of them - GREAT RIDES! But I have to say that in my older age, the twisting and looping of Anaconda left me a little queasy.


Of course, being the cartoon loving kid that I am/was, one of my favorite rides in the park had always been the kiddie coaster Scooby-Doo. It's now called Ghoster Coaster, but no matter what you call it - I was elated to be able to fit into the ride's smaller cars and ride it with both of my children. (It was Tanner's first "big" coaster and he absolutely loved it!)


Elias also added a few more "big boy" rides under his belt. He loved the Avalanche bobsled ride and the Backlot Stunt Coaster, which is a bit intense but he conquered it twice! I also really enjoyed the ride. It's a roller coater with a little story and show attached to it, something Kings Dominion doesn't typically do. The cars of the coaster actually look like little sports cars (They were originally designed to resemble the getaway vehicles from the movie The Italian Job.) The train of cars blasts off from the station and swirl around three levels of a parking garage before dodging through traffic and several police cars. The train then comes to a stop in some sort of warehouse setting, where a helicopter starts to shoot at you. You then blast off again, into a tunnel for some fairly extreme twists and turns in the dark before crashing through a billboard and landing in a drainage ditch. Pretty fun little ride!


They still have the crazy upside down ship ride at the front of the park called The Berserker, and they still have their stand-up roller coater Shockwave. Both - rides I've never been on and will probably never get on! There's two newer steel coasters that I also opted out of: Dominator and Intimidator 305 which is tall. I mean, really, really tall!


Kings Dominion is still home to one of the best white water rapids rides White Water Canyon. And they still have their original log flume ride, Shenandoah Lumber Company, which has not been altered since it debuted in the 1970's. Nice touch!

Unfortunately, there is alot of the park that has been changed too much over the years. When Paramount Pictures took control of the park in the early 90's, they started to make sweeping changes throughout the park. Most of the changes were to brand the park with Paramount owned franchises and also to promote new movies and TV shows. This is the time in the park's history when the Wayne's World section of the park was introduced. A well executed addition, but a ridiculous idea for something that is so permanent like an entire themed area of the park.

Some of the natural beauty of the park has been lost over time as well. In some spots of the park there are too many things shoehorned into a small amount of land. Rides are squeezed in between other rides and there are way too many Games of Chance and Dippin' Dots stands. (Really, how many Dippin' Dots stands does one park need. Is it really that popular!?!) The Grizzly is a great wooden coaster that was originally designed out in the woods. The queue for the ride took you way back into the woods and you couldn't really get a good look at the ride until you were on it. That is a major design element of the coaster. That illusion is lost today, as the wooded area around the ride was torn down to make way for a go-cart track, an arcade and a Dippin' Dots stand!

A go-cart track in a world class theme park like Kings Dominion is a horrible idea! It was added under the reign of Paramount and I would hope the parks new owners, Cedar Fair, are considering removing it. First of all, it just cheapens up the park. Anybody can go 10 miles in any direction from their home and find a go-cart track. Second, the track just sits there unused because why would anybody shell over another $8.00 to go on a ride when they just spent $50.00 to get into your park and go on rides all day! I would really like to see Kings Dominion remove the go-cart track and add another ride or just plant some trees and leave the Grizzly back in the woods where it belongs.

This year also marks the first time in the park's history that the association with Hanna-Barbera cartoon characters has been completely eliminated. Paramount took over the park at a time when Hanna-Barbera was fading in popularity and Nickelodeon (a division of Paramount) was looking to further brand itself. Slowly the park lost the original Hanna-Barbera Land to Nickelodeon Central. Out went Scooby-Doo and Yogi Bear and in came Spongebob and the Rugrats. This year Kings Dominion removed the final elements of Hanna-Barbera and all the Nickelodeon and began to bring in Charlie Brown, Snoopy and the Peanuts characters to Planet Snoopy. For me, the Hanna-Barbera characters have always been as important to KD as Mickey and Co. are to Walt Disney World. If I had to choose another group of characters to move in and take over hosting duties from Yogi and the gang I can't think of a better property than Peanuts. It's timeless and has a universal appeal to children and adults. I'm going to save further discussion of Kings Dominion's new Planet Snoopy section for the next post...

Here's a few more things I'd like to see Kings Dominion take care of to spruce up the park: #1 Work on the outside of the park. The drive up to the parking lot booth is nothing - there is no show quality what-so-ever. Some flags, some landscaping and some repaving would go a long way. Currently the parking lot rows are numbered in colorless A1, B7, C13 signs. The original KD had all the parking lot sections named after Hanna-Barbera characters. Let's break out some new colorful signs so the next time I visit I can park in Pig Pen 4, Peppermint Patty 16 or even just Snoopy 1.

#2 - Get rid of all the chain restaurants. This actually goes for alot of parks because I know Hersheypark does the same thing. Who goes to an amusement park and gets Subway or Chick-Fil-A or Panda Express!? Why is there a Cinabon and a Starbucks on King Dominion's International Street. Same thing like the go-carts, it looks cheap and it's not out of the ordinary. I can toss a pebble of my porch and hit 3 Starbucks, they don't belong behind a $50 admission gate.

#3 - Bring Back Entertainment. Kings Dominion now has three shows, one of which is just people singing in the street. Little ol' Dutch Wonderland is a fraction the size of KD and they have 5 times the entertainment options. Where's the country music show? Every park should have a country music show!

#4 - Don't add another bazillion dollar roller coaster until you fix up some neglected areas of the park. The former Wayne's World section is just kind of there. It's a bit empty and needs alot of attention. Also, the kids area needs alot of work - mostly in themeing, but there is some awkward space where stuff used to be that they need to fix up.

#5 - Don't rush everybody out at closing time. They were directing foot traffic through the front gates at closing time quicker than a Zu-Zu Pet fueled stampede on Black Friday. We were not allowed the luxury to shop International Street (their Main Street) at our own leisure. They seriously wouldn't let me cross the street to shop the other side! Hey Kings Dominion, the only attraction on International Street is "spending money!" You really should let people stick around and spend as much as they want. Disney World wouldn't dream of even hinting at kicking a single soul out the front gate until every wallet has been sufficiently drained!

Those are just a few of my suggestions. Kings Dominion: still a great park, filled with many memories and still able to make new ones! Check back tomorrow for a look at Planet Snoopy...

A Kingdom For Everyone

The other day I ran a search on this blog for local amusement park Dutch Wonderland and was surprised to find only a brief mention of a 2006 visit. That's hard to imagine because the little park really is one of my favorites. So today, Dutch Wonderland gets it's very own post! Opened in 1963, the park is one of the crown jewels in Lancaster County, PA's tourism industry. Situated among the beautiful Amish farms and outlet malls of Lancaster, Dutch Wonderland has grown into a full service amusement park which caters to families and little children. The park does have it's share of simple carnival kiddie rides that go around and around in a circle, but they also have a nice assortment of family rides that everyone can enjoy together. A good number of the rides are unique to Dutch Wonderland, either homemade experiences or old fashioned amusement park fare that has managed to withstand the test of time protected behind DW's castle walls.


In the earlier part of the last decade, Dutch Wonderland was purchased from it's original owners by Hershey Entertainment and Resorts Company, the same fine folks who run Hersheypark as well as most of the town of Hershey, PA. (They are actually not the same company that makes all the candy.) When Hershey took over Dutch Wonderland they did a marvelous thing. Instead of jacking the place up to a totally modern theme park, they invested alot of time and money to bring the park into the 21st century without deleting the park's history and charm. (A fate Kings Dominion was not allowed!) The result is a park full of attractions high tech and low tech.

Some of the park's attractions date back to the first few years of the park, like the log boat ride in the front of the park - visible from the highway. The ride is now called Dragon's Lair and features a huge audio animatronic of the park's mascot Duke the Dragon, but the lagoon and the track the boats travel on were there when the park opened almost 50 years ago. Another nifty old attraction is called the Wonder House. In the house, guests sit on a bench in the middle of a little house that spins completely upside down again and again. Tables and chairs glide above your head and yet...riders remain perfectly still. It's a big thrill for kids who are brave enough to enter the spinning house.

For my money, you ain't got an amusement park if you don't have a train, and Dutch Wonderland has one of the neatest little train rides around. The Wonderland Special takes guest on a winding tour around the park. The train travels right through the Turnpike ride which is one of the nicest antique car rides you'll find at an amusement park.

DW is also home to two roller coasters, both small but both fun! Joust is the smaller of the two coasters, with a top height of only 16 feet. It's a steel coaster with a small drop and a few bumps and twists. It doesn't seem to intimidate to many kids. The park's other coaster is Kingdom Coaster and although there are no big drops on the other side of the 55 foot chain lift, this classic style wooden roller coaster does reach speeds of up to 40 MPH and does have some serious curves, jolts and even a decent amount of air-time. It was the first project for Custom Coasters back in 1992 and they are now the world's largest builder of wooden roller coasters. Our trip last week marked my son Elias' first ride on a real, honest to goodness roller coaster. He loved it so much we ended up riding 5 times throughout the day. Younger brother Tanner wasn't quite ready for Kingdom Coaster, but he did enjoy multiple rides on Joust including a trip in the very front car!

Now, everything worth seeing and doing at Dutch Wonderland doesn't have to move. There are some really neat old fashioned attractions here as well. One of the most popular is Bessie the Cow, who is available for milking all day long. It's not a real cow, and it's not real milk...it's water. But it's exciting for kids anywho to get a chance to almost milk a real cow. Kids also love buttons and there's plenty of chances throughout the park for kids to activate animated puppet scenes at the push of a button. Some of the scenes depict Amish life and others show elves making toys and candy. Dutch Wonderland's got it all!

Did I mention Thomas the Tank Engine is there too? Oh, and they have a kid sized water park...and a high diving show. And they have pin trading...and a really great gift shop. I'm telling ya...DW is where it's at! Here's Elias and Mommy with the Princess of Dutch Wonderland. How exciting is that!?

Dutch Wonderland is located on Rt. 30 East in Lancaster, PA. They are open daily through Labor Day.