holleypie
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2010
- Messages
- 370
Tabby and Tommy were on vacation this week in Gettysburg, and they invited us to join them for the day at Hershey Park on Sunday.
Hershey, PA is about a 90 minute drive for us, so initially Brian thought we could head up on Saturday night when I got off work and stay at the Hershey Hotel. When you buy a full day ticket, Hershey Park lets you in for free during the last 2.5 hours the day before. But Brian balked when he saw the price of the hotel. He said, "We could stay at a deluxe resort at Disney World for that much money!" Heh.
Instead, we just left Sunday morning. We wanted to be there when the park opened at 10am, so we left at 7:45 to give us plenty of time to get there.
I brought a bag full of toys and snacks to keep Luke entertained. He was content munching on some cereal for awhile while I read my Disney Files magazine, then he started getting cranky so I crawled to the backseat to entertain him. I'd borrowed a Playaway View device from the library to see if that might hold his attention. A Playaway is basically a hand-held player preloaded with songs and stories. He likes electronics, so I was pretty confident he would love it.
Nah. He quietly watched it for less than five minutes, then handed it back to me and started whining again. Oh well, worth a try. So I just handed him toys and told him about all the fun we were going to have today.
Clearly, he was excited. Before long, we reached our first destination.
A supermarket!
We'd read on the Hershey Park website that if you bought your tickets at Giant, you would save $15 each, plus when you buy two tickets you get a free parking voucher. That's $42! We have a few Giant stores nearby, so we checked them out and none of them had tickets. Brian looked online and learned that the Giant stores in Maryland and the Giant stores in Pennsylvania are actually DIFFERENT chains. But, curiously, they're owned by the SAME company (and to further complicate matters, the PA Giant chain does have stores in MD, but they have a different name).
While Brian was buying the tickets, he asked about all this and learned that the MD Giants and PA Giants existed independently and then were just coincidentally bought out by the same company at some point. While we were there I briefly thought about calling Tabby to see if they wanted us to pick up tickets for them too, but because they were actually ON vacation instead of just coming up for the day, I assumed they had already bought everything ahead of time. (I was wrong. They bought their tickets on site and didn't save $42. Oops. I wonder if I will ever learn to stop assuming.)
After we'd gotten our tickets, we headed to Hershey Park. Sort of. Brian hadn't been able to find "Hershey Park" in the GPS, so he entered "Chocolate World," figuring they were in the same place anyway. Well, We ended up driving completely around Hershey Park and could NOT find the parking lot.
There's a roller coaster!
This way to Chocolate World!
But now we're back on the street again. (Aren't those street lights ADORABLE?)
Finally we pulled into the Chocolate World lot to ask for help. The security guard said we could park there for $25 (yeah, right) or he gave us a list of printed directions to the HP lot where we could use our free voucher. The directions had SEVEN STEPS. I have no idea why it was so complicated to get there when we were literally looking at Hershey Park. Between using the printed directions and entering Hershey Park's address into TomTom and looking out for signs, we finally found the correct parking lot.
We ended up getting there about fifteen minutes before 10. I called Tabby after we parked because they were planning on getting there when the park opened also. But she said they were going to be another hour so I guess they hadn't even left Gettysburg yet.
We headed up to the main gate where there are a few shops and restaurants before you actually enter the park. As you can see, it was a pretty busy morning.
At Hershey Park, the height restrictions are candy coded.
Luke is a Miniature.
And I'm just barely a Jolly Rancher, which makes no sense as the tallest designation. This category used to be called Cookies N Creme and before that Bar None.
Now it was past 10, so we entered the park.
Our first order of business was meeting the Hershey Bar, who was just standing around all by himself.
As you can see, Luke was more interested in the Carrousel behind us so the pictures are pretty awful.
While we waited for Tabby and Tommy to arrive, we decided to take advantage of the low crowds and hit some of the coasters. I like wooden coasters, and the Comet is one I actually remember riding before. I went to Hershey Park at least once when I was a kid, and once with Brian when we were dating, but I have virtually no memory of either visit. It's pretty weird. Nothing looks familiar at all. If I didn't know I'd been there before, I would have no idea. So basically everything we did felt new.
The Comet was a walk on. There were only a few people waiting and, unlike Disney, no one directing you to a numbered spot on the floor, so I chose the back seat. It's a pretty mild coaster, so it was a good first ride of the day.
Brian took his turn next, and I waited at the exit. I had the camera ready to take his picture, but the coaster was going in the opposite direction so I got a nice shot of the back of his head. He'd chosen the last seat, too.
We walked over to the next coaster, Skyrush. I wasn't sure about this one.
Look at that hill! So I let Brian go first.
There weren't any shops in the area, just carnival games and food stands, so we walked around in a big loop.
Unfortunately this show doesn't open until next week, so I never got to find out if I'm smarter than a candy bar.
When I finished my second loop, Brian was just getting off. I still wasn't sure if I was getting on. It had taken Brian about 20 minutes to ride, and I wasn't enthused about that hill. Brian told me, "The lines are only going to get longer!" So I said, fine, I'll ride it.
There was a separate line for people who wanted the front row. The group of guys behind me bailed on the regular line because the line for the front was shorter.
The wait wasn't as bad as I thought. When I got up there I wasn't sure what to do with my cell phone and my glasses. There were signs everywhere saying, "THINGS WILL FALL OUT OF YOUR POCKETS!" At Disney I wouldn't have thought twice about leaving my stuff, but for some reason at other amusement parks I just assume everyone is a thief.
I don't even have a nice phone that anyone would want to steal, but I have a lot of pictures of Luke on there so I didn't want to chance it. Ultimately I figured there was a bigger risk of me dropping the phone, so I left it sitting on the shelf for bags.
Then I saw the ride vehicle and I thought, "Oh no. Nope. This isn't happening." There were four seats across, and the two seats on the end didn't have a floor underneath them. And the restraint system wasn't over your shoulders, it was just a lap bar. It did not seem secure at all. And do you REMEMBER that hill?
I strongly considered taking the chicken exit, but I didn't.
And it was absolutely terrifying. But the view from the top of that hill right before you go barreling down? Beautiful. And also terrifying.
After it was over, I felt kind of traumatized.
Now that we'd gotten two coasters under our belts, we decided to backtrack and find something Luke could ride. But this certainly isn't Disney, so what are we going to find???
Hershey, PA is about a 90 minute drive for us, so initially Brian thought we could head up on Saturday night when I got off work and stay at the Hershey Hotel. When you buy a full day ticket, Hershey Park lets you in for free during the last 2.5 hours the day before. But Brian balked when he saw the price of the hotel. He said, "We could stay at a deluxe resort at Disney World for that much money!" Heh.
Instead, we just left Sunday morning. We wanted to be there when the park opened at 10am, so we left at 7:45 to give us plenty of time to get there.
I brought a bag full of toys and snacks to keep Luke entertained. He was content munching on some cereal for awhile while I read my Disney Files magazine, then he started getting cranky so I crawled to the backseat to entertain him. I'd borrowed a Playaway View device from the library to see if that might hold his attention. A Playaway is basically a hand-held player preloaded with songs and stories. He likes electronics, so I was pretty confident he would love it.
Nah. He quietly watched it for less than five minutes, then handed it back to me and started whining again. Oh well, worth a try. So I just handed him toys and told him about all the fun we were going to have today.
Clearly, he was excited. Before long, we reached our first destination.
A supermarket!
We'd read on the Hershey Park website that if you bought your tickets at Giant, you would save $15 each, plus when you buy two tickets you get a free parking voucher. That's $42! We have a few Giant stores nearby, so we checked them out and none of them had tickets. Brian looked online and learned that the Giant stores in Maryland and the Giant stores in Pennsylvania are actually DIFFERENT chains. But, curiously, they're owned by the SAME company (and to further complicate matters, the PA Giant chain does have stores in MD, but they have a different name).
While Brian was buying the tickets, he asked about all this and learned that the MD Giants and PA Giants existed independently and then were just coincidentally bought out by the same company at some point. While we were there I briefly thought about calling Tabby to see if they wanted us to pick up tickets for them too, but because they were actually ON vacation instead of just coming up for the day, I assumed they had already bought everything ahead of time. (I was wrong. They bought their tickets on site and didn't save $42. Oops. I wonder if I will ever learn to stop assuming.)
After we'd gotten our tickets, we headed to Hershey Park. Sort of. Brian hadn't been able to find "Hershey Park" in the GPS, so he entered "Chocolate World," figuring they were in the same place anyway. Well, We ended up driving completely around Hershey Park and could NOT find the parking lot.
There's a roller coaster!
This way to Chocolate World!
But now we're back on the street again. (Aren't those street lights ADORABLE?)
Finally we pulled into the Chocolate World lot to ask for help. The security guard said we could park there for $25 (yeah, right) or he gave us a list of printed directions to the HP lot where we could use our free voucher. The directions had SEVEN STEPS. I have no idea why it was so complicated to get there when we were literally looking at Hershey Park. Between using the printed directions and entering Hershey Park's address into TomTom and looking out for signs, we finally found the correct parking lot.
We ended up getting there about fifteen minutes before 10. I called Tabby after we parked because they were planning on getting there when the park opened also. But she said they were going to be another hour so I guess they hadn't even left Gettysburg yet.
We headed up to the main gate where there are a few shops and restaurants before you actually enter the park. As you can see, it was a pretty busy morning.
At Hershey Park, the height restrictions are candy coded.
Luke is a Miniature.
And I'm just barely a Jolly Rancher, which makes no sense as the tallest designation. This category used to be called Cookies N Creme and before that Bar None.
Now it was past 10, so we entered the park.
Our first order of business was meeting the Hershey Bar, who was just standing around all by himself.
As you can see, Luke was more interested in the Carrousel behind us so the pictures are pretty awful.
While we waited for Tabby and Tommy to arrive, we decided to take advantage of the low crowds and hit some of the coasters. I like wooden coasters, and the Comet is one I actually remember riding before. I went to Hershey Park at least once when I was a kid, and once with Brian when we were dating, but I have virtually no memory of either visit. It's pretty weird. Nothing looks familiar at all. If I didn't know I'd been there before, I would have no idea. So basically everything we did felt new.
The Comet was a walk on. There were only a few people waiting and, unlike Disney, no one directing you to a numbered spot on the floor, so I chose the back seat. It's a pretty mild coaster, so it was a good first ride of the day.
Brian took his turn next, and I waited at the exit. I had the camera ready to take his picture, but the coaster was going in the opposite direction so I got a nice shot of the back of his head. He'd chosen the last seat, too.
We walked over to the next coaster, Skyrush. I wasn't sure about this one.
Look at that hill! So I let Brian go first.
There weren't any shops in the area, just carnival games and food stands, so we walked around in a big loop.
Unfortunately this show doesn't open until next week, so I never got to find out if I'm smarter than a candy bar.
When I finished my second loop, Brian was just getting off. I still wasn't sure if I was getting on. It had taken Brian about 20 minutes to ride, and I wasn't enthused about that hill. Brian told me, "The lines are only going to get longer!" So I said, fine, I'll ride it.
There was a separate line for people who wanted the front row. The group of guys behind me bailed on the regular line because the line for the front was shorter.
The wait wasn't as bad as I thought. When I got up there I wasn't sure what to do with my cell phone and my glasses. There were signs everywhere saying, "THINGS WILL FALL OUT OF YOUR POCKETS!" At Disney I wouldn't have thought twice about leaving my stuff, but for some reason at other amusement parks I just assume everyone is a thief.
I don't even have a nice phone that anyone would want to steal, but I have a lot of pictures of Luke on there so I didn't want to chance it. Ultimately I figured there was a bigger risk of me dropping the phone, so I left it sitting on the shelf for bags.Then I saw the ride vehicle and I thought, "Oh no. Nope. This isn't happening." There were four seats across, and the two seats on the end didn't have a floor underneath them. And the restraint system wasn't over your shoulders, it was just a lap bar. It did not seem secure at all. And do you REMEMBER that hill?
I strongly considered taking the chicken exit, but I didn't.
And it was absolutely terrifying. But the view from the top of that hill right before you go barreling down? Beautiful. And also terrifying.
After it was over, I felt kind of traumatized.
Now that we'd gotten two coasters under our belts, we decided to backtrack and find something Luke could ride. But this certainly isn't Disney, so what are we going to find???
and possibly take a road trip to visit Brian's mom. Brian told me that Holiday World in Santa Claus, Indiana is allegedly even cleaner than Disney, so maybe that will be our next adventure. 
I'm thinking about coming for the TOT 10 Miler this year but it's smack in the middle of my daughters track season so it won't be a family trip 
