Wildwood, NJ or Ocean city, Maryland?

[gillenkl]

Ocean City, NJ or Wildwood Crest.

 

[shystalips]

Another vote for ocean city, nj. Been to all of the above and for the ages of your kids, probably the best fit. We always stay @ the impala island inn. Good central location, clean, and pretty reasonably priced. check it out

 

[addicted2dizney]

I'm sorry I usually keep my mouth shut and let ignorant comments be ignorant comments but I feel the need to intercede on this one considering I have actually worked at both parks. While I loved working for Disney more than any other job I ever had, one thing I can say for sure is that the safety at Disney SCARES me! Your afraid of Six Flags NJ....you really have no clue. Disney relies WAY too heavily on computer systems and guests to check their own restraints! Next time you go to Disney tell me I'm wrong?! This "pull up on your own reatraint" crap is one of the unsafest things I ever heard of! All roller coaster designers manuals say to PUSH DOWN then pull up on the restraint to make sure its properly in place. This is because if the person doesn't pull it down far enough if they are pulling up on it its not gonna matter if its too high anyway! The death on Superman: ride of steel at SF New England in the early 2000s was due to the restraint NOT BEING PUSHED DOWN and only pulled up to check! Since that incident Six Flags makes sure to push down and pull up via their workers! Disney is too concerned with making the line move quicker than safety! They can lie thru their teeth all they want that they have safety as their number one goal but if that were true cast members would be physically checking belts! But I have actually heard stories of cast members at disney who were reprimanded for physically checking guest restraints!

But don't take my word for it lets look at the number of deaths shall we! Six Flags Great Adventure has not had a death at the park since the early 80's with the terrible haunted house fire tragedy. Disney on the other hand in the past 10 years alone has at least 4 deaths that I can think of off hand at WDW alone. 2 guests on mission: space; the monorail accident and a worker on primevil whirl who was hit by a coaster train. Don't let the fascade of the Disney name fool you they are just very good at covering up incidents or getting them out of the spotlight quick so people forget, but take it from someone who has visited every major theme park east of the Mississippi River of all the parks I've seen besides some rundown tiny no-name parks....Disney is one of the most unsafe there is.

I agree that six flags is a great place and I have season passes.. of course in beauty and overall theme it's certainly no where near the level of WDW. But I just wanted to point out there's no way you can compare those two places. 6 Flags is open a few months a year and disney runs a mini city multi theme park with it's own transportation system year round with millions of visitors. I'm sure if someone check stats 6 flags would take a decade to see the number of guests the WDW complex does in one year. Not to mention near 20 hours a day of transportation in the summer.

Certainly NO ONE wants to see any death or tragedy in either place and I do 100% agree that 6 flags is wonderful. But to others who don't really know the park it's just not a fair statement towards Disney.

 

[Ginny Favers]

I also have to pipe up and say that Six Flags Great Adventure is not a bad place. We've been there numerous times. My sister has season passes and goes all the time... she says that actually, people think the weekends will be crowded but it can sometimes get even more crowded during summer weekdays, with camps going there. She went on a Saturday and was surprised that the crowds were manageable.

Love the safari. One of the things I remember very vividly from my youth was going through there and ALWAYS bypassing the baboon area because they were known for sitting on cars and ripping up the upholstered rooves on old-style cars, which we had. Now I know they've changed it so that the baboons are enclosed and can not reach the cars.

I can't say anything about the beaches. The only one I've ever gone to is Seaside Park, because we had a house there. Love that place.

 

[katrina1122]

I still say 6 Flags is totally rundown and scares me. I haven't done the safari but have heard great things aobut it and as I've said, the waterpark is nice.

As to safety, I say it again, a bolt came out of my lapbar and I had to hold it down the whole ride. The employee I showed it to just tossed the bolt to the side and let another rider on. Sure no one died, but that doesn't mean that wasn't safe. The park is always dirty, I hate going into the bathrooms. And no, I'm not comparing it to WDW. I enjoy Dorney Park, Busch Gardens Williamsburg, Sesame Place. I'm just saying 6 Flags NJ is rundown and scary. Yes they meet saftey standards, but they certainly don't exceed them in anyway. Plus nothing ever gets painted in the off season, lights on the ferris wheel are always burnt out. I could go on.
Defend all you want of 6 Flags NJ, that's fine. But I'm not making this up. DH and I will go to Wildwood anytime over 6 Flags or any of the other amuesment parks in this area...or 6 Flags Hurricane Harbor. Just not 6 Flags itself.

 

[mjkacmom]

I haven't been to 6 flags in ages (although we've done the safari - it's awesome!). My kids have gone on field trips, and love it (really great coasters). We prefer Wildwood (stay in the crest) over OC now that our kids are older - the boardwalk at OC gets old quickly, especially the rides. We like the beach better at OC - much shorter walk to the water.

 

[lukenick1]

Any info on this place? Didn't even know there was one!!! Any suggestions on places to stay there??? Still considering our options.
Thanks again!!!!

 

[Kathi OD]

Any info on this place? Didn't even know there was one!!! Any suggestions on places to stay there??? Still considering our options.
Thanks again!!!!

It's the old Great Escape park. Haven't been there in years, so I can't shed any light on it.

 

[Mickeyluver37]

Just went to Wildwood this past weekend for the Band/Guard championships, so I realize it was off season and hard to compare. I've been to OCMD many times, including in the off season, but that was my first time at Wildwood. Both are great for the beach, but it seems to me like there is so much more in OCMD. We had heard the recommendations to stay in Wildwood Crest over Wildwood as well, and while we did, it was still walking distance to the boardwalk- I'm not even sure why they are considered different towns. Ocean City is MUCH larger than the two combined- many more streets, restaurants, stores, bars, etc. Plus, we usually stay in Rehoboth or Bethany in DE to enjoy being away from all the crowds, but can still drive down to OC for fun. Wildwood has Cape May, but there still isn't a ton to do besides hang on the beach.

Morey's Piers in Wildwood is way better than the inlet rides at OCMD. And I say this even though I went on the off season. We still got to ride quite a bit of the dry rides, and although the water parks were closed, you can tell they have quite a bit. Ocean City, MD does have several other waterparks though- they just aren't on the boardwalk. And again, there's Rehoboth which also has rides.

We had a really hard time deciding where to stay. Almost everything in Wildwood is 1-2 star motels! We ended up enjoying where we stayed- the Royal Hawaiian- which is right on the beach in the Crest. But again- I'm not sure that too much has been built in this place in 50 years- very different than the high rises and condos all down Coastal Highway in OCMD. It's a very charming small old beach town- we found all the "sun decks" above the pools amusing. Pretty much every place has efficiencies as well- which is a good thing because there aren't too many options for food off the boardwalk. Huge contrast to OCMD.

I don't think you can go wrong with either one, especially for a short stay. I enjoyed Wildwood, I just consider it a beach experience on a much smaller scale than what I'm used to with the OCMD/DE beaches.

And another unrelated tidbit- I used to LOVE those babboons at Six Flags. Sure they ripped the rain guards off of our windows, but dh and the kids and I never laughed so hard in our lives- I'm sad that they've changed it!