Dorney Park

In Allentown, Pennsylvania there is a park named Dorney.  It is one of the oldest parks in the country, at more than 120 years old, but since being acquired by Cedar Fair (the operators of mega-park Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio), it has been considerably modernized.  Many enthusiasts think this process has gone too far, as many of the older attractions have been stripped away.  I had never been there before its transformation, but had never had a great fondness for the new park.  It had a very generic feel to me, with little of the charm that a park with such a long history should have.  Nor were any of the attractions I'd been on best in their class.  However, it had been several years since I'd been there, so there were some new rides to try.  Janna and I had won free tickets to the park at an off-season coaster event earlier in 2006, so we had a ready-made reason to visit later that summer.  Some friends of ours in Allentown--who were always great hosts--had invited us to their block party, so we took the opportunity to go to Dorney Park the next day.

We aimed to arrive near the time the park opened, but were a little late.  There was already a big line of cars to get into the parking lot, and later a large crowd of people at the entrance gate, but in typical Cedar Fair fashion, things were run efficiently and we were in the park pretty quickly.  Also, the crowds were deceptive.  Most went to the water park, leaving the amusement area much emptier than the mob at the entrance gate would have indicated.  This pattern is common in many amusement parks on a hot day, and we were prepared to take advantage of it.

The first ride we went for was the one we thought likely to have the longest wait, the Wild Mouse.  Like other Wild Mice, it features single cars negotiating a series of sharp switchbacks and small hills.  The cars were cleverly made to look like cats and mice, caught up in an eternal chase.  However the ride itself wasn't very inspiring, due to relatively heavy braking along the course.

While waiting for the Mouse, I spent a lot of time watching the nearby White Water Landing ride.  Many parks have similar rides in which a boat kicks up a huge splash (generically known as "shoot the chutes" rides).  Most look the same as each other, but White Water Landing distinctively resembles Cedar Point's version of the ride.  Both have a roof above the highest parts of their troughs, and a characteristic way in which the water cascades down the chute.  Watching it brought back memories of my first trip to Cedar Point, many years ago, when I spent some time admiring their ride.  Then as now, I didn't actually ride it--I was more interested in watching than getting drenched--but the recollections it brought back were pleasant.

Our next coaster was a new one to me, the bright green coaster called Hydra.  It's a "floorless" coaster like Medusa at Great Adventure.  The front seat on any floorless coaster has the best experience, because of the visual impact of seeing the track directly beneath your feet.  Since there was only a three train wait for the front, we naturally waited it out.  Hydra is manufactured by B&M, who make a lot of popular coasters, but many of the ones they make that go upside down have rather similar layouts.  Hydra is an exception to this rule; its layout is very unique.  It even starts straight out of the station with a one-of-a-kind element named the JoJo roll, where the track rolls completely over slowly.  I liked that the layout was so creative, but the execution left something to be desired.  There was a weird vibration throughout the ride that made it somewhat uncomfortable.  I didn't care to ride it more than once.

We walked toward the back half of the park, which is downhill from the gate (the climb back up sometimes makes it hard to leave after a long day).  Along the way Janna got some cotton candy.  There was a promotion chainwide throughout the Cedar Fair parks in 2006; that they would offer cotton candy for 25 cents.  Though I'm not a big fan of cotton candy, I appreciate the retro prices.  I'm sure that it doesn't cost the park anything, as cotton candy must be extremely cheap to make.  It worked for us at least, as Janna got some.

Hydra's location used to be taken up by a very large wood coaster named Hercules.  It wound up being something of a rough mess (as many large wood coasters of the late '80s and early '90s turned out to be) so they tore it down.  But fortunately their older wooden coaster, Thunderhawk, is still going strong.  It is only about 80 feet high, dwarfed by the nearby Steel Force, but it is still a great little ride.  In the third seat there are several moments where riders pop up off their seats surprisingly and abruptly.  The short layout folds on itself, yielding a variety of twists and drops.  There are only two drawbacks: The seats have high, hard backs that are somewhat uncomfortable, and right before the last sequence of hills there's a strong brake that destroys the ride's momentum.

To get to the back of the park from Thunderhawk, we walked through the wood coaster structure itself.  This may be my favorite part of the park.  Besides the wood coaster surrounding us on both sides, there are many trees shading the path.  It makes me think that this must be what the entire park might have been like before Cedar Fair took over.

At the rear of the park we came to the Steel Force coaster.  It is around 200 feet tall, by today's standards a moderate height, but it towers over the rest of the rides in the park.  I remember riding it shortly after it opened, and at the time finding it one of my very favorite steel coasters.  Since then it has declined a bit in my estimation.  Perhaps this is because some newer rides have opened that have eclipsed it, not so much in height as in intensity.  I also think that they have turned the brakes up somewhat.  Since the brake is halfway through the ride, this doesn't affect the ride's beginning, but the final series of small humps has lost much of its potency.

Laser is the other coaster at the back of the park.  This small looper has every bit of its original potency, because there are no brakes to turn up.  A turning first drop leads to two successive vertical loops that generate powerful G forces.  Then a series of turns and helices keep the forces going through the end of the ride.  Laser is actually a portable coaster, not embedded in the ground but held in place by pools of water.  But it's been at Dorney for more than 20 years, and I hope it stays indefinitely.  In a day of larger and larger thrill rides, Laser demonstrates that a ride not be the tallest to be powerful.

Across from the Laser is a small kiddie ride called Dragon.  It is an example of some of the foibles of coaster enthusiasts.  We tend to ride even the smallest coasters.  It's sometimes embarrassing but I like to think it's somewhat liberating too; we can feel free to indulge ourselves without caring what anybody else thinks.  In fact, the operator got a kick out of us riding; he'd probably had enough of dealing with kids and their parents.  The flip side of all this is that none of us considered Dragon a "real" coaster.  It has a motor that powers it all the way through, so that it's not really operated by the force of gravity.  So from the perspective of coaster enthusiasts, there was really no reason to ride at all except that we were there and there was no wait.

Having reached the far end of the park, we began to make our way back to the front.  Along the way we came upon one of the odder bumper car rides around.  The cars are circular, use inner tubes for bumpers, and are steered by two levers like a tank.  They're more maneuverable than usual bumper cars; they can be driven straight backwards or just spun in place.  I wouldn't want all bumper cars to be like this, but the Krazy Kars are kind of fun.

As with many parks, Dorney has a log flume (called Thunder Creek Mountain), but like their bumper cars, it's rather unique.  I had never ridden it before, and wanted to make sure to try it on this visit.  Fortunately we didn't have to wait very long.  In keeping with local culture, there are hex signs on the station.  Out of the station there's a short stretch of slow lower level trough, amidst  a lot of ferns and bushes.  The lift climbs up the park's main hillside.  There's more slow and scenic trough on the upper level, winding around Hydra's track and next to the Steel Force helix.  Right before the main drop is a water curtain.  The drop itself is not steep, just descending at ground level back down the hillside.  This doesn't make for the most thrilling ride, but it gives it a feel of an older Shoot the Chutes, unlike almost any other log flume currently in existence.  As somebody who appreciates uniqueness in amusement park attractions, this instantly became one of my favorite log flumes.

It was well after time for lunch.  Back up at the top end of the park is a sit-down restaurant called Game Day Grille.  They had some tempting offerings beyond the usual run of amusement park food.  I had a pot roast sandwich, while many of my friends had triple grilled cheese sandwiches.  The indoor air conditioned environment was quite welcome.

Back in the park, we next rode Talon, a new coaster since the last time I visited Dorney.  Talon is an inverted coaster.  The train sits below the track, with nothing beneath the feet of the riders as it goes through its acrobatic maneuvers. It's a popular variety introduced in 1992 that has spread widely since.  Dorney was relatively late to this game, as Talon was opened in 2001.  It has a reputation of being one of the milder rides of its type, but I liked it a lot nonetheless.

One coaster remained, Woodstock's Express, in the children's section of the park.  Cedar Fair has the rights to the Peanuts characters, hence the name.  No more needs to be said; as usual I'm a bit embarrassed to ride kiddie coasters just to get the "credit", but I do it nonetheless!

Though we'd not spent four hours at the park, we were eager to get on the road.  Dorney is just not the type of park that holds my attention very long.  There are some good coasters, but none that is top-notch.  And as I described above, the overall feel of the park is a bit too generic for me.  But one little touch perhaps reflects the park that once was.  As we were leaving the kiddie section, I saw a little set of metal tiles on the path.  A little more investigation revealed that when stepped on, they made musical notes, kind of like a xylophone.  I suspect this is a holdover from the pre-Cedar Fair days.  I wish there were more of this sort of touch to Dorney Park.  As it is, an infrequent visit is enough to keep me satisfied.