Our First Trip to Hersheypark!

When I say “our first trip” to Hersheypark, I mean it was our first trip there as a family, and my boys first time there. Fred grew up going there since he’s originally from PA! I actually went there when I lived with my dad in the 6th grade. Don’t try figuring out how long ago that was, it was basically in ancient times!

We headed up to PA early in the morning and stopped at Fred’s parents’ house to have breakfast. They gave us 4 tickets to get in! What a blessing. It’s a 2 1/2 hour drive from the house in Maryland to the Hersheypark parking lot! I went with big expectations of doing everything: amusement park, ZooAmerica, and The Boardwalk. Silly little lady. Getting up there around 11:30 makes it hard to do anything other than the amusement park.

  

Having not been there for over 30 yrs, I had no recollection of what the park was like. Fred said we had to start the day with the tour. When we walked into the Hershey’s Chocolate World, it was a wonderland of chocolate everything!

From there we started our first ride of the Comet roller coaster. The guys got in line and I decided to scope out the food options. The guys started out behind the 1 hour wait line. Needless to say, it was just over an hour for them before they had their turn.

Did you know they have an app that tells you how long the wait is for each ride? Yea, we didn’t know until they were already in line for the Comet! I tell ya what, they should have wait times listed for the food too, because it took almost 45 minutes to get our family meal at the place we chose to eat. Little did we know if we’d gone to the back of the park we could’ve gotten in and out of one of those food joints. Next time!

The rest of the time at the park we looked at the app for every ride we got on. Now I use the word “we” very loosely. I only rode a couple of rides because I like walking around with the family watching them ride, and holding their things. It’s the role I like at amusement parks. lol

As the afternoon moved on I found one of the T-Mobile charging stations. None of the chargers were working and there was even a broken charger line that was still “hot” and I burned myself on it. We found a station later on in the day, and that one wasn’t charging either. We did have a backup charger in the car, but none of us was desperate for a charge that we wanted to go back.

I was actually shocked at some of the rides my boys went on. Fred’s a pretty good sport and rides pretty much all of them. Doodle wanted to do the Storm Runner and I wasn’t so sure about that for him. I finally relented because of how people are restrained on the ride. Standing there watching the people who ride in the front two seats is probably the best part of the entire amusement park. It was hysterical.

 

Now, I have to say I was impressed that Buddy wanted to go on the Fahrenheit! That bad boy goes straight up, and then straight down. I was horrified just watching that! HA! Fred got off of it saying he was done!

While the two guys rode the Fahrenheit, Doodle and I rode the Howler. That ride was just my speed, but the one thing I couldn’t do was look away from the pole between us. We were spinning so fast, my equilibrium was thrown off the moment I glanced away. From there, the guys were still in line for their ride, so we headed over to the Funnel Cake house. The entire time we were at the park, I never saw that line shrink, and it was no different when we got in line around 9:30.

We got our funnel cake as the guys joined us from their ride, and we headed out of the park. Oh, I forgot to mention, I had a moment of weakness and bought a Christmas ornament at the S. Clause & Co. Gift Shop! Everyone knows I don’t “do” Christmas anything before Thanksgiving…if possible.

 

I really want to go back…and soon. I know Fred’s kids go up during their Christmas Candylane, and always love it. My plan is to spend a weekend up there next year at some point. Hey, a girl can dream!

What’s your favorite ride at an amusement park?