Tag Archives: Pennsylvania

Hershey Park, 2017

17 Friday Nov 2017

Posted by in Travel

≈ Comments Off on Hershey Park, 2017

Tags

, ,

We visited Hershey’s Chocolate World the last time we were in Pennsylvania.  This time we skipped the Chocolate part and stuck to the amusement park.  Our logic is that we’d done a few days at Sesame Place, which is really more appropriate for the younger ones.  So we headed out to Hershey Park to satisfy the thrill ride appetite of the older ones.

Overall this proved to be a good decision.  We kept exclusively to the dry rides, so I won’t review the water park.  But, there were enough rides for the little ones and the oldest, specifically, was very excited by the big roller coasters.

We think we will go again sometime, maybe even stay at a Hershey Park hotel to get another day in the park and gain some of the benefits for hotel guests.  That being said, there were some issues.

  1. It is very hilly, especially the entry area.  This can be a real beast with a stroller.  The entry is so steep that even going down can be tricky to manage.
  2. There are six different ride heights, more than I’ve seen anywhere else.  With the kids spread across four of them it was trickier than usual to keep track of who could go on each ride.
  3. Along these same lines, the little kid rides are almost exclusively mechanical carnival rides so I would recommend your youngest being a Hershey’s Milk Chocolate Bar (48-54 inches) before you go.  This seemed to be the sweet spot where the most rides were available.  Therefore one could choose between the calmer kiddie rides and the bigger thrill rides, depending on your child.
  4. Our tickets came with meal vouchers.  It was annoyingly difficult to determine where these could be used.  Plus, once you did figure that out, it was almost impossible to find the establishment you were looking for.
  5. To follow up on that, the paper map is useless.  Nothing is properly marked, it’s by region at best.  In many cases we couldn’t figure out where the thing was even though we were in the correct region.  In other cases we could see a ride, but couldn’t find the entrance even with the map.  Somebody really needs to go over that again.

With all that in mind, we did have a good day.  Our strategy was to head all the way to the farthest point in and work our way back stopping at rides we liked along the way.  Doing this we did get almost everything we were interested in done before nightfall.  We did end up eating dinner in the park, which hadn’t been part of our original plan.  We also did manage to sneak into the place we found to eat dinner just before it closed.  I’m not sure why it closed so much earlier than the park itself.

Some of the rides had very long lines (1 hr +) on a summer day that was nice, but no so hot that you felt you needed to go in the water park.  They do offer FastTrack passes, but they are only available for a limited number of rides.  We did not get that option and I’m not sure how helpful it would have been, both because I’m not sure one matched the rides we went on and because I’m not sure one matched the height categories of our family.

Some of our favorite rides were:

Bigger Kids: Laff Trakk, Lightening Racer, Comet, Great Bear, The Howler

Smaller Kids: Tiny Tracks, Fun Slide, Red Baron, Traffic Jam, Dry Gulch Railroad

In summary, we enjoyed Hershey Park.  It offered ride options for all ages and was reasonably accessible.  It was also a good day trip distance from Philadelphia where we based most of our activities.  That being said, it seems like a place you need to go to a few times before you feel comfortable with the lay of the land, which is a bit unfortunate.

Philadelphia 2017

10 Friday Nov 2017

Posted by in Travel

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , ,

Continuing our adventures in Pennsylvania, we spent a day in downtown Philadelphia.  Once again it was raining, but we decided to endure the weather this time to catch some of the sights.  First, we stopped at the Independence Visitors Center to pick up tickets for Independence Hall.  As it worked out we were done with our other stops with too much of a gap to our tour time, so we didn’t end up using them.  But, you don’t know what times will be available until you get tickets.

Once we had our tickets, we went across the street to the US Mint.  This proved to be an excellent tour.  I have no photos since they’re not allowed inside, but I can give an overview.  First, there was next to no line, which was especially nice since it was raining.  There is a security screening, but its not to cumbersome.  The main viewing area is on the upper level.  This requires two escalators separated by a mezzanine displaying historical coins.  An elevator is available towards the back of the gift shop (as are bathrooms) that accesses both levels.

Once you get upstairs the path is quite prescribed, but wide enough for strollers or wheelchairs to pass.  There is plenty to see and read so that if you did look at everything it would take well over an hour.  Where you will want to spend most of your time is in the viewing gallery that occupies about half of the upper level.  This gives you an excellent view of the coin making machines and process.  It isn’t too loud and the windows are big enough that even small children can see.  The machines are labeled so you can get a feel for what is being produced during your visit.  We definitely recommend a visit the next time you are in Philadelphia.

IMG_6663

Then we headed back across the plaza, in the rain, to the liberty bell.  Not sure this was worth the hassle.  First, you can see the bell through the glass from outside.  It is not as good a view, but one avoids the outdoor line and security.  We were here only 15 minutes or so, less time than the line took.  At this point we still had 1.5 hours to our Independence Hall tour slot and it was lunchtime.  After a quick look at the choices we decided to head across town to the Franklin Institute instead of waiting.

The Franklin Institute is an excellent, kid-friendly science museum that we have been to before.  But, we never seem to have enough time to see everything, so we had lots of new things to see on this visit.  First we had lunch.  They have an acceptable food court with plenty of choices for kids and adults.

The main downside to the Franklin Institute is that it is difficult with strollers.  Technically, everything is accessible.  But, the paths are not always clear and multiple times we ended up in the wrong elevator and therefore on the wrong floor.  On the plus side, because it has reciprocal benefits with The Museum of Science, Boston, our tickets were included with that membership.

Some of our favorite exhibits:

Your Brain, with its two story tall neural network climbing structure.  One of the best aspects of The Franklin Institute is the number of times gross motor for the kids is woven into the exhibits.  There’s plenty to read too, but all the activities really keep them engaged.

The Giant Heart, a walk through (not stroller accessible) heart model.

Sir Isaac’s Loft, with its physics experiments.

Sportszone, with many measurable aspects of sports, from running, to basketball, to surfing.

Space Command, where you can build a moon rover model.

And, The Train Factory, which gives you a better idea of just how huge trains are.

I can’t recommend The Franklin Institute highly enough.  One could easily spend an entire day there.

I think over our many visits to Philadelphia, the three places I would recommend anyone visit are The Franklin Institute, the US Mint, and The Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Sesame Place – 2017 Review

03 Friday Nov 2017

Posted by in Family, Travel

≈ Comments Off on Sesame Place – 2017 Review

Tags

, ,

IMG_6763

We spent a week in Philadelphia this past August.  Over the next few Fridays I’ll review where we went.   Here’s the link to the review of our last visit.  So, some of the places we had been before and some were new.

Unlike our previous visit, we did no shows this time.  We didn’t even watch the parade.  We did have standard two-day passes.  The second day isn’t really necessary, but we spent two low stress days vs trying to cram it all in.  As before, we ate lunch at Captain Ernie’s Bistro.  This was the first time we had been in August.  The weather wasn’t too hot (which it certainly could have been) and the place seemed less crowded then when be had been before in June.

The older boys spent almost all their time on the water slides.  The Count’s Splash Castle was the hands down favorite.  This was reasonably popular with the younger ones too.  Though, this time we gave the older ones a bit more freedom to move between the rides even if we weren’t necessarily with them.

IMG_6675

Everyone who was tall enough (this included the four year old) loved the Vapor Trail roller coaster.  Cookie’s Monster Land area was also popular, especially among the younger set.  Oscar’s Rotten Rusty Rockets was by far the favorite with the Honker Dinger Derby and Monster Mix-Up coming in next.

Newly available to us was Abby’s Magic Queue.  This allows you priority boarding at most of the dry rides throughout the park.  Frankly, we didn’t see much use for us.  It usually saved one cycle of the ride, but none of these rides are very long.  I have seen reviews online where people report saving 30 minutes, but this definitely was not the case when we were there.  Now, if it could be used on the water rides that would have been a different story.  Those lines have always been much longer when we’ve visited.

While we like Sesame Place, and if we lived closer we would go more often, its probably time for us to branch out.  With the kids’ ages, we expect this to be our last trip unless the youngest develops a strong Sesame Street connection.

Pennsylvania – 2015

21 Friday Aug 2015

Posted by in Family, Travel

≈ Comments Off on Pennsylvania – 2015

Tags

, ,

After leaving Philadelphia, we headed northwest to Hershey, PA.  Next trip, when the kids are a bit older, we will probably replace some Sesame Place time with Hershey Park time.  But, this time we limited our visit to Chocolate World.  Because we were passing through we limited our visit to the Factory Tour and lunch.

The Factory Tour was what I remembered as a child, though updated a bit (particularly at the end) to include some of the more recently acquired brands.  My husband thought it was too “ride” and not enough”factory”, but the kids all liked it.  Lunch also went well as their food court was reasonably family friendly and the food was well received.  We did a fair amount of looking around in the gift shop area (really unavoidable since its basically the whole main level), but decided against purchasing anything as it would only melt in the car in the summer heat.

After lunch we headed northeast to Ashland, PA for the Pioneer Tunnel Coal Mine.  We had no idea what to expect, having found it as a tourist dot in a good pausing location in the Rand McNally map book.  Despite an entirely unassuming arrival, I highly recommend this attraction to anyone passing through.  It was the highlight of the boys’ trip.

The attraction consists of a ride into the coal mine on an actual mine train (watch your head!) followed by a ride through the woods above ground on a steam train.  Both were very informative, but the staff also kept things moving which kept the kids attention.  And, there’s a train-themed park across the street which is great for keeping folks entertained/burning off energy before and after the tour.  There are also bathrooms, picnic tables, and a small cafe (seems to have limited hours).

All in all the boys’ agreed this was the best day of the trip – beating out the amusement park.

Philadelphia – 2015

07 Friday Aug 2015

Posted by in Family, Travel

≈ Comments Off on Philadelphia – 2015

Tags

,

We had planned a day in downtown Philadelphia after Sesame Place, but the weather forced our hand a bit so we put it in the middle.  The heavy rain also changed our downtown plans.  We had intended to visit the Liberty Bell and some of the other more historic sites, but opted for the larger indoor museums instead.

We started at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.  First we ran the Rocky Steps.  Well, the older three boys ran them.  I walked up them and Peter took the younger two in the stroller around them.

Inside one of the twins wanted to take a picture of the statue.

IMG_3403

We had planned to eat lunch there, but found the restaurant not kid friendly.  So we moved on to The Academy of Natural Sciences at Drexel University.  Here they did have a kid-friendly cafeteria, which was fine.  The museum was small, but the boys enjoyed the exhibits, especially the dinosaurs.

At this point the rain was really coming down so we made the actual decision not to visit the Liberty Bell.  Instead we went next door to the Franklin Institute.  The place was packed!  Thankfully, we were able to speed through the members line using our reciprocal privileges.  Inside were loads of rooms the boys enjoyed – gears & levers, trains, and airplanes.  We could easily go back again and this was hands down their favorite museum of the day.  We stayed until closing.

Sesame Place – 2015 Review

31 Friday Jul 2015

Posted by in Family, Product Reviews, Travel

≈ Comments Off on Sesame Place – 2015 Review

Tags

, ,

This will be the first of a few reviews covering the various places in New York and Pennsylvania we traveled to in June.

I wrote a preview of Sesame Place based on our previous visits roughly two months back.  This, therefore, is more of an update than a complete review.

We had a wonderful trip to Sesame Place.  Once again we purchased a standard ticket which gained us two days entry to the park.  I did, this time, have a few “free” passes which I’d “purchased” via my Pampers diapers points so we did not need to actually purchase tickets for everyone.  We had intended to be there Friday & Saturday, with Sunday in Philadelphia, but it rained hard on Saturday so we chose to go to Philadelphia instead and Sesame Place on Sunday.  The weather both Friday and Sunday was lovely – warm enough to enjoy the water rides, but not so hot as to be unbearable.

IMG_3390

In general we enjoyed the changes to the park.  The biggest downside was that the cargo nets have been replaced by the Monster Clubhouse, which is not nearly as interesting.  In fact, my guys weren’t interested in visiting it the second day.  But, the new rides underneath were enjoyed by all and a definite improvement to the dated climbing structures that were there earlier.

That being said, they’re obviously not quite done because while Big Bird’s Balloon Race has been renamed Flying Cookie Jars and the balloon tops have been repainted, the bottoms are original and should be redone to look like cookie jars.  Moving through the park we didn’t observe any other significant changes.  Now the twiddle bug areas look the most in need of revamping as the Twiddle Tracks and Silly Sand Slides feel dated. The boys did take in more of the water slides, which were much enjoyed, as they are now older, taller, and better swimmers.

The younger two and I took in two shows – Elmo Rocks! and Elmo the Musical! (which were new to us and quite good) as well as Let’s Play Together! which we did last time also.  We also enjoyed the parade both days and got photos taken with Big Bird and Elmo.

IMG_3372 cropped

The food remains fairly dull amusement park fair.  We ate lunch at Captain Ernie’s Bistro both days.  The weather was nice for outdoor seating and it avoids the pitfalls of going indoors – tables set for 4 and little stroller space.

In summary, a positive trip, though we’re reaching the point where two days may no longer make sense if we can figure a way to get enough one day tickets.

Sesame Place Preview

06 Wednesday May 2015

Posted by in Travel, Twins

≈ Comments Off on Sesame Place Preview

Tags

, ,

Well, I’m gearing up for summer!  Planning is underway for our summer trip which looks to be a short one to eastern Pennsylvania.  As such (and because we intend to visit again), I thought I’d recap our previous two trips to Sesame Place.  This will remind me of what to expect and hopefully interest/educate.

We first took our older three boys Sesame Place (outside Philadelphia) when they were not quite 2 (x2) and not quite 4.  The main logic behind this timing kids under 2 are free, and we had two such candidates!  The second time we went was after our fourth child turned two as going before his second birthday really wasn’t feasible.  I hadn’t been since I was single digits so I wasn’t sure exactly what to expect.

Sesame Place has water rides and dry rides. Two days is really the right amount of time. (Conveniently a base ticket option is a free second day).  We drove down the night before and back at the end of the second day so it was 2 nights/2 days. There was a lot more water than I remember.  That gave us one wet day and one dry day; if you are driving direct do the wet day first.   They don’t have changing rooms (unless you pay for a cabana). The coed pavilions are fine for kids to change, but not really for adults so if you want to change out of wet stuff you end up in the bathroom.  It would have been better to do the water stuff on the first day and plan to stay dry the second. Of course, if you’re staying another night in a hotel it doesn’t matter. And, it wasn’t that big a deal, just one thing to deal with. We also didn’t do naps those days; we were at the park until roughly 4 each day.

042

While not technically a ride, the cargo nets are a favorite for my guys (you can see two of them up there).

My oldest never got into the character thing, but the younger ones did and when they were toddlers really enjoyed seeing the characters. The park is generally manageable with twins/strollers. The only issue we found is that a lot of the rides required one adult per kid. (From rides to dining, the entire place is really set up for families with 2 adults and 2 children.) We managed to work around this the first time by keeping the twins on the smaller rides where they could go together with an adult, but I imagine this could be an issue for somewhat older kids. So, there were a few rides the little ones couldn’t go on, but they didn’t notice because they were so excited by what they could do.  By the time we went back, the twins were plenty big to go on their own so we were back to a 1/1 ratio with the youngest (where it mattered)!

051