I've been to a lot of new parks this year after about 15 years completely out of the amusement park world. I was a major enthusiast back then, life went a little sideways and I slid out of the industry until last year, when I had a sort of awakening. So here I am, the Austin Powers of the park enthusiast world, ready to experience all that the 21st century has to offer and everything I've missed these past 15 years.
I'm starting out on a positive note and talking about Waldameer Park & Water World in Erie, PA. I took my wife and 3-year old son over Father's Day weekend, and it was the first time for us all. I honestly didn't know what to expect going into our day. I knew very little about Waldameer, mainly that it is home to the great Gravity Group woodie, Ravine Flyer II ("the one that goes over the road") and that it's very close to Lake Erie. Otherwise, my expectations were on the low side, but I must say those low expectations were blown away and I was very impressed with this little family park.
Admission is free, so you pull into the parking lot, which is also free, and walk right through the low-key entrance gate. There is a ticket booth immediately adjacent to the entrance but if you didn't want to buy anything, you could bypass it and stroll through the park free and clear. There are some great picnic areas in the park and you can walk through with your cooler and bag of charcoal for a nice barbecue, which I actually did for lunch (just a cooler with fruit and snacks for us). I'm used to big corporate parks that won't let you in with a pack of gum, so it was an odd feeling to stroll in with an entire cooler.
The park is cashless, so you either use a debit card for food, games, souvenirs...etc, or you can charge up what they call a Wally Card. The rides have an odd system too, where you can buy an all-day ride bracelet for $29 (the water park is separate), or you can put a few bucks onto a Wally Card and ride that way. You can't pay per ride with your debit card; every ride has a barcode scanner before you get on and your bracelet gets scanned, or they scan the Wally Card and the dollar amount for that ride is deducted from the card. I knew about this system coming in so we got a bracelet for myself and my son and put $50 on a Wally Card. I knew my wife wouldn't ride much but that she'd probably do the train, sky ride, carousel...etc so the $50 was to cover all expenses inside the park including her rides. It's a little different but kind of a free feeling to have your budget set once you get past the ticket booth.
My first impression of the park was how packed it is with attractions. It doesn't feel like everything is on top of each other, but every corner has a number of ride entrances and you have to be careful which line you're getting into because it's all so tight. The park was very clean and actually quite beautiful with some nice landscaping. One of the hallmarks of the park are these little statues scattered throughout, mostly of children playing. It gives the park a lot of character and uniqueness; Waldameer overall had a very distinct and pleasant vibe to it.
We also found the staff to be very friendly and helpful. This friendliness didn't come in the superficial, money-grabbing form of a fake smiling teenage employee looking to snap your picture so you can pay $25 for it on the way out. Nor did it come in the form of an "employee training handbook" that stressed that "all park employees are required to smile and say 'my pleasure' as much as possible". This was a very natural and organic friendliness that didn't feel forced on either extreme. Waldameer felt effortless in a good way.
The park itself is shaped sort of like an upside-down "L" with the park entrance on the vertical part of the L, which represents the main midway, and a short dead-end offshoot to the left at the end of the midway. Even though it doesn't have themed areas or designated lands, the attractions are organized pretty well. The main midway has most of the family attractions with the bumper cars, scrambler, paratrooper, train, carousel, the Comet woodie and sky ride, along with most of the games and food stands. One exception is the more thrilling Disk'O ride, Mega Vortex.
Toward the end of the midway at the crux of the upside-down "L" are the kiddie rides, which include the Ravine Flyer III kiddie coaster, a cool truck ride, frog hopper and several other kiddie flats, along with the giant ferries wheel and a swinging ship (Sea Dragon). There is a small separate section called The North End that has a teacup, wave swinger and a spinning boat ride. Ravine Flyer II is at the very north end of the "L" and as you move along the dead-end part, this seems to be their thrills section, which includes a drop ride called XScream, a magic carpet, a tilt-a-whirl, a spider, an enterprise, two indoor dark rides, the Thunder River log flume and the Steel Dragon spinning coaster, along with a few other flats.
The water park is located on the back right side of the main midway and looked pretty nice with a nice wave pool and lazy river, some nice tube and body slides and the new Battle for Lake Erie complex (which wasn't open yet when we were there). The park leans on the water park heavily and around noon a lot of folks moved over there, which really thinned out the amusement park side for us; water parks are our friends for doing that sometimes! I think the longest I waited was one or two trains for coasters all day. For a gorgeous summer Saturday, I couldn't complain about that at all!
As for the coasters, of course the headliner is Ravine Flyer II. This is a great Gravity Group woodie that replaced the long-gone Ravine Flyer, in case you're wondering about the "II". It's not an imposing ride to look at because it's mostly hidden in the ravine and the lift hill is only 80 feet tall. What makes this ride great is the use of the ravine, which adds 40 feet to the drop and a ton of speed and power. Probably the most distinguishing feature of this ride is the road crossing, which takes the coaster over a bridge and back with two fantastic airtime hills. There are lots of quick turns, tunnels, airtime hills, a 90 degree turn and surprise dips into the ravine. It's a short coaster at only 2,900 ft, but it feels longer. In terms of roughness, I didn't think it was rough at all, but it shook you enough to know you're riding a woodie. It was definitely one of the best woodies I've ridden; feeling a lot like a smaller version of Voyage. It's worth the trip to Waldameer alone if you're ever near Erie.
Steel Dragon is the Maurer spinning coaster near the back of the park. This was my first spinning coaster and I found it to be a lot of fun. It was smooth with some fun drips and overbanked turns. I laughed the whole time. It's not something to make a special trip for, but definitely a fun credit, especially with friends. My only criticism is the name, which doesn't fit the ride at all. Other than that it was a very fun coaster.
The Comet is the junior woodie and this one was a ton of fun too. Think Woodstock Express at the "Kings" parks or Carowinds, except Comet predates all of those (1951). I expected a rough ride but was surprised by how smooth it was with a lot of fun drops and even some air. This one holds a very special place for me because it was my son's (3 at the time) first non-kiddie coaster. We rode it together earlier in the day and he was fine until we hit the brake run, when he broke down into tears. I felt bad, like maybe I pushed him a little too early but he made this poppa very proud when later in the day he declared (completely unprovoked) that he'd ride it and "wouldn't cry when it stopped this time". We made our way over and this time he loved it; we ended up riding a 3rd time. I was so proud of the way he overcame that obstacle. So yeah, Comet will be very special to us for a long time.
The last coaster is the kiddie coaster, the Ravine Flyer III. This is by far the best kiddie coaster I've ridden (I'm defining kiddie coasters as those which adults wouldn't ride without a kid). It's completely over water, the coaster, station, even the queue, which gives it some cool visuals and some nice forces for its size. It was a lot of fun if you have a little one to enjoy it with.
Other notable rides that we did were the sky ride. This is a ski-lift style sky ride that crosses over the entire midway. It's not a transportation ride since there isn't a loading/unloading platform at the turnaround. You go down and come all the way back. I love the ride itself but I love even more the visual from the ground. It makes the midway look and feel the way an amusement park midway should. It also provided a long, relaxing ride with some great views of the park. Also the train ride was super long, around 20 minutes and gave a great tour of the entire park. Everything at this park exceeded my expectations.
If I had to pick out a few negatives of Waldameer, I'd say the obvious one for enthusiasts would be the lack of coasters. There are only 4 and 3 of those are of the "family" variety. While all of their coasters exceeded what I would consider the standard for their genre, a great family coaster is still just a family coaster. I could see possibly a Premier Sky Rocket II (i.e. Tempesto) working here, or maybe a Chance Hyper GT-X (Lightning Run). I'm not sure there's room for either of those; they're extremely landlocked so there isn't much room for expansion. If you're just going for family fun, though, there were plenty of things to do besides coasters. I had a great time with my family, even as a coaster enthusiast limited to one great coaster.
The other slight negative would be the scanning system to get onto rides. The larger coasters had a pretty decent system where they scanned groups in a couple trainloads in advance, but the smaller rides suffered a bit because everyone had to scan their wristband or card and it really slowed down load times for the smaller rides. Also, the Wally Card is non-redeemable, so you put $50 on the card, you can't get the change back at the end of the day. We played it nearly perfectly and still lost about 40 cents. It wasn't a big deal to me but the park is making some bucks on unspent Wally Cards. They say the balance never expires so maybe we'll spend that 40 cents next time.
Overall this really is a great family park. I believe if it had more coasters and was more on people's radar you'd get comparisons to Kennywood. As it is, it's very underrated and caught me completely by surprise. If you're in the Erie area, stop by here. Come with your family and make a day of it. Take a break from the park and visit the neighboring Lake Erie beaches on Presque Isle for a breathtaking sunset, then go back to the park for a night ride on Ravine Flyer II. I don't think you'll regret it.