Hershey Park

The first thing you notice when you visit this park is the elegant entrance filled with lush trees. The park entrance is buried in trees. The park had a very relaxed family atmosphere that was a nice change of pace from Six Flags World of Adventure, the park I visited a few days before. The theming was above average and I especially enjoyed the Midway America section of the park. It gave the impression of an old fashioned fair. My main problem with the park is the very confusing layout. I felt that at times I was spending more time trying to find the attractions rather than riding them. Their seemed to be lots of dead-ends near the swinging ship ride, and I kept ending up by it. The food was decent, and the fries I had tasted EXACTLY like the famous fries at Kennywood. Now onto the coasters:

Comet: This ride, built by Herb Schmeck, has a very steep and intense first drop and a nice turnaround, but the rest of the ride was marred with braking, creating a pretty tame 2nd half. Without the brakes this coaster could have been a legitimate top 25 woodie. My rating: 6

Great Bear: Noted as one of the more unique creations by B&M, this inverted coaster starts out with a very odd elevated helix. The helix creates some very intense g forces before the decent first drop. The first loop, immelman, and zero g. roll, are all nice and intense. The ride suffers from a very weak ending and is too short. My rating: 6.5

Wildcat: This GCI woodie features a nice swooping first drop characterstic of the classic woodies of yesteryear. The first drop on this coaster was awesome, and the directional changes are very disorienting. The coaster was extremely rough though, however, it had real nice laterals throughout. My rating: 7.5

Superdooperlooper: This coaster was built by steel coaster visionary, Anton Schwartzkopf. The ride is pretty tame, but the vertical loop has some very powerful positive g's. My rating: 5.5

Lightning Racer: The 2nd GCI coaster in the park, this woodie is undeniably smooth. It is an absolute masterpiece. The coaster packs a nice punch of laterals, a little airtime, and a near miss with a waterfall near the middle of the ride. The dueling effect works to perfection and the coaster actually races, which is something you don't always get with a "racing" coaster. My rating: 10

Overall park rating: 8.5