Post by Bud Parsley on Sept 16, 2010 12:16:41 GMT -8
Well, finally I have time to post my trip report from Holiday World. For those not aware, Silverwood and Holiday World have been the subject of comparisons for several years now among coaster and theme park enthusiasts. This probably stems from the fact that both are family-owned (a dying breed these days), both have world-class wooden coasters, both have water parks attached to the main theme park, and both are located in somewhat remote, isolated areas of the country. In this Trip Report, the inevitable comparisons between Holiday World and Silverwood will be made in detail. I should point out that I visited both Holiday World and Silverwood 9 days apart this year, so I think my comparison has some perspective to it. Also, please note that Silverwood is my home park that I’ve visited almost annually since 1994, and this was my first trip to Holiday World, so the photos are exclusively of Holiday World, and the commentary assumes the reader is already familiar with Silverwood. Read on and agree or disagree, but most of all, enjoy.
While I am going to claim a “winner” in each areas/ride I compare, I’m not going to keep score or declare an overall better park since different categories carry a different weight to different people. For example, some might find the wooden coasters the most important factor, to others it might be the water parks, and to others it may be the food selection, theming, etc. I’ll let you figure out the final score yourself based on the things that are most important to you. Let’s get started…
First, let’s talk about the parking - which is 100% FREE at Holiday World. This was a shock to me as I drove into the lot and I could not believe it! Also impressive was the staff they had on-site guiding cars to park, since the lot is not paved. Regardless of the gravel ground, free parking clearly gives the edge to HOLIDAY WORLD.
Parking: FREE and plenty of it!
Let’s talk theming now. Of course, Silverwood has four main areas of the theme park area: Country Carnival, Main Street, Garfield’s Summer Camp, and Roller Coaster Alley. While these areas do have distinct lines drawn on, say, a park map, they really don’t have much in terms of a coherent theme. Holiday World on the other hand has five separate themed lands: Christmas, Thanksgiving, Halloween, 4th of July, and the kid’s area Holidog's Funtown. Holiday World’s lands are themed with music, heavily themed shops and rides, and a great unique feel to each one of them. HOLIDAY WORLD takes the cake here.
The entrance to the Thanksgiving section of the park
A nativity scene in the Christmas section
The Christmas area is themed like Santa’s village complete with Christmas tree centerpiece
I’ll comment on the overall scenery now. It’s no contest. While Holiday World has neat themes that work well and are very cohesive, Silverwood winds hands down for pure beauty and landscaping, especially with what they’ve done the past couple of years. SILVERWOOD gets the win in this category, with the help of the incredible scenery of the Northwest - an attraction in and of itself.
Scenery as you approach. The Midwest is just so FLAT!
Before we get to the rides, let’s now talk food. Now I absolutely love Lindy’s at Silverwood with a great menu that does not feel a bit like theme park food. They also have a spectacular setting with indoor and outdoor patio seating as the train comes within feet of your table. Beyond Lindy's though, the rest of Silverwood offers little more than your typical county fair. Holiday World on the other hand has a few more choices, especially at the Plymouth Rock Café in the Thanksgiving area of the park. Their prices are rock bottom low, and the food quality does not suffer. Plymouth Rock offers a full-blown thanksgiving dinner with oodles of choices. Overall, I give the edge to SILVERWOOD for Lindy’s, but only by a hair, and if they ever get rid of the garlic fries, they just might fall behind in this category.
For less than $10, I had a Thanksgiving feast with some Southern flair. Far more than I could eat in a single sitting.
Next up, there are the drinks. Many of you are already aware of the soda arrangements at Holiday World, but I was not until I got into the park. In fact, it was lunchtime when I realized as I ordered my meal, that there were no drinks on the menu. I asked the question and found out that Holiday World offers – completely free of charge – all the soda you can drink, all day long in the park. Just stop by any Pepsi Oasis (enclosed building scattered throughout the park) and take your pick of one of 10 different Pepsi products, water, or coffee in the complimentary cups provided. Return to any station at any time and grab as many cups as your hands can carry because you can drink as much as you want all day. Folks, this is ABSOLUTELY AMAZING and without question the prize goes to HOLIDAY WORLD.
Pepsi Oasis buildings are found all throughout the park.
Inside, there are plenty of choices. Did I mention it’s FREE?!?!
OK, let’s talk rides now. Flat rides at Holiday World are few and far between. Even more so than Silverwood, if you can believe that. And just like Silverwood, there really aren’t any unique or exciting flats to get excited about. But what Holiday World does offer is rides that have great themes to fit their locations. Also, their flats are in excellent condition – looking almost brand new with great paint jobs and kept very clean. Silverwood has a few more and wins in terms of quantity, but the edge goes to HOLIDAY WORLD here for the quality: great theming and nice look of their flat rides.
Turkey Whirl is a turkey-themed tilt-a-whirl
Fresh paint always helps.
Even the Carousel is nicely themed.
I LOVED the theming on their waveswinger.
We’ll talk towers now because both parks have one. Holiday World’s is an S&S launcher called Liberty Launch which is very short in height by tower standards. Panic Plunge at Silverwood is a bit more unique, and is taller, faster, and provides a better view of the gorgeous Idaho mountains. SILVERWOOD gets the point in this category.
The Liberty Launch tower at Holiday World isn’t much of one.
Holiday World does have a train, which I neglected to get any photos of. It’s a very short kiddie ride through a very small route and it can’t hold a candle to the amazing Silverwood Central Railroad that travels through both the park, and the nearby woods, and provides a halftime entertainment show. SILVERWOOD wins this battle for sure.
Holidog's Funtown - the Holiday World kiddie area - puts Garfield’s summer camp to shame. HOLIDAY WORLD wins this comparison without question and their Howler kiddie coaster is a much more interesting ride than the Tiny Toot “coaster”. I've griped for years about Silverwood's weak kiddie area, and visiting Holiday World gives me one more reason to do so. It's hard to find a weaker kids area than what you find at Silverwood.
Even the entrance is better.
An interactive water area and various play areas are found in Holidog’s Funtown.
The Howler is a fun little kiddie coaster.
Frightful Falls is Holiday World’s log ride located in the Halloween section of the park, intertwined with the Legend coaster. The ride doesn't offer much in terms of theming, however it does start with a very small decline in a pitch dark tunnel which is interesting the first time through. From there it’s basically a standard journey in an open flume, with a final lift and drop about the size of Silverwood’s. While it does offer some great views of Legend, the ride is otherwise uninspired and SILVERWOOD wins this battle, with a longer ride and much better scenery.
The main drop goes right through the lift of the Legend coaster.
Raging Rapids is Holiday World’s raft ride. It certainly does not offer the secluded wilderness journey that you find on Thunder Canyon, but it really doesn't seem to be even attempting to do that. Instead, Raging Rapids has some great effects like “geysers” that shoot up into the air and soak your boat when you pass by. The ride also journeys through an old west town with a few additional surprises. It’s a very close call on this one, so I give this one a TIE between both parks.
In contrast to Silverwood's Thunder Canyon, Raging Rapids BEGINS with a tunnel.
Geysers spray guests along their journey.
Water sprays guests by surprise as they travel through the old western town.
I probably should compare the water parks as well, though my experience of Holiday World’s Splashin' Safari was limited only to their new 2010 water coaster Wildebeest – the world’s longest, and one amazing and thrilling ride. Holiday World offers a bigger, better, and broader selection of attractions, but Boulder Beach is extremely well themed, cleaner, and designed much better. However, at the end of the day I have to give the edge to HOLIDAY WORLD. Splashin' Safari offers a better selection of things to do as well as Wildebeest – which was an amazing attraction and worth wearing a bathing suit just to experience.
A very small portion of Wildebeest – the world’s longest water coaster and worth every second spent in line.
A great racing slide with plenty of lanes to choose from.
One of two large kiddie areas – very similar in style to Silverwood’s Polliwog Park.
The other kiddie area.
Avalanche Mountain-style family raft ride.
You can’t go wrong with a Proslide Tornado.
The theming along their 2 lazy rivers leaves a lot to be desired.
A classic “toilet bowl” style slide.
Both parks also offer a few major attractions that are unique and not really comparable at all. Silverwood has the classic corkscrew which is simple but has a great history behind it. And of course Silverwood also has the jaw-dropping Aftershock which the park seems to have successfully revived from what appeared to be certain doom in its former home at Six Flags Great America. Both of these coasters offer great rides and Silverwood should be proud. Holiday Worlds only major unique attraction is the one year old Pilgrim’s Plunge – a shoot-the-chutes ride with a unique (and slightly terrifying) vertical lift elevator. It is amazing to watch, scary to ride, and gives you a surprisingly mild splash at the bottom of the hill, which I enjoyed in comparison to the drenching you often get on these rides. However, I found that while riding in the front seat – the only place where you can see well – the speed of the ride splashes water into your face in such an uncomfortable way that it forces you to close your eyes. Sure it was fun to drop that far, but I wanted to be able to see! However, the speed made the splash of the water sting my face, and I just couldn't enjoy it much at all. I wore sunglasses the second time to avoid the stinging spray of water, but they just got soaked and I still couldn’t see anything.
Pilgrims Plunge is amazing to watch, and only so-so to ride.
Holiday World's other "unique" attraction is Gobbler Getaway, a shooter dark ride where you essentially try to herd cartoonish-turkeys for Thanksgiving with your "gun". Like many interactive dark rides, it is entertaining to try to rack up as many points as possible, and Holiday world keeps the lines moving well on this one. It's a great little attraction, the likes of which Silverwood has never seen. I've said for years that Silverwood could use a good dark ride, and experiencing one at Holiday World reminded me how well a good dark ride can round out the offerings at a park. Now, if I have to make a comparison of these “unique” attractions - which is kind of hard to do - I'd probably give a slight edge to Silverwood, but it's a tough call because I'm really not comparing apples to apples here. Silverwood has two great steel coasters, and Holiday World offers the entertaining Gobbler Getaway and the incredible-to-watch but somewhat-of-a-letdown Pilgrim’s Plunge. I guess in this area it just depends on which type of attractions are more important to you. The coasters are great, though I appreciate how "complete" Holiday World feels with a shoot-the-chutes ride and a dark ride - neither of which Silverwood offers. I suspect due to the extremely differing nature of the attractions I'd call this one a TIE.
The Gobbler Getaway building is easy to pull off as a big red barn.
An animatronic Grandma tells you the story of the runaway turkeys as you wait in line.
OK, so, let’s start comparing coasters now. Holiday World has 3 wooden coasters, and Silverwood has 2. For starters, I’m going to compare Tremors with Legend. Why? Both are twisters with tunnels, and both are roughly the same speed and size. At the end of the day this is practically a draw, but I’m going to have to give the edge to LEGEND simply for these reasons: two trains (which I understand was the result of an upgrade a few years back from when the ride only opened with only one train - see Silverwood? It CAN be done!), cool sound effects up the lift hill, and a very fun twisting ride intertwined through the water slide towers. It’s very, VERY close here, but HOLIDAY WORLD wins.
The entrance to Legend invokes the Headless Horseman theme of the ride.
The main lift hill of Legend.
Legend twists its way over, under, and through various slides at Splashin’ Safari.
Legend leaves the station with a train full of excited riders.
Now, let’s make a comparison of Timber Terror and Raven. At first this may seem an odd comparison, but I have to pair these up because Voyage is so absolutely in a class of its own (more on that later). So Raven has a cool, creepy entrance, and offers a fun little twisting journey back into the woods, and along a lake. However, to me it was way too short and didn’t offer many real thrills at all. I actually found it quite anti-climactic when we arrived back at the station with a sort of "that's it?" feeling. Timber Terror is a classic woodie that has a huge repeatability factor with major airtime and a great helix finale. Both of these coasters have only one train, and that makes for a very frustrating wait in line, but it's really no contest: Timber Terror wins and so does SILVERWOOD.
Raven’s lift hill is seen clearly in this shot from the parking lot.
The entrance to Raven is creepy and nicely themed.
Holiday World’s only one-train coaster, the Raven.
Finally, there is the big daddy of them all – the king, the crown jewel – Voyage. Believe everything you've heard. This ride takes Tremors and Timber Terror out back, beats them into a bloody pulp, and eats them both for breakfast. Yes, it really is that good. It’s almost not even worth trying to put into words how great this coaster is, but I will try. For starters, they run 2-3 trains on this bad boy at all times. So that means minimal waits in line for a world-class coaster. Second, the incline and first two drops are just INSANE in height, speed, angle –everything they should be. Third, the airtime is just sick: they claim it is the most of any coaster in the world, and I believe it. You feel it even in the front seat. Fourth, the 5 underground tunnels are fantastic – especially the one with the triple dip which is just long enough to get you a bit nervous about not being able to see where you’re headed next. Fifth, the three 90-degree banked turns were a new experience for me and simply a brilliant addition to a wooden coaster – a ton of fun and a completely new sensation unlike anything else I've ever experienced on a woodie. But perhaps the best thing about Voyage is that it truly is a voyage – a whopping 6442 feet in length (compare to Tremors at 3000 feet in length). The Voyage just keeps going and going and going. I rode it multiple times and each time I was just fascinated with how long the ride lasts. The next day I rode the Beast at King’s Island – technically a longer coaster – but Voyage felt longer and much more satisfying with virtually no “dead” spots. Here I am re-reading this review and I just can’t do it justice…this ride has everything you want in a wooden coaster and then some. It’s like they took the best parts from every woodie out there, put them all on steroids, and morphed them together into this freak of a wonderful machine. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this coaster, and even better is the news that they appeared to be in the process of getting new trains that look like they’ll provide an even more amazing experience with their more open, exposed design. The ride is mostly hidden back in the woods apart from the rest of the park, so the photos I did get were few in number and don't do much justice. I strongly recommend taking a virtual ride-through on Holiday World's park website.
You pass under the brake run of the Voyage as you enter Thanksgiving.
The lift hill is just colossal.
Most of the ride is hidden back in the woods, but it’s hard to miss the lift hill.
Guests take their seats in a blue train.
The new trains look like they’ll be excellent.
Minimal enclosure around the body. Nice.
So there you have it: my review and comparisons of two absolutely wonderful parks. I must admit though: after a trip to both in such a short period of time, I found myself longing for certain changes at my home park of Silverwood, and at the same time more appreciative of the great things it offers that I sometimes take for granted. Both parks are great, and both parks have unique offerings that just can’t be duplicated anywhere I’ve been. Here’s to two great family-owned parks that truly know what they are doing, and keep us coming back for more again and again. Keep it up, both of you.
(See below for a few more photos…)
A kiddie canoe ride.
Now smoke free…
The live entertainment of the day was a Christian revival of sorts. This definitely ain’t the Northwest!
Kiddie car ride.
More kiddie rides in Christmastown.
Height measurement stations such as these were found throughout the park.
All coasters offered FREE lockers to store your personals in while you ride. Another huge plus.