Summer Coaster Tour - Day 06 - Dorney Park - 2026/05/26

It's a new day and it's time to go visit a brand new park! Dorney Park in Pennsylvania! 

Not everyone is a big roller coaster enthusiast. Theresa gets motion sick pretty easily so even though she's planned this whole trip, with hotels and everything, she's not always going to participate. Alli, Ian, and I left her in the hotel room working, while we caught a ride-share to the park. 

And here we are at the entrance right around 10am. It won't open for another 30 minutes but maybe we'll be let in early. 

Through security within a couple minutes and the first in line for the park! We ended up chatting with a local who is here by herself and told us she comes at least every week. 

10 minutes later, the courtyard in front of the entrance is starting to get full. I see a lot of kids here with pieces of paper, which means there's a lot of schools here today and they're all getting lunch. We'll have to plan our day around that so we're not in long lines. 

10:20am and we're inside the park! 

I went to the photo pass area to get my "all season photo pass" activated at yet another park. I wish it would just "work" without visiting the photo desk at each park, but we'll get this figured out. 

Except... Dorney Park uses yet another unique system! Not Fun Pix (which I bought). Not PomVom (which I also had to buy). But this is Dorney Park Fun Foto Pass, which isn't either of those. Luckily for me, the people at the photo desk gave me a QR code I can scan to get my pictures today.  

We didn't get a wristband issued to us when we entered the park. I didn't see a place in my app to activate Fast Lane either, so I headed to the Guest Services booth to figure out how to get our Fast Lane activated at this park. Turns out you need to go to a merchandise counter, have them scan your pass, scan the QR code on a band to activate it, then they put it tightly around your wrist. 

Even with all that, we got everything wrapped up just in time to make it over to the 10:30am rope drop! 

We saw our friend that we chatted with earlier heading to a roller coaster in the back of the park and headed that way with her. 

Off to Iron Menace! 

We made it on to the very first coaster of the day! Back row! 

Once you get to the top of the 160' lift hill, the car stops and hangs you over the edge. Then you drop at a greater than vertical 95 degrees, before heading off to do four different inversions. My main complaint is that it is over so quickly! It's only 1:30 minute ride, but the portion from going down the lift hill to slowing down to go into the station, it's only 30 seconds! 

There was not much of a line and we could have stayed on and gone again, but somehow the restraints really dug into Alli's thighs and she would not go again. 

Our friend was heading to Steel Force next, and invited us to join her. 

It was a fine coaster that was basically a long out and back again. There were some airtime hills, but it wasn't anything amazing. 

Thunderhawk is Dorney's 100+ year old coaster and one of the oldest wooden coasters in the world that's still in operation. We found it a bumpy of course, but not as bad as some. 

Icee time! Our friend Becky also has a drink pass and dining plan. Makes sense if you're here every week! 

The next big coaster on our list of rides to do it Hydra. The lines are starting to get long though, so it was here that we said goodbye to our friend. She's headed off to get lunch while we jump in the Fast Lane line. 

The kids were able to get into the front row!

While I was right behind them. 

And the cameras work here! 

This coaster, The Hydra was built right on top of the former Hercules coaster. 

I loved the slow Heartline Roll (aka Jojo Roll) right out of the station. It had lots of twists and turns and we liked it a lot. 

Next is the Wild Mouse coaster. 

If it's not the twin of Goofy's Sky School at DCA, it's definitely it's brother. I find these mouse coasters rough and I have to brace myself for the sharp turns. Not my favorite. One and done. 

Let's break for lunch. Holy Smokes BBQ is sounding pretty good to us! 

I got a pulled pork sandwich with tots ($18.99), which I found to be pretty tasty. 

Ian got loaded pulled pork tots ($14.99) which he also enjoyed. 

I felt like Alli got ripped off a bit with her Garden Salad ($17.99). It did come with 2 chicken tenders, but that's a small bowl and it's not even close to being full of lettuce and other toppings. 

There's another ride that we've heard good things about. Talon - The Grip of Fear. It's an inverted coaster with lots of inversions. With these style coasters, we love sitting in the front row. We waited and got it and it was definitely worth it. 

There's a couple portions where you're going close to the ground and through the trees, which is super thrilling and a great view from the front row!

Drink stop! 

We've done most of the coasters here, but there's still some more thrill rides to go on. 

Growing up in California, when I was in my early teens, we went to Great America (not the one in Illinois). They had a big drop tower that was like a giant 10 story slide. 

There is was called The Edge, but here it's called The Demon Drop. It's different than the regular drop towers we go on, so I was excited to take the kids on it. 

They thought it was fun, especially sliding on your back when you get to the bottom. 

We did find a gift shop called The Edge. Wonder if it's somehow related. 

Then it was over to Dominator. There's 2 different towers here: one that takes you to the top and drops you, the other that shoots you to the top. 

Both are fun! 

Possessed is a near copy of The Flash from Chicago's Six Flags Great America. 

Fun, but over too quickly. 

What else is left? Revolution? This looks to be identical to La Revolution at Knott's Berry Farm. But we rode that one lots of times and it was always fun. 

Over at Snoopyland, we took a ride on the Woodstock Express and made sure to claim our coaster credit. They even have an on-ride photo! 

And they go around twice, so you get pictures twice! 

Wheeeee!

Finding a random park photographer and getting photos here at Planet Snoopy. 

The kids and I took a spin on Woodstock Whirlybirds. It's basically teacups, but we weren't allowed to ride in the same nest.

Finished with her work day, Theresa packed up the rest of the hotel room and came to the park! Hi T! 

We've got to get her on a ride, and since we're in Planet Snoopy, I think we can find something that works. 

How about Snoopy's Rocket Express? 

It's on a track, but because it doesn't "coast" we can't claim it as a coaster credit. 

Love the random details around this area. 

Nickels, nickels, nickels. 

Time to go on more rides. The Doctors is OUT. 

The kids both have spending money from birthdays and Christmas, and we said they could get a memento from this trip. When they saw the cute Snoopy plushes, both knew what they wanted. 

Not Woodstock, though he is cute. 

We have a World War I Flying Ace Snoopy, and Joe Cool. 

Riding in Theresa's pockets while we go on another ride. 

Back over to Hydra for another round! 

More Icee! 

Dinnertime. Theresa thought our lunch looked pretty good and thought pulled pork would be good for dinner too. Alli's salad still looks sad. 

We're going to start wrapping up our day but we'll do one more ride on Talon, from the front row again. Theresa was here this time to get our picture as we went by. 

And a fun one with us inverted. Nice work T. 

It's about 4:30pm and the park doesn't close for a little while, but we've got places to be. 

It's about 96 minutes to our hotel and we've got another Six Flags park to visit tomorrow. Let's hit the road. 

But because we've got some extra time, let's stop at Chuck E Cheese along the way. No big tickets on the basketball game. I got a whopping 3 tickets for beating the high score. You get more tickets on the mini-basketball game for the really little kids. 

Milk Jug Toss was still winnable with decent tickets. 

Perfect scores at least twice. 

T couldn't use her regular method off the back wall, but still managed to consistently make a few. 

All in all we won 2637 tickets on 184 credits, giving us an average return on 14.3 tickets per credit, which isn't too bad. 

Another LIDL you say? 

Getting some tasty pastries, even though it's late in the day. 

Right across the street is an Aldi. Both Lidl and Aldi are German owned discount grocery stores. 

Time to go into New Jersey! 

And getting to our hotel right around 8:30pm. It's been a very busy day. 

I knew I'd need to do laundry midway though the trip. I was happy to see that this hotel had a laundry room, and even better, it was free to use! I brought some detergent sheets and dryer sheets.

Tomorrow we're off to Six Flags Great Adventure! 

Our adventure so far.