This week we were invited to visit Hersheypark to take a ride on its 15th coaster, Candymonium! It is the tallest, fastest, longest (and sweetest!) coaster at the park at 210ft tall and dropping as speeds up to 76mph! But before we got to ride, you have to enter into the park through its completely brand new entrance plaza and park land, Chocolatetown.

CHOCOLATETOWN

Chocolatetown is not only a new entrance plaza for park entry and ticket sales, but also they have introduced some new shops and dining locations as well. And they look incredible! There has been so much care put into every single detail with countless nods to the Hershey brand and its history everywhere you look!

And it’s still largely under construction, so we expect to see even more added throughout the season! The park sent over a great drone video that truly shows off the scale of just how much has been added.

Entering any park in 2020 is gong to be quite the experience, and I’m pleased to report that the team at Hersheypark has already done a great job to make the process as smooth as possible. The wide plaza is great for spacing out guests waiting to enter as they receive touchless temperature tests (they seemed to still be testing multiple systems here with the main park and Chocolate World utilizing different methods) and prepare to pass through the main gate. Similar to what was announced by Six Flags a few months ago, the park has installed several touchless Evlov Express stations that really have sped up the security check process making us wonder why every park in the country hasn’t gotten a few of these yet! manual bag checks were still conducted and this did manage to create a bit of congestion and we are hoping that in the future a dedicated bag line may be needed to prevent the backup that occurs when guests with bags get pinched between entering guests and those waiting to be searched. But if you don’t have a bag, then this system allowed for guests to enter without stopping at all which was incredible to see.

Once inside, you enter into the main part of Chocolatetown and are immediately faced with the giant Bolliger & Mabbillard hyper coaster, Candymonium as it travels around and interacts with the pathways below. As we made our way to the coaster, we passed by the still under construction Kisses Fountain which when completed will use water to create the shape of a Hershey’s Kiss! We were told that it will also have a light show planned as well!

Next you pass by 3 more new shops, a Starbucks, the HP Collections gift shop, and Hyperdeck, a multiplayer VR experience (additional charge needed). You’ll also find that the park’s classic carousel has been moved to a new location in Chocolatetown. The new structure for it looks great, though it does feel a bit odd with how it’s a bit pushed off to the side of the pathway when before it was located right in the center and you would always walk all the way around it.

The shop was still in the process of getting some final touches and Hyperdeck was open! While we did not try it out, we did have a chance to experience it at last year’s IAAPA Expo and can say that it truly is a really unique experience where it mixes Virtual Reality with a moving floor, surround sound, wind, heat, and getting to be in a virtual space with up to 3 of your friends! It is definitely not cheap at 15 dollars per person, so you may want to be sure of what you’re getting into before trying it out. The money may be better spent on one of those incredible milkshakes. The park continues on as you are greeted a statue of Milton Hershey, but we took a sharp right to ride something.

Candymonium

You pass under the ride’s final turnaround to enter to small plaza built for the new ride’s station building. This area offers some incredible views of not only this giant ride, but also all of Chocolatetown. We quickly entered the station and were ready to ride! The ride queue was full of social distancing markers every 6ft reminding guests. This system seemed only moderately effective as people would bunch of on stairs and especially when choosing a row to wait for. distancing was entirely up to guests and at times the station did become a bit crowded, but luckily not for long as the park’s operations team did a great job to keep people moving.

Finally it was time to ride! We were able to get 3 rides all in different seats and can easily say that this is the best ride at Hersheypark! There is just so so much airtime over those 7 sweeping camelback hills where you feel completely weightless for seconds at a time! This is especially true in that back most row! The ride goes off in a direction away from the park into some wooded area which is unique for a park known for building so many of its rides literally on top of each other. The highlight of the ride is easily the twisted drop back into Chocolatetown which breaks many of the conventions seen on other B&M hyper coasters. This twisted section that follows the terrain of the area and then sweeps around the Kisses Fountain site makes for a moment where you just know that every guest walking by will stop to watch as trains fly by overhead. The airtime is great, the speed is felt throughout the entire ride, (no midcourse brakeruns here!) and once the Kisses Fountain is completed this will be the park’s standout attraction! There also may be a lighting package planned that has yet to be installed for the ride!

The ride’s three trains of themed after Twizzlers, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, and of course Hershey’s Kisses. And of course they all look great and so vibrant as they ride on that chocolate-colored track! You should probably just stop reading and go out there and ride this thing for yourself! (if you cant wait there’s a POV below!)

The ride is extremely photogenic and surely will be seen in every guest’s photo album in the future!

Thank you to Amanda and the whole great Hersheypark team for allowing us to experience this fantastic addition to an already great park! Visit Hersheypark.com for tickets and a great Fourth of July weekend even! Date and time specific reservations are required and information about all of that can be found here.

As always stay turned to our Instagram page for many more photos and updates in the near future!