Visit Dates: May 25-26, 2025

Whenever there’s a long holiday weekend, Sam and I are always scoping out a travel destination. With more limited time this time around, we decided to head out east to Hersheypark in Hershey, PA to spend Memorial Day weekend!

Hershey is home to both an amusement park and the famous Chocolate World, and while Sam and I have both been to the latter (thanks to Hersheypark Stadium being the home of various Pennsylvania high school state championships), this was our first visit to their amusement park. Hersheypark has more than 70 rides and attractions, as well as boasting the most roller coasters in the Northeast — fourteen! They also have a waterpark within the theme park, and while it’s not something we are interested in checking out, it looked well maintained and like a fun experience.

Single day tickets cost $89.95, but like most amusement parks, they’re always running a deal of some kind, so I would imagine it’s rare to pay full face value for a ticket. We purchased ours in March while Hersheypark was running a special deal – we purchased two 2-day tickets plus two parking passes for $220.00 before fees. If you’re doing the math, that’s $42 per ticket per day, excluding the $52 for parking.  

Parking is definitely plentiful but also expensive at a whopping $26/day. Unfortunately, I’m not sure of any workarounds or alternatives to avoid paying this. Due to the size of the parking lots, they do offer tram service for those parked further away, but we found it worthwhile to walk from our spot rather than wait for the tram. But the tram is a great service for those with additional accessibility needs or who just have tired feet after a long day in the park.

As far as the park itself, I was really impressed! Most areas of the park were clean from the time it opened until close, and I thought the bathrooms were especially tidy and well designed. The only complaint was that the park was a bit hard to navigate, with many dead ends and few shortcuts, which meant that it took some time to walk from ride to ride. 

There were a lot of food options as well, ranging from classic theme park food to more adventurous options, like Cuban food. Additionally, we noticed a few state specialities, such as Chickie’s & Pete’s and a cheesesteak place. And, for those who need their waffle fries and nuggets, there is a Chick-fil-A on the property. One of their food highlights is The Chocolatier, a sit-down restaurant with many items that have some sort of chocolate twist to them. We didn’t make it there this time, but we would definitely like to check it out on another visit!

Here’s everything we did over the course of our two days, along with some thoughts about our experience:

DAY 1: Sunday, May 25, 2025

Arrived into the park at 11:30AM

Comet

SkyRush

**Lunch Break**

Storm Runner

Trailblazer

Ferris Wheel

Lightning Racer

Wildcat’s Revenge

Train

Monorail

Candymonium

Left the park at 8:45PM

After a pretty easy drive from Pittsburgh along the Turnpike, we arrived in Hersheypark right around opening. We parked and walked to the entrance, which puts you right outside of one of their most popular coasters, Candymonium, in a newer section of the park. However, I usually need a warm-up ride on an easy coaster, so we decided we would come back to this later. We followed the crowd until we ended up outside of Comet, a wooden coaster. Wooden coasters are some of my favorites, so this seemed like a good place to start. It ended up being the worst decision of the day.

We ended up waiting at least 90 minutes, if not closer to two hours, for a wooden coaster that was just okay. This was by far the longest wait of the weekend, and the longer we waited, the sillier we felt, but it was a sunk cost situation and we couldn’t justify leaving the line. One silver lining of the long wait was we got to experience Hersheypark’s marching band quintet, who came to serenade us in line. The group – consisting of a snare drum, a trumpet, a saxophone, a trombone, and a tuba — played a few catchy songs before transitioning into music trivia. It was a fun way to pass the time, and as a former marching bander, I appreciated the entertainment. 

After we finally got off of that ride, we went next door to SkyRush, which was a great roller coaster and one of our favorites at the park.  By this time, we had been at the park for at least three hours and only had two rides to show for it. We decided that it was time for a lunch break and hoped that food would pick up our spirits. We went to Overlook Food Court and split an order of chicken tenders, fries, and pink lemonade. We thought it was decent value and quality for theme park food. 

After our much needed lunch break, we reorganized ourselves, spent the rest of the afternoon riding rides, and by the end of the day, got through pretty much everything we wanted to ride. In particular, I really enjoyed Storm Runner, which launches you 72 mph in two seconds.  It reminded me of Maverick in Cedar Point, another one of my favorite coasters. We rode some smaller rides, including a wooden racer coaster that packed a punch, before getting in line for Wildcat’s Revenge, a hybrid coaster similar to Steel Vengeance in Cedar Point. Wildcat’s Revenge was the only coaster that we rode which required us to use lockers, but they were free to use. The coaster was smooth and had some great inversion time. Although it was renovated from a wooden to this hybrid coaster by the same company as Steel Vengeance, I enjoyed this one a lot more.

We then checked out the train and the monorail, the latter of which was a must-do for us and offered a great perspective of the amusement park, Hershey’s Chocolate World, and ZooAmerica. We finished up out night riding Canymonium, the ride at the front of the park and one of their newest coasters. This ride was a classic steel hypercoaster and super smooth. It was a great way to end our day! 

We went on a Sheetz run – a must if you’re ever in central Pennsylvania – before going to our accommodation for the night. Even after our rocky start, we were pleased with how much we got done and knew that we could take our time the next day. 

DAY 2: Monday, May 26, 2025

Arrived at park at 10:45am

SkyRush

sooperdooperLooper

Great Bear

Coal Cracker

**Lunch Break**

“ZooAmerica”

Wildcat’s Revenge

Candymonium

“Hershey’s Chocolate World”

Left the park at 4:30PM

After a restful night spent with good company, we hit the road early and made it into the park shortly before the opening time. Like many amusement parks, we were able to enter through the gates before the advertised opening time, but were roped off from any of the rides until official opening at 11am. However, it did seem that Candymonium was running earlier than 11am, but with a 2 hour wait time, we decided to hold off on that and make our way further back into the park.

Since our friend joined us on this day, we did a mix of rides we did yesterday, like SkyRush, and some new ones, like sooperdooperLooper and Great Bear. SooperdooperLooper is a mild coaster with one big loop-de-loop (thus the name) and was a little rough, but it ultimately would make for a great coaster for younger kids looking to try out an inversion. Great Bear was one we had all intentions of skipping, but a friend gave us a rave review of it, so we decided to check it out. We don’t have much luck with hanging coasters (thanks to Raptor at Cedar Point), so we were both nervous about this one. While we both liked it more than Raptor (again, a pretty low bar here), this solidified that hanging coasters aren’t for us. 

We took a quick lunch break after the water log ride, Coal Cracker, where we enjoyed a bucket of loaded fries and our friend had a walking taco, both of which were very good. It was at this point that we parted ways for a bit, as she wanted to ride some more coasters and we wanted to check out the zoo portion of the park.

ZooAmerica is an attached small zoo dedicated to the wildlife and plants of the Americas. Admission is included with your Hersheypark ticket, but you can also purchase admission to the zoo alone. Sam and I were on the fence about visiting this section, but when we saw the bear exhibit from the monorail the night before, we knew we had to check it out. The zoo is small but offers a lot of different exhibits. There were also a few places to buy food and souvenirs, as well as plenty of benches and tables. Unfortunately, we visited at the hottest time of the day; most of the animals were sleeping in the shade, so we didn’t get to see as many animals as we had hoped. Nonetheless, we had a great visit and would definitely consider this a must-do on subsequent visits to Hersheypark.

After meeting back up with our friend, we hit Wildcat’s Revenge – which was solidified as one of my favorite coasters after our second ride – as well as her favorite ride in the park, Candymonium. We had just enough time to stop by Hershey’s Chocolate World – where we picked out a few sweet treats and Sam customized a two-pound Reese’s cup. Then, we were back on the road to head home to Pittsburgh, after having spent a great weekend at Hersheypark!

We know price can be a huge factor in people’s decision to visit an amusement park, so in full transparency, here’s how much we spent on this trip (not including gas/tolls):

Tickets + Fees : $183.36

Parking: $52.00

In-Park Food: $49.24

Total = $284.60

Overall, we really enjoyed our trip to the “Sweetest Place on Earth”! The park is well maintained and has a wide variety of attractions and experiences. It’s a great weekend trip for anyone — couples, families, and large groups. Sam and I had a great time, and we are already looking forward to our next trip to Hersheypark!

WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU

Have you visited Hersheypark before? What’s your favorite ride? What’s the next amusement park we should visit and review? Let us know in the comments!