Greetings everyone!
Last Friday, I was assigned to chaperone the Music In The Parks trip to Dorney Park. Most of you have seen this type of event, as hordes of kids wearing identical shirts head en-mass to your local local park for a band competition, some good times on rides and a nice way to end the school year.
This report will focus less on rides, ratings and typical park "stuff" in lue of the stuff that goes on behind the scenes at these music in the parks events.
If you just want the ride ratings: skip down.
I woke up at 4 an got to school by five. Load the busses up and head out by roughly 5:30. Loading the busses up means drums, horns, tubas, etc. We had a convoy of 4 coach busses loaded with kids and their parents. The goal was to leave from Long Ialnd and beat rush hour. Everything, including the weather looked like it was going to cooperate.
The thing about Music in the parks that is deceptive is that none of the musical performances take place in the park. Instead, the groups are judged at eduational sites near the park (such as a high school or local college). I remember years ago when I saw actual live local marching bands at Kennywood, and my family and I loved every minue of it. How sad that the public couldn't enjoy the stellar music.
When we pulled into the school, (Which was well-kept on imaculate grounds), a representative from Music in the parks boarded my bus and gave the children thier directions...the cases were to stay on the bus and the kids were to meet in the gym. They could watch other perfromances, but htey will be "judged" on their behavior while watchin others.
Since we hit no traffic, we were an hour early and we took photos of the band, the jazz band and the orchestra.
The hosting school was smart. They were hawking thier snack bar and coffee whaich they said is quite a better deal hen we would get at Dorney. They were right soda was a buck and a frank was two. The only problem is that nobody wanted a frank at 9 AM. The food stand was a fund-raiser for the hosting school's music department.
At 10 the orchestra warmed up in a music room and took the stage at 10:30. They did a nice job. Then at 11:00, the band warmed up, by the time the jazzband finished and the busses were loaded again it was 1:30 PM.
The judging was unusual. There were two guys (full suits and ties) talking into a tape recorder and making 'notes" about each performance. This, from what I understand, is routine.
On the bus to the park we ate lunch, I gave out the tickets and told everyone to follow the rules, wash their hands before eating and to stay with their parent chaperones. Also, everyone had to be at the Food Fest (Catering area) At 6:15 for the awards ceremony.
The lot was nowhere near filled, but the bus parking was so full that there were sectioned bus areas in the regular lot. This was going to be a crowded day.
90 percent of the people in the parks were wearing band, orchestra or chorus t-shirts.
We were then allowed to roam the park at-will, and every kid was paired with thier parent chaperone.
At the end of the night, the judging ceremony took place and every group in our time slot was given an award rating of either: (from best to worst): Superior, Excellent, Good, and a few other ones. The people in my music department take the ratings seriously, as does the district. We won superior in all three events, but others did not. We also won first place in our division, which was weird, because we were the only elementary school participating in our events that day.
Again, I wish we could have played for the park patrons instead of 15 minutes away.
Ride Ratings:
Talon: Last row: Still lots of fun, Well-maintained. I did my famous "1 cheak sneak" and got a quick re-ride in the back row. The people in my school were not impressed with my efficiency.
Hydra: Last row. Ok. I like the JoJo roll, other than that...it's a Talon wannabe.
Thunderhawk: First time, mid train. I thought it was a bit rough. I also felt like my hands would have been able to touch the guard rails along the tracks. It's not as bad as Rolling Thunder, but it's not Lightning Racer or any wood at Kennywood either.
Scrambler: Moved a bit faster than most. Decent cycle. Good ride.
Monster: The ride op told me it's the only manuall controlled ride in the park. A bit of neck pressure, but a fun ride.
Log Flume: One hill, nice ride. Note: there are some active bee hives on the side of the loading dock.
Apollo: Fun ride. There should be more of these in parks.
Food: Just Chicken: Not too good long lines facing the main midway, but very short lines on the adjacent corner.
GameDay Grill: By far the worst motzerella stix I ever ate. None at my table wanted one. When was the last time that ever happend with cheese stix?
Bottle of water: $3.50 from machine. No thanks. The fountains though, were cold.
OTher things we would care about:
I saw a security guard tell a couple on a bench about the smoking policy, they quickly put it out. I thanked the guard.
There was a show going on that was so poor. My kids would have done a better job on stage.
Not a single line cutter.
Cussing was at a minimum.
Have a great day!
Here's To Shorter Lines & Longer Trip Reports!