Dollywood

Pigeon Forge, Tennessee – Monday, June 12th, 2023

In a U.S. theme park market dominated by Florida and California, Dollywood is perhaps the closest anyone has come to building a major theme park resort in a non-coastal state.¹ It’s certainly built a heavy allegiance among a certain segment of the fandom that straddles the theme park fan/coaster enthusiast dividing line, earning it the honors of the top American park in the Golden Ticket Awards since 2019. The coasters are mostly great (don’t ask about dark rides), as is the placemaking, a combination of rustic or whimsical theming and natural Smoky Mountain beauty. And of course the food.

But there’s one quality that puts Dollywood in the same league as the Disney theme parks that few other major parks can lay claim to, not even Universal nor sister park Silver Dollar City: having a real person as the park’s namesake and figurehead. And what’s more, Dolly Parton is still very much alive and active, something that wasn’t true for the namesake across the entire operating history of Walt Disney World.

But anyone watching the global cultural arena over the past decade knows it’s obviously a risk to tie the fortunes of a major business to a single living personality.² People can change, and very successful people in the 21st century have proven particularly susceptible to all manner of brain rot and reactionary politics. (You know who I’m talking about, except you don’t because that’s at least a dozen people among the most famous examples.) At first blush “superstar country music singer” isn’t exactly the kind of vocation for someone whom you’d want to bet big money on remaining a non-controversial figurehead for your business well into their octogenarian years.

So god bless Dolly Parton for somehow being one of the other dozen successful people that has maintained and even strengthened her venerated reputation over her lifetime. When Herschend signed the contract with Parton back in 1985 to remake their eastern Silver Dollar City property into “Dollywood,” history could hardly have played out any better for them. Despite the growing political and cultural divide in recent years, Parton somehow has managed to remain beloved by people of nearly all political affiliations, even with her philanthropic efforts that have occasionally required her to wade into the political conversation in her own ways. Maybe that bipartisan agreement on her legacy won’t last forever, but in the meantime it’s nice to have an American theme park that outwardly offers conservative homespun Americana yet is also represented by a steadfast anti-racist and matron saint for the LGBTQ+ community.

I had visited Dollywood twice before, first in 2004 for the opening of Thunderhead, then again in 2007 for Mystery Mine. The park has transformed tremendously in the time between my second and third visit in 2023, even changing layouts from an organic network of cul-de-sacs to a more traditional loop path (with less-organic cul-de-sacs now sprouting off of that). There were six new roller coasters in that time period, making it a long, long overdue return.

There’s also been a notable shift from Dollywood being the type of charming, rustic park that Silver Dollar City still is, to a more mainstream corporate theme park and resort. On my first visit Thunderhead felt like it was at the edge of an uncharted wilderness. Nearly two decades later, it now feels like it’s in a parking lot. The new additions are very good, but they also change the tempo of the visit. Having nine coasters in the park means I’m constantly moving in a way that wasn’t necessary when there were only three or four. Walkways are widened for increased crowds, and trees near ride areas are culled for presumably insurance reasons.³ Every organization goes through challenges as it scales up to a higher level, and Dollywood has managed its growth competently although far from flawlessly. Some say that bigger is always better, but I think good theme parks have a sweet spot of size and attendance where quality is achievable but things still operate at a human scale. Dollywood won its accolades by finding its place square inside that sweet spot, but they may soon find themselves emerging on the other side.

Lightning Rod

This was the first priority of the day given its reputations both thrilling and troublesome. Lightning Rod proved both those things, but not by as much as I might have anticipated. It lived up to the troublesome reputation with only one train running and accordingly long lines; plus the front grill was inexplicably not attached on that one train for an unusually exposed-feeling front row ride. Yet it never had any major downtime throughout the day, which was much more than could be said for the newest coaster in the park. As to its thrilling reputation, it was indeed very fast with some great maneuvers, especially the uphill launch, first wave turn, and quad down into the station. Yet it was far from the furious rampage I had heard about in its earlier years; I might even rate it one of the easiest RMC coasters to ride and re-ride (if not for the queue). Which was not a bad thing: after Storm Chaser, ArieForce One, and Twisted Cyclone earlier in the trip, my legs had enough of the defensive posture needed for RMC restraints, and I appreciated Lightning Rod’s forceful yet more even-keeled disposition, recalling Intamin megacoasters as much as its Ibox brethren.

Lightning Rod opened with a very strong sense of the kind of coaster it was, and that identity has been weakened over time. The world’s first launched wooden coaster is now none of those adjectives, although at least I still got to experience the launched aspect in its final season. The sudden acceleration up the hill catches you off-guard, a no-nonsense introduction that sets a promise of speed in the first moments and delivers on it to the very end. With a more traditional chain lift you introduce an element of teasing or suspense to the beginning, which is a different kind of coaster. The loss of wood is more felt on the hillside setting than in the running rails, although there was poetry to the idea that this one-of-a-kind launched wooden coaster maintained the tradition of wooden coasters being non-looping. As a steel coaster the intent is lost, like the ride is trying (and failing) to be a family thrill coaster where an inversion or two might have flowed more naturally.

Especially at the ending, which I always thought was Lightning Rod’s weakest point. The quad down serves as an inspired bookend mirroring the launched hill and double drop, wrapping the middle’s sustained speed and sideways rotations. But then there’s that big uphill sweeping curve that levels out into a sharp drop into the brakes. It looks cool from the queue and midway, and feels like the start of a big finale, but turns out to be an incomplete thought of two half-elements plugged together. Wrapping around once more into a full helix might have given the sense of resolution it’s lacking, or better yet, continuing to twist into a barrel roll downdrop to put one last surprising exclamation point at the end of the ride. This might have been an acceptable trade-off for the modifications that, necessary though they may be, have removed some of the original spark from Lightning Rod. To be certain, it’s still one of the best rides in Dollywood and maybe just outside my top 5 RMC coasters overall. At the end I was wiping my tears away from the incredible speed, and not just over the thought of what could have been.

Grist Mill & Cinnamon Bread

In the pantheon of cultish devotion to theme park treats, there’s Butterbeer,⁴ and then right below there’s Dollywood’s Cinnamon Bread. In the objective interest of sociological study, I decided I had to order a loaf to try for myself and to report back my findings.

It is, indeed, very, very good. I would add, I believe it’s also very much a culturally inherited taste. It’s very rich in sugar and calories, which the cinnamon spice balances just enough to keep it from becoming unpalatable while also not complicating the taste palate, as so many other theme park desserts fail. Having acclimated to desserts from around the world, especially in Asia, that kind of taste profile is either acquired or something you try with a curious “When in Pigeon Forge” attitude. I liked it, but I also wouldn’t universally proclaim to anyone that they have to try it without knowing more about their taste preferences and/or medical history.

It’s also huge, enough for at least four people (although who are we kidding, I know some of you out there have housed a full loaf by yourself in one sitting). This presented a problem in our group of two, with at least one more ride to ride before taking a break in the car. The solution was to wrap the remainder in its well-greased paper bag and hide it in a corner with a live-and-let-live attitude that it would either be our breakfast tomorrow or someone else’s mid-afternoon snack today. (As it turned out, cinnamon bread also makes a pretty good breakfast.)

Daredevil Falls

Daredevil Falls is located in the heart of Craftsman’s Valley, the most preserved, naturalistic area of Dollywood. This Hopkins Rides Super Flume from 1998 is a rare creation that straddles the line between a log flume and shoot-the-chutes. The eight-person, two abreast boat is about halfway in scale, and the layout has just enough meandering turns through the woods to feel log flume-esque even as it’s mostly focused on a single lift and splashdown. Fortunately the level of soaking that drop delivers is more in line with a standard log flume than the standard shoot-the-chutes, which makes it worth a ride.

Blazing Fury

For all the similarities between Dollywood and Silver Dollar City, it’s a somewhat remarkable fact that the two parks share almost no duplicate attractions between them, and the closest they come—Silver Dollar City’s 1972-built Fire in the Hole and Dollywood’s 1978-built Blazing Fury—both were built in-house rather than rely on an existing ride model. Silver Dollar City’s has since been replaced with a surprisingly reverent modern update of the nostalgic original, leaving Dollywood to cater to the purists for whom a regional dark ride isn’t a classic if the sets aren’t crumbling under blacklight and the animatronics aren’t stiff and dead-eyed.

Blazing Fury has definitely seen better days, although the collapsing bridge gag is still a beautifully simple yet effective stunt. Water has been eliminated from the roller coaster splashdown finale in favor of brakes with some fog and lighting effects. I don’t want to make any predictions about what awaits in this ride’s future, which I suspect largely depends on its status at Dollywood as a beloved intergenerational classic or a cheesy relic.

Tennessee Tornado

This roller coaster feels like a nexus portal to several alternate timelines. Down one thread is a world where it never existed at all and the Thunder Express mine train was still thrilling families at Dollywood instead of packing up for Arkansas. Dollywood feels like exactly the kind of rustic family theme park that should have a traditional mine train coaster, yet for business reasons I can’t fully parse in 1998 they decided to replace their only family-friendly coaster in favor of a fairly extreme custom looping coaster (with the next three on the extreme end of the spectrum as well).

Or maybe in this world where Thunder Express was kept, Tennessee Tornado was instead built on the future Thunderhead or Lightning Rod plots, but with a more conservative, traditional layout due to the limited budget from not reusing an existing station. Reviews were mixed, and this alternate Tornado eventually met the wrecking ball that was spared for Thunder Express, a more ignominious ending to Arrow’s legacy.

But follow a different multiversal thread, and perhaps the success of our version of Tennessee Tornado could have led to a reinvigorated Arrow Dynamics that managed to escape bankruptcy. They went on to produce many more likeminded rides, rendering the Tennessee Tornado a more commonplace creation, and in the process kept much of the talent and projects that in our timeline went to companies like S&S and RMC instead.

The point of these imagined possibilities is that the actual reality we ended up with—Tennessee Tornado as a one-of-a-kind last hurrah by a dying manufacturer, never seen before or again—feels like one of the strangest, least-logical, but maybe best possible outcomes. Climbing into an old-school Arrow horsecollar train to smoothly fly through a set of wavy inversions and overbanked curves that predate the new-school of freeform coaster design by nearly a decade, is a profoundly weird experience. But the strangest of all is that first drop: dip off the 163 foot lift hill to turn around at ground level, and then fall a further 128 feet down through an underground tunnel to emerge at the bottom at 63 mph staring up at a 110 foot tall vertical loop. That’s one of the most amazing opening acts of any roller coaster ever built, and we don’t talk enough about how gonzo creative the coaster really is. I suspect because while the opening act is amazing, it’s essentially missing a final act entirely, flying into the brake run after just five separate elements with too much excess speed to spare. An extra 500 feet of track might have been enough to vault Tennessee Tornado into the pantheon of all-time coaster classics. As it stands about a quarter century later, I’d still rank Tennessee Tornado among the top three coasters at Dollywood, maybe in the top two if Lightning Rod continues to get significantly bowdlerized.

Wild Eagle

Wild Eagle is a perfectly good roller coaster that’s frustrating because with the unique setting, ride system, and all talents involved, it had all the potential needed to be a truly great one. Among the first generation of B&M Wing Coasters to open in 2011 and 2012, it seems like Merlin set out to really figure out the full creative potential of the winged seating design for their two installations in Italy and the UK, while Six Flags copied Merlin’s homework for their simplified but still fairly successful X-Flight. But Herschend seemingly only had plans for a Dollywood iteration of Silver Dollar City’s Wildfire, and clicked the “winged seating” add-on at online check-out without putting in the same work as their peers to consider what this technology truly made possible. The result is a rather middle-of-the-road B&M looping coaster.

The National Park Service rustic parkitecture is stunning as a station house, as is the bespoke artisanal 12,000 pound metal eagle sculpture at the entrance. The lift climbing the natural hillside looks intriguing from the ground and seems to promise a creative terrain setting similar to the Tennessee Tornado. But while the views of the Smokies at the top of the lift are indeed breathtaking, the layout that follows feels like it was designed for a parking lot coaster from a decade earlier. A loop, zero-G roll, Immelmann, corkscrew, and figure-eight finale is about as standardized of an element progression as B&M coasters come, with not a single element feeling designed to take advantage of the winged seating configuration (although the roll and corkscrew still somewhat benefit, boilerplate though they are). No keyhole flybys, no inline rolls, dive drops, or other custom elements. A terrain setting used well can hide surprises like on Tennessee Tornado or Lightning Rod, but here the benefit of the hillside is mostly to feed the down slope of the brake run at the end. I was still happy to take a handful of re-rides to try the different seats, but the huge empty queue told me what I needed to know about Wild Eagle’s enduring popularity a decade after its debut.

 

FireChaser Express

It took fifteen years to add the overdue family coaster replacement for the Thunder Express, but the wait was more than justified by the result of FireChaser Express, which I would rank as one of the best family coasters in the world. It was one of the earlier examples where the declining costs of launches and switchtracks inspired ride manufacturers like Gerstlauer to show off the full spectrum of ride and show possibilities in a single product. It could have been a grab-bag of different gimmicks, but they’re arranged in a thoughtful pattern that creates a clearly escalating progression to the story and ride experience.

FireChaser Express begins with a gentle launch before reaching a traditional lifthill. A nice mix of drops and curves along the attractive hillside setting forms the core of the ride, somewhere between a mine train and bobsled style coaster experience. But a detour into a backstage area actually works thematically as the fire engine trains reach an illegal gas and fireworks operation, a delightful sense of danger that’s probably too edgy for even current-day Herschend. A mid-course special effect show scene results in an “explosive” backward launch through the final section of layout until reversing into the station. It all works so well together, rivaling the ambition of Intamin’s Hagrid coaster at Islands of Adventure, but on a fraction of the budget and a half decade before Universal took up the challenge.

Indeed, the only criticism I have for FireChaser Express isn’t experiential but operational: the station as a switchback prong looks clever, but it’s not worth the hit to dispatch interval by having to clear the launch hill and reset the switch before the next train can enter. It got me to splurge on a TimeSaver Pass to skip the popular queue more than once, so maybe Dollywood management doesn’t even see it as much of an issue.

Wildwood Grove & Dragonflier

Aesthetically, Wildwood Grove feels very Christian-coded. Thomas Kinkade and Hobby Lobby, VeggieTales and Jesus Camp. The pastel colors, florid yet flat design, and aggressively wholesome semi-anthropomorphized animals are typical of children’s entertainment, yes. But it also points to a kitschy evangelical aesthetic common throughout the heartland in which nature is an innocent, perfect part of God’s creation, yet is there for the benefit of humans to enjoy and control. It’s how you get the paradox where Dollywood’s most nature-focused land is plainly the most artificial… and the most devoid of trees. If this establishes Herschend’s new “house style” (judging by the near-identical implementation at Kentucky Kingdom’s Discovery Meadow), I’m not exactly thrilled for what the future holds for the growing chain.

For how big this cul-de-sac land is, most of the rides are pretty small, low-capacity children’s affairs. The most significant element as part of the phase one build was the Vekoma 453m Suspended Family Coaster Dragonflier. Given the emphasis on theming, the landscaping around it was surprisingly lacking compared to other worldwide installations, with the tunnels and trenches plain concrete and the ground all grass, mulch, or stone cover. The layout of this model is fairly good as far as family coasters go, though I’d rather enjoy it with a side of Communist Propaganda instead.

Big Bear Mountain

Full disclosure: I only got a single ride in the back row of Big Bear Mountain, so my experience with the ride is not as thorough as I’d prefer to give it a full assessment. I initially intended to hit the brand new coaster in the morning after our first lap on Lightning Rod, but the app reported it was closed for mechanical issues. It opened a couple hours later, but by the time we reached it there was a 45 minute wait, and no TimeSaver. I had hoped to return for more near the end of the day when crowds usually disperse, but it shut down again mid-afternoon and never returned. These things happen with new rides, and one lap is far preferable to none.⁵

With all that out of the way for what’s likely my most contrarian take in this park review, I found Big Bear Mountain to be a much weaker family coaster compared to FireChaser Express. There are multiple contributing factors, but the biggest issue was the clear-cut landscaping. It’s a massive, ground-hugging terrain coaster where the “terrain” is all neatly trimmed grass or stone cover, with the natural treeline cut back at least 50 feet (and up to 200 feet) away from the track. Given Big Bear Mountain’s creative intent from both a storytelling and rider experience perspective, this escalates a moderate flaw to a fatal one. The whole point is to explore the wilderness in search of Big Bear… but what wilderness?!? The entire four-thousand foot layout is clearly visible from any perspective in Wildwood Grove. There is no mystery or drama, and not even much of a sense of place, all on a ride that stakes its entire thematic storyline to those very qualities. The on-board audio is completely independent from the visuals, telling us to look left or right to find Big Bear in… the same empty field. The result is less “environmental storytelling” and more akin to an improv sketch, or perhaps a black box theater (with Big Bear as Godot).

While I appreciate the duration of this nearly 4,000 foot long family coaster, I don’t believe Vekoma found the most interesting use for all the track length to play with. The first half of ground-hugging switchbacks is repetitive especially in the absence of an interesting setting. The second half is similar but folded into a spaghetti bowl: it’s a little bit taller, faster, and with more sustained forces. This slightly escalates the thrill, but the continuous flowing curvatures smooth out the “snaps,” those moments of onset motion that can give your inner ear a sense of spatial direction. Instead the dynamic profile is a flowing mix of sustained forces, a design that’s “smooth” in theory but actually increases nausea quotient. I found FireChaser Express to have a much better, varied mix of elements while still providing a comfortable family thrill ride with a thematic storyline that mostly follows through on its promises. (I’m also amused that this $25 million dollar coaster uses the same ride vehicles that evolved from the original Vekoma Roller Skaters.)

And not to keep beating the drum on the landscaping issue, but at a certain point amidst the ongoing climate crisis we need to understand this not just as an aesthetic issue but a moral one as well. Dollywood is 130 acres, and how they manage their carbon-capturing, heat-deflecting forests when it comes to new developments matters more than most other businesses would ever have the responsibility for. It’s especially dispiriting for a park whose thesis is represented by Dolly Parton’s own conservative conservationist philosophy and is located at the footsteps of one of America’s greatest national parks. Regardless of what their mission statement says, Dollywood’s recent actions towards its own property seem to be a prime example of how not to build theme parks for a sustainable green future.⁶

Mystery Mine

During construction in 2006 and ’07, the teaser campaign for Mystery Mine’s mysteries was effective enough that I found myself planning a return trip to Dollywood just three short years after my first visit, despite the distance and many parks on my list I had never visited at all. “What if there is no light at the end of the tunnel?” Few high thrill coasters in the U.S. at the time were this elaborately themed, and the imposing structure seemed like it could hold countless possibilities. Today it’s easy to forget how much hype this coaster had prior to opening. Of course, that hype already died down very shortly after opening, when Mystery Mine was revealed to be a somewhat short, headbanging experience.

I recall adamantly avoiding spoilers before my visit, but as it turned out there was very little inside to spoil; the light at the end of the tunnel arrives rather quickly. (I guess I’ll throw the spoiler warning here for those who are really behind the times.) The main tower was obviously a Eurofighter lift and drop; the idea that we’re escaping up and out of a dangerous mine shaft has never quite worked given we were coasting around in broad daylight just seconds before.⁷ The first tunnel section, while having a few surprises like a brief outward-banked turn and a decently effective false track effect, was really more vamping than anything that needed a strong spoiler warning attached. The most memorable stunts were all outside. I still think the double rollover into a stalling dive loop is a really effective finale for a coaster. It still is. It’s just too bad there’s not much before for it to finalize.

It was clearly the weakest of the three thrill coasters at Dollywood at the time it opened, and time has only gotten unkinder to Mystery Mine. A replacement of the rolling stock with lapbar-only Infinity Train models would do wonders for the rides revitalization, but that would cost a lot of extra money. Instead, fixes to the ride have mostly come in the form of removing problematic elements. Many smaller effects no longer work, although the screen and fire during the final lift still seem to work more often than not. The trestle section has been completely stripped of its themed cladding despite being directly above a major guest thoroughfare. Where this trestle used to terminate in a surprise vertical dip into a horseshoe stall curve, the signature thrill maneuver anchoring the first half of the ride’s slow-building suspense, it now awkwardly makes a left turn off the end for a not-quite-vertical, not-at-all-surprising drop into a smoother curve, shortening the track. No doubt this was necessary in some form as the original maneuver was very poorly designed for rider comfort, but this new design simply avoids the problem rather than attempt to fix it. It’s easy to make a roller coaster smoother if you simply abridge much of the coaster track and thrills out of it.

I still hold out hope that someday Mystery Mine will receive a major renovation and upgrade to turn it into the kind of ride it always promised to be during that teaser campaign. But if I’m being realistic, I don’t think that day is coming soon.

Timber Canyon

The removal of trees and expansion of the parking lot behind Thunderhead is still a major loss for the atmosphere in this corner of the park. But if you don’t look up the hill too much, Timber Canyon has developed quite nicely from the days it was known as “Thunderhead Gap”, becoming one of Dollywood’s best examples of a modern themed area that still retains its rustic, natural setting.

I regret I never got to experience the original toppling Timber Tower, but from reports it sounds like the Drop Line drop tower is a superior experience. The lumberjack theme and ride pad surrounded by water features serve as good placemaking at ground level, and the 200 foot tall tower goes much higher than expected. I still maintain that drop towers are best thought of as observation rides with an abrupt ending, but you could do a lot worse than the views of the Great Smokies that this rendition offers.

The other ride I tried was Whistle Punk Chaser, a fantastic name for a kids coaster. This Zamperla family coaster is seemingly the default model for non-spinning kid’s coasters everywhere, but a decent presentation including a steaming whistle effect also kicks it up a notch, especially for the kinetic excitement of being nestled among the structure of Thunderhead.

Thunderhead

All these years later, Thunderhead is still⁸ my choice for Dollywood’s best roller coaster, as well as the best GCI coaster I’ve ever ridden. If Shivering Timbers represents the ideal out-and-back airtime form of wooden coasters, then Thunderhead is its equal and opposite, the perfect twister layout to get lost amid the tangle of timber, yet with enough variation of forces and pacing to always keep it fresh. I was worried that after nearly two decades Thunderhead might have lost some of its luster, but a dedicated refurbishment effort has kept it running as good as it ever has.

The first half of Thunderhead is a perfect balance of sweeping high-banked turns and high-speed valleys. The 80 degree pitch of the first banked curve was seen as outrageous for a wooden coaster in 2004, but unlike some of the 90 degree gimmick turns that followed a few years later, it feels perfectly natural in context of the ride around it. The fan curve into the station fly-through is another highlight both on and waiting for the ride, the first and still best example of this maneuver. The brief section of straight track in the middle of the twister layout helps to separate the first and second halves of the ride, each with their own distinct personalities. The next section has much more rapid-fire pacing between elements, introducing more pops of airtime as the cars skip back and forth like we’re playing a high-speed version of hopscotch. There isn’t a proper “finale” per se, but the balance between halves and progression of pacing makes it so Thunderhead doesn’t need one. The ride ends right where it’s supposed to, feeling the glowing satisfaction of having just experienced one of the best modern wooden roller coasters ever built.

(I should mention my special attachment to Thunderhead. After my first visit in 2004, I resolved to recreate the coaster in NoLimits, using my own memories and very limited reference photos and videos that were available online at the time. It took me the better part of a year to complete, in no small part because as I recall it was one of the first wooden coaster re-creations uploaded to the NoLimits design community to feature extensively customized supports. I’m sure it pales in comparison to what people have created since using NoLimits 2, but it’s probably the fan project I’m most proud of having created. I also had ideas for Shivering Timbers and Maverick recreations, but eventually my quality standards outpaced my patience and skill level, and I deemed it better to focus on writing instead.)

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