Pigeon Forge
Tennessee, U.S.A. – Sunday, June 11th, 2023
Deep down, there’s part of me that believes places like Pigeon Forge can only be enjoyed ironically. In our desire to get closer to nature’s majesty we’ve decided to construct an adjacent space so eye-poppingly commercialized that, for many, it completely supplants the surrounding nature to become the primary attraction. Like, we all know this place is silly, right? Things like the Titanic Museum and Lumberjack Feud Show and Jurassic Jungle Boat Ride are clearly all elaborate pranks, grown-up variations of the original roadside Mystery Spots. Even the name “Pigeon Forge” is a little absurd, like “Meow Wolf” a combination of opposites that connote a strength of meekness. We go here because it’s fun to temporarily be part of this grand American tradition of abundant hucksterism that’s made possible along the frontier’s edge, only it’s made safe and legitimate, the only danger present is spending a little too much money or drinking a little too much moonshine.
But there’s another part of me that realizes that this is just one frame of mind, and it’s possible to enjoy Pigeon Forge in complete sincerity. It’s a postmodern landscape that’s crowded but not complicated; it’s not deceitful when everything on the inside is more or less exactly what the signs and symbols suggest on the outside. The vast parkways and parking lots lining the valley are paradoxically too much and never enough, but it’s all primarily accessible from the atomization of our own automobiles, that most American symbol of individual freedom. And it’s all meant for our enjoyment. If someone didn’t find utility out of it, then it wouldn’t be there, as the rapid turnover rate of businesses along the Great Smoky Mountains Parkway can attest. I was lured in by the promise of nearly a dozen new coasters along the strip since the last time I visited, the majority mountain coasters which I generally sincerely enjoy, even if I’m a little annoyed at how big a chuck of my trip itinerary it takes to attempt to hit most of them.
Whether ironic or sincere, we’re here, choosing to spend a couple days in Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg and Sevierville. Just make sure you don’t forget why it’s all here in the first place, and spend some time supporting America’s increasingly threatened public lands and spend some time in Smoky Mountain National Park as well.
SkyLand Ranch
The first stop of the afternoon along the Great Smoky Mountains Parkway was actually in Sevierville, despite being within sight of Pigeon Forge mainstays like WonderWorks and the Titanic Museum. SkyLand Ranch seems intent on building itself up into a more comprehensive hilltop attraction along the lines of Gatlinburg’s Anakeesta, with a chairlift to the summit and various attractions included in a general admission or as an add-on. While being very much in the tradition of Pigeon Forge style attractions, SkyLand Ranch’s clean black-and-white branding and “farmhouse chic” design feels distinctly that of a gentrifier to the strip, with prices to match.
As of 2023 the main draw was the region’s then-newest mountain coaster, the Wild Stallion, a Gen 2 Wiegand model. If statistics are to be believed, this is the longest mountain coaster in Tennessee by a fairly considerable margin at 6,600 feet of track,
although based on my personal experience I have a slightly hard time believing it. The overall ride experience I found to be fairly middling and certainly didn’t stand out for any superlatives apart from the most expensive. There are two lift hills with fairly average (yet still full-sized) downhill runs that follow, which I suppose may be enough to qualify for the longest when factoring in the combined length. They have a sizable hillside to work with, yet the ground has mostly been cleared and worked over for SkyLand’s various expansion projects, giving the ride a more panoramic quality over a naturalistic setting; you can see most of the layout to come from the top, which doesn’t help the perception of length. The ride feels sturdy if overly controlled, typical of the newer mountain coaster models. My conclusion at the end was that Wild Stallion was good but not great, something I’d likely only do on a return visit if SkyLand builds itself up enough that I would be interested in seeing what else is new. So far that’s mostly been a new Star Flyer swing ride, which I would probably take a pass on in the interest of other attractions.
Rowdy Bear’s Smoky Mountain Snowpark
So far Rowdy Bear’s Snowpark is the only attraction in Pigeon Forge to include two mountain coaster style attractions, neither of which is a traditional mountain coaster. The park seems based around winter activities, although I rather suspect most visitors in the area arrive in the summer season like we do. In that case, the winter snow tubing hill is simply converted into summer tubing atop a synthetic surface.
While I normally meticulously plan every part of a trip, the surfeit of attractions between Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg meant I overlooked the admission structure of this particular park, which doesn’t sell individual tickets but rather offers unlimited ride wristbands valid for one hour. Even at risk of getting further behind schedule, we elected to stay the full hour to get our money’s worth and our fill of its two most unique attractions.
The older attraction (opened in 2019) is the Ski Lift Shootout Coaster, a Wiegand Mystical Hex model that’s essentially a mountain coaster version of a suspended coaster. Given that mainstream full-sized coaster manufacturers have deemed suspended free swinging too much of a design risk despite the obvious demand for it in the family thrill market, it seems the tradition of Big Bad Wolf or Eagle Fortress has now been passed on to these FEC attractions. The ride experience is… not great. The low speeds combined with the rocking swinging motion around the unbanked curves feels more awkward than anything like flight, although it at least gets you up in the air more than a typical mountain coaster. The Shootout Coaster is also outfitted with an interactive shooting component. I found it fairly non-essential, but with the unlimited ride pass, you can try it at least once with the blaster and once with it holstered.
The newer, longer, and better of the two is the Avalanche Snow Coaster, the world’s first installation of a Wiegand CoasterKart that essentially works as a high-speed powered mountain coaster variant that isn’t dependent on a large hillside and long cable lift to get you up to speed. Like all mountain coasters, you can control the speed, which, once you get the feel for it, means you’ll likely have it maxed out the whole trip. Removing the lift means it’s a fairly quick ride relative to other mountain coasters, but it maintains a decent rate of speed along its ground-hugging course underneath the Ski Lift Shootout Coaster. It’s mostly curves and S-bends, but a highlight comes near the end with a small drop over the side of a culvert tunnel earlier in the ride, producing the faintest whiff of airtime.
I even tried the Summer Tubing before the hour was up. It’s somewhat intimidating to be standing at the edge of the hill knowing you’re going to slide all the way down in a glorified inner tube. I spent most of it going backward, leaving me with a slightly soggy bottom from the slicked synthetic surface.
The Island in Pigeon Forge
The Island is a large, popular development in the middle of Pigeon Forge that represents the archetype of what the industry calls an RD&E district: retail, dining, and entertainment. The acronym is sequenced in that order because that’s generally the order of importance to the owners and operators, though as tourists we’re more drawn by the opposite order, or in my case, the sole part of the “E” that represents a +1 to my coaster count.1
With limited time, I parked, got my tickets, and climbed aboard the Spinning Parrots Coaster as quickly and efficiently as I could hope for. This SBF Visa Spinning Coaster is colorful but not really decorated in any meaningful way apart from a sign on the figure-eight pass. I couldn’t tell if The Island was trying to lean into a tropical getaway identity, the tried-and-true rustic Smoky Mountains aesthetic, or something else entirely.2
There are a number of other rides and experiences to try, including a large observation wheel and a Zamperla Nebulaz, but the only other thing I made sure to make time for was their SkyFly: Soar America flying theater.
Most travelogue flying theaters in the style of Soarin’ have a fairly neutral, modernist presentation, but SkyFly: Soar America does it differently with a surprisingly elaborate steampunk preshow featuring an eccentric scientist Peter Wilder and his bright, eager daughter Hannah.3 It even carries over to the ride itself, with the steampunk trim and holding screen during load and unload, and the ride beginning with Peter and Hannah slingshotting riders on a flying contraption.
The fantasy framing is an odd juxtaposition for the realistic ride film that follows. For the most part the focus is on natural settings across America, with a particular emphasis on the west; more than a few scenes feel like a direct callback to Soarin’ Over California. One odd exception is a scene of a Nascar race (just to remind us what part of the country this is), and the finale includes a rather uninspiring aerial of The Island at Pigeon Forge in the same vein as the Disney Parks finales, which quickly shifts to focus on the CGI firework display instead. I got the impression that the main ride film was a generic library title, and the custom steampunk elements were grafted on later when the original proposal was deemed underwhelming for the market. I won’t complain, as I’m sure it gave some writers, artists, and actors some pretty good billable hours, which is more than can be said for many cost-conscious competitors.
Jurassic Jungle Boat Ride
Ah, the infamous Jurassic Jungle Boat Ride… somehow the only slow-moving dark ride in the Smokies.
I’m a little surprised it’s still here, although at the prices they charge it doesn’t require too many punters to ignore the abysmal online reviews and help them break even. It works out to nearly $2.00 per minute which must be among the worst value themed experiences in the country (given at least one of those minutes is spent staring at a black wall waiting for an animatronic to burst forth). Yet the reputation is such that, like a Mystery Science Theater 3000 film, people like myself will still gladly put down a hard-earned Andrew Jackson for the opportunity to see if it really is so bad it’s good?
It’s pretty bad. But it does thread the needle just right with enough failed ambition that I didn’t leave feeling genuinely swindled by the lack of any attempt at making a memorable ride. It’s memorable! There are indeed lots of animatronic dinosaurs, some of them vicious, some of them stoned, some toothy, and some kaiju. I generally knew what I was signing up for, and it gave enough material to crack jokes over that it would take a failure of one’s own imagination to be bored through the entire cruise. There’s great art and boring corporatized product, but there’s also the category of cheap art made by and/or for degenerates. That kind of art has a role in any creative ecosystem too,4 yet it’s become increasingly endangered for an industry that was created by the philosophy that there’s a sucker born every minute. It’s fun to willfully sign up to be fooled once. But paying another $20 to be fooled twice, however…
Goats on the Roof of the Smokies
Popular culture has determined that farmyard animals are inherently funnier than most other creatures. They don’t have to do anything funny, but the mere concept of “a cow” can, in the right context, be hilarious.5 Goats have also picked up some of the same cultural cachet; look at the success of the Goat Simulator video games. Goats on the Roof can explain its history as a former restaurant that allowed its goats to graze on its sodded roof, but it works better as a deadpan absurdity that offers no further explanation. There are goats, which are funny, and they are on the roof, which is even funnier.
I appreciate the homespun absurdist humor of Goats on the Roof of the Smokies which intentionally harkens back to an earlier era of roadside attractions, even if there’s not a whole lot more to it once you’ve gotten up close with a couple of goats and perused the gift shop. Its location about two miles off the main Parkway developments helps to burnish its roadside charm and serves as a better location to build a mountain coaster, their signature Goat Coaster.
The Goat Coaster is one of the relatively older mountain coasters in the area, opening in 2015 when the name alone could serve as the main differentiator. It has a single lift with a good, average-length downhill run through the hillside forest before culminating with a couple of helix descents back to the station area. It’s about as “standard” of a mountain coaster as you can get, which is more complimentary than critical, given the surplus of newer mountain coasters shoehorned into less than ideal plots with more gimmicky concepts. Still, it’s far from the “greatest of all time” mountain coasters, with little distinctly memorable about it except the namesake goats.
Smoky Mountain Alpine Coaster
A little up the road from Goats on the Roof is the original Smoky Mountain Alpine Coaster, the very first to start the trend in Pigeon Forge way, way back in 2013 (a solid six years after my most recent prior visit if I want to feel really old). In theory this seniority should hurt the attraction, having the most generic name and oldest technology, but if the crowds were any indication it continues to be one of the most popular, resulting in a 20 minute queue even with the cars on the track hitting close to minimum interval. Everyone might be onto something. If I had to pick a winner for the best mountain coaster of the eight or so I sampled on this visit,6 I would award it to the Smoky Mountain Alpine Coaster.
For one, like the Goat Coaster, the Smoky Mountain Alpine Coaster has a more remote setting away from the main strip, which gives a much better “flying through the trees” sensation than most of its competitors, especially at night. It’s a single lift and run back down the hillside, with about 900 feet more track than the Goat Coaster, which I believe would rank as the longest continuous downhill run among the mountain coasters in the area. As mountain coaster technology has “improved” it’s gotten a lot slower and more controlled with more robust track fabrication and additional safety features (see the Wild Stallion above). Racing through the forest at what felt slightly beyond a safe speed around the sharp, underbanked corners was a little unnerving, and rates as one of the most thrilling mountain coasters I’d ever experienced, especially heightened by the nighttime atmosphere and rainbow pride tracer lights. A real case of “they sure don’t make ‘em like they used to anymore,” even though it’s barely more than a decade old.
Rocky Top Mountain Coaster
Just outside of Dollywood, the Rocky Top Mountain Coaster is the third-longest mountain coaster in the area behind the Smoky Mountain Alpine Coaster and Wild Stallion, yet with four(!) lift hills it easily ranks as the longest by total duration, taking nearly ten minutes to complete. On paper this doesn’t actually sound like a great recipe: a lot of filler with very little meat.
I suspect a daytime ride would have validated this assessment, but we got on at night right as a storm was expected to hit. The darkness hid the ride area, which mostly takes place in its own small forested valley away from the road. It wasn’t too long until a light sprinkle started, which gradually escalated as lightning flashes came closer (but not too close). The overall experience was quite wild and surreal, and the seemingly never-ending length of the ride and isolation meandering through the woods at night definitely played a part. By the time we got back to the station the coaster had already been shut down for weather. Based on just that one experience, I’d have to rate this a close second behind the Smoky Mountain Alpine Coaster, with the reservation that under different circumstances it might not be quite as impressive.
Dollywood’s DreamMore Resort
While the storm was still a sprinkle, we headed over to Dollywood’s DreamMore Resort. Our budget didn’t include a reservation at the hotel, but I did want to stop in to the Song & Hearth Southern Eatery for a late dinner after a full day. It looks about what I expected for a medium-high end resort in the region: large volume, clean rustic chic design with nice finishes, but architecturally fairly boxy and pedestrian.
The most interesting element is found in a jewel case in the lobby: Dolly’s “Dream Box”. This time capsule contains a song by Parton titled “My Place in History” to be released on her 100th birthday in 2046.
By this point the heavens had opened up in spectacular fashion. We opted for a covered patio seat to get the full experience. It was a memorable meal, if not for the food then certainly for the setting.
I still had a couple more mountain coasters to try in Gatlinburg. But next and most important: Dollywood.
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