The Roller Coaster Alley team was at Silverwood this month, and we’ve got a lot to cover! In this post, we’ll share photos from around the park, along with our thoughts on everything we experienced.
Thrill Rides: More I-Box and Improved Dispatch Times
Let’s start by talking about coasters. Both Tremors and Timber Terror got some additional RMC I-Box “Retrak 208” again this year.
For 2023, Timber Terror’s final helix (pictured below), and Tremor’s final turnaround and brake run (pictured above), are now as smooth as ever.
It seems the park is slowly re-tracking both of these coasters one chunk at a time, and it will be interesting to see if more I-Box track continues to be added next year.
From our perspective, all of the roughest sections have now been completed.
Another improvement we noticed this year was the addition of ride dispatch timers on most of the major attractions. We’ve bemoaned the sometimes painfully slow dispatch cycles in previous years, so it’s great to see some improvement in this area.
The timers appear to be set to 2 minutes, once the train or vehicle arrives in the station. The clock stays green so long as the train is loaded and released within that time.
Here, the final time is shown for one of the cycles, where the team exceeded the time. From our perspective this has made a huge improvement on all the rides we saw it on – great job to all the ride ops for their efforts!
Food: A Mixed Bag of Changes
Let’s shift gears a bit and talk about food. Any good day at Silverwood starts out at the coffee shop just inside the front gate. All the pastries and snacks are fantastic, and we were surprised with a new offering this year – Cinnamon Bread!
Theme park enthusiasts will no doubt recognize this as a familiar fan-favorite treat found at Dollywood and Silver Dollar City.
Both versions are great, but each is unique. The Dollywood/SDC version (pictured above) is a much lighter and fluffier bread with cinnamon sugar coating.
Whereas Silverwood’s version (pictured above) is much more dense, sweet, and rich. It’s very reminiscent of a cinnamon roll. We would highly recommend giving it a try!
Our favorite treat continues to be the blueberry muffin top, but we’re glad to see new options available to round out the selection.
Next, a quick update on Lindy’s. This is still the best place to eat in the park, hands down.
We tried the new version of garlic fries, now listed as “garlic twists”. It’s a bit disappointing how far these have fallen over the years, and we long for the return of the original garlic fries. That said, these are still a great appetizer to share, so don’t listen too much to our mild grumpiness!
We also tried a newer salad that we hadn’t seen before – the steak salad. We’ll be blunt – this was, sadly, very disappointing. The steak and chimichurri sauce on their own would’ve been great, perhaps paired with a side salad. But the combination of both into one dish did not work for us. Your mileage may vary.
Thankfully, the tandem jump with the legendary gingham salad still remains on the menu, and continues to be the best meal you can get in the park, hands down. At least one person in our group ordered this both times we ate at Lindy’s, and you should too.
Moving away from Lindy’s, we noticed that the food options in Boulder Beach have been scaled back quite a bit. The widemouth sub sandwich shop that used to be across from the lockers has been replaced with the ice cream stand that used to be up by the front of the water park. Also, the menu at granite grill no longer offers pulled pork or pizza. And Pablo’s has removed the quesadilla’s.
We’re hopeful that the upcoming expansion to Boulder Beach will see some of this rectified with some new and different food options. More on that later. 🙂
Finally, our last comment on the food – the “single scoop” ice cream inside country carnival is still just as good – and as massive – as ever. Seriously, where else can you get this huge of an ice cream treat for less than $10?
Entertainment: Stepping Things Up Yet Again
Silverwood’s entertainment offerings have always been top notch, and far better than what you might expect. 2023 was no exception to this trend, starting with some great upgrades to the magic show stage, pictured below.
In the past, the magic show featured Nick Norton at the helm on most days of the week, with his apprentice, Isaiah Daniels, filling in on his days off. For this year, the two magicians have combined forces for one show that crams what feels like nearly double the magic acts into the same 30 minutes.
This was a fantastic move. Both Nick and Isaiah work together well, giving audiences an even better show than we’ve ever seen before. We’ve said it many times before, but this is an absolute DO NOT MISS!
The Silverwood Central Railway has also evolved a lot over the years. For 2023, there are three options for your trip around the perimeter. First, a “no show” option in the early morning and late evening that is simply a scenic ride with no stop at the mine. Second, a “Shootout” show at the mine for the early afternoon shows, and then finally a “Rescue Mission” show in the late afternoon/early evening involving an expedition to save Sasquatch.
We watched both of the show options, and both were great fun. The Rescue Mission was our favorite of the two, but we would not hesitate to recommend either one. It’s really nice to have different options, and makes for much improved re-rideability throughout the day.
Sets along the journey have also improved.
They have a much more consistent theme and feel throughout.
There are even a few surprises involving a spray of water or two, but luckily nothing that will leave you soaked!
Boulder Beach Expansion
Finally, the big news that we’ve already posted about: construction is well underway for a $15 million expansion to Boulder Beach planned for 2024, and we’ve got a few new photos to share!
Nothing has been officially announced yet, other than a hint by Gary Norton that this will contain the largest attraction ever built in the water park.
Also, with a few buildings already going vertical, we’d expect at least one of these to be a new restaurant or counter service option. We certainly hope this is the case, based on the dwindling food options at the water park that we mentioned earlier.
We’re super excited to find out what will be added. Stay tuned!
One final comment: Stunt Pilot still rules the day. We are truly lucky to have such a fantastic RMC coaster in our home park, and it continues to run beautifully. If you get a chance to experience it at night with all the lights on, we’d highly recommend it!
And with that, we’ll wrap up the report. It was an overall great visit to the park, and we can’t wait to return again soon!
The official Silverwood Theme Park website can be found at: www.silverwoodthemepark.com. All business-related questions should be directed to this site.
yo i just wanna say you guys do a great job though i am very disappointed with the box track too smooth these things are supposed to throw you around now they just putt around not too thrilling keep up the good job maybe someday silverwood will get the SKYCOASTER lol!!!!1111!!!!!11!!!