When We Were Inverted launched in 2020 you could find me visiting Hersheypark quite often. I had left my full-time job and was doing freelance work. When I had downtime, I was making use of my King-Sized Season Pass and meal plan. I visited the park nearly three dozen times over a two year span. I rode a lot of rides and took a ton of photos.
Fast forward to these last two years and things are a bit different. I’m working full-time again and still do a little bit of freelance work. I’ve also been traveling several times per year to visit parks across the country. All this has left me with a lot less time to visit the parks in my region, including my homepark, Hersheypark. I visited only twice in 2025 and until now, I haven’t been to the park at all in 2026.
Back in July I had a week of vacation and started things off visiting Quassy, Lake Compounce, Six Flags New England (SFNE), and Six Flags Great Adventure (SFGAdv) with Sam and Jen. That trip kicked off Day 1 of my vacation, but only took up half of my vacation time. I had four days without anything to do. I decided to add in a day trip to Hersheypark to wrap things up. My niece, Dalila, was also in town and had never been to the park before. I asked her if she’d want to go and she didn’t hesitate to say yes.
I decided to wait until Monday for our visit, electing not to visit on Saturday or Sunday to avoid the crowds and space out my time between trips. What we didn’t end up avoiding, however, was three straight days of massive storms. It wouldn’t have mattered what day we went. It rained and/or stormed every single day. With Monday looking no different, I postponed the trip until August, getting Dalila to the park a week before she was set to go back to school. Sam also had the day off and since she had only visited Hersheypark once this year, she was excited to come along. We had a much better day than we would have had we not postponed, that’s for sure.
No Lines to Start the Day
Our plan was to arrive at the park early for Sweet Start (1 hour early entry for passholders/resort guests). That didn’t end up happening, but thankfully we encountered little to no lines to start the day. We decided to head over to Storm Runner and Fahrenheit first since both can build up lines the longer you wait – especially with Storm Runner running one train all season. This turned out to be a good idea and we grabbed a bunch of rides early before the park got busier later in the day.
Here are some of our highlights from this trip.
Storm Runner
This was our first ride of the day and was a one train wait. With such a short ride duration that meant the wait wouldn’t be long. It also meant that when walking up to the ride, there was enough of a pause that Dalila didn’t see what played out in the launch area. We walked right past it and into the station. This would be a nice little surprise for her.
As always, the launch was nice and punchy, but the airtime felt stronger than normal cresting the top hat. Maybe it’s just been a while since I last rode it, but it did feel a little extra powerful to me. And of course the flying snake dive was so good. I love that element and wish it existed on more coasters.
Dalila ended up enjoying the ride and as we rode more and more rides throughout the day, I kept asking her which one was her favorite. Storm Runner was up there for most of the day, but eventually dethroned by the coaster I’m going to cover last in this trip report.
Tidal Force
With Hersheypark’s announcement earlier this year that Tidal Force would close at the end of summer, I wanted to get one last ride on it this trip. I rode it last year with Jen for the first time in ages and loved it. I wish I had been jumping on this Shoot the Chutes ride more often these last few years.
After riding Storm Runner, Jolly Rancher Remix, and Fahrenheit, we were making our way back toward Wildcat’s Revenge. We knew we were going to ride Tidal Force at some point, but when we saw no one in the station, we decided to go ahead and do it early. We got in line for the front row and waited just one boat for our turn.
Wow! Talk about getting soaked. The funny thing is, it feels like get drenched twice. The way the boat throws water up onto you initially and then seconds later, the water hitting the bridge falls down onto you to soak you all over again. Needless to say, we were dripping wet walking off the boat. It felt good though because it was hot.
Candymonium
I was looking forward to a ride on Candymonium after riding Mako at SeaWorld Orlando (SWO) last September. While I love Mako, Candymonium has always felt too short to be among my favorite B&M Hyper coasters. The airtime is elite if you like floater and it is much stronger than many of its B&M Hyper siblings. Still, I always put the likes of Nitro, Diamondback, Raging Bull, and Thunder Striker above it because I feel like they’re more complete rides.
Maybe Mako changed me a bit. I really loved that ride last year and I saw what a longer version of Candymonium-like airtime could be. On this day, however, I feel like I had one of my best rides I’ve had on Candymonium and I appreciated those long airtime pops even more. Sure, the ride didn’t get any longer and I still feel like the Kiss Fountain helix was shoehorned in, which kills the potential for a great ending to the ride. But everything from the first drop and into that helix felt more powerful than it has before. I even felt a small bit of airtime exiting the helix and going into the first brake run. Sam echoed my feelings saying it was one of her most memorable rides on Candymonium too.
For Dalila, this was her first-ever ride on the park’s tallest and fastest coaster and she absolutely loved it. When all was said and done, Candymonium was her favorite ride that we did.
Final Ride Counts
Candymonium (1)
Coal Cracker (1)
Fahrenheit (1)
Great Bear (1)
Jolly Rancher Remix (1)
Lightning Racer – Lightning (1: Patrick, Dalila)
Lightning Racer – Thunder (1: Sam)
Monorail (1)
Skyrush (1)
Storm Runner (1)
Tidal Force (1)
Wildcat’s Revenge (1)
Eager to See What Replaces Tidal Force
I’m curious as to what Hersheypark has in store for the Tidal Force plot of land. I know years ago people talked about putting a B&M Dive Coaster there. While I’m sure they could make it work, I just never saw that being a good option. It would most likely have to be a small-scale installment and with Dorney Park adding Iron Menace a few years ago, I seriously doubt that a Dive Coaster is on the table now.
Water park expansion makes sense. The Boardwalk does draw in guests and the park would be wise to cater to those who frequent the park for its offerings. Since I don’t visit water parks these days, I don’t know what The Boardwalk could use or is missing in its line up. I just know the park would want to keep up with this section of the park and I could see something coming here to replace Tidal Force.
What would I like to see? Honestly, a Mack Water Coaster. I always liked how accessible Tidal Force was for guests in both the water and main park. If they could install a water coaster with the same access for guests, that would be ideal. It would also give the park a new water ride and coaster that they could advertise to different crowds. I also think it would be a good family ride fit.
I guess we will just have to wait and see…
Hersheypark Photo Gallery - August 17, 2026
If you would like to use any of the images in the gallery above for your commercial and/or non-commercial projects, feel free to do so. I ask that you credit We Were Inverted whenever they’re used. I also ask that you do not alter the image or remove the watermarks. If you need any images/video resized or without the watermarks, please contact me directly.
CREW MANIFEST
The following flight crew members attended this park, & earned the respective credits below:
Patrick
CAG
New Credit(s): n/a
Sam
Admiral
New Credit(s): n/a