Welcome to AmusementParkMom.com!

I get a fair amount of email and some of the basic website questions people ask are listed below.  Hope you enjoy the site!

So who is Amusement Park Mom?

Hi!  That’s me, Shawn Marie Mann, but please just call me Shawn or Amusement Park Mom, or whatever.

And why does she have this website, what does she know about parks?

I love amusement parks and always have – but I’ll make a confession, I do not ride most rides.  That doesn’t mean that I don’t know much about parks though, I just don’t know things like how much air time you’ll get on Storm Runner at Hersheypark or if the Phoenix at Knoebels really deserves to be ranked second best wooden coaster by Amusement Today’s Golden ticket awards. I leave that to the experts on the coaster forums and the American Coaster Enthusiasts.

Every year I make around a hundred trips to Pennsylvania amusement parks to document them for my own personal projects involving to park history and geography. Thousands of photos and a few dozen funnel cakes later you kinda know your way around. The truth is you don’t make that many trips and not pick up a few money or time saving tips along the way.  You also come across some truly amazing things to share with family and friends and that is what this website is all about – sharing the great stuff you can find in our PA parks.

Is she credentialed? (Are there really amusement park credentials?)

Um, there sort of are amusement park creditials – for enthusiasts that is and I’m a card carrying member of the American Coaster Enthusiasts, the National Carousel Association, the Dark Ride and Funhouse Enthusiasts and the National Amusement Park Historical Association.

All of these organizations work to enhance your amusement park experience and to preserve the colorful past of the parks for the children of the future. Consider joining one or more of them if you love to ride the rides or eat the goodies.  Some of them have unbeatable perks for their members and they are just a lot of fun to belong to.

So what can I find on amusementparkmom.com?

My goal for this website is to provide families with information about Pennsylvania amusement parks they plan to visit – everything from ticket prices to food information to the location of baby changing facilities.  This is the kind of stuff that will help you prepare for a trip and have a much better time.  We are a family of 5 with two toddlers and a teen so we find these things out first-hand and pass them on to you.

My blog posts are divided into categories for each park that I discuss.  The easiest way to find all the posts about a certain park is to search by category.  You can find a category drop down on the top of the right menu bar where it says “Pick a Park” or click on the “Find a Park” page in the upper menu on the left.

If you aren’t certain what park to visit, you can also search the site by typing your subject into the search bar to the right of the website title.

Or you can just scroll around till you find something interesting.

What won’t I find on amusementparkmom.com?

You won’t find any reviews published as a result of receiving perks and freebies.  Everyone seems to assume I get in free and all of that, but I painfully shell out hundreds (some years thousands) of dollars a year in admission fees, season passes and food money.  The only special treatment I receive is as a member of one of the enthusiast organizations above which all require dues, so there is no free lunch here and no influence from my being given something other people don’t get.

You won’t find posts trying to convince you to visit one park over another – unless there is a valid reason such as the age of your children. I’m not trying to convince you to go to one place or the other because all of our parks are something special in their own way and each is worth the trip.  We do have three very distinct children’s parks in the state and that does sometimes lead me to advise against going to a certain park – especially if you are searching for thrill rides which are in short supply at these parks.

Something else you won’t see here is lodging information.  I know about amusement parks, I don’t know hotels and motels.  There are so many other great sites on the web for finding reviews and deals concerning overnight stays so you should be able to find some great information out there.

And you won’t find anything about Disney parks here.  Don’t get me wrong, WDW is an awesome place, but it isn’t in Pennsylvania and that is all I care about.  Someday if I take a few side trips out you might find some trip reports for non-PA parks here, but I’m not going to cover them the way I do PA parks.

So is amusementparkmom.com affiliated with any of the parks mentioned on the site?

Nope. This site is not affiliated with, authorized, endorsed or sponsored by any of the destinations we discuss.  This is an independent and unofficial site for PA Amusement Parks.

Where do you get your information?

Lots of places.  I visit the parks myself and use their websites to get the bulk of my information – first hand experience trumps everything.  I also subscribe to several Amusement Business trade publications which provide me with “insider” business info (not really, you can get most of this stuff in free enewsletters) and I search the web.

I will on occasion email a park with a question, but I use the same info email addresses you would if you emailed them.  No special connections or anything other than Conneaut Lake Park has me on their news brief distribution list which probably anyone could get on if you were able to help them raise money for the park in some way.

Sometimes a reader will leave a helpful comment or ask a question that prompts me to do more research on something.  That to me is the real fun of running this website – helping someone while learning something myself.

I have a question, comment or I found a broken link, how can I contact you?

If you have any questions, please contact me at APMom@amusementparkmom.com and I’ll do my best to answer them or point you in another direction to find what you need.  PLEASE report broken links since they slow everybody down.  (Thank you in advance for that….)

Shawn aka Amusement Park Mom on her favorite type of ride - a carousel - at Hersheypark in the Dark