Sesame Place

[bjornolf]

My wife and I just heard about Sesame Place, the Sesame Street themed amusement park, a few months ago by chance. It is nestled just off I-95 between Philadelphia and Trenton near Langhorne, PA. The website is www.sesameplace.com . We went last weekend, staying at the Sheraton right across the street.

My boys are 4 and 2, and they had an absolute blast. My older son really enjoyed the water rides. He loved the roller coaster, the Vapor Trail, which is NOT your typical kiddie coaster. It has some definite meat to it as a coaster. He laughed maniacally from start to finish. He thought the breakfast with Elmo, Zoe, Bert, Ernie, and Big Bird was awesome. He had a great time at the shows, and he loved the parade, especially when Telly took his (my son's) hat and stuck it on his (Telly's) nose.

My younger son, 2, could also go on the vast majority of the rides. He really enjoyed the ones he went on. He especially loved the parade, the elmo world live show, and the big bird's beach party show. The breakfast with the characters was great for him, as he got to spend a good amount of time with Ernie, his current favorite, and Elmo, his all-time favorite. He spent almost an hour in the pit with the sponge shapes you could throw around. Man he loved that!

I saw a lot of kids there that were much older who also seemed to be having a great time. The older kids (9-13) seemed to like the water rides and the coaster a lot.

There are also great programs with free tickets for active military and the staff is VERY supportive of children and families with special needs. From what I've seen, they're the best for those families of any park I've experienced.

Anyway, if you have just older kids, there are certainly better places to go. However, if you have just little kids or little kids and big kids, this place seems to have BY FAR the most fun for the whole family.

Also, if you get the grover season pass, you get access to ALL the Busch parks, including Busch Gardens and Sea World. So, I guess you could bribe your older kids with those parks. :)

Anyway, just thought I'd pass that along for those of you with kids who hadn't heard of it.

-Joe
Duke '97

[ehdg]

Thanks for the report. I've long wanted to go there but without a kid just didn't have a reason without looking weird. ;) But now that my wife and I have a 7 week old we can't wait till she's old enough to enjoy it!! Btw is Kermit also there? For the breakfast how early do you have to be there? You don't need to stay at a hotel for the breakfast do you? We only live like 40 Minn from there so it wouldn't make sense to stay at one.

[bjornolf]

Well, as for the breakfast, it starts at 9:15, but you need a ticket and the ticket booth doesn't open until opening time (10 I think). So, you should buy your tickets ahead of time, or get the 2-day pass. Without the AAA discount, the 2-day pass and one day pass are the same price. Do the second day breakfast. As my wife and I learned, our little guy (2 in july) needed some time to get used to the big characters. The first time he saw cookie monster right after we entered the first day, he was shouting "cookie, cookie!" but as we got closer and closer and cookie got bigger and bigger, he started crying. After that, we went to the elmo's world live show and the big bird beach party show, then saw the parade. By getting to see the big characters at a distance for a while, he got used to them. By the second day, he was practically running up to them on his own, especially at the breakfast. Also, if you only have time to do one day, they also have lunches and dinners. Just make sure you make reservations at least a few weeks ahead of time. They book up FAST.

I did not see Kermit. I think it's limited to the Sesame Street regulars: Big Bird, Elmo, Bert & Ernie, Cookie Monster, Telly Monster, Rosita, Zoe, Abby Cadabby... I think that's all we saw, though we certainly could have missed a few.

Also, if you are active or reserve military, you can get free tickets for you and your family at Sesame Place or any Busch park through their Salute our Heroes program. Just something to know.

DO NOT MISS THE PARADE AT 1:30! It's awesome!

[Highlander]

Well, as for the breakfast, it starts at 9:15, but you need a ticket and the ticket booth doesn't open until opening time (10 I think). So, you should buy your tickets ahead of time, or get the 2-day pass. Without the AAA discount, the 2-day pass and one day pass are the same price. Do the second day breakfast. As my wife and I learned, our little guy (2 in july) needed some time to get used to the big characters. The first time he saw cookie monster right after we entered the first day, he was shouting "cookie, cookie!" but as we got closer and closer and cookie got bigger and bigger, he started crying. After that, we went to the elmo's world live show and the big bird beach party show, then saw the parade. By getting to see the big characters at a distance for a while, he got used to them. By the second day, he was practically running up to them on his own, especially at the breakfast. Also, if you only have time to do one day, they also have lunches and dinners. Just make sure you make reservations at least a few weeks ahead of time. They book up FAST.

I did not see Kermit. I think it's limited to the Sesame Street regulars: Big Bird, Elmo, Bert & Ernie, Cookie Monster, Telly Monster, Rosita, Zoe, Abby Cadabby... I think that's all we saw, though we certainly could have missed a few.

Also, if you are active or reserve military, you can get free tickets for you and your family at Sesame Place or any Busch park through their Salute our Heroes program. Just something to know.

DO NOT MISS THE PARADE AT 1:30! It's awesome!

Interestingly, one of my friends from Duke worked a few summers here. Apparently Bert has a birthday party every summer, and every summer he turns 5. It was always good fun in the fall to ask about her summer, and whether Bert turned five that year or not.

I've never been to this park personally. I would, however, recommend the "Day out with Thomas" event if your kids like trains. We saw it in Spencer, NC last year, and it was well worth the expense. Other than the train ride, most of the activities were free, and they had tons of tables with the little wooden train sets for the kids to interact with. Our son had an absolute blast.

[bjornolf]

According to www.sesameplace.com, Bert's birthday is July 26th. I assume that would be the day that they have the party for Bert each summer.

We have been talking about going to see Thomas. My elder son adores Thomas, watches the show, and plays with the wooden trains daily. My younger son is okay with Thomas. He likes playing with the trains, but he is kind of indifferent about the show. His favorite thing relating to Thomas, by far, is playing godzilla and tearing up his brother's tracks. :)

[ivduke]

I took our family over there. It was extremely over-crowded and more importantly over priced. When your spending $60 on lunch for people and essentially eating picnic food it can be irritating. On top of that, there were so many out of control children that you didn't trucst to leave a smaller child in the water for fear some unsupervised 10-12 year would run them over and drown them. My kids were 7 and 3 at the time and I vowed never to return....:(

[bjornolf]

I took our family over there. It was extremely over-crowded and more importantly over priced. When your spending $60 on lunch for people and essentially eating picnic food it can be irritating. On top of that, there were so many out of control children that you didn't trucst to leave a smaller child in the water for fear some unsupervised 10-12 year would run them over and drown them. My kids were 7 and 3 at the time and I vowed never to return....:(

Well, the breakfast was okay. It's really more for personal time with the characters than the food. If your kids aren't into the show, it's definitely not worth it. Our kids had a GREAT time and we got adorable pictures, so it was worth it for us. As for the children, we didn't really go on anything where we left our children in the water alone. My older son was bored by the wading pools. My younger son didn't like them either. So, hey, sorry your experience sucked.

[bjornolf]

we did go in the first week of June in the middle of the week. I'm sure anyone going on a weekend or in the middle of the summer would find larger crowds. But, then, we purposely plan our vacations around those things. Off-season prices. Smaller crowds. Cooler temperatures. It's why we go to Disney in January, for example.