TR: Camden Park
Huntington, WV
September 4, 2021
“Old School Charm, and unusual ride features”

The Backstory: As anybody that has followed my ramblings for the past 25 years or so may know a few things about me. One, due to certain vision issues, I cannot drive. Secondly, for the past 20- years or so, I have maintained a network of friends, one of which I met maybe 25 years ago, Dave Althoff, Jr. Beyond coasters we stay in touch year round, and in a random conversation, Dave mentioned wanting to get back to Waldameer again this season.. Knowing Dave likes to do his park visits on Sundays (“Nobody goes to parks on Saturdays, it’s too darned crowded”) , I slid in a self-invitation that if he chose the Sunday of Labor Day weekend I’d see wht I could do about getting to and from Columbus. Well, as things worked out, he did decide on Waldameer for Sunday, and I had sourced a way to Columbus. Then the wheels started turning, what if he went to Kings Island on Friday, then he could get me Friday night and we could do Camden Park on Saturday. Having not been to either park, I, of course, was salivating at the thought. Camden Park is equidistant from either my house or Dave’s is just that we are also a fair distance from each other. Well, then we had Hurricane Ida to look after, and all told, Dave said he would go to Cedar Point on Friday, and he would get me Saturday, and if timing looked good, we’d go to Camden.

So its Saturday, and Dave comes to get me at 1:45, its two and half to three hours to Camden Park, but they are slated to be open until 9, and as Dave said, you don’t exactly need a long time to see the park,. So we head out to the east, and as it turns out , our timing was just about perfect. We only made a couple rest stops along the way, one of those at a gas station just down the road from the park where Dave strongly advised taking care of any restroom needs there, rather than at the park. It should be noted that gas station restrooms have generally improved over the years as the stations focus on being the travelers go to for anything they may require during their trip.

Accordingly we are pulling into Camden Park by their iconic vintage clown sign right around 4:40. A quick stop to pay a $5 parking fee and we park the car in a nice close up space and head to the ticket booth. I do mean ticket booth singular. There was a crowd at the booth, but as we deduced from their matching shirts this they would all be one transaction, and they were.. We get to the booth and are very happy we did not take the park up on its offer to send $17 to their Pay Pal account, then bring the Pay Pal confirmation to the park in what must be a convoluted online ordering process, as we learned that since we arrived after 4:30 we get Starlight admission, all this for $9.99 + taxes. That’s right an amusement park admission that includes the rides for under $10. We pay our admissions and get a green ticket which , we continue a few feet further to the main gate and hand back in.

Immediately to the left upon entering the gate it Kiddieland, but we keep heading straight past the rental center and come to what passes as the midway in these here parts. Straight ahead of us is the gift shop. We make a left hand turn, and on my left is a row of food stands, then the Haunted House, then the pizza stand, ending with the carousel. To the right is a bunch of trees with a ramp on either side them, some benches and ACE landmark sign which I suppose serves as the sign for the Big Dipper. If you peek up above the trees you can see the Big Dipper just peeking out over the trees. Yes, this is the parks major roller coaster. IT’s right up front by the main gate. It’s not the world’s –est anything, standing at a modest 50 feet high and sporting a 35 foot biggest drop, its barely bigger than the mid-sized junior coasters. But, it is a rare example of a surviving NAD (Dayton, OH) Vaszin designed coaser. Like most of the parks rides, the gates or ramps are marked with simply large IN or OUT signs, we got the left hand ramp marked IN and start up to the station. It’s a very simple station completely hidden in the trees. Two ramps come down flanking the park benches and ACE sign. Both ramps go up towards the station, turn and then meet roughly in the center of the station. On the load end of the station the near side of the station is taken up by a queue area, the unload side has a wide unload platform in this space,. Between unload and load there is a wooden board with a bunch of holes in it apparently for the cotton candy I didn’t see anybody having. When you get to the head of the line, there is a gate and maybe a one and a half person wide walkway down the side of the train. No seat lanes, this is first come first served. Much like most of the day, the wait would usually be to wait for the next train, maybe 1 more, the longest we waited was a 3 train wait.

The train waiting for me, well it’s an authentic NAD Century Flyer. The front grill work looks to be mostly intact, it has headlights in the sockets but they don’t appear to function. It’s a 3 car, 3 bench train, and for my first ride, I hop into seat 8. I noted seat 9 has been gutted, no seat, and perhaps even no lapbar. Dave reports that seat 9 has been missing for years. With it being a NAD train, the single operator first has to count off people and let them onto the platform, then close the gate, cross over to the other side of the platform, go to each car and lock the lapbars in each car manually. No issues with the lap bar. There is only an opening on the one side, and the seat, the back, and the sides are nicely padded, there is even a knee pad in front of you. Imagine that, a coaster train that looks like it was built with rider comfort in mind.

Ok, so how is it. Well let’s take the ride element by element. You leave the station and make a turn to the right to the lift hill that cuts diagonally across the structure. During you climb up the lift you are treated to the train rocking from side to side leaving a lingering feeling of just how well is it connected to the track. When you ride in the front seat, you can actually see the lift chain twisting back and forth. Coming off the lift, the first drop is a tease, only a few shallow feet deep and back up, then a turnaround back to the left, for the first return run you go straight along the midway, down the second (and main) drop, here back car riders get a blast of ejector air, front car riders get a floater to moderate air, back up then another shallow dip, and turnaround to the left again continuing straight on the second pass, its down a nice drop and a couple hills that set up a totally weird part where your coaster cars are rocking violently back and forth. Premier Rides could never figure out the subway stair drop for their coasters in 2005, but Camden Park figured it out in the 1950s.. The second outbound pass ends with an unhill climb into a long dark tunnel that covers the whole turnaround (to the left) and even part of the drop off the turnaround (those headlights could have showed off here). For the fourth pass it’s another diagonal crossover with the rides final dips and up into the brake run where the train comes in with a nice bit of speed behind it until slowed down, and then brought into the unload area where a track mounted mechanism releases the lap bars as you enter unload. (Don’t worry they thought about station blow-through with an automatic re-locker on the other end. ) Technically the operator need not ever leave the controls, so long as the lap bars are all the way down they will automatically lock as you leave the station, and release as you enter the station. I doubt any park would operate it that way in the modern. day.
The operators control area consists of three big floor levers to control the various brakes (Back, unload and load), with a rope loop that goes over one of them to prevent it from releasing itself, also a red box with a trolley handle that apparently controls the lift chain. As we head down the unload ramp, Dave asks me “When is the last time you were that scared on a rollercoaster?” “Williams Grove Cyclone!” It should also be noted the parks locker rental is also right t the Big Dipper exit. I also hear tale that the coater has been rehabbed, as in parts of the structure used to visibly shift as the train went by.

Leaving the coaster, we cross the midway to the other side. Here a wooden façade ominously greets us as we approach the Haunted Mansion. It looks fittingly for its location Appalachian in theme outsie, and after maybe a 10 person wait, we make our way through the small queue area. I note the usual large riders may not be able to ride, but also a large riders may have to ride alone. Fine by me. The front of the structure is dominated by a huge painting of the devil, under the devil you can see both a lift hill in the background, as well as a coaster like dip in front of it, sure other dark rides have a small dip in front, but this is much deeper. You load in the front left corner as viewed from the midway. I take a seat, and notice the car seems to be mounted on a single point and is free to tilt from side to side and again gives you pause about how well the car is connected to the track. There are no restraints, just a grab bar. You fist make a turnaround to the right and before you go inside, you first pass the ride safety warnings and then go up the lift hill. At the top you make a turn to the right and you may notice the track is on a constant but very slight slope down through this part. You peer out overlooking the midway before a turnaround to the right and then a tur to the left sends you down the drop and back p, you then turn right and actually enter the dark ride proper. From there it is a bunch of incoherent scenes, the kind that light up as you go by, and you do go by at a fast rate of speed. You see this is a Pretzel gravity dark ride, so after the lift hill, your car is being powered purely by gravity the rest of the ride. The track layout is known for its numerous hairpin turns, which are both thrilling as well as help bleed off some speed. Ah, maybe the cars are supposed to tilt to the sides to help with the lateral forces. After a minute or so, all good things must come to an end where you exit the building and the unload operator grabs a hold of cart to stop it while making a menacing growl. Exit to the left and down the ramp.