Adventureland in Iowa - A great Traditional Amusement Park

Day Three of my epic trip brought me through Nebraska and Iowa and what better way to take a break from driving than at a great amusement park. 

Adventureland in Iowa is a great smaller park with some great rides, great food, outstanding staff and a main street that may look a bit familiar to most of you. 

There's a lot of pictures to get to, hope you enjoy the update!! 

If you missed the first two updates from my trip to Adventuredome at Circus Circus, Las Vegas or Glenwood Caverns Adventure Park in Colorado click the links to get caught up!! 

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Upon arriving to the park around 3pm after a 9 hour drive I headed to the booths to get my ticket. If you are going to the park be sure to stop by a local "Taco John's" to get a coupon, it will save you a few bucks. 

I was kind of worried that 3 hours wouldn't be enough to experience everything the park had to offer but thankfully a Wednesday in May wasn't very busy. It also helps that the operations at the park were phenomenal. 

Upon entering the park, I caught a glimpse of the train station. As a train fan I made a point to come back later and enjoy. 

Headed through the tunnel under the tracks

As soon as I did, I was met with a town square that looked awfully familiar, cute, quaint and welcoming. 

The parks carousel

Let's take a look at the parks town square and Main Street

Some of the buildings are functional, some look to be just themeing. Not sure if they open these up when the park is busier, it certainly wasn't needed during my visit. 

The other side of Town Square

The Fire Station is where you rent all of your strollers and/or wagons

Shave and a Haircut ... 

I love this clock

The parks carousel is beautiful

The left side of Main Street was completely destroyed in a fire in 2010, the park has done a GREAT job rebuilding and matching the two sides. 

If you squint you can almost see the castle, just like at Disneyland. ;)

The newest side of Main Street

They even have a Penny Arcade

Photography store at the end of Main Street

A look back at Main Street

Let's take a little ride on the railroad

The train isn't necessarily a "transportation" ride, but just circles back to the front of the park.

The train ride gives a great view of the park and many of the rides 

The Paratrooper. One of my favorite flat rides

The park is absolutely beautiful and very well maintained. Just a nice place to spend a spring/summer day. 

Geese seem to follow me everywhere

One last look at Town Square from the train station

Beyond Main Street you get to have a great time on many of the parks rides

The first coaster I came to was Tornado, which is a fun wooden coaster. It proves that it doesn't have to be the tallest or the fastest to be fun. 

Lots of shade in the queue for those hot summer days

The ride stretches out to cover most of the backside of the park and gives a great view of the waterpark which sadly wasn't open during my visit. It looked awesome! 

Fans of Windseeker at Knott's rejoice, the park is building their own model named Storm Chaser. As you can see the ride is a bit smaller than the standard model but it should give some great views of the park once it opens in June. 

Once the ride opens we'll be sharing all of the info the park provides us. It's scheduled to open sometime in June. 

Some of that good park food I was talking about earlier. Giant Pickle on a Stick ... because anything on a stick is awesome. 

Walking along the lake towards the back-side of the park

Hmmm ... =)

The park has an AMAZING collection of flat rides

Next up was The Dragon. I'd heard a lot of mixed reviews of this ride, I thought the layout was great, a bit bumpy but overall not the worst ride I've ever been on. 

The exit from the station to the lift is pretty unique

Double Loop Awesomeness!! 

HELIX!! 

These would be like 10 foot Ninja Turtles in real life 

Heading to the very back of the park, the Outlaw Gulch area is the parks Wild West area

Saw Mill Splash is a great raft ride. I didn't ride this one but I've ridden similar rides. Lots of fun. 

This is definitely one of the better themed ones I've seen

The other major ride in this area of the park is the Outlaw, which at a height requirement of only 42" is a great "starter" coaster. 

Outlaw is a very fast and fun woodie that I rode multiple times

The surrounding area is themed nicely

Sidewinder, another of my favorites

Very retro 80's

The ride that I was looking forward to most was definitely The Underground which is a fun roller coaster with some dark ride elements. 

It definitely has some themeing that reminded me of the Calico Mine Ride at Knott's, just on a lesser scale, but still a heck of a lot of fun. 

Not sure what these things are for (other than shade) but I've seen them at a few other park sand they are cool looking. 

Bernie Benard!!! 

Lastly, one of my favorite rides at any amusement park has always been the Sky Ride, sadly they are becoming harder to find. Adventureland actually has a pretty great one!! 

Time for an overhead view of the park

Through the trees!! 

River Rapids Log Flume, another of my favorite type of ride

A birds eye view of Main Street

That's going to wrap it up for this update, we hope you enjoyed this look at a great amusement park. If you ever find yourself in Iowa, Adventureland is definitely a park you should find the time to visit. You will have a great time. 

For more information on the park you can check out their website at www.adventurelandpark.com 

Tomorrow we are going to be playing catch-up a bit with some press info from Knott's and Legoland California and then early next week we'll have some updates from Six Flags Magic Mountain/Hurricane Harbor, Six Flags Great America and Six Flags St. Louis. 

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