Story Land

When you have a kid, you find yourself reliving a lot of your own childhood.  And since I often feel like a five-year-old at heart, this may be my favorite part of parenting.

We took an impromptu trip to Story Land yesterday, which I have fond memories of visiting as a child.  Although the last time I remember going there, my now twenty-five-year-old nephew was a baby, so it's been a very long time.

For those of you outside of this area, Story Land is a nursery-rhyme-themed amusement park located in the White Mountains of New Hampshire that is geared toward young children.

I've wanted to take Madeline all summer, but it's a three hour drive from our house, so we kept putting it off.  Then, we realized that Monday was our last day of freedom together as a family since Eric starts marching band stuff this week, and I go back to work next week.  (Lame.)  On Sunday night we spontaneously decided to just do it, got up and out the door by 7 am on Monday, and headed toward the mountains.

It's funny how memories work.  I'm not sure if I actually remember visiting Story Land as a child, or if it's just that I've seen the old photographs so many times that it still looks familiar.  Regardless, the front part of the park has not changed in decades.

When guests first enter, a path wanders through an area of miniature houses and characters from Mother Goose's nursery rhymes.  Madeline saw the little houses peeking over the fence before we even entered, and exclaimed, "I want to go on that!  I want to go there!  Can we go on that?"  Madeline is the perfect age and size to be wowed by little houses.

Though she still may be a little short for some things...

We wandered through Mary Quite Contrary's house, the Old Woman's Shoe, Peter-Peter Pumpkin Eater's giant pumpkin, and the cottage of Goldilocks and the Three Bears.  Madeline liked lying in Baby Bear's bed the best, and she probably ran up and down the stairs of their tiny cottage at least three times.  

From there, we rounded the corner to Alice's Tea Cup ride.  Madeline loves the Disney version of Alice and Wonderland, so I thought she'd be really excited to see the images of Alice, but she was kinda "meh" about that part.  She did ride the tea cups with Eric though, and loved it.  Pregnant women were not allowed.  Womp, womp.   

There's also a section of barnyard animals designed to look like stories such as The Three Little Pigs or The Billy Goats Gruff.  Madeline was not interested in any of the animals except for the pigs.  Pink, curly tails do it every time.  

After winding through the nursery rhyme section of the amusement park, guests enter through large castle gates into a fairy tale land featuring Cinderella.

A motorized pumpkin coach will bring guests up a steep hill to Cinderella's castle.  Several times throughout the day, Cinderella sits on her throne to greet guests.  The line for the coach was a little long, but we knew Madeline would love it.

As we waited to board, who should exit the coach right in front of us?  Cinderella herself!   It seems the princess was headed to her lunch break, which means we missed seeing her in the castle.  We didn't mind though because Madeline was pretty star struck to see a real life princess standing in front of her.  Later she kept saying, "She was so, so beautiful."  I think the surprise of seeing Cinderella get out of the pumpkin made the whole experience more magical for Madeline.

Look how happy she is riding in the pumpkin...

Even though Cinderella was out, Madeline still got to explore her throne room complete with a glass slipper.   She enjoyed sitting on the seat of honor.  She said, "I looked like a queen!"

After the excitement of the pumpkin, we needed a little rest.  We got lunch from one of the concession stands, found a little picnic table in the shade, and munched quietly while scoping out the rides ahead.  

Madeline decided she had to go on the carousel first thing after lunch, and luckily, pregnant women are allowed on that tame ride.  She even rode a horse instead of just sitting on the bench like she usually does.  

The rest of the park is filled with rides themed after different areas of the world, which is probably more exciting for older kids than the nursery rhyme sections.

Eric brought Madeline on a roller coaster.  It was pretty small, but big enough to make Mumma nervous while waiting for their turn.  I wasn't sad that pregnant women weren't allowed on this ride.  I even sent Eric a text that read, "Hold on to my baby tightly!" followed by, "Seriously."

That's them in the back!  

Of course, Madeline wasn't afraid at all.  Eric said she laughed and screamed the entire way down.  Yikes, Maddie Bear.  

And she loved these flying shoes that she could make go up and down by herself.  Nothing makes me smile as much as seeing Eric in a giant, flying shoe.    

For relief from hot days, there are several water rides.  We almost opted to go on a ride featuring water cannons before Madeline decided getting squirted with cold water was not her thing.  All in all, we managed to stay dry though there were lots of little kids wandering around in bathing suits.  Smart.  

 When we made it back to the main entrance, we hopped on the little train that winds around the park to get one last view of everything.  All three of us were pretty beat, so even though there were many rides we missed and face-painting opportunities to be had, we decided to start on the long drive home.

It took us 2.5 hours to get there, and we spent four hours wandering the park.  We figured we had put in enough time to make the trip worth it.

I'm so glad we went.  We had a beautiful day.  It wasn't too hot, and there was a cool breeze.  A woman waiting in line with me complained about the amount of people, but I didn't think the crowds were bad at all.  I tend to get short-tempered and cranky when I feel crowded, but I never got the feeling that we had to fight for space or elbow other parents to get our kid on a ride.  (Not that I'd do such a thing.)  It helped that we visited on a Monday morning.  I'm sure on weekends it can get very busy.

Most importantly, Madeline loved it.  She talked about it all night.  I think Cinderella was the highlight, but she also liked going on rides with Dada.  She was sad that we missed the hot air balloon ride the she spied in the distance, but I told her we'd go on that next time.

It's safe to say that we'll probably be back again next season...this time with baby sister strapped to our backs.  Perhaps we'll even stay in the area since there are about two hundred hotels and a thousand things to do in North Conway.

And so the family tradition of Story Land visits continues!