Field trip: Enchanted Forest

I decided yesterday (Wednesday) that we needed to go somewhere that we hadn't gone in at least 3 years by my count.  It may have been 4.  In any case, I found out that Enchanted Forest opened this week for the spring/summer season, and really wanted to take the kids since we hadn't been for so long.  So, we ditched the school work and headed out for the afternoon.

It turned out to be beautiful!  The weather is just starting to get nice around here, and we were so excited to hit Enchanted Forest on such a perfect day.  The kids loved it.  They are hoping to go back again this summer.  As far as theme parks go, it's pretty old fashioned.  But, my kids are happy with it, and I like that it isn't all over-done like Disneyland.  I kinda like it's antique feeling.  Don't get me wrong, I still want to take my kids to Disneyland someday, but I'm so glad that we have this close to us.  It's all we have for a theme park here in Oregon, so we'll take it.

Just as we arrived, they were pretty excited to see what this place was all about (April only remembered a little, and Aaron was just a little guy last time we went, and of course the little 2 had never been).

So, here's the low down on Enchanted forest.  It's like a huge storybook land.  There are a number of different classic children's stories, and nursery rhymes all throughout the park.  We started out walking through a castle that you could walk through some tunnels and find different characters/stories in.

The top of the castle with some beautifiul sunshine starting to peek through the trees yay!

 

Then we continued down a path that took us through Hansel and Gretels house, past Mary had a little lamb's school house, past Humpty Dumpty, and through a tunnel to Alice in Wonderland.

After Alice in Wonderland we walked further along this pretty path to Snow White and the seven Dwarf's house, and finally to the witches castle.  They of course get to walk through the dark tunnels of the witches castle, and up the stairs which leads to a slide.

This is the entrance to the witches castle.  I had to go in with the 2 littlest ones, they were kinda scared at first.

 

But, then they saw the slide and all was good.

This shot shows on the left the entrance, and the right is the slide.  It is set up nicely so they can go up some stairs to keep going down the slide over and over again.  Some even chose to keep going through the witches mouth over and over again..."I'm not scared!" they would say.

 

Alex just couldn't get enough of this place.  He loved looking at this little scene from snow white after the witches castle where the seven dwarfs are waving bye to snow white after she is rescued by her handsome prince :-)

Then we came to Goldilocks and the Three Bears.  Here's Goldilocks in her bed.

Alex is watching the three bears through a window...

...here's the scene where the 3 bears are telling the story about how their porridge had been eaten, and their chairs had been sat upon.

Up next...the crooked man's house!

 

There was a crooked man,

and he went a crooked mile,

He found a crooked sixpence 

against a crooked stile;

He bought a crooked cat, which

caught a crooked mouse,

And they all lived together in

a little crooked house.

 

They loved the crooked house.  It really is a little cooky to walk in.  You feel a little "crooked" :-)  Here they were being really silly trying to walk on the crooked floor.

Then to Little Red Riding Hood, and the old lady's shoe which the kids could slide out of.

Now we're in western town.  Walking through the old west.  There are some fun things to look at and do here.

This horse girl loved the opportunity to pretend to rope a steer.

 Aric decided to give it a try too.

That took us to the ride area.  Aric rode the bumper boats.  Alex really wanted to do this too but he was afraid to go to the guy that was going to help him into the boat.

April and Aaron rode the bumper cars.

Then I went with the 2 little ones on a train ride.  This is the little elf world.  It was cute.

April and Aaron waiting for us.  Probably laughing at how funny Mommy looked squished in that kiddie train :-)

Aric said hi to a chipmunk.

April rode on the log ride all by herself.  She loved it.  We ran out of tickets after that so we continued our journey through the park.

We're almost done!  Sorry about all the pictures.  I just loved taking pictures of everything.  We walked through a little village that had these fake people talking out the windows as if they were gossipping/chatting like they would have done back in the olden days.

 

Then there was Pinnochio and Geppetto talking as we walked through Pinnochio's playhouse about Pinnochio becoming a real boy.

And, finally, to finish it off there's a cool little water show to watch.

The kids had such a good time. There was a lot that we didn't do as far as rides go, and we missed the theatre production of Cinderella because we didn't want to hang around for another half hour with a cranky toddler (the older kids really wanted to watch it).  But, it was a fun little trip, and much needed getaway for us this week.

Desiree