Knott’s Blast From the Past
If you find yourself at Knott’s Merry Farm this year be sure to check out the Barn in Ghost Town for a nice display featuring some familiar characters from the venerable theme park’s past…
If you don’t know who that is in the picture above, it’s a (non functioning) animatronic from the famed and long-gone legendary dark-ride Knott’s Bear-yTales. The Bear-yTales website notes the attraction took you along “various adventures of the Bear-y Family. Along the way, you’ll see Frog Forrest, the Candy Company and bakery where everyone is making boysenberry pies and preserves, the Gypsy camp, where Sara tells your fortune, and the spiders and creatures of Thunder Cave. And you can’t forget the Weird Woods, home of Crafty Coyote, or the trilling conclusion at the Country Fair.” The Boysenberry smell piped into the attraction was the best!!
Interestingly, KBT was replaced by Kingdom of the Dinosaurs in 1986. That ride (also quite good) closed in 2004 and you can find some of the former set pieces in the Timber Mountain Log Ride; such as the evil red-eyed wolves.
It’s nice to see Cedar Fair making use of old Knott’s props and historical ride pieces throughout the park. Now if only they would scale down the thrills and beef up the family entertainment. A nice new Peanuts dark-ride or even a new concept dark-ride altogether would we a welcome addition.
It must be ages since I’ve been there.
I BARELY remember Knott’s Beary Tales, but I remember well the dinosaur one.
The characters are functional. there is a thing where you have to put quarters in and the display would move with the thee song of the ride.