Family Fun in Oregon: The Enchanted Forest

Do your kids enjoy fairy tales and princesses? You're in luck. Fairy tale characters abound in an Oregon forest near you. The Enchanted Forest is a fun, relaxing place for families to visit. It's an amusement park, but very different from typical amusement parks.

First of all, the Enchanted Forest is, in fact, set in a forest. Visitors enter through a fairy tale castle, and then progress down cool, shaded brick paths through Storybook Lane. Figures from nursery rhymes and fairy tales are set among the green plants of the forest (most of them appear to be native plants). You can visit the witch's cottage from Hansel and Gretel, the Three Bears' cabin, and the Seven Dwarves' house.

Even more fun are the tunnels. The first is a rabbit hole from Alice in Wonderland. The tunnel goes under the path and exits a little further down through a keyhole. The tunnel is dark, but plenty big enough for kids and most adults (I'm plus sized myself, and it was no problem).

The Seven Dwarves' mine is a walkable tunnel past treasures, stalactites and stalagmites, and colored waterfalls. The mine is also quite dark in spots. All of the tunnels do have walk-around paths, however, so those who don't want to go through the dark can wait at the exit.

There are many activities in Storybook Lane; too many to list them all! At the end of Storybook Lane is a large slide inside of the Old Woman's shoe. The Enchanted Forest provides special blankets to sit on while sliding, and an employee who makes sure everyone gets seated safely at the top of the slide and waits their turn.

The path next leads you into Tofteville (named for park creator Roger Tofte), an Old West town complete with boardwalks, sheriff, jail, and saloon. That's right, a saloon! It's actually just a little hallway that wiggles and jiggles so you can't walk straight. There's also an assortment of Old West businesses with humorous exhibits inside the windows, and a gift shop.

Fort Fearless adjoins Tofteville, and offers towers, a slide, and an Indian cave that leads from a tepee, under the main pathway, and back up to a cave exit on the other side.

Just past Fort Fearless is an intersection of several paths. Here, you can continue down a lane to the English Village, with more exhibits and fun activities, or you can check out a number of rides. Rides have separate admission tickets, and each requires a different number of tickets (or a ride bracelet).

The Challenge of Mondor is a ride through a magical cave, where you use a pretend gun to try to hit various targets as part of your quest. The ride includes sudden stops, turns, and a dragon flying over your head. My four-year old and seven-year old enjoyed it, and were actually able to hit some of the targets.

The Ice Mountain Bobsled ride is a fairly small roller coaster ride, but it actually takes some fun dips and turns. Nearby is the Big Timber Log Ride, which takes you up through a mill, past the mill offices, down a couple of smaller dips, and then finally down a steep drop with a big splash. Logs are big enough for four, so it makes a great family ride. Rain ponchos are provided for those who prefer to remain dry.

An assortment of kiddy rides are provided for younger children, including a Ferris wheel, train ride, frog jumper, bumper boats, and bumper cars. Even our two year old was able to enjoy the bumper boats and train ride.

Down the hill from the kiddy rides is the Haunted House. This is a walk-through haunted house, rather than a ride, but it does require extra tickets as well. This is a pretty scary haunted house, and isn't recommended for younger children.

The Haunted House exits back into Western Town. From here, you can also head back down toward the entrance, where the food court is. Food is sold on-site, but you can bring your own food, and picnic tables are provided. The park provides a basic hamburger/hot dog stand and an ice cream parlor. Both are reasonably priced. We bought lunch for four (and shared it with the youngest) for $16.95.

After lunch, we went back around Fairy Tale Land, got snow cones, and then went to the Fantasy Fountains Water-Light Show. This is an indoor show, with man-made rock formations, water, colored lights, and music. Water spray and lighting are coordinated with the music, and the colored spray closely resembles fireworks, which was great for a July 1 visit. Adults may or may not be impressed by the show, but the kids loved it, and it held all of our two-year old's attention for five of the seven minutes of the show, which is no mean feat. The show is included in the price of admission. Also included with admission are short plays presented in the Comedy Theatre. We chose not to view a play.

We ended our visit after the water and light show, leaving the park about four hours after we arrived. This was enough time to see everything and go back to a few things we wanted to see again.

We visited the Enchanted Forest on a Sunday. The park is open from 9:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. on weekends, and Sunday mornings are recommended as a less busy time. We arrived at 10:00 a.m., and the parking lot was maybe one-quarter full. It was full by the time we left, but the park still never felt over-crowded to us. We didn't wait in any especially long lines, and the atmosphere was calm and relaxed. The park was also exceptionally clean. We didn't see a single piece of litter on the ground while we were there.

Part of the reason for this may be the park's outstanding organization. It's mapped out so that you can follow a certain sequence of activities and progress easily from one area to the next, and people seem to naturally space themselves out as they come in. However, there is also a network of paths that allow to you move between the different areas of the park at will.

The Enchanted Forest is just south of Salem, Oregon off of I-5 at exit 248. It's about an hour's drive from Portland. Admission is $9.25 for adults, and $8.25 for children ages 3-12 or seniors aged 62 and up. Children under 3 are free. Unlimited ride bracelets can be purchased for $16-22, or you can purchase individual ride tickets for 75 cents each. We opted to purchase the individual ride tickets, which was actually more economical for us. The park is open from mid-March through September, but the days and hours open vary, so check the park website at www.enchantedforest.com to confirm when it will be open.

We were completely satisfied with this outing for our family, and I can highly recommend the Enchanted Forest.