My San Diego Sesame Place Experience

 

The first time I ever heard about the Philadelphia amusement park known as Sesame Place, was sometime in either 2014 or 2015, when I stumbled across their website.

Naturally, a theme park based around one of my favorite shows was a place I really wanted to go to, but I couldn’t. Because it was located in Pennsylvania, and we live in California, which is on the other side of the USA, entirely. And my family and I didn’t have enough money for that kind of vacation. So, that was the end of that. And Sesame Place just became a place I thought about every now and then and hoped to one day have enough to go there one day.

Then, in 2019 (AKA: Sesame Street’s 50th Anniversary, a new type of Sesame Place was opened up in the SeaWorld theme park in Orlando, Florida. Simply titled “Sesame Street Land”, it was a small part of the park that replaced Shamu’s Happy Harbour, and another place that I was dead-set on visiting. But geographical convenience has a very sick sense of humor, as Florida and California were also on opposite sides of America, and my parents still didn’t think it was a good investment to pay for that flight.

So, that was two for two, and it really bummed me out, because these theme parks look like really unique, amazing places to spend the day, and given that I found out about them during my sporadic Sesame Street obsession time periods, all the videos I watched just made them look and sound even amazing, and just increased my longing by a huge amount. And as much as I love California, I really wish that it wasn’t so far away from amazing Sesame Street things and places.

But then, one day on October 21, 2019, Sesame Workshop released an official article on their website stating a new Sesame Place would be built in San Diego, a place only two hours away from where I lived. And after hearing that and seeing concept art on Muppet Wiki, needless to say, I was ecstatic and brought it to my parents' attention as soon as it opened up. They convinced me that we shouldn’t go during the opening week, since amusement parks usually like to charge extra for stuff then. That sounded fair to me, so we waited a while, and then on June 19th, more commonly known as Father’s Day, we packed our stuff and headed over to my first ever Sesame Place experience. And now that it’s over, I have thoughts that I want to share with you guys. And who knows, you might find this information useful if you want to check this place out for yourself.

Negatives

Okay, I’m gonna start off with the negative aspects of this park just to get them out of the way, and thankfully, there aren’t that many.

The first problem my Sesame Place has is that the park hours are RIDICULOUSLY short! It opens every day at 10:00 AM and then closes at 5:00 PM on weekdays and 6:00 PM on weekends! So put together, that gives you either eight or nine hours of park enjoyment! That’s especially bad news for a family like us who always arrive to things at the last minute! We ended up arriving sometime around 11 or 12, I think, so, that only gave us six hours, and when 6:00 rolled around, I still feel like we had just gotten started, and it felt like we had to scramble to leave. At Six Flags, they open at 10:30 AM, but they let you stay until 9:00 PM, sometimes even 10:00, the usual times when people feel like they want to wind down. I just really think the Sesame Place owners should add three more extra hours to their park times, so people have more time to enjoy themselves and don’t feel like they have to rush to leave.

The second thing that wasn’t so good was the food, well, just the dessert, really. I got a pizza there, and it was actually pretty good, but I also got some chocolate chip cookies and a brownie, and they were REALLY subpar. I mean they weren’t god awful, but they weren’t that good, either. It makes me think back to the cookies and brownies I got at a Renaissance Fair in Arizona. Those things were heavenly, in both smell and taste. Those people really knew how to bake baked goods. If any of you are wondering why I brought this up, it’s because I believe that when the show you’re basing a theme park around has a character whose entire personality is loving cookies, I think there are some standards that have to be met. A Ren Fair should not be doing infinitely better than you when it comes to making cookies.

Also, this isn’t really an issue with the park itself, but the weather on this particular day was rather cool. Too cool for water attractions. But I did go on the ones at Sesame Place and the water was freezing. It was as cold as the water at the North Pole! …Okay, that was an exaggeration, but it was pretty cool. When I went on a water slide in The Count’s Splash Castle, I was so freezing afterward, that I couldn’t go on any more water rides or sit/stand in any pools. Though that was probably for the best, as some of the water rides aren’t my speed, but we’ll get to that in a bit.

Anyway, I think that’s all the things I didn’t like, now let’s move on to the positives, which thankfully, outweigh the cons. I’ll start with the best and most important aspect of Sesame Place…

Presentation and Character Representation

I’ll start off by saying this. When I first saw that sculpture of Elmo, Ernie, Bert, Big Bird, Oscar, Rosita, Cookie Monster, Grover, and Abby by the entrance, that’s when I knew: “Oh boy, this place is gonna be great.”

Sesame Place is the place to be for both kid and adult fans of the show alike. When you’re there, you really do feel like you’re stepping into a distant Sesame Street paradise. Everything is spread out and easily accessible, they’re constantly blasting Sesame Street songs everywhere, and don’t even get me started on the recreation of the TV set. Yeah, the way the locations are placed is pretty inaccurate to the real thing, but it doesn’t really matter, because they still look like they came straight from New York. The 123 Building, especially.

But the bigger factor on why this park is so awesome is how it manages to use the characters of the show it’s centered around.

I’ve said this multiple times in the past before, but the main reason Sesame Street has the following it does is because of its lovable ensemble of furry, felty friends. It’s why me and so many others come back to it as often as we do because we love the characters so much. The makers of Sesame Place knew this and made sure the park gave each main street member their dues. (Well except for maybe Baby Bear.) If Sesame Place did what Season 51 did, and solely focus on Elmo and Abby, it wouldn’t be that appealing for most people, because while those two are great characters and the ones that kids know and love the most, they’re not the only ones who made Sesame Street such a timeless classic. It was a team effort by all of the main muppet players on the show. Which is why, it brings me great pleasure to say, that while the red monster and pink fairy are the most prominent characters featured, Sesame Place still features plenty of the giant yellow canary, the googly-eyed eating machine, the garbage dwelling grump, the Odd Couple, the cute and furry multi-tasker, the arithomomanic vampire, the cyan, Spanish monster of the caves, the shaggy brown non-elephant, the purple, neurotic, triangle-loving mess, the orange, rock-loving ballerina, and so many more of the SS muppet roster. So chances are, everyone SS fan who comes to this park will get to see at least a small amount of their favorite character, and that makes it a great success in my eyes.

If you want the best examples of that, I have three: 1, the portraits at the very entrance of the park of the main muppet players. 2, the mural behind the wall of Ernie's Twisty Turny Tunnels and Bert's Topsy Turvy Tunnels, which features a great selection of many recognizable SS characters. And 3, the Sunny Day Carousel, a carousel that is decked out with Big Bird and the street sign on the very top and features portraits of each main muppet on each individual section.

Rides and Attractions

Despite how they may look, the rides of Sesame Place, or at least the ones I was actually able to ride were great, exciting rushes of energy, that, like I mentioned before, gave each main character a spotlight.

My personal favorite was the Cookie Climb, which is sort of like the drop towers, but this time, you have to pull yourself up using a rope.

Second place was Abby’s Fairy Flight, which is sort of like if a swing and a roundabout had a baby.

And third was the Sesame Street Soar and Spin, which featured a nice selection of character-themed balloons and the ability to spin the baskets around as much as I like.

There were actually a few rides that I wanted to go on that weren’t open. Like Ernie’s Rub-A-Dub Sub and Super Grover’s Box Car Derby, which was a bit of a bummer.

But for the most part, I had a very good experience with the rides of Sesame Place. Now onto the water attractions. I didn’t get to go on many of those, (See my reasoning above.) but the ones I did go on were definitely more of my speed.

Big Bird’s Ramblin River was a pretty nice trip, once you got used to the water. I love the sculptures of Elmo, Tango, and Dorothy at Elmo’s Silly Sand Slides, and The Count’s Splash Castle was actually very well put together.

Big Bird’s Beach also looked like it was a chill hang space, but I didn’t have enough time to be there, and, as mentioned before, I was too cold to ride Snuffy, Bert, or Ernie’s water slide sections. Ah well, there’s always next time.

But there are three rides that I’ve decided I’m NOT going on, even IF the weather is warmer. And those are Oscar’s Rotten Rafts, The Honker Dinger Dash, and especially Cookie’s Monster Mixer. I’m sorry, but these rides just look way too big and scary for me to go down. And each of their structures make me worry about how much my safety would be at risk if I went down. My sister made my dad go on most of these water slides with her, and he said the Monster Mixer in particular was pretty terrifying. So I don’t care if it’s a ride about my favorite SS character, and I don’t care how many times Sophia calls me a baby, I’m not getting on that thing.

Moving on to more pleasant park features, there was Rosita’s Harmony Hills, a sensory playground where kids could just wander aimlessly and touch music-related stuff. I didn’t get to explore it that much, but from what I did experience, it was pretty nice.

And, I would like to tell you about my experience with the mascot costume characters, but I sadly don’t have any. Either we arrived at the park by the time the mascots were off-duty, or we just didn’t seek them out in time. So yeah, we didn’t get to see the stage show, witness Big Bird’s Story Time, OR get our pictures with any of the Muppets.

But we did get to see the parade, twice. And I gotta say that while the parade and the floats did look very nice, and it was great to finally see the characters I know and love so much, up close, I prefer the 2011 version in Philadelphia better. The characters get more to do, and the whole section where Abby tries to think of a magic spell for letters and numbers was probably my favorite bit. Also, that parade seems way more spaced out compared to San Diego, where there was limited space and it felt rather crowded.

But overall, there was still a good amount of activities that kept both me and my family entertained for the duration of our visit. Now it’s time to look at the gift shop.

Gift Shops and Merchandise

Okay, guys, I'm not gonna beat around the bush: The merchandise at Sesame Place might be the best collection of Sesame Street merchandise I have EVER seen in my life. There’s just so much variety in what stuff they have, T-shirts, books, plushies, bubble wands, snowglobes, lots of stuff! And there’s variety in which characters the merch features, Elmo, Abby, Big Bird, Cookie, Grover, Oscar, Ernie, Bert, Count, Rosita, Telly, Zoe, Gonger, Julia, and even Rudy gets the recognition he deserves in the merch world. It makes me so jealous that we don’t get this type of grade A quality content at OUR local stores. You don’t know what I would give to be able to buy this type of stuff at my nearest Walmart, for an affordable price.

But anyway, Sophia and I each got bubble wands of our respective favorite characters.

I got this awesome T-Shirt.

This cup actually was part of our meal, at one of the restaurant stands, but it was so cool, I HAD to hang on to it.

And last, but certainly not least, I bought the whole collection of special figurines the park has that you can buy five of and put them in a carrying case. (My Telly and Prairie Dawn aren’t from Sesame Place, I purchased them on eBay.) While the detail on these things is amazing, there are two glaring issues with these figures that can’t be overlooked. One, the carrying cases for these figurines are too small to fit five characters, especially the bigger ones like Cookie, Count, and Snuffy. Seriously, I tried, and it didn’t work. And two, the scaling is all kinds of wrong. I know these are supposed to be small collectible items, but Elmo shouldn’t be nearly as tall as Big Bird and Snuffy should NOT be smaller than literally everyone else.

Other than that, I was happy with my merch selection, and can’t wait to buy more of it the next time we go there.

A Failed Experiment

This next section is about something I chose to do for fun but didn’t turn out as I expected.

Seeing as how this was my first time going to a place, where it’s guaranteed that people who like the same thing as I do will be, I decided to survey the other park-goers’ favorite SS Muppets. I bought a clipboard and made 12 separate sheets of paper to collect votes for Elmo, Abby, Cookie Monster, Big Bird, Oscar, Grover, Ernie, Bert, The Count, Rosita, Snuffy, and Kermit, and another sheet of paper for any and all other characters people voted for.

But sadly, we were so busy roaming around the park and getting our amenities, that I didn’t get nearly as many participants as I was hoping for. Though that’s not to say I didn’t get any at all, and those few were one of the many highlights of my day.

Altogether 14 people voted, and five characters were voted for.

I predicted Elmo would be the one to get the most votes, and I was proven right because he came in first with a grand total of four.

Abby and Oscar tied for second with three votes each.

And Grover and Rosita also tied for last with two votes each.

So yeah, not really the best results I could’ve gotten. But no worries, I was just experiencing Sesame Place for the first time and figuring out where everything is. I plan to do this experiment again, the next time we come back, and I’m sure I’ll get a lot more participants then. Hopefully.

Conclusion

So, there you have it, folks. The lowdown of what I did at Sesame Place in San Diego. And while I did have some slight issues with time, prices, and dessert, it had great rides, equal character representation, great merchandise, and was a fantastic tribute to one of my favorite TV shows ever. It doesn’t matter if you’re someone who has kids who love Sesame Street, an adult Sesame Street fan, or a person who loves water parks, this version of Sesame Place has something for everyone.

Me and my family will definitely be going back sometime this year. We just have to figure out when. The one thing I know for sure is that we should head out a day early, so we’ll have enough time the next day to get to the park as soon as it opens.

But despite everything I said about this place, I do still want to visit the Sesame Place in Philadelphia and the Sesame Street Land at SeaWorld in Orlando, because from what I’ve seen online, they seem like the positive aspects of my Sesame Place beefed up to 100. And hopefully, that chance comes sooner than later.

Well, I think that’ll do it for this blog post. I just wanted to make this to share this new experience with you guys, and give my recommendation. If this article made you want to check this place out for yourself, please let me know. And now I plan to get started on the third installment of the Sesame Street Retrospective. Look out for that sometime next month. With that said, thanks for reading, and I’ll see you next time. Bye!