Sylvan Beach Amusement Park is one of the oldest parks in the country and this place feels frozen
in time. For some, that may be a negative. But for me, that’s a positive. This park has a throwback
vibe combined with some rare attractions you’ll struggle to find elsewhere. So in this review,
I’ll explain why this park may be worth visiting on a road trip through New York.
Sylvan Beach Amusement Park has been around since the 1870s. The park is located in central New
York on the shores of Oneida Lake. This park feeds off the energy of the nearby village and beaches.
To capitalize on this, Sylvan Beach Amusement Park has free admission and no gates so people
can come and go as they please. If you want to ride anything,
you can either purchase individual tickets or an all-day wristband. The latter costs roughly
$35 as of 2022 and that’s the best option if you want to ride multiple attractions.
This park is a short detour off I-90 if you’re on a road trip that way. When you arrive,
you have two places to park. You can either park across the street or behind the amusement park.
The lot across the street can fill up quickly, but the one behind the
park had plenty of space for cars. Both lots cost $2 per hour or $10 for an entire day.
As you walk down the midway, this park oozes a 1950s vibe. You have multiple arcades with giant,
flashy signs plus a retro collection of flat rides. As someone who appreciates the history
of theme parks, I liked this aesthetic. Some of the rides and buildings look a bit dated, but many
rides were sporting fresh coats of paint like the Bomber Roll-O-Plane and the Galaxi roller coaster.
And I imagine this place may have some nice lights at night once the sun goes down.
I visited on a holiday weekend in the afternoon and lines were non-existent.
I could get onto the next cycle of any attraction that I chose. This park does have rotating ride
operators for the flat rides. And this is even with the park only being open 4 days per week.
This park is often open just Thursday through Sunday with the exception of holidays. So you
may have to wait 2-3 minutes for an operator to finish a cycle on an adjacent ride before
they can help you. While the park wasn’t staffed as fully as some other parks,
anyone I interacted with was friendly and they would load rides quickly once they came over.
One word of warning I’ll give you about visiting this park is to avoid it on
a rainy day. This park can close early or not even open if there’s a stormy forecast.
That makes sense since this park thrives on attracting nearby beachgoers.
Many of the rides at this park are relocated. That’s why even their
newest attraction in the G-Force Rotor looks pretty darn old…because it is.
The lone coaster here is a S.D.C. Galaxi. While this ride has the familiar layout, it has three
things going for it that make it better than the others out there. First, it offers great views of
the lake and beach. Second, this one runs two car trains, so the drops have some airtime in the back
car. Third, the brakes towards the end fail to engage, so the final turns and humps, which are
usually taken slowly, instead offer surprisingly strong laterals and an abrupt pop of airtime. I
loved this finale! I have an entire review on this coaster if you want to learn more. If you want to
experience this coaster, note that you need at least 2 people and they need to front-load
the train to prevent it from valleying. One other fun fact about this ride was that it
was closed the past two years. It was closed in 2020, like the rest of the amusement park,
due to New York’s covid-19 pandemic regulations. Then in 2021, osprey made a nest on the coaster.
Because of how these birds are territorial, the park and local nature groups decided it would be
best if the coaster remained closed until the birds migrated down south in the fall.
For flat rides, you have an interesting mix. If you love spinning rides,
do not miss Tip Top. You basically ride in a tea cup on this bouncing platform.
The cars are incredibly easy to spin, which results in an extremely dizzying experience.
I also want to point out the Himalaya. This one only runs forwards, but it has a high top speed,
resulting in powerful laterals plus little pops of airtime on the humps.
One spinning ride I missed out on was the G-Force Rotor. It’s my understanding this ride has been
closed for a few years and I hope it reopens since there aren’t many Chance Rotors left. I
love the centripetal forces these rides produce. The two most thrilling flats are Rock-O-Plane and
Bomber. The latter is the fastest Roll-O-Plane I’ve ever experienced. This ride gave some
weightlessness over the top when the arm was positioned vertically. Then this ride had some
of the most violent laterals I’ve ever experienced since the cars would twist out of inverting at
the very last second. I was comically tossed side-to-side when the arms went horizontal.
Rock-O-Plane is a high-speed Ferris Wheel that you can invert if you
strategically hold the lever in front of you. This results in some great hangtime.
Then for kids, there’s a dedicated Kiddieland with 10 rides exclusively for them.
This park also has a classic Pretzel dark ride in Laffland. The visual quality was on
par with a carnival dark ride, but there was a well-timed gag every few seconds typically
accompanied by a sound effect. It wasn’t super scary, but it’s just an old-fashioned ride.
The lone water ride is the Bumper Boats, which are not included with wristbands.
As a result, I didn’t see anyone riding them all-day.
Another major part of a visit to Sylvan Beach are the arcades. This park has multiple
arcades. The ones owned by the amusement park have a collection of older games.
Then smack dab in the center of the park is Carello’s Carousel Arcade.
This one features more modern games plus an 1890s Looff Carousel that is in pristine condition.
Sylvan Beach used to own this carousel themselves, but it was sold and it’s in good hands.
Carousel lovers should not miss this ride. This park also features one of the last
Fascination parlors. If you’ve never played this game before, it’s an addictive combination
of skeeball and bingo. Games cost just 25 cents, so it’s an absolute bargain.
This attraction had a delayed opening and I’m not sure if it’s closed on less busy days,
but I was thankful to see it open! I didn’t see many food stands in the park,
but I think that’s deliberate since the nearby beach and village has plenty of sit-down and quick
service restaurants to choose from. So do I recommend Sylvan Beach Amusement Park?
Coaster credit hunters probably shouldn’t go out of their way for this park, but it can be a quick
and cheap pit stop if you’re passing it. It can be reasonably added to a trip with some of New York’s
other parks like Seabreeze or Great Escape. Just remember this park’s limited days of operation.
But I think this park is worth visiting if you’re into classic rides and amusement parks. This park
has a nice feel to it, and I had a few hours of fun lapping the flat rides and playing many rounds
of Fascination. Then this park can be paired with the nearby beach for a relaxing day of fun.
So those are my thoughts on Sylvan Beach Amusement Park in central New York.
What are your thoughts on this small amusement park on the shore of Oneida Lake? Do you like this
park’s retro feel? Let me know your thoughts down below. If you enjoyed this review, I’d
appreciate it if you gave this video a like and you considered subscribing since there will be a
lot more roller coaster and amusement park videos here at Canobie Coaster. Thanks for watching!