If I could be anywhere… Magic Forest

Besides the Renaissance Faire, the Magic Forest is one of the few places I visit every year. Not that anything changes there in a year’s time; there are no new rides, never any improvements to the facilities — but nothing quite compares to walking down an overgrown path and coming face to face with a decomposing statue of a character from a nursery rhyme, its glassy blue eyes staring back at you from corroded sockets filled with spider webs, a cord wrapped in electrical tape dangling between its legs connected to a new-fangled tapeless answering machine which, when activated (and, believe it or not, not every machine always functions properly), intones a warbly, haunted sentence explaining its place in Mother Goose’s pantheon. No matter how many times I’ve experienced this… experience, it continues to blow my mind. Mike, who shot the photos seen here, posted this rather amazing gallery after a very special visit a couple of years ago.

Once, a very long time ago, Lake George was a major family vacation destination. In fact, miniature golf was invented in LG. Dozens and dozens of small theme parks opened back in the days when Six Flags was still just a cowboys and Indians show in some podunk Texas backwater. Over the decades, declining airfare rates allowed Northeastern vacationers to take their family dollars elsewhere and, sadly, one by one the small, family owned and operated theme parks shuttered their decorative doors forever.

But, against all odds, one little indie theme park survived; and they bought up all the hippo mouthed trash cans and sculptures of French Fries splattering themselves with ketchup the bankrupt parks were unloading for next to nothing. The Magic Forest is still open today, and it’s an amazing collage of 1960s family fun. Although the word ‘preservation’ would be totally inaccurate, the rides and attractions are splendid in a way that something like Great Adventure, which is right down the street, could never be.

If you’re in the Lake George area it’s an absolute must. If you don’t have plans to visit Lake George this summer, make them.