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DOLLYWOOD & Splash Country
Pigeon Forge, Tenn.
Herschend Family Entertainment
---- THE LATEST BUZZ ----
(11/27/19) New Details For Planned Second Resort Hotel Uncovered (MORE...)
(10/23/19) A Look Back At The Tennessee Tornado (MORE...)
(10/22/19) More Details About Park's 35th Anniversary Season (MORE...)
(10/19/19) Dollywood Adding New Flower & Food Festival in 2020 (MORE...)
Dixie Stampede (2016) Review
FireChaser Express - Grand Opening & Review
Dolly’s Splash Country Waterpark - Official Screamscape Review
Dollywood’s DreamMore Resort - Official Screamscape Review
 General Park News - (10/23/19) A fun collection of photos showing off the construction of Dollywood’s Tennessee Tornado coaster (Arrow) have been posted to Coaster101 in celebration of the coaster’s 20th Birthday that took place earlier this year.
(10/22/19) Dollywood has announced a few more dates for other returning special events coming to the park in 2020 for the 35th anniversary season.
The season will begin on March 14 - April 20 with the return of the Festival of Nations event that will feature a stage productions of Namaste India, Ole!, Drumstruck, JigJam and Invaders Steel Orchestra, plus the return of popular International Food items.
Next is Dollywood’s Barbeque & Bluegrass presented by BUSH’S from April 24 through May 3, followed by the return of The Gazillion Bubbles Show from June 20 through Aug. 2, and Rock the Smokies returning on Aug. 22. This will be followed by the return of the Great Pumpkin LimiNights and Southern Gospel Jubilee events in the fall and then Smoky Mountain Christmas.
 (10/19/19) Dollywood is planning a new five-week long festival to take place at the park in Spring 2020 called Flower & Food Festival. This will take place between May 8 and June 14, 2020 and coincide with the park’s 35th anniversary.
Look for colorful displays of blooming spring flowers and stunning 10-15 foot tall topiaries to be found throughout the park along with an assortment of ultra drool-inducing Smoky Mountain dishes to try at every turn.
Dolly describes it best, “When I was just a little girl, spring was a wondrous time,” Parton explained. “Everything came to life – flowers bloomed in the meadow near our house, and the Dogwood, red bud and fruit trees blossomed with the sweetest smells. I imagined having my own special field of flowers that were a fragrant home to my favorite animal friends in the woods. Now, my Dollywood becomes that special place with everything made of flowers – I can’t wait to share it with everyone just in time for our 35th season!”
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(7/17/19) Dollywood will soon become a location for a new Hallmark Christmas movie production. According to the local news, the film will be called “Christmas at Dollywood” and filming is set to begin this August. The film will feature Dolly Parton of course, along with Danica McKellar as the main star who will play a single Mom seeking a job at the park as a show producer for the Smoky Mountain Christmas Festival.
(5/15/19) This week I shared my latest thoughts all about the Dollywood Resort and how their mission of putting the “family experience” front and center in everything they do, and decided to share this vision with our friends over a BlooLoop as well. Read on and learn what drives every new experience at the Dollywood Resort.
2020 - Nothing is known at this time...
Future Developments - New Attractions Survey - (4/10/19) Screamscape sources tell us that Dollywood is looking into more than just ideas for a new coaster… the park is also conducting guest surveys asking about a variety of dark ride themes and concepts (see images) they are considering for the park, as well as a Flying Theater attraction and even a “interactive walk-through immersive experience”... for the later one they show images from Universal’s Poseidon’s Fury.
(4/6/19) Screamscape sources tell us Dollywood was sending out guest surveys again this week to get reactions to a variety of new attraction concepts. One of the most exciting to all your thrill ride nuts out there may be for a new “Indoor Coaster” experience, one that would offer a “2 - 4 minute thrill experience” along with a high level of themeing that would mix slower scenes with animatronics, lighting effects and projection mapping with the high-speed thrill sections in order to tell a story.
They also ask about other new coaster concept as well however, including an out & back traditional Hypercoaster (over 200ft tall, 60mph, full of air-time hills) with an on-board soundtrack, as well as a Spinning Coaster experience, in which the intent is to make something similar to Time Traveler from Silver Dollar City, which came from Mack Rides.
The other concepts are more entertainment related, including a possible Summer Daytime parade concept that would include Macy’s style balloon floats as well as a Christmas Candlelight Nativity show experience.
(Early 2019) An early rumor claims that Dollywood may be looking to build their next major coaster as a Phase 2 expansion to the 2019 project. Manufacturers are being looked at, but rumor has it they may be leaning towards B&M simply for a reliability standpoint. What kind of coaster may be up in the air as well, though after just opening Fire Chaser Express and Lightning Rod, they definitely are not looking to have another launched coaster at this point. While a B&M Hyper may be considered a likely choice, I believe Dollywood is too close to Carowinds and Six Flags over Georgia for that to happen with the typical B&M contracts that prevent similar coasters from being built too close together too soon. A B&M Inverted may be a possibly however, even though Carowinds has one as well, simply because Afterburn was built in 1999, and by 2020 enough time should have passed to allow for it. Plus I think it would be kind of cute to open the rumored family inverted coaster in 2019… and then follow it up with a monster sized version that could run wild through the mountainside and trees, much like Alpengeist at Busch Gardens Williamsburg.
That’s just a dream on my part however, Dollywood could very well opt to go with an entirely different manufacturer to get a Hyper or anything else they want. Stay tuned while we listed for more rumors on the wind.
???? - Second Dollywood Hotel - Planning - (11/27/19) Screamscape first reported that Dollywood was preparing plans to add a second resort hotel a little over a year ago (see below) and now we finally have an update on the project. According to the local news the theme park submitted a preliminary site plan to Pigeon Forge showing a 310-room hotel project with a 325-seat restaurant as well as conference space that would be located somewhere between the current DreamMore Resort and Dollywood’s Splash Country waterpark.
When approaching the current DreamMore Resort, as you reach the top of the first drive-way segment, you have to make a left turn to get into the DreamMore parking lot, but you may have noticed that the drive-way road continues on straight for another 10-15 feet before ending in the brush. That road will be extended to lead up to a round-about that will split traffic between the meeting space and guest room ends of the new resort property.
(11/12/18) During an interview with the local news Dolly Parton where they discuss a new Netflix series she is working on as well as the new Glacier Ridge addition to Dollywood’s Smoky Mountain Christmas, Dolly let another interesting detail slip out. While discussing meetings they have each season to go over what guests like, don’t like, and what people would really like to have added to Dollywood, they decided that they need to build another hotel. According to Dolly, "…just like we’re going to build a new resort because our resort stays busy all the time!”
If you haven’t seen it yet, Screamscape has stayed at and reviewed Dollywood’s Dreammore Resort and we loved it! You can see our official review and photos here.
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