Stunt Pilot and a Look at Silverwood Theme Park
Silverwood Theme Park, Athol, ID
What’s this? A NON-Halloween update? Yes, to break up the spooky season content, and in honor of the brand new Rocky Mountain Construction single rail coaster that just opened last month at Six Flags Magic Mountain, we’re taking a trip to… a completely different theme park in order to check out their new RMC single rail… that opened last year.
A small, charming, and somewhat quirky amusement park just north of Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, Silverwood Theme Park may not be one of the more prominent or high profile parks out there, but it does feature an interesting line-up of roller coasters, a family-run environment, and a beautiful setting. It’s also home to a couple of well known roller coasters that began their lives in other, more famous theme parks—Corkscrew at Knott’s Berry Farm was the first modern looping roller coaster and Aftershock used to be Deja Vu at Six Flags Great America outside Chicago—as well as several other original and exciting roller coasters in their own right.
Welcome to Silverwood Theme Park!
Stunt Pilot was a big addition to Silverwood Theme Park last year—in multiple ways! Not only was it a new and modern thrill ride, it came literally just down the street from RMC’s headquarters in neighboring Hayden, Idaho. A near-mirror clone of RMC’s Raptor single rail prototype, Stunt Pilot celebrates the aviation history of the area. In fact, Silverwood Theme Park was built on the former site of the Henley Aerodrome airfield, and air shows used to be held in the area in the late 1980s through mid-90’s. Originally meant to go to (no longer Six Flags) Kentucky Kingdom, the roller coaster deal fell through during the COVID pandemic, allowing Silverwood to pick up the order and install the roller coaster last year as their seventh in the park.
Stunt Pilot in all its glory!
The RMC Raptor model is located in the park’s Roller Coaster Alley area, which houses three other prominent roller coasters—Tremors, Aftershock, and Timber Terror. Standing at 105 feet tall and located between the Roaring Creek log flume and the back end of Tremors, Stunt Pilot is positioned prominently as guests enter the area. It’s also the first roller coaster in the park to feature two train operation—none of others even have a transfer track—and the thrill ride sends riders down a nearly vertical drop and through three inversions and multiple twists and turns and drops at speeds reaching 52 miles per hour!
Guests waiting in line can see the coaster in action as it snakes its way over and around the queue area. Inside the station, loading is unique and functions almost like an omnimover, with the training remaining in slow movement forward as it enters the station, allowing riders of the one-seat-per-car train to exit one side while the new riders hop on from the other. This is not unlike how a wild mouse coaster operates, and on smooth operation cycles, a train may never actually stop while guest are unloaded, loaded, locked in, and checked before dispatching. Of course, if there is a delay, the train will stop at the front of the station.
Stunt Pilot occupies a prominent location at the entrance into Roller Coaster Alley.
The ride starts with an immediate ascent up a relatively steep lift hill out of the station. The trip up is relatively brisk before leveling out and making a U-turn to the left. The first drop is sudden and swooping, angling at 87° and descending 100 feet. From the back, guests are practically wrenched over the top, and the airtime is pretty wicked—especially with the comfy vest harnesses that allow for some movement while keeping guests safe from excessive forces (kind of like a seat belt). The drop hurtles under two sections of track that guests will traverse later, offering a nice pair of head choppers, before soaring up again and veering into a dive loop.
The loading is part roller coaster, part omnimover, slowly rolling forward as guests get off and on.
Climbing up the lift hill…
The drop is steep!
The first inversion is a towering dive loop.
Exiting the loop, the 10-row / 10-person trains take a curving and banking airtime hill that changes direction after the peak—sort of like a non-inverting corkscrew—before zooming into a tight upward helix that levels out and jukes an S-turn in the opposite direction. This part offers a nice stretch of positive G’s before switching to a lateral barrage. Before riders can recover, though, it’s down a smaller straight drop and into a cutback—an inverting overbanked turn similar to a corkscrew but coming out the opposite direction of entry—which then transitions immediately into an actual corkscrew that sails through a little aero shed for another head chopper moment. One sharp, banked turn to the left takes the ride into the brake run with plenty of momentum left, ending a zippy course that lasts less than a minute of actual ride time. But the experience is certainly far richer!
A nice airtime hill comes next.
The tight twists and turns of Stunt Pilot are pretty awesome.
There’s a corkscrew.
This ride’s a real barnstormer!!
Stunt Pilot is an excellent addition to a park that boasts a unique line-up and offers fantastic forces, airtime, and thrills. The front is fun for the clear, single-rail vista that riders sit straddled over, but the back is (unsurprisingly) the best seat in the house for those looking to maximize forces. There is so much airtime, and the course is relentless—barely offering any moment to recover before the next element. And though the trains only accommodate ten riders total, which can lead to pretty low capacity on one-train operating days, when the ride does run two trains, it can actually churn through guests pretty quickly and keep a relatively slim line.
All in all, Stunt Pilot is pretty awesome, and it bolsters the roller coaster roster in Silverwood’s Coaster Alley!
We will devote another post to more detail about the rest of the theme park, but we wanted to cap this update with a few photos of the rest of the park. On the roller coaster front, the park has five “adult” coasters and two “kiddie” coasters (including one of the powered variety, so for purist enthusiasts, that one doesn’t even count).
Tremors is a Custom Coasters International wooden roller coaster that features a lot of twists and tunnels and play with terrain. It’s quite zoomy, and through the roller coaster is pretty rough (despite the presence of an early iteration of RMC’s topper track), the park has been reprofiling it sections at at time with newer RMC 208 RetraK. Those portions are noticeably smoother and carry a pretty nice roar as the train hurtles through.
Tremors, doing its curvy, twisty, rattly thing.
Timber Terror is the other wooden roller coaster, also constructed by Custom Coasters. A more conventional out-and-back layout, Timber Terror was originally called Grizzly and unfortunately carries some similarities to its California’s Great America brethren—namely that the layout is somewhat uneventful and minimally forceful while still managing to be rough. Timber Terror is nowhere near as boring as CGA’s Grizzly, but it’s certainly not making anyone’s top wooden roller coasters list.
Timber Terror not running up that hill.
Aftershock is a Vekoma Giant Inverted Boomerang, which many guests will remember debuted as Deja Vu in three Six Flags parks across the country (including Magic Mountain, though that one ended up going to Six Flags New England later) in 2001. Aftershock is also the last remaining Giant Inverted Boomerang still operating in North America. The operations problems that have plagued this model have often given it a bad rap, but it does offer a terrifying and thrilling experience (especially going up the first lift hill, looking straight down) when it does run. Unfortunately, the weather conditions that allow Aftershock to run are limited, making this the Goldilocks of Silverwood’s roller coasters.
Aftershock inches up its first lift.
In the adjacent Country Carnival area, the Corkscrew is a landmark in roller coaster history. Literally! It’s got a plaque from the American Coaster Enthusiasts organization and everything! But it really does carry historical appeal because it used to occupy the area of Knott’s Berry Farm now housing HangTime (and before that, Boomerang). When it opened back in 1975, it was the first modern steel looping roller coaster, and ten versions of this model ended up being installed across various amusement parks. Silverwood has the original, though. With its two inversions and relatively short profile, the ride is nothing special by today’s standards, but it definitely has prestige from its ground-breaking impact.
Corkscrew won’t wow anyone these days, but it’s a classic!
Over in Critter Camp, the park’s children-centric theme area sort of akin to Knott’s Camp Snoopy, there are two family coasters that the younger tykes can enjoy. Krazy Koaster is a spinning coaster with a figure eight layout. Tiny Toot is a Zamperla powered mine train coaster.
Krazy Koaster is one of two children’s roller coasters in the park.
Beyond that, other popular attractions include Panic Plunge, an A.R.M. / Larson International drop tower; the previously-mentioned Roaring Creek log flume; Thunder Canyon, an in-house rapids ride; and Spin Cycle, a pretty towering Maxi Dance Party 360.
Panic Plunge offers a nice pop of airtime despite its relatively short (for drop ride standards) profile.
Roaring Creek is a nice log flue.
Thunder Canyon also cools guests off on warm days.
Spin Cycle does all the flippy spinny flips.
Then there’s the Silverwood Central Railway, which really deserves a post onto its own. But basically, it’s a 30-minute loop around the park that is part train ride and part safari attraction and part themed exploration of an elusive Sasquatch. Yes, we said Sasquatch.
The Silverwood Central Railway station is beautifully set.
But the train also ventures off into wilderness.
The park’s Main Street area is also exceptionally charming, with an old-fashioned aesthetic that harkens back to the turn of the 20th century. The quiet charm and lovely character of the park really do draw parallels to Knott’s Berry Farm, and while Silverwood lacks Knott’s history—having only opened in 1988—it retains that privately-run feel that Knott’s used to have before Cedar Fair purchased it. Plus, it also has its own Halloween event—Scarywood—that takes over in September and October!
The park entrance is lovely and nostalgic.
The Main Street boardwalk features plenty of great photo ops.
Next door to Silverwood is also a sister water park, Boulder Beach, that is open during the summer months. Park entry includes both the amusement park and water park when both are open, and the amusement park only when Boulder Beach is closed.
Boulder Beach, across the way.
If you ever do want to visit Silverwood, flying into Spokane would be the best choice. From there, it’s a convenient 45 minute drive from Spokane, turning through Coeur d’Alene, and to Silverwood! When we visited last year, Silverwood was part of our Coeur d’Alene leg (when we also visited our friend, Matt, from Park Journey) before we continued onto Glacier National Park.
That caps off this glimpse of Silverwood Theme Park after our focus on Stunt Pilot. We’ll return with more exploration through the rest of the park (which really means more photos), but we hope you’ve enjoyed this little break from the Halloween season content (even though the season hasn’t formally begun yet!).
One more nighttime view at Stunt Pilot.
Architect. Photographer. Disney nerd. Haunt enthusiast. Travel bugged. Concert fiend. Asian.
