We took the kids to a water park yesterday which was not a unique idea.
Like us, many parents looked at their calendars and realized, the summer holiday is coming to an end so it’s time to start cramming every fun activity we talked about doing the last day of school and generating an album of photos to prove we really did make some dreams come true.
We were charged $103 for a family of four water park participants. Our twenty-one month old was free other than the $5 life jacket rental. I guess $103 for a waterslide vs. $5 for a life saving apparatus makes sense. In addition, there was a $2 charge for socks, a mandatory cover for any bare footed children attempting to use the indoor play yard. Lesson learned. Most people wear socks to a water park in August. Thanks to the tigers and helicopters among you.
Have the rates always been that high? $103 does seem a little steep to stand next to a couple of sprinklers and realize the average man could get away with wearing a larger bra than you.
We assumed (erroneously) that our two oldest would meet the height requirement to enjoy most of the fun water activities, especially since our five year old is tall enough to ride Space Mountain at Disney World, the world’s scariest ride. Sadly, our oldest was the only one able to enjoy ANYTHING other than a couple of sprinkler heads and a bucket that from time to time would fill with water and dump gallons onto some lucky sock holding parent’s head as the children had studied the filling patterns and calculated to the second when to drop everything and run for cover.
$103 really? How much does it cost for a couple of plastic tubes that only three park goers are even tall enough to be permitted to use? There can’t be that much wear and tear.
The wave pool wasn’t what it used to be when I was a kid either. I remember thinking on many occasions I may never make it back to the shallow end alive after being thrashed around in the treacherous swells. Today’s waves were more like the ripple you might see if someone dropped a sock from the burger terrace above or a disgruntled child, too small to enjoy the waterslides but big enough to become severely whip-lashed on Space Mountain did a cannonball into the deep end.
As expected, the park became increasingly busy as the day went on. I’m assuming families were at Costco, grocery shopping and someone mentioned it was August 20th prompting parents to look at each other and decide it was dangerously close to back-to-school time and they had yet to visit a no-socks-no-service water park and fast.
Summer is almost over.
We’ve got a lot of tandem bike riding, kayak racing and remote, boutique wineries to visit.
