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New Indoor Water Parks Take the Plunge

What's new at water parks for the 2004 season?

By Arthur Levine, About.com

Splashin' Safari ride picture

Holiday World's Splashin' Safari will debut Jungle Racer this season.

Holiday World 2004. used with permission.
Apr 6 2004
Dollywood's Splash Country in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, will introduce Big Bear Ridge, a new themed area. Its centerpiece will be Big Bear Plunge, a family rafting ride that will take passengers on a 548-foot-long ride through dark caverns. Another family raft ride will debut at Cincinnati's The Beach. Called Volcano Panic, the custom ride will meander through the park's hillside terrain before landing in a spashdown area made to look like molten lava. Visually, I don't know how "refreshing" that will appear on a sweltering day.

Holiday World's Splashin' Safari in Santa Claus, Indiana will launch Jungle Jets, a new sprayground, and Jungle Racer, a five-story water slide with ten racing lanes. Camelbeach Waterpark in Tannersville, Pennsylvania will also introduce a racing water slide attraction. Called Checkered Flag Challenge, eight racers at a time will plunge head-first and sensors will determine the winner at the finish line.

More indoor water parks take the plunge

Yet another indoor water park is taking shape in Wisconsin, although this one isn't in Wisconsin Dells (the hub of the indoor water park universe), but in Sheboygan. The Blue Harbor Resort, set to open this summer, will feature a 40,000-square-foot indoor water park as well as hotel rooms, a conference center, restaurants, condominiums, and other amenities. The Great Lakes Companies, which operates the Great Wolf Lodges in the Dells, Sandusky, Ohio, and Traverse City, Michigan, is developing the Victorian-themed Blue Harbor Resort.

Cedar Fair, the parent company of Cedar Point and its adjacent Soak City water park, is building Castaway Bay, an indoor water park near the Sandusky, Ohio roller coaster mecca. Scheduled to open in November, the renovated Radisson Harbour Inn will serve as the water park resort. Its main feature will be a Master Blaster water coaster.

When it opens later this year, Avalanche Bay Waterpark Resort in Boyne Falls, Michigan will include a huge 58,000 square-foot, Alpine-village themed indoor water park. Among its features will be a Wave Loch Flow Rider, which recreates huge surfing waves for snowboard/surfboard-like maneuvers.

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