I could not WAIT to visit Adventure Landing. Water + Park = Lots of fun! Especially since this Summer really sucked because of rain. Locally, our weather men and women would predict sunshine and we’d end up with a day full of lightening and thunder. I stopped listening to them years ago and knew when I checked the weather for Jacksonville and saw that it said 80% chance of rain, it would be perfect weather for a ROAD TRIP!
Every time we passed a sign I had to snap a picture, we were literally counting down the miles until we would arrive, no one fell asleep during our 4 hour drive to Jacksonville, FL. We filled our tummies and pulled up to the parking lot of the park ( I think it was actually the back). At first glance it looked kind of small for an attraction. As we drove further my thought was then, “Whoa, it’s only noon and this place is packed with like 100 cars!” The sun was shining and it was hot, I was hoping the lines for the water rides weren’t ridiculous.
ENTERING THE PARK: Once you park your car, you have to walk past the water park area to enter the front doors. There’s a bridge to the entry way with water below and small gators. Once inside, there is a candy shop, food and seating area, huge arcade, laser tag, lots of games and an upstairs area for parties. I cannot comment on the activities indoors, because I went to have water fun! After we received our passes, we went right outside to see what was there.
DRY AREA OF THE PARK: Outside the arcade area there are batting cages, a mini roller coaster, mini golf, a ride that takes the kiddies up in the air and bumper cars. I really wanted to ride the bumper cars, but we all had on flip flops and covered shoes are required.
WET AREA OF THE PARK: As we passed the lockers at the mini golf area, we decided to rent a locker and get ready to change. Silly me, I should’ve waited until I entered the water park to rent one. We went looking for a place to change but there wasn’t one. Well, there were changing areas, but nothing private. Just an open spaces with people (males and females) getting dressed. My kids got dressed outside, my husband and I made makeshift dressing areas by holding up towels so they’d have privacy. I got dressed in the open area in the women’s restroom. Another lady kindly held the door for me as I quickly threw on my bathing suit top. Usually we would wear our swim suits to a beach, pool or water park, but the bathing suit top would be so uncomfortable for me during a four hour drive.
Aside from the changing issue, we had a ball. The water park is no where to try to snap family photos, so I grabbed a few pictures before putting my phone in the locker. The only thing I didn’t mind being ruined during this trip was my hairdo. There are a couple of really cool slides, a “Hydro Halfpipe” and more, but all we cared about was spending as much time in the wave pool, swimming and relaxing on the lazy river and getting soaked in the Pirate’s Play Village. The park fun can be had in about 2 hours, but we stretched it to four because we were in no rush to leave the water.
We picked the perfect time to go. There were a lot of people there, but the wait for people to give up their tubes for the lazy river was only about 5 minutes before you’d see someone heading to another attraction. In addition, because of the Pirate Ship there were other options if you did not want to wait. My kids had fun horsing around with other children.
PREPARING TO LEAVE: Before we left we decided to take a ride on the kiddie roller coaster. My hair was a mess and our skin was ashy (lol), but I figured it wouldn’t look good anyway after speeding through the air in a giant caterpillar. It wasn’t as “kiddie” as I expected, every time we turned the corner I thought I would fly out because it speeds up and curves, but it was so much fun! My kids were ready to go back into the water park, but we had a long drive so it was time to go!
WHAT I LIKED: We enjoyed everything about the water park attractions. Even my husband was saying he didn’t want to leave. We’re not water slide people, I have a blast just watching others enjoy the drop, but I love swimming and floating in the lazy river and jumping over waves in the wave pool. The pirate ship was also a blast with heavy showers falling on top of us. I went down the kiddie slide a few times and was so tired after a while my husband and I just watched the kids run around. We were there for about four hours and then we had our long ride home.
WHAT I DID NOT LIKE: The condition of the restrooms, changing area(?). It won’t keep us from visiting again, I’ll just change in the car if need be!
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Ronda Writes Disclaimer: This post was created in partnership with Usfamilyguide.com. All opinions are my own.
