Monday, April 14, 2014

Review of Rapids Water Park (March 18, 2014)

To start my week long break in Florida, I made a 50 minute drive north from Miami to Riviera Beach, Florida (near West Palm Beach) to visit Rapids Water Park. Later within the week was a 3-day Disney Dream Cruise out of Port Canaveral which ported in Nassau, Bahamas, and Castaway Cay island. We'll get to that cruise in a later report.

The first thing to note about Rapids is that it is huge! The water park has a whopping collection of 13 different ProSlide brand water slides (some with multiple flumes/lanes, which would count as 35 altogether!) within a 30-acre property. The majority of water slides are very thrilling, but the collection ranges from wild for the thrill seekers, to mild for those who can't or choose not to experience the more thrilling slides.

Due to personal complications, my day started later than I had originally planned, so I only had roughly 3 1/2 hours to experience as much of the water park as I could. Luckily the late start would not prove to be a major issue, because the water park's first operating day of the season was only three days before my visit! So one of the biggest advantages of visiting on this day, March 18th, was that the water park was nearly vacant; aside from the few groups enjoying the park, and the lifeguards and staff that were present. Most lines for the slides were practically walk-ons, which allowed me plenty of time to ride the slides I could and photograph the park!

After entering and getting settled near the park's wave pool to stash my stuff, I started making my way around the edge of the park to the first ride.

Tuesday, April 1, 2014

A Florida-Bound Spring Break!


About two weeks ago (from when this is written), I had my spring break in Florida and dedicated it to knocking out 2 water parks and a cruise! The week started off when I paid a visit to Rapids Water Park near West Palm Beach, Florida on March 18th. The day after was spent relaxing with family and preparing for the cruise, which was on the next day when we drove 2 hours North out of Miami to Port Canaveral, to board the Disney Dream ship for a 3-day cruise to Nassau Bahamas and Disney's Castaway Cay private island. At Nassau, we did get off the ship for the Aquaventure water park at Atlantis Paradise Resort!

Because the Disney Cruise ended the day before my classes started back up, I've been having a little bit of trouble trying to get all pictures, videos, and reviews out as fast as I wish. So far, pages for all three places (Disney Dream, Rapids, and Atlantis Nassau) have been made and published to the Water Slide Database website, and all photographs have been uploaded tot he website and Flickr page. The first video of the whole trip, the Aquaduck POV, has been published as well. All that's left is to edit and publish two more videos, and finally pump out the reviews for each place.

To keep current with progress on these, you can follow Water Slide Database on Twitter (@WaterSlideDB), "Like" on Facebook, or Subscribe on YouTube. You can also find us on Google+ if that's your kind of thing!

-Marcus