The Disney Blizzard

The day we went to Blizzard Beach (there’s a map of the identical California version here), one of two Disney water parks, did not start well. We had bought our tickets in advance, had told the concierge that we needed to visit a water park and were confident that we had the tickets we needed to get in. We were wrong. We strode confidently up to the entrance, put in our tickets and nothing. When we checked, it turned out our tickets couldn’t get us in.

Since we were there already, we decided to stay. My sister went to the long queue, while I tried to find out how much it would cost us to upgrade our tickets. The greeter didn’t know and didn’t want to find out, but I persisted until I was given access to the information window. We quickly found out that the upgrade price, would set us back an extra $10 a ticket (!) than if we just paid admission, so we paid to get in, got our tickets, extracted my sis from the long queue and went in.

Next we needed a locker. You get these from the cash desks in the shop, which is a clever ploy to get you to buy stuff you probably don’t need. We managed to get out of there with just the key to a large locker, having paid the $10 deposit. Off we went to change and then cram our stuff into the locker. We should have gone for two, since the term ‘large’ was somewhat misleading. With a bit of pushing and shoving, we got everything in and set off to do something to salvage the day.

We picked an attraction with a 30 minute wait time – Teamboat Springs. Of course, the wait extended while we were in the queue, but at least we felt like we were getting somewhere. As we got near the top, someone sprayed us with water. It was truly refreshing and we started to feel better. Of course, the top was not the end of the queue – it turned out there was another mile of snaking line to go before we could get into a family sized raft, grip our daughter’s hand tightly and swish around the water slide. It was a blast! We swirled around, getting sprayed and all of us wanted to do it again as soon as it was over. We decided to save that for later and headed for a child friendly activity – Tikes Peak.

This was one for the little ones, with mini water slides, some floating icebergs and some jets of icy water which were as much fun for the adults as the children. My sis opted to stay there with my daughter, while hubby and I headed for another attraction. The chair lift was out all day while we were there and the biggest ride, Summit Plummet, posted a 90 minute wait time. Instead we headed for Runoff Rapids.

This involved picking up an inner tube (tip: go for the double ones as the line is usually shorter) and hiking up the steps to the top of a water slide before swooshing down with no control whatsoever. It was so much fun that we did it again since no one was waiting for our tube. Then we decided that we couldn’t face the steps again and headed back to Tikes Peak to pick everyone up for lunch – another Macdonalds type fat fest.

That delight over, it was off to the Lazy River which circles the whole place. We made a couple of circuits, getting sprayed by icy water at intervals. It was very relaxing. Then hubby took my daughter back to Tikes Peak, while sis and I did the Runoff Rapids. We all made a foray to the wave pool, which was very wavy with a rather uncomfortable surface underfoot. Then we changed places and hubby and I did the Toboggan Racer, an exhilarating downhill slide. Finally, it was back to Teamboat Springs for our final ride of the day.

Despite an inauspicious start, Blizzard Beach gets the thumbs up from me. The snow theme was very well done, though my daughter was disappointed that the snow wasn’t real. There was plenty to do for all ages, and I’d love to go back.