Guest Safety at Castaway Bay vs. Kalahari

I just got back from a summer vacation which involved a stop in the Wisconsin Dells and a stay at the Kalahari resort. While I was there, I observed what I think was a seemingly indifferent attitude toward guest safety as demonstrated by the Kalahari lifeguarding staff which I don't think I've ever observed at either Soak City or Castaway Bay. I'll just provide a few examples...

-- Not once did I notice an employee check a child's height before he or she went on any of the slides with a height requirement. At one point, while I was waiting for my turn to slide, a parent approached the employee standing nearest to me and asked, "Can you tell me if my child is tall enough for this?" The employee shrugged and glanced around, then said, "Well... we *used* to have something to measure kids up here, don't know where it is now... He, um, looks okay, I guess." The employee then turned away from the guest without any further comment or assistance. The parent wasn't convinced and went back down the stairs, I'm assuming to find someone else. At another time, I watched an employee let a parent on the water roller coaster with a child who couldn't be much older than two. The child wasn't even holding on to the roller coaster tube by himself -- the parent held him around the waist, which meant she wasn't holding on to the tube, either. It seemed a questionable arrangement at best.

-- Not enough employees, in my opinion, were available to watch guests in either the wave pool or at the tops of many of the slides. Only one employee was watching the wave pool, and at the top of an area with four separate slides, only one employee was watching that area. She was stationed near only one of the slides, and she stayed there the whole time, focused only on the guests that wanted to go on that particular slide. When her back was turned, three teenage boys quickly jumped into another slide at the same time. When they got to the bottom, an employee chastised them for sliding together; however, the whole situation could have been avoided had there been enough employees at the top of the slide.

Now, I'm not posting to "rip on" Kalahari. Overall, I had a great time and enjoyed many aspects of the water park -- the great theming, the quality facilities, and the pleasant and attentive servers in the restaurants we dined at. Despite this, though, I couldn't help but wonder at what I had observed at the waterpark -- if someone's kid gets hurt because of a lack of enforced safety regulations, the parents aren't going to be positive about their vacation experience there. Because of their attention to everything, including guest safety, Castaway Bay is still #1 for me.

Has anyone else who has stayed at a Kalahari resort noticed anything like this? Opinions? Thoughts?

I have never been there but have been to Cataway Bay. Saftey was excessive (and appreciated).

MrScott

Lisa

Slightly off-topic . . . but a week or so ago, Luke and I went to Michigan's Adventure and noticed a similiar problem in their waterpark.

They have three different wave pools, and each time I noticed that the lifeguards rarely looked at the pool -- they sat in chairs, and when the waves came on, they stood up and then seemed to have some interest.

I remember at Soak City how the lifeguards had to "rove," walking and looking at the water in a strict pattern to ensure no one was in need of help.

Like you said, just one accident is all it takes!

Cedar Fair uses Ellis training which is largely regarded as the best of the best. Don't know if Kalahari does the same but based on your explanations it doesn't sound like it.

Disney also uses Ellis.

The times that I have been at all 3 parks mentioned, the safety seemed excessive and I certainly didn't have a problem with that. I didn't notice any differece from park to park.

Head to a Lake Michigan beach, where several people drown a year and lifegaurds are in lesser numbers at the public beaches and hardly seen at along most of the coastline.

Waterparks are safer than the Big Lake, though I'm sure not equal to each other.

MrScott

My cousin got back from Kalahari a couple weeks ago and said a section of the water coaster was taken out. The ride was closed of course.

Not surprised as people said the Kalahari water coaster (not a Master Blaster product) was very painfully rough in places.

That surprises me, as I rode the zip coaster shortly after it opened at Kalahari, and the ride was decently smooth. The major problem with the ride was that boats were constantly getting stuck at odd points throughout the ride, which required a lifeguard to push the boat to an evacuation point and then drag it through the rest of the course once the riders had disembarked. At the height of this day, one in three boats got stuck on the ride. There appeared to be a representative from Whitewater supervising the ride and taking down data from the PLC display during that day. If I had to guess, I'm thinking that they'd be fixing an area of the flume near the first turnaround, as that area was especially susceptible to boat stalls.

I can't speak for the Kalahari at Wisconsin Dells, but we just stayed two nights at the Kalahari in Sandusky and thought their lifeguards and employees in general appeared to be very safety concious. After walking over the entrance bridge and entering the unloading area I took a spill (my clumsiness!) and had a concerned employee at my side in a second! There is no wave pool at Sandusky, Kalahai that we saw. Loved the overall experience--unfortunately, won't go back until they stop having the 'photo ops' with the baby tigers. That is a safety issue---but all lifeguards we saw were very attentive to those in the water.

Ok. I was watching the Travel Channel today. At SFMM they said MM had a 300ft tall water slide named Venom Drop. MM does have a 75ft tall slide named Venom Drop. I think it is sad that they say false stuff about rides. They were off 225ft. That is a huge difference. They never even mentioned Soak City.

It's impossible for the Travel Channel to hit up every single water park in the country. Aside from having Cedar Point as a sister, Soak City really is an average water park; there is nothing that makes it stand out from the rest. With that being said, the shows normally seem to focus on parks that have added something recently, and Hurricane Harbor did build a Tornado slide.