I'll preface this by saying this is a really fun p...

I'll preface this by saying this is a really fun place to visit. However, we noticed quite a few major flaws. First, as Camelbeach season pass holders, one of the "perks" is the opportunity to visit Aquatopia for a day for $19.99 instead of paying for a lodge stay.

Well, we called to find out about when we could use this perk and we were told "We're open 10 to 10 every day -you can use it any day except for a weekend. Okay, so we went to go last Thursday and called that morning and we were told "Sorry, we are closed today for cleaning". There was nothing at all on the facebook page; nothing on the website ANYWHERE about a black out date! Good thing we didn't drive all the way there!

So we finally got there today. It was quite crowded which would have been fine, except that early afternoon, two major rides "broke down". The "water stopped" . The attendants didn't have any other information - since this was the water coaster and Venus Fly Trap, the most popular rides, this was a major bummer! This made the other slides all the more crowded, but the lines were not terrible. In our years going go Camel beach all summer, we have never seen multiple rides just "go down" at once. And we have never, ever seen one of their major slides, let alone two, go down for the entire day. It's just never happened.

The other situation that really surprised me was the lack of life guards. There were slides that were all but "self serve" where there was no attendant at the top monitoring when people were going. This was really surprising, as Camel beach is very well staffed. But the worst, was the lack of lifeguard supervision in the river. The river is not a "lazy river" like Camel beach, but rather has a fairly fast current. At Camel Beach you MUST be in a tube. If you are not, the guards will ask you to get one. Not so in this river. It twists and turns through dark tunnels and many MANY young children were swimming in the current with no tubes at all, anywhere in sight. And no parents. This might be okay if there were lifeguards, but there were long stretches where the water was not visible to the lifeguard stations. A young child can drown in the shallow end of a swimming pool; how much easier in a dimly lit tunnel full of inner tubes and a fast current? Compared to Camel Beach, safety was really lax at this facility, which is surprising since it is all part of the same facility.

That being said, this is a great place to visit for families. It's very similar to Great Wolf, but I think a little better for older children. If the two best rides had not been broken down, we would have rated it above Great Wolf. But since we were only there on a day pass (we still spent $80 to get our family in), to have the two best rides down for the entire day (the staff said they would be broken until tomorrow) was really a bummer.