50 Ferncroft Rd, Danvers, MA 01923
The indoor water park is about an hour and a half from Gray, Maine (where we live). The drive is fair and goes by pretty quickly. I’d plan to stay here for most of the day if not all day. We were here for roughly five hours and easily could’ve stayed the last three hours until closing. There are signs leading to the Waterpark and its parking is easy. There is walk to the building no matter where you park. Tickets are $35 dollars for unlimited play or $30 to play between the hours of 3pm and 7pm, which they call their twilight hours. These prices are for 23 months and up, all others are free.
Inside is a breeze. The ticket line is sorted into different groups; online tickets, buy tickets, etc. Service was fast and all we had to do was give them my name (we reserved in advance). They give us each a bracelet and we went in. There are showers and bathrooms to the immediate left. They ask you shower before entering the pools. Lots of lockers are in here too if you find you want to lock your stuff up. I saw most people with their stuff at their seats, including us.
We got there pretty close to opening time so there were plenty of seats and tables to choose from. We sat nearby the toddler are thinking that’s where our kids would spend most of their time (boy were we wrong!). Along the net of this area are life jackets if you didn’t bring your own and they aren’t required but they are suggested.
The toddler area goes from 0 inches to 2 inches, the deepest being near the end of the three slides in this area. A giant blue mushroom spouts six or seven waterfalls. You can run through them or between them to get to the stalk. Another structure are tipping buckets. There’s four of them and they don’t dump much being in the toddler section and all. There three sides, two smaller and connected to each other and a bigger, faster slide. My 17m loved the smaller blue slides. Parents CANNOT ride down with them. So unless you and your child are okay with entering the pool at a fast speed into the 2′ deep water, you’ll want two people to help, one to put your toddler on the slide and the other to catch them. When we first arrived to play here there were a handful of others but by the time we left at 4 it was packed with littles and parents either right there with them or taking a sit on the edge dangling their feet in.
The bigger water area, is BIG. My 4yo didn’t even attempt to go up but I did see kids around her age running around and through it. There were lots of older, preteens and teens here, mostly because of the giant slides. To get to the slides or around this area, you walk through a multitude of sprayers, water cannons and a big dump bucket. I will warn those with small children, the bucket dumps A LOT of water and it can be heavy and hits hard. Hard enough to knock a little one down. There’s a spot where my 17m old stayed for a majority of our time in this area- it was this spout type things that kids could maneuver and let the water flow in different spots. Two small, yellow slides with less than an inch of water at the bottom was popular by the young kids (including mine). These slides he could climb up and go down by himself without having to be caught. There’s a chairs surrounding the perimeter of this area for adults to sit if they aren’t running up the water soaked maze to get to the slides too.
Behind the play sturctures are two pools, one of which was closed at our visit. We had to argue with my 4y to come out and do other things. She quite literally could’ve swam there all day. It is quite crowded as the pool we were in had two basketball hoops. Mostly teens and adults played this, while the young kids just swam around and jumped into the pool. This area is on the dark side but it wasn’t an issue. Near the pools is a hottub, stating only 15 and up allowed in but we saw younger kids in with their parents.
Surrounding the big play sturcture is a lazy river. It is very shallow and slow (as it should be), once around takes maybe two minutes. From what I saw you could go around as many times as you want.
We brought our own food and left it in the car to then come out and eat. Thank god we did because food/drink prices were insanely high. Many people were buying so it must be good but we couldn’t justify $14 for a grilled cheese meal lol. They ask you don’t bring in your own food but if you’re a rebel you easily could’ve brought a few snacks. We really didn’t mind going to the car though.
I think this will be a staple for our family. It was so much fun and we’ll worth the drive and money. There was so much to do and kept everyone’s attention well. There were a few exhibits closed while we were there that I imagine is alot of fun but very busy. One of those exhibits being an outdoor splash pad and small pool. Lounge chairs surrounded it but I bet when it’s open seating is hard. The other exhibit was two tornado slides, which you can see from the outside, I’m not sure where the lead to but they’re BIG and I can only guess you have to be of a certain height/age.
It was busy but not busy enough where seating was impossible to find. If all tables are taken there was a huge area with extra chairs for you to use any where you needed it. We brought our wonderfold wagon, which IYKYK, this thing is huuuuge, and I easily maneuvered around with it when I needed to, otherwise I just left it at our table with our belongings.
I suggest this place for all, newborns to adults. It’s fun for everyone. It is attached to a hotel and they have deals on staying and playing. We originally were gunna do this but changed our mind last minute. However the deals were good and we plan to take advantage of it next time we go. If there was a disadvantage it would be the cost of food but for us it wasn’t a big deal because we brought food in the car and it was nice break from the noise to go out and eat in the car. Other than that, I don’t have much to complain about it suited all three of my kids (4y, 17m and 2m) and looking around everyone else’s too.
little Movers Maine 