Surf’s Up

Todd and I are water park junkies. We are so addicted that we actually re-routed our honeymoon so that we could check out the biggest water park in the world—Schlitterbahn, located just outside of San Antonio, Texas. Then we hit Schlitterbahn’s sister park in South Padre Island, Texas later that week as well.

When we found out that Six Flags built an indoor water park in upstate New York, we knew we had to check it out. The weekend before Christmas we rounded up his parents, his sister and our nephew and headed to Queensbury, New York where the Six Flags Great Escape Lodge is located. It’s a hotel and a water park all rolled up in one. We checked in on Friday night, and hit the rides after dinner, then spent the entire day splashing around on Saturday. There is a gigantic hot tub, a lazy river, and a half dozen or so slides of assorted size and speed. Bliss!

I was reading the brochures in the room before we made our way down to the slides on Friday night. I read the part about surfing lessons on the boogie board continuous wave ride, and made for the gift shop to sign Todd and I up.

On Saturday morning they closed the ride for an hour, and we were the only ones taking the surfing class. We learned how to stand on the board, how to move it back and forth across the wave, and how to fall down and feel the strength of the wave force us to the back wall of the ride. The instructor stood on the side of the wave and let us hold on to him as we edged into the wave then let go and surfed.

I managed to stay on for several minutes at a time, and even learned how to shift my weight back and forth on the board to maneuver it back and forth across the wave. I fell down many many times, I suffered a mild case of whip lash as well. But it was so worth the extra money, the exhaustion in my legs, and my inability to turn my head to see anything on either side of me.

Here’s a picture of me, surfing:

The T-shirt is not exactly flattering. But the instructor warned me that the power of the wave might blow my bikini off. Considering the alternative, I opted for the T-shirt.