Our Trip To Lagoon

FH's employer paid for us to go to Lagoon, a local amusement park. I had several observations about Lagoon that I wanted to blog about.

First, Lagoon is no Disneyland. It's no Magic Mountain either. However, it does cost quite a bit to get in ($32.95 for an adult pass). Not only that, but when you do get in, the gouging doesn't end there. It costs $5 to rent a locker, $5 to rent a flotation device for the waterslide, etc. etc. ad infinitum. If you go to Lagoon, in addition to the entry fee be sure to carry at least $40 in cash for every man, woman, and child you bring with you.

Second, Lagoon (much like California) offered a fashion show of the worst of slutty dressing. And I'm not just talking about the women either. I observed several males who had their swim trunks sagging down below their butt-cheeks (with a pair of boxer shorts thankfully clouding the full moon). The only thing I could observe holding the trunks up was, well, their built-in coat rack. Besides being full of slutty dressers, Lagoon was also heavily populated with plus-size people. The most unfortunate aspect of this was that the two sets of people were not mutually exclusive, and their intersection was actually quite... sizeable.

Third, Lagoon is doing a great public service by hiring teenagers who would otherwise be out on the street futilely attempting to find their own butts with two hands, a flashlight and a topo map. I had to ask three people where the nearest bathroom was before I got an answer that didn't presuppose that I was intimately familiar with the locations of all of Lagoon's landmark rides. As it turned out, the first two were actually directing me to some of the farthest bathrooms, even though they could clearly see that I had a five-year-old doing the potty dance by my side. The third one pointed to a nearby building, and said "It's right over there," and the first two slapped their foreheads.

On the subject of Lagoon's bathrooms, I would add that while the women's rooms were clean, they were miserable for people with small babies. I doubt it would cost much money or effort to install one of those fold-out diaper changing shelves, but sadly that wasn't done. Fortunately there was some counter space I could use for diaper changes (trust me, it's truly miserable when you have to do them on the floor). Unfortunately, some well-meaning soul had installed a motion-sensitive hot air hand dryer above that stretch of countertop, so that every time Bagel waved his arm he got a blast of hot air full in the face, unless I turned him sideways which meant that either his head or his feet had to be in one of the sinks. I had to do two consecutive diaper changes on that same stretch of countertop. Not fun. You'd think that a park that advertises good clean family fun would make some basic accommodations for us family types.

Last, if you have small children, you should never attempt to go to an amusement park. Amusement parks are for teenagers-- people who are old enough to navigate the park by themselves, but young enough be thrilled by the prospect of vomiting up a $10 hamburger. If you attempt to go to an amusement park with small children, you will find that there really is not much you can do. The kids are too short to go on the rides, and too bored if you go on one by yourself. Some crucial piece of gear-- a bottle, a shoe-- will inevitably fall out and get lost. And they will complain and complain about how bored and tired they are, until you take them back to the car, when suddenly they will become enthusiastic about going back in. (Do not take them back in; they will immediately resume being bored and tired.)

UPDATE: Lagoon writes back to me to say there is a pull-down diaper changing shelf in every bathroom. Maybe they've been conned by the diaper-shelf installers, because if there was one, it was totally invisible.