With the weather warming up in Florida and cast members handing out free water (picture courtesy of the Touring Plans twitter feed):

What can guests do to cool off if they don’t want be in the parks and hit up the “Cool Attractions: https://dadfordisney.com/2014/05/09/cool-attractions-at-walt-disney-world/”

Disney has two water parks, Typhoon Lagoon and Blizzard Beach, where guests can go and cool off.  These water parks are not included in the standard park ticket unless guests choose the “Water Parks and More” option when purchasing their tickets.  One-day, one-park tickets can be purchased as well.  Tickets cost $53 for ages 10 and up and $45 for ages 3-9.

What do you get at these parks?

Each park has a very similar set-up which fit into the theme of the park.  Typhoon Lagoon’s theme is storm-ravaged tropical bay and Blizzard Beach has a “melting” ski resort theme.  There are three attraction areas in each park.

Typhoon Lagoon has a shark reef area which has two saltwater reefs where guests can snorkel through stingrays, sharks, and tropical fish.  This is included in the park admission.

The marquee attraction at Blizzard Beach is the Summit Plummet which features a 120-foot drop where guests can reach speeds approaching 60 miles per hour.

Starting with Typhoon Lagoon, there are three main areas of the water park: Mount Mayday, Hideaway Bay, and Typhoon Lagoon.

The largest of the three sections is Typhoon Lagoon which houses the surf pool which shoots out six-foot high waves every 90 seconds.  The rest of the area is zero-entry and has low, gentle curving slides for smaller children.

There is also a surf school where guests can take a 2.5 hour surf lesson before the park opens in the morning.  There is an additional charge to attend the school.

The area with the most attractions is Mount Mayday where five attractions are located.  The only attraction with a height restriction is Humunga Kowabunga which is a “speed flume” ride and the height restriction is guest must be 48 inches tall.  There are two tube flume rides: Mayday Falls and Keelhaul Falls.  Also, the area has a family raft rides which can accommodate four guests in an inner-tube.  Lastly, there is Storm Slides attractions which is a long water slide with a 30-foot drop from top to bottom.

The final area is Hideaway Bay which features two attractions.  Sandy White Beach which is a wading area next to the area’s other attraction, the Crush n’ Gusher water coaster.

Winding through the entire park is 2,100-foot Castaway Creek “lazy river” attraction.

Leaning Palms is the primary counter service restaurant in Typhoon Lagoon and it does take the Disney Dining Plan.  And there are bars and snack stands throughout the park.

Moving to the second Disney water park:

The “melting” ski resort Blizzard Beach.  It has three “slopes” or attraction areas: Green Slope, Purple Slope, and Red Slope.

The Red Slope is where the main pool is located.  Melt-Away Bay is a wave pool located at the base of Mount Gushmore.  There is an area for smaller children featuring scaled down versions of the attractions within Blizzard Beach.  Also, there is a ski resort style chair lift to take guests from the base of the mountain to the top.  The top of the mountain is where the entry point for many of the attractions is located so it can save guests a walk up a lot of steps.

Green Slope is highlighted by the Summit Plummet which I discussed earlier.  There are also two other attractions: Teamboat Springs Ride where as many as six guests can share an inner tube and go down the 1,400-foot long slide and the Slush Gusher, a slide attraction which takes guests up to 35 miles per hour down the 250-foot course.

The Purple Slope has three attractions where guests can race each other down the slides.  All three attractions are slide attractions which only require a mat not an inner tube.  The first is the Downhill Double Dipper which simulates the start of a skiing downhill race complete with audio to start each race.  At the bottom, each racers can turn and look at their time to determine who actually won.  The second attraction is the Snow Stormers which gives riders the experience of being a slalom race on a slide with lots of hairpin turns.  The last attraction is the Toboggan Racers where as many as eight guests can go down at the same time.  It can best be described as the a water park version of the tall slides at a county/state fair.

The 3,000-foot long Cross Country Creek lazy river winds through the entire Blizzard Beach Park.

Like Typhoon Lagoon, there is a counter-service restaurant (Avalunch) which takes the Disney Dining Plan along with bars and snack stands through the park.

Also, sometimes during the summer, Goofy makes appearances in the park:

 

I have gone with my family to Blizzard Beach but not to Typhoon Lagoon.  My daughter and I rode on every attraction except for Summit Plummet and the Downhill Double Dipper while my wife did many laps on the lazy river.  All of us had a great time and it was a great getaway from the parks and the resort pools and gave us a chance to do something different.  It is something that we are going to make part of every Disney vacation….probably not.  But it is definitely worth the change of pace.

The two parks are operational every day during the spring, summer, and early fall months.  Later in the fall and in the winter, Disney takes one of the parks out of service for refurbishment while the other park remains in service.  Once the refurbishment is complete, it reopens and the other park goes dark for its annual refurbishment.

I’ve started collaborating with a friend of mine, Kim Jordan, who is a travel agent with Magic of Mickey Travel.  If you ever need a person to help you plan your Disney vacation, she is an excellent resource and would be more than welcome help you plan the vacation.  Her contact information can be found on her Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/KimJordanMagicOfMickeyTravel

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