Calypso

In Greek mythology, Calypso was a nymph who lured Odysseus to her island and kept him and his crew imprisoned for years. It’s an apt name for the kidstravaganza that opened up just 35 km from our house this summer — Calypso Water Park. It certainly lured and captured Sam. The hype around this 100 acre, 50 million dollar park (Canada’s largest) has been building in these parts for more than two years, so we knew it would be ridiculous to try to get anywhere near it during summer vacation. That’s why we didn’t wait until summer vacation.

On June 28, the last Monday of the school year, we pulled Sam and Carter out for the day and made our way to Limoges. We weren’t the only geniuses in line (about 40 school busses were in the lot), but we learned later that this pre-season visit was definitely the way to go. The first day the temps topped 30 degrees; there was a 4 km-long line-up of cars trying to jam into Calypso’s parking lot! On the contrary, we all enjoyed a balmy 23 degrees and a parking spot that was 50 steps from the entrance.

The first thing the boys discovered was Calypso Palace, the 52,000 square foot wave pool. Here’s the blurb from the website: “You wanted a wave pool to eclipse all others; we’ve got it. We’ve captured over an acre of ocean and set it free in our park. With several different types of waves, and easily accommodating 2,000 of your friends, Calypso Palace wave pool is where people gather to have fun.” Yup. That’s right. 2000 of your friends. Thankfully, there were only several hundred people in with the boys! The waves start slow and build in force until they’re throwing Sam 20 feet back at a time. Loved it!

Next up was the Turbo Lab, a series of tunnel water slides. Sam wasn’t tall enough for two of the four routes down, but he could ride the Steamer with me in a tandem inner tube. The slow climb up the stairs dwarfed by high school students didn’t do anything to boost his confidence (I saw very few kids smaller than Sam on the rides), and when his wee butt slipped through the inner tube hole before he could reach forward for the handles at the top of the ride, it was game over. Not this time. We wiggled our way down the entrance stairway and headed for a ride with a flat bottom tube—Canyon Rafting!

This was Sam’s slide. A 500-metre elevated river ride which swings a big 6-seater raft up the walls to the tipping on its way to splashdown. It was a hoot! We rode it twice—the second time with a foursome of teens whom Sammy was not shy about hooting and hollering in front of—even advising that they "hold on! hold on!" as we ripped around the last corner.

From there, we headed for Jungle Run, a river ride whose current pushes swimmers through a ‘rainforest’ adventure of much soaking. Then we stopped briefly at the Pirate’s Aquaplay climber and circled back for a picnic. Carter and Tracey went on some of the big rides, like Fast Track, Adrenaline, and Zoomerang (Sam’s a few inches shy of having to consider summoning his inner daredevil), but most of the afternoon was spent answering Calypso’s call at the Palace, anticipating the conch shell song that starts the big waves rolling.

The boys came away exhausted and happy; and the moms came away patting themselves on the back (ouch! sunburn!) for having kicked off the summer season off with a bang. Or a splash :)