AQUATICA - Since the much-awaited opening of Aquatica, Sea World’s new water park, we have been receiving a bit of a mixed bag in terms of reviews from guests.
Many guests have experienced disappointment in that they have turned up not long after the gates opened, joined a long line and then been turned away as the park’s capacity had been reached. This suggests that guest capacity is quite modest and that, certainly during peak season, people will need to arrive well before the gates open to be assured of entry.
Once inside, most people have praised the park for its general design, cleanliness, overall style and not unreasonable wait times for the rides. Equally however, most have expressed a feeling of being slightly under whelmed by the overall experience and considered the “star” rides to be a little disappointing.
Maybe the expectation levels here are now too high when a new attraction opens. Maybe Aquatica is a little missing in certain areas. Maybe there is a lot of individual subjectivity in the views that have been expressed. Whatever it may be, it seems clear that Aquatica is not going to overnight going assume the mantle of being THE water park to visit, more it is just another alternative to the well-established Typhoon Lagoon, Blizzard Beach and Wet ‘n’ Wild.
BUSCH GARDENS – A large (4-acre) area to the rear of the park has been redeveloped over the past 2 years and now goes under the name of Jungala.
Jungala is probably best described as an adventure playground – with a difference. Here your playmates are the animals and your playground is their playground.
On a more sedate level you can observe orang-utans in their natural habitat from tree-top observation platforms, mingle with gibbons and flying foxes up in the Kula Canopy, learn all about the tiger’s fight for survival in Tiger Lodge and also get close-up with the tigers themselves on Tiger Trail, including watching them play in the water from an underwater viewing gallery.
For the more adventurous and the thrill-seeker, Jungle Flyers is a zip-wire line with three different flight patterns above the tree tops and Wild Surge shoots you up four storeys high out of the top of a waterfall and then straight back down into the crater below.
If the kids have got too much energy left over, there is also Tree Top Trails, a three-storey high climbing area that takes you up and through the tree-tops on rope bridges, climbing nets, crawl-tubes, slides and a multi-level maze – oh and there is also the ubiquitous chance to get wet with bursts of water that shoot up from the ground.
