My Brush With the Wave Pool of Death

Ah, the wave pool at Seven Peaks. What kid doesn’t get excited at the thought of being jostled around in manufactured waves while being pummeled by tubes, thrashing arms and other flailing body parts? 

Being the bright young teenager that I was, I assumed that I could just walk out into the middle of the crowded wave pool without a life jacket while the water was calm and simply jump effortlessly over the waves when they turned on. After all, I could swim a mean doggy paddle, so that should be enough to keep me afloat, right? 

Apparently there is a reason most teenagers aren’t given the opportunity to make life or death decisions. They are kind of bad at it.

I sauntered out to the middle of the wave pool, until the water started to get uncomfortably high, then I stopped and waited for the waves to come. At first it was thrilling and really fun. I jumped each time a wave approached me, and I seemed to float right on top of it. Then, the waves started to get bigger, and they began to go in conflicting directions. I found myself being knocked about by water swells that were less than gentle. Even worse, I started to get pummeled by the tubes of all the swimmers who were smart enough to take drown-prevention devices with them into the wave pool.

It didn’t take long for me to panic as I kept getting shoved beneath the waves by the inner tubes of smiling, oblivious people. I found it harder and harder to keep my head above water long enough to take in a frantic breath. Finally, in an act of pure desperation, I grabbed hold of two legs that were hanging over the side of an inner tube like dangling life preservers, and tried my best to scramble up them to safety. 

It is unfortunate that the frail old man who was sitting in that tube was very thin and lightweight. It is doubly unfortunate that at the time I grabbed onto his legs, he was already tilted slightly downward from a wave that was passing beneath him.

For a very brief moment, I looked into his startled eyes as he tilted up into the air and his tube flipped over – leaving him face-down in the water before he regained his composure and swam up through the middle. I think I may have tried to commandeer his tube out of sheer self-preservation, but failed. 

Thankfully, the waves slowly came to a stop and I was able to splutter and sob my way out of the wave pool. I never looked back at that old man, so I have no idea what his reaction was to my failed attempt at drowning him and taking over his tube. 

I haven’t been back in a wave pool since that day, and quite frankly, I’m curious to give it a try again. Maybe I’ll go this summer… with an inner tube, of course.