Roaring Springs
The grotto pool in Roaring Springs
Roaring Springs was set in a heavily wooded area. While the other sections were clear of trees for the most part, this section had seemingly every tree intact. The first thing you would see after walking down a winding path were the “roller slides.” I don’t remember their real name but they were these 3 slides that had steel rollers as a sliding surface. First you had to tote this heavy plastic sled to the top of the platform which sucked since they weighed like 20 to 30 pounds. At the top, the ride op would position the sled on a pivoting platform; the rider would then climb onto the sled and get ready to drop. The ride op would push a lever that would tilt the platform and the sled would rocket down a very steep drop which must have been pitched at like 70 degrees. The slide then leveled out before abruptly ending in a shallow pool where the sled would skip over the surface of the water for quite a length before stopping. It was a very dangerous slide if I say so myself, but kind of fun at the same time!
If you continue past the “roller slides,” the blacktop path will eventually end and turn into a large area of semi-smooth tan rock. Aqua Socks are a requirement for this section of park; if you don’t have them your feet will be bruised and banged up from all the steps and dips scattered throughout the area. The rock y landscape marks the main area of Roaring Springs, a large rock face grotto.
Jumping off the Cliff Dive
The grotto has two sides separated by a long, narrow rock island with trees and bushes covering its top. To the right is a semi-shallow pool area, to the left is a blocked off section that becomes vastly deeper and contains a few horrifying attractions. The water in this grotto and everywhere in this area is very, very cold; almost too cold to swim in. On the far end of the grotto is the exit of the Rogue River body slide. Riders will periodically shoot out of the tunnel into innocent bystanders which was sort of funny.
The left side of the grotto is where the “Air Slide” and “Cliff Dives” reside. The Air Slide was a very simple waterslide; it started out maybe 25 feet above the grotto on a rock faced cliff. You simply slide down a wide 15 or so foot slide and then fall about 15 feet into the water. The Cliff Dives are even more simplistic, you walk out onto a ledge and jump! There were two cliff dives, one was maybe 15 feet and the other was about 20 feet. The water below these attractions is cold and about 20-25 feet deep. Unlike most of the deep pools, the bottom was a lighter color so you could actually see the bottom. According to Tom Fergus’ write in to Weird NJ, this was in response to an incident when someone jumped off the Cliff Dive and could not swim. “After that, they painted the pool white so they could see bodies lying on the bottom.”
If you go to the right of the grotto, you’ll see the line for two of the three river rides at Action Park ; Thunder Run and The Gauley. The Gauley is for single tubes and Thunder Run is for double tubes. Both are fairly long river rides that wind riders down the side of the mountain. Thunder Run is pretty straightforward with many turns, tunnels, bumps and drops. Double tubes aren’t as versatile as single tubes so the course needs to be a bit more structured. It’s really well made, and almost looks like a natural downhill river feature…even though it’s obviously not.
The first set of turns on Gauley
The Gauley on the other hand is a free for all single tube bedlam, and my second favorite ride in the park. The very beginning of the ride is very intense for a tube slide, and of course the queue line surrounds this section so everyone gets a clear view of riders being thrown off their tubes. Basically the beginning of the river is a long, steeply pitched S shaped curve. Once out of the start pool, you race down a hill into the first curve where your tube slams into a curved wall. You slide down the wall right into the second curve which turns maybe 120 degrees before dumping riders into a small pool. You’d be hard pressed not to see at least one rider loose their tube in this first section.
The pool is like a break, you float around it until you slide down a small hill into another pool. Sometimes your tube will flip over when you slam into the next pool but the tube easily retrievable here. After the second pool is a large turn where your tube speeds up greatly. The turn gets progressively tighter until you enter a tunnel that makes a steep curve and then spits you out under a waterfall and into the lower portion of the main rock grotto. I lost my tube in the turn before the tunnel once, and had to slide down the tunnel on my back. It sucked because the tunnel is grooved and not meant to be used as a body slide by any means.
Going into the tunnel on Gauley
Colorado River Ride
The real draw of Roaring Springs was the Colorado River Ride, a long river ride into the backwoods of the park. The river is tucked into the back and is a bit tough to find. Back in the Action Park days, you would first wait in a line to get your humongous, forest green colored, circular rubber raft and then you were forced to drag it all the way to the top of the hill. The thing weighed like 50 damn pounds and was unwieldy as hell. The path you rolled or dragged it up was uneven and many people would loose grip of their rafts; the rouge raft would then tumble down the hill into a wooded area, leaving those people to fish it out of the thorns and brush.
Once you got your raft to the top, you had to then wait in a line to actually put it into the start pool. The person in the water would hold the raft while riders piled into the raft at which point the raft would flood with ice cold water. Out of the start pool, the raft would travel down a small hill, under a bridge, and then around a corner at which point you would be out of the view of the queue line. Next there are a few turns, small drops, and sudden bumps which would toss more ice cold water into the raft.
Eventually the riders would come to a fork; to the left was a rocky cave with two heavy duty sprayers manning the entrance and straight ahead was a corner followed by an unknown portion of river. 99% of the time, the raft would slide into the tunnel despite the fact that there was nothing keeping you from going straight. What was around the corner you ask? I have no idea, I have never been down that path…it remains a mystery to many. Upon entering the cave riders are sprayed directly in the face by the sprayers.
The cave/tunnel itself really does look like a natural cave feature…again it’s obviously not; if it was real, who needs Action Park when you could just look for more features like it in other hills! Anyway, the cave is dark and humid with quite a few turns and bumps that throw the raft around. The raft picked up a huge amount of speed here as well and upon exiting the cave, the raft slammed into a curved wall that damn near flipped it. The raft would then slide into a small pool that seemed like it was in the middle of nowhere; this is also where the second path reconnected. While my raft was floating around the rock pool once, I saw a tube full of people stuck near the exit of the second path. As they saw our raft they began to yell “help! We’re stuck!” I guess they paid the price for going down the other path!
It sometimes took a bit of time for the raft to find its way out of this pool, but eventually it would float out and down a hill into the final stretch of the river. One could see the end pool by now, but in front of it was a long stretch filled with bumps, moguls, and some small obstructions. The raft picks up speed very quickly here and tends to slam into bumps hard enough to throw the raft off course or into the wall of the trough. As the rivers last hurrah, the raft rocketed over a small drop were the raft momentarily caught air before slamming back down to surface. Finally, the raft ploughs into the large splash pool which seems to sit on the edge of the mountain. The pool is a little deeper than expected and many a rider would leap out of the raft and slip completely underwater.
The Colorado River Ride is one of the few attractions that still has that Action Park life in it. At one point Action Park’s new owners switched the rafts out with dingies…which sucked. The dingies didn’t send you up walls or fly over bumps nearly as well as the old rafts. They didn’t last long however and were replaced by smaller and lighter versions of the multi-person circular rafts. Today you’ll still get a completely out of control ride on the Colorado River Ride. The sprayers guarding the entrance to the cave are gone, luckily, and a couple of other things are cleaned up; but other than that it’s the same old rough and tumble ride that it always was. The versions that start high in the air can’t compare to this terrain hugging beast!
Motorworld
On the opposite side of the park, across the highway, is Motorworld. To get there you needed to ride these weird single seat monorail cars which brought you over a bridge and to the Motorworld section. I never did anything in Motorworld but I do know some stories. First off, this section was filled with go-karts, tank tag, and speed boats. The Go-karts are hardly the kind that you see at any normal theme park though, these are practically real cars. They had these fast mini NASCAR looking cars that could go at like 20 to 30 mph, and then they had LOLA cars (small, dangerous looking Indy cars) which went a bit faster. According the Issue 24 of Weird NJ, ride ops knew how to override the throttle regulators with tennis balls, and would race around at like 50 or 60 mph in the cars!
The Tank Tag was this large caged arena where people could pay some money to ride in a small, tennis ball cannon equipped tank around the caged arena while people could pay a couple of bucks to shoot tennis balls at the tank via cannons set up around the arena. When a tank would stall, the ride op would need to scramble out to fix the tank while patrons happily shot him with the tennis balls. Lastly, Motorworld had speedboats which raced around a swampy area. The swamp was infested with water snakes apparently and when a person would capsize, the lifeguard would have to fight off the snakes while rescuing the person. (Most of this was written about in Issue 24 of Weird NJ.)
I’ll always remember the Action Park commercial which featured some guy speeding along in a LOLA car. He seemed to be going extremely fast and I now realize that he was probably using the tennis ball trick.
The two screenshots were taken from this video by darklighter5000. The video also features Action Park’s Bungee Jump and Slingshot, it’s definately worth a look!
Action Park Today
In 1996, Action Park closed its doors. The company that owned the park and ski area had been in trouble with the law for various money related indecencies which resulted in the closing; plus the fact that Action Park was a deathtrap probably didn’t help either. Though, Intrawest bought the resort and turned the ski resort and waterpark into Mountain Creek.
Mountain Creek during the winter is a ski resort, and in summer is…surprise, surprise…a waterpark! Not much changed to Action Park really, though it is MUCH safer and more family oriented. Many of the more sinister attractions were taken down such as the Alpine Slide, roller slides, the Cannonball Loop, the bungee rides and all of Motorworld as well as some lesser known slides.
However, even after the acquisition by Intrawest, many of the best slides and attractions still exist with improvements. You now do not have to lug a huge tube uphill to ride the Colorado River Ride as now a modified ski lift does the work for you. The two slides that flanked Geronimo Falls (now called H2 Uh-Oh) are gone, replaced by two enclosed slides (one is called Vortex and the other is called Vertigo…I think.) It also looks like the original Geronimo slide has been modified as well, along with the second one being taken off altogether.
I’ll give Mountain Creek credit for adding the “High Anxiety” slide though, which seems like something Action Park would have loved to see in its heyday. High Anxiety is basically a 4 person per tube slide (they also have odd looking two person tubes) in which you slide down an enclosed drop which dumps you into a massive funnel-like structure that lies on its side. The passenger tube is then shot up the walls of the funnel using it’s own momentum until it slides out the other end. It definitely looks more like a torture device rather than a waterslide. But it’s fun!
Mountain Creek is a good park today, a bit mismanaged according to some, but it’s still a bunch fun. Of course, Mountain Creek isn’t a park that you can come back from and proudly proclaim “you should have seen THIS place” anymore. Going to Mountain Creek today will not merit you an award for tempting death and living. Nope, today Mountain Creek is simply one of the more scenic waterparks in the country with many unique slides and attractions.
Lynx
Back to Observations
If you have an Action Park story to share or just want to comment on the article then by all means, drop a comment below!
“Most people would never make it out of the building due to their inexperience. However, sometimes you would see some hotshot rise up from the structure and hover 15 or 20 feet above the building. I doubt that thing made much money for its size and probably it’s cost, but it was interesting”
I went on it in 1995 or 1996 and I know I got back change from my ten dollars, I want to say it was only like 7 or 8 dollars extra to do it.
I got massive street cred with my friends for doing it. I fianlly went sky diving a few years ago and actually, I was in more fear for my life at Traction Park then I was when I did the real thing lol.
I beleive doing the Aerodium garners some sort of post Action Park internet cred as well. lol Few can say that they have done one of Action Park’s three most infamous attractions: Cannonball Loop, Aerodium, and their bungee jumping. And I guess to some extent the ‘expert’ run of Alpine Ski Slide.
I guess I could see how the faux skydiving could be scarier, at least at Action Park. There’s just something about Action Park’s lax safety coupled with a giant whirling fan that might cause for alarm. Haha
Thanks for dropping by!
I remember this place, the roller slide was called the Aqua Scoot! I loved that thing. I personally never got injured in my multiple visits between 87 and 91, but I remember those guys with their shirts off and a nice Alpine Slide burn. Those looked like they hurt. This was a great stroll down memory lane, I look forward to going back someday. I am in the midwest now and hating it
Aqua Scoot! That name does ring a bell now that you mention it! I actually remember many waterparks having those types at slides at one time.
Wow.. I thought I forgot about Action Park for good..
I had worked there for 7 years both seasons..
For the first few years I worked Food and Beverage, then ride attendant, Then finally once I was old enough and they had an opening I was allowed to work as a mechanic in motor world.. I rememebr breaking in the Lolas after they got new engines.. all we did was drive them up into water world and back down over and over again to break them in..
I remember the battle action tanks mechanics shop had some prototype or homebrew air cannon that would shoot a tennis ball from the tank cage well up past 94.. I wonder what happened to it. if anyone knows the make or has plans drop me a line.
I spent most of my time on the dock at the super speed boats, I remember one day clearly . There was an asian woman on the paddle boats in the adjacent pond and a lightning storm was rolling in. Unfortunately she panics and couldnt figure out how to work the boat controls..
we has one speed boat with a larger engine than the reast of them and it was our tow boat(for capsized recoveries) and a plaything for us to show off to the girls with.
I remember that we endedn up having two lifeguards stand on the edge of the foating dock that separated the two ponds, I disengaged the transom lock and headed straight at the dock head on.. because it was tilted my way it resembled a ramp, I then launched my boat onto and over the dock landing in the paddle boat pond. I then hooked her up with a line and towed her back to the area where the paddle boats were funneled into the boarding area.
The ride attendant girl hooked the boat with her boat hook and helped the woman out.. I was a hero for 15 mins.
In the winter I was a snowmaker.
I remember riding my skate board to work and having my mother pick me up after .. I lived in augusta so it was not a short trip… Fellow emploee parents passing by would often pick me up if they had the room so it wasnt too often that I skated the whole way.
I remember the first timecard system they put in.. you got a card with punch holes in it.. you’d slide it into the clock in the managers office, bang in a few codes and pull the card back out.. the funny thing was that if you didnt punch out say on friday night and then came back monday morning, you could punch out then back inand get paid for the weekend.. apparently one of the parks downfall was the accounting department.
Thanks for the memories..
Thanks for dropping by sigmaz; that was some great stuff! I always like hearing stories from Motorworld since I never really hung around in that section all that much and don’t really know the full details of that section. At the time I was too young to drive the cars or anything so I just stuck to the waterpark.
Also, skateboarding from Augusta to Vernon doesn’t sound like fun at all! Besides the fact that it’s a long trip, I would think that it’s very hilly as well!
The Cannonball Loop was opened. I rode the Cannonball Loop. My pre-pubscent friends and I would gawk at the holy grail of water slides everytime we went to the park. And one spectacular day my wildest dreams came true, they were actually asking for patrons to ride the slide. It’s funny how many people who bragged that they “…would totally do that!” had somewhere else to be when they were actually looking for riders. I volunteered. I was led up to the slide and then had my height and weight measured. The more I think about this, the crazier it becomes because I couldn’t have been more then 12 or 13 and my parents were no where around to give consent to their kid signing up for a suicide mission. When I got to the top of the slide the park attendant (who I doubt was an engineer) hit me w/ a garden hose to essentially lube me up in order for me to make it through. I prided myself on doing everything at “Accident Park” but this moment of truth was scarier then the rest. A crowd had formed as I got into the slide and I felt like Evil Knievel climbing onto a stars and stripes motorcycle. I got the go ahead and sent myself down the pitch black tube. When you’re sure you are going to die your mind records everything. I vividly remember the sensation of my feet going up as I realized “Here comes the loop!”. I remember being ecstatic when I had cleared the pinnacle of the loop, however the worst was yet to come. Apparently my sub 100 lbs body was not heavy enough for the ride and rather the sticking to the slide on the back end of the loop, I actually fell to the bottom of the loop. I smacked the back of my head on the slide and was nearly knocked unconcious. It was then I saw light as I sputtered out of the exit of the tube into the splash down pool which about 8 inches deep. I was able to orient myself enough to get to my feet and smile with pride as the stunned crowd cheered for the little kid who just went down the most dangerous water slide of all time. It was closed again within minutes and although I went to the park a dozen times after that day I never saw that slide opened again. I have no fear of amusement park rides after going on that death trap. There is nothing that will be built as dangerous and poorly supervised as the cannonball loop again. It was truly a perfect storm for water park aficionados.
That was a great story! Falling from the apex of the loop must have been just awful. At least you didn’t slow down and fall in the other direction however; then you would have been stuck in that section at the base of the loop. I can’t imagine how terrifying that would be, basically coming out of a momentary disorientation only to find yourself in some small dark space. lol
I worked there for several years as a lifeguard, and a few things.. The tarzan swing and the cannonball pools… The pools were only 15′ deep and yes freezing cold, they were fed from a spring fed lake at the top of the mountain. The bottom of the pool was not lined with anything they were concrete pools that had large rocks/boulders around them. The water was crystal clear. As a guard I would be able to sit on the stand (10′ tall) and I could spot and tell if there was a dollar bill on the bottom and if it was within 10 – 15′ of the stand I could tell you what denomination it was. it just seemed dark because of all the shade in the area.
The riptide slide was called Surf Hill… when it first opened the 2 left most lanes (looking down from the top, or the right most from the bottom looking up) were the “expert lanes” initially they had a ramp and I can remember going down with friends and family and it wasn’t uncommon to get 10 – 15′ of air off the things… landing was sometimes a bit tough, but I can remember people and us included doing flips and twists off that thing. The trick to it was to use more than one mat the more you had the faster you went. Too many people got hurt and they redid the ride to make it a much smaller ramp. the employees were able to secure a section of the new lining it’s was about 4 – 6″ thick and we cut 2 hand holds in the front of it… I wasn’t crazy enough but I knew and watched several friends going down using that mat… they would go so fast that they would end up hitting the first 12″ of the water puddle at the bottom meant to slow them down and it wouldn’t do a thing.. They would end up literally slamming into the padding at the end of the lanes hard… a couple of them hard enough that they needed help getting out from where the padding and the floor met.
Only 15 feet deep?! Aw man…that’s takes all the odd mystique out of the pool. lol Actually, I saw a photo of those pools drained on another site and it did look only 15-20 feet with slabs of concrete at the bottom. Although, I distinctly remember a lifeguard at AP saying that they were some 30+ feet deep, but I guess it was just to weed out anyone thinking they could do the attraction while not knowing how to swim well.
That Surf Hill story literally had me laughing! It just amazes me that Action Park thought it was a good idea to add in ramps for riders to rocket over. And then employees fashion up a mat made of that super slick crap, that’s just too much. I can just visualize the scene of some kid going at like 40mph head first and completely overshooting that little slowdown pool. lol It’s too bad they got rid of that slide…
Thanks for commenting Mike!
i remember this exactly as he described. we would go every year when i was a kid. there was always people trying to find a mat, yet we would always have like 3 or 4 stacked. im glad you confirmed that it did make u go faster, i always wondered if i carried that extra wieght for nothing! lol man i wish this place was still around, i rode every ride there (except loop) many many times and managed to never get seriously hurt. i will try to find old picsand vids i knw we have somewhere and send in…
I remember snakes in one of the pools. I rode this tube down a long slide and half way down i fell of the tube landing painfully in the pool with less skin on my legs then when i started the ride with. But just when i thought my ride of death was over I see this huge snake swimming right at my face. I was only 8 and i couldnt swim very well, so their i was flapping my arms and legs screaming for help because of this snake and the fact i was bloody and in pain, and not one person came to my aide. All the children were pushing me down in the water and they were trying to get out of the pool, I though i was goin to drown or be attacted by this snake. THANK GOD for my older brother, because he pulled me out.
When i was 7 I rode 1 of their tube rides and i was going so fast my tube almost reared off the slope which was very high off the ground. Also the tide pool was the worst being so little the waves would knock me over and afew times a almost drown because the lifeguards were to busy watching the women then watching the children. The place always had nasty snake infested water and half the rides would brake down during the few hours you would spend at the part. Even the kiddie pool with those little bumper boats was a death zone. Once I seen one of the boats start to sink with a child in it, you would think that the lifegaurds would have leaped in the pool to get the kid out, but No the parent had to be the one to jump in and unbuckel the child before the boat sank drowning the kid… Though the park was full of danger, it still provided me with alot of fun and some great memories.
i rose the canonball loop. man that sucker beat you up.
I am curious if there’s any remains of action park left. was mountain creek built on the old site of AP? did they leave any remnants? is there anything to explore?
I don’t know if anything of Action Park is left actually. Everything in the waterpark was pretty much reused by Mountain Creek, and some of the most known attractions (Cannonball Loop, Aerodium, etc) were simply removed. I know they have one river attraction that pretty much sits un-used for the most part. The Surf Hill slides might still be “standing but not operating” as well but other than that I’m not sure.
By looking at Google Earth, it doesn’t look like Motorworld is around at all; at least I can’t spot any tracks or anything. You can check out Mountain Creek on Google Earth at ‘41°11′24.78″N 74°30′30.55″W’ and see if you can see anything. That giant field just to the west of Mountain Creek might be where Motorworld was.
As a kid i have always had a strange fixation with roller coasts & amusement parks. Who knows why?!But I have to say that i have been obsessed with Action Park since i found out about it 4 days ago!
We only had a Wonderland (affiliated with Hannah Barbarah) out here in Australia & I was always a scaredy cat to go on any of the big rides!
HOWEVER! I feel so disappointed to have not experienced the ‘legend’ of Action Park. From everything I have read, it seems so ridiculous & intriguing, like a taboo movie about reckless teens!
As ridiculously conservative I am, if I had the chance to jump at any of these threatening rides, I totally would! The Cannonball Loop had my jaw dropped for hours as I read comments/experiences & studied pictures! I even showed my co-workers & their response was “……WTF.. how? wha.. HOW THE HELL WOULD THAT EVEN WORK?!” lol! “Exactly. Fucking insane”
I am sure the real experience isn’t as romantic as it seems- but to someone who has always been safe, always been scared of danger, this place seemed like a place that was so so wrong it was right!
Just want to say thanks for the indepth descriptions! It makes the idea of the place even more real! You have no idea how many people i have told about the place! Just out of sheer disbelief that something so dangerous could have existed for such a long period of time!!
Thanks for the experience!! =)
Lauren
Thanks for stopping by Lauren and thanks for the kind words!
“So wrong it was right”…I like that! It’s a pretty good one sentence summary of how Action Park was.
You know, I think something like the Cannonball Loop, while still crazy, wouldn’t be as insane if it were built today. Like if built in 2009, there would be definately be calculations, proper water drainage, correct pitches, etc; it would be studied up and down and over again until the most minor of faults were ironed out.
Back in the mid 80s it was probably just two guys sitting at a bar with one going “hey, let’s see if this will work!” Two weeks later their drawing scralled out on a napkin became Cannonball Loop! How did they know it would work? Well they didn’t until ‘John the Lifegaurd’ went down and didn’t die!
Even I can’t beleive some of the stuff that went down at Action Park even though I was there!
loved that place went from 86 to 1990 loved motor wolrd and the indy cars fastest go cart ive ever been on got kicked off in 89 hit a cone or tire went over thew yellow line god i miss that place also went on aero ride first year it opened that was fun sad to see it in ruins ps any one know where i can buy one of those cars ?
After doing a google search for water slide, I came across a youtube video of a loop slide in germany. I got curios and googled loop slide and found all this information on this ridicouls ride at action park! Since webates have sparked my intrest in action park and looking at pictures, I’ve relized this was a place my father use to vist. I have pictures of my parent visting this death trap.
Although the picuters show a water slide that was long and horzitial with long bumps. Can anybody tell wich ride this was?
Long horizontal slide with bumps sounds like either Kamikaze or Surf Hill.
Kamikaze was a single slide built into a hill with 3 or 4 small/medium sized drops before ending in a pool.
Surf Hill was like one very wide slide with 8 or so lanes which traveled down 4 or 5 hills before ending.
can you post any pics you have of action park? starting a history site
The only photos I have from the park were from the Mountain Creek days unfortunately.
I was doing a search on action park just to see what would come up and I came across this site. I was also curious about the “Cannonball Loop Slide”. I remember going there when I was a kid and seeing this crazy looking slide that had a loop, but the slide always appeared abandoned and completely shut down. I remember hearing stories that a woman snapped her neck in the loop, but these were all just rumours , or course. I find it so cool and fascinating to read the stories of the people who actually rode that slide, (and made it out alive) major props to you.
Would be great if someone posted up a video of the most dangerous slide ever created.
I had a lot of memories of Action Park going there as a kid, no major injuries, just a few head bumps and scrapes, minor compared to some people. I remember my brother tricked me into going down one of the slides in the lower area (in the freezing cold water). He said “oh it’s just a tiny slide”, little did I know that it had a 20 ft drop at the end of it. lol I was only about 9 years old, but I was a good swimmer. I remember the girl asked me before I went on the slide if I could swim and I thought, that’s odd why is she asking me this. lol I also remember the one tube slide next to that area, The Gauley, (I believe that was the name of it). It was fun, but you would sometimes get stuck in certain areas and have to push yourself down, and of course you would sometimes smash into people and sometimes pile up. I also remember the cannon slides which I ended up banging my head around one of the turns in the tube, then being spit out into ice cold water and barely being able to catch my breath. The wave pool was insane, the waves were oddly big, you could drown very easily if you weren’t a good swimmer. The kamikaze was surprisingly fast, probably one of the best slides at the park and the Geronemo Falls slides were crazy, at the end of the ride you had a dental floss for a bathing suit.
I definitely want to make it out to Mt. Creek one of these days just to experience the waterslide thrills once again…
thats exactly what im searching for any pics of old action park or videos of the cannonball slide
i know i commented on someone elses comment, but i wanted to comment on this artical, its GREAT! the descriptions were pretty much dead on. what sucks is i had a lot typed up and some how it didnt get posted, now i dont remember it lol.
i loved this place as a kid. I started going ~90-91, which would make me about 10. im proud to say i went the last year it was open, since it says it was closed in 96. i moved to the south in 95 and swore i went back twice, but it must have been once.
we would run up and down thoses hills barefoot, which would burn and cut ur feet all up, but we didnt care. i loved this place because they didnt care about ur size or age for anything, and at 10 doing these rides you loved it. i rode everyride/slide except cannonball loop, (which was never open while i was there, thankgod cause my stupid young ass would have done it) many many times, avoiding serious injury somehow. my dad would never let me do the areododim for some reason, lol. the wiki says that it would bring u 6-7 feet up, but im here to tell u ive seen people go up higher then the building, i remember thinking to myself “he’s dead if he doesnt go back down correctly to land on the padding!” i loved every ride, some more then others, but top 2 was probly the cliff jump, and the tall ass strait down slide (which had a chain net covering the first 15′ or so down so u wouldnt fall out). i remember only weighing maybe 90 pounds, i wouldnt even be on the slide, it was a free fall till it curved out. im sad to find out these 2 rides are gone at the new mountain creek.
i did the motor park a little. wish i would have know the tennis ball trick, lol. i did wreck the cars though, being 12 in my memory of the motorpark, the only pedal i used was the gas (which was always on the floor). shot the tennis ball cannon many times, and yes the best part was shooting the helpless employees, lol
im gonna go back one day, but its so less appealing now that my favorite rides and others are gone, but my curiousty wont let me not go so i can look in theses areas and see what is or isnt there for myself. i’ve always wished it was still around, but in the back of my mind knew based on my memories that there was no way it could still be today(not in its true glory anyway). as i look back all i can think is “holy shit that really did happen!”
I remember going so often with my friends we used to plan trips to go mid week, when it was cold and cloudy. That way the park was empty. We would complete every ride before lunch, eat, and then repeat.
Surf hill was the best. The ramp in lane 7 and 8 were great but when the lines were long, we would fight, literally, for lane 3. it was the best. We would line up in lane 1,2,4,5. On “three” we would run half way down the slide and jump onto the neighboring chute, claw at your friend who is already sliding, and jump in front of him who would grab you to slow you down. We were not gentle. The person who crossed the water at the end, in lane 3 won. Bruises ensued. Thankfully the laughter always beat out the contusions. Mitch once hit the water so fast he skipped over it and as he was about to ram the padding, he ducked his head and went right under. Four people had to pry him out. He was king for the day and operations on the slide never even slowed down.
That place Rocked!
I worked in Wharton and use to go there back in the late 80’s. We would get out of work at 3 and be there by 4. They use to discount after 3 or 4. It was always pretty empty people would be leaving at that time of the day.
Anyway, I’m surprised I lived. Beer sales were real lax up there, it didn’t matter how tanked or young (sometimes) you were.
Geronimo Falls was my favorite, saw quite a few lost tops from the girls that rode it. Everybody got a wedgie.
Tarzan Swings was great to watch folks get faced.
No place was really safe, I’ve read people use to meet up with snakes on the Miniature Golf Course.
Our Boss hated the place, everytime we went there. We would always be all banged up the next day (with leftover beer buzz),we were pretty much worthless for half the day. that’s if we even showed up.
Thanks For posting this Brian.
There will never be another place like Action Park.
Good Times!
God Bless Action Park!!!!!!!!!
I remember being on the cliff dive looking down at people swimming way too close to the divers and landing right next to them surprised no one was smashed there, but action park was the best thing ever built….new jersey must find a way to build something similar.
Also remember being scared as sh**, but saw everyone else was ok with it so when in rome!!!! LIVE ON TRACTION PARK
This site and reading people’s experiences bring back some awesome memories. Surf Hill and all the stories about people crashing into the padding, getting wedged into it and how the employees would eat at the base of hill while being entertained by the injuries are just remarkable. Here’s my experience.
I get to the base of brand new Surf Hill with some friends and we’re told the ride is closed and can’t go on it. It’s just been built and the surface is brilliant blue. We stand around watching people go down for awhile, apparently trying out the ride. Looks like its open to us so we let the attendants know we’d like to give it a try and are given permission. First time down was fun, though a little bumpy. It feels like the polyurethane foam has just been laid down directly on top of the rocks underneath. I make a note to myself to keep my hands and soft parts on the slide so I don’t get any bone chips.
Second time is when the fun starts. Surf Hill when it was brand new was not the way most people remember it. There was the same 80 feet or so of vertical as you slide down, then maybe an 8” deep puddle, less than in later years, then a slight upslope to slow down and get this… NO padding at the end!!! I go zipping down fast, blow right through the puddle and straight into the gravelly dirt at the base! For everyone who smacked into the padding, imagine the ride brand new with no padding and not even any grass at the end, just gravel and dirt. That was my last time on Surf Hill and, like the employees on lunch break, I then stood around at the end waiting for the next person to get injured.
I’m surprised there’s no mention of how many bikini tops came off at this place. My girlfriend lost her top on the tarzan swing the first time she tried it. Everyone got wedgies on the water slides. Funny it did not seem so dangerous at the time, but I do remember all the topless girls from teh crazy water rides.
newslife site » Horrorific tales from ACTION PARK – Vernon, NJ // Sep 17, 2009 at 5:09 am
[...] Great site and photos of ACTION PARK in its horrifying heyday [...]
Hey I rode all these rides for years. I even got to ride the cannonball 2…referred here as the cannonball loop…did it 4 times in a row then they closed it. Me and my friends recalled all the attendants that were there kept saying whatever you do don’t lift your head and there were 4-5 attendants in the dispensory pool all very helpfull while you recovered your conciousness. That was an awesome ride!!! Awesome!!! I flew off the side of the expert Alpine Slide…thought I was gonna die but ended up unscathed….I want to win the lottery and buy the place for myself.
i remember going to action park as a kid during the mid 80s to early 90s. as a kid, you never realize how dangerous the place really was. my father told me about the guy who got electrocuted a few years before we visited. so, my father took me to a park where someone was electrocuted in a water ride! ah, the 80s were such a different time! things were just more lax in general it seems. i hate great adventure, so action park was more fun. i went on the tarzan swing. i was only 10 or 11 and could barely reach the handle. i slipped off and belly floped into the pool! i didn’t get hurt, but everyone thought i did. i felt ok. but man that water was cold!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! good times during a time when things were simpler. no way would action park have lasted today! i want to get to mountain creek, if only to reminisce about the place when it was action park.
Most of the Waterworld/Roaring Springs rides are still there, and most of them are unmodified, so to say Mountain Creek is just another scenc waterpark, IMO, isn’t correct. I was there over the summer, and of all the former Action Park rides still there, they all felt like they were haunted by the soul of the predecessor… I believe strongly especially since I nearly injured myself on the Colorado Rapids ride – head trauma almost inflicted from the continual head banging into head, and head banging into wall action.
The Alpine Slide was probably my favorite ride ever, anywhere. And it really wasn’t that bad, danger-wise. I rode that thing probably 20 times and I knew all the tricks and I always made sure to get a fast sled, and I rarely braked. I’d always catch up to the person in front of me and *then* I’d brake. I remember eventually I started asking the attendants to give the person ahead of me an extra-long head start – they’d do that for the more advanced riders. But I never came close to going over the edge, though I guess it was possible. The sleds did take some skill to “drive”, you weren’t just free-falling, you had to lean into turns the right way and sort of guide the sled down the track. I guess I learned that from doing log flumes with my brother when I was really young – we’d always get our log going so fast in the water that we’d catch up and bang into the people ahead of us. Most people don’t even know you can do that!
Anyway, I’m sad that the Alpine Slide is gone.
Ah, Vernon Valley. I actually was taken to the Alpine slide back in the late 70’s along with my brother by my grandfather. See Vernon Valley used to also have the Playboy club, and Grandpa did plumbing for them. So he knew the Valley and the locals well.
Anyway, this was before “Action Park” and it was a bit lonely. You went up the chairlift with the little carts on the side. Had to jump off at a dip spot mid-way up, then off to the tracks.
For a kid, this thing was incredible. Push the stick forward you go faster, pull back you brake. Lean forward while pushing and you go *fast*. The track itself was long, twisty, and had one part where you literally went *down* fast enough that if you hit it at high speed you would fly off the tracks then land at the bottom (maybe a 5 foot drop). There was a “SLOW DOWN” sign just before it.
Right.
I flipped out once, tore up my legs but got back on. My brother actually banged his head on the track fairly badly; ended one of our excursions.
Last time I went was probably in 82 or so, after the rest of the rides had opened. Much more crowded, noisy, everyone riding the water rides. Not for me, I wanted to ride the slide of death. And let me say that was probably the most dangerous thing there, bar none.
Now… There are a few Alpine slides still around, most of them are shorter and slightly…. better thought out. I went to one in TN last year with my kids. They went down slowly. Me…. Let’s just say that at 41 years old and 250 pounds when you lean forward on that stick you can go *FAST*. As in ride the edge of the track in the curved banks fast. The people working there thought I was insane. But I’ve been there, done that, have the scars on my legs.
Next time though I’m bringing my motorcycle helmet with me and full leathers. Dance a bit closer to the edge, shall we?
CZ