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OMG I remember Action Park (I'm on a Western NJ memory kick tonight! LOL)
I almost died there too... in the wave pool when I was in 7th grade. LOL I was trying to save my sister's little friend and nearly went down myself - the 20 some odd lifeguards standing around did nothing. Some old man who didn't speak English pulled me out. LOL
Not funny though, the next week someone died in that pool.
We went with a Sunday school trip and someone threw up in the Cannonball thingey and another person would up seriously injured on the Alpine slide.
We went one time after that and my Mom decided NO MORE... she really wanted us back in one piece!
I was a victim to the Alpine Slide as well... took a nice chunk of flesh out of my arm. I went into panic mode because I was going to fast so I grab the side (concrete remember) with my arm to slow myself down... not too smart. Nice big rasberry on my bisep : ( I use to love the go carts...the ones you needed a driver's lic. in order to ride..fun, fun! I wasn't aware that it had closed down..when did that happen?
We used to go to Action Park a couple times a summer from around '78 - 84 with my day camp. Needless to say, we freakin' loved that place.
1. I do remember a couple news stories about deaths in the tidal pool. Way too powerful and as someone said above, the lifeguards liked to conserve energy.
2. Everyone I know had some alpine sled injuries -- mostly lost skin from the concrete tracks.
3. On the jungle rope swim, you had to swing out a bit from where you started to clear this dock (or land) that was covered with some astroturf. I personally saw a kid start to swing and immediately let go of the rope and hit whatever that was. He left on a stretcher, leg probably broken, wailing.
4. Wedgies from the tall, high waterslide. Ayy.
5. I remember them building that loopdee-loop waterslide that Tahiti posted a picture of. Even as a little kid, I thought "they're going too far with this one."
6. Some juvenile delinquents from my town would go just to steal new sneakers from the cubbies of the tidal pool.
7. When we were in the parking lot by the van, waiting for the counsellors and other kids to show up to got home, we got razzed and smacked around by some guys that had to be in their 20's, probably drunk.
8. The safest attraction may have been the scariest one -- the cliff jumping. I guess I had a fear of heights but that was scarier than the other stuff.
Good times. Wouldn't let my kids near a place like that in a million years.
Wow, being from South Jersey, I've never been to Action Park. But there was a similar place down near Pine Hill called Action Mountain. Don't know if they were related.
During the winter the place was called "Ski Mountain" and they had snow machines and skiing. But then they opened Action Mountain in the summer.
I remember going once, and thinking back on it through a 21st century lens, it was a pretty dangerous place. One of the kids we went with got some sort of huge bloody rope burn from some kind of ride, and someone else from my school broke an arm. At some point my mom decided I wasn't allowed to go back because it was so dangerous. I also remember seeing teenagers much older than I, smoking lots of pot in the parking lot before going on the attractions. Maybe that's why mom forbade me from going back?
Yes, I remember it, and what about Jungle habitat? My husband drove me from LI on our first date to go there, then we went to a restaurant on LI(cookies) and a drive in Movie. None of those places are still operating.
Diane
this is a really sad story, the owner basically abandon the property and let all the animals fen for themselves. People were hiking in the woods and coming across sick exotic animals. I went hiking in the area and the remains of the old sign were still there the entrance way all in wooden logs, that was about 3 years ago. I also found a road that you could 4 wheel on and drove it and found old cages, and stuff like that on this road.
It was in West Milford. Google it, I found some intereting things on it - including the animal issues mentioned above.
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