Water Park - India Style

On Tuesday, we took a bus, with two other Hebron families, to a water park called Black Thunder. It was amazing! There were all kinds of amusement rides, water slides, swimming pools, horse/camel rides, paddle boats, and a wildlife refuge (not bad for $5 a person). The scenery was beautiful - it was right at the base of the mountains, and the weather was pretty good (rained fairly hard in the afternoon, but wasn't too cold). Needless to say, we were the ONLY white people in the entire park. During lunch we were the main attraction - seriously, about 40 people just sat and stared at us while we ate our food.

Also, as you can see from the photos, the swimming attire was quite different than what we're used to in the west. There were women and girls in their school uniforms, salwars, and even saris going down the water slides! As you can see from the pictures, I too was fully clothed in the pool - it was quite an experience! To add to the show, we had three little ones with blond, curly hair in our group which made them targets for attention. I don't think I've mentioned this before, but Indians love to pinch the cheeks of white babies. They believe that it's good luck, and they love to pinch hard enough to make them cry! I only had to yell at one group of women for pinching Addie, so that was good. There were a lot of people standing around, so I think the word travelled quickly.

The one ride that we all avoided was the Ferris Wheel. I've never seen a more terrifying ride - it was going so fast! At the other extreme was the Lazy River that went around the park. It was so slow that we ended up paddling with our arms the entire way. The next morning, we were all complaining that our arms were sore, and it took a while before we realized it was from that dumb river.

Side note: in case you're wondering about the volcano that Addie is sliding down... no, it is not made of cement - it's some kind of rubbery something.