Crystal_Beach_043.jpg

July 29, 1978

Reporter "investigates" the River Kwai tube ride on Crown Mountain at Crystal Beach... one of two of the country's biggest water rides opening in the area.

 

Reporter Tests Suicidal Thrills in New Fun Rides

By Michelle Coffas

 

THE INNER tube teetered at the edge of the waterfalls and the woman clung desperately as the water forced her over the edge. She took one last breath and held her nose. The fall was long and perilous but she made it to the end. She looked heavenward and was grateful that she had been saved.

A sniffling child behind her pushed a hand into her back and said: “Come on, lady, you’re holding things up.” Such is the life when a Courier-Express reporter is given the honor of being the first down the White Water Raft Ride at Darien Lake Fun Country, which opened for a preview on Friday.

 

Later, things went downhill, so to speak, as the same reporter, pushing her luck, took a plunge on the new “Crown Mountain,” the “world’s largest” water slide, which opens officially today at Crystal Beach. It was a tough day.

 

THE WHITE WATER RAFT RIDE is billed as the biggest water-propelled inner tube ride in the United States. The ride features plunges down waterfalls and through whirls and rapids: shades of the movie “Deliverance.” But it’s for those fairly courageous persons who don’t want to risk their necks and backsides on the real thing.

 

It’s two - or three - minute ride, depending on whether you get stuck in a whirlpool or get bumped through, the 300 feet of rough waters by the adventurers behind you. For a fee of $2 per half-hour the rider gets a colored inner tube and a chance to take the hairy ride for as many times as he or she can climb the steps back to the starting point.

 

The ride is climaxed by the largest of the waterfalls, which unceremoniously dumps the rider into a wading pool. The whole thing is a kind of mini – fantasy for those who have ever wondered about riding Niagara Falls in a barrel.

 

DESIGNER G. DOUGLAS Walter, the Snyder – Darien Corporation vice president who worked out every detail of the ride, called the successful preview (nobody got hurt, everybody loved it) his “crowning achievement.”

 

“There is an element of suspense about this ride. You don’t know where you’re going until you get there, he said, explaining that his creation is only the second of its kind in the United States. The original, at Disney World, is a smaller version.

 

As he watched the hundreds of children who were riding for free Friday, he noted the smiles and screams were his biggest pleasure. “If they don’t scream, they’re not having fun,” he said.

 

Darien Lake Fun country can be reached by taking the Thruway to Exit 48A. Then head south five miles on Route 77 to Corfu.

 

BY THE SCREAM measure, the fun was just as great at Crown Mountain in the

Ontario amusement park of Crystal Beach.

 

Their water slide is about 68 feet height and has four channels which are about 400 feet in length which vary in fright value. The two “killer” tubes, which start at the waterfall which caps the mountain, are called “Deliverance” and “River Kwai.”

 

The rider, who pays $1.00 for half hour’s worth of rides, gets a colored sponge mat to sit upon in the tubes. The mat, pushed by the water (keep your elbows tucked in), slides the rider into gravity defying positions as the tubes cure around and down the hill.

 

This ride also has a pool to catch the rider – who again must climb to the top of the hill for another ride…if the knees have not turned to jelly.

 

For the not – so – bold, and the smaller children, Crown Mountain offers a “tame” tube for a sample of the fun.

 

To get to Crystal Beach, Ont., take the Peace Bridge and follow the signs. Bring your swimsuit.

Done