Happy Holidays

In the small town of Santa Claus, Indiana, there is a world renowned theme park called Holiday World. Almost every year from the ages 8-12 I went to this theme park at least once during the summer. Holiday World not only has your typical theme park rides (dropzone, roller coasters, bumper cars, etc.), but it also is home to the best water park I have ever been to in my life. And to make it even better, the park rides are divided by different holidays and drinks are free!

The first time I went to Holiday World I was with my grandparents and Meredith. We camped in my grandparents RV (does that really qualify as camping?) and rode the shuttle into the park. At first I was a complete chicken; no roller coasters or dropzones or anything with even the slightest decline. But I quickly realized that it was extremely unlikely I would die on a ride, so I gathered my courage and got on the Liberty Launch. I screamed my lungs out, but man was it fun. I never looked back, and to this day I am the ultimate theme park thrill seeker. At Holiday World, I rode all of the wooden roller coasters (I think my brain turned into a smoothie because I was shaken around so much) and then turned my attention to the water park. The lines were long but the rides were longer, even the longest water roller coaster in the world! My favorite slide was definitely the Bakuli (essentially a toilet bowl) and my least favorite were any slides that you didn't have a raft for (the slides always burn my back). This was just my first experience at Holiday World; the future held many more for me.

My absolute favorite Holiday World trip was when I was 11. My parents, grandparents, grandparents friends, grandparents friends grandkid, and Meredith were once again pseudo-camping at the park. The first day we went into the park and we were pleasantly suprised to find a new ride, the Pilgrims Plunge. Basically 8 people got in raft, floated to a platform, were lifted up 135 feet, then slid down at a 45 degree angle.

 why are the supports curvy??

 

It was terrifyingly fun, but a couple of years later they took it down because it was deemed too dangerous for humans. The same day we first rode the Pilgrims Plunge, there was a tornado in the parking lot of the park and we had to hide in the boys bathroom for about 15 minutes. The real fun started when we got back to the campground. Meredith and I were playing tag on the playground when three boys our age came over and asked if they could play. We of course said yes, and thus began arguably the funnest five hours of my life. We played freeze tag, hide-and-go-seek, swung on the swings, and talked the night away. Their names were Devin, Justin, and Jacob and they were all from Illinois. I was in love with Devin and Meredith was in love with Justin, and everything about them was perfect. Parting that night was sad, but thankfully we still had one more day and we didn't waste one second of hanging out together. To this day I am friends with Justin on Facebook and Devin and I follow each other on Instagram (poor Jacob, he never got any love). It's amazing how quickly you can become friends with people, and how lucky we were they approached us that night. Holiday World not only gave thrills and water slide burn on my back, but a lightning friendship with some awesome people.