Well, I will be a little more clear on my title. During our last visit up North, we decided to try the Clearfield Aquatic center. The had a lot of fun things to do, and the boys seemed very excited about it. There were a few rules that I wasn't too impressed with, i will explain...
1. Every child under the age of 4 has to wear plastic pants in the pool. I get the rule, because of the whole outbreak thing, but my kid has been potty trained for well over a year, but I am over that so $5.00 purchase for plastic pants.
2. They have a hydro tube and it has 2 rules, you have to be so tall to go by yourself, or else have to have an adult. You can't wear any type of floaties, life jackets etc. I didn't mind going with my kids, it was just fine. what I didn't like was the amount of lifeguards they had stationed there.
Which brings me to the drowning part and my 3rd complaint of the place. They had one lifeguard stationed at the bottom of the slide where you come out. His job was to watch the kids that come out, then motion to the next child waiting at the bottom of the stairs that it was there turn to go up. So there was no other lifeguard to make sure that people were the right height, with an adult, and safe. That is a big job for 1 person. So this is the part that really aggravated me. So we went down the slide, and Roz took Davis and I took Ky. We had fun, and we headed to the kid part with the big toy. My mom and sister go over to the bottom of the little slide and I take Davis and Ky up the toy to take pictures of them while they are playing on it and my mom and sister have the slide covered. On our way over to the stairs to play Davis heads up and I say to Ky come on lets go up with your brother. He proceeds to follow me. I turn to walk up the stairs and I take a picture of Davis and turn around... NO KY! So I do a quick glance around to see if I can see him, NO! I quickly yell to mom and Roz to see if he has slipped past me ans went down the slide, NO! So we all break loose. My mom does a scan of the 4 feet water to see if there is a head bobbing in the water, I tell Davis to come with me, Roz goes one way I go the other. PANIC. Roz sees this brown hair bobbing up front he water at the bottom of the hydro-tube. Yes that is Ky, She jumps int he water, is swimming out there, a mom sees him under the water jumps in gets out there before Roz , and lifts him up, and where is the lifeguard you might ask... the person that is being paid to help prevent drownings. Oh let me tell you, he is squatting on the edge of the pool not even attempting to get in the water, with his stupid orange floaty stretched out for Ky to grab on to as his head stays under the water. Now I am sure that many of you are thinking horrible mother... but This all took place in about 30 seconds. From the point where Ky was following me, he stepped out of the pool ran over to the slide past all the kids, ran up the stairs and went down the slide. I was mad at myself that I didn't have his hand, but the lifeguard just stood there, like a 3 year old the is drowning under the water can grab a stupid floaty. And then another mom saves him faster than a lifeguard that is 1 foot away. This is where additional lifeguards at that station would have been more useful. One st the top or bottom of the slide could have stopped him from even going down! Oh what a horrible feeling. So that was our experience at the Aquatic center. Poor Ky was so scared he was a pale gray for at least 30 mins after that, needless to say we didn't' stay for that long!
