Opening weekend draws crowd

MOSES LAKE — The sun was out, the music was rocking, the pool at the Surf ‘n Slide Water Park was full of splashing, excited kids. Summer is straight ahead.

Omar Valen and his extended family drove from Tacoma for the weekend. It was time to get away.

“We’ve been locked down for too long,” he said, as he shook water out of his ears after a jump off the high diving board.

Memorial Day weekend was the 2021 opening for Surf ‘n Slide. The pool was closed in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It will open for daily operation on June 17.

Admission will look a little different, at least until June 30, when all restrictions are scheduled to be lifted. Until then, people are encouraged to register online, which provides a price break and entry through a separate gate. Pool capacity will be capped at 1,000 people per day. Online registration is available through the city’s website, https://www.cityofml.com/394/Surf-n-Slide-Water-Park.

There are still some bugs to be worked out. A family trying to enter through the advance registration gate discovered the registration form somehow left off a family member, and the staff was trying to figure out how to address it.

Jayden and Ethan Badajoz, of Kennewick, splashed in the shallows under the watchful eye of their uncle Eddie Galvan, also of Kennewick. A sunny Memorial Day weekend provided a good excuse to get away after 15 months of restricted movement.

“We took a little road trip,” Galvan said.

He’s looking forward to a more normal summer.

“Hopefully everything comes back together like it was,” he said.

Josh Kintner and nephew Zachary, both of Yakima, waited outside the big slide landing zone to get pictures of family members as they came off the slide. The extended family decided to get out of town for the day, Josh Kintner said.

Nicole Strom, of Moses Lake, sat in the shallows and played with her son, Caleb, and said she was glad to see the pool open again, even with temporary restrictions.

“Very glad,” she said.