Tropic Falls at OWA — Attraction in Foley

If you've never been, get ready to fight for your place in line...seriously. And also if you've never been, stretch out your leg muscles because you're gonna be doing a lot of needless stair climbing. If you make it to the end of the review I'll explain why this should have and could easily be a 5 star experience.

Showed up at 10:15am yesterday - 4/12 (we got the family of 4 pass). Waited in line at the tickets booth just to be told that we needed to go to the main entrance so they could go thru our stuff.

They gonna go thru ur stuff. Not for weapons or drugs. But to make sure ur not bringing any food or beverages because thats another means for them to make they money.

My gf had the barcode (same as me) on her phone. I had it on my phone too. The barcode that you get after u make ur purchase. The one it tells u to keep. Well they told us that that one is no good. They need the 4 separate barcodes that are sent in the email after u make ur purchase. So we had to get outta line so I could pull up my email and I'm ballparking after app 10 mins I was able to find it in my junk mail. Then we had to get back in line (the place was starting to get busy).

Point is we had to learn all this "as we go", which could easily have been avoided had we known which line to go to first and to have the email ready. There was absolutely no instruction or direction. So that was our experience getting in. Hope u read this n fare much better.

We wanted to do the indoor water park stuff first. There's a lot of stairs to climb to get to the different slides you wanna go down. Some require a mat to go down, some require an inner tube, some require nothing at all. The inner tubes and mats are stored in a place called "the cave" which is not near the tower to the slides. No clear on instructions on how to get to the "cave" and it is a dark room accessed down some dark corridors somewhere under the lazy river. We literally had to find it.

But this was AFTER we had climbed the tower to the slide we wanted to go down. We find the "cave", got what we needed, and then ascended the tower again. Once it was our turn, we were told that our waterproof vivitar camera that was attached to my wrist, and my gfs sport prescription glasses (that were also tethered) were not allowed n that we could either take them back down n lose are place in line OR leave them with them and come back up the tower n retrieve them. We chose the latter option. We asked why there was no sign or instructions about all these things. They said there was a sign at the bottom of the tower. Once we got down, we found the sign...literally covered with other inner tubes and mats. Hope u read this n fare much better.

As the hours progressed, the amount of children in the park grew exponentially...but not parents. Keep that in mind when ur waiting in line wit ur kids and ur literally watching these other kids wit no parents jumping in line in front of u. Sometimes way in front of u. They magically appear out of nowhere mind u...like ninjas. When this happens the looks on ur kids faces is gonna break ur heart. Trust me.

The surf simulator. That thing looks so cool and I really wanted to try it. I really did. We waited our turn in line. Just before signing the waiver, some European dood (who spoke clear English but had an accent) came up to us and asked if we were waiting in line to which we clearly told him (and it was obvious) yes we are standing in line. As we were signing our waivers, he goes up to the waters edge n "floats" around n then sits right by the water. When it should have been my gfs turn this dood jumps up n grabs a boogie board and the employee starts prepping HIM! So...seeing that this is a grown man, not a child, right there in front God and allllll the other people who had been waiting their turn, I went up to the employee and I said are you seriously fixing to let this man do this thing right now!?! Blank stare and no response. So I confronted the man. I said it's not ur turn dood, get back in line n wait like everyone else. Won't lemme...

We hoped to have our last summer hurrah at tropical falls today. Unfortunately we were very disappointed in all that tropical falls was lacking. We could have easily driven to gulf shores water park but chose to come to tropical falls despite the huge price increase. We were hoping to not be stuck out in the sun all day since temperatures were well into the 90’s and we have two young (2 and under) children. There was a huge line at the ticket booth and only two windows of the seven (on a Saturday) were open. The children were already exhausted after spending over a half an hour waiting in line just to get into the park. After finally getting in, panic quickly flowed over me as mother of 5 young children when the water park was obviously over filled. I’m talking shoulder rubbing, “ I’m so sorry to bump you” full. The bathrooms were a mess but I chalked that up to typical wet water park bathrooms. When our party of 7 finished changing into swimwear we wanted to do the lazy river as a family to try to get the layout of the park. The lazy river was in fact closed. Let me just take the time to list the other things that were closed as well: the surfing ride, and wave pool was turned off and their were even water slides that were not running. I spoke to about 3 employees who all gave me the same story “the park was over capacity by about 5,000 people. There were no tubes available for the lazy river or wave pool when they finally did open ( approximately 3+ hours after we arrived). It was like the titanic sinking… not enough floatation devices for the occupancy. Even life jackets where hard to come by. The lazy river was so over crowded I worried my child would fall into the water because we kept getting ran into. The kids play area was so crowded when the large bucket of water would drop kids were trampling each other. When they finally turned on the wave pool the waves were very underwhelming. I’ve seen bigger waves in my own tub at home. So much trash in the water. My 2 year old kept picking it up. Gross!!! There was no seating available. We just stood and let the babies rest in their stroller. I also tried to purchase a souvenir refillable cup for my 5 kids to have plenty to drink but after going to 3 food places I was told they were sold out parkwide due to going over occupancy. I wound up paying $4 for a styrofoam cup of Lemonade for the kids that was 85% ice which left little room for the drink itself. We finally were able to enjoy the last 30 minutes of the park when the numbers finally started going down. But $280 for 30 minutes of fun, that’s just highway robbery. I can honestly be thankful there were no real emergencies as trying to help anyone would have been almost impossible with all the people. Tropical Falls has their work cut out for them. Their fancy indoor park is no match for their local competitors. Better prices and better experiences found just a short drive down the road in Gulf Shores. 1/5 stars, would not recommend for large families especially people with small children in their group....

I've been a long-time visitor to OWA Tropic Falls theme park, but recent changes to their pricing structure and policies have left me disappointed. The park no longer offers a free 'non-rider' entry pass, which has made it unaffordable for many working-class families. Additionally, the pricing for the Tropic Falls indoor water park is unreasonably high and does not provide a flexible pricing structure that accommodates different budgets. The season passes are also not accommodating, as they expire on December 31st regardless of when they were purchased.

Furthermore, the rides at the park are mostly the type you see at local carnivals or fairs, with the exception of a couple of roller coasters and a haunted house ride. While these attractions are fun, they do not offer a lot of variety and may not be worth the high cost of admission. We use to make the drive to OWA to shop and eat and go to the park and now with the park being the way it is, we may not even visit OWA at all anymore.

Overall, I believe that OWA Tropic Falls theme park needs to reconsider their pricing and policies in order to make it more accessible to families from all walks of life. I suggest that the park reintroduces FREE or an extremely cheap non-rider entry pass option and provide a more flexible pricing structure for the indoor water park. In addition, the park should focus on offering more diverse attractions that appeal to a wider range of people. Until these changes are made, I may only attend the park once every year or two with the kids, if at all.

Update They still do not offer a free or reduced non-rider pass. It has now been over a year since we last visited. Very sad as it use to be a place we would attend several times per year with the grandparents, but now it is simply not worth the cost, to pay for all of us that are only there for the kids, and not riding rides. Really unfortunate, but hopefully they wise up and change things soon...

Update 2 Still do not offer any options for non-riders. So we have not been back in nearly 2 years. Sad, considering we use to visit 2-3 times per year and would eat at the park and shop at the local stores. Mangement does not seem interested in offering a free or discounted non-rider pass unfortunately.

Update 3 Still no options for non-riders. It has now been well over 2 years since we last went. They truly do not care though and focus solely on charging full price for everyone.

Update 4 Still no change to this policy and management never did anything to address this, nor did I ever receive a follow-up from them about it. Overall, they have lost at least 5 or 6 visits from my family and I, where we would have bought food, refreshments, and shopped. All because they no longer allow individuals who are unable to enjoy the rides to just come be with their families without paying the full cost of a ticket. Again, this is not Disney, as besides the rides there is nothing else to do or experience at this park, so non-riders do not even get any value unless they are...