Wings & Waves Waterpark — Attraction in McMinnville

We visited here yesterday while on vacation in OR. From my point of view, this place is okay. Upon entry my eyes started burning. It's about 85° in there with the humidity and the air is thick with chlorine. After rinsing off and heading back to where we're staying, my skin was peeling. Only it wasn't my skin. That's how much chlorine is in there. Everything after we left tasted like chlorine. Even breathing. It's a lot! And then the pricing. I fell over at $30 per person. The same stuff as our rec center back home ($7) and the pricing just shy of our giant waterpark with less than a fraction of the space.

There is a tiny "wave pool" and I'm not sure you can even call it one. These "waves" are more like someone cannonballs in over actual waves. All 5' 3" of me stood in them n At the 5' mark and I didn't jump or get splashed in the face or anything. Wave pools are pretty popular in other states and they are actual waves. Deep, heavy, cresting and crashing waves. Not this tiny pool.

There is a splash pad area for small children. This, or similar, can be found at parks along out journey for free and even at Rec Centers for around $7. I wouldn't take my under 42" child here for the price of daily admission. It wasn't special.

Where the true uniqueness and magic happens is on the roof where a real actual plane sits. Once you're inside the water park, there are 2 sets of stairs. Each set is for 2 or 3 different slides. When you get to the top of the stairs, you are waiting inside the actual plane body to begin your journey down. That is pretty cool. There's no creativity allowed on how you go down these slides. You face forward on your tube and go. No backwards or laying. They are overly cautious. The one slide that doesn't require a tube was also overly cautious. You can't have a swim shirt on. I thought this was odd. We wore them as we didn't realize this "waterpark" was indoors. Not a big dead but it still caught me off guard and as I've done many, many water slides much more intimidating than this one with board shorts and a rash guard, it just didn't make sense. The lines are long. There is a display talking about the plane and putting it on the roof about halfway up but if you stop to read it, you'll lose your place in line. It wasn't a busy day and we went late in the afternoon during summer. Not many people at all and we still spent about 40min per slide. Again, they wait until the individual is out at the bottom before they start the next person. Something I've not seen at other waterparks. The majority of the slide is a dark tunnel so it isn't fun. It felt like I was an extremely drunk passenger in a car. I imagine if you go on colder days it will be longer. I was told it's much busier after Summer since its indoors. 4 slides, long lines.

There is a food area up top over a corner of the area. We went between lunch and dinner so I cannot comment on the food. They do have little plastic cups that you can use to get a drink of water for free which I thought was very nice. There isn't any water fountains so this is the way to do it. It is much cooler up there and you can see the bottom of the blue, green and yellow slides from the top and inside the "wave pool" as well. We went up for the A/C.

The locker rooms aren't clean and they were extremely packed when we went. Perhaps that's due to the end of the day. We didn't rent lockers or bring anything in with us so it was just for restroom breaks and rinsing off. Both men and women enter the locker area and then the separate sides for men & women are right next to each other. There's an odd toilet display placed at that entrance.

Parking is ample and the lot was free of potholes and cracks. That was nice as we did have a wheelchair. Handicap parking is available and its accessible. But a dry pass is still $10.

Basically, we went to check out this airplane business and now we've done it and won't be back. But I think that's the goal all along. Their claim to fame. See the airplane, spend a ton, go home. Done. I only wish they'd consider a...

Myself, my husband and 7 year old daughter went on 11-3 pm on Sunday 2/4 with another couple and their 7 year old daughter and we rented a cabana for the 6 of us. Overall we had a fantastic time and Austin our cabana runner was awesome at keeping us informed and checking in on us (especially through some difficulties that were not of his making).

The tube-based waterslides (yellow, green and blue) were super fun and kept us trekking up the stairs with our kiddos who could not get enough of them. They also loved the water playground area with the smaller slides and the wave pool. After 4 hours of near nonstop play, they crashed on the way home!

Now to the reason only 4 stars - for one, it is pricey even for our family of 3 and the drinks and food offered for purchase (no outdoor food allowed) is pretty limited, especially if you have any food allergies or dietary intolerances. However, I will say the fresh fruit cup was of surprising quality and amount given the pricing of the other menu items.

Second, most of the cabana runners are young (under 21) and unable to take alcohol orders, they have to radio someone that is of age to come and verify physical IDs and provide additional bracelets, notify you of the alcohol rules and take the order. Note all consuming adults have to be present at the time the one person of age comes to your cabana which is difficult when parents are taking turns out in the pool or slides with the kids.

We were left for 20/30 minutes all confined to the cabana waiting for our drinks with no updates as to the issue. Austin our cabana runner came by to check on food and had to go find the person to get them to give us an update. We were provided the update (wines we ordered for the 2 of us wouldn't scan so they couldn't completed the transaction) but told it should be resolved soon, they had called someone to help. However, we still had to stay there for an unknown timeframe to be able to receive the ordered drinks. Given we had some background in service and POS systems, we asked about different ways that they may solve the issue, including scan another alcoholic beverage of the same value and adjust the inventory on the back end, but we were informed it was not possible. (The employee that was able to serve alcohol had no desire to try to work with the customer or attempt to solve the issue, we were just supposed to sit there. Almost an hour from our original drink order they finally informed us that they created a new button and could completed the transaction, 10 minutes later our dinks finally arrived. In the mean time our awesome, customer service-minded, 16 year old cabana runner, Austin, had come by at least 5 times, taken our limited food order and provided it, checked on us and kept getting status updates and generally wanting to work with us to make sure we were getting assistance and what we ordered. As a 16-year old Austin is well-ahead of his years with customer service skills and ability to make his customers feel they are being taken care of, we cannot compliment him enough.

The whole process for only being able to order alcohol needs to be streamlined/revamped. We suggest that IDs for beverages checked and wrist bands handed out upon check in and rules related to alcohol provided at that time (and the cabana registered for the certain number of 21+) or let people know where they can go if they don't want to do it at check in rather than being stranded in the cabana waiting for an of age person to come by.

Additionally, if the younger cabana runners could at least take orders from the patrons with the 21+ wrist bands to keep things moving and then an of age server actually enter them into the system/verify comply with the rules and run the drinks out etc.

Overall, the 4 adults in our group lost valuable time playing with their kids in the 4 hour block dealing with something that should have been relatively simple (order one drink each in a 4 hour time period) that could have been so much easier, even without the unfortunate...

Would love to give this place 5 stars, and will gladly update my review in the future if they’re able to improve.

Infrastructure: amazing! The creativity of design and the overall space is one of a kind. The windows both in the main floor and at the top of the water slides are impressive and create a majestic feel. The engineers and architects of this facility are truly world class.

Hospitality: unfortunately this area is extremely lacking.. It would help if they had anyone with a little bit of customer service training available for the initial welcome as you check in and pay (we pre-payed). The person who checked us in seemed to be a high school student who was equal parts hard to understand and rude. Neither my wife nor I knew what he’d said, as he rendered his “micro machines” (1980’s commercial) re-enactment which was ostensibly giving us information, but was actually a waste of time for us all.

We also had reserved a cabana which was supposed to come with water and food service. Only finally after we asked at the cafeteria area did we get someone to bring us water. We never did get food service, so we just got it ourselves. (Not a big deal, though they just should set the expectation differently). Also-big mistake since we’re extremely good tippers-haha

Food: since no outside food is allowed inside, there should be a natural opportunity to sell food to a captive audience. Unfortunately the food is absolutely uninspired low quality food that isn’t even appealing to hungry kids who’d just worked up an appetite swimming. It’s hard to make pizza this bad, for example, and the “avocado toast” is actually a small pre-packaged container of crackers and processed avocado spread that is laughable. Given that the owner of the facility also appears to own a successful vineyard and tasting room/restaurant, one would think that they could have decent food here. After eating the food at “Wings and Waves” even Denny’s quality food would sound appealing.

Overall experience: Again, an amazing venue that, as an aviation buff, I wanted to love. Unfortunately the combination of rude/poor service by some younger employees (who act like patrons are an annoyance) and the awful food, it makes Wings and Waves a place that is not nearly as pleasant an experience as it could be.

The team that manages this facility (and the aviation museum) is missing out on a major opportunity to make the experience one that engenders loyalty and repeated visits. If well managed, this place would be extremely popular and successful. The management group really needs to do some focus groups or market research to understand the perspective of visitors.

Hoping to edit my review to 5 stars in the future. I wish the best...