Hamilton-Lowe Aquatics Center — Attraction in Moscow

I am so furious at the horrible way we were treated at this so-called 'family' center. The life guards are more concerned with bossing parents around than actually just watching out for drowning people-which is their job. I have a two year old so my husband and I put her in little arm floaties and HELD her in the 2 feet deep water to get her accustomed to the feeling of wearing the arm wings and being in the water. One of the life guards, who was a teenager, came over and started telling me that my daughter couldn't wear the arm wings in the pool or we had to go get a life jacket. We removed her from the main pool and took her to a little slide where yet another life guard approached and informed us that she couldn't wear any flotation device on the slide. At that point, the original teen lifeguard came and joined the second lifeguard in correcting us. All this time, my daughter was crying because she was being kept out of the water and was getting cold. I asked why she couldn't go on the slide and was told that the kids could get stuck or that they could be in danger if the arm wings popped. I then asked how my two year old would be safer WITHOUT any flotation if I didn't have a life vest. I even went and spoke to a manager who flat out told me that according to their policy, children without flotation wings are SAFER than a baby in arms wings being held by TWO parents because if the wings popped she could drown, or she might think she could swim further than she could and get into deeper water if she was wearing arm wings which is absurd because we were holding her. I tried to reason and explain how kids are safer with the arm wings and the manager wanted to know why my toddler needed them if she was being held. Again, I explained we were getting her used to wearing them and furthermore, that is not the decision of anyone except a child's parents. There is no reason why a couple of overly bossy teens should decide how a parent should teach their child to swim!! This was NOT family-friendly and totally ruined our trip. Even when we agreed to try a life vest, it made things worse because it literally tipped our daughter face-first into the pool which is WAY more dangerous than just letting her wear the arm wings while she was held by her parents. The logic is pure stupidity and I'm so annoyed that I wasted my time and money at the...

Dangerous & nerve-wracking experience . They won't let kids wear floaties but you can get a life jacket if you leave your car keys. It was way too big for my 5yr old. But they wont let you bring your own. They make you remove it every time the child goes down the slide which is about every 2 minutes. There's deep water just past the end of the slide so if the child keeps going past that point they can drown. But they don't allow floaties. They blow whistles & yell constantly at toddlers playing harmlessly on the small moose slide. A child was struggling & going under in the deeper water so I jumped in to pull her up. No lifeguard even saw her. Then they yelled at me for being in the water with a denim skirt even though i wasn't swimming, I was rescuing a child. My 5yr old daughter just stood around looking confused because she couldn't take 2 steps without a lifeguard whistling & yelling at her. They aren't helping those who need help & they ruin the fun & actually create a dangerous environment by not allowing you to bring floaties. We go in water all the time & my daughter does great with floaties. It was wearisome listening to the literally constant barrage of lifeguard whistles & them yelling. Gave us headaches. It was a very stressful & militant environment, will not waste our money...

Prices are fair and it COULD be fun if they had more options for toddlers. Took our 2.5 year old and she was having fun on the small moose slide until one of the lifeguards told me she couldn't go down it (even though she was being supervised by both parents). We left after that since there wasn't anything else for her to do (and I wasn't too happy to see another small child being allowed to go down the slide not even 5 minutes later by the same lifeguard).

I wasn't too impressed by the women's locker room. For opening day, it looked like it hadn't even been cleaned from the prior year and the showers weren't working. I can see it being great (cleanliness aside) for families without toddlers and if you can't swing the cash to go to Silverwood. But my family won't be returning for...