The White Mountains of New Hampshire are filled with family friendly outdoor adventure options. During our ten days there we hiked, biked, kayaked, zip-lined, and swam. But we also enjoyed two great theme parks. Our morning at Clark’s Trading Post was filled with fun, and our two afternoons at Santa’s Village were even better. Both parks were clean, reasonably priced, and filled with a wide variety of rides that kept everyone entertained, including mom and dad.
I was initially suspicious of the whole Christmas in Summer concept. But when we walked through the gates of Santa’s Village and smelled roasted nuts, and heard Elvis crooning Christmas tunes I immediately bought in. Max and Theo’s reaction was even stronger. They were ready to stay. Forever. Good thing mom had decided that we should come after 3pm so that our tickets were good for an entire second day. A pretty sweet deal if you ask me.
During our first visit the boys quickly discovered the water slides and they wanted to ride them again and again. The lines were not long so that’s exactly what we did. Apparently Stephanie also really enjoyed the slides. Theo may have beat her to the bottom on this trip, but mom (check the purple slide) scored more style points with her hands free approach!
During Max and Theo’s multiple water slide runs Wesley was more than happy to explore the rest of the water park. Here he casually cools off his fingers while watching all of the action on the slides.
When we returned two days later Wesley shared his discoveries with Max and Theo and they put on an artistic water show purely for their own enjoyment.
After we dried off and shared some snacks we decided to explore the rest of the park. The boys loved every ride that we went on, and just like on the water slides, they wanted to go repeatedly. The short and occasionally nonexistent lines made this possible every time. Next to Elvis blasting over the park’s excellent sound system, these short lines may have been my favorite part about Santa’s Village. The rest of our afternoon went like this:
The boys mastered the “Red Hot Racers.”
Screeched and screamed on “Rudy’s Rapid Transit Coaster.”
And experienced zero gravity on “The Chimney Drop.”
Oh yeah, as I mentioned earlier, mom and dad had plenty of fun too.
But the highlight of our second afternoon at Santa’s Village was clearly the “Yule Log Flume.” We made it over to this corner of the park about a half hour before closing time. The boys crammed in several repeat trips and, you guessed it, could have kept going and going.
This ride, like all of Santa’s Village, was charming and attractive.
The approach to the top of the flume filled the boys with the perfect combination of anxiety and excitement. Notice the hands gripping the railing.
And the drop itself? Pure theme park bliss! Better than your biggest present on Christmas morning!
Of course, the boys got a little wet!
But they dried off on this funky retro slide outside the gates of the park.
As we headed back to our truck we overhead another family of five, with older kids, laughing and talking about how they broke their record from last year. Intrigued, I eavesdropped to try and find out what record they broke. I found out. Last year they had gone down the “Yule Log Flume” 13 times. This year they made it to 14.
I felt like they were throwing down a challenge to the other families walking back to their cars, trucks, and mini-vans. My competitive juices started flowing. As if we even needed another reason to plan a return trip to Santa’s Village…
Onward.
