If you think that Wild Waves is basically just an aquatic version of a carnie fair, filled with loose-screwed Twirly-Gigs and Vomitorium Octopuses and populated by the kind of people who have lower-back tattoos of the Batman logo and give zero fucks about "designated smoking areas," then you'd be right. But for a Midwest transplant like me, that's a welcome and familiar taste of the old dirt. Moreover! Wild Waves is one of the few semi-dangerous experiences you can still have in the greater Seattle area. That's worth something.
I decided to check out the water park on a recent Monday. I arrived at 3:30 p.m., which was two and a half hours before closing. Wait times are probably longer on weekends and in July and August. Also, I didn't ride all the rides. I couldn't do Hooks Lagoon because it was for children and I would be arrested. I didn't have time for the Raging River Ride, which looked jammed up anyway. Nor did I do Zooma Falls (aka "Big Red Slide") or Riptide, both of which were out of commission at the time.
ENTRY/EXIT TO PARK
Wait Time: Mild nightmare.
Security Level: Some police.
Obstacles: Waddling clumps of people blinded by their humongous, hard-won stuffed animals.
Joys: Watching teens smoke weed as they sit on tailgates.
Deep Sadnesses: Hidden fees. You can buy tickets online for $14.99, but really it costs $50: $10 for parking; $14 to rent the smallest locker (fits a small backpack), which includes a $5 deposit that you only get back if, by the end of the day, you return both the key and the flimsy paper wristband a young person will be kind enough to put on for you; and, finally, $14 to rent a white inner tube that you need in order to ride the big slides. If you don't want to pay for that tube, you have to wait in line for a slide-specific inner tube before you wait in line for the slide. This largely unsupervised customer-to-customer tube-exchange process adds maybe 5 to 10 minutes of wait time, depending on how alert you are. For the Do the Dew slide, a young girl who was really pushing the 42-inch-minimum ride height approached me, carrying an inner tube much larger than she was, and lisped through the gap in her front teeth, "Do you need a thingle tube, thir?" I did. Thus, I did the Dew.
THE MOUNTAIN DEW SLIDE COMPLEX
Wait Time: 20–30 minutes.
Security Level: Walkie-talkie-wielding, smiley lifeguards.
Obstacles: Screams echoing from the mouth of the orange flume. Unidentifiable pop music blaring from hidden speakers. Picking a slide: lime-colored slide versus lemon-colored slide versus orange-colored slide. Lime is uncovered, very fast. Lemon trades speed for torque and is covered. Orange is a compromise between the two. People leaned lemon.
Joys: The fastness of the lime-colored slide. The feeling of your chest hollowing out and your stomach leaping into it.
Deep Sadnesses: The slowdown area at the end, which makes you feel as if you've been caught having fun by the lifeguard waiting there. As if you were a sheep. A sheep of fun. A soaking-wet fun-sheep pooped out of the glee tube like the rest of 'em.
ACTIVITY POOL
Wait Time: 0 minutes.
Security Level: Young, vocal lifeguards.
Obstacles: All activities that are not the "drop slide."
Joys: The drop slide, a huge fake rock with two water-slicked chutes jutting out of the center of a large pool. The slide features an approximately three-foot drop to the water. Also great: overhearing boys talking about performing sweet slide moves (e.g., "360s off the drop").
Deep Sadnesses: Unclear rules regarding which fake rocks are okay to jump off of and which will garner yells and whistles and thumbs-downs from lifeguards.
KONGA SLIDES
Wait Time: 15 minutes.
Security Level: One guard, four slides.
Obstacles: Cold water dripping down from slides above you. Other people bumping into you with their cold inner tubes as they try to dodge drippage.
Joys: Plunging into the darkness of the purple slide. Little bullet holes of light shooting in from the rivet holes. Feeling like you're zooming through that one Korn video. Losing all sense of direction and gravity and time.
Deep Sadnesses: Tall stairs leading up to the top afford only a view of the traffic you'll be sitting in when you leave the park.
WAVE POOL
Wait Time: 0 minutes.
Security Level: DEFCON 2. Lifeguards are older-looking and hawkish, with whistles poised in their mouths. Plus, a scattering of moms.
Obstacles: Drowning. Elbows. Legs.
Joys: People jokingly booty-dancing to Kylie Minogue's pulsating 2001 hit "Can't Get You Out of My Head." Dads tossing kids at other kids. Lifeguards exchanging lots of thumbs-ups. Just treading water in crystalline liquid, being caught up in the slosh of a regulated wave.
Deep Sadnesses: Stray wristbands floating by. The realization that people won't get their locker deposits back.
FOOD CHOICES
Wait Time: 5–10 minutes.
Security Level: Mob rule.
Obstacles: Other people.
Joys: Witnessing a group of four girls devour an elephant ear in less than 10 seconds, and then watching the leader toss the paper plate in the trash while still chewing. Beer garden.
Deep Sadnesses: Advertisements for chocolate milk in 90-degree heat.
I wasn't at Wild Waves to have fun. I was there to inspect fun. But I ended up having a lot of it anyway, and so did many of the people I saw there. The signs said "No Running," but the kids were running everywhere. Preteens were on the lam. Teens were having clandestine, full-on make-out seshes in the shade of the ring-toss tent. Ice cream was being eaten in places where ice cream has never been eaten before. One did not feel overseen. 
