New Year Destination

New Year DestinationNew Year Destination

For those thinking of adding a swimming pool or hot tub, the UK’s only dedicated wet leisure exhibition, SPATEX 2019, is a must-attend. SPATEX is a shop window on all that is new and happening in hot tubs, swimming pools, spas, saunas, enclosures, steam rooms, all under one roof, at Coventry’s Ricoh Arena, from Tuesday to Thursday, January 29th to 31st. The exhibition offers a unique platform for free professional training and education and repeating last year’s success of a double parallel programme, seminars will run on all three days of the show.

SPATEX
Tel. 01264 358558
www.spatex.co.uk

The Fun Factor

The Fun Factor - Water Play

TheFunFactor

Think swimming, then think fun, with water leisure attractions one of the biggest draws for the modern holiday park destination.
Consistently one of the top holiday choice markers, a resort that offers the additional splash appeal, will reap the rewards, with not only a booking but those all-important repeat bookings. “More and more facilities are looking for resorts that offer more than just a pool,” explains Simon Smith of World Leisure. “Knowing how crucial it is to customer appeal, pools should be offering so much more than a basic swim,” he emphasises. World Leisure recently completed a £1.5m overhaul of the swimming pool facilities at Ribby Hall Village Holiday Park in Lancashire. Last December Ribby Hall won an unprecedented four Gold Awards at the UK Pool & Spa Awards. The new pool features new slides including a 48m interactive play slide. Swimmers can climb a tower to the top of the slide, which then takes them out of the building and back inside again. As they come down the slide, they can play an interactive touchpad game on the inside of the slide, with scores recorded once the ride is complete. Scores can be uploaded to social media platforms, with the top three scores displayed in the pool area. World Leisure also refurbished the splash pool and added an interactive aqua deck play structure, with tipping buckets and integral slides. A themed GRP (Glass Reinforced Polyester) toddlers’ pool links into the splash pool, with a slide and steps to open the pools up to all ages. World Leisure also installed a new sauna, steam room and feature showers, with all new filtration and controls. Mark Leech, senior manager of Ribby Hall Village, said: “It is important as a business to continually invest and improve the facilities we offer to our customers" Mark added: “We believe the new interactive slide and new splash pool features will be real talking points that will bring family visitors back again and again.”
Park operators need to provide appealing facilities for all age groups, with a typical water leisure offering including cannons, waterfalls, rain curtains, fl oor volcanoes and wall-mounted massage jets to add more attractions to the pools. Achieving this – and still providing an acceptable return on investment – requires very careful planning at the design stage, particularly where space is limited. Water slides and flumes have always been popular, but they require a significant capital investment, huge amounts of energy to drive massive pumps and constant life guarding.

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PLAY OFFERS WATER FUNPlayOffersWaterFun

The main aim of aquatic play equipment is to allow kids to have fun in a safe environment. Playing with water is also a vital part of a child’s development. Hippo Leisure’s modular play equipment, including Water Factories, Interactive Masts and Play Platforms are all extremely versatile products and can be expanded or updated to help to encourage regular, repeat visitors.
“What you’re aiming for in your facility is a way to keeping the whole family entertained, regardless of age or ability,” comments Teresa Metherell, Marketing Coordinator for Hippo Leisure. “This can be achieved by installing a variety of interactive water play features that provide both low level sensory play for toddlers as well as high level anticipatory and big splash play for older children and even adults,” she adds.
“It’s important to keep water play areas fresh and appealing.”

Hippo Leisure
Tel. 01752 771740
www.hippoleisure.com

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SPLASH PADS OFFER FAMILY APPEAL

SplashPadOfferFamilyAppealThe naturally inclusive and adaptable nature of a zero-depth splash park makes it an excellent amenity for holiday parks seeking to increase family attendance. Ustigate is a partner of Vortex International of Canada, offering a product portfolio of over 300 aquatic structures specifically designed to meet any specification, from low water consuming products for once use systems to super soaking buckets which create tidal waves.
The range includes many interactive free-standing products, the Water Journey collection, inspired by nature’s streams, and the Elevations range, are play structures that provide great combinations of water features between platforms of varying heights, encouraging children to climb and move between levels while engaging with children on and off the unit. The Elevations can be installed inside or outside, as part of a splash pad scheme or in a wading pool – They are designed to take fun to the max and are offered with a choice of water slides for the ride down.
Vortex is a world leader in aquatic play solutions, having completed 7000 installations in 45 countries, all of the products are renowned for being robust and innovative. Vortex recently announced the Explora collection has won two International Design awards, taking Gold in Leisure Games and Fun and Silver in the Social Impact category. Like all Vortex products, the Explora collection integrates a strong active play component that keeps children moving, pushing, pulling, spinning and exploring. The price of a typical splash pad depends mainly on three factors; size of the scheme, the type of water system – either a once-use or recirculating – and finally the selected water features. A typical once-use system would cost about £100,000 and the majority of recirculating systems are priced from £250,000.
Ustigate’s splash pad designers divide all waterplay installations into three bays; toddler, family and teen, in which they place specific products that are designed for each age group, therefore increasing play value and popularity. “By effective selection, combination and positioning of aquatic play features for your scheme, it will speak for itself and attract and retain customers naturally,” says Ustigate’s Ernie Hemming. “In addition, by using a range of colours, sensations of water and sleek designs, there won’t be any member of the family who will be able to resist playing!”

Ustigate Waterplay
Tel. 01322 424445
www.ustigatewaterplay.co.uk

Swim Star Opens Devon Splash Pad

splash padSwim Star Opens Devon Splash Pad

Olympic Gold-medallist swimmer Liam Tancock took time out from the fast lane recently to open the new Splash Zone at Ladram Bay Holiday Park in East Devon. Set alongside the park’s main swimming pool, the 160m2 zone includes interactive water features, spray guns, and even a sea serpent that sprays water. The ocean-themed Splash Zone is part of a £1 million investment made by the family-owned park in the run-up to the 2018 summer season when its 75 anniversary is being marked. With its own private beach and longstanding appeal to young families, Ladram Bay has prided itself on continually expanding its range of attractions.

In 2017 Ladram Bay Holiday Park approached Ustigate Waterplay to request a design and build program to establish a splash zone outside their indoor pool complex. The splash pad consists of 19 products to please all ages. There is a low level interactive fi sh, six jet stream geysers and six wave geysers to tickle small children and a boat feature, tipping bucket, cannons and a sea serpent to cater for all those that love nothing more than being soaked in splash. One of the wonders of a splash pad with zero standing water is the creation of an environment where children of all ages and abilities can access aquatic recreation and play together safely.

Ladram Bay director Zoe House, who is a member of the parkowning Carter family, said it was a great privilege to welcome Exeter-based Liam to Ladram Bay: “Although the Splash Zone is all about having fun, Liam knows that youngsters just enjoying themselves in the water can be a great introduction to swimming as a sport,” she said. “We have many guests which return here year after year, and we’re often told that one big reason is the wealth of things to do for all ages, no matter what the weather. “Our main aim has always been to create amazing holiday memories with fi rst-class facilities, and I think that our new Splash Zone comes right up to the mark,” added Zoe.

Ustigate Waterplay
Telephone: 01322 424445
www.ustigatewaterplay.co.uk

Swim To Win

Swim To Win

swim

Even parks with the most basic of wet leisure facilities can maximise the potential their offering with a few simple measures that will broaden appeal.

With water leisure at the top of many visitor priority lists, it is vital for holiday parks to continuously not just meet but exceed demands for safe and fun aquatic facilities.

Even parks with the most basic of wet leisure facilities can maximise the potential their offering with a few simple measures that will broaden appeal and keep the guests coming back time and time again.

“The pool is a vital tool in attracting and retaining new customers,” explains Kevin Christopher, leisure manager at Swanage Bay View Holiday Home Park in Dorset. “We do our utmost to provide an extensive range of pool-based activities, and are continually improving these to ensure that guests are more than satisfied with the offering.”

The indoor heated swimming pool at Swanage Bay View is open to guests and the public, and sees around 50,000 users on average each year. The pool plays host to an assortment of water activities as well as swimming sessions, including snorkelling, aqua fit classes, pool parties and the increasingly popular Waterwalkerz, which can be hired by guests on request.

Kevin comments: “We run Waterwalkerz sessions every weekend for our younger guests between the ages of five to sixteen, at a cost of £5 per session. “We have had the two Waterwalkerz for just over year now and they are certainly one of the most popular activities we run at the pool.”

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The Waterwalkerz at Swanage Bay View Holiday Park are a popular attraction at the poolside.

Haven holiday parks make the most of their swimming facilities by offering swimming lessons for children, amongst other pool-based activities. In partnership with the Swimming Teacher’s Association (STA), Haven provide Learn2Swim sessions for guests aged four and above, as well as parent and child Water Confidence sessions for youngsters between six months and three years of age.

Gordon Bush head of sports and leisure for Haven comments: “Many of our parks offer sessions to team members and their families and have also worked in partnership with local communities by inviting local schools onto park to access our lessons and facilities.

“Last year we taught nearly 18,000 guests in just one of our lessons. We trained a further 75 swimming teachers in 2014 and will look to train a further 60 in 2015 so that we can deliver this life skill to our guests of all ages.”

The indoor teaching pool at Haven Holiday Park in Burnhamon- Sea was recently transformed into a highly interactive water play area aimed at increasing water confidence among youngsters. Supplied by Hippo Leisure, the pool now features a short mast which supplies two interactive water channels with a flow of water. There are also large tipping buckets, water wheels and shark showers, which are suspended above the pool on a span pipe, with high level water spraying, tipping and showering at regular intervals.

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