The North Arundel Aquatic Center has been on my to do list for a long time. It is a water wonderland for the whole family, with three sessions per day, but access is limited! This helps it from getting too crowded and allowing for more open space.
They only sell 125 tickets for each session. The water park has three sessions (11:00-12:30; 12:45-2:15; and 2:30-4:00). You have to create an account and each day they open up the tickets at 11:59pm the night before. We went with friends that got our tickets right at midnight. When I checked at 6 am, the morning of our session, there were 40 spaces left and then at 7 am there were 15 left so, I think in most cases you are safe to buy the tickets the morning of as long as it is early enough. They do sell some tickets onsite, but I wouldn’t chance it. It is $7 for an adult and $5 for a child.
Children have to be 3 or older to use the water park and they have to be potty trained.
We got there 20 minutes before our session, got yellow wristbands, checked in and then waited until they let us enter the indoor water park. The waterpark itself was very clean. They have a large slide where you have to be taller than 48 inches and a short slide where you have to be less than 48 inches. They have many different pool sections for everyone including shallow pools for the littles. There is a fun whirlpool where all the kids move in a circle and create a whirlpool. There are some splash pad elements like buckets that fill up and dump and different spray features you can play with near the smaller slide. They have a hot tub for adults only so you can relax in a hot tub while your child plays – if they are safe enough on their own. There are also bleachers and benches all around for the adults. My son and his friend had a blast and the hour and a half went by really quickly. You really can’t beat the experience for the price. We stopped at the Severna Park Taphouse on the way home for lunch and had ourselves a fantastic morning.