“You guys are headed to Silverwood today? Us too!” some big kids in the breakfast lineup at our hotel asked when they heard my husband and kids talking about our trip to Silverwood Theme Park. You’re going to have the BEST time!!!” And then they went on to tell us that they had visited when they were younger and loved it and it had become a family tradition to revisit. So now my guys had it on good authority that they were going to a really cool place and they were totally excited. Silverwood was about a 30 minute drive away from Coeur D’Alene, Idaho, where we were staying and it was nice that it didn’t open super early; I think it opened at 11am the day we went so we had time to have a leisurely morning, get our stuff organized be ready for an adventurous day.
We decided to start at Boulder Beach first so we wouldn’t be too hot on the rides or too wet when we drove home. It might have been a better idea to do the theme parks rides first though and get wet and refreshed at the end because it was a little cold the morning that we went and it got a lot hotter later in the day.
Regardless of any chill in the air, my guys loved floating around on the lazy river (I think we went a dozen times) and splashing in the Polliwog Park area. They liked the independence of doing the mini-waterslides here and were told to wear a life-jacket so I liked that the water park had good attention to safety. We even went on our first family ride together: Avalanche Mountain and I realized that we have entered a new era of amusement park fun with my 6 years going on teenager sons.
We ate some pizza here that was decently priced and not crazy expensive so that was a nice surprise. We were also thankful that there were lockers that we could rent here to store our wet clothes.
As soon as the Bean saw the roller coasters, that is all he wanted to ride and miraculously he made the height restrictions for a few just by a few hairs. After we rode all the other rides we thought we would do for the day we let him try a big roller coaster. My heart was in my throat as he and my husband went up, up, up way above my head. My other son and I ate shaved ice and crossed our fingers that we would see the rest of our family again.
The Bean not only survived but was so incredibly inspired by his roller coaster ride he no longer wants to ride anything else. But that was enough of an adrenaline rush for me and we bribed the kids with carnival games and began our journey home. They are still talking about the great time we had at Silverwood and knowing how close Coeur D’Alene is from Seattle, I think we’ll be able to make this a bit of a tradition in our house too.
(PS. FYI. We were given tickets to visit Silverwood Theme Park but were not required to post and these opinions are our own. Thank you Silverwood!)
(PPS. I noticed that the soft serve, shave ice and slushee stand had all three different types of treats but I really wish they could put slushee and soft serve together because I’m obsessed with a treat from Canada called a Screamer and I’ve never seen it recreated anywhere else and this was the closest I’ve ever seen. Please let me know if this happens because that would be definitely be worth the drive from Seattle too! Have you ever had a treat like this?)
Terumi Pong is a Seattle-based family travel writer and mom of twin teenage boys. She loves coffee and pastries, shopping local and looking for greener ways to live. She is also known as Scout’s mom (Scout is a 5ish pound little black yorkie-poo)
Awww, this made me all fuzzy and nostalgic. I grew up in Redmond, and we visited Silverwood a few times before or after seeing grandma in Spokane. We always looked forward to our trips. I hope you and your family get to return many times.