This week, we’re back to Canada, and back for another round of water parks. Summer’s almost over, folks, and the kids are almost back to school. Let’s enjoy the dog days of summer with another tale of an abandoned waterpark: Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild.

This time we’re back in Canada again. Yep! Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild was located in Lockport, Manitoba, a small town near Winnipeg. For Americans, go to Fargo, North Dakota, and then drive north four more hours.

Manitoba Tourism and the Genesis of Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild

In 1984, the Rural Tourism Industry Incentive Program of Destination Manitoba offered a grant of $150,000 to help fund the development of a major water park in Lockport. This assistance was part of a grant program designed to expand and promote the Manitoba tourism industry. Destination Manitoba was 60% federal and 40% provincial (state).

The owner group included Al Thompson, of the Skinner’s restaurant chain, and Wayne and Dave Babych. The Babych brothers played hockey in the NHL – Wayne in the late 70s through the late 80s, and Dave from 1980 to 1999.

Operational Years for Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild

Together, they built Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild, a waterpark in Lockport, Manitoba. “This is one of those landmarks that pretty much everyone in Winnipeg/Lockport knows about.” says blogger The Silent Road.

The park’s predominant feature was the four-slide complex in the middle. It was seven stories tall, and the slides were reportedly 425 feet long.

Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild officially opened in 1984, becoming the second largest water park in Manitoba. Aside from the slides, the park also featured baseball, mini-golf, bumper cars, golf course, and batting cages.

The snack building promoted nachos and mini donuts together at once, which sounds most triumphant to me. You can’t go wrong if that’s what you’re offering.

Reportedly, the park saw about 1200 tourists on an average weekend, but that was not considered to be as significant a tourist draw as had been hoped.

Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild Waterpark in its early abandonment. Photo by Daniel Brock via Flickr; used under CC BY NC 2.0.

Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild had a fairly nondescript operational lifetime, and to be honest, has been more interesting in its abandonment. It was the place of choice for school patrol weekends, day trips, and other small outings. Online, people remember the park fondly, if vaguely, with “good times” being a very common refrain. Other common refrains, however, are to the effect of the small size of the park, the poor functionality of the slides, and undesirable things being found in the water. A former visitor online opines: “I believe the issue was lack of maintenance and the slides got so worn down it was too expensive to fix them. The last few years they would scratch the shit out of you going down. I miss that place it was fun.”

View of abandoned Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild. Image courtesy Holly P.

Downfall of Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild

In the early 2000s, several summers were unseasonably cool. This kept attendance numbers low, severely hurting income. “We were closed 16 days in August last year,” the owner remembers in an article at the time.

Sketch of the abandoned Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild Waterpark by me, The Abandoned Carousel.

“Hard to stay in business when you can only be open for 2-3 wks max during the summer,” comments one former visitor online.

“Our expenses keep going up. Taxes and insurance were big factors,” says owner Al Thompson in an interview with the Winnipeg Free Press at the time. Liability insurance for an attraction of this type was costly, as were the expenses related to maintaining the slide structure after two decades of harsh Manitoba winters.

Competition with other local attractions, including the free Grand Beach and Victoria Beach, was also fierce. And of course, Fun Mountain, closer to Winnipeg, opened around the same time as Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild.

“Although maybe it’s worth noting that in my experience the park sucked when it was still open…overcrowded & there was only the one staircase to several slides. Apparently that’s why it was shut down, because it was a safety hazard”.

Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild closed in 2005.

View of the slide complex at the abandoned Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild. Image courtesy Holly P.

Abandonment of Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild

Thompson sold the park in 2007 to Santa Fe Developments, who were reportedly only interested in the land and not the waterpark as a business. It was reported that they were planning a housing development, but no work proceeded. Internet rumors suggest that the next decade’s worth of delays involved struggles with the city primarily over utility connections.

Unsurprisingly, the site became a haven for teenagers and urban explorers. Vandalism also became a concern, with a gazebo set on fire in 2017. Anecdotally, the park had lax security even when it was operational, leading teens and young adults to spend evenings casually trespassing at the operational park.

View of abandoned Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild. Image courtesy Holly P.

View from the top of the slide complex at abandoned Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild. Image courtesy Holly P.

Reportedly, during at least one Halloween, people dressed up and used part of the park for spooks.

2015 and 2017 interviews with the CBC describe safety concerns with the massive seven story slide structure, by this point missing steps and segments of the slides after suffering through decades of harsh winters. At some points, missing slide segments led to thirty foot drops straight down.

Sketch of the abandoned Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild Waterpark by me, The Abandoned Carousel.

Finally, reports surfaced of construction vehicles on site in 2017, after years of governmental concerns for safety.

“We’re sad to see it go because we’ve had a lot of, a lot of years of fun times, but it’s nice to see the next step,” said Skinner’s owner Brenda Thompson. Reportedly, by the time the slides were to be demolished, they would shake in the wind, and a number of pieces of the slide simply cracked and fell off, leaving thirty foot drops to the ground in places.

Sometime after October of 2017, the massive slide structure was finally demolished.

View of abandoned Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild. Image courtesy Holly P.

Interestingly, at least a few sections of the slides still live on, sold to private buyers for personal use.

Netflix’s How It Ends was filmed on location at the site, featuring the slides shortly before they were demolished.

Additional media usage of the site includes an independent film called The Goose, and the 2011 film Father’s Day.

The plan is for the site to become a residential housing development. Or at least, that was the plan at one time. Other information I’ve read indicates that the municipality has refused the idea of housing developments, townhouses, or condos, and that the land will be public green space. Only time can truly tell.

Sketch of the abandoned Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild Waterpark by me, The Abandoned Carousel.

Skinner’s Restaurant

The Skinner’s is still there, and still open. Oh, did I not get into that? The park was called Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild after the Skinner’s restaurant immediately adjacent to the waterpark. Remember, the Thompsons were partial owners of the park and are owners of the restaurant. Skinner’s is reportedly the oldest continually operating hot dog stand in Canada. The shop opened as a small stand in Lockport in 1929. Storekeeper Jim Skinner sold hot dogs for 10c and fries for 5c. Opening a store in the middle of the depression was a challenging act, but it proved to be a smart one, given the store’s track record.

The location of Skinner’s by the former waterpark is the “new” one, new since 1946, that is. Pictures online show black and white checked floors, red seats, and plenty of slick chrome details. “Growing up in the St. Andrews/Lockport area, I remember when they built Skinner’s Wet n’ Wild water park. Hell, who hasn’t worked at Skinner’s a summer or two! I hated having ice cream duty. Hard ice cream, the WORST. Having to stick your arm in gooey bucks all day, trying to get that perfect scoop. But it was almost like a right of passage having to put your time in at the legendary Skinner’s restaurant.”

Some philosophical graffiti at abandoned Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild. Image courtesy Holly P.

Comparing Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild and Lake Dolores

I thought it was interesting to look at Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild after Lake Dolores, as a nice little compare and contrast exercise. Both parks closed for good in 2004, yet the condition of Lake Dolores is beyond the pale in regards to damage, scrapping, and graffiti. At Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild, there’s some graffiti, yes, but not much. Only a little scrapping. Few smashed toilets! Windows still had glass in them for goodness sake! Is it just the cultural difference between Canadians and Americans? And Wet ‘n Wild was demolished in 2017, while Lake Dolores still remains standing and smashed.

But still, a similarity between the sites is the opinion of visitors that often they were both too far from major city centers. Of course, Lake Dolores was a solid two hours from both Los Angeles and Las Vegas. Lockport, in contrast, is a small town about 30 minutes from the major city of Winnipeg in Manitoba. Far enough to be inconvenient for things like school field trips and summer camps, particularly when a larger waterpark with more features existed just five minutes from Winnipeg. Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild was further away from the big city compared to the other park, and had fewer amenities. Given the competition and the short summers, it’s not surprising how things turned out. Yes, that larger waterpark, Fun Mountain, is still open.

The sun sets over the top of the slide complex at the abandoned Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild. Image courtesy Holly P.

Conclusions

No matter what, though, folks of course have strong memories about Skinner’s Wet ‘n Wild. Imagine the spooky thrill of seeing a shadowy green slide structure backlit by city lights at night, surrounded by inky darkness. Imagine too a bright sunny day, the chill of a wet swimsuit as you climb the stairs high up in the air; catching a warm breeze off the prairie; then the whoosh of the chlorinated water as you slip-slide down into a big splash, chasing the last glimmering days of summer.

A former visitor online sums it up perfectly.

“It is strange being old enough to remember places like this opening brand new, and seeing them dying like this thirty years later is evidence what was fun and adventurous to us in our youth has become irrelevant today.”

Remember that what you’ve read is a podcast! A link is included at the top of the page. Listen to more episodes of The Abandoned Carousel on your favorite platform: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Spotify | RadioPublic | TuneIn | Overcast | Pocket Casts | Castro. Support the podcast on Patreon for extra content! Comment below to share your thoughts – as Lucy Maud Montgomery once said, nothing is ever really lost to us, as long as we remember it.

Thanks to Holly for providing the inspiration for this episode, and for her lovely images of the abandoned waterpark.

If you enjoyed the show, please subscribe on your podcast app, and remember to tell a friend. I’d love to hear your stories, about this park, or anywhere else you’d like me to cover – drop me a line below.

As Lucy Maud Montgomery once said, nothing is ever really lost to us, as long as we remember it.

References

I’ve included a complete list of references used while researching this topic. It’s hidden under the link for brevity.

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