Wow hearing that commercial literally brought tears to my eyes. Also I love that now Great Wolf Lodge is here however I honestly liked that camping experience that came with Manteca Waterslides. That's probably one of the best. I remember us being out there for a week at a time and it didn't feel like it.
I had a season pass every summer when I was a kid to manteca waterslides.. Was gonna get a job there my senior year but it closed two years before :( I miss this place every year when it gets hot! RIP Oakwood Lake
The song!!! I have always remembered that song and I am 31!! I was like 10 when I last went there or heard the song! Such a great place. I'll be going to the Manteca Great Wolf Lodge next month Jan 2022. But I know it will definitely not even compare.
Kris thank you so much for this video. I spent many summers there as well. I spent two of the greatest summers of my life there, '88, 89. My first real job at 16, I went to buy my season pass for my birthday in March, Mike Brown said you are old enough to work here now, a couple weeks later I was certified by the National Pool and Waterparks as a lifeguard. That was an awesome video, I look over that way every time I'm on highway 120, so many great memories of my teen age years, all under water now. Thanks for the memories Kris
Thank YOU, Doug for sharing your memories of this great "lost park." Be sure to share with anyone who has fond memories of this park - as well as with your favorite cable and local channels! We'd love to get on PBS and go STATEWIDE!
This was fantastic. There was and still is a mobilehome park that was at the very west side of the park that in 1988 I purchased a mobile there and raised my two children, still residing there today. My parents retired there as well. The entire water park was truly one of a kind. You would never get bored for lack of anything to do. Just walking the grounds and talking to the day visitors, or the overnight (and longer) campers was worth the walk. The concerts were way beyond anything you could experience today, for sure, being out of doors. There was no need for security walking around with guns all the time....everyone just got along, or they left. And, the new homes, and the transplants from elsewhere in the bay area, think they are something special because of the size of their homes. If they only knew....My kids were there all summer, and then got their first jobs there, summer after summer. They were the biggest employer in the area for miles around.Thank You Kris! And, it was good to see Mike Brown again, after all these years. Great, well done video of my home!!~
My dad used to take my brother and I to Manteca Waterslides when we were kids. It was awesome because the slides were so gentle that you could put out your arms and hold yourself in one spot in the waterslide. Then my brother would crash into me. Then dad would crash into both of us and we'd tumble down the slide the rest of the way. It's AMAZING none of us were ever seriously injured doing this.
We used to go there in the 1970s with a group of friends. After going on the water slide over and over, we would lay on the grass in the sun...and still feel the swaying motion, side to side, as though still on the water slide. Some of my best childhood/teen memories are of visits to the Manteca Water Slides.
This video was awesome. I had my senior picnic here (c/o 1991) and I will never forget the fun we all had as teenagers here. The slides were awesome and there was always something to do. The scenery was great, the rides awesome and the staff were always friendly. It saddens me still that this amazing place of so many of my childhood memories is gone. :-( Thanks for this video.
Hervin Balfour Thank YOU for enjoying it! Feel free to share with your favorite local TV station or streaming service - we'd love to expand our audience and bring back more memories!
Kris you rock man! I have been wanting someone to do this for years! I went there as a kid. I am 33 now with a 5yr old daughter and 2yr old son. I am sad I can not take them to experience the fun times I had but I am hopeful they build new waterslides.
Coming form you guys - that means quite a bit! Thanks for sharing your thoughts - we'll look forward to what you think of our other projects soon, too!
One of my favorite slides at Manteca I forget the name, it was like "The Edge" or "The Plunge" not sure, but it was the longest slide they had in terms of time. It started out as an open cement slide with plants growing on either side of it as it hugged the edge of the hill and I remember the person would disappear almost immediately from sight. It would eventually become a fiberglass slide on the way down. You would wind down in a much wider path than any of the other slides. Eventually it came to a pool of water, where sometimes there was a life guard shooing people along, sometimes not, if not you could hang out in this pool dedicated to one slide. Then you could continue on and slide down even further. I remember at some point in the mid-late 90s that pool and beyond it were routed and the whole slide was shortened. A few years went by and you could just look down from the stairs and see this old pool of water that no longer connected to anything. Eventually the entire slide was shut down. Omg that wristband. So much fun. One of the best places on Earth. Visited every summer from 1991-1998 with my swim team the Belmont Bullets in Stockton.
I’ve beeen to many water parks all over the country and still haven’t matched the experience of Manteca . I grew up in the bay so I went to raging waters majority of the time but nothing compares to Manteca I tell my kids about it and for them it’s a like a legend .
Thanks again Kris > Love these films and what you are doing . Used to roll out there from Pleasanton with friends in 76'-78' and see how far up the sides we could get ....we were 17/18 we skateboarded in pools The slides were so fun AND fast on hot Summer days. Also, camped out there once. Now my friends just bought a home on the lake I must visit. They were the pioneers of Waterslides ! I am sharing all of your films with friends ;)
Oh man the memories. . .I spent a lot of summers in the there as a kid back in the mid-90's. At first I was too afraid of the Rampage slide- it just seemed too fast and so tall with what looked to me a near vertical drop, but it wound up becoming my favorite slide. Only downside was hauling that yellow, heavy duty plastic toboggan up the hill. . . It's heavy as fk when your 12. >_< I remember breaking the park's time limit rule a few times by swapping those colored rubber mats they told us to get when we entered the slides. Occasionally there'd be a mat stuck to the inside of the tubes here and there and I'd go retrieve it when I knew my color was up. :-P You'd think the lifeguards would be all over you, but I guess they knew I'd have to stop eventually 'cause my eyes would start to burn from all the chlorine. lol My only regrets were that I never got to go bungie jumping or drive the Go-Karts 'cause I wasn't old enough. . . By the time the V-Max slide debuted we had already stopped going because my mom couldn't afford it anymore. :-(
Rampage slides today seem far too dangerous - but it was a different time then, huh? Be sure to share with anyone who has fond memories of this park - as well as with your favorite cable and local channels!
Oh man I just now found this video. As I was thinking of the waterslide park in Manteca when I was a kid in the 80's. Wanted to take my kids down to California to this park Sad to find out its gone. I guess I'll go back to my hometown and take them to GAmerica or RaginWaters. I remember being afraid of the Rampage slide! To be honest I was petrified, but a teacher I was with literally made me get on it.
I lived in Manteca for a few years when I was in high school. We just called it Oakwood Lake. I have good memories riding my bike out to the lake. We would ask people leaving to give us their arm bands and we would get in for free. My very first concert ever was at Oakwood lake Y&T. yea we didn't pay for that either. lol
Another excellent video! Once again, I can't tell you the last time I watched a video on RUclips that was longer than like 3 minutes. Very entertaining and informative, with a great mix of footage from then and now. More!
This place was a big part of my child hood! My grandma and grandpa worked and lived there through out my child hood. You pulled into the park and followed the road and across from the actual enterance to the park by the office across the road from that was my grandparents house. I went there from when i was like 4 or 5 to when they closed. A lot of my cousin and my sister had there first jobs there. I miss it. We knew the Browns who owed it.
I was so little when my mom would take me and I remember how fun it was and I remember when the vmax first came out the lines were so long and so scary going up those stairs every time you look down you get nervous but I was terrified I was so little but my mom told me too and I ended up doing it and I LOVEEEDDD IT!
Great info... but missing some trivia. There was a Coca Cola commercial that was partially filmed there in 1979 where they showed a slow motion of kids as they were spit out at the bottom of one of the slides. Great fun place.
Wish we could have gotten everything - there was just SOOOO much to get into one episode! Be sure to share with anyone who has fond memories of this park - as well as with your favorite cable and local channels!
We had our senior picnic there too, class of 95 Amador Valley Highschool, Pleasanton. Miss the place dearly. They should rebuild this, it would be a hit.
our family went to the water slides in 1974 when they first opened for years. I remember going down the first slide and landing in a small square tub and I swear but I could be wrong did the second slide end up in the lake? I cant remember...I do remember them being cement and we could ride for 1 hour and I think it cost us a dollar. I thought we got our hand stamped before they switched to mats but geez my memory is bad but it was so much fun Im now 50 so I would have been 9 crazy =(
Used to go every summer when I was a kid. I still have a scar above my left eyebrow from when I hopped the railing and slipped and landed on my face. There was a lot of blood.
+Kris Rowberry Last I read Great Wolf pulled out but the development company is in talks with another operator that wants double the land Great Wolf wanted. Said they should have something in place by the end of the year.
I grew up near here and never got to go. I watched a video about how the gov passed some law they knew mantica couldn't ever make possible and it was dumb. My dad said it was one of the best 👌
Thank you, KillJoy83! Feel free to share the video with your favorite cable channels and production companies - we'd love to spread the concept to the rest of the country!
Brings tears to my eyes even after all these years. I'm sad that my children will never know the one and only Manteca Waterslides.
Brings me to tears. I miss this place so much. None of the other parks had its charm.
I really miss this park and was very sad to see it go....
Wow hearing that commercial literally brought tears to my eyes.
Also I love that now Great Wolf Lodge is here however I honestly liked that camping experience that came with Manteca Waterslides. That's probably one of the best. I remember us being out there for a week at a time and it didn't feel like it.
Listen, I'm not even from Manteca but this goddamn song has been stuck in my head since 2003 when I'd visit my grandparents in Manteca.
It's an ear worm for the ages!
My childhood was epic because of this place . Some of the best memories were made here camping and swimming with friends and family !
I had a season pass every summer when I was a kid to manteca waterslides.. Was gonna get a job there my senior year but it closed two years before :( I miss this place every year when it gets hot! RIP Oakwood Lake
The song!!! I have always remembered that song and I am 31!! I was like 10 when I last went there or heard the song! Such a great place. I'll be going to the Manteca Great Wolf Lodge next month Jan 2022. But I know it will definitely not even compare.
Kris thank you so much for this video. I spent many summers there as well. I spent two of the greatest summers of my life there, '88, 89. My first real job at 16, I went to buy my season pass for my birthday in March, Mike Brown said you are old enough to work here now, a couple weeks later I was certified by the National Pool and Waterparks as a lifeguard. That was an awesome video, I look over that way every time I'm on highway 120, so many great memories of my teen age years, all under water now. Thanks for the memories Kris
Thank YOU, Doug for sharing your memories of this great "lost park." Be sure to share with anyone who has fond memories of this park - as well as with your favorite cable and local channels! We'd love to get on PBS and go STATEWIDE!
This was fantastic. There was and still is a mobilehome park that was at the very west side of the park that in 1988 I purchased a mobile there and raised my two children, still residing there today. My parents retired there as well. The entire water park was truly one of a kind. You would never get bored for lack of anything to do. Just walking the grounds and talking to the day visitors, or the overnight (and longer) campers was worth the walk. The concerts were way beyond anything you could experience today, for sure, being out of doors. There was no need for security walking around with guns all the time....everyone just got along, or they left. And, the new homes, and the transplants from elsewhere in the bay area, think they are something special because of the size of their homes. If they only knew....My kids were there all summer, and then got their first jobs there, summer after summer. They were the biggest employer in the area for miles around.Thank You Kris! And, it was good to see Mike Brown again, after all these years. Great, well done video of my home!!~
A quick road trip every summer from Stockton, now it's gone. Along with Golfland.
My dad used to take my brother and I to Manteca Waterslides when we were kids. It was awesome because the slides were so gentle that you could put out your arms and hold yourself in one spot in the waterslide. Then my brother would crash into me. Then dad would crash into both of us and we'd tumble down the slide the rest of the way.
It's AMAZING none of us were ever seriously injured doing this.
You're quite welcome! Part of the fun of doing this series is to watch people light up with their memories, so MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!
13:46 my childhood
I went to my first concert there, it was Night Ranger opening for DIO back in 1986
We used to go there in the 1970s with a group of friends. After going on the water slide over and over, we would lay on the grass in the sun...and still feel the swaying motion, side to side, as though still on the water slide. Some of my best childhood/teen memories are of visits to the Manteca Water Slides.
This video was awesome. I had my senior picnic here (c/o 1991) and I will never forget the fun we all had as teenagers here. The slides were awesome and there was always something to do.
The scenery was great, the rides awesome and the staff were always friendly. It saddens me still that this amazing place of so many of my childhood memories is gone. :-( Thanks for this video.
Hervin Balfour Thank YOU for enjoying it! Feel free to share with your favorite local TV station or streaming service - we'd love to expand our audience and bring back more memories!
Kris you rock man! I have been wanting someone to do this for years! I went there as a kid. I am 33 now with a 5yr old daughter and 2yr old son. I am sad I can not take them to experience the fun times I had but I am hopeful they build new waterslides.
Thanks for the compliment! We're so excited to be able to bring back people's great memories of these long gone parks!
wow thank you for doing this video brought back so many early childhood trips there!!!
Coming form you guys - that means quite a bit! Thanks for sharing your thoughts - we'll look forward to what you think of our other projects soon, too!
One of my favorite slides at Manteca I forget the name, it was like "The Edge" or "The Plunge" not sure, but it was the longest slide they had in terms of time. It started out as an open cement slide with plants growing on either side of it as it hugged the edge of the hill and I remember the person would disappear almost immediately from sight. It would eventually become a fiberglass slide on the way down. You would wind down in a much wider path than any of the other slides. Eventually it came to a pool of water, where sometimes there was a life guard shooing people along, sometimes not, if not you could hang out in this pool dedicated to one slide. Then you could continue on and slide down even further.
I remember at some point in the mid-late 90s that pool and beyond it were routed and the whole slide was shortened. A few years went by and you could just look down from the stairs and see this old pool of water that no longer connected to anything. Eventually the entire slide was shut down.
Omg that wristband. So much fun. One of the best places on Earth. Visited every summer from 1991-1998 with my swim team the Belmont Bullets in Stockton.
Grew up at the manteca waterslides. Thanks for so many memories bring it back!
Thanks for watching!
I loved the Manteca Water Slides...that's where we spent our whole summer growing up...I didn't like the v-max too much (scary, and scratched my back)
Manteca Waterslides was incredible. Really missed it this weekend when we had a terrible experience at Sunsplash
I remember when California was fun. What happen? Why California. I remember my childhood was fun but now I don't see California like I used to know..
I’ve beeen to many water parks all over the country and still haven’t matched the experience of Manteca . I grew up in the bay so I went to raging waters majority of the time but nothing compares to Manteca I tell my kids about it and for them it’s a like a legend .
Kris awesome video! thank you for checking out my Manteca waterslides vid!
Thanks again Kris > Love these films and what you are doing . Used to roll out there from Pleasanton with friends in 76'-78' and see how far up the sides we could get ....we were 17/18 we skateboarded in pools The slides were so fun AND fast on hot Summer days. Also, camped out there once. Now my friends just bought a home on the lake I must visit. They were the pioneers of Waterslides ! I am sharing all of your films with friends ;)
Oh man the memories. . .I spent a lot of summers in the there as a kid back in the mid-90's. At first I was too afraid of the Rampage slide- it just seemed too fast and so tall with what looked to me a near vertical drop, but it wound up becoming my favorite slide. Only downside was hauling that yellow, heavy duty plastic toboggan up the hill. . . It's heavy as fk when your 12. >_<
I remember breaking the park's time limit rule a few times by swapping those colored rubber mats they told us to get when we entered the slides. Occasionally there'd be a mat stuck to the inside of the tubes here and there and I'd go retrieve it when I knew my color was up. :-P You'd think the lifeguards would be all over you, but I guess they knew I'd have to stop eventually 'cause my eyes would start to burn from all the chlorine. lol
My only regrets were that I never got to go bungie jumping or drive the Go-Karts 'cause I wasn't old enough. . . By the time the V-Max slide debuted we had already stopped going because my mom couldn't afford it anymore. :-(
Rampage slides today seem far too dangerous - but it was a different time then, huh?
Be sure to share with anyone who has fond memories of this park - as well as with your favorite cable and local channels!
Oh man I just now found this video. As I was thinking of the waterslide park in Manteca when I was a kid in the 80's. Wanted to take my kids down to California to this park Sad to find out its gone. I guess I'll go back to my hometown and take them to GAmerica or RaginWaters. I remember being afraid of the Rampage slide! To be honest I was petrified, but a teacher I was with literally made me get on it.
I heard a really cool family used to help run this place... must have been some amazing memories :)
Loved this place.
Oh Kris this is a great report. Keep up the good work
Thanks - be sure to share with anyone who has fond memories of this park - as well as with your favorite cable and local channels!
I lived in Manteca for a few years when I was in high school. We just called it Oakwood Lake. I have good memories riding my bike out to the lake. We would ask people leaving to give us their arm bands and we would get in for free. My very first concert ever was at Oakwood lake Y&T. yea we didn't pay for that either. lol
Another excellent video! Once again, I can't tell you the last time I watched a video on RUclips that was longer than like 3 minutes. Very entertaining and informative, with a great mix of footage from then and now. More!
This place was a big part of my child hood! My grandma and grandpa worked and lived there through out my child hood. You pulled into the park and followed the road and across from the actual enterance to the park by the office across the road from that was my grandparents house. I went there from when i was like 4 or 5 to when they closed. A lot of my cousin and my sister had there first jobs there. I miss it. We knew the Browns who owed it.
i even lived there at one point.
I like when the guy pops out of the old slide 😏
Brings back great memories. Thank you for the video!
I was so little when my mom would take me and I remember how fun it was and I remember when the vmax first came out the lines were so long and so scary going up those stairs every time you look down you get nervous but I was terrified I was so little but my mom told me too and I ended up doing it and I LOVEEEDDD IT!
I wonder if the vmax is bigger than the drop at atlantis??
I remember going as a child!
Great info... but missing some trivia. There was a Coca Cola commercial that was partially filmed there in 1979 where they showed a slow motion of kids as they were spit out at the bottom of one of the slides. Great fun place.
Wish we could have gotten everything - there was just SOOOO much to get into one episode!
Be sure to share with anyone who has fond memories of this park - as well as with your favorite cable and local channels!
We had our senior picnic there too, class of 95 Amador Valley Highschool, Pleasanton. Miss the place dearly. They should rebuild this, it would be a hit.
Great job!
our family went to the water slides in 1974 when they first opened for years. I remember going down the first slide and landing in a small square tub and I swear but I could be wrong did the second slide end up in the lake? I cant remember...I do remember them being cement and we could ride for 1 hour and I think it cost us a dollar. I thought we got our hand stamped before they switched to mats but geez my memory is bad but it was so much fun Im now 50 so I would have been 9 crazy =(
Used to go every summer when I was a kid. I still have a scar above my left eyebrow from when I hopped the railing and slipped and landed on my face. There was a lot of blood.
This video is a few years old... Will there ever be a replacement park???
There's still talk about the Great Wolf Lodge - but no progress yet.
+Kris Rowberry Last I read Great Wolf pulled out but the development company is in talks with another operator that wants double the land Great Wolf wanted. Said they should have something in place by the end of the year.
Good video BTW you got a new subscriber
Does anyone know where those slide pieces ended up?
I grew up near here and never got to go. I watched a video about how the gov passed some law they knew mantica couldn't ever make possible and it was dumb.
My dad said it was one of the best 👌
Manteca waterslides used to be OG l!T fr. RIP
RIP indeed.
I never got to go on v-max. I miss the ride where you rode on yoga mats.
Thank you, KillJoy83! Feel free to share the video with your favorite cable channels and production companies - we'd love to spread the concept to the rest of the country!
i miss it too alot
I really hope you do a feature on San Francisco's Playland at the Beach.
We've got it planned as our series finale! But, that doesn't mean we won't be featuring some S.F. parks in the meantime...STAY TUNED in 2014!
Remember the trapeze hanging down for water skiing around the lagoon?
What about the new indoor park, what ever happen to that ?
damn you gray davis!
Turbo Tubes!
r.i.p
Freaking Gray Davis..........
They killed manteca