{"id":57018,"date":"2025-07-26T10:58:55","date_gmt":"2025-07-26T14:58:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=57018"},"modified":"2025-07-26T10:59:01","modified_gmt":"2025-07-26T14:59:01","slug":"river-ranch-resort-in-eastern-polk-county-opens-its-water-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2025\/07\/26\/river-ranch-resort-in-eastern-polk-county-opens-its-water-park\/","title":{"rendered":"River Ranch Resort in eastern Polk County opens its water park"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Summer has traditionally been a period of relatively low occupancy at Westgate River Ranch Resort, situated in eastern Polk County.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

That is changing with the recent opening of River Country Water Park, said Jim Szabo, River Ranch\u2019s executive general manager.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don’t know if you’ve been out here, but during the summertime, it’s really, really hot,\u201d Szabo said \u201cSo, no matter how nice it is and all the stuff we have, the one piece that was holding us back is not having that water feature. So by opening this park, I mean, it truly makes us all seasons now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Summer occupancy has tripled since River Country Water Park opened about a month ago, Szabo said. Westgate River Ranch Resort, located about 20 miles east of Frostproof in eastern Polk County, is staging a grand opening for the water park on July 28.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Covering 22,000 square feet, River Country Water Park<\/a> features a 281-foot water slide, a tube slide and a 35-foot freefall slide. For younger children, the attraction contains a splash pad, dump buckets, spray cannons and a waterfall shower.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAnd then they have the water guns themselves, which are cool,\u201d Szabo said. \u201cThey’re mounted, and you can sit there on your little pony and point a water gun and get mom and dad wet. I mean, that’s what I would do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The walk-in pool has a maximum depth of 6 feet. Children under 18 must be accompanied by an adult. Lifeguards are stationed by the pool, and life vests are available to swimmers, Szabo said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Guests can rent private cabanas at poolside, shaded areas outfitted with couches and chairs, TV screens, and a stocked refrigerator. A server is available to take orders of food and drinks, such as Cowboy Donuts and the Campfire, a s\u2019mores donut.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The attraction provides food and beverage options at Bar\u2019N and Bar\u2019N Bites. The former serves a range of libations, including such cocktails as 8 Second Mai Tai and Tipsy Gator. Bar\u2019N Bites serves burgers, tacos, and chicken tenders, among other items.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Summer has traditionally been a period of relatively low occupancy at Westgate River Ranch Resort, situated in eastern Polk County. That is changing with the recent opening of River Country… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":57020,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"14","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyNVwvMDdcL3VubmFtZWQtMy53ZWJwP2ZpdD0xMDI0JTJDNTc2JnNzbD0xIiwidHh0IjoiUml2ZXIgUmFuY2ggUmVzb3J0IGluIGVhc3Rlcm4gUG9sayBDb3VudHkgb3BlbnMgaXRzIHdhdGVyIHBhcmsiLCJ0ZW1wbGF0ZSI6ImhpZ2h3YXkiLCJibG9nX2lkIjoxNjMwNDA2NjF9.sD3jgDWf3VrTJjyQPQP1xrZwDpL3fxKyAtKCV7mUkGcMQ"},"version":2,"attached_media":[{"id":57020,"url":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/unnamed-3.webp","type":"image\/jpeg"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[14],"tags":[11912],"class_list":["post-57018","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-river-ranch-resort-in-eastern-polk-county-opens-its-water-park"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57018","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57018"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57018\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57021,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57018\/revisions\/57021"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57020"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57018"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57018"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57018"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}