Resisting the Urge to Scream in Tenerife

...the words ‘I’ll try the Tower of Power’ came out of my mouth before I could stop them.

It all started pleasantly enough at the Siam Park, one of the main waterpark attractions in . Passing a lake of barking sea lions, I headed straight for the Lazy River.  On the slow rubber-ring tour I watched a small child drop delicately out of one of four chutes at the bottom of the Jungle Snake. I’ll try that ride first, I thought, deducing that it would be a gentle introduction to the waterpark experience. How wrong could I have been?

At the top of this Siam Park ride I was beckoned to one of the openings and given another rubber ring.  I quickly ended up hurtling almost upside-down through a pitch black tunnel feeling very disorientated and clutching my inflatable donut!

Moving swiftly on, I ventured on to The Volcano where, seated on a four person inflatable, I was pushed into the unknown depths of the tube. Myself and three strangers sat in silence, circling the echoing chamber a couple of times while smiling at each other politely, before screaming in unison as we were violently sucked down the final U-bend and into the pool below.

Feeling full of false bravado, the words ‘I’ll try the Tower of Power’ came out of my mouth before I could stop them. I slowly climbed the million steps leading to the pinnacle of the park’s scream-inducing rides.

‘Cross your arms and your legs and DON’T sit up,’ grinned the lifeguard. One minute I had an unrivalled view of the whole southern Tenerife coastline, the next a scream burst from my lungs as I plummeted 28 metres down a near-vertical drop towards a pool of sharks. I had just enough time for my brain to register not good before I whooshed past the sharks into a narrow plastic tube and was expelled at 50 kilometres per hour into the braking pool.

I was in shock. With a reputation to upkeep, it breaks my heart to admit that yes, I did scream like a schoolgirl; I’d just been on the best ride ever!

You can avoid the queues and book tickets for Siam Park and dozens of other Tenerife excursions.