Family fun at Silverwood or as I have come to call it SilverWON'T

We took the kids to Silverwood last week and while we did have a really great time for the two days we spent there there was one thorn in my side about the trip... and that was the lack of vegan food and the lack of information about vegan options in the park.  That and coming from a girl who grew up in California with access to Disneyland, Magic Mountain, Universal Studios, Knott's Berry Farm, Six Flags, WaterWorld, Raging Waters and more I have HIGH expectations when it comes to theme parks and Silverwood ALWAYS seems to fall short for me, it just seems like a slightly more upscale version of your State Fair and when compared to the cost of parks that offer so much more than they do I find them HIGHLY over priced.  However... it is the ONLY game in town here so folks line up with their money in hand to get in and spend the day.  My kids are young enough that they don't really remember how awesome the theme parks in California are so they absolutely LOVE Silverwood and I try my best to enjoy it vicariously through their eyes. There is the amusement park side with a couple roller coasters, a small area with 5 or 6 tame rides for the littlest kiddos, a log ride, super fun river raft ride (which is always our favorite!), bumper cars and bumper boats, a couple of your typical spin-you-around-until-you-want-to-vomit type rides, carnival games, a train tour and carousel. And then on the other side of the park is a waterpark with some really great watersides, two wave pools, an awesome lazy river and super cool kids play area/climbing structure with big and little kid slides.  Honestly if it wasn't for the waterpark part of Silverwood I would not even want to go, the waterpark is the best thing it has going for it.  We spent HOURS floating the lazy river, and there is a swim up bar (yippee!) so you can get yourself a fruity adult beverage to float around with :)  Just make sure you figure out a way to bring some money in your swim suit (hello boobies!)  Note to mamas:  The waves in the wave pools can get CRAZY, I stayed towards the "shore" with my 3 year old and my 7 year old ended up going out a bit too far, got caught up in the sideways waves they were making at the time and had to have a lifeguard jump in after him all while I was stuck in the shallows with the little one.  I felt like such a horrible mom in that moment, what do you do??? Leave the little one alone and go in after him?  Well in the 10 seconds it took me to work it through in my mind the lifeguard jumped in and pulled him out and he was fine, no worse for wear just a little embarrassed.  He can swim but those waves were just too much for him, so I told him he always has to wear a vest in the wave pool no matter what.  I would recommend the same for any kids going into those wave pools that are not exceptionally strong swimmers, in fact I think it should be a policy of the park.  As big and strong as they make those waves, it is just way too easy for kids to get stuck in them.  Just my little FYI so you don't experience that same moment of terror I had.  Aside from that moment of drama we really enjoyed ourselves, my 3 year old Bella decided she was a mermaid and never wanted to leave the water.  She swam and played in the water so much both days that when we finally forced her out she was falling asleep within minutes :)

Anyway about the food... I wanted to plan ahead and know what was vegan to eat from the stands and restaurants within the park so I wrote to management a week before we were going and asked what they had to offer vegans to eat in the park.  The response I got back was so lacking in information or help it really kind of pissed me off.  This is the was the email conversation I had with the park staff:

Hello, my family is planning a visit to Silverwood and I would like to find out if any of the restaurants offer vegan dining options? Please let me know what, if any, vegan items are served in your park. A vegan item is one that is free of any animal flesh or animal derived ingredients such as eggs and dairy products (milk, cheese, cream etc).

Also are wagons allowed in the park?

Thank you in advance for your help.

Ash Menacho
Silverwood Theme Park 

Ash,

 

We do have salads and some menu items that would work with your vegan diet. It will take some work on you part and we would recommend you speak with an employee before ordering so you can make sure that what you are getting will work for you. The other option is to just pack your own food and eat is out in the grassy area next to our parking lot. We do have a few table out there as well as plenty of room for a blanket picnic.

So it took them almost a week to get back to me and I started to wonder if they would ever write back so I called and spoke to someone who said they had "No idea what might be vegan in the park" and suggested we bring in our own food.  If you have food allergies or other dietary restrictions you can pack food into the park if you leave it in the fridge within the first aid center, you just have to go back there to get it when you want to eat.  Be advised you can NOT take a cooler into the park.  You can take your food in in ANYTHING but a cooler (we learned the hard way).  


When we got into the park I stopped to look at the menus at a couple of the places and there was NOTHING suitable, even the salads they mentioned in the email (which btw I didn't receive until the first day we were already at the park... lot of good that did us :/) were covered in meat and cheese.  As a mom with 3 kids I did not appreciate knowing that if I wanted to eat from the places in the park I would have to stop at each place and try to figure out if there was anything vegan there and if not then haul my hungry kids to the next place in an endless cycle of trying to find something to eat... it just seemed like it would turn into such a nightmare for us and totally take away from the fun and relaxation we were trying to enjoy on our trip. 

So we decided to take our own and I spent the better part of the day before we left preparing the food for our trip.  We decided to take our own food for every meal and snacks, rather than take any chances on not being able to find something to eat there.  My love of packing and list making and organization kicked in and I decided to just make the best of it and have fun making sure everyone had enough yummy fun food for 2 days.

I started off with a rough draft of the meal planning

Breakfast for Gabe Day 1 - Cereal in Ziploc "bowl," spoon, poptart and banana.

Once I had the meals planned I got to packing.  Each person had a Ziploc for each meal for the day and one for snacks.

Those then when into big grocery bags for each meal each day.

 And each bag was labeled to let me know what meal it was.
This is Breakfast for Day 2

A days worth of meals.  The ones that were getting left in the fridges in the park had our last name on them as well.

Lunches for the kids consisted of homemade Uncrustables, chips, cookies and pudding.

Grownups had Tofurkey, Daiya, and lettuce sandwiches with vegan mayo.
Hint:  Put your mayo in between slices of Tofurkey or cheese (not right on the bread)
to keep your sandwich bread from getting all nasty and soggy. 
I packed these sandwiches for lunches both days and the ones for day two
were just as yummy and fresh as the ones from the prior day.

Snacks were Primal vegan jerky, vegan fruit snacks, fruits and vegan "Pocky Sticks."













Pocky Sticks are a treat that my kids used to love but are not are not vegan, so I make my own with breadsticks and chocolate peanut butter.  The kids LOVE these.

Please ignore my messy counters I was prepping
all this food at once in a big hurry :)

For dinner each night we had salad jars.  I chopped red onions and radishes and put those on the bottom, then covered them with dressing (those got really nicely pickled in the dressing), next came carrots the quinoa and then greens, tomatoes and some garbanzos.  There might not look like there is much in those jars but you really shove and pack it in there and there is 3 heads/bunches of greens divided between he two jars.





Each night for dinner I went up to the counter at the BBQ place and asked for the paper "boats" and then I plated the salads.  Each jar held enough for me to make 4 salads this size out of.

Amy's vegan chili, corn, quinoa and garbanzo
beans made up our "tacos"

Dinner the first night was sandwiches and salads and on the second night we had "cold walking tacos" which I made from tortilla chips placed into the paper boats and then covered with cold chili, tomatoes, corn, quinoa and beans.  I packed some hot sauce packets we had laying around from Taco Bell for Mike and I to spice ours up.  They were really good, easy and filling but I totally forgot to take a pic of them all plated up :(

The breakfast cereal was eaten out of Ziploc "bowls."  I simply packed a portion of cereal in a baggie with a plastic spoon and when it was time to eat poured in a little soy or chocolate coconut milk.  The kids all did really well eating cereal like this, I was worried it would end up in a big mess but even my 3 year old was able to eat it without making a mess.  We even ate these in the car on the way down the first morning and not a drop was spilled.

Campfire Cuddles!

That's my daredevil hubs in the backcar of the coaster.

Me and my munchkins <3 :)

This one may have had a bit TOO much fun hehe

All in all we had a great trip, I just really REALLY wish that the park would make available a list of items that people with dietary restrictions can look at and decide what if anything they can eat in the park.  I have since written to them requesting they do just that as of yet no response to that email.

Goodbye Silverwood!