This water park takes riders to The Edge

Unique water coaster opens at Soaky Mountain in Tennessee

It’s the middle of July, which, with temperatures soaring and summer vacations in full swing, is prime time for water parks. Featuring attractions such as wave pools, lazy rivers, and play structures filled with sprayers, fountains, slides, and enormous buckets that dump torrents of refreshing water every few minutes, they can be great places to find relief from the heat and humidity. Water parks can also be great places to find thrills.

Soaky Mountain (what a great name!), a water park that opened in 2020 in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains in Sevierville, Tennessee, recently expanded with what appears to be a singularly thrilling attraction. The Edge offers a dual-track water coaster for side-by-side racing. For its finale, it includes a “Boomerango” element that sends the rafts racing up a nearly vertical wall that resembles a halfpipe skateboard ramp.

The Edge water coaster (Soaky Mountain)

After climbing a 70-foot tower, guests board two-passenger rafts. Two rafts are dispatched at the same time and immediately plunge down a drop followed by an uphill section that is powered by surging water jets known as “Master Blaster” technology by the ride manufacturer. The rafts then enter enclosed, opaque tunnels that include colorful, almost psychedelic “AquaLucent” rings of light through which riders pass. That’s followed by a two-story drop and another Master Blaster surge up into a second tunnel with equally freaky rectangular bands of multi-colored light.

A final blast of water sends the rafts racing up the Boomerango wall where they come to a halt and deliver a momentary pop of negative-G weightlessness. They then scoot down the wall, scale a small hill, and coast a straightaway into a pool to end the race. A scoreboard informs the passengers which team nabbed the best time.

“When you hit the Boomerango wall with its translucent top, it really looks like you’re going to go over the edge,” says David Andrews Jr., general manager of Soaky Mountain. The tricked out water coaster lives up to its name in another way. “The whole ride really hangs off the edge of Soaky Mountain,” he adds.

The Boomerango elements on The Edge (Soaky Mountain)

From above, the twin Boomerango elements look like giant water skis. The ride’s orange and turquoise color scheme will remind folks of a certain age of the defunct Howard Johnson’s chain of restaurants. The Edge is the only water coaster of its kind.

The new ride is the young park’s second water coaster. Visitors can also brave Avalaunch, which is a first-of-its-kind attraction as well. In addition to its uphill water coaster blasts and “FlyingSaucer” elements that include compound curves to send its rafts racing in different directions, Avalaunch features a “TornadoWave” finale that, like The Edge, delivers free-floating negative Gs.

The full-featured, 50-acre Soaky Mountain made its debut in June 2020, soon after the first wave of pandemic restrictions were eased. It was challenging on a number of fronts, Andrews notes. For example, the park had to restrict the number of guests it admitted to allow for social distancing.

Soaky Mountain is part of the Wilderness Resorts and Waterparks group that operates an enormous indoor water park resort in Wisconsin Dells as well as a second one, Wilderness at the Smokies, which is located across the street from the outdoor water park in Sevierville.

You can see some highlights of The Edge water coaster in this video from Soaky Mountain. No, there isn’t anything wrong with your speakers. The clip does not include audio.

Would you want to give The Edge a whirl? What are your favorite water park rides?