Friday, October 18, 2013

Adventure Playground (South Germantown Recreational Park)

18041 Central Park Circle
Boyds, Maryland 20841

5 out of 5 swings


Boy, have WE got a park for you! This park is one of our new favorite local parks. It's a bit further away from us than we'd like, but it is SO very worth the trip. Adventure Playground is part of the bigger South Germantown Recreational Park, the 695 acre Recreational area that once was a working dairy farm back in the 1800s! It is one of the most organized large parks I've ever seen! It's got all kinds of activities and amenities from hiking/biking, archery, mini golf, driving range, swimming, all kinds of sports fields, picnic areas, tot lots, a beautiful pond and even a "Dairy Mooseum"! But our fav, of course, is Adventure Playground!

Adventure playground... where to start. When we first pulled into it, I had the feeling similar to when you pull into an amusement park. While driving down the long driveway entrance, you can see the pointy roofs of the large castle in the distance, which gets you excited! It has a large parking lot, with plenty of spaces. The grounds are clean, well-landscaped, beautifully designed and sectioned out. A large garden area with sculptures, benches, rock wall climbing seats in the shape serpents or dragons... To the right is a musical area with a painted map of the globe on the ground. Three musical large instruments with mallets surround the map and beckon you to come and play with them. To the left there were mini hut-shaped enclosed areas with picnic table and bench inside as well as rocking riders shaped like cars, with two benches, each with two wheels so EVERYONE can drive. :)  -- This was Bray's favorite part. He stayed in the car so long I had to beg him to come out.

There was SO much open space to run around in, Brayden didn't know which way to go! We followed the bricked sidewalk to a painted blue walkway. It didn't take me long to realize that it was painted blue because we were now in the moat of the castle! looming above us was a tall wooden castle, a bridge to 'cross the moat' and enter the castle. What a cute concept. Until we saw that on the other side of the bridge as we were crossing it there was a scary serpent waiting to eat us alive! It was a cool 3 piece sculpture that made it look like parts of it were under water. I love it! Once you enter the castle there are tons of levels of stairs, obstacle courses, rope climbing, bridges, tunnels, spiral slides, straight slides, curvy slides, lookout towers, you name it! It looked like bootcamp for kiddies! I could almost hear the drill sergeant's whistle! Just outside of the back of the castle, there was a water theme. Here I met a very nice lady and her son who was about Brayden's age. They played and chased each other for a while and we talked about our son's similarities/likes. She gave me tips on where to take Bray to have a good time for free, including home depot in the rider mower section and a pet store! I definitely will try those spots. 


Just to the right of us stood another large section of playground equipment, smaller scale than the castle but still pretty big. This too had a ton of obstacle courses, including ladders, moving floors, rope climbing, sliding tubes, small spaces where you have to crawl, moving bridges and more! There were also swings, teeter totters in the shape of swimming fish, sculptures of sea creatures, and plentiful benches. 

This place was so cool and so much fun, that I lost my mind for a minute and put my phone in a shallow pocket just before going down a tube slide. Next thing I know... no phone! Panic set in. The only way back up to the tube was to go through that whole long obstacle course again. And with all those kids, I got nervous that it would be ruined. I know i had it just before going down the tube so it must be up there! We walked back through the obstacle searching every ground, floor, tunnel possible. No phone! We went back down the tube to make sure it didn't get stuck in there. No phone. I walk back over to this family that had been playing on the teeter totters for a while and asked the mother and father if they had seen it, and they said they hadn't but will keep an eye out for it and come and get me if they find it. The man even helped me search the area! Then a nearby person overheard I was looking for my phone and exclaims that she had seen one. A man had picked it up and was looking for the owner. She took me to him and he was happy to have found the owner of the phone. I believe he was even on the phone calling the park to ask about lost and found!


Everyone at this park was amazingly down to earth and so caring ... not to mention so honest! I love communities that look out for their people like that. They could have just left it there for it to get trampled/broken or stolen. I'm so very thankful my phone was recovered, because without it, I wouldn't have been able to post these great pix! :)

What a great adventure we had here at Adventure Playground. This entire park, not just playground deserves 5 swings out of 5! We'll be back to explore some more!



Bray ran into the park like he owned the place!







'swimming in the moat'

bridge that goes over the 'moat'

bridge that goes over the 'moat'

castle entrance

castle wall detail



inside the 'castle'



inside the 'castle'


side of the 'ship'

front of the 'ship'







little car and hut


They see me rollin'...


Beep Beep!



Leaving the castle was even an obstacle!


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