Closed Southern California waterpark off I-15 may see comeback (2024)

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Closed Southern California waterpark off I-15 may see comeback

Entrance gate of the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Buildings are covered in graffiti at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Buildings and even rocks are covered in graffiti at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Water skill and fuel tank are covered in graffiti at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Spray paint cans are littered all over the property at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Buildings are heavily damaged and covered in graffiti the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Buildings are heavily damaged and covered in graffiti the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

A float area is empty of water but filled with graffiti at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Tanks are covered in graffiti at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

A water slide hill is dismantled and covered in graffiti at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Buildings are heavily damaged and covered in graffiti the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Buildings are heavily damaged and covered in graffiti the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Buildings and fencing are heavily damaged and covered in graffiti the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Entrance gate of the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Buildings are heavily damaged and covered in graffiti the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

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A water slide hill is dismantled and covered in graffiti at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Buildings are heavily damaged and covered in graffiti the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Graffiti covers all signage at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

A water tower is covered in graffiti at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Tanks and building exteriors are covered in graffiti at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Graffiti covers most of the remaining structures at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

A water slide hill is dismantled and covered in graffiti at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Graffiti covers most of the remaining structures at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Graffiti covers the ground and most of the remaining structures at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Graffiti covers most of the remaining structures at the former Rock-A-Hula Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

A water slide hill is dismantled and covered in graffiti at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Graffiti covers most of the remaining structures at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Exterior signage is covered in graffiti at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Graffiti covers most of the remaining structures and ground at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Paint splotches and graffiti cover the ground at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Graffiti covers most of the remaining structures at the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

Entrance gate of the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

A storm moves in over the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

A panoramic stitched image of the former Rock-A-Hoola Water Park on Tuesday, July 23, 2024, in Newberry Springs, CA. (L.E. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) @Left_Eye_Images

A photo of Lake Dolores from August 1989. The caption reads: "DESERT PARK - A diver takes a plunge at Lake Dolores, a park about 130 miles south of Las Vegas off Interstate 15."

Lake Dolores waterpark's Lazy River attraction, in its heyday. (San Bernardino County Planning Commission)

A photo of Lake Dolores waterpark's oval jet ski water racetrack venue and swimming pools, in its heyday. (San Bernardino County Planning Commission)

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ByTaylor Lane/Las Vegas Review-Journal

August 16, 2024 - 6:02 am

Updated August 16, 2024 - 7:00 pm

You might know it as Lake Dolores, or Rock-A-Hoola Water Park or Discovery Water Park.

But whatever you know it as, you’ve likely seen it if you’ve driven on Interstate 15 near Barstow, California, in the last 50 years.

And after sitting empty for two decades, you might even get to experience it again.

‘An old fashioned swimming hole’

The closed water park 130 miles south of Las Vegas opened as Lake Dolores in the 1960s, named after one of its co-founders, Dolores Byers, according to Review-Journal archives.

Before the lake, Dolores and Bob Byers grew alfalfa at the property throughout the 1950s before converting the land into an amusem*nt park.

In its heyday, the park included eight lakes, 10 water slides and 30-foot trapeze swings on the 300-acre property to help keep people cool in the Mojave Desert.

“We have an old-fashioned swimming hole,” Bob Byers told the Review-Journal in 1989. “You have to have a little country in you to enjoy this.”

Byers claimed his park had “the fastest slides around,” with eight of the 10 slides over 200 feet tall.

The park closed the first time in 1987 after the Byers decided to retire, but because of popular demand, Lake Dolores was reopened in 1989.

Lake Dolores was renamed Rock-A-Hoola Water Park in 1996, but the park couldn’t seem to capture the same business as Lake Dolores did half a decade before.

And it wasn’t long before one of the “fastest slides around” caused even more problems for the park.

In 1999, a 23-year-old water park employee became paraplegic after going down the Doo Wop Super Drop slide. The employee, James Mason, told another employee to turn the slide on after the park had closed for the day. Mason went down the slide before its “runout lane” was full of water, and hit the dam at the end of the slide at a high speed, causing Mason to fly in the air and land on his back, according to court documents.

After suing the water park for negligence, a jury awarded Mason nearly $4.4 million, court records state.

The park’s name was changed again to Discovery Water Park in 2002, but still couldn’t find success under a rebranding. It closed in 2004, and has remained out-of-operation since.

Since its closure, the park has become a hub for graffiti artists and skateboarders.

Future plans for the park

But, Lake Dolores may make a return some time in the next few years.

A project to bring Lake Dolores back was approved by the San Bernardino County Board of Commissioners in March 2020, at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, and is slowly inching toward developing the property, according to county spokesman David Wert.

County planning commission documents for the project from 2018 say the developer, G&GF Enterprise, LLC, plans to develop the property in five total phases, starting with the revival of the park’s 22-acre lake and a 2-acre pond.

An RV park would be constructed in the park’s second phase of development, and the water park and a parking area would be built in the project’s third phase, documents state.

Documents also show a proposal for the park to open 89,730 square feet of office and administrative space in its fourth phase, followed by a proposed 45,727 square feet of commercial and retail space.

Plans also call for improving the I-15 interchange near the park site as part of a “cooperative agreement with the (project) applicant and the county,” Wert said in an email.

“The county does not know if the developer has a timeline in mind to begin and complete work on the project,” he said.

Contact Taylor Lane at tlane@reviewjournal.com.

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