This is part of my series on Mumbai. Water kingdom is a fantastic place. Let me walk you through it.
One way to get there is to take the ferry from Malvani, Malad to the island. Once on the island, a little train then takes you to Water kingdom and Esselworld, which are next to each other. With a cover charge of around Rs.300, you can avail of all the rides, slides and pools at Water Kingdom as many times as you want as long as you want.
After the main entrance, you’ll come to a sort of general area which branches into separate locker, shower and changing areas for the men and women. You can store your bags, wallets, valuables, etc in lockers which are locked with tokens that can be purchased for a small sum. It’s one token per locker. But be careful! The lockers operate on a one-time token system so when a locker is filled and closed you shouldn’t open it except to remove your bags permanently. If you do open the locker for any other reason (like if maybe you forgot something) and then close it again, you’ll have to get another token to do that which means paying for its use all over again.
After the lockers come the changing areas and after changing into your swimming clothes you can dump your old clothes into a kind of storage bag and leave it in the care of an official present nearby in exchange for a token (this token service is free). This storage system is quite useful for two reasons. One, because your bags are’nt allowed into the changing area; they stay at the lockers and you carry your clothes with you to the changing area. Two, the lockers are quite small and can be used for storing only a limited quantity of items.
Then come the showers which are a must use before entering any pool anywhere anytime. They make sure the pools aren’t unneccessarily dirtied with sweat, etc. The entrance to the pools, rides, etc comes after the lockers and showers. Only nylon or polyester clothes can be worn beyond this entrance. But don’t worry if you havn’t brought any. There are shops in the general area I mentioned earlier that sell the required clothing and other things like cameras. You will of course have to open your locker again for the cash so make sure you’re wearing proper clothing before closing your locker.
The park’s central attraction is its large paw shaped main pool with its water cannons in one section and artificial waves in another. There are also fountains you can sit under in the more shallow sections of the pool. The great thing about the main pool is that it gets progressively deeper and is probably a little over 6 feet at its deepest point (a feature common to all the attractions). Most of the rides require you to sit in floats (single or double seater) as you toss and turn through various water slides. They’re really scary the first time you try them but are in reality quite safe. The scariest rides are of course the really steep slides. There’s also a separate little pool exclusively for the younger children and a dance hall with in-house rain. The other attractions include a lazy river i.e a circular river that you can float leisurely through.
Since the park is huge and each attraction is some distance from the others, be prepared to walk a lot to get from one attraction to the next. There’s also a great McDonalds outlet next to the main pool where you can lunch. The least crowded time on weekends is during the morning/afternoon. It gets really crowded towards late afternoon with long queues for each slide. Please visit on a weekday if you can. The best time to visit is during hot seasons when you can enjoy the cool water. Be sure to leave before evening as it can get quite chilly and the water can get cold.
And don’t forget that mosquitoes thrive in this area so leave before five o’clock to prevent getting bitten a lot on your way home. The ferry service continues until late in the night as do the buses and trains in Mumbai (information for out of towners) but leave early anyway.