One of the things on our annual summer bucket list is a visit Rock’N River Water Park in Round Rock. It’s such a great park — and such a terrific bargain. With a lazy river, water slides, a giant tipping water bucket, several pools, a rock climbing waterfall wall, food trucks, plenty of shade — this place is awesome. Located in Old Settler’s Park, this is just a short drive from Austin. What may be the best part, though, is that admission is only $12 for adults, $10 for youth & seniors, and $5 for ages 2 & under. Read on for some of the detailed highlights of a visit to Rock’N River…

Let me start by saying the park is NOT OPEN on Wednesdays. We have to admit that we didn’t look this up in advance on our very fist attempt last year and arrived on a Wednesday. Womp, womp. You know the scene in National Lampoon’s Vacation when the Griswolds arrive at Wally World? Yep. That was us. But from the parking lot we could tell this was going to be worth it, so we came back the next day.The park opens at noon, and we arrived around 1 p.m. to find the parking lot packed! It seems like it’s best to arrive early. After paying admission, the kids got measured to see if they could go on the water slides. Kids are given a wristband noting if they passed the height requirements. Once we got that settled, we were off in search of a chair or two to serve as home base of our towels, cooler, etc. We were anxious to get splashing!The kids were immediately drawn to the feature called Splashville. This is a huge sprayground play area that has 4 water slides, tipping buckets, hose jets, water guns, net obstacles and more! It is really incredible. The kids loved getting doused with water from the huge bucket.We were also big fans of the lazy river. There are plenty of tubes available there, but a lot of kids were just walking their way through, too. I will note that by late afternoon, the lazy river was so packed with people that it felt kind of too much for our own personal space comfort level. But the kids didn’t seem to care.

There is also a really cool area of the park called The Quarry that includes a 12 foot jumping platform and rock climbing wall with a waterfall feature. It also includes a drop slide that sends you deep into the pool. This area also includes water volleyball and basketball. To use this part of the park, kids need to pass a quick swim test in the pool.

There are plenty of shallow areas for young kids, slides for big kids, and basically lots of fun for all ages.

You can bring your own cooler full of food and drinks (no glass or alcohol), but there are also food trucks in the park as well as a swim-up snack bar.

While there is a lot of shade in the park, you can also opt to rent a cabana or an umbrella. Click here for info about rentals.

What to Know Before You Go:

• Click here for park hours.
• The park is closed on Wednesdays.
• The park offers Half-Price Twilight Hours from 5-7 p.m.
• Click here pricing info.
• You can bring your own food & drink, but no glass or alcoholic beverages.
• Guests must be 40″ to ride the Blue Blazes, Yellow Sidewinder & Orange Outlaw slides.
• Guests must be 48″ and pass a swim test to use Dropslide, Diving Platform or Rock Wall.

To learn more about the Rock’N River Water Park, you can visit the City of Round Rock’s Parks & Recreation Department website.