Lashed wake park reopens
A popular summer sport destination is back in business after Christmas storms and floods devastated the Gold Coast hot spot.
Gold Coast Wake Park reopened on Saturday, offering for the first time a full breakfast and lunch service as well as wakeboarding and kneeboarding thrills.
Owner Daniel Watkins said the quick reopening a week after the park was hit by flash flooding would not have been possible without the help of staff and community members offering services for free.
“It’s been all hands on deck,” Mr Watkins said. “We have such a good crew of staff and community – everyone just rallied behind us.”
“We’re open on a limited capacity at the moment, but we’ve already had lots of people supporting us.”
The Oxenford-based tourism spot was left with no electricity after the Christmas night storm with tens of thousands of dollars of food and equipment down the drain.
Most of the park’s jump ramps were left “unrepairable”.
Mr Watkins said initial damage assessments had racked up half a million in costs.
However the forced shutdown since Christmas – the park’s peak season – had been the hardest blow with loss of profits, he said.
“But we’re working around the clock to order steel and do repairs,” Mr Watkins said. “By ANZAC weekend we’re expecting to be back to that 100 per cent capacity.
“The best thing people can do is rally around us. Come out and enjoy the park, or if wakeboarding isn’t really your thing we have a restaurant and a fully licensed bar that overlooks the lake with a fullyqualified chef. We have live music every Sunday – last week we had Lily Grace, she’s really talented.”
GC Wake park offers a subsidised 10-week wakeboarding program for school students of all fitness levels.
“It’s a great way to get your kids to try something new this summer,” he said.