|
LOST ISLAND
Theme Park & Water Park
Waterloo, Iowa
 Park News - (3/7/2023) According to a local news report, things are expected to shape up better at Lost Island Theme Park in 2023. After all, the opening season last year was a bit of a disaster for them. Delays in opening the park, staffing issues, two major rides not able to be opened at all, and less than stellar attendance. According to the report, “every day but one showed an operating loss.”
Despite it all, the Lost Island Theme Park will be back in 2023, and for starters, those two missing rides will be ready to open on opening day. Yes, they have confirmed that Matugani is “definitely going to be 100 percent operating” and the SuperFlume, which was delayed after a fire broke out during construction, will also finally be ready for guests.
Look for the park to open for the season on May 20th.
(11/23/22) Congratulations to Sally Dark Rides and Lost Island Theme Park for winning an IAAPA Brass Ring award for ‘Best New Product - Major Ride/Attraction” with a cost over $5 million for the park’s new “Volkanu - Quest for the Golden Idol” custom dark ride attraction. This would be the second major industry award for Volkanu, as the ride also won the Golden Ticket Award for “Best New Family Attraction of 2022” from Amusement Today.
Volkanu - Quest for the Golden Idol is described as being a “4D interactive dark ride is housed inside the park’s large, iconic Volcano structure, serving as a beacon to the Mura (fire) Realm at Lost Island. Guests queue in a elaborate, winding lava cave and learn the details of their quest from a Shaman who sends adventurers onward to defeat the fiery monster, Volkanu. Once aboard Inferno Transport vehicles, riders are equipped with powerful Thermal Blasters as they battle lava scorpions, spiders, bats, and other monstrous beings in their attempt to save Lost Island.”
 |
 |
(8/31/22) Well consider me surprised… the new Lost Island Theme Park has thrown in the towel early on their 2022 season. Posts on social media indicated that the park’s last day of the season was Sunday, August 28th. We know the park was having a rather tough time of it during their first season, with the log flume being delayed until next season due to construction fire and the big launched roller coaster everyone was waiting to try also now having a delayed opening until 2023. According to various news reports the daily attendance at the Lost Island watepark down the street was about double or more than what the new theme park was able to bring in on any given day. Add in other issues like staffing problems and I guess we can see why the park decided to shut down for the season earlier than expected in order to regroup and try again next season.
(8/12/22) A little bad news for those who have been waiting for Lost Island to open the Matugani roller coaster. The park apparently confirmed that they’ve been waiting on Intamin reps to arrive to get the launched coaster up and running, and their arrival has been delayed until later this week. With that in mind, it is unlikely that Matugani will be ready to open to guests before the end of the season, though with a little luck, they might be able to soft open it and hold off on the grand opening until 2023.
2022 - New Park - (7/9/22) According to a local news article, attendance at the new Lost Island Theme Park has not been great so far. Keep in mind that the park just opened on June 18th, but according to the report the park is only seeing about 100 to 300 guests a day, compared to the 1,500 to 2,500 guests who are visiting the group’s established Lost Island Waterpark. The owners are hoping things will change quickly as word gets out that the park is now open, but they also anticipated that there would be some crossover between the good attendance at the waterpark to increase attendance at the new theme park.
July 4th attendance? They say just 415 guests came to the theme park on what should have been a busy holiday where they expected 10 times that amount. There has been some difficulty opening some of the park’s attractions so far: with a flume ride delayed by a year due to a fire during construction, a carousel that has yet to arrive from the supplier, and the previously reported supply chain issues keeping the park’s Matugani launched coaster closed while they wait for a “brake motor part”.
While I can believe that some of those wanting to visit may be holding out until the Matugani coaster is ready to open, hopefully the owners can find a way to shift some of those waterpark guests over to the new theme park. Towards that endeavor they are already offering a $69 parking hopper pass that allows for guests to visit each park on two consecutive days.
(7/2/22) New videos showcasing the attractions to be enjoyed at the new Lost Island theme park can now be found. I’ve added a video below showing off POV footage on the park’s Anara Aviators (Gerstaluer Sky Fly) and Nopuko Air Coastrer (Vekoma SLC). For those wondering about Matugani, probably the park’s most anticipated coaster (formerly known as Kanonen at Liseberg) it seems supply chain issues have kept this coaster from opening with the rest of the park. It looks ready to go at any time, so hopefully it won't be much longer until Matugani is ready to roll. Stay tuned!
(6/25/22) A new video featuring a different look at the new Volkanu dark ride has been posted by creator, Sally Dark Rides. The world can never have enough dark rides in my opinion, so Screamscape sends out a big congratulations to the entire team at Sally and Lost Island Theme Park for taking on this fantastic project!
(6/22/22) A great video showing off the new Volkanu: Quest for the Golden Idol dark ride (and pre-show) at the new Lost Island Theme Park can be seen below, posted by the Dark Ride Database.
(6/12/22) Good news, Lost Island Theme Park, America’s newest theme park, will finally open to the public on Saturday, June 18th. The local news dropped a couple days ago to shoot some footage as the final preparations are being made for opening day. They do mention that staffing has continued to be a struggle and they’re a bit behind, so when the park opens at first they will only have daytime hours of operation. Currently the calendar shows 10am to 6pm hours daily throughout the summer, though Lost Island says once they get more staff they hope to be able to stay open later into the evenings on Friday and Saturday nights when it becomes possible to do so.
(4/12/22) Park Paradise was able to take a construction tour of the new Lost Island Theme Park this month. While there is still a bit of work to do, this is an exciting time to see the park as a lot of the parks custom theming elements are being put into place and much of everything has been painted, which has turned the construction site into a very colorful landscape.
(3/12/22) The new Lost Island theme park suffered a small set-back this week when one of the buildings to be used as a ride queue caught on fire in the middle of the night when the site was closed. Nearby neighbors spotted the fire and called it in thankfully, as there was no one on site at the park at the time.
As for the 1,500 sqft building, it was a total loss and burned down to the foundation, and also resulted in the destruction of the control panel and loading station systems for the Yuta Falls flume ride. According to the park owner, Eric Bertch, while this will delay the opening of the flume ride while a replacement control panel and station parts are obtained, they hope to begin the process of building the new queue structure as soon as next week. The fire will also not delay their plans to “soft open” the nation’s newest theme park sometime between late May and early June.
You can see some footage shot showing off the remains of the fire site shot in the daytime on Friday morning by watching the video included in this follow-up report. It looks like rebuilding the structure will be the easy part as they determine just how long it will take to get the needed replacement parts from the ride manufacturer to them to know if the opening of the flume ride will be a few months, or if it may have to wait until next season. Best of luck for a speedy recovery to Lost Island in their recovery from this incident.
As the opening of Lost Island Theme Park is nearly upon us, it is also worth mentioning that the park is preparing to hold two job fairs to fill about 450 new positions next week, on March 16 and March 19. Staffing up is a vital part of being able to open the park, and being part of the opening crew for a brand new theme park is a unique experience.
(1/27/22) According to a post at Reddit, it appears that the new name for the former Kanonen coaster is now Matugani. They also have pictures of the new yellow and green trains that appear to have a snake face painted on the front.
(11/17/21) In a presentation at IAAPA from Sally Dark Rides they revealed the name for the new dark ride coming to the new Lost Island Theme Park will be, “Volkanu: Quest for the Golden Idol”. According to the description Volkanu is the god of fire living deep inside Lost Island who is being kept dormant by a sacred statue. The minions of Volkanu seek to wake him and have taken the statue, so it is your job to climb aboard an Inferno transport vehicle, your job is to return the statue to the altar within the Temple of Fire.
Sally had an animatronic figure for the new attraction on display at the IAAPA show floor.
(10/29/21) A video shot during a construction tour of the Lost Island Theme Park can be seen below. They go over the coasters, a dark ride to be built inside a volcano structure, and various other flat rides coming to the park. While there is still a lot of work to do, the park is already shaping up nicely based on what they have already installed, and appears as if it will be very colorful once finished.
(9/23/21) According to others on the construction preview tour for the Lost Island theme park, the park’s layout has been designed to have room to accommodate a major new attractions in each of the lands going forward. This is assuming the park is successful and has the capital to keep on expanding over the years that follow the grand opening. Apparently they’ve got ideas for at least three more coasters in the future as well, but first things first, they’ve got to open the gates, and guests have to visit and be ready to come back again and again.
It’s not easy to open a new park these days… and anyone who remembers the troubles faced by Hard Rock Park can attest to that truth. So we wish them well and can’t wait to see more as they move closer to opening day!
(9/22/21) I’m not sure how accurate this tweet is, but if they are right the new Lost Island theme park will open with a interactive dark ride from Sally, and has plans to add a River Rapids ride as the park’s first possible addition following the opening.
While reading that, I had a bit of a flash-back myself to an old scale model display Sally used to bring to the trade shows for a couple years that was called Forbidden Island. I actually was able to snap a picture of it at IAAPA 2010 myself where you can see a unique looking concept that would start outdoors and then venture into a dark set of caverns under a volcano. Just looks like something that would be a perfect-fit for a park with the Lost Island theme. Maybe we’ll see something similar built.
(9/8/21) A quick look at the new Lost Island Theme Park can be seen by clicking here, which features a good look at the former Kanonen launched roller coaster (now painted green) now set up at the new site in Iowa. The new theme park is still set to open in 2022, with lands that seem to be based around the elements of Earth, Air, Fire and Water.
(6/3/21) According to a press release the Bay Creek Carousel will now be sent to its new home as part of the new Lost Island theme park under construction in Iowa. The 50 foot carousel has 42 wood carved animals and 4 chariots. Western Train is overseeing the project, which will take the Bay Creek Carousel that was originally designed for for “Bayside Village” and install it at the new Iowa theme park by early 2022. The carousel has a Tropical Island and Aquatic theme.
(5/26/21) Fantastic new construction pictures of the coasters now set up for the Lost Island theme park in Iowa can be seen on Facebook. This includes a look at the former Cobra coaster (Vekoma SLC) relocated from Ratanga Junction (South America) and the former Kanonen (Intamin Accelerator) relocated from Liseberg (Sweden).
(1/23/21) Construction on the Lost Island theme park in Iowa has been moving at a rapid pace it seems. Check out some amazing pictures posted to Facebook showing off a purple and bright green roller coaster now under construction along with a flat ride or two.
(10/31/20) According to a local news report, land clearing, grading and excavation work is underway for the new Lost Island Theme Park project. It is great to see work taking place on this project, pushing ahead despite the pandemic issues. If all goes as planned, hopefully the pandemic will be mostly behind us in time for the new theme park to open in 2022.
(7/12/20) Green roller coaster track was spotted being unloaded from a shipping container on the site for the new Lost Island theme park in Waterloo Iowa this week. Check out the photos below. The distance that the photos were taken makes it difficult to really see any track detail other than the color. Squinting a bit, I will say that this doesn’t look like the Intamin style track from the former Kannon coaster purchased from Liseberg. If anything it looks more like Vekoma/Arrow style track, and the park was rumored to have purchased a Vekoma SLC for the park, possible the retired Cobra from Ratanga Junction.
![]()
(5/4/20) A quick update regarding the Lost Island Theme Park coasters. While it is still very possible that the park got the Cobra (Vekoma SLC) from Ratanga Junction, they the other coaster actually would not be the mine train from that park, as it was already sold and installed to Fantasilandia in Chile.
A video on YouTube from Park Pros actually does a good job breaking down the possible new rides coming to the park based on a park layout image and concept art released thus far, so check that out below.
(5/3/20) Construction is underway for the Lost Island theme park theme park in Iowa. It has been about a year since we’ve heard anything about the plans to build the Lost Island theme park across from the Lost Island waterpark, but according to a local news report grading and early construction is still in progress, despite the pandemic that makes the opening of their waterpark an unknown at this point. The owners say that they have already committed and invested so much for the new $100 million, 90-acre theme park that it wouldn’t be wise to stopping things now for the 2022 project.
They have also confirmed that the park will become the new home to the former Kanonen launched roller coaster from Intamin that ran at Liseberg in Sweden from 2005 to 2016. There is also some speculation that the park may have also bought the former Cobra coaster (Vekoma SLC) and Diamond Devil Run (Vekoma Mine Train) from the Ratanga Junction theme park in South Africa that closed in 2018. While Lost Island admits to Kanonen, they will not confirm the rumors about the Ratanga Junction coasters.
Either way, I think people will be excited to see a brand new theme park coming to Iowa. The opening of a new park is a rare thing these days.
(7/18/19) Could a new theme park be coming to Iowa? According to the local news, the owners of the Lost Island Waterpark are set to begin construction on a “Lost Island Theme Park” next month with plans to open it in 2022. The $100 million project moving forward is still pending on obtaining final zoning and building approvals.
Once approved they say the park will feature five lands and “a variety of rides and attractions designed to immerse guests in the stories of magical lands that can only be found at the Lost Island Theme Park.”
|
