For years I’ve been visiting LaSalle Park for lots of reasons, including visits to The Barkyard dog park and strolls along the water’s edge with my dog. Over the past few years I’ve watched with interest as The City brought back to life Centennial Pool and the nearby splash pad. While the pool looks great, and is a big boost for the park, I recently discovered that the reopened splash pad has been tricked out with all sorts of water features.
It was during an overcast and lightly drizzling day that I ended up walking from Front Park to LaSalle Park with my dog. Upon approaching the splash pad I realized that it was not the same water feature that I had seen in years past. Instead of a steady stream of water spouting out of the nozzles, the water actually danced as we walked around the pad.
Our interaction with the dancing water was a ton of fun – my dog continued to get caught off-guard as he wandered across the spray pad. One second he was sniffing around, the next minute he was taken by surprise as the water shot out of the ground. Then I would try to get him to run through the water and I would get nailed by a jet that I thought was not quite ready to sound off – there appeared to be no rhyme or reason to the sequence of sprays.
While I am aware that this is not a dog park, I did take advantage of the drizzling rain (with no one else around) to check out the feature with my dog. On sunny days I’m sure that this is probably one of the best places to take kids. And now it’s a cool water feature for entire families. I’m not sure if all of the splash pads around the city are the same as this one. What I can say is that the one at LaSalle Park is completely reenergized and should be enjoyed by anyone visiting LaSalle Park.
Chances are I won’t be taking a swim at Centennial Pool due to all of the kids that swim there… but on occasion I will definitely stop by the splash pad to watch people as they interact with it. And maybe on another drizzling day I’ll sneak a play date at the splash pad with my dog again. Sometimes it can be fun to act like a kid again.