the fugitive beach

The only part of the day that was fun was jumping from the cliffs. The quarry was filled with nothing but sharp rocks that you could not see and I cut my foot several times. This is not the place to go if you want to drink a little and have a good time, they find reasons to kick you out and call the police to get you busted on a DWI because the owner was the chief of police of Rolla. Not a place I would visit again one of the worst experiences of my life. Save yourself the money and the headache of visiting this place.

If you love a little adventure that the whole family can enjoy this is the place. Understand that if you have young children, you need to monitor them. That said, this place is exciting and much more of a thrill then just got average swimming hole. The cliff jumps and slide offer some adrenaline, but my 9 year old son did all of them and he had a blast. Be prepared to be a little sore, but this place is well worth the time and drive.

We took our family to check it out with high hopes and expectations only to be disappointed in the "beach" layout and murky water- we did not stay but left without going in the water as we were uneasy with the swimming area.

Most of the things we do for fun in life involve a little danger and fugitive beach is no exception. You are likely to come home a bit bruised and scratched up, especially if you brave the cliff jumps and slide. With that said, this place is really fun and mostly safe if you use a little caution and common sense. My three kids (15, 12 and 7) and I managed to avoid significant injury and most of us did both cliff jumps and the slide repeatedly. They have staff monitoring the cliff jump and slides. I’m really sore, but that’s what happens when your 51 year old body hits water from a good height.It’s really no worse than any beach or lake that has rocks and I don’t think the rocks would be more easily seen if they took out the blue pond dye. You have to be really careful getting in and out or you will trip and/or fall and can easily cut yourself on sharp rocks. My daughter cut her shin, but it was no big deal. For adults, you need to be careful not to get your foot caught and twist her ankle. However, other than avoiding the rocks in getting in and out of the swimming areas, it seems like the areas of the cliff jumps and slide have been cleared enough that you need not worry about hitting any rocks. You will, however, lightly touch the bottom if you jump in feet first. A little more rain will probably fix this. The management indicates that it plans to drain the quarry and remove some of the big rocks over the winter and that’s probably a good idea. It got pretty crowded as the day went on and there were a lot of 20-somethings drinking and getting a bit rowdy. Most were well behaved. A few really inebriated guys served as good entertainment and provided my kids a lesson on why moderation is a good idea. My only complaint about the crowd concerns a group of tweens and eventually young adults who took over the swim dock in a very dangerous game of “king of the dock," pushing and throwing each other off the dock. The worst group appeared to be military guys from Fort Leonard Wood. I could not believe these guys were manhandling kids. The little kids wanting to use the dock to climb and jump were pretty much chased away and those that refused to go were met by 200 lb a-holes landing on top of them. This should have been stopped by management. Actually, it should never have started. The parents of the tweens should have stopped the tweens from throwing little kids off and landing on the little kids. The soldier should have exercised some common sense. We brought our own lunch and drinks, but my kids bought snow cones and I grabbed an adult beverage, which are reasonably priced at $3 to $4. All in all, this was a very inexpensive outing, other than gas from STL. The snacks for purchase looked good. They also have grills available to use. My suggestions for improvements would be adding a 5-foot and 10-foot cliff jump for younger kids and less adventurous adults. More swim docks would also be nice, especially ones for the exclusive use of kids. I think the admission could actually go up to $8 for adults without losing any business.

I had seen the photos on Facebook and decided to make the drive with our family. We drove about an hr and a half and arrived about 2 pm. Their hrs are noon-6pm and decided to miss the opening rush. The facility is a work in progress but so out of the ordinary it is still cool. There were about 500+ people here and it didn't feel that crowded, especially once in the water. Most folks were observers, watching the kids and kid at heart play. There is a giant water slide and I saw everyone from 5 yr olds to 75 yr olds go down and the six foot drop to a nine foot deep pool. There are two leaps from the old quarry edges of about 20 foot each. Only $5 to get in and I would have paid more. I can't wait to see what they do with the place as revenues come in. This location is also the site of "Spartan" or "Tough Mudder" type of races. See it for yourself.....you will enjoy the family day. Pack a light lunch and drinks, there is a concession there but we did not check it out as we had come prepared for none.