Theme & Amusement Parks in Lake Forest Park

Baseball players can't skimp on their hitting, pitching, and catching skills if they want to dominate the game—a fact that the instructors at Northshore Sports Complex know well. In 1982, Cody Webster earned the title of MVP while playing for the Kirkland Nationals All-Star Team—the first US team to win the Little League World Series. He continued to play throughout high school and college, and went on to coach for Pepsi Baseball. His cohort, Craig Bishop draws on 20 years of coaching experience at high schools and colleges. Together, the duo shares the task of teaching students the fundamentals of the game inside batting and pitching cages.

Surrounded by a chain-link fence and divided by safety nets, their astro-turfed cages shelter machines that launch baseballs and softballs straight down the plate. These projectiles can reach speeds up to 85mph, which would be really scary if the baseballs weren't tranquilized beforehand. Sans the machines, pairs can take to the cages to hone their pitching and catching abilities.

Traxx Indoor Raceway measures out adrenaline in seconds. It takes a go-kart just 23 seconds to careen around the indoor 1/5-mile track once, and 45 seconds for it to crest the 1/4-mile outdoor track's hill and swoop around its smooth turns back to the starting line. Drivers can reach speeds of 35 miles per hour in the SODI GT2 gas-powered karts, so the track provides helmets, jumpsuits, and notes from their mother to keep the racers safe. All contests last 20 laps or up to 15 minutes, except for the Traxx 100, a monthly marathon when 10 drivers rumble around the outdoor track 50 times.

Although drivers on the main track must be at least 14 years old, the team is committed to spreading the excitement around. Kids aged 3–10 gear up and hop into electric cars, zipping around their own four-turn track under the watchful eyes of attendants. Among other carnivalesque distractions, the colorful facility boasts an arcade and a 24-foot climbing wall to thrill jaded teenage thumbs, as well as a checker-themed banquet hall that seats up to 150 people for parties and team-building events.

The ability to swim allowed humanity to explore the seas, discover pearls inside oysters, and evolve arms devoid of inflatable muscles. Wave Aquatics Centers’ instructors understand the importance of such a skill, aiming to impart it within children and adults alike across the community. Working as a nonprofit organization fueled by the common purpose of providing students of all ages with a slew of programs and lessons, the staffers share their wisdom in Juanita and Redmond High School pools. They train their charges in competitive swimming, maintaining three teams, including a year-round Masters-level team taught by professional coaches and reformed mermaids.

Not only is the Seattle Aquarium the ninth largest of its kind in the United States—with more than 22 million visitors since its opening in 1977—it is also an integral center for marine conservation and education. The exhibits display stunning creatures of land and sea, and staff biologists study the aquatic tenants to conduct critical research on giant Pacific octopuses, sixgill sharks, sea otters, and other indigenous animals.

Though the Seattle Aquarium is an advanced center for research, it isn’t all serious business and otters wearing lab coats—it also hosts numerous interactive exhibits and displays to please young and old alike. The Marine Mammals exhibit puts visitors up close with sea otters, playful river otters, harbor seals, and fur seals. The Pacific Coral Reef exhibit displays visually stunning and vibrant tropical fish, and the 120,000-gallon Windows on Washington Waters exhibit provides a floor-to-ceiling view of hundreds of Puget Sound fish, including salmon, lingcod, rockfish, and wolf eels.

The Seattle Aquarium also stays actively involved with the community. The aquarium’s biologists partner with local divers to take an annual octopus census, and each year the center trains more than 150 volunteers to teach visitors about the ecosystems of local beaches.

With hands gripped to the wheels of karts capable of cresting 45 miles per hour, up to 12 racers hum around the hairpin turns and straightaways of K1 Speed's indoor track during adrenaline-spiking sprints toward the podium. This brand of excitement can be found at all 15 locations, where racers eschew the fumes and inflammatory skywriting of gas kart exhaust for European, eco-friendly electric karts designed to instantly accelerate out of curves, which are bordered by safety barriers that absorb impacts. To keep everyone in the chase, dialed-down junior karts (available at select locations) safely carry tiny drivers between the height of 48" and 58".

GameWorks fosters friendly competition between kids and adults by surrounding pizza, draft beer, and half-pound burgers with a mosaic of interactive pursuits. Each location holds more than 150 arcade-style games, which include racing and shooting challenges from Sega as well as lower-tech classics such as pinball.