About Belmont Park
Belmont Park is an amusement park located right on the boardwalk in Mission Beach. It is small enough to be digestible in one afternoon, but big enough to keep kids (and adults) entertained for hours. There are rides for kids and adults of all ages, including an arthritic, old wooden roller coaster called The Giant Dipper that definitely does not take the turns as smoothly as it used to. There is an arcade, a laser tag area, a mini-golf course, a rock climbing wall, a zip line, a rope course, and a 7D theater called Xanadu which we have yet to visit, but seven dimensions does sound intriguing. The whole park is well maintained, clean, and easy to navigate.
Belmont Park has a few stalls serving beer, canned cocktails, and frozen margaritas among the rides. There are also a few food vendors within the park, including a Pizza Port, as well as three sit-down restaurants attached to the amusement park that serve drinks and full food menus right on the boardwalk with a view of the ocean. These are Cannonball, Draft House, and Beach House.
So spend the morning riding rides and discovering what the 7th dimension has in store for you (and the 6th, 5th and 4th), then get lunch at one of the restaurants.
Great For
• Kids
• Quintessential California
• Family time
• Getting whiplash
A Closer Look
Belmont Park first opened in 1925, developed by sugar magnate and local-San-Diego-big-deal John Spreckels. The Giant Dipper has been a fixture of the amusement park since that year, throughout the parks ups and downs. In the 1960s and 70s, the whole place was almost torn down because it was an unused blight on the boardwalk, but it has seen several rounds of rejuvenation since then. Most recently, in 2013, a real estate company called Pacifica Enterprises leased the whole complex and fixed it up.
While technically the people at Pacifica Enterprises are local to San Diego (Dario De Luca, the Pacifica CEO, lives in a big house in North County), we would not label this place as “locally-owned” in any meaningful way. But also, it kind of is locally owned. The truth is Belmont Park is a San Diego landmark and it takes someone with a lot of capital to spruce it up, so we thank our corporate overlords for stepping in and restoring it. Hopefully now the park is in a period of stability and success that will last and us plebians can enjoy some rides and forget our nine to five lives. No, we’re kidding. Mostly. We don’t actually know.
Location
Feature image by chrisinphilly
