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New name, new focus
Amusement park to feature NASCAR simulator; owners hope to open an upscale RV park
By RENEE RICHARDSON
Senior Reporter
On a warm April morning last week, people were already stopping in to drive go-carts and play miniature golf at the Vacationland Family Fun Park.
The amusement park, along Highway 371 a few miles north of Brainerd, is slated for an official April 29 opening. Many changes are in store for park visitors this season. And if new owners Dave and Donna Burggraff are able to pursue their plans, they are just scratching the surface now.
A mutual friend put the Burggraffs in touch with Kart Kountry's owners. Dave Burggraff said the former owners, who relocated to the Brainerd area from their Thief River Falls home each summer to run the park, were finding the summer move no longer worked well.
The park with go-cart tracks, batting cages, miniature golf and bumper boats sat on 15 developed acres on a 36-acre tract. The Burggraffs learned an adjacent landowner wanted to sell 77 acres, the majority of it heavily wooded with ponds, picturesque wetlands and wildlife. The land borders Brainerd International Raceway on two sides.
The Burggraffs bought it all and renamed it Vacationland Family Fun Park.
A Fort Worth, Texas, company - Davis & Davis, recreational planning consultants - told the Burggraffs it was a pretty area, but advised expanding to a year-round business. The advice was a tall order for a park in a northern climate with owners who had no experience running an amusement park.
Dave Burggraff has a history in real estate and banking. Donna Burggraff is a registered nurse, working with home care for the sick and dying. They never worked together before, but were looking for a change. And they wanted to do something fun.
"This is about as different as it gets," Dave Burggraff said. "It was just time to do something different."
"You can be out here 12 hours and it feels like six or eight," Donna Burggraff said.
Faced with the challenge of a year-round amusement park, the couple began churning out ideas for the property.
When the park officially opens later this week, it will have a two-story building housing a NASCAR simulator with four race cars providing a virtual reality opportunity to drive a race car at speed without risking life and limb.
A concrete dome is slated for construction in the park's current parking lot next to the NASCAR building, but it won't be completed in time for the opening. The Burggraffs are working with Widseth Smith Nolting, an engineering and design firm in Baxter. The structure, 45 feet in height, is expected to be energy efficient and strong, allowing it to double as a tornado shelter. The dome will have a food court with seating inside and in an outdoor courtyard, laser tag, arcade and climbing wall.
Plans are to move the entrance road a little to the south and have parking behind the attractions that front the highway. A "spray ground" water park area is planned along the highway with a bumper boat area. Water will be recycled, including water runoff from the dome, and used to irrigate the park grounds. A monument sign with pond and fountain is planned at the front of the park along with ornamental fencing.
The former ticket booth building is being transformed into a driver's diner with kitchen, ice cream counter and arcade. The Burggraffs have scavenged material from the former World on Wheels and Green Mill. Electric go-carts were obtained from a bankrupt skate park in Robbinsdale.
If one proposal gains Crow Wing County approval (it's expected before the county's planning and zoning commission on Thursday) and state approval (for private wastewater treatment center) an upscale recreational vehicle park may be added. The proposed RV park is catering to rigs in the $500,000 to $1 million range. The RV park, with 49 oversized pads, would be built on 17 acres of the 77-acre site.
"It's not a campground at all," Dave Burggraff said. "It's an RV park, a resort so to speak."
Amenities may include miles of walking trails through the woods, screened-in sites with firepits in certain clearings and a recreation area inside a dome where swimmers could use the pool inside or swim under a glass wall to the outdoor pool section. The dome could include fitness center, private theater, fireplace and conversation pit away from mosquitoes, shower/laundry and game room.
Other recreation amenities for the RV park may include tennis courts, volleyball pit and children's playground.
Dave Burggraff said his research indicates there is a market for this type of upscale park. He said a Florida version costs $80 per night to stay. Hookups would include water, sewer, cable and wireless high-speed Internet. No RVs would stay at the park more than a short time. If approved, the RV park could start construction in the fall and be ready to open in the spring of 2007.
But ideas aren't stopping there. The Burggraffs have thought about adding adventure golf, a water park with wave pool and Tahiti beach and even a rollercoaster.
Dave Burggraff said he doesn't feel the short summer season of good weather will be a hindrance to attracting the needed income. If the electric go-carts on the park's back track prove to be a draw, the Burggraffs are considering putting an air bubble over the area. They've debated whether the air bubble could be made big enough to include a golf driving range.
Just putting go-carts in a warm building for the front junior track, where riders are set up in the cars indoors, is expected to lengthen the go-cart season and make the operation safer and more efficient. Riders get into carts on the side of the track now.
Jackpine logs from trees cut at the site will be used to create Fort Kylie, named after the Burggraffs' nearly 3-year-old granddaughter. A picnic pavilion is being created and the Burggraffs talked to Rhythm of the Rails about locating at the park.
Dave Burggraff said the attraction they are creating should be a complement to existing recreation like the nearby Pirate's Cove, which is adding a go-cart track to its miniature golf.
Park fees have yet to be determined, but the idea behind admission operations is high tech.
Customers receive a bracelet encoded with the specific activities they bought or have entry to everything with an all-day pass. The goal is to have 1 million visitors.
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