Great Tides opens on Great Stirrup Cay with a 170-foot slide tower
Norwegian Cruise Line's new island water park opened on 4 September 2026 with 19 slides, the Caribbean's tallest slide tower and dueling Master Blasters.
Norwegian Cruise Line has opened Great Tides Waterpark on its private island, Great Stirrup Cay in the Bahamas. The park covers about six acres and packs in 19 slides, an 800-foot river and a family splash zone.
The Tidal Tower
The centrepiece is the Tidal Tower, a 170 ft (52 m) structure carrying eight slides. NCL bills it as the tallest slide tower in the Caribbean. Note the usual caveat: 170 ft is the tower height, not the vertical drop of any single slide, so it does not challenge Meryal’s Guinness record of 76.3 m of slide drop.
Dueling Master Blasters
Two side-by-side Breakwater Blasters, WhiteWater West Master Blaster water coasters, let riders race uphill on water jets, the first dueling Blasters on a cruise-line island.
Why it matters
Cruise lines have become one of the fastest-growing buyers of big water slides. Royal Caribbean’s Perfect Day at CocoCay set the template in 2019 with Daredevil’s Peak; Great Tides is NCL’s answer, and more private-island parks are in the pipeline for 2027.