The job market is so tight in the Central Valley that the prospect of more than 400 mostly low-paying seasonal jobs at a Clovis water park drew more than 1,800 applicants Saturday.

Wild Water Adventures planned to hire 400 workers for the summer season, which was welcome news to applicants who began showing up at 10 a.m. for the job fair -- three hours before it was scheduled to begin.

So many showed up, and so many were qualified, that sales manager Bob Martin said park officials decided to hire 500 people.

"The applicants are so good, we decided to over hire a little," Martin said.

The water park hires for jobs ranging from lifeguard and customer service to maintenance and human resources. Park personnel usually attend job fairs at local colleges to find workers. Martin said this year officials decided to do their own after hearing stories of huge turnouts at other events.

In March, 10,000 hopefuls attended a job fair at the Fresno Fairgrounds. The trend is happening nationwide. Last week, more than 10,000 people descended on a job fair at a New Hampshire college gymnasium, jamming traffic for miles and forcing organizers to cut off admission to the event after just two hours.

At Wild Water Adventures, applicants came from as far away as Bakersfield and Merced. Martin said a family of four from Bakersfield all applied for jobs, and a man came from Merced in a three-piece suit with a briefcase.

"He told us he'd been laid off, his unemployment was about to run out, and he'd take any job," Martin said.

Mario Pena, who was hired earlier in the week as a human resources manager at Wild Water, said he could relate to the hundreds of applicants he interviewed Saturday.

Pena, a former sports-apparel store manager, was laid-off in December and applied for almost 200 jobs before being hired at Wild Water.

"I wanted to work, just like the people I talked to here today. They just want to work," Pena said.

Edwin Mora showed up hoping to be hired by Wild Water's maintenance department. He said he recently finished an automotive training program but couldn't find work as a mechanic.

"At this point, I'll take what I can get and be happy," Mora said.

Martin said Wild Water officials will begin interviews next week, and those hired will work at the park starting Memorial Day weekend. The seasonal work will end after the Labor Day weekend.