We left around 4:30 Wednesday afternoon. The drive up was pretty uneventful, other than that we forgot just how long five and a half hours in the car feels! (It was actually a little long, since we looked at the traffic around Chicago and decided to go far, far around that mess.)
Tess liked being a little melodramatic in our pictures during this trip.
We finally got up to the resort around 9:30ish Wisconsin time (1 hour behind Indiana), so we were all pretty tired and ready for bed. The first hint at things to come was the front desk person, who first of all made me wait while he finished (what sounded to me like) a personal conversation with a co-worker. Then he was not exactly friendly. I mean, he wasn't rude or mean or anything, but he certainly didn't act like he wanted to be there! And then he acted amazed that I wasn't willing to fork over $70 PER CHILD for their Cub Club for all the activities and such they had around. Um, no thanks. Just give me my room key, sheesh.
We parked, dragged all the bags into the building, and finally found our suite.
It was... not what we expected. Don't get me wrong - I've stayed in way worse places before. WAY WORSE. But for what we paid, I did NOT expect there to be duct tape along the carpet/tile divide under the bathroom door. And there was only one bathroom, and the master bedroom did NOT have a door to it and I could have sworn there was one when I looked at the layout maps while researching places to stay. (But that's on me, I guess. Still. Disappointing.) And it just wasn't as nice as the Wilderness resort where we had stayed last time!
Still, it was late and the kids were seconds away from melting down. So we tossed everyone into pajamas and put them swiftly to bed.
Lance and I crashed into bed, and that's when we noticed the freeway noise. Even though we were 3 stories up, we were RIGHT NEXT to the freeway and it was LOUD. And then we noticed the smell... I can't quite describe it. It was kind of sewerish, kind of garbageish, kind of mildewish. We couldn't figure out where it was coming from, and it wasn't that bad, just enough to make you wonder...
If we had been there in the afternoon I would have definitely gone down to complain about the room. But we had a suite full of sleeping children. Besides, what would they have been able to do? I'm pretty sure the place was sold out.
We went to bed feeling kind of picked on.
The next morning was spent trying on wolf ears, eating Eggo waffles for breakfast (my kids' new FAVORITE thing to eat on vacation), and swimming.
The indoor water park was pretty good. A whole lot smaller than the last place we went, but still pretty fun. Plus, the water was way warmer than last time, which was a definite bonus. The biggeest disappointment was that several of the slides were closed. What the what? But the kids had a great time and wore themselves out. Tess must've gone down the kiddie slides 50 times in a row, I'm not exaggerating.
After eating lunch at our suite we decided to split up: Lance and the boys to the arcade, Tess and I for some girl time. I decided we'd go check out their Create A Creature place (think Build A Bear, only for Great Wolf Lodge characters). We got there and I quickly realized that this endeavor would easily cost around $40, and Tess didn't seem that into it. So we looked around the souvenir shop instead and she fell in love with a $9 owl instead. Sold.
It was pretty cute, though. Tess had to look around that entire, rather large, shop to make sure she saw all of her options and to check everything out. She really likes to window shop!
After buying "Fluffy" (what she named the owl), we decided to splurge and get a treat. This is where Tess's late night and long morning of swimming came to bite me: she saw Dippin' Dots and was bound and determined to get those. But I just couldn't stomach the $4.50 price tag for a very, very small cup.
Tessie tantrumed.
We left the shop.
Tess repented and we each got an ice cream cone. (For less that what the one Dippin' Dots would have been!) She still pouted a lot, but eventually got sweeter.
We then roamed around and looked at things around the lodge, eventually making our way back to our room to watch a movie. (I was hoping for a nap for both of us. No dice.)
She begged to take some selfies with Fluffy, and I obliged.
With the obligatory silly faced one, of course.
The boys got back, disappointed. The arcade had been a big rip-off. Much sadness. So we spent the afternoon drowning our sorrows in long UNO games (house rules, of course!) and Yahtzee.
It was actually really fun. I love times like this when we can all play together and have fun.
Cole and Josh kept looking out the window at the freeway. Cole thought the cars were racing each other, which made Josh laugh, which made Cole keep talking about it.
Tessie always wants to play Yahtzee, but always quits halfway through. It's tough being four.
We decided to have an early dinner that night. (Well, early for Wisconsin. It was 5pm there, 6pm to our tummies.) We decided to have our Thanksgiving Feast at Buffalo Phil's again.
Here we are at the entrance. It's a pretty big place! Two years ago it was SUPER CROWDED on Thanksgiving night and we had to wait for almost an hour. This year? Walked right in and got a table!
We got an excellent table with a really good waiter - he was so nice and great. We had spills and messes and kids acting like kids, and he was just so patient the whole time! I felt bad for him for working on Thanksgiving and made sure to leave him a good tip.
And of course we had our food brought to us on a toy train!
The food at Buffalo Phil's is alright. I mean, it's good, but not the best ever. I think it's the ambiance that gets people there. Lots of old timey pictures and stuffed animals doing funny things like drinking beer, or the rear end of a bear sticking out of the wall. Classy. :) (It's actually really goofy and fun.)
The kids all ordered kids meals which they promptly ignored because they all filled up on soda first. Growl. (Some things never change. You'd think Lance and I would remember to ask for no drinks until our dinner comes, but we never do.)
The chandelier by our table.
The waiter was nice enough to take our picture.
Poor Josh didn't eat anything - his tummy had been giving him trouble all day. Nothing that stopped him from doing all the activities, but he just couldn't stomach any food. (We've had all sorts of weird bugs going around town.)
My Thanksgiving feast: a buffalo burger with onion rings, bacon, Canadian bacon, and BBQ sauce, with a side of fries. It was pretty good!
At one point one of the trains had a singing, dancing Elmo doll on it. The boys thought it was HYSTERICAL when the Elmo doll fell off. Dinner and entertainment!
Afterwards we walked around this big entertainment center called Knuckleheads. Think Chuck-E-Cheese, only on a grander scale. Josh wanted his picture with this robot because we have the exact same robot only in a smaller form. (Lance and I brought it back from our SF trip.)
Who needs pie for Thanksgiving dessert when you have M&Ms?
That night I took Tess, Cole, and Josh down to the Grand Lobby for the Clock Show and bedtime story. This had really been talked up by the staff and other people.
It was pretty much what I expected - animatronic animals and humans singing pretty cheesy songs and having pretty cheesy conversations. (Their whole spiel was on conservation. Quite frankly, it fell on the deaf ears of children and tired parents.) Also, the sound system wasn't that great, so it was really hard to understand any of it. My kids thought it was okay, but I think after having gone to DisneyWorld recently they were expecting a lot more!
We entertained ourselves with selfies while waiting.
Ever charming, Tess.
So for the bedtime story this lady came out (accompanied by some guy in a Raccoon suit), and she was holding a big box of candy. All the kids got excited and raptly paid attention while she explained the candy was only for those kids who had completed some scavenger hunt sponsored by Boogie Wipes. You could literally see the looks of disappointment pass back in waves as the realization coasted through the kids. No candy?!
I was pretty shocked. I mean, not that my kids need more candy at all. But coming out to a crowd of 100+ kids with a box of candy and then telling them they couldn't have it? LAME.
Almost as lame as the booooring, self-selling book she read about Great Wolf characters. My kiddos are used to more exciting bedtime stories; this did not sell it. When the story was over they pretty much ran all the way back to our room.
I did get to see this moose in the lobby, though, and decided if I ever had a stuffed moose in my house I would definitely hang ornaments from its antlers during the holidays, too.
Since we were at the VERY FURTHEST END away from anything, the walk to anywhere from our suite always took a while. Sometimes we had to stop and rest. On giant benches.
The next morning was spent swimming again. And it was fun! And exhausting! Which is why we spent a lazy afternoon napping (like Tess and Lance), watching TV (like the boys), and shopping online (like moi).
We eventually ventured out and went to see "The Good Dinosaur". It was pretty good; not my favorite Pixar movie ever, but good. The animation for the backgrounds, especially the water, was AH-MAZ-ING. Seriously, to the point it was distracting.
Nobody was hungry by the time we were done, so we decided to go swimming again. It was pretty quiet and there weren't really lines for the slides, which was fun. We got to go on their biggest ride - the Tornado - with it all lit up with flashing lights and such. Way fun.
It was while bobbing up and down in the wave pool that I came up with my WalMart/Target analogy as far as these water resorts are concerned.
Great Wolf Lodge is the WalMart of the resorts up in Wisconsin Dells. It's not bad, per se, but you really do get what you pay for. The Wilderness Resort is the Target of Wisconsin Dells - just nicer in most ways. A little more pricey, but worth the extra cost. And in all seriousness, when we were at the Wilderness Resort I saw tons of moms in Land's End bathing suits. (Several with the same I was wearing!) And at Great Wolf? Lots of moms in WalMart bathing suits.
My friends are probably all laughing at me because I shop at WalMart all the time. But it's not that I love WalMart so much, it's just that it's so stinkin' close to our house (less than 2 miles), and so dang cheap. Cheap groceries are good in my book. Cheap resorts? Not so much.
Oh, and in case you're wondering, we've already decided to upgrade our next trip to the Kalahari Resort. I've priced it out and it'll only be about $300-$400 more. Totally worth it in my book. (Although I'm having a hard time coming up with a store to compare them to... perhaps they're the online grocery delivery service of resorts? You can afford to have them delivered, but you're not so rich that you can just hire your maid or butler to do the shopping. I dunno... I'm kinda beating this analogy to death.)
Anywho, we eventually got back to our room and sent Lance out to get our dinner. (Because we were both pretty sure no one would behave if we went out!)
The waiting was hard and long...
Okay, not that hard.
But completely worth it. Gourmet macaroni and cheese and it was sooooo good!
It was a delicious way to end our night. (Literally. We ate and then it was right to bed, which never happens around our house.)
The next morning we packed up and headed out. We all agreed we had had fun, but would not miss Great Wolf. Sorry not sorry, GW.
On our way to Madison, where we were going to visit some old friends, we saw a sign for the Cheese Chalet. OF COURSE we had to stop. And when we saw the giant cow out front, OF COURSE we had to take a picture.
Lance caught this gem of Cole. Yikes.
We picked up cheese curds and a cheese magnet. Because that's how we roll.
We had a really good visit with the Roylances. John and Sara were in our ward a few years ago and we were pretty good friends. (They were always the last to leave any party or get together at our house - and we loved it.:)) Sara was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer last spring and died on the 4th of July, leaving behind John and their 5 kids. (The oldest is 11 and the youngest just turned 1.) John and the kids are all doing well and we spent a good 2 hours catching up and holding kids our laps, chatting, and getting our nails painted by Emma, who is 5. (Okay, that was just Tess and me.) John is such a great guy - seriously, I was just humbled by his resilience and good attitude. He's finishing his PhD program soon and on a job hunt; I can't help but feel that after all they've been through, it's time for their family to catch a break and get the best job ever! (Fingers crossed, prayers said.)
After our visit we decided to get some lunch. We first stopped at a gas station Subway (once you leave Madison you're pretty much in the middle of nowhere), but as we stood there getting ready to order I just felt this overwhelming "GET OUT OF HERE" feeling in my gut. And I've learned that when you get that feeling you listen to it. So we drove some more and when we saw a sign for the World's Largest Culver's, we knew where we'd be having lunch.
It was all we hoped for and more... Okay, it was just a Culver's. About twice the size as the one on Lafayette. But Culver's is good and I splurged and got the fried cheese curds, so life was extra good.
So this vacation wasn't exactly what we were expecting. But it wasn't terrible, and we still had a lot of fun together as a family. In fact, I'm already planning our next Thanksgiving trip. Whether it'll be next year or the year after remains to be seen, but we certainly know where we will not be going! (Sorry, Great Wolf Lodge!) (Not really.)
