Finishing Up

Since I have virtually no pictures of the last couple days of our vacation, I’ve decided to finish up our vacation in one post.

And there was much rejoicing.  Especially from me.

On Saturday, July 9, we packed up and headed out to the final destination, save home, of our epic road trip:  the Wisconsin Dells.

I’ll just tell you that I’m not a huge fan of the Wisconsin Dells.  I think that the hotels there are massively overpriced and the amount of fun that one can have in waterparks is massively overrated.  That being said, my kids absolutely love the Wisconsin Dells, so this was part of the trip was much anticipated and much enjoyed by them.

On our way to the Dells, we stopped somewhere in Wisconsin at Moe’s (Almost World Famous) Diner, mostly because we liked the name and were tired of eating at chain restaurants.  It was not a great experience…terrible service, so-so food.  Perhaps we should have stuck with what we knew!

Upon arrival at the Dells, we checked into our hotel, the Grand Marquis.  This place is not one of the mega-resorts with huge indoor and outdoor waterparks, but it was much more affordable, with a small waterpark and pool, and it offered great discounts on tickets to THE big outdoor waterpark, Noah’s Ark.  So, this is where we landed.

One thing to which the kids had most been looking forward, aside from the water stuff, was playing a game called MagiQuest at the Great Wolf Lodge, one of the mega-resorts for which I refused to pay.  MagiQuest is something like a real-live video game, in which “magi” purchase wands and then proceed to go on quests.  The magi finds out what his or her quest is and then runs around a four-story “forest” pointing his or her wand at various treasure chests, paintings, and tree stumps to solve it.

(Really, if you want to know more about MagiQuest, Google it.  I’m explaining it badly.)

Charlotte and Elijah absolutely LOVED this game.  In fact, they played it from 3:30 that afternoon until 10:45 that evening, when they had completed every quest available to them at least twice and I managed to drag them back to our hotel.  Jeff had walked back to our hotel hours earlier so that Jeremy could go to sleep, and I couldn’t believe that the kids actually played this game for this amount of time.  I finally quit chasing them around the place, sat down on a bench, and played card games on my iTouch.  Sheesh.

We did take a short break for supper, when we somehow managed to find a vegetarian restaurant called the Cheese Factory.  No, we didn’t do this on purpose, and, while the Rachael-Ray-endorsed grilled cheese was fantastic, we did find ourselves wishing they’d thrown a little meat on something.  But the kids were chomping at the bit to get back to MagiQuest, so we didn’t linger.

The next morning, I got in a five-mile run, and then it started raining, so we swam and played at the hotel while we tried to figure out our options.  We had coupons for discounted entry to the Kalahari Waterparks, which would let us be inside all day if the weather didn’t clear up, but this didn’t really appeal to any of us.  Fortunately, the weather finally blew over, and we decided to head to Noah’s Ark around 11:00.

Our hotel was offering a fantastic deal for this place:  40 percent off one-day admission.  Noah’s Ark was also offering free admission on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays with paid admission on Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays.  Since we were there on a Sunday and Monday, we paid about $80 for all of us to spend two days at a really good waterpark.

On our first day at Noah’s Ark, we rented a cabana, where Jeremy and I hung out while Jeff and the older kids hit some rides.  After a late pizza lunch, we loaded Jeremy into his stroller, and Jeff and I spent the afternoon swapping out riding with the kids.  In retrospect, the cabana was an unnecessary purchase, but live and learn!

We stayed at the waterpark on Sunday until about 6:00, ate at a surprisingly good restaurant called the Brat House Grill, and then headed back to the hotel for more swimming.

On the final day of our vacation, we checked out of the hotel and went back to Noah’s Ark, where the kids ate Dippin’ Dots for lunch, and we rode all the rides we had the previous day over and over and over again.  I think this was the kids’ idea of nirvana.  As we had a four- to five-hour drive home, we left Noah’s Ark about 2:00, swung by the Crocs outlet for summer shoe purchases, ate a late lunch at Subway and Taco Bell, and were headed home by 3:00.

This is what the last two days of our vacation did to Elijah, and this is the only picture that I took of the Wisconsin portion of our trip.  Huh.

A quick word about Noah’s Ark…we really enjoyed it.  The kids were able to ride all but one ride, which Jeff tried out, and there were lots of thrill rides there.  The lines weren’t terrible, and it was nice to be outside.  We all ended up a little bit burned, but what’s a summer vacation without at least one sunburn?!

Whew!  What a great nine days.  And what a great relief that I can finally put this vacation in the books.