Spring Break In The Dells

With Spring Break approaching, I decided a few weeks ago that we needed a little get away. It would have been nice to spend a week on a beach somewhere, but that wasn't in the budget this year. So after some internet searching we decided to venture north to the Wisconsin Dells to an indoor waterpark. We had never been to the Dells, but had heard lots about it from friends - so I found a good deal at the Kalahari - "one of the largest indoor waterparks in the country".

http://www.kalahariresorts.com/wi/

On Saturday afternoon we left with friends from church, Rich and April and their son, Jordan - and drove to Madison, WI. We decided to spend the night there so that we could hit the waterpark early on Sunday. We stayed at a Homewood Suites. (pause for commercial break) If you are ever travelling, you should try these hotels. It is becoming one of my favorites. You get a suite with a pull-out couch, full kitchen, breakfast (and dinner on weeknights) for the price of most regular rooms in say a Hampton Inn or Fairfield. We have stayed at several throughout the country and haven't been disappointed yet. OK back to your regularly scheduled blog...

After we checked in we went to dinner at another of our favorite places "Cheeseburger In Paradise". Awesome food, fun drinks, and Jimmy Buffet music. It's a fun place and if you ever go to one of these, you have to try the Chocolate Nachos for dessert - they are amazing!

Chocolate Nachos - Chocolate and flour tortillas fried, sweetened and covered with chocolate sauce, strawberries and colored sprinkles. Served with Blue Bell® strawberry and vanilla ice cream for dipping."

So here's a little side note: Before we left, I wasn't feeling too great and felt like my diverticulitis was maybe flaring up. Right now, I'm a little panicky with every ache and pain for fear I'll end up in the hospital again. I called my Dr. on Sat. morning and he gave me a prescription for an antibiotic. At the restaurant, I had one of their oh-so-delicious rum runners, but it is made with fresh raspberries, which have lots of seeds (something apparently I have to really be careful bout eating). So after dinner, I was feeling even worse and spent the evening in the room while
Mike, the boys, and our friends went swimming. I guess my rum runner days are over!! :{

Sunday we woke up to about 3 inches of snow - where is the SPRING in Spring Break ??!! We headed for the Dells,. We quickly got out of the snow - although the weather never got much warmer.

Another side note: I'm finding out more and more, that I've become very sensitive to medicine. As we were driving I started to have a reaction to the antibiotic the dr. had prescribed, even though it's one I have had before. ARGHH!! So, our first order of business was to find a Walgreens to get some benedryl (luckily I didn't have to take it because I would have slept the rest of the day and the itching stopped on it's own)


We got to the hotel and were just amazed at the size of the place. It's literally like it's own city. It reminded me of the hotels in Vegas that just go on forever. Except this totally caters to kids - so of course, our boys were in heaven. The waterpark has numerous slides, climbing areas, a wave pool and surf pool, a huge lazy river, water basketball, hot tubs, etc.. etc... It was really too big, because it was hard to keep track of the kids. In addition, there is an indoor amusement park with go karts, climbing wall, ferris wheel, ropes course, laser tag, etc.. etc.. and tons and tons of video games where you can win those wonderful tickets to redeem for prizes. Our package included a day in the amusement park with unlimited rides. Of course, we also spent quite a bit of $$ on the video games.

Here's Mike and Collin in the wave pool.

After swimming for several hours, we checked into our rooms, changed and headed for dinner. One of the restaurants was advertising their prime-rib buffet. At first we were thinking it would be kind of like an Old Country Buffet - but it was way better, with a wonderful selection of food: prime rib, sirloin, salmon, etc. etc. The food was great, plus there was an amazing dessert buffet. The advertised price that we had seen was $21.99 for adults, $4.99 for kids - we thought this was a little high, but given it's at a resort and the quality was really good we figured we'd go for it. When we got the bill, we found the week day price was only $16.99 - a very good deal. So after stuffing themselves with pounds of meat and awesome desserts, Mike and Rich were nearly in tears to learn the bill was $10 less than they had expected. They were happy guys!!

My boss and his family also joined us at the hotel on Sunday evening. They have 2 girls, so it made for more friends for Andrew and Collin to play with. So, they all went back to the pool for more swimming, while Collin and I headed for bed.

The next day we did the amusement park.

Collin especially loved the go-karts with mommy driving. He kept yelling - "I love this ride!"


He also loved the ferris wheel, but that was strictly
a daddy and Collin ride - mommy doesn't do heights!

Andrew is now tall enough to drive his own go-kart by himself. He thought he was pretty cool stuff. I was a little nervous.

Andrew and Emma (my boss' daughter) were the only ones brave enough to tackle the ropes course. It had 3 levels of ropes that went about 4 -5 stories high. I think Andrew was petrified through most of it, but he kept on going. I was really proud of him - it was high and scary and there is no way I would have ever done something like that!

























The Laser Tag was probably our favorite. I'd never done a laser tag course and there is something pretty thrilling about sneaking around rocks and shooting at unsuspecting people. Collin never quite got the sneaking part. He mostly just stood out in the middle and shot at anyone who ran past...but he loved it!


After a full day there, we headed for dinner at - that's right - the buffet. Then Andrew and I both sang in the Kalahari Idol competition. You know if there's karaoke - I'm there. They had a kids and adult competition...unfortunately neither of us won, but it was a fun time. Andrew is pretty good at working the audience, showing off his dance moves and playing harmonica on the microphone. I don't know where he gets that flair for showbiz!!?!? We did get two free large pizzas for paricipating and of course, the adoring cheers from our fans (all 9 of them)!

Afterward, Collin and I went to the room to relax. Andrew and Mike, ever the energizer bunnies, closed the park down at midnight! They are party animals!

Tuesday we spent the morning swimming - until Collin closed down the waterslide! Don't want to go into too much detail, but we were "that family"!! A proud parent moment!! After that incident, we decided it was time to leave (before we were asked to). While Mike and the boys ate pizza, I ran over to the outlet mall across the street for a little retail therapy. Unfortunately, I didn't really find any great deals. I thought there was a recession going on??


So, we headed for home. All in all it was a fun, exhausting trip - but one we would definitely do again!