Days 13 & 14: Sandusky Ohio - - Great Wolf Lodge
Total Miles traveled: 2,800 something - it's all blending together
Total paper towels used: 1.5 rolls
Total wipes: 1/2 a brick
9.1% Alcohol Beer consumed 4 bottles
Ice cream stops to date: eight
Animal fact: Owls are the only animal that can see the color blue
Memories:
Gordon: Grace screaming on the water slides
Danny: Leaving the campground; splooshing people from the water bucket; finding out about the silver dragon at MagiQuest; the girl ice dragon
Therese: The kids' reaction when we surprised them with a stay at the GWL; Using the underwater camera
Grace: Finding out about the GWL; MagiQuest on all four floors of the lodge; getting beaten by the Silver Dragon
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We got outta Dodge around 9:30 - we tried our best to impress our neighbors with our expertise. The kids helped and also caught frogs. They mostly caught frogs.
The car ride was long again. Danny was very concerned that because we didn't have time to swim in the campground we might not get to swim at all on our vacation. Gordon and I promised him that if the place we were staying in Sandusky, Ohio didn't have a pool we would turn around and go somewhere else. {{Wink, wink}}
Pennsylvania is one long state. It cost about $30 to ride on their expressway but it took less time to drive more miles on this leg of the journey than it did to drive the shorter, previous leg. We also drove through the beautiful mountain ranges in PA. The kids got a kick out of the tunnels that took us right through the mountains.
We rolled into the parking lot of the Great Wolf Lodge at about 6:00 pm. The kids thought we were turning around. We sprang the good news on them and they were thrilled!
We had been promised something special at the Lodge since we've stayed at the Dells GWL so many times. They gave us two bottled waters, a small bag of plain pop corn and six dum dum lollipops. Royal treatment. We were mildly disgruntled.
Nevertheless, the kids enjoyed the Lodge. The water park is only about 1/4 the size of our usual place and the MagiQuest game is sprinkled throughout the four floors of the lodge. Grace, who is watching over my shoulder also added (for the MagiQuest enthusiast) that it has quest stones instead of a quest tree.
Although the water park is much smaller, we really enjoyed the water slides. I liked them better than the Dells place - they were much faster and wove outside of the Lodge which was cool in the sunshine. I had loaded up on a fresh batch of sunscreen but it turned out the outside pool was quite small so we stayed inside the whole time. My ears are still ringing from Grace's screams on the water slide. Every time we blasted through the tunnel the lifeguards on the other end seemed to be on high alert.
I am also glad to see Grace getting so comfortable in the water. We played in pretty much all the areas of the water park except the kiddie pool.
The other big feature of our time in the water was our new waterproof camera. We got a bit carried away trying to do an underwater selfie. It was nice to be able to carry a camera every where we went without worry.
As we were getting ready to have dinner we got a call from the front desk. They had a gift card for us that we were supposed to have received at check-in. $50!!! Alright, disgruntled-ness: gone. Since we didn't have any more expenses planned for our stay, the kids were each able to get a MagiQuest accessory and ice cream. We have enough left over for two more scoops tomorrow before we head out.
Our plans are changing a bit on for the last two days. The thought of a nearly 7 hour drive to Naperville, IL and a long bus ride into the city the next day is a bit daunting. We're ready to wind down. So we will be driving a little over four hours tomorrow to the Indiana Dunes State Park area. Sunday we will spend some time in the dunes and drive three hours to Milwaukee and crash at Paul's house. Monday we hope to spend a little time on the Lake Front and head home - wow that went fast!
