A Howlin' good time at the Great Wolf Lodge

 The beginning of the year we planned a family vacation to Michigan this summer.  As often happens, Matt's work schedule played havoc with our plans--instead of a family vacation, Matt spent most of the summer traveling to Finland and various other US cities.
I wanted to do something really fun for the kids this summer and decided to try taking them to the Great Wolf Lodge in Concord, NC.  We have been twice before and my kids absolutely adore it!  When I told them that we wouldn't be going on a 10 day trip to Michigan and instead we were doing a 2 day/1 night trip to the Great Wolf Lodge, the kids were thrilled!  I believe the comments went something like "this is going to be the best summer ever!!"
I have to admit I was worried about taking 4 kids to a water park without any other adults...but, having such a great time there before, I figured I would take the chance. We left our house at 8:15 on Monday morning.  We stopped at our favorite rest stop--the welcome center on the Georgia/South Caroline line.  There is a little lake you can walk down to and the kids like looking for seashells.

My boys are always ready for a battle!

 We arrived at 12:45 (lunch and bathroom breaks added to the 4 hour drive time).

Our first stop is always to take a picture with the bear!  I loved how excited the kids were to get there.  The entire drive they talked about what they were going to do first and what ride they were going to go on and what they were going to look at....how fun to be so excited!

After we checked in the kids had to go look at the waterpark.  Caroline and Carter were pointing everything out to Alex and Aaron...it was so fun!  The awe and excitement they had right then made it worth the trip!

  The Clock Tower show is another favorite.  They show it at bedtime and followed by story time.  We got there late and Carter was disappointed that we didn't see all of it, so the next morning we left the waterpark for a few minutes so they could see all of it!

We spent 13 hours at the water park out of 30 hours we were at the hotel!  Carter and Caroline were tall enough to go on anything they wanted and Alex could go on most of the big slides if I was with him, and all of the smaller slides by himself.  There was also a lot that Aaron could do (another thing I love about the Great Wolf Lodge!).  I've always been torn while at the GWL because I didn't want to take my nice camera in the pool area, but that is where we spend so much of our time that I hate not having pictures at the end of the trip.  This time I brought our small waterproof camera and it was perfect.  No flash, so a lot of the pictures were blurry, but there were enough that turned out to make it fun.

I think 75% of our time was spent at the wave pool.

As usual, Caroline made a friend while she was there--they did things together both days.  Caroline said she was nice and she thought about staying good friends with her, but she was only 8.

Aaron and I loved the wave pool too--this was at the end of the second day and he would just rest his head on me and relax while the waves crashed into him.

The lily pads were so much fun.  All the kids loved going on them and trying to walk across them without falling in the pool.  They are tethered to the ground with one strap in the center of each lily pad so they move a lot, but you can hold onto the rope on top.  Caroline got to where she would get a running start and be able to run/slide over the first three!

I love how many different things there are--really there is something for everyone!

Our other trips we have always spent a lot of time in the baby pool area--these "boats" with the water guns are a favorite!  This year we spent some time there, but I guess with Aaron big enough to go on some of the slides and big enough to enjoy the wave pool, the baby area wasn't as much fun anymore.  I do love that it is a fenced in area and the water isn't more than 18" deep so it is perfect for little ones--and easy for parents to  keep track of them.  I also love that there is a LOT to do in that area--not just a shallow pool but fountains and slides and water guns and even a mini bucket that dumps.

Caroline (and now Carter)'s favorite part of the water park is the bucket at Ft. Mackenzie.  This is a giant bucket (you can see it to the right of Carter's head in the picture above) that fills with 1,000 gallons of water and, once filled, dumps it out over anyone below it. While Caroline and Carter loved it--Aaron and Alex despised it.  Aaron's problem was that the 2 big water slides he was allowed to go on started right under the bucket--so if you didn't time it right you would get caught with only a small roof to shield you from the water dumping down.  I got to be pretty good at timing--we would get almost to the water slide then wait for the bucket to dump.  As soon as it dumped we would hurry and get in line and usually Aaron could get started on the slide just as the bell was ringing to indicate it was about to dump!

Here is Caroline waiting for the bucket to dump

  the view as the water is coming

The end

Carter's Turn!

The full action video!

The pool area is fun too--the water in this area goes from 3 to 4 1/2 feet and with basketball hoops and a floating snake there is a lot to do.

I remembered that the camera was waterproof up to 3 meters.  I couldn't remember exactly how much 3 meters was (in relation to yards), but I figured we could a few feet under water.  The kids had fun posing under water, unfortunately the battery was about dead (I had forgotten to charge it overnight) so we couldn't play with the underwater pictures as much as we wanted to.

A few pictures on the big water slides.  This is Carter and Alex and I (and some strange man that they put us with--whose knee is in every shot I took!) on the River Canyon Run.  Alex could only ride it with an adult so Caroline watched Aaron while I took him.  Alex LOVED this one and would have done it 100 times if he could have!

Carter and Alex going down Alberta Falls.

We had so much fun while at the Great Wolf Lodge!  Really it was great to be able to let the kids go and do things and I just had to keep track of Aaron and check in with Alex frequently.  I was thinking that it will be perfect when Alex is 3" taller and can go on all the rides without an adult and  Aaron is 3" taller and can go on all the rides with an adult!

 After we left the water park the boys wanted to do the magicquest game  with their wand.  Their goal was to fight the dragon....really to do that you need to spend 5-6 hours doing the quests.  We spent two hours doing it and had done it an hour that morning, but there was still a long way to go.  Luckily as we walked past the dragon (about the time that we really had to leave) there was a boy fighting the dragon, and several other kids waving their wands to "help" him.  I told the boys to jump in and help him to...so they did and when the dragon was defeated I told them all congratulations and we gave some high-fives and they were ready to leave! The drive home was uneventful and we got home about 9pm.  The kids all fell into bed and were fast asleep in minutes...it was a great end to the trip!

Matt had suggested taking the kids to a local water park instead of driving 4 hours to Concord, NC and spending the night.  It would definitely have been cheaper, but I decided that there were a few things that made the GWL better.

The first thing is that it is in a self contained area and the only people there are either employees or hotel guests--no long lines, not really crowded even at the busiest times, and it was fairly easy to find all the kids when I needed them.  We set up meeting times and places, but if I needed them, it wasn't hard to get them.

The second thing is the lifeguards.  The lifeguards at the GWL are AMAZING!!  I normally do not trust lifeguards at pools to do anything more than blow the whistle when it is time for their break (anything they do above that is a bonus).  But at the GWL the lifeguards are well trained and on the job.  They have routes that they walk (no sitting in chairs for any of them) and they check danger spots all the time. When we were waiting for the opening on our second day they told us that lifeguards are constantly trained and evaluated--they have 20 seconds to identify someone in trouble AND rescue them!  I saw 2 tests while I was there--one in the wave pool and one in the regular pool.  The two I saw were with real people who started acting like they were drowning (waving their arms and bobbing in the water).  Both times at least 2 lifeguards blew their whistles and those people were out (one on a stretcher) in the time required.  I know they also use child sized dummies for testing.  Our own experience with them was great--Alex swallowed some water in the wave pool.  He was in the very shallow end (about 1 foot) and I was right next to him.  He started coughing and I was making sure he was okay--he was coughing so I knew he was okay, but he wasn't talking.  I got him to stop coughing and talk.  Right next to us was a lifeguard who had come over and stayed next to me the entire time that Alex was coughing and he stayed until we were both sure that Alex was okay.  Alex clearly wasn't in any danger and I was there to get help if needed, but I loved that the lifeguard came and stayed until everything was completely normal again.  Confidence in the lifeguards made it possible for me to feel mostly comfortable with the kids going off on rides and in the pool without me.  They are all good swimmers, but without such good lifeguards I wouldn't have let them and none of us would have had as much fun.
I was worried I would regret going, instead I am thinking when we can do it again!