Saturday, February 4, 2012
So glorious to wake up and know the whole day stretched ahead of us with nothing to do but play until we dropped...at which point, we could drop into nice, cushy hotel beds!
Nathan was up around 5 but quietly chatted with himself until amping up the volume incrementally sometime in the early 6's, at which point, we all roused.
Then it was no holds barred pajama-jammie-time in room 568!
These grizzly bear footies matched our lumberjack room decor perfectly. (I personally think Nathan planned that ahead of time.)
Happy running-singing-dance from one end of the room to the other, repeated several times, with much heavy footfallage. I shudder to think of the curses the downstairs neighbors surely hurled our way...
Nathan discovers we have a porch.
Ayize scrupulously looked after Nathan's every concern, appointing himself Chief Safety Office Up On High of our hotel room. Here, he made sure the latch was properly locked before informing Nathan quite imperiously that "babies are not allowed to go out there, it's not safe"!
Ayize shrieking, "Hide and seek, and I made a mask!" He had made it with his art supplies, which we'd laboriously towed from home (the art was drawn on the other side).
Both boys clearly show a talent for camouflage BTW - I obviously had no idea where either was hiding...
;-)
Heading out for Mommy morning java at the one Starbucks in town.
Ayize danced around on a shelf of polluted ice at the edge of the parking lot while I hunted for Car-o-line, our Forester (so dubbed by Ayize - get it? "Car"?).
Eventually, I had to resort to the old "push the unlock button multiple times and follow the beep-beep sound" trick. Some things never change.
A driving tour of wacky and wonderful Wisconsin Dells.
Mount Olympus...
...complete with Trojan horse roller coaster.
Ghost town, it being winter. Dozens of defunct, weather-battered waterslides everywhere the eye could see.
And they actually paid someone to build the place like this??
Coffee in hand successfully, and I was one happy woman.
Back to the hotel we headed, for a quick breakfast in our room of cereal and apples. There, we discovered pantless little man dancing on the bed. Meanwhile, Mom contemplated the difficulties ahead (shirt removal and the donning of swim trunks were the next events up).
Shirt removal. I gave her a 9.7 for technique, speed, and finesse.
Gratuitous, adorable, grabbing-of-the-toes shot for the grandmas, as Nathers rolled around on the bed, delighted with his own dressing antics.
Job well done, Frau Byrne! And I even managed to sneak in a mom-tot portrait.
We were all suited up, but our first planned pool of the day, the Wild West Waterpark, didn't open until 10. Wah!
We decided to kill an hour playing in the hotel's indoor playground, the Timberland Play Park. Nyika, Daryle, and the girls were finishing up their hotel breakfast and meeting us there, too.
Ayize donned some socks with his Crocs - never a good look, but socks are required to play in Timberland - and he was off at a run for some pre-pool fun.
Checking out the Sky Ropes Course, suspended over the Northern Lights Arcade, as we neared the Timberland Play Park. I soooo wanted to do this, but it cost extra, and Ayize was not tall enough - though he thought it was super cool, too! Next year?
The play park was way huger than anything I'd expected. This was the entrance, bordered by the arcade. Not too crazy-looking, right?
Wrong. Here are some more views.
Slides that corkscrewed like crazy...
...four layered stories of climbing floors with tunnels and tubes and dead ends and obstacles every which way...
...a huge, square mazelike floorplan...
...and in the center of it all, several stories of a cutout, open, central area with balconies adorned with pneumatic ball shooters that sent projectiles flying every which way at all times.
Take cover!
Along one wall was a small toddler's play area of hard, slippery foam.
Siblings dancing on the soft, springy "river".
I can jump on, I can jump off!
I can even climb out of this "baby jail" if I so choose to!
Big sister Brianna informing Mom that Nathan would like to slide down this stone bridge, and for Mom to please come help him. Lucky little brother, to have such an attentive translator!
Mom complied. Wheeee!
Ayize, in the grip of the cobra.
He escaped, only to lose his "girlfriend" to the same foe.
The pneumatic ball shooter things were super loud, and louder yet was the periodic explosive sound effects as air was forced through a bunch of structures inside the play park to clear any trapped balls from nooks and crannies.
Clearly, Kayla was not appreciating all the racket!
(But she did enjoy borrowing my socks - Talya, take note! Target stocked up on some uber-cool, jealousy-inspiring, new kneesies, just as my dream predicted so many months ago. Just sayin).
Lost in the maze, and despite being able to touch him through the net, I got hopelessly turned around trying to get to him.
Nathan got just a few feet inside the first story of the play park and got stuck (not really - but he was intimidated by the short drop to the next level down). Such a cute, determined, yet helpless position he found himself in!
Big sis came to the rescue with some tenacious tugs.
Not long after, Ayize and I found each other (at long last), and then he led me to this fun, fast, bumpy slide for a race.
Leading me on what I thought was a wild goose chase to what he called the "big, black slide" (I would discover the next day that such a thing actually does exist, we just didn't succeed in finding it that morning).
The search continued across this plank walkway...
...and then up this rope ladder.
Okay, I was exhausted, and my back was killing me from crouching around and climbing through stuff designed for little people.
How much further? Are we there yet?? Whine, whine whine.
Eventually, we gave up on our hunt, but did stumble across this music area and had a lot of fun creating some jams together.
The mouth of that crazy twisting-forever slide from an earlier photo.
I went down and got a bit nauseous from sliding at such an alarmingly speedy rate, and with so many stomach-turning corkscrew twists. Ugh. But on the other hand, the peekaboo windows were kinda cool!
Suddenly, someone pointed out that it was 10 o'clock, and like magic, the play park evacuated, ourselves included.
We walked across an elevated bridge separating the two side of the sky ropes course and entered the Wild West. First order of business: secure a big table for all of us (we had discovered firsthand how hard that was to do the evening before).
Nathan happily laid claim to a spot at our chosen place.
Our table was close to a kiddie play pool, and Ayize was already off and running and rocking the tot slide before I could even get my Crocs off.
Brianna followed suit (though the slippery slide gave her a few butterflies).
Speed demon (or as speedy as one can get on a toddler-sized slide).
He was just warming up for the crazy rides to come as the morning progressed.
Next stop: the Wild West's Ransack Ridge. This crazy, four-story water playground is supposedly the largest of its kind in North America. I believe it! Every turn and every corner brought peril to the hydrophobic: buckets dumped on our unsuspecting heads from naughty kids running around on overhead levels, a 750-gallon tipping bucket dumped its head-knocking load every few minutes, all while water cannons and blasters, plus their animated targets, shot and sprayed and blared and moved everywhere.
I quickly developed a headache, but Ayize was in Overstimulation Paradise! And that was even before he discovered the two giant four-story-high body slides...
Climbing the stairs to Ransack Ridge, and stepping on water sprays to blast other kids.
Kai and Daryle were checking out The Fantastic Voyage and The Black Hole, the two big attractions, that bordered the end wall of the waterpark from this handy elevated vantage point.
We all took turns racing each other on a pair of yellow side-by-side speed slides and ended up in this splash pond below, where I watched Nathan while Brianna made a quick bathroom break with Mom.
The boys had fun on these weird water animals.
Nathan liked the frog's leap pads, and butt-bounced on them merrily til Mom's return.
Tamara returned to collect Nathan, and they headed off to grab some lunchy grub.
Ayize and I set off to ride The Black Hole, a four-person "thrill ride", with Nyika and Kayla. This is the view as we climbed the stairs to the ride, and we weren't even at the top yet. From up here, even the four-story body slides of Ransack Ridge looked dimunitive (and believe me, they were not).
Climbing higher, and looking out the window at some of the paths the Wild West thrill rides take.
While we waited, Kayla provided entertainment! LOL
At the top, finally! We watched as our boat came off the lift.
This guy was just ahead of us in line. No joke, his wife chickened out at the last minute! She abandoned him and ran back down the stairs through the huge line. He stood there, not knowing what to do for a moment, then finally decided to ride alone with his two very small children.
Everyone looked on dubiously, including the attendant, who was no doubt wondering how the guy was supposed to safely hold onto both an infant and a young toddler while also holding the handles (as required in the ride's long set of rules posted nearby), but the guy just gave one final, manly, brave shrug and awkwardly hoisted himself and them in, then off they went, down the black hole's sheer drop, their terrified screams trailing behind them.
The attendant grabbing our raft. Hurrah!
Everybody was pretty psyched, even Kayla, who was equally terrified, despite (or maybe because of) this being her second time on the ride.
And we're off! The daredevil of our group, predictably, was the most excited.
Action shot, taken sometime in the middle of our ride!!!
Alive, and safely on solid ground again!
I seriously had to go collapse in a nearby lounge chair because I had my previous headache, way too much coffee that morning, and the ride scared the crap out of me...because I'm a wuss with horrid vertigo.
I asked the kids, as we disembarked, "Did you guys have fun?"
Ayize shouted, with great animation, "Mama, I want to go on that AGAAAAAIN!!!"
Kayla chimed in, in a tiny peeping voice, "That was not fun for me."
Nyika and I started to giggle, I collapsed into my aforementioned chair, shaky legs and all, and then we luckily managed to dissuade Ayize by pointing out that the line had become way longer in the space of time it had taken us for our turn.
Phew!
It was past noon by now, and Ayize was getting hungry, so we returned to the room for some PB & J and fruit.
When we got there, buck nekkid crank-calling chaos was in full tilt!
;-)
Tamara attempted to dress a moving target - Ayize was performing a karate-chop dance, which Nathan was happily imitating, even while pieces of his wardrobe were tugged upon him!
Nathan's version of "the karate chop", Ayize's signature move (though Nathan's was less karate, more hip rotation)!
Mom...are you in there?
So cute when he starts exclaiming, "Wow!"
Calling Grandpa to ask if he and Grandma will come to the hotel so we can all live there. Not sure what the front desk thought of this phone call...LOL
After lunch, Tamara put Brianna and Nathan down for naps, and Ayize and I donned dry swim gear to head back to Wild West. Not sure why he was making this funny face here, but it made me giggle.
He supplemented his sammie lunch with this slice of pizza from the waterpark stand, which was actually really darn tasty. And inspired yet more funny faces from him. Go figure.
Well-fed, and ready to hit the pool. I think this young gal had a bit of a crush on him, as she kept following him around the kiddie play pool and making eyes at him.
The kiddie pool also had a contraption which had three hard plastic seats suspended from it. They were basically like bouncers for babies, and hung from tight spring coils. The kids hanging in them bounced, using the ground as leverage for their feet, if they were tall enough, or simply swung in them if they weren't.
Ayize was predictably entranced. It didn't take him long to make his way over to them.
First he tried to figure out the springing action. Then he began to test his weight by leaning into this one and swinging/bouncing it.
And then, in one mad scramble, he was in! They were designed for pretty small tykes, so this one groaned laboriously under his weight and sagged down to the full extension of the heavily-taxed spring coil. He was delighted with his own cleverness - until he realized that he couldn't get out on his own.
"Maaaa-maaaa!" I generously came to his rescue (though admittedly only after a few minutes of helpless mirth. Couldn't help myself).
Sticking to solid ground this time, he tested it to see what its swing limits were.
Back to the toddler slide. It was made out of that same strange Woodfield Mall-esque material, and was super speedy.
Off to Ransack Ridge again, this time to explore the big body slides, which he had just noticed when we were in line for the Black Hole earlier. The blue one is here above his head, and he was talking to me about it as I took this shot.
Up, and around, and up, and around...
Another good view from halfway up Ransack. Water cannons everywhere! I was struggling to keep my camera lens at least a little dry, so I could get shots of the waterslide action to come.
Yee haw! Here he is taking his umpteenth turn, this time down the orange slide.
As I stood up there, waiting for his return (long climb back up), I shot this overhead view of down below, with a better view of the splash pad we played in earlier. You can also see another indoor-outdor hot tub in the upper left corner, which we enjoyed when we were done watersliding.
But he was still sliding away merrily - this child has no fear!
Finally, after a few more slides, and a nice long warm-up in the hot tub, we were ready to change locales.
We walked with Nyika and family to their room, stopped in for a brief bathroom break for Ayize, and then went on ahead to the Wild Waterdome, where they would catch up with us later.
The Waterdome was totally awesome, drenched in sunlight, with tropical plants growing everywhere and cave cabanas lining all three walls. The massive pool was split into two sides: the huge left side was a giant wave pool, and the right side was a smaller, zero-depth pool for kids with lots of water playground fun: mini-slides, sprayers, all the good stuff, and a deeper area for swimming and paddling. More thrill rides were located at the far end of the waterpark, beyond the kid's pool.
A long surge wall split the two connected pools and protected the play pool from the brunt of the waves, which got pretty crazy when they were cranked up high - though I don't think they ever got as high as their 5-foot max, much to Ayize's disappointment!
The entire roof of this huge waterpark was glass-paned and used a technology they termed Foil-Tec, which was basically thin lines of aluminum foil-like stuff running through every pane, attracting more sun and heat. A few folks were putting on SPF lotion and tanning on lounge chairs. Palm trees and potted tropical plants abounded, all flourishing in the ample sunlight. A totally transporting and lovely experience - like a mini-slice of the Caribbean but just two hours' drive from home.
Riding the beaver in the play lagoon. He got a big kick out of this thing. The tail was a mini-waterslide, too.
Another toddler waterslide with a random spray of water shooting out of its side.
Yet another mini-waterslide, this one an odd little treehouse structure, with more random squirters and shooters. Okay, so they weren't the Black Hole, nor even the four-story body slides of the Wild West waterpark, but he had almost as much fun just the same.
That's my boy - adaptable, and always ready for a good time!
The waves only run for five of every fifteen minutes, so he had thus far hardly noticed the wave pool, but when they next started up, and screams of exhilarated joy erupted from that side of the dome, his attention was indisputably caught.
No fears. He dashed over straightaway and was already throwing himself up on a donut as I ran scrambling behind him to catch up.
I'm up - bring it, baby!
The first waves always started out pretty tame.
Coasting up and down in a mellow kind of way. And then...
"Here comes a big wave, hold on!"
Hollywood-worthy wave pool screams!
After that spateof waves ended, we returned to the play lagoon for a bit.
But anticipating more excitement in the neighboring pool, he quickly headed back and grabbed a donut, despite the obvious lull in activity.
Grabbing on.
Hoisting up and getting cozy.
Wading out.
Okaaa-aaayyy. I'm ready. Now if only the waves would start...
Nyika and Kayla joined us as the first mini-waves finally began. Daryle and Kai were already out in deeper waters.
The face-slapping action of the waves was understandably a bit of a turn-off for Kayla.
This guy, on the other hand, had no qualms about being slapped.
Pushed all the way back to shore, once again.
So he made a noble attempt to return to deeper waters...
Riding the waves all the way back to the "beach". AGAIN.
Sigh.
They were just too darn strong for him!
He finally gave up on the whole "return to deep water" mission - for the moment - and stayed in shallow waters for a bit.
I guess his philosophy was, if ya can't beat 'em, jump 'em!
Back to the water playground again. (Yes, lots of back and forth).
A power nap on a toddler lounge chair.
He wasn't really asleep, but he was very tired.
He said he would take a picture with Kayla and Nyika, but this was how he wanted to pose. Mmmmm-kay. LOL
Note also that Nyika and I, suffering from a dearth of poolside chairs, had to sit on inflatable donuts instead. It was just like those days immediately following childbirth...
Yuk yuk yuk.
A Caddyshack moment occurred - y'all know what I mean. I'm talking about a Butterfinger in the pool, guys. Within moments, the mass of wave-riding humanity was cleared, and the ample sunlight dappled over a sea of rapidly-beaching donuts.
Ayize kicked back to watch the entertainment. One unlucky lifeguard - guess he drw the short straw - was sent in wearing no protection other than a pair of green latex gloves, like the kind you wash dishes with. He was armed with a dainty little net and a big bucket. He hunted laboriously, up and down that entire 16K square foot expanse of water, until finally he found, and fished out, the offending item.
No one was saying for sure what had happened, and all the lifeguards played dumb when I nosily enquired, but according to Daryle, the item as seen from a distance was dark, long, and tubular in shape. So no actual verification that a Butterfinger was the damper on all of our fun - but given that evidence, you be the judge as to what happened!
At any rate, none of us wanted to re-enter the pool anytime soon, so we gathered our stuff and headed out for another waterpark.
This poor poop catcher had an audience of hundreds! Pressure's on...
;-)
Onwards and upwards. The nearest waterpark was Klondike Kavern, just a couple of minutes' walk away, so we headed that way. Unfortunately, so did just about everyone else who evacuated the Waterdome, so there was a serious lack of space to stow stuff.
We finally stashed our shoes and towels on a ledge of the hot tub, and then Ayize trotted off purposefully towards the Bonanza Bluff water playground, having spotted a waterslide we missed the evening before.
Doing the purple bodyslide. It was way tamer than those at Ransack Ridge, but he still did it about five times in a row, and had a good times doing it.
Nice cushy landing for the tots.
Tamara called. The kids were up after both taking long naps, but Brianna wasn't feeling great, so they were hanging out in the room. Dan was coming soon, too, and would most likely take Brianna home with them in a quick grab & go.
Ayize and I headed out to see them and grab some grub. Tamara was reading stories and Nathan was using her as a pony when we arrived.
Reading the Amy Tan book I brought for Tamara by osmosis. And what the heck is Mom doing to his foot?? LOL
Loving this book. And Mom still playing footsie!
Cracking the books. Gotta get a head start on schooling.
Looks like a long one. Better get comfy.
Onto more age-appropriate reading material. Too many naughty words in the other book, anyway!
Bookish boys being silly. I particularly like Nathan's rejection technique at the end.
Schooling young Nathers in the art of jumping furiously on hotel beds.
Apt pupil demonstrates newly-honed skills.
And while he's at it, he does a little somersaulting on the bed, too.
Nathan taking over Brianna's sofa/sleeping bag area. A well-deserved rest after that hearty workout.
Food arrived from the resort's nearby pizza parlor - pizza and steamed broccoli for all - and we ate with gusto. Ayize devoured his black olives and garlic pizza, a zillion broccoli florets, and still had room for fruit.
Dan arrived just as Nathan was playing the "push Ayize" game that Ayize had delightedly taught him, much to us adults' collective dismay.
Brianna was feeling better by this time (I happened to have Children's Tylenol on hand, and she had taken some an hour or so beforehand), so all six of us ventured back to the re-opened Wild Waterdome. Tamara hadn't yet had a chance to see it.
The kids loved it, and the adults took turns trying out the wave pool.
Ayize, meanwhile, manned the controls on these water-blasting rings, and made me endure a million drenchings for his own amusement, which was fine by me.
Laughing as he sprays me.
Gleeful at having soaked me to the skin...for the millionth time.
We finally dragged ourselves back to the room after lots more water playground and wave pool fun. Ayize was totally gung ho to meet up with Nyika, Daryle and the girls for some arcade fun and the hotel's haunted house, but despite his eager demeanor, I could tell by his haggard undereye appearance that there was no chance in hecky of his making it.
So while Tamara headed back to the hot tub to relax a bit, Dan and I put our respective children to bed, and Ayize was indeed out within moments of lying down. Only Nathan (thanks to his marathon 4-hour nap from which he had just awoken a short while before) resisted sleep - and even that was a silent resistance. Finally, even he was crashed out.
Dan suited up and headed back out with Tamara, who had returned to see what was taking so long. They did some hot tubbing and their beloved Hurricane thrill ride, which looks so cool (photos to come). I avoided my responsibilities, and rather than cleaning up the room, properly rinsing and draping up our suits to dry, or packing my bags, I messed around on my computer checking email and downloading photos from my camera. Typical!
The couple returned to the room and Dan decided to go home childless, since Brianna was feeling so much better. Dan was totally tempted to stay and play, but Shadow, faithful fido, was waiting at home, so off he went to make the 1.5 hour drive back home. A trooper! At least he got a little water time in.
Tamara and I went to bed not long after. I think my head was on that pillow less than 30 seconds before I fell into the deepest of sleeps. As my eyelids closed, I could almost feel the gratitude of my ocular orbs as they were finally granted sweet reprieve after all that chlorine- and salt-water punishment!
0 comments:
Post a Comment