Great Wolf Lodge

 This past Monday we headed off to Williamsburg, Virginia to Great Wolf Lodge. For those of you who may not be familiar with it, Great Wolf Lodge is a huge hotel with a giant water park within it. Although we have not been in two years, it has become a family tradition of ours since I returned from Afghanistan. It is a nice get away for our family.

 These pictures were taken from the top of Afton Mountain. A near by historical marker states that Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and several other men met in a near by tavern to decide where the University of Virginia would be built. I doubt that this was the last meeting that would be organized in taverns regarding college stuff. Anyway, all you Hokie fans lurking in the shadows, having two of the founding fathers in on the plans is pretty impressive. Of course, having a talking turkey that can dance around the football field would be also.

 Vicki and I have found out through the years to let the kids act wild and distract all the locals. This usually gets all the excess energy out, in this picture Cailin is racing up and down the side walk. I am sure that to passing motorist, they may have thought that she had just broken into someone's car. Anyway, we got out of there before the local police showed up.

 Brianne was at first lost in the water park. I don't mean we could not find her, she was just sort of dazed as she stumbled around the wading pool. Once she realized that she could go where she wanted she was off to the races.

 I really appreciated how all the kids took turns looking after Brianne. She did not lack for siblings to play with. Also Delaney and Liam enjoyed many of the same things.

 Although you can't tell it, Ryan really had a hard time hiding his delight and enthusiasm about this family outing. Sadly he has reached the age where going places with the family can be a test of endurance. It was a sensory overload with all the noise and people. He was a trooper though, and hung in until the end. We just want him with us, the family feels incomplete when he is not.
 I did see him quite animated at one point, Connor and I talked him in to riding the Howling Tornado with us. As we were dropping into darkness and twisting in the slides he became quite passionate about how he felt about his brother Connor and me. As I remember it now his words were something like,"I hate you, I hate you. Why did I allow you to talk me into this!" Well, it was something along those lines. Connor and I could see though all that raw emotion that he was having a blast ............or not.

 One of my favorite activities was taking Brianne into the big pool with me. She and I walked all over that pool. She was a good deal lighter then when on dry land. Anyway, it was kind of like dancing with her. She just hung to me and it was just us. It was one of those times that you can hold a child very close and they don't seem to mind. I didn't even think of dunking her.

 Delaney learned how to swim--sort of-- last summer while on our beach trip.  She was delighted that she no longer has fear.  She no longer fears deeper waters (at her chest level) and will swim around by herself with out us hanging on to her.  I think her next goal is to swim in the deep, over your head, type water.

 Cailin and Delaney were on the go the whole time we were there. I did not even attempt to keep up with them.

 This huge contraption is called Fort McKenzie. As you can see it is like a huge jungle gym with ropes and slides and all types of climbing obstacles. This was where Delaney and Liam could be found most of the time. You may notice the large bucket at the top. This filled with water about every 10 minutes or so and then dumped on anyone that stood in its path. Can you believe that folks lined up and waited to get dumped on, what a strange world we live in.

 Liam's favorite place at the Great Wolf Lodge was the wave pool. Here after the howling of the wolves, waves are mechanically produced within the pool. I am not sure what all the howling is about. Liam loved to get an inner tube and ride the waves.

Connor somehow talked me into riding the Howling Tornado with him about seven times. You may remember this ride from our last adventure at GWL. This ride demonstrated the law of gravity, you know, where the bald fat guy always ends up going down the ride backwards. Well, not much has changed on that account. Forgive me if I bore you but I feel it important to review how this 8th wonder of the world works. The tube that people use on this ride has four seats. Everyone sets facing in, everyone's feet is in the center. After ascending about seven flights of steps you come to the top. This is no cheap feat for an old infantry guy with bad knees.
It is here in this pool that you are seated by the attendant, usually a young teenager who seemed to be very bored, even though you know he is in on the joke of shoving you to your doom. It is here that Connor and I watched a husband get the "upper hand" if you will, on his unsuspecting wife.
Let me preach on it, Connor and I had climbed the huge stairway to the Howling Tornado in order to wait for our time to place our lives in danger for no apparent reason.  Anyway, there was a family in front of us that was getting on the float.
The wife was a good deal bigger than her husband. I do not mean that in any bad way, who am I to judge. She most likely weighted about like me, maybe a bit bigger.  I noticed that the husband took the seat facing backwards, meaning he would be going down the worse part of the ride blind. It is not a pleasant feeling to drop backwards in the dark what feels like about three stories. Yeah, I am exaggerating a bit, however you get the point.
His wife was seated across from him with two children taking up the other seats. Just as the attendant pushed them into the mouth of the ride, the husband's skinny little arm shot out and he grabbed the side of the wall. He managed to swing the tube around so that his wife was now the one headed down backwards down the slide. Connor and I just stood there in wonder and admiration as we continued to hear the wife yelling at the husband until they hit the drop off point, then it was just screaming. I just knew that that little man was getting a beat down when they reached the bottom.... if they reached the bottom. It just shows that you can't trust skinny people, they are sneaky.

As you can see, here is the stairway to heaven, or maybe a bit south of there depending upon your view of rides that are designed to make you feel like your going to be sick.

 We were really roughing it for dinner that evening. Actually Vicki had brought a crock pot of stew which we ate from some tin plates. Yes, that is about as close to camping as I care to be these days.

 Here is Ryan armed with the remote. He was not afraid to use it either. That place had three televisions in the room, you can imagine what that sounded like.  Vicki and I once again affirmed our commitment to NEVER get cable or satellite.

 During the evening the lodge put on a puppet show with these talking animals and trees. Sorry, but I just could not get the picture of the trees from the Wizard of Oz out of my head, creepy.

 ....but the kids enjoyed the show and we didn't have any nightmares to deal with so it must have been thrilling for them, at least not Wicked Witch of the West scary.

 Thankfully there weren't any fights over the coveted loft bedroom. Cailin and Delaney enjoyed the night sleeping here.

 By early evening Brianne was worn out. She climbed up on the bed with me. At first she was content to cuddle and I rubbed her back. The next thing I knew she was sound asleep.

 Delaney and Brianne loved the music that was coming from the TV---their dancing feet just couldn't help but move and groove.

 This picture reminds me of my army days when you had an activity that was put on for the enjoyment of the soldiers. They were mandatory and you could get in quite a bit of trouble when you did not participate. They became known by the troops as "mandatory fun days". This was a mandated fun picture. Everyone is smiling because they know that mom will get her picture if it takes all day, a trait she has had passed down to her from her mother..... love and hugs Janet.

 Here the family is having lunch before we hit the road. It may appear that the pizza is great, however let me disabuse you of this thought. This pizza was about the worse I have eaten. This is saying a great deal when you consider that I have eaten pizza in the Afghanistan and Kuwait, places not exactly known for the pizza renown. We won't make that mistake again.

 These slides came off Fort McKenzie structure. Cailin, Delaney and Liam thought these were great fun. They got you moving pretty fast minus the three story drop in the dark.

 I would assure the reader that it was a much regretted mistake that I was not in this mandatory fun picture. I just did not get there in time. I must say that they are a pretty good looking group.

 See, I was close by when the above picture was taken, just in the BMW - Big Mormon Wagon, when the shot was taken.

All in all we had a great time. Vicki tells me from time to time that it is so important to create memories. I have come to agree with her. We were setting around the dinner table not too long ago talking about our prior trips and laughing about all the rides. You can not buy or reproduce those types of activities. I understand the "quality time" concept of spending  time with your family, however I have come to realize that those times only come with the quantity of times everyone is together. There is no other place to be.