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Devil’s Lake

We hit the pools in the morning and then, after Gamma’s nap and lunch in the room, headed out to Devil’s Lake State Park for the afternoon.

Devil’s Lake is a lake surrounded by hills and rocks and trees. Very scenic. The local DNR has done a good job renovating the lake, as there was no trace of any fire or brimstone. Not even any scorch marks anywhere. “Devil’s Lake” is quite the misnomer in this case.

We started with a hike down one of the easier trails. It’s hard to push a stroller on rough paths. Then the boys decided they wanted to try one of the steep paths (Pothole Trail, in case you have a trail map). Wife and Gamma hiked it for a minute, then decided against it and went back down. Alpha and Beta (and I) made it about 2/3 of the way up.

Then they gave up and went back down, where all 3 of them played on the rocks as we walked back to the lake.

My wife, always thinking ahead, had packed water and granola bars, so we sat by the lake and enjoyed a snack. The boys enjoyed seeing some minnows, and it was all rather peaceful.

Dinner

Then we went back into the Dells. Some more hotel and some down time, then out to eat! Dinner that night was at a restaurant. The wife had planned ahead and we brought a cooler full of food. So until this point in the vacation, we had not set foot in a restaurant (or gone through a drive-through place either) (or drive-thru). She had seen an ad or something for Buffalo Phil’s. She thought it would be a fun place because the ad said that a train delivers your food. We got in there and, sure enough, there was a model train (of a larger scale) that went from next to the kitchen, past a few tables, and back to the kitchen.

However, the tables that were next to the train were full, so we sat at a table that was served by a plain ol’ waiter guy. I’m pretty sure the train does not expect tips, so it should be slightly cheaper to sit there.

The food was plentiful, as evidenced by my meal:

That was a buffalo burger, which had buffalo meat for the burger part, and bacon, and pulled pork. I don’t know why they needed pulled pork on it, but I didn’t mind.

We learned something at the restaurant: restaurant cups with lids and without straws are an acceptable substitute for sippy cups. Albeit slightly messier.

Then back to the hotel, another round of waterpark fun, and then to bed.

Coming soon…Day 3

Continuation of a previous post

Note: Most pictures can be enlarged by clicking on them.

Arrival

After running the gauntlet of tollbooths that stood between us and Wisconsin Dells, we were ready to be done driving. It was a little over 7 hours of driving; with stops it took a little over 9 hours total. We arrived in the late afternoon or early evening. It’s hard to tell which was which because of the time change.

Our destination was The Wilderness. Orwell would be proud of this place (officially called Wilderness Resort), because there was not much in the way of wilderness at this self-proclaimed “America’s largest waterpark resort”.

If you look up “wilderness” in the dictionary (which I did not do), you should not see that it means waterparks, arcades, golf courses, laser tag, and a spa. But they tried to have some rustic decor.

Check-In

The person at the front desk did all the check-in stuff and we thought we were all set. Then he said “But wait, there’s one more thing. You need a parking pass.” Makes sense, so give us the parking pass then. But no, we needed to see the concierge for that.

The concierge did give us our parking pass, but not before she told about the local outlet mall, a couple local restaurants, and the condos available for sale. And to entice us to hear more about the condos for sale, she told us how we could get a few hundred dollars worth of gift cards and coupons. The real estate office is right next to the children’s activity area, so they can be occupied while the adults have the opportunity to listen to a sales pitch.

That’s right, the sales pitch for the sales pitch meeting is part of the check-in process at the hotel. Note: if your hotel/resort has a “real estate” section of its website, be wary.

Waterpark

After a quick tour of our area (there were 3 areas in our hotel and about 3 hotels in the resort), we had time to play in the pool (for which the kids were quite eager).

We were closest to the Wild West Waterpark, but Alpha’s favorite was Klondike Kavern. That was because Klondike Kavern has the Hurricane.

What is the Hurricane?

Let’s start with the view out our window:

And then let’s zoom in:

Do you see that 4-story green and white funnel? That’s the Hurricane. You walk up 4 flights of stairs, get in a raft, and then slide down 4 flights of adrenaline.

And then you repeat, because Alpha wants to go again. He hasn’t been on a roller coaster yet, but the Hurricane provides the exact same pit-of-your-stomach sensation, so I’m sure he’s ready.

Here’s the inside of the Hurricane. See that small yellow thing? That’s a 4-person raft.

Cost

Our room was nice. It had two queen beds plus a pull-out couch, plus various other amenities. We got the room for under $100 each night. You may wonder how the resort can do that.
The answer has a few parts:

• the “resort fee” is not included in that price. What is the resort fee? It is about $10 a day and helps cover expenses and keeps the listed room rates low (kind of like shipping and handling charges on eBay),
• the outdoor pools and waterparks were not open, because the outdoor season does not start until Memorial Day. That meant we could use only half of America’s largest waterpark resort, which was good enough for the 3 nights we were there, and
• the Wild Waterdome was closed for cleaning/sealing. That didn’t have much, other than America’s largest indoor wave pool and indoor tanning. But the kids don’t like wave pools, so we wouldn’t have been in there a lot anyway.

Then we went to bed – a bit of a struggle with the kids all excited and everyone in the same room – and got ready for day 2.

To be continued…

Really it should be “To Wisconsin” but “On Wisconsin” is more recognizable.

We already had our spring break trip to Idaho, and we have our summer trip planned and booked. But both of those involve visiting other families. When would we get a chance to go on a vacation with just our own family?

In the middle of May, during school, of course.

Alpha’s in kindergarten. No one is going to notice if he misses a couple of days. It is not going to affect his graduation or choice of college, so we told the school that he will be gone for a little bit and we went to Wisconsin.

Wisconsin Dells, to be specific – very high on the list of top tourist-traps in the nation.

We left early in the morning, which in our house is about 9:30 AM. Our route went through Chicago, and we were prepared for the toll roads – we had dimes and quarters and dollar bills. We went through a couple of toll booths with no problems.

Then we came to one that said “Cars: $.50” I know we were in a minivan, but I consider that a car. It was an unattended tollbooth, and I thought it was taking a while. “Do those people not know how to put coins in a slot?” I wondered to myself. “And why are they gesturing at the machine? Just pay the toll and go on.” I got my $0.50 (pronounced “fitty cent”) ready, so I wouldn’t be that guy went it was my turn.
(more…)

This post is a continuation of a previous post.
Please start with that if you need some background information.

I’m done with all the pictures – now I have some stories about the trip to Idaho.

Cart Wheels

I will relay one incident on the flight over. We were sitting peacefully, nibbling on some pretzels and watching people. The airplane was not huge – there were three seats on each side of the one aisle. A lady, probably in her late 70s, was making her way back to her seat and was a few rows in front of us, facing away from us. The airplane wasn’t getting ready to land, but it was going through a bit of a descent, and we heard “Look out!” from behind us.

If that ever happens to you, make sure you turn to look without leaning your head into the aisle. Because the warning was to let us know a beverage cart – a metal, heavily-laden cart – was freely rolling down the aisle. As it passed me, I put out my hand and foot to slow it down, as did the guy in front of me. It ended up stopping a couple rows before the row where the lady was standing.

If the cart hadn’t stopped before reaching the lady, I think the cart would have won that confrontation.

It’s Not a Cookie

If you have a young child, do not opt for the “cookie” that they offer as the complimentary snack on the plane. It is a thinly-disguised teething biscuit. As many parents know, teething biscuits are just dried paste. Sure they taste fine, but the child’s saliva turns the biscuit into a goo that gets on any surface near the child. I was trying to clean biscuit paste off my shirt for the rest of the flight. Go for the pretzels instead.

And I know I could have titled this section “Snacks on a Plane” but I already used that heading in a picture post.

During the Flight

Beta: “What are clouds made of? Are they made of fluff?”

How could I tell him they weren’t?

I couldn’t. But I may have said something about fluff being made of water vapor.

One Side of a Conversation

Overheard on the way to Boise, during the flight:
“This is the plane that Captain Sullenberger landed in the Hudson River.”
(garble garble from the other person)
“No, not the actual plane, just the same model.”

Solid, Liquid, or Gel

We inadvertently found a way to stump the TSA. As a general rule, you are not allowed to bring liquids onto the plane. Liquids are not allowed, but solids are.

My wife likes cold water, so she stuck a water bottle in the freezer the night before the flight, and it was still frozen when we went through security. The TSA lady saw that bottle (since we had it with the other liquids to help keep them cold) and said she had to test it since it was more than 3 oz. When she picked it up and saw it was not liquid, she didn’t know what to do. She conferred with some other TSA people, then she walked off with our bottle. She came back a few minutes later and said it was good.

Oh, and yogurt counts as a liquid. In case you were wondering. Or maybe it’s a gel. Either way, they don’t like it.

Sharing

Our hosts were very nice. The daughter relinquished her room for the few days we were there, and all five of us stayed in that one room. Apparently they grow houses a bit bigger over there. Gamma stayed in a pack-n-play, which our hosts borrowed from their neighbors. The morning of our departure, we stripped the sheets off the beds, packed up the pack-n-play, and tried to restore things to how they were before we arrived.

I was thankful that we did not have to return the pack-n-play to the neighbors because they’re a little weird. Friendly people, and gracious to let us borrow their stuff, but weird. Phone first before stopping by their house.

This post is a continuation of a previous post. Please start with that if you need some background information.

Scenic Soccer

We had a variety of things planned for our third day [insert musical reference here, such as “Consuming Fire”]. The day started off with our cousin/nephew’s soccer game, which consisted mostly of viewing the scenery and chortling at the coach’s comments. We arrived at the soccer park too early, mainly because the kids needed to expend some energy, so we explored the part of the park that was not soccer fields.

As I noted earlier, there aren’t many real trees in Idaho. The soccer park was one of the few places that had trees, although it was too early in the season for leaves.

And here’s the scenery at the soccer game:

Rock, Table, Scissors

After the soccer game, we went back to the house to pick up the rest of the family. The boys wanted to hike a mountain since we don’t have that opportunity very much otherwise. So we went into Boise, grabbed lunch, found the old penitentiary, and hiked up Table Rock.

We chose the less-strenuous path because of the small children. It was longer but less steep, at least that’s what the sign said. Some people aren’t convinced that it was less strenuous. Much of it was flat, albeit winding.

The view from the top was great.

No, that’s no one we know. I just thought it would make a great picture.

Boise Zoo

Beta had a great time the whole time during the hike. Some other children, however, were done at the top and did not want to hike back down. We had planned to stop by the zoo before heading back to the house, but considered dropping it due to the crankiness factor. Once we were back in the car and the kids had some water and suckers, everyone was happy again and ready to hit the zoo.

The kids liked watching the tiger

Beta and the lion are watching the same thing, although I do not know what it is.

When it was time to leave the zoo, we received many protests. So put Zoo Boise on the list of things that kids like to do. The playground and prairie dog exhibit were the highlights for the kids. Mine was the bird that sounded like an elephant.

Bouncy Boise

The next day we just stayed around the local area (Boise is the nearest big city, local area is not). We broke out the bounce house. You don’t need to tell kids when to stop playing on the bounce house because they gradually stop as they become hurt or tired.

And I’ll put this picture in here, even though it is not bouncy. The kids didn’t play in the bouncy castle all day – we did send them outside too. They gravitated to the sandbox, so they could get dirty and need cleaning when they came back inside.

Not-So-Scenic Drive

The next day was our final full day. Since tomorrow would be travelling all day, we decided to stay around the house again. Well, almost. The boys had seen the snow-capped peaks of the distant mountains and wanted to visit them. I think they wanted to go hiking again and hike up to the snow. So in the afternoon I packed up the older boys and drove about a half hour east into the mountains.

The speed limit on the 2-lane road was 65 mph, and it wound through the mountains.

It was snowing in the mountains.

And it was cloudy.

I did not always go 65. That particular 2-lane road does not have many options – no intersecting roads and no shoulders. I didn’t want to keep driving, so I finally found a turn-around spot and pulled over.

Alpha and Beta got out of the minivan, but it was cold so they didn’t want to go anywhere. Well, they wanted to go hiking but they also wanted to be warm.

So we were there about 5 minutes; then we got back in the van and went back to the house. My nephew never even got out of the vehicle. He fell asleep on the way back to his house, as did Beta.

Going Home

Then came cleaning and packing. That meant we had to say goodbye to the bounce house.

The next morning we were up at 7:00 and out the door around 8:30, after some final packing and cleaning. We arrived in Boise without any delays or problems, which was good because they started the boarding process as we were walking to our gate. That’s too close for how I like to plan things, but I am glad we didn’t have to wait long with small children.

Now we’re back home, and the kids have fond memories of their trip to see relatives out west. And tumbleweeds.

I did not succumb to the temptation to title this post “The West of the Story”, since someone already used that. Also note that “West Side Story” is also taken.

A week ago we were in the Boise area, packing our things and getting ready to leave the next morning to fly back home. Now I’ve had time to download all 500 photos from the trip and go through some of them.

Here are some highlights of the first two days of travel:

Snacks on a Plane

Here is a rare sighting of Alpha and Gamma. They are not in their native habitat, and they are curiously awaiting to see what we do next.

Tumbleweeds

The first novelty of being out west was the tumbleweeds. The boys found some right away, which was not difficult since they rolled right in front of us at the park (the tumbleweeds, not the boys).

However, the kids’ tumbleweed-gathering skills varied:
Alpha got a decent tumbleweed

but then his cousin, the resident of Idaho and therefore more familiar with tumbleweeds, showed what a real tumbleweed looks like

Beta joined in the fun, and he succeeded in finding one about his size.

We all climbed the hill there at Camel’s Back park, played on the playground, and then went to dinner (pizza, in case you were wondering). Then there was evening and morning, the first day.

Playing the Slots

We had thought about going out and seeing some things in Boise that first full day, but, after a long day of travel the day before, we just wanted to stay close to the house. So our hosts broke out the slot-car track, which kept the older boys occupied for a while.

Attack of the Tumbleweeds

After lunch, we set off on a little adventure, just to get the older kids out of the house for a change of scenery. We got to see what happens when someone puts a fence across the tumbleweeds’ migratory route. Hint: they don’t like it. They attack the fence until they break through and can continue on their way.

Tackling

Since the weather was still nice when we got back, we took advantage of it. Of course, the children can’t play by themselves in the backyard when there is an able-bodied adult standing around. So I played football with them, as did our host (although he is not in the picture).

A-hunting We Will Go

The last thing we did before dinner was go on a black-widow hunt. The kids had been asking about black widow spiders, so we figured we’d see if we could satisfy their curiosity. At the end of the block was a drainage ditch that doesn’t get much use in the dry mountain weather there.

There were plenty, plenty, of rocks for the boys to overturn. They found a couple spiders, but no black widows. Some other boys saw them, and they came over to help too. The two packs of boys didn’t quite gel, but I did learn one thing: if you want to get the attention of a group of boys and get them to come to you quickly, simply yell “Hey! I found something!”

On our way back up the block, we ran across a few more neighborhood children. They had collected a hobo and we told them “No thanks, but let us know if you find a black widow.” A little while later, we heard a knock at the door. There were several neighborhood children and one of them had a plastic jug. Sure enough, the jug contained a black widow. I did not have my camera nearby, so I can’t show you the spider. Then all the kids ran into the back yard to play, and they took the black widow too. I’m pretty sure they did not release it in the back yard.

Take a travel alarm clock with you. I took my battery-powered one this time, and it was quite handy. It is common for hotel rooms in Europe not to have alarm clocks. In Germany and Spain at least, it seems that they expect you to rely on the hotel wake-up-call service. Having a battery-powered clock meant that I did not have to worry about electrical adapters.

Take a direct flight whenever possible. I had a couple of connections each way on my last trip, and they caused problems. On the way there, the middle flight was late, so we missed our flight for the final leg of the trip. We got booked on the next flight, but that an extra two hours of sitting in the airport. On the way back, the flight for the final leg of the trip was canceled, so we got booked on the next flight. That meant an extra three hours of sitting in the airport.

I recommend against using US Airways (and those surveyed by Zagat agree). See above post for background information. For some humor, see the survey outtakes. And on the last flight, the one that was three hours after the original flight should have been, someone decided to wait for another plane that had passengers connecting to our flight. So we sat for another 30 minutes for this other plane’s passengers. After that time, the pilot announced that the other plane had not yet landed, so we were going to take off. But since we were just sitting and waiting, the ground crew for our plane had been pulled off in order to assist another plane, so we had to wait for them. It was a long day of waiting. But the flight itself went smoothly and safely. However, I have not had the logistics problems on other airlines that I had on this trip with US Airways.

Take plenty of cash, in Euros probably. Many places in Europe don’t like credit cards. Even a restaurant in the Barcelona airport would take Visa but not Mastercard. If the card reader prompts the cashier for a PIN and you don’t have one because it is a credit card not a debit card, then just press Enter without entering a PIN. This one threw me off for a few tries, which is why you need to have cash on hand, in case something is not right with the credit card transaction.

Tomato soup in Spain may be served cold, so if you don’t like V-8 juice, then ask about the temperature of the soup beforehand.