Three Years of Great Wolf Lodge

A few years after I was born, a hotel called Wheels Inn was opened in Chatham, Ontario.

This was no ordinary hotel. There were games and water slides and an indoor/outdoor pool. It seemed that most of my classmates went to this magical hotel and their stories filled my head with dreams of swimming right out of the hotel into the sunshine.

Sadly, I never got to go to Wheels Inn with my family and without a doubt it was the single worst, most traumatic, life-altering...ok, maybe it was just a mild disappointment, but it certainly did stick with me.

So, when I had the chance to take my kids to Great Wolf Lodge in Niagara Falls I jumped on it. For the past three years we've made a two-day, one-night trip to the hotel and every year, the experience gets better.

I'm sure we had some fun on our first trip, but the only thing that I remember is "the night from hell". My daughter came down with a bad cold while we were on our trip and just couldn't sleep alllllllllllll night long. Crying and complaining dominated the night and sleep was impossible for anyone. I pride myself on my patience, but when daddy doesn't sleep, daddy is grumpy. And when daddy is grumpy, no amount of water sliding or being pelted in the head by buckets of water dropped by strangers from 20 feet is going to cheer me up.

Thankfully, year two was a different story. The kids were healthy and sleeping was no problem. My daughter was very excited to bring along a character named "Flat Stanley" on the trip. Flat Stanley had come to her class on loan from a school in the U.S. and each child was asked to bring him home and take pictures of his adventures which would be sent to this other class. Flat Stanley, as his name suggests, is a two-dimensional, laminated piece of cardboard and he was going to Great Wolf Lodge!! As a parent, I've learned that you just roll with things like this and it does you no good to question whether Flat Stanley can swim, meets the height requirements for the slides, or has any food allergies.

As luck would have it, one of my daughter's classmates was also going to be at Great Wolf Lodge at the same time, so each would have the responsibility of Flat Stanley for one day. We would have to find "Kamden" and her family to arrange the hand off. (As a side note I've also learned that comments like "Kamden? That's a really weird name!!" are problematic and are to be avoided). Great fun was had by all and I suspect Flat Stanley had nothing but positives to report when he returned home.

Year three truly was the best yet. The kids went on every slide in the park and I managed to find the energy to keep up with them. Everyone slept and the kids got along famously. I had to laugh when my son jumped on a girl's back in the wave pool, thinking it was my daughter because she had the identical swim suit. The girl didn't quite know what to make of the little monkey and the look on his face when he realized his mistake was priceless.

My daughter took home a stuffed wolf as her souvenir which has since been named "Abbey". My son wanted two toys and a whoopee cushion as his souvenirs. One day he might look back on those as foolish purchases. I'll look back on the trip and remember a great time.