10 Truths About Visiting an Indoor Water Park With Your Family

Never been to Great Wolf Lodge, the indoor waterpark chain? Don't worry, you won't get through your kids' childhoods without a trip there somehow. If you've been, you'll recognize these things that always seem to happen when you go…

  1. MagiQuest will happen. Not sure what this is? You'll spend about an hour waiting in line and approximately one-quarter of your life's savings to buy your kid a wand that they'll use to wave around the hotel in search of . . . well, nobody really knows. Never thought you'd spend a vacation running up and down hotel stairwells looking for a place called Pixie's Perch? Welp, it's happening! The good news: you'll get your steps in, Fitbit fans. And, your kid will come up with an awesome name for his or her MagiQuest persona. Sir Unicorn Pants, Princess Banana Face — whatever it is, you'll hear references to it the entire time you're there.
  2. When you're not watersliding, you'll play people-watching games with your adult compatriots while in the pool area. Hey, mix it up a little: give prizes for finding best tattoo, most interesting swimsuit, and most male body hair! It's good old-fashioned family fun.
  3. Yep, the giant slides (especially that tornado one) are still scary. For YOU! Every time!
  4. You'll carefully craft your plan to avoid the giant bucket of water that spills onto the park about every five minutes. However, in your efforts to steer clear of Dump-a-palooza, you will forget that you're walking right underneath a spot where some kid will be waiting on the steps above to pour water on your head or otherwise spray the heck outta you. Your hair will get wet — don't even bother with your pre-water-park blowout, just don't. It's time to own the hot mess you will become.
  5. You'll discover that the bars serve things like Baileys and coffee and delightful Bloody Marys. This will forever change your experience at Great Wolf Lodge (for the better). Other parents will spy your drink in hand from across the park and go full-on triathlon to ask where you GOT that. Congrats, you made someone's day!
  6. The wave pool is pretty much the best place on the planet, even though it will have you bonking into strangers and yanking your swimsuit top back on, more than once. Whoopsadaisy.
  7. The hot tub will be full. You will still find a way to squeeze in by a bubble jet and you will set aside your claustrophobia and pretend the dagger eyes from your new best friend/conjoined twin to the left aren't happening because YOU just spent two hours in a stairwell with Countess PoopyPants (see number one).
  8. Walking around a hotel barefoot suddenly seems perfectly normal, perfectly healthy. Walking around a hotel barefoot AND wearing a wolf ear headband also seems perfectly normal, perfectly healthy.
  9. You'll spend about $30 on average to get your kid some Jolly Ranchers and a plastic bracelet in the arcade, but somehow it'll feel worth it because SKEE-BALL.
  10. Your kid(s) will ask if you can move to Great Wolf Lodge because they'll never want to leave.