Kalahari Dreaming

The Kalahari is a massive resort/convention center in Wisconsin Dells. When I signed up for the Charter Bundle pack (basically meaning that I pay over a hundred dollars a month to a company that I don't really like and receive services that often fail) I got a free night at Kalahari. This offer was for certain nights, and those nights were up on June 7. So, I had to get this in at some point.

True to form, I called about seven days before this deal concluded, but unlike normal proceedings, they still had room. cool.

On Monday, my mother and I drive up to the Dells using my new book:

Side Review of this book:

1. it is chock full of fun drives through Wisconsin. This is true.
2. Don't go backwards on the drives. The directions are NOT designed for it. You will find yourself sitting at an intersection and reading the directions, then mentally pretending that you are actually traveling down the road that you are trying to get onto and then turning onto the one that you are currently on. Does this sound confusing enough? Right!
3. Neither my mother nor I are convinced that the directions would be good enough frontwards either.
4. I encourage you to pursue these drives on a weekday, preferably in the middle of the day. This will lessen the pressure from other motorists who don't understand why the fact that the three conflicting signs to Durfey's Glen at this intersection are confusing you.

One quarter of the recommended drive takes us two hours and includes a stop at Kristina's Restaurant in Baraboo. Recommendation, go ahead and skip Kristina's on your next trip to the Boo.

It is at Kristina's that we choose to detour directly to the Dells. We want to get cracking on all that Dells goodness. First on our list, a drive through town pointing out the ridiculous. The Trojan Horse roller coaster, the Paul Bunyan Flapjack outlet, and many giant fiberglass animals are spotted.

Second, the Upper Dells boat tour. We take the bus to the launching point with a family from Missouri that can't believe the river freezes over. ha! we drive pickups on our lakes in Wisconsin! Overall, the boat tour is good. Far better than an ill fated Colorado River boat trip my mother and I once took. I was in charge of the good camera. I took at least 200 pictures, most of which look exactly like all of the other ones. One highlight:

After the tour we had to walk up the World's Steepest over the Longest Distance Ramp. If I had been pushing my grandmother up that ramp we wouldn't have made it. That sort of defeats the purpose of the ramp, right?

To cheer ourselves up after the ramp, we had a couple beers and chips at Mexicali Rose. Word on the street is that their margaritas are good, but food not so much. I will not pass judgment here though and let someone from this site go there and do a proper review.

Fortified, we head to the hotel complex. Several U-turns later we arrive. My mother compares it to the Opryland hotel. I don't know about that comparison, but I do find it funny that she has stayed at the Opryland hotel. The lobby is pretty cool. My best comparison is a Las Vegas hotel- lite. It has a theme and they really do their best to carry that theme throughout. Like real safari guides, the check-in people wear safari style jackets, but overall seem woefully ill-equiped to defend guests from a stampeding herd of water buffalo. Speaking of the wildlife, around every bend/staircase/elevator bank is a resin elephant, zebra or giraffe. There is even a super pathetic robotic talking rhino. We got real excited and pushed his button, but it was so bad that it made me think of how they are all going to die and I had to walk away to avoid crying.

The room - uninspiring. We did have a view of the parking lot, a microwave/refrigerator, and a full size coffeepot.

The indoor waterpark - pretty cool. very big. America's Largest, if you believe what they say. We did the lazy river. I wanted to do the bowl ride, you literally drop out of the bottom into a deep pool, but I was chicken.

The restaurants - one was filled with the screaming of children and we walked out, but ate rather in the lobby bar. The food was decent. Their gin martini was delicious (two big olives).

The next morning it was more of The Backwards Navigation Challenge. This time I tried navigating the route back to Sauk City backwards from Mr Knowles' directions. This proved just as challenging as my mother had claimed yesterday, but this time I belived her.

And, just as we had on the way to the Dells, we hit the Madison rush hour traffic through the construction on the beltline. ah, home sweet home.