 Show Great Wolf Lodge If you’ve never heard of Great Wolf Lodge, you probably don’t know many 9-year-olds. This pack of wilderness-themed water-park resorts has been steadily expanding since the 1997 opening of the company’s first property in the Wisconsin Dells, which is to indoor water parks what Holland is to tulips. There are now more than a dozen Great Wolf Lodges across the country—in northern Ohio, Southern California, the Dallas suburbs, the Pocono Mountains of northeastern Pennsylvania, and lots of other places—with more on the way. Though there are small variations across properties, each site features a hotel with family suites and kid-friendly amenities (interactive games, a junior spa), all attached to a covered aquatic playground roughly the size of an airplane hangar and stuffed to the rafters with water slides, tipping buckets, swimming pools, and other chlorinated delights. When invited to check out the Poconos resort for a media weekend, I invited along my amphibious niece and nephew, 10-year-old Sage and 9-year-old AJ (for their privacy, those are pseudonyms of their own choosing). None of us had been to a Great Wolf Lodge before, but when the kids talked about it ahead of our visit, they made the place sound like a semi-mythical paradise on the order of Kubla Khan’s Xanadu—but with inner tubes. Here’s what we learned.
Great Wolf Lodge The Plan The most popular length of stay, according to Great Wolf Lodge company representatives (or “pack members”), is one day and two nights. That seems the wisest choice for avoiding sensory and budgetary overload as well. The water park is for resort guests only, and—important note—admission is included in your room rate. You can show up as early as 1pm on the day of your reservation to commence splishing and splashing (there are lockers to store your stuff before your room is ready). Show up in the afternoon, tackle the water park, and have dinner on site on your first night. The next morning, return to the water park until lunch, hit the ropes course or other nearby attractions in the afternoon, and head back inside for dinner, games and activities, or one last wistful tour of the water slides. Then pack up and leave the next morning.
Great Wolf Lodge Water, Water Everywhere Muggy, echoey, and emanating a chlorine scent that seems powerful enough to disinfect the tristate area, each of the huge indoor water parks at Great Wolf Lodge properties (the one in the Poconos is 79,000 square feet) has three basic types of aquatic features.
Note that admission to the water park is entirely free for resort guests. You don't have to pay extra for any of the above attractions, either. My niece and nephew spent about 90% of their time on the slides (or in line for them). They had little use for the tipping buckets, though they crossed the lily-pad thing several times; it reminded them of a challenge on the American Ninja Warrior game show. The three of us bobbed for a while in the wave pool, too. In a contest to see who could stay underwater the longest, my nephew was declared the winner, until a cheating scandal marred the victory.
Zac Thompson A Sliding Scale Slide-wise, the principal claim to fame of the Poconos property is the Double Barrel Drop, which features back-to-back funnel-like descents in darkness punctuated by flashing lights. That ride supplies disorienting thrills, but I preferred the Hydro Plunge, a kind of roller coaster that uses a mechanized conveyor belt to carry rafts from one drop to the next. The experience lasts much longer than on the typical water slide, and because of the conveyor belt, you go up as well as down. Sage and AJ had trouble choosing a favorite ride, but they went down Coyote Canyon the most. On that one, a 40-foot drop leads to a bowl with a drain at the bottom, so before you come out the other end, you spend a few seconds spinning around the bowl like a hairball in a sink. You can go down certain slides while sitting on a specially outfitted board with laser shooters you’re supposed to aim at colored lights along the way. But I couldn’t get the shooters to work and the board was too heavy for AJ to carry up the steps. Photo: my niece and nephew getting spit out of Coyote Canyon
Zac Thompson Fun and Games My sister, who was with us too, kept calling the place a “water-infused Chuck E. Cheese's.” As at that rodent-themed kids’ entertainment emporium, Great Wolf Lodge has a roving cast of costumed critters, brief shows, and games galore. In the arcade, you can play skee-ball and such for tickets that can be redeemed for candy and novelties. AJ acquired a sign reading “Caution: Fart Zone.” His mother was thrilled. There’s also mini bowling (pictured above), mini golf, an outdoor ropes course with zip lines, a pink-saturated kids’ spa, and an interactive wizardy scavenger hunt called MagiQuest. To play, you have to buy a wand that can unlock badges, light up crystals, and open treasure chests in the halls of the hotel.
Zac Thompson The Room There are 12 different types of suites, with varying configurations to accommodate from 4 to 8 people; some units have fireplaces and whirlpool tubs. By far the most coveted options are themed suites with separate, enclosed areas—a log cabin (pictured above), a tent, a cave—for kids. Some of these hideaways have bunk beds and their own TVs. And to think, when I was a kid all I had to hole away in on trips was the occasional poorly constructed pillow fort. During this particular stay, my family was very disappointed in my inability to secure one of the cabin suites. Instead, we stayed in a large room with two queen beds and a foldout sofa, which Sage said was about as comfortable as “sleeping on plates.”
Great Wolf Lodge The Food Your onsite dining options are a pizza place, a snack stand at the water park (during the summer, there’s another stand by the outside pool), and a buffet restaurant. These casual eateries get the job done without being especially memorable, though the baked goods, fudge, and ice cream at Bear Paw Sweets & Eats are above average. According to my sister, many parents no longer enforce the age-old law of requiring a half hour between eating and swimming, having dismissed as a myth the threat of a dangerous digestive cramp mid-doggie paddle. Our own mother would be scandalized to see a kid fill up on fudge shortly before cannonballing into the pool, but I guess times change.
Great Wolf Lodge For Grownups Though the lodge’s focus remains squarely on the grade school set, there are several parental consolations. These include bars serving wine, beer, and fruity cocktails, as well as an adults-only hot tub (some Great Wolf properties have a grotto pool set aside for grownups, too, but the one in the Poconos doesn’t), a very busy Starbucks, and a spa that I didn’t see a soul enter except during my official tour of the resort. Additionally, a company representative says the lodge is looking into adding a drop-off program for kids so that parents can grab a little alone time.
Pixabay In the Vicinity If your party grows overstimulated and you sense a meltdown coming on, consider slipping away for a few hours to take in other more low-key attractions nearby. Traipsing through a little nature—such as at Big Pocono State Park, a short drive from the Pennsylvania Great Wolf Lodge—might help ease the feeling that you’ve spent too much time inhaling chlorine indoors. (Of course, outside options will be more limited in the winter.) If you want the opposite of a low-key alternative, some Great Wolf Lodge outposts are situated in tourism hotspots; one of the company's biggest properties is just down the road from Disneyland in Anaheim, California. On our second night in the Poconos, we drove into the charming town of Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, where Main Street is lined with 19th-century buildings occupied by restaurants, pubs, wine bars, and antique shops. The visit did wonders for restoring our equilibrium. Photo: Lake Naomi in the Pocono Mountains, about a 20-minute drive west of Great Wolf Lodge
Zac Thompson Critics' Roundtable Me: So what’s your final verdict on Great Wolf
Lodge? Me: What was your favorite part? Me: I thought y'all liked Coyote Canyon. You rode it
10,000 times. Me: Was there anything that disappointed you? Me: How long would you have liked to stay? Me: What should visitors know before
they go? Me: AJ, what are you going to do with the Fart Zone sign you won? Photo: your travel correspondents in front of the fireplace at Great Wolf Lodge Pocono Mountains Where is the biggest Great Wolf Lodge located?The largest properties in the Great Wolf Lodge chain are Great Wolf Lodge Garden Grove in California at 121,000 square feet and Great Wolf Lodge Niagara Falls (on the Canada side) at 103,000 square feet.
How many locations are there of Great Wolf Lodge?With over 19 different lodges.
Is there a Wolf Lodge in Florida?Great Wolf Lodge South Florida will become the brand's 21st resort in North America, featuring 500 family-friendly suites and an expansive 100,000-square-foot indoor water park.
Are they building a Great Wolf Lodge in Maryland?With construction now officially underway, Great Wolf Lodge Maryland is scheduled to open mid-late 2023.
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