Sonya's Blog - Day 32 - Driving to Milwaukee

Sonya’s Blog - Day 32 - July 24th - Driving to Milwaukee

I got up to get my packing done so that I could head to the waterslides with Isaac for opening time. Things were going well and Isaac and I raced out the door at 9:55. I decided on the ride over that we should go to the other entrance down by the hotel because that is where the indoor waterpark is and it will save time to not have to walk through the park. It was all downhill there so it was a good ride down, not looking forward to the ride back up:) It turns out the entrance went right into the indoor waterpark, which was a huge bonus and I had made the right choice. We were on the slides by 10:15 and there were no lines. Just us racing up the stairs and riding the slides down and then the tube slides. We then finished off on the lazy river. I ran to rinse off and get changed while Isaac played in the park area. We hopped back on our bikes, I dropped him off at our usual entrance because he wanted to ride Hades 360 again. I left him there and headed back to the RV to help Blake hook up and send Tash over to the park to ride with Isaac. I rode over with Tash because I am finding drivers in the US not so polite and they sure don’t like to stop for pedestrians, even when we have the walk signal. Furthermore, super aggressive an will pull out and turn into you as you are crossing and I am not comfortable with Tash facing that on her own. We have had a few near misses, with drivers trying to turn before we started crossing the road, because their timetable is obviously more important than our lives. Okay, that was my little rant. I got Tash over their safe and sound and she headed in to find Isaac in line at Hades 360. I headed back to the RV in time to help Blake put the finishing touches on packing up and to help him pull out of the campground. It was a little tight, but everything went well.

We headed over to the park to pick up the kids, hoping they would be done their ride by the time we got there. They have a very large parking lot and an area is reserved for the RV’s of people who are checking out, but still want to visit the park on their leaving day. We made it over their and I went in to the park to find the kids. I roamed around a bit as I wasn’t sure if they were still on Hades 360, pictured here:

Isaac said they would head to the Pegasus rollercoaster if they had time. I checked Pegasus and didn’t see them and then headed back to Hades 360. Just as I was coming up the hill I saw Isaac’s Spiderman shirt, he was ducking and weaving his way through the line up. He finally got up to his sister and I managed to catch their attention. They didn’t think they would be that much longer so I said they could ride it and then come out to the parking lot and find the RV. I went out and grabbed their bikes so we could get those on the bike rack and be ready to leave by then time they were done. We were probably about 1/2 hour before we managed to get all the bikes secure on the bike rack and we went over to wait for them at the entrance. I was trying to get a picture of them coming down the main drop on the rollercoaster (see pic above), but after 40 minutes and no sign of them I was starting to get hungry and frustrated. I headed back to the truck and told Blake it was his turn and I started eating my lunch.

Blake and Kizmet waiting for the kids:

Sure enough, 10 minutes later or so they came out and it was the only ride they did! They waited an hour and 1/2 or something. So we had a bit of a late start due to that, but Milwaukee is only 2 hours and a bit away.

We are actually heading to Caledonia, a suburb of Milwaukee which is only 20 minutes from downtown. We are staying at a Jellystone Park this time, with Yogi Bear and everything.. They are a chain of campgrounds across the US, much like the KOA’s.

The drive was pretty uneventful, but again - the roadkill Wisconsin - holy cow!! Tons of it and in various states of decomposition, time to clean up the highway.

We found our campground without any issues and what a campground. Waterslides, mini-golf, golf carts you can rent for your stay there if you are too lazy to walk around, laser tag, all the Yogi characters, an ice cream/coffee shop and really nice wide large sites. We are arriving on a Friday and it is busy, busy, busy. My guess is that this is a popular campsite for those living in Milwaukee for a quick resort style weekend getaway. They were clearly in a party mood, the kids were allowed to run around wild and there were obviously lots of people camping in groups and the parents were sitting around drinking. It reminded me of our Cow Lake days when we lived in Rocky, but with far better amenities. Isaac was super excited after being a little depressed for 2 hours that we had left the Wisconsin Dells, a place he has vowed to return to. I will, in all likelihood, never return.

We got busy setting up and Tash and Isaac headed over to the pool/waterslide area to check things out. This is, by far, the nicest campsite we have had yet. We have lots of room behind our trailer and the fish pond is behind us, which is a lovely natural wetland. There is a nice path around the fish pond, which is perfect for walking Kizmet. This will be a good place, too bad we only have 3 nights. Plus, only 20 minutes to downtown will be great after the long commutes in Chicago.

After supper we had a fire and I guess it was National Hot Dog Day so I broke down and got Blake and the kids hot dogs to cook over the fire. The weather is perfect, hot days but cooling off a bit at night. It’s all good!

Blake booked us a tour of Milwaukee for tomorrow. It is 3 hours and only 11 people can go on the tour at a time. We will go to a cheese factory, Art Museum, the large park on Lake Michigan and end the tour with a Brewery tour and tasting.

Talk to you later,

Sonya