Great Wolf Lodge Southern California

The Great Wolf Lodge, I must admit, seemed like a strange concept for southern California when it opened a few months ago.  An indoor water park in sunny, warm California still seems a bit strange to my beach loving, So Cal mindset, but when a co-worker shared her 50% off deal with me, it seemed worth a try for my family of 5.  $400+ might seem like a bit much, but when your price comes in at only $200 for a 1 night stay, that's not so bad. 

So, we arrived at the Great Wolf Lodge in Garden Grove, CA a bit after noon.  We had stopped at Downtown Disney in the morning for some shopping and an early lunch.  We knew that the guidelines said we couldn't go in until 1, but we thought we'd give it a shot anyway.  When we got there, the line to check in was already about 30 people deep.  Apparently, we could have arrived even earlier.  Still, the line moved fairly quickly and our room, to our surprise, was ready immediately.  After checking out the awesome lobby, which is currently decorated for October and Halloween, we headed to our room to get ready for some water park fun.

We stayed in a family suite on the second floor, which includes 2 queen size beds and a pull out sofa bed.  There are fancier options that have bunk beds or even a separate room for the kids, but with our budget, we stuck to what we could manage.  The room was sparely decorated, but overall, a nice, quiet room.  As an added bonus, there was plenty of floor space which we appreciate as we always bring the twins' cots to make their sleeping easier.  The room included a small refrigerator and microwave, which we made use of when re-heating leftovers from our dinner for breakfast the next morning.

The water park was amazing, though I have to say that if you have a child who tends to wander, you need to make sure to have an adult for each child in your party.  Our oldest got separated from us.  Thankfully, a wonderful staff member helped him find us again, but it was a bit scary.  The water park is large, which was part of our challenge.  Most of the excitement is indoors where the room temperature and water temperature are kept constantly in the mid 80s.  I was afraid it might feel too humid, but it wasn't bad.  I was also worried about the smell of chlorine, but I didn't smell any.  In fact, I might be wrong, but I think the pools are using a salt water filtration system as opposed to chlorine.  I definitely tasted salt in the water, but as I said, didn't really notice chlorine. 

There's a wonderful little area for the toddler/preschool crowd, which has gates around it so kids can't run off.  There are even little slides just right for young ones.  There are other areas as well, including a large play structure with a giant water bucket, a basketball pool, larger slides for older kids, teens, and adults, and even more outside, including a standard pool.

Outside of the water park, there are a handful of restaurants, bowling, an arcade, and mini golf, all available for an additional fee.  There's also an interactive quest involving locating different activities with a magic wand.  Wands can be purchased for yet another fee (about $25 for the base model).  We did not participate in any of these activities not because the cost is too outrageous, but because we just didn't have the time.  They looked fun though.

We ate at two places in the hotel:  Dunkin Donuts and Hungry as a Wolf.  Hungry as a Wolf is a pizza place with a few different pizza options, pasta, and salads.  The food was good, though admittedly a bit expensive.  We fed 6 people for about $75, but had extra food to feed the kids the next day for lunch. 

Dunkin Donuts was one of those things I just had to try.  As a child of Southern California, I've always been firmly in the Starbucks/Coffee Bean camp when it comes to Coffee, but I just had to weigh in on the comparison with this East Coast favorite.  I will say that I enjoyed my donut, but I thought my iced cafe latte was just so-so.  It was good and smooth, but really no different from any other coffee chain.  It was definitely a popular place for breakfast though.  We got there before the rush, around 7AM, but by 8AM the line was all the way to the lobby.

There were also many activities in the lobby each day.  My little ones and I checked out the indoor nature walk/story time, the animatronic show (which felt a bit like Chuck-E-Cheese), coloring/arts and crafts, and, as a special treat just for October, an evening of trick-or-treating.  There were other activities, but again, we just didn't have time.  Overall, it was a great trip.  It turns out, an indoor water park isn't that weird of an idea and actually works really well.  I'm glad we went.

We'll be taking a break from trips for a while.  Most years, we don't go on this many.  In about a month and a half I will be back though, with an exciting 4 day trip to Disneyland to start off the holiday season.  I've been going through withdrawals.  It will be so nice to be back at my happy place.