I don’t have any pictures to go with this unfortunately. Guess I was too busy having fun.. Or something.

We had talked about going up to Rapid and spending the night for quite awhile now. First we were going to go before Christmas but that never worked out. Then we were going to go for 8’s birthday. The first attempt at that didn’t work out, so we tried again. We were going to stay the night, swim at the hotel, swim at Watiki, and do stuff.

I said that maybe we should shorten that a little. Perhaps we could just go up and do Watiki? The weather was looking decent. Snow, but not lots and relatively warm. So we went. I had been looking up hotels and Watiki on the internets. We got the feeding done and rushed to get up there in time for lunch.
HuHots was as delicious as always. The kids were even marginally well behaved! The Goblin Child loaded up on noodles and black beans. It didn’t seem to matter the sauce. As long as she was eating for once I guess it doesn’t matter how odd the food.

It was there that my poor husband who had never been thrilled about the trip to start with discovered that Watiki didn’t open until four that evening.

There we were finishing up lunch shortly after twelve with the hope of heading home around four. This made our plans a little more difficult. I hadn’t done my research very well. I had looked and looked at their website to make sure they were really open and see what all was included before we came up. It had never occurred to me that they wouldn’t be open all day and no hours had been evident. Great.

So we shopped. We went to the book store and introduced the children to the joys it help within. It was nice to see them enthralled. We looked at RV’s and all the accompaniments to see what is available to furnish the school bus someday. We went to Cabella’s before it turns completely to BassPro. The children were amazed by the taxidermy on display and we got fudge. Lots of delicious fudge. Finally it was late enough to head to the pool.

It was a Thursday evening in the middle of winter. I hoped we would have the place mostly to ourselves. It was packed! Probably it really was mostly empty compared to when tourist season is in full swing. There is NO way I would set foot in the place then. The toys were great. The kids ran off and climbed, sprayed, and slid for quite awhile as we sat watching, hoping it could go on like that. Of course it couldn’t.

Soon they wanted to explore beyond the kids playground.

We went down water slides, floated around the lazy river, and, finally, found a warm pool to heat up in. There were floating pads under a climbing net for them to run across. Over and over and over again. The Goblin child having been down one slide and deciding she didn’t like it wanted to spend the rest of the day there. 8 was more adventurous. He liked the slides and wanted to go again and again.

During all of this more and more people were coming in. Gross disgusting people. Half naked men  with huge man boobs. Bulging women scantily covered with clothing but well decked out in tattoos. Everyone was covered in tattoos and hair. Ugly cheap looking tattoos. If you’re going to get something drawn on you that is going to last for the rest of your life wouldn’t you want to save up and invest in a decent one?

The worst thing was that we were all soaking in the same water. It touched them and then touched me. I don’t seem to be able to go out in public anymore. I can’t handle being that much together with people.

Food and beer were also allowed! The gross people were eating in and around the water. Even better.

We finally dragged the kids out and went to get more food before driving home. Strangely enough Perkins has become a favorite when we get to Rapid. We ate way too much breakfast for supper then brought the kids cookies and a piece of french Silk pie for me home with us to finish up when we weren’t so full.

The trip home was made through snow covered roads and fog. I hated it but was assured that they weren’t as bad as it seemed. 8 was sound asleep before we got out of Rapid. The Goblin Child made it slightly farther. Both of them slept all the way home so we got to listen to our book. They stayed asleep when we carried them in and we followed suit as quickly as we could.

It was a fun trip despite my various mistakes. I will not be pushing for another one any time soon.