Mt. Olympus is celebrating its 40th birthday* by offering free admission to the water park for several days in July!  Free admission is available on July 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 12th, 13th, 14th, 15th and 16th 2010.  The free passes are for the water park only, and do not include admission to the Mt. Olympus Theme Park.  Also, you are not allowed to come and go with these passes, once you leave the park, you would need to pay if you wanted to return.

In order to get the free passes to Mt. Olympus, you need to reserve them on the Mt. Olympus website.  Free admission is only available with an advance reservation, and won’t be available at the gate.

* I am not quite sure how Mt. Olympus came up with the number 40 for their birthday (unless the Greek gods age faster than the rest of us).  The name Mt. Olympus wasn’t used until 2004.  Prior to 2004, the property was owned and operated as separate entities – Big Chief Go Carts and Treasure Island Waterpark Resort.  In 2004, the family that operated Big Chief bought Treasure Island (formally Family Land), and changed the name to Mt. Olympus.

The tickets to Mt. Olympus are valid from June 1st through June 30th.  When you make a qualifying purchase at Pick ‘n Save or Copps, your receipt will contain a voucher for the free water park passes.  You must bring your receipt showing the purchase and the voucher to get free admission.

This is an incredible savings over the $40 admission price that is charged at the gate.  The 48-hour sale ends soon though – at 2:20 P.M. on Wednesday, August 5th. 

The discounted passes are good for the 2009 season, which runs through September 7th. Admission to Mt. Olympus includes 4 different parks – Neptune’s Outdoor Water Park, Zeus’ Outdoor Theme Park, Medusa’s Indoor Water Park and the Parthenon Indoor Theme Park. More information including details on all of the Mt. Olympus attractions can be found on the Mt. Olympus website.

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The news report states that the Kalahari, Wilderness & Chula Vista stand to do the best during the economic downturn.  I think that some of the smaller Dells resorts & motels may also see a bump in their business in 2009.  Visitors who still want to make their annual trip to the Dells might consider staying at a smaller Dells resort or one of the many motels in the area to save money.   Several Dells motels have partnered with Mt. Olympus to offer passes to the Mt. Olympus Water & Theme Park during the summer months.  Money saving programs like the Dells City Pass might also appeal to cost conscious travelers this year. 

The Channel 3 report can be viewed below.  The text version of the story can be found on their website.

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Chula Vista

• Week of 3/29 – standard rooms from $149
• Week of 4/5 – standard rooms from $139
• Week of 4/12 – standard rooms from $99

Chula Vista also is offering a couple of Spring Break packages that are worth looking into.  The Family Fun Package is $159 a night (2 night mid week stay required), and includes a large pizza, $25 dining certificate, and 100 arcade tokens.  The Spring Party Package is $199 a night (2 night mid week stay required), and includes a stay in a 2 bedroom condo, large pizza, $30 dining certificate, 2 games of bowling, 2 orders of chicken wings & a 6 pack of soda.  Details on these packages can be found on the Chula Vista specials page.  Reservations can be made here.

Great Wolf Lodge

• Week of 3/29 – standard rooms from $199
• Week of 4/5 – standard rooms from $199
• Week of 4/12 – standard rooms from $169

Great Wolf has a promotional code of BREAK on their website, however prices are the same if you use the code or not.  Reservations can be made here.

Hotel Rome

The Hotel Rome at Mt. Olympus has some great Spring Break packages, as I wrote about last week. For the next several weeks, you can get up to 3 additional free nights depending on how many nights you pay for. You also get passes to come back to Mt. Olympus Water & Theme Park during the summer. Click here to go to Hotel Rome’s website for more details.

Kalahari

• Week of 3/29 – standard rooms from $229
• Week of 4/5 – standard rooms from $199
• Week of 4/12 – standard rooms from $199

There are several specials going on at the Kalahari during the weeks surrounding Easter.  For example, the week of 4/5, you can get 2 nights plus 4 passes to the Indoor Theme Park for $299 (the passes normally sell for $20 each for hotel guests).  To see all of the specials for March and April, check out their specials page. Reservations can be made on their reservations page.

Wilderness

• Week of 3/29 – standard rooms from $150
• Week of 4/5 – standard rooms from $180
• Week of 4/12 – standard rooms from $150

The best deal that the Wilderness is offering is the Wild Fun Package from 3/29 – 4/4.  For $150 a night you get your choice of any Wilderness hotel room and 4 Wild Fun Passes, which gets you mini golf at two new indoor courses – the Wild Abyss course & the Wild Buccaneer course, a game of laser tag at the Wilderness Ok Corral Lazer Runner, and 8 arcade tokens.  The code for the Wild Fun Package is I-FUN.  For details on this promotion and the other Spring Break promotions, check out their April Specials page.  Reservations for the Wilderness can be made here.

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• Pay for 2 nights, get the third night free – $399
• Pay for 3 nights, get the fourth and fifth nights free – $580
• Pay for 4 nights, get the fifth, sixth and seventh nights for free – $750

If you’re looking for a spring break getaway, this is a great value.  In addition to the four free summer passes to Mt. Olympus Water & Theme Park ($160 value), they also include 80 arcade tokens for each of the packages ($20 value).  Stays at Hotel Rome include admission to Medusa’s Indoor Water Park and the Parthenon Indoor Theme Park.  Additional details can be found on Hotel Rome’s website.  To book this, call Hotel Rome at 800-800-4997 and use promo code SPRINGBREAK09.

• Mt. Olympus Water & Theme Park
• Riverside & Great Northern Railway (new for 2009)
• Dells Army Ducks
• Christmas Mountain Golf
• Dells Comedy Club (new for 2009)
• Wisconsin Deer Park
• Mark Twain Boat Tours
• Chalet Lanes Bowling (new for 2009)
• Shipwreck Lagoon Mini Golf
• Top Secret
• Wild Thing Jet Boats
• Castle of Terror & Haunted Crypt (new for 2009)

Although the $99 price tag might seem high, it can be an incredible value if you take advantage of all of the offerings.  The pass won’t be available for use until May 23rd, however it can be purchased anytime on the Dells City Pass website.  I will certainly have more to say about the City Pass as the summer tourist season comes closer.

For details on this promotion visit the Mt. Olympus website.

This past weekend was another Kalahari Family Nights special weekend, and my family found ourselves at the Kalahari in Wisconsin Dells again.  With the grand opening of the Kalahari Indoor Theme Park just around the corner, I inquired to see if I could get a sneak peek tour of the new theme park before it opens on December 19th.  The folks at the Kalahari graciously agreed to my request. 

I met with Rob White, the General Manager of the new theme park.  Rob previously managed a couple of other similar theme parks in Florida before being hired and moving to Wisconsin in September.  If I had to use one word to describe the new indoor theme park, it would be incredible.  Although Wisconsin Dells has a couple of other indoor amusement parks (Knuckleheads & Mt. Olympus Indoor Theme Park), the Kalahari Indoor Theme Park will be bringing several new attractions not seen anywhere else in the Dells. 

The centerpiece of the $20 million, 110,000 square foot complex is the 6 story Ferris wheel.  The Ferris wheel is situated so that it faces I-90/94.  As we arrived in the Dells, we saw the Ferris wheel beautifully lit up from the highway.  Next to the Ferris wheel is the 2 story go kart track.  The go karts will have cars for single and double riders, so parents can ride with their children if they would like.  Underneath the elevated go kart track is the 18 hole Madagascar Mini-Golf course.  During my tour it was a little hard to tell that it was going to be a mini golf course since the green turf hadn’t been installed yet.  In fact, it was apparent during my tour that a lot of work still needed to be done in the next two weeks before the park could open.  Rob assured me that they were on schedule, and there was no doubt in his mind that they would be fully operational on December 19th. 

In the vicinity of the go karts and mini golf course are the rock climbing walls, and the ropes course, which is located high above the main floor.  The ropes course wasn’t something that initially appealed to me, but after seeing it high above the floor, I think I’ll give it a try on a future visit.  Participants on the ropes course are fastened into a safety harness and then are allowed to climb on 22 different climbing activities.

Throughout the main level of the theme park will be many different video games and redemption games.  For younger children there is an African themed merry-go-round with several unique animals not typically seen on a carousel – giraffes, lions, gorillas, tigers, zebras, birds, and cheetahs.  There is also an indoor play area called Kenya’s Jungle for the little ones to play in.  The lower level of the complex houses the laser tag arena.  During our visit, the artists were putting the finishing touches on the outer space themed murals on the walls and the neon obstacles throughout the laser tag area.

The second level of the complex is the more “adult” area.  This is where the 24 bowling lanes are located.  There is a large bar and dance floor.  The back of the bar area opens up and offers patrons an incredible view of the main floor of the theme park below.   There are also two high definition golf simulators in the bar area.  I have seen golf simulators before, but have never had the chance to actually use one.  Rob let me take a few swings on the virtual driving range.  It was really cool, and very realistic.

There are a couple of different dining options to visitors of the facility.  Damon’s Grill is located right at the entrance to the theme park from the hotel.  The restaurant has been closed since the beginning of December as they remodel and renovate the restaurant to incorporate it into the theme park.  One of the changes to Damon’s will be the addition of “outdoor” seating that will be outside the walls of Damon’s, and inside the theme park.  There is also a dining area on the main level of the theme park that will offer pizza, burgers, sandwiches, etc.  Food service will also be available in the bar on the upper level.

During my tour I took several pictures of the theme park and all of the attractions.  I will be posting those in the next couple of days.  I will also discuss the pricing of the rides, and offer a few more observations about this incredible addition to the Kalahari and the Wisconsin Dells.

Part 2 of this post can be found here.

Last week, I posted about a deal where you can get 2 nights at the Copa Cabana Resort, or Quality Inn Antiqua Bay Resort, plus 2 passes to the Wilderness Water Park or a $50 Gift Certificate to a “popular restaurant” for $89 if you agree to sit through a timeshare presentation by Bluegreen.  As of right now, that offer is still available.  Obviously it won’t be lasting much longer if the sales offices are going to be closing.