Wisconsin Vacation Day 3: Touring The Dells

Although many people think of waterparks when they hear of Wisconsin Dells, the reason that all of those waterparks even exist is the natural beauty of the area that drew tourists there.  So, on day three of our Wisconsin vacation, after a quick cereal breakfast, we spent the day touring The Dells.

First, we started off with a Duck tour of the area on the Original Wisconsin Ducks, "an amphibious vehicle used during World War II.  These restored ducks travel by land and water on trails tucked away among the natural beauty of Wisconsin Dells."

Grandma, Papa, Asher & Avery waiting to start the tour.

Eric & Asher excited about the start of our ride.

Avery thought it was pretty great too.

View to the front of the Duck...heading from land into the water!

Another tour behind us entering the river.

The beautiful sandstone cliffs on our journey

<3 these two!

When the duck tour was over, we headed out to find some lunch and ended up at a restaurant called Moosejaw Pizza & Dells Brewing Co...

The restaurant's delivery vehicles :)

Asher & Papa

Asher sporting the restaurant attire.

& our other little moose.

After a yummy lunch of pizza (for everyone except Eric who is always the odd man out in our family and ordered a burger), we headed downtown to tour the Upper Dells on a Dells Boat Tour.

Kisses from my boy! <3

This tour included not just a 2 hour boat ride through the Dells, but also let us get off to explore at two separate sights.  The first of these was Witches Gulch, a beautiful little boardwalk through the stone walls of the area along side a stream and small waterfall.

When we were done touring the Witches Gulch area, we boarded the boat again and headed over to the second shore landing: Stand Rock, which is known for making the Dells famous.  Here, the photographer H.H. Bennett's son was caught mid-air leaping from one rock bluff to another, during a time that photographing movement was unheard-of due to the technology (or lack there-of) at the time:

From Wikipedia: As people across the country saw more and more of Bennett's photographs of the Wisconsin Dells, they began to flock to Kilbourn City to see the rock formation in person.  The area quickly became a destination for sightseers eager to leave behind the bustle of the city.  Bennett capitalized on this, building the H.H. Bennett Studio in 1875 and using it to see postcards and souvenir portraits to travelers.  In the meantime, he continued to innovate in the field of photography by inventing a stop action shutter which allowed him to take photographs of instantaneous events.  Previously, it took several minutes for a camera to take a picture, and any movement of the subject being photographed over this time caused the picture to become blurry.  After Bennett created the new shutter, he was able to take clear pictures of moving subjects. The best known photograph taken by Bennett with this device was an 1886 image of his son Ashley jumping between two rock formations in the Dells.  Boston audiences of 1890 gasped when this photograph was projected as a magic lantern slide.

H.H. Bennett's Famous Photo

This dragonfly is one of several that were attracted to the woman's shirt in front of us.  They must have thought she was a gigantic flower!

Avery with Grandma & Papa on the tour.

Stand Rock today

They recreated the picture with a dog for us.  Notice him jumping to the rock...

& jumping back to the other side.

A view from under the rocks.

Family Photo

Finally, after a couple of hours of touring the beauty of Wisconsin Dells our tour was complete.  The boys were exhausted after skipping nap time and Avery had pretty much had enough (although he did finally take a little rest at the end of the boat tour).  Before we headed back to the campground for dinner though, Eric wanted to introduce Asher to one more thing at the Dells: Go Karts!  Yes, there is a lot of natural beauty in the area, but the town is also chalked full of touristy things to do and that includes several go kart attractions.  Now that Asher is 3, Eric decided it was time for some Father/Son fun.

Eric & Asher waiting to drive the Go Karts.

Asher was so small in the seat that I could barely see him over the steering wheel and he was just barely tall enough to be able to go on them in the first place!  On their second track run, Asher couldn't even reach the steering wheel!

One of my favorite pictures from the week.

Father/Son Selfie

When we finally did get back to the campground, Mom grilled up some brats for a quick dinner while the boys entertained themselves with the watering jug.  Then we tried the Banana Boat camping recipe that is all over Pinterest for dessert and headed back to our campers for some much-needed rest!

Playing in the water is So.Much.Fun!

My Banana Boat...I tried peanut butter & chocolate chips

Asher waiting for our desserts to cook.

Excited to try out our creation.

So, it doesn't look real appetizing, but it was pretty good...could have used a scoop of ice cream on top though! ;)

Devil's Lake at Night (by Eric...while I worked on convincing Avery to go to bed).