Best Wisconsin Dells resort??

[chemteach Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close chemteach]

I'm thinking of possibly visiting the Dells with family next summer and am wondering about which of the timeshares are the best for a family with kids 3 to 9 and a family with kids 14 to 18. I'd be going with my sisters and their children also. I heard the Fairfield Wyndham property is supposed to be very nice. Is it a difficult exchange? Anyone know if these get deposited in II or RCI?
Thanks!

[bnoble Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close bnoble]

The two I'm most familiar with are Tamarack and Glacier Canyon.

Tamarack consists of several clusters of townhomes (2-4 units per building, 1-2 floors per unit) plus one "Standard Fairfield" mid-rise condo building. The mid-rise is RCI #A777. The townhomes appear under two RCI numbers: #1439 and #5599---the difference being these units belong to different HOAs. Both townhome sections fall under a single id in II: TCK. There is an indoor pool, raquetball, tennis, an outdoor pool. There is a hot tub, but it is indoors (?). There is a modest but decent activities schedule---we didn't sample much, because we were always out and about at various Dells attractions. The townhomes don't have washer/dryer, but the mid-rise units do.

In summer, the Wyndham mid-rise is unlikely to be deposited, because it fully books at close to the 10-month mark, and Wyndham's current deposit strategy is to let owners get first dibs via internal reservation. An ongoing search might snag a townhome week, but you might have to be flexible, and if you're after two units for the same week, it might be tricky.

Glacier Canyon is the "new" Wyndham that you are probably thinking of. It's part of the Wilderness complex, and is very nice. Last I heard, waterpark passes are included with a stay---and Wilderness has one of the better waterpark complexes in the area. Again, though, summer books up quickly once the 10-month window opens for Wyndham owners, so I don't know that your exchange chances are very good. I can't seem to find its RCI ID.

The other obvious candidate is Christmas Mountain. It seems to have better availability in RCI than II, but you might be too late for Summer '09 developer deposits, if I remember the sightings correctly. I'm sure brucecz can tell you all you'd want to know about CMV in just a few minutes.

If you need two units for the same week, in summer, I'd think you'd be better served either with a direct exchange with or rental from a Wyndham or CMV UDI owner---it's not an impossible exchange, but it's not easy either.

As for which is best: we booked the Tamarack Wyndham for this summer's trip because it required fewer points, and we planned to visit the major area attractions (Noah's Ark, Mt. Olympus, etc.) anyway. If I had it to do over again, I might book Glacier Canyon next time because of the on-site waterpark. But, the Tamarack stay was perfectly fine.

If you want to get there via exchange, none of the resorts in the Dells would be disappointing, so I probably wouldn't be too picky.