Our Honest (Good & Bad) Review of Great Wolf Lodge in Naples, Florida

We just got home from the Great Wolf Lodge in Naples, Florida (literally a few hours ago). Before I forget any of the details, I sat down to share our experience and honest review. So, let’s get into it!

I’m going to share what we liked, what we didn’t like, and what we think would have changed our experience.

Let’s Start with the Good: What we liked about our stay at Great Wolf Lodge in Naples

Here are things I noted that I liked about Great Wolf Lodge:

Easy check-in kiosks

When we entered the lobby, we were able to check in ourselves using a digital screen, which then dispensed our wristbands. I was able to customize whether each person’s wristband was able to open our room door and/or process a room charge. While some people may prefer a person to check them in, I liked that I didn’t have to wait in line for that. I also liked that we could use our wristband as a room key, because I hate having to keep up with a card key.

Friendly Staff

Every staff member we encountered was friendly and helpful, or at least tried to be. We had some staff members give us bad information (like the wrong closing times for different areas, or that we didn’t need to carry a raft up for a ride only to be sent back down tons of stairs to get a raft). But, we’re all human and they are all pretty new still since this location just opened, so we can forgive that. I appreciated that they were friendly and kind.

Great Shower

Chris said his favorite part of our room was the shower. It was tall enough for him (he is 6 feet tall), had great water pressure, and good-smelling soap. All wins in the shower area!

Water Fun

As a family, we were able to ride the Breakaway Bay ride, where 5 people fit on a raft and go down a large slide. Because we have a 5-year-old who didn’t meet the height requirement, we had to go on the slower of the two options, but it was still really fun.

There was another slide you could ride a two-person raft down, which was also really fun. My bigger kids did that one over and over. They also did the individual slides without rafts multiple times and loved them all.

Ropes Course

My two bigger kids did the ropes course and loved it. They were able to zip line for the first time ever. This was probably one of their favorite parts. More on this below, because there were some issues.

Extra Little Events

It was neat to see things like the dance parties, storytime, and yoga in the main lobby. Anything extra like that is just fun for the kids.

But, we have to be honest and also share the bad parts of our stay at Great Wolf Lodge in Naples.

I am always going to give an honest review, so as much as I was hoping this was going to be a glowing recommendation, I’ve got to keep it real and give you the facts. Here are the things we did not love about Great Wolf Lodge:

Food was not great

That may be a lie because I got Koa some french fries at the concession area inside the water park and he would tell you those were good. We honestly did not try any other food from that area because we had been told by many other people that it was not good.

Dinner experience

So, we went with the buffet for dinner. The food was, meh. The prime rib was way too raw for me, I just couldn’t do it. The meatballs, orzo salad, and antipasti salad were just okay. Kai got the salmon and did not like it, and I don’t think that kid has ever met a salmon he didn’t like. Overall, it was an expensive dinner for some very blah food.

Breakfast experience

We decided to give the breakfast buffet a try, and it was also meh. Well, the scrambled eggs were cold and hard, the pastry you see in the picture above looks good but it was actually empty and weird on the inside, and the oatmeal was cold.

Chris got an omelet to order but didn’t eat much of it, if that tells you anything.

I will say, the bacon and sausage were good and the fruit was very fresh and tasty.

Once again, a very expensive breakfast for some very blah food.

Phone in room did not work / inconsiderate people

Unfortunately, we needed to call the front desk after midnight. We always make sure our family is highly considerate of other families when we stay in hotels, so we try to keep our kids reasonably quiet and calm through the hallways, and in our room when it’s late night or early morning.

However, not all people feel this way, apparently. We had what sounded like 20 kids jumping off beds over and over above us. We were trying to be chill about it and thought surely this would stop by 11 PM. But nope. It sounded like they were coming through the ceiling nonstop past midnight.

So, we finally picked up the phone to call the front desk, but the phone did not work. So Chris had to get dressed and go downstairs, which you can imagine was very annoying for him when we were exhausted and just wanted to sleep.

Lack of Efficiency/Communication

This was probably my biggest complaint that would have changed our experience quite a bit. Overall, it felt like a few minor tweaks could make a big difference. Here are a few examples:

Checkout experience for activities:

I found it really odd that the checkout counter for the ropes course, putt-putt, and Adventure Trail was basically in the walkway between the lobby and the waterpark. So, as a long line formed at this checkout counter (which was almost always the case the whole time we were there), the line had nowhere to go except to block the walkway.

Or, you could try to be considerate like me and another woman tried to be and leave a space for people to walk through, but then others got confused and thought you weren’t in line and it just became a mess. This did not feel well thought through and created a lot of opportunities for confusion and frustration.

Ropes course experience:

My kids waited in line for 45 minutes for the ropes course. When you get through the main line, they take you into their gated area and start putting harnesses on, then attach you and send you up the stairs to the course.

It was a few minutes before 9 PM when they took both of my kids in and put harnesses on them. They then hooked up my son and sent him up. Then, they announced it was closed, took the harness back off my daughter, and told everyone else in line they couldn’t take any more people. Mind you, all of those people had also already paid.

Now, I will say, when I pointed out to them that they had sent my son up and not my daughter, then told my son he had to come down and we just paid for this… the staff was very kind and said we could bring our receipt back the next day and basically start over.

That said, it felt like they could have simply cut off sales and the line way earlier to avoid the whole entire line of angry people and all of the confusion.

We did go back today, the kids got in line before they even opened and ended up still waiting 40 minutes, but they got to do the ropes course and they loved it.

Lines for rides:

When you make your way up for the 5-person tube rides, there are also lines for the single slides. However, there is no signage or any direction about where each line is supposed to go.

We found out by random listening that one side of the stairs was the line for the single slides and the other side of the stairs was the line for the 5-person tube. But every person who came up was so confused, so people kept trying to skip the line simply because they thought we were all waiting on the 5-person ride.

Then people would get upset, tell them to go to the back of the line, explain there are actually two lines, and repeat over and over.

I stood there in line thinking about how some simple signs could go a long way. This type of thing irritates me so much, because when you have large crowds of people in an unorganized and poorly-run “system” it creates opportunities for people to get irritated with each other when that is just not necessary. Just a little bit of clear direction goes a long way toward limiting confusion and opportunities for people to get agitated.

Cleanliness

I will start by saying that our room was very clean. No issues there at all. However, that same standard didn’t carry throughout the Great Wolf Lodge. Now I understand it’s hard to keep the entire place clean all day while tons of families (kids) are running around creating messes. I also think everyone needs to do their part of cleaning up after themselves, but that goes back to not everyone being considerate of others and I’ll stay off that soapbox for now.

With that said, we entered the water park as soon as it opened this morning and went straight out to the pool area outside. There were still messes everywhere, including spilled drinks and ketchup on the ground. That gave me an icky vibe, and I couldn’t help but think they could have made an effort to clean between the time they closed the waterpark the night before and 10 AM this morning.

Summary of Our Experience at Great Wolf Lodge in Naples, Florida

Overall, our family had a good time and did some fun things at Great Wolf Lodge. The staff was friendly and helpful, and all seemed to be working very hard at their jobs. It did seem like a lot of the staff were just new (which makes sense since this location just opened last month) and did not fully know everything they should, yet.

The food did not feel worth the money and was largely disappointing, but the service was good. The rides and activities were fun, but a bit more clarity, communication, and organizing could have improved the experience.

Our room was clean, nice, and comfortable, but our phone didn’t work when we needed it, which was frustrating.

Would We Go Back to the Great Wolf Lodge in Naples?

Honestly, I’m not sure if we would go back. If we could do a day pass for the water park, I say yes (since we live in Naples). However, my feeling right now after just leaving there, is that I can check that one off my list.

To be clear, I’m glad we went and experienced it. We had fun, but would it be worth going back and spending that much money to do it again? I don’t think so.

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