Theme & Amusement Parks in Baraboo

Knucklehead's Bowling & Indoor Amusement Park's 80,000-square-foot facility is bursting with a dozen family-friendly attractions. In the bowling alley, a light show illuminates pins and balls to the tune of festive music and a black light adds an eerie neon glow to cosmic bowling. You can also bowl under conventional lighting, of course, opting for automatic bumpers to prevent gutter balls and marshmallow pins to muffle noisy strikes. Elsewhere, go-karts zoom around a track, bumper cars collide, and visitors swing hand-over-hand through a weblike ropes course. A roller coaster zooms throughout the space, and the arcade whirs and flashes with video games such as Dance Dance Revolution and Madden, as well as traditional games that award prize tickets to their deftest handlers.

Packs of go-kart racers keep pace as they round an uphill turn, and dart through the stomach of a giant Trojan horse. They drive past Greek ruins and navigate ramps up to elevated tracks—or head under the water of a manmade pond. Riders soar past these scenes pulled straight from Greek and Roman mythology on many of Mt. Olympus Water & Theme Park's eight go-kart tracks. Alongside other themed attractions, the racetracks sprawl across the 200-acre year-round resort's four areas: an indoor and outdoors theme park, and an indoor and outdoors water park.

In the outdoor Zeus theme park, screams and laughter echo around the turns of four wooden roller coasters and seven themed go-kart tracks. At the Parthenon indoor theme park, a wild mouse roller coaster pulls passengers through dips and spins, while smaller children learn the basics of government cover-ups in an extraterrestrial-themed ball pit.

The Medusa indoor water park and Neptune outdoor water park contain 44 waterslides that send riders down dark tubes and steep inclines, or spinning around a giant funnel. Indoors, a tubing river runs past decorative Mayan ruins, and a beached pirate ship houses tunnels and waterspouts. Outside, visitors navigate a six-story semi-aquatic fortress, and ride currents in a surf pool. Visitors who can’t soak in all of these park attractions can find overnight lodging in more than 20 resort buildings and a Roman-themed hotel.

From the 10-story peaks of Timber Falls Adventure Park's Hellcat roller coaster, visitors can view the entire family-fun facility before quickly gliding back to the grounds. The Hellcat is one of three high-speed rides that keep adrenaline levels soaring at the facility. The park also hosts a log flume with two steep vertical drops, and a gravitational-force skyscraper ride that sends passengers as high as 160 feet in the air. Between high-speed public-transit simulations, guests can enjoy relaxing features such as the 72-hole miniature golf course. Tall trees and wooden bridges sit between each hole, providing the experience of jungle exploration without the inconvenience of having to hunt down your dinner—a Hot Pocket in a jungle-dweller’s refrigerator.

At Bouncy Town USA, children cavort, slide, and bounce across five inflatable structures. Regular hours encourage kids to make friends across the padded bounce floor, while parties make memories out of birthdays with private rooms, pizza, and cupcakes. On some days, Bouncy Town USA welcomes kids for drop off while parents enjoy a night out.

Little Amerricka takes young thrill-seekers on a journey into the past with its 1950s wooden roller coaster, The Meteor, as well as several restored rides from amusement parks of a bygone era. More than two-dozen rides and attractions cater to all sizes and shriek tendencies of visitors, from adrenaline-pumping go-kart races (for riders 56 inches and taller) to relaxing rotations on the kiddie ferris wheel. The conductor of the Whiskey River Railway chugs the train along 2-mile treks through the rustic Wisconsin countryside, where runaway bumper boats graze native grasses before being lassoed and brought back to the amusement park.

Dolphins Cove thumbs its nose at the furious summer sun with more than 36,000 square feet of watery attractions. Revelers steel their courage before careening down 800 feet of waterslides, or challenge each other to games of water basketball, rope-climbing races, and sand-volleyball tournaments. More relaxing diversions include the outdoor bar and party deck, as well as the lazy river—which will never live up to the example set by the Colorado River in terms of canyon carving and doesn't really care. Kids can safely splash in their own activity pool or participate in regular events such as slide races or treasure hunts.