About Great Wolf Lodge Traverse City, Michigan

We Bring Joy to Families

Since opening our first lodge in Wisconsin Dells in 1997, Great Wolf Lodge has grown to 23 locations - and we're still expanding. We are proud to be North America's largest family of indoor water park hotel resorts. Our over 12,000 employees (we call ourselves Pack Members) are dedicated to our mission: Bringing Joy to Families. Every attraction, every experience, and every interaction is designed to create memories families will carry with them long after their visit.

Great Wolf Lodge Traverse City at a Glance

Opened: March 17, 2003, the third location to join the Great Wolf Lodge family
Address: 3575 N. US 31 S., Traverse City, MI 49684
Suites: 280 suites in 14 suite types, from 448 to 896 square feet, including standard, themed, and premium suites
Largest suite: the Deluxe Wolf Den Suite, which sleeps up to 12 guests in 896 square feet
Guest elevators: 4
In every suite: mini-fridge, coffee maker, hair dryer, and a sleeper sofa; an iron and ironing board are available by request
Microwaves: in every suite
Check-in and check-out: check-in at 4:00 pm, check-out by 11:00 am; late check-out until 2:00 pm may be available for a fee
Water park: 38,000 square feet, kept at 84°F year-round; open to overnight and Day Pass guests
Features for young children: Cub Paw Pool and Whooping Hollow, with zero-depth entry and kid-sized slides
Beyond the water park: MagiQuest, Oliver's Mining Sluice, Ten Paw Alley mini bowling, Northern Lights Arcade, Build-A-Bear Workshop, and outdoor Howl in One Mini Golf in the warm-weather months
Meeting space: 10,771 square feet, with 10 breakout rooms
Fitness center: the Iron Horse Fitness Room, with treadmills, a recumbent bike, and TVs
Wi-Fi: included throughout the lodge
Pets: service animals only; other pets are not allowed

Our Story

Great Wolf Lodge originally started as Black Wolf Lodge in Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin in 1997, and was one of the country's first indoor water park hotels. From here, we grew into a place where families could escape together, play together, and connect in a way that only a fully immersive resort experience makes possible.

Great Wolf Lodge Traverse City sits at 3575 North US-31 South, Traverse City, MI 49684, along US-31 in Michigan's northwest Lower Peninsula, just minutes from downtown and about five miles from Cherry Capital Airport. Opened on March 17, 2003, as the company's third location, this lodge was positioned to draw families from both Chicago and Detroit and was the first to standardize the use of totem poles to decorate Fort Mackenzie in the water park. Interestingly, there were 15 herds of buffalo that roamed the property from 2003 to 2012.

Today, the lodge's location puts guests close to downtown Traverse City's shops, wineries, and restaurants, as well as regional attractions like Traverse City State Park and the area's well-known wine trail.

Known as "the Cherry Capital of the World," Traverse City is a four-season playground for families, from Clinch Park Beach and the Great Lakes Children's Museum to Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.

As Great Wolf Lodge has evolved, we've continued to innovate:

2000s:

Great Wolf Lodge opened its second location, in Sandusky, Ohio, originally called Great Bear Lodge, beginning the journey to becoming America's largest group of indoor water park resorts.
Great Wolf Lodge goes international, opening its first location outside the United States in Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada.
We added an interactive magical scavenger hunt game called MagiQuest at all lodges.

2010s:

We added indoor adventure parks, complete with ropes courses, rock walls, and other attractions to complement our water parks.
The GWL (Great Wolf Lodge) Scholarship was founded. To date, more than two million dollars has been distributed to Pack Members and their families to support their educational goals.
Lodges began special seasonal activities and events that have included things like a life-size gingerbread house during our winter Snowland, giant spiders made from balloons during Howl-O-Ween, and duck racing down waterslides during the Summer Camp-In.

2020s:

We launched The Great Wolf Pack, an exclusive animated series, featuring our beloved characters, including:
Wiley Wolf – The adventurous, energetic leader of the pack. Wiley is curious, brave, and always ready to explore something new.
Violet Wolf – Wiley's sister. She's creative, kind, and loves music, art, and helping friends solve problems.
Brinley Bear – Friendly, thoughtful, and dependable. Brinley enjoys nature and often brings a calm, encouraging perspective to the group.
Oliver Raccoon – The inventive tinkerer. Oliver loves building gadgets, experimenting, and figuring out clever solutions.
Sammy Squirrel – Full of enthusiasm and optimism. Sammy is playful, energetic, and always excited to join the next adventure.
We celebrated 25 years of making family memories.
At Great Wolf Lodge Traverse City, Camp Critter Bar & Grille serves an all-day menu of lodge-made sandwiches, salads, steaks, salmon, and pasta, with a newly renovated bar, providing a delicious but relaxed sit-down dining option for guests.
We rolled out private cabana rental options complete with covered seating, mini-fridge, safe, TV, towels, overhead fan, and space for up to eight guests at all water parks.
We opened three new fourth-generation lodges in 10 months – our biggest expansion at one time.

Today, with 23 lodges across the United States and Canada, we're proud to welcome more than 10 million guests each year. As we've expanded, we've worked hard to make sure there's a Great Wolf Lodge a short drive away, no matter where you live.

Rooms Built for Families

At Great Wolf Lodge Traverse City, our guest suites are designed with families in mind. Unlike a standard hotel room, our suites are built for families, with layouts that sleep six to 12 guests, so families can be together with enough space to relax after a day of fun.

Each lodge is a little different, but they all feature themed suites which embrace the Northwoods feel, including a separate kids' sleeping area with bunk beds built right into the room, turning bedtime into part of the adventure. Unlike a standard hotel, we love to embrace the fun of a weekend get-away with kids.

At Great Wolf Lodge Traverse City, there are 280 suites across 14 suite types. Our standard suites start with 448 square feet of space, and our largest suite, the Deluxe Wolf Den Suite, is nearly 900 square feet. To ensure all our guests can get to and from their rooms, we have four elevators.

Themed suites put kids' fun front and center. The KidCabin Suite has a queen bed, a bunk bed, a day bed, and a full sleeper sofa for up to seven guests in 544 square feet, with a balcony or patio. The Wolf Den Suite and the KidKamp Suite each pair a queen bed with a bunk bed and a full sleeper sofa for up to six guests in 448 square feet, with a patio or balcony.

Premium suites have room for extended families and groups traveling together. The Deluxe Wolf Den Suite sleeps up to 12 in 896 square feet, with three queen beds, a bunk bed, two full sleeper sofas, two full baths, and two fridges. The Loft Fireplace Suite offers two bedrooms, a fireplace, three queen beds, and a full sleeper sofa for up to eight guests in 736 square feet. The Majestic Bear Suite has a king bed, two queen beds, a twin sleeper sofa, and a breakfast bar for up to eight guests in 836 square feet.

The Queen Sofa Suite and the Royal Bear Suite are offered as accessible suites, and accessible versions of several other suite types are available.

Across all our suites, guests appreciate amenities like mini-fridges, microwaves, sleeper sofas, and sinks accessible outside the bathroom for easy hand washing. Our spacious suites provide a welcoming environment to ensure families have more time spent making memories together and less time stressing about logistics.

Free Daily Events

Every lodge offers free daily activities for everyone who is staying overnight or visiting with a Day Pass. All these events are family-friendly and include things like morning family yoga, story time, character appearances, arts & crafts, games, and our signature nightly family dance parties.

Character appearances feature the Great Wolf Pack cast — Wiley Wolf, Violet Wolf, and their friends — which we know are meaningful for younger guests. We pay special attention to all the details to make sure our music is fun (and PG rated) and all activities work for every age group and ability level.

At the Traverse City lodge, the daily lineup includes Yoga Tails, Meet the Great Wolf Pack, Arts & Crafts, Epic Story Time, the MagiQuest Ceremony, and our Family Dance Party.

Attractions

Beyond the water park, Great Wolf Lodge Traverse City is full of attractions for a break from the pools. Pan and sift for gemstones at Oliver's Mining Sluice, then take your collection home in a keepsake burlap gem bag. Roll a few frames at Ten Paw Alley, where shorter lanes and smaller bowling balls suit everyone from toddlers to teens and adults. Play for prizes at Northern Lights Arcade, and bring your favorite Great Wolf Pack character to life at Build-A-Bear Workshop. In the warm-weather months, Howl in One Mini Golf offers 18 holes of outdoor play with traps, tricky shots, and giant animals.

MagiQuest is one of the attractions outside the water park that sets Great Wolf Lodge apart from other water park resorts. It turns the lodge into a live-action interactive fantasy adventure game where guests are the star. Players choose a magic wand, top it with extra powers, and set off on a quest throughout the lodge.

Every day, the MagiQuest Ceremony welcomes our newest members into the order of the Magi. Check the Great Wolf app for event details.

Water Park

Water Park Attractions

The indoor water park is the heart of every Great Wolf Lodge: a massive, climate-controlled space kept at a comfortable 84°F year-round, regardless of the weather outside. Inside the water park, expect pools, slides, toddler areas, a giant water-tipping bucket, and much more.

At Great Wolf Lodge Traverse City, the indoor water park covers 38,000 square feet. Alberta Falls sends you and a partner on a tandem tube through four stories of banking turns and steep pitches, racing outside the building and back in again before the final drop into the plunge pool. River Canyon Run takes the whole family on a twisting, turning raft ride through the dips and bends of a curving river. The four-story Fort Mackenzie water fort treehouse is filled with interactive water toys and body slides, with a giant bucket on top that tips when the bell rings.

For a slower pace, float the Crooked Creek lazy river, shoot hoops at Chinook Cove, or see who can cross the floating lily pads and cargo nets at Big Foot Pass the fastest. Totem Towers offers slides with easy turns and gentle straightaways, sized for small and tall alike. Our youngest guests have their own spaces: Cub Paw Pool welcomes toddlers with geysers, a zero-depth entry, tiny kiddie slides, and an 18-inch "deep" end, and Whooping Hollow has smaller slides with gentle slopes just right for little ones.

The outdoor Thunder Bay pool opens seasonally, weather permitting, with a four-foot, six-inch deep water play area and plenty of poolside seating. The whole pack can unwind in the warm Manitoba Tubs hot springs, open to guests of all ages. The water park is included with every overnight stay, from opening on your arrival day until closing on your departure day, and Day Passes are available for families visiting for the day.

Safety

At Great Wolf Lodge we take safety seriously. We are proud to have a partnership with Ellis & Associates, the global leader in aquatic safety and risk management. Every lifeguard at our facility is trained through the International Lifeguard Training Program™ (ILTP®). This training includes advanced water rescue techniques and emergency care. Lifeguards must pass both written and practical evaluations and maintain proficiency through regular testing and certification renewals.

We also use the Ellis Aquatic Vigilance System (EAVS) which uses high-definition analytic cameras to help monitor every body of water in our lodges. We combine our diligent and well-trained on-deck lifeguards with the live feeds monitored by a certified lifeguard in the onsite control room to provide even more attention to safety.

Local Events

Plan your trip around some of the area's favorite traditions, including the annual National Cherry Festival and Northwoods League baseball with the Traverse City Pit Spitters at Turtle Creek Stadium. No matter when you visit, Traverse City's four seasons offer plenty to explore on your way to or from the lodge.

Our Values

We take our company values seriously and incorporate them into how we treat each other and guests.

We Are One Pack: We help every Pack Member feel they belong. We assume positive intent, and listen with empathy and curiosity.
We Improve Every Day: We always reach for more. We value feedback as fuel for growth and stay adaptable in the face of change.
We Get It Done With Care: We're creative in finding solutions, take pride and ownership in our work, and we celebrate the wins — big and small.

Each year, our Traverse City lodge is the "Family Sunday" sponsor for the Traverse City Pit Spitters.

Accessibility

To support our mission of Bringing Joy to Families, we want all kids to feel welcome and supported in our lodges.

Sensory Accessibility

We have partnered with the International Board of Credentialing and Continuing Education Standards (IBCCES), an organization that specializes in autism and neurodiversity training. You'll find sensory guidelines to help evaluate all water slides, pools, attractions, arcade, shows, and activities. Each item is rated and described for expected sound, lighting, touch, smell and movement. This allows families to plan activities based on their child's sensory preferences before arriving at the lodge. We know, with many kids, a little planning goes a long way.

As part of the IBCCES partnership, Pack Members receive training designed to help them better support autistic guests, sensory-sensitive children, and neurodivergent families.

Physical Accessibility

For guests with physical disabilities, we work hard to ensure guests can experience as many attractions as possible. We offer ADA-compliant guest rooms, accessible entrances and parking, pool lifts, sloped entries, or transfer systems (depending on the attraction), and closed captioning or transcripts for certain entertainment experiences, including MagiQuest content where applicable.

Service animals

Great Wolf Lodge permits trained service animals throughout the resort, including most public areas. Because of health regulations, service animals are not allowed in or immediately adjacent to pools, but they are welcome in other accessible areas of the water park.

Our Leadership

Great Wolf Resorts is led by a team of experienced hospitality professionals united by a shared passion for families, team members, and operational excellence. We are proud that many of our lodge General Managers and Assistant General Managers start as front-line Pack Members. Supporting Pack Members and providing training and professional development is part of how we Improve Every Day both at lodges and at our corporate support center, in Chicago, Illinois.

The General Manager of the Traverse City, Michigan lodge is RaShaun Bird, supported by an experienced and professional staff leading Aquatics, Attractions and Retail, Engineering, Entertainment, Finance, Food and Beverage, Group Sales, Guest Services, Housekeeping, Human Resources, Security, and Technology. There is always a manager on duty to support guests with anything they may need during their stay.

Five Pack Members at our Traverse City lodge have 20 or more years of service, and Laura Neubauer is the longest-tenured Pack Member in the Great Wolf Lodge brand.

Recognition

Great Wolf Lodge has been recognized repeatedly as one of the best family resort destinations in North America, including:

10 Best Indoor Water Parks — USA Today (2026)
Best Family-Friendly Waterpark — WhereverFamily (2025)
Best Play-filled Water Park - Good Housekeeping Family Travel (2025)
24 Best Water Parks in the U.S. - U.S. News & World Report (2025)
National Family Travel Award – Parents Family Travel Awards (2023)

Great Wolf Lodge is a great place to work, and was cited by Newsweek as one of "America's Greatest Workplaces" for diversity, for women, and for Gen Z!

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Wolf Out With Us

With 23 lodges across the United States and Canada, you are probably just a short drive away from a great adventure for your pack. Each Great Wolf Lodge features our signature indoor water park, themed accommodations, restaurants, a full arcade, and free daily events and activities designed for every member of the family, from toddlers to grandparents.

Great Wolf Resorts, Inc. Chicago, Illinois www.greatwolf.com

Great Wolf Resorts, Inc. is owned by Blackstone.