Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
contortionists and frenetic juggling acts. One of the best acts is the Sky Flyers Aerial Heli-
copter Trapeze. It runs three times daily, rain or shine, through Labor Day.
Adjacent to the show is
Tommy Bartlett's Robot World and Exploratory
(9am-9pm
dailyMemorialDayweekend-LaborDay,10am-4pmtherestoftheyear,$13adults),asur-
real mix of high-tech and kitsch set aboard an intergalactic cruiser and house of the future.
Hundredsofhands-andfeet-onactivities exploregravity,energy,light,andmotion.Robots
actually guide the tours. The original MIR space station is here too.
Broadway
TheDells'maindragis
Broadway,
thenetherworldofAmericana,commercialism,andbad
T-shirts. Duck into a couple haunted houses, have your picture taken Wild West style, or
perhaps engage in laser tag or some sort of wizard quest. Top it all off with a sarsaparilla at
an old timey saloon.
H. H. BENNETT STUDIO AND HISTORY CENTER
The
H. H. Bennett Studio and History Center
(215 Broadway, 608/253-3523,
www.hhbennettstudio.wisconsinhistory.org
,
10am-5pm daily May-Oct., extended evening
hoursinsummer,$7adults),the
yin
culturalspirittoBroadway's
yang
weirdness,isthehis-
toric former studio of renowned photographer H. H. Bennett, the man who literally put the
Dells on the map a century ago with his glass negative prints of the sandstone escarpments
(developed in the oldest darkroom and photographic studio in the United States). There are
interactive exhibits, with the overall theme of the evolution of the Dells region from pre-
history to the 21st century, and, obviously, lots of photography is featured—vintage prints
adorn the walls. The Ho Chunk Nation isn't overlooked.
KITSCH ON THE DELLS
The first road signs—huge and color-splashed and screamingly designed—crop up
somewhere around Madison if you're coming in from the south. With each mile
clicked, the traveler becomes more fully informed as to the delights that the distant
oasis offers. It's a numbing—nay, insulting—onslaught of countryside visual pollu-
tion.
There are those who believe—stridently—that the Wisconsin experience neces-
sitates a descent into the kitschy, cacophonic purgatory of the Strip in the Dells
