Family Vacation: Part Two

Our second day involved more walking, and a trip to Epcot. This time we went to the pool in the morning since we had dinner reservations at a restaurant in Epcot. Mexico to be specific.

We didn't do Epcot right the first day, which I'll explain later, possibly in another post. It was kind of neat to walk from country to country all in one day. First we hit England. We didn't do much there, but it looked nice. See.

I had to get a picture of the phone booth and mailbox. I don't know why.

Next we walked through France. We didn't go in many shops there either, but we got to see a man balance on some chairs. Our son was mesmerized by that.

I know the chairs are specially made to do those tricks, but sill, that was pretty cool.

Going through France we stopped in Japan.

Jenn and our daughter both wanted sushi. So us guys went over to America to eat some burgers and fries. Actually I didn't eat anything there. I wasn't feeling so well that day. I think it was from the heat.

After a food break we headed over to Germany and Italy. We had to hit some countries of our heritage.

There was no Swedish representation, but Norway was there. So I took a picture of this giant gnome. That seems like an oxymoron, doesn't it?

We got some smoothies as we walked through Africa. You know, nothing says Africa like a strawberry smoothie. This Coke machine was cool, though.

We also went to see Nemo and his friends at "The Seas with Nemo and His Friends." The little ride was okay, but the really neat part was talking with Crush. It was an interactive show with an animated Crush who would talk to the crowd. The kids liked it, even though they didn't participate all that much. The show was fun for adults and kids, just like a Pixar film.

Like I said, we had dinner in Mexico. I made sure to get the least spicy thing on the menu, luckily the waitress helped me out. I've forgotten all my years of Spanish. I think the kids favorite part of the day was the little boat ride through Mexico with Donald Duck and his friends.

The kids were pretty wiped out after all that excitement, so we headed back to the hotel.

The next day was Animal Kingdom day. I took lots of pictures here. Like the tree of life. Cool, huh?

At first when we walked in to the park we were under a huge canopy of trees. We thought we were going to be in the shade all day, unfortunately that wasn't the case.

We walked the Pagani Forest Expedition Trail first. It was like a zoo, but you could walk through it. Does that make sense? You were a lot closer to most of the animals, and the seemed to be more integrated.

We saw Gorillas, some weird animal called and okapi, lots of birds, including this giant one that reminded me of Kevin from UP.

Next we went on a safari. I liked how they did this. They pretended like you were on a real safari. They had radio where a pilot was radioing positions of animals to the driver and then warned us of poachers in the area. Luckily, we scared of the poachers, but not until after we were shot at!

I got a couple nice shots of giraffes, ostriches and the lay of the land as a whole. The place was really nicely set up.

We hung around the park for a little while longer by going to Dinoland USA. That wasn't so fun. The kids were hot, we were hot and there wasn't a whole lot to do there. But the giant dinosaur that greeted you seemed nice.

Then it was pool time and back to the Magic Kingdom for dinner. Which we followed up with another spin on the Buzz ride and a trip to the Laugh Factory featuring the cast of Monster's Inc. This was another interactive show, but this time the had cameras on the crowd and would get you more involved with the show. Our daughter got picked out as "Boo" from the movie, probably due to her age and hair. She was a little embarrassed, but it was cute.

Before we left we walked through the Swiss Family Treehouse. Can you believe Jenn has never seen that movie? We went back to the hotel were the kids passed out before the fireworks show. Again.

That's enough for now. I promise, Star Wars talk (and pictures) on the next installment.

As before, more pictures on Flickr, but I'm not done with them all yet.