The Summer Vacation Wrap-up (Finally!)

I promise this will be that last one. It's only about the last two days of the trip and there was nothing as exciting as Star Wars Weekend to take up a lot of the discussion.

On Monday we went back to Epcot, but this time we did something a little different. Something we should have done the first time. See, while Epcot does has some fun stuff for the kids, the countries that you walk through aren't all that exciting for them. But, that is where the genius of Disney comes into play.

If you don't have younger kids you may not have heard of Kim Possible. It's a show about a teenage girl how is also a kind of secret spy/agent type thing. What Disney did is bring Kim Possible to Epcot. You go to a Kim Possible recruiting center in the front part of the park, then the agents there give you a slip of paper that tells you what country to report to and at what time. Then, when you get there you get a special phone that Kim Possible and her friends can communicate to you and tell you what to look for and what to do. It is really a great idea. My son was really into it. We went to four different countries finding clues before he got too hot and wanted to stop. I highly recommend doing this if you have kids. It makes the countries interesting to them, and they just might learns something. Isn't that why you bring them to Epcot?

Before we left Epoct I bought a shirt with the birds from Finding Nemo. You know, the ones that keep saying, "Mine. Mine! Mine!" I like those guys. I wore it on the plane home. I'm pretty sure it is a requirement to wear something Disney related on the flight home from Disney World. I think I saw it somewhere on the hotel reservation.

That night we had dinner in the Polynesian Hotel. It was okay but, again, quite pricey for what you got. I don't remember what the name of the restaurant was, it wasn't their main one. We also notice how loud the hotel was. Everything in the lobby is opened up so both restaurants, the stores and everything on the first two floors all combine into a disorienting cacophony of voices and shouting. Then again, in a place with tons of kids, what do I expect?

On our last full day we decided to go back to the Magic Kingdom. We hit the Buzz Lightyear adventure again (third time I think), Tom Sawyer Island again and a few other rides. I think my son could have spent the whole day on Tom Sawyer Island. He loved running around in the fort and pretending to shot the bad guys. He ended up getting recruited by a slightly older kid and fighting a war with him.

We didn't stay all that long this day. The kids didn't want to do much more at the park, so after lunchtime we went back to the pool. As you can see, we did that a lot. This time, though, both Jenn and I got sunburn. We forgot to add more sunscreen after changing into swimming gear so our shoulders were burnt. Not terribly, but enough to make us a little uncomfortable. Actually I got a very strange tan line on one of my arms because I missed a spot earlier in the day. Luckily it is covered up by a normal shirt so I don't look like a weirdo everyday at work now.

For our last meal we went all out and had a good dinner at Narcoosee's which was right outside our balcony. I had a good steak. The best one I had in Florida. I just realized I had steak three times there. I guess that's what happens when you go to seafood places and you don't like seafood.

As we were at the restaurant we could see some storms building up around us. Which was funny because I talked to my dad the day before and he asked if we got caught in any rain. and we had not. I didn't think we were going to escape it today. And we didn't. As we were heading to the door of the restaurant I could hear thunder outside. Good thing we only had to walk a few feet to our room.

As you can see it got pretty bad out there.

I was surprised that the boat kept going. I wouldn't get on that thing in this storm.

And here is my one-and-only lightning shot. I was totally lucky to catch this. It's only a single bolt, but it still looks cool.

So, that is our trip. Now what am I going to talk about here?

This wasn't one our last day, but I feel like I should ad a sunset shot when I close out this series of posts. You know?

Thanks for reading. I'll find something else to talk about now.

Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #42: Water, Water, Everywhere

Carly wants some water shots this week. Well, we just came back from Walt Disney World and I think I have some that fit the assignment. Let's see...

Here's a hippo cooling off at Animal Kingdom. Sure, he's not playing around, but do hippos move much anyway?

Here's a bird of some sort from outside our hotel. Does anyone know what kind it is. I'm not very good with birds.

I'm not sure if the falls into the proper category, but I like it. It looks like the water is shooting up to clean off the Epcot golf ball.

Extra credit: Too be honest all I felt was hot while taking these. I'm not used to the heat of Florida. At the same time I was glad to be there with my family and watching the kids enjoy themselves.

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.