1975 & 2010 A double trip report. Day 3 Typhoon Lagoon

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Pre-trippie here: http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2558071
Day 1 here: http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2594850
Day 2 here: http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2597434

We are:

Me, Theresa
My DH Tony (Tony64)
My sister Mandy (MandyJane)
My Brother-in-law Peter (FleetPete)
My Nephew Andrew (16)
My Nephew Kieran (12)
And dd Maddie (MaddieB)

Incidently,all photos in this trip report are a mixture of those taken by us all.

Monday 18th October
Today, we chose a water park.

Back in 1975, on our first trip, Mandy and I had been thrilled to find our hotel had a lovely pool, even though neither of us could swim. This pool was to be the scene of an unforgettable experience for Mandy.

This picture shows me sitting on the steps in the pool at the Royal Plaza.

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Those steps are very misleading – the last one is actually a big drop. Mandy found this out after slipping from the final step into much deeper water and was instantly out of her depth. It was terrifying. Our mum (who couldn’t swim either) shouted for help but was ignored, so was forced to wade into the pool, fully clothed and still with her shoes on, to grab Mandy. Mandy was very shaken but otherwise ok, thank goodness, but it was a very scary experience. Bizarrely, our dad was upstairs standing at our hotel room window unwittingly taping the whole incident on cine film!

Needless to say, the first thing our parents did when we returned home was to book us some swimming lessons!

Back to 2010.

We were all up early again and had a leisurely breakfast of croissants and cinnamon buns before heading to Typhoon Lagoon, a place Mandy and her family had not been to before.

We arrived just after opening at 10 am and it really wasn’t very busy at all.
We chose a row of loungers and settled in.

We all decided to go on the family raft ride first. For obvious reasons, Mandy isn’t very keen on water activities, so she took some persuading, but agreed to go on it too.

The boys were a little dazzled by the CM:

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We had an old instant water camera with us and took some hilarious pictures of Mandy on the ride, but I am banned from showing most of them to you!
I'm allowed to show this one:

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After her ordeal on the raft ride, Mandy decided to go back to the loungers and recover, while the rest of us went on the other slides.

At one point, Kieran decided he didn’t like the look of one of the slides, so agreed to meet us all at the bottom. However, the five of us waited and waited and he didn’t turn up. Peter said he would go and look for him, so that left four of us waiting there in case he showed up. After a while, Andrew said he would go back to Mandy as there was no point us all waiting and anyway Kieran might have gone back there, so we were down to three. Ten more minutes passed and no one came back to us, so Tony said he would go back to Mandy, see if Kieran or any of the others had turned up and would definitely come back to us to let us know (that bit is important!). So Maddie and I stood and waited. And waited. It was a bit like one of those murder-mysteries where the victims disappear one by one and you’re finally left with two people who both think the other is the murderer. Finally, Peter came back, said he had found Kieran, but hadn’t seen Tony. Thinking Tony would be mad at us if we went off without waiting for him to return (as remember he was definitely coming back to let us know) we waited some more! He never came! A bit cross by now, we made our way back to the loungers where Mandy informed us he had been back and had gone off to get himself a pulled pork sandwich! A PULLED PORK SANDWICH?!!!! What about us, waiting for the person who was definitely coming back? ! Grrr!

He turned up a few minutes later, sandwich already eaten, and completely bewildered as to why we were mad at him! When I asked if he had got sandwiches for Maddie and I, he said “No, because I didn’t know where you were”!!!

We were not amused.

Since Tony had already had his, we stopped for lunch at this point, choosing chicken wraps (quite nice) and burgers (horribly dry). In fact we took Maddie’s back as it was so awful, and they changed it for another that was much the same. She was so disappointed, as she loves Disney burgers and was so looking forward to her first one of the holiday.

We spent a lot of time in the wave pool; Kieran especially loved it and went out really deep, much to Mandy’s horror. He was completely obliterated by the huge wave each time and it was so funny hearing Mandy shriek!

Maddie in the wave pool:

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Kieran in the wave pool:

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We did several laps of the lazy river, which was lovely.

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We left the park around 4 o’clock.

Me, Tony and Maddie drove down to the Official Ticket Centre to pick up Maddie’s Disney ticket that we had ordered a few weeks ago, while the others went back to the villa.

We then headed to Best Buy at The Loop to see if they could fix my camera plus we also had Callum’s DS with us that needed fixing, and a camera lens of Tonys that would no longer auto-focus, but unfortunately they couldn’t do any of them without sending them away for 2-3 weeks.

As we were at The Loop, Maddie and I decided it would be just plain silly not to go into Michael’s craft store (Although we had to endure the wrath of Mandy later, when we told her we had been there without her). Maddie cleared out half the store of embellishments for her scrapbooking, and I bought some craft punches and a cricut cartridge at a bargain price.

For dinner, Mandy and family went to T-Rex at Downtown Disney, and the rest of us went to friendly’s as we knew T-Rex would be noisy and we were a bit headachey from the sun today.

Maddie had fish and chips, Tony had a cup of chilli, and I decided on a tuna roll with waffle fries. We all chose desserts of course: Big mint choc sundae for Maddie, mango sorbet for Tony, and a giant Chocolate/caramel lava cake with “Nuts over caramel” ice-cream for me. The picture does not do it justice – it was really big! I finished it though. It was all very nice and under $40.

Maddie's:

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Mine:

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We returned to the villa and met up with the others.

Some pics of Mandy and family at T-Rex:
Mandy and Peter
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Peter with chicken pot pie, which was apparently quite good.

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Mandy wasn’t very impressed with T-Rex. Her meal was cold, she waited 15 minutes for it after the others had finished, and both the person who showed them to their table and their server were completely disinterested and useless. So useless, in fact, that they told their server he wouldn’t be getting a tip! It’s the first time they have ever done that and all he said was “Fair enough”. He really couldn't care at all!

Cross that one off our list then!

We were all pretty tired so had an early night ready for Universal Studios and a wee bit of shopping tomorrow.
 
I'd have killed Mike if he'd done that to me at a water park or anywhere else for that matter.
 
I'd have killed Mike if he'd done that to me at a water park or anywhere else for that matter.

It has been discussed...........at length and Theresa has omitted the fact that Mandy had informed me that Peter had gone to tell them Keiran was back.

I do see Theresa's point and I hope she will let it lay......somewhen before the next trip would be good. ;)
 
Theresa,
I believe you have hit on a new TR genre--the Then and Now report. The photo of you in the Royal Plaza pool plus the story about Mandy's struggle in the pool (which must have been horrific for your mother) were excellent companion pieces to your present day report. I may try Then and Now on my next TR.
Right in sync with you, I guess, because just before reading that they indeed did, I thought--hmmmm, bet the guys loved getting directions from the TL CM. Also, the comparison of you and Maddie being left behind (as one member of the group after another left you standing waiting for Keiran) to the dwindling party murder mystery crossed my mind about a dozen words before you wrote that very thing. Simply finding Tony wouldn't have been nearly as funny an ending to the perfect short story that you wrote as your knowing by the time he turned up that he'd managed to polish off a pulled pork sandwich while you were standing tapping your toe where he left you. As irritating as that was (I don't blame you for letting that hang over his head for awhile), you've got to admit the entire mess handed you a much funnier story to tell. Pulled pork--in any context--is hilarious.
 

you made me laugh with the whole ...last women standing bit. That is eactly why I don't like TL, it always happens to me and I am never the one with the locker key so end up alone and hungry and getting sun burned.

those icecreams look amazing.

Isn't it worrying how appaling health and saftey around pools were back in the 70's, you would have a bout 20 life guards dcending on you now.
 
I hate splitting up with people as I always end up waiting not knowing whether to stay or go. great photos of you all having fun at TL.

We find t-Rex very noisy but will always go back as great theming. we went twice on our last trip and were lucky to have good service.

susan
 
The waiting around, people disappearing and Tony with the sandwich has made me cry with laughing. Brilliant :rotfl:

Loving the then and now photos :goodvibes
 
Loving your TR, and eagerly awaiting the next installment!

We hated T-Rex too - and also didn't leave our server a tip!
 
Great day Theresa, I love Typhoon Lagoon, but I love the look of that pie even more lol :goodvibes
 
Another great day:goodvibes Tony not coming back & instead going for food made me laugh:rotfl2:
 
OK, so I'm a bit late catching up with all this, but two months flashes by without so much as a by-your-leave, especially with Christmas in-between! :goodvibes

The first time I visited Orlando, when the girls were just 7 and 5, we had a similar experience to your mum's/Mandy's. The girls' Dad and I were lazing by the pool, while the girls happily splashed around. All of a sudden, elder daughter, George, was struggling (drowning for want of a better word). I'm screaming and (my then husband) Gary jumps in, fully-clothed, to scoop her out. It's one of those moments forever etched into my memory...

Don't be put off from T-Rex based on Mandy's family's experience. We enjoyed both our visits there back in 2008. Like everything else, it's all about timing, people and perspective. We definitely need to experience the whole Orlando thing together at some point! :thumbsup2
 














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