Can I convince you...an offsite adventure (complete 8/29, pg 4)

[zigzagzerr]

I'll try to post some more in the next few days (life is crazy), but I wanted to at least put a few up, now that I've finally figured out how.

This was the view from our hotel window. Pretty, huh?

DH and DD on the beach volleyball court. The kids' spraying fountain thingie is behind them.

The lazy river was so relaxing.....could have spent all day here.

Okay okay, I know it's a potty. But look at the pretty pink bow on the tp -- now that's classy!

 

[missmun52]

Thanks for the pictures

 

[Princess89]

Those pictures are gorgeous. We usually stay offsite for a few days before we check into Disney, and this is one that I will definitely have to consider for next year. I love the idea of a lazy river right at the hotel.

 

[Pink Disney]

Love the pictures. Thank you.

 

[zigzagzerr]

DAY 4
Tuesday, June 20

Plan: Universal Studios



Today was the sad day when we had to check out of our fancy Omni digs – really gonna miss that pool, I can’t say enough good things about it. I noticed when I was doing some Priceline research, that people were having the Omni come up as a resort hotel in Orlando, and they were getting it for a price in the $90’s . I would say that if you can do that, you should. Don’t pay too much attention to the reviews people write, saying the hotel is too far away from Disney. I didn’t time it but I would say it was only about a 15 minute drive, and it’s a world away from all the chaos that is Orlando. I will point out, however, that we didn’t come back to the hotel in the middle of the day, as some of you with younger kids probably would, but even so, we probably come out about even when you consider how long a bus wait and extra stops take. Timewise, I would guess it comes out to about the same amount of time. And you have all those wonderful amenities. A trip around the lazy river does wonders to wash away a long hot day in the parks. Just saying….

So, we waved goodbye and headed out for the next part of our offsite adventure!!! Yea! Okay, in truth, I guess we should consider the Hard Rock Hotel an onsite hotel for Universal – but it’s an offsite hotel for Disney! Aha!!! We drove up I-4 and found the Hard Rock without any problem. Very quick check-in, obviously our room was not ready at 8:30 in the morning, but we received our hotel id’s for front-of-the-line passes, and were soon walking our way down the path to the parks.

I just love Universal. I’m so glad we bought the 3 day passes initially, so we had days left over for this trip. Growing up, Universal Hollywood was a mere 10 minutes from home, so I went a number of times. I always loved the tour. I was curious when we first went to the one in Orlando 2 years ago, because I just couldn’t understand how they could have all the same rides but not have the tour! That was the whole point of Universal Studios – the Universal Studios Tour!! Oh well…I still don’t get it, but we had a complete blast 2 years ago and were looking forward to another round.

Quickly in through the ticket stiles (I also couldn’t figure what they were comparing the fingerprints to, since we didn’t do fingerprints 2 years ago) and ready to go. My DD had been going back and forth for awhile on whether she was riding the Mummy – we had tried it out at Christmas time at Universal Hollywood when we were out visiting my folks and she was quite scared by it, but loved the roller coaster part. As of this morning, she was ready to try it again. We got on quickly, no line. For those of you who have not ridden this, the Mummy ride starts out like a dark ride and then suddenly stops, and shoots off to become a roller coaster in the dark. No crazy stuff, no giant drops or loops or anything. But as you’re coastering around in the dark, there’s all kinds of nifty special effects. I will admit that I missed some of them, closed my eyes for awhile (wimpy, I know, but I at least rode it!).

We quickly power walked our way to the back of the park toward Men In Black. There was a cast member standing out in front of the Jaws ride trying to lure us in with a fishing pole and a rubber shark, but we did not succumb. DD had to get her MIB groove on. It was still pretty early in the day, so we probably didn’t need to use our front-of-the-line pass. But we still did. : ) Twice. We love shooting those aliens.

Then, on to Back to the Future. It took awhile to get onto this, and I decided that maybe I didn’t need to be on another simulator for awhile. In fact, I ended up looking at the dashboard control panel of our DeLorean instead of at the screen. Didn’t want anything untoward to happen, you know. ET was next – this is really good ride, but I fear for it. They have already removed it from the Hollywood park. Very much along the lines of Peter Pan, but longer and more detailed. Kids who have seen the movie will love this.

After saving ET, we decided to press our luck and go after the shark. You know, THE shark. Well, let me tell you – our tour guide was “ready for his closeup”. Completely outrageous and over the top. Teasing the folks on our boat relentlessly. It was an utter hoot, and an amazing job. Last stop before lunch was Earthquake. Both times we have been here, we’ve had a good-sized wait for this. And I don’t think the fotl really does much for you with this one. Since I am from California and have experienced some of these big-sized earthquakes up close and personal, I don’t know that it really wowed me that much. But I still liked it.


Now onto the best part – lunch! Last trip 2 years ago, we ate at Monsters Café for lunch, and that was pretty good. But this time, we tried the Beverly Hills Boulangerie, and this was extra extra super dee dooper dee good, because they have Cheesecake Factory cheesecake and pastries to go with your lunch. Yum!!!!! The 3 of us shared a tuna sandwich on a croissant, ham/cheese sandwich on a croissant (both sandwiches came with fruit) and a large Sprite. Oh yeah, and 2 pieces of cheesecake – Dulce de Leche and Reeses Peanut Butter Cup. Total was around $28. If you’re smart and think of it (which we’re not and didn’t), show your AAA card and get 10% off. I am at this point an unbelievably happy camper, because not only do I get to eat 10 bazillion calorie cheesecake that tastes like absolute heaven, but there is a Lucy and Ricky Ricardo show going on right outside the restaurant which we can watch in blissful air conditioned comfort. Two slices of cheesecake was too much, by the way. You could split one piece between 3 people very easily. But oh my god, worth every calorie!

After waddling our way out, we went to see the 3D Shrek show. Absolute must-see, it’s hilarious. After a long stop in the Lucy exhibit, we hurried over to catch the Animal Planet live show. DD loves animals. It’s a very cute show. Somehow, after that, we squeezed into the next Horror Makeup Show, which was on my must-see list. It’s extremely interesting to see how they do horror makeup for the movies and it’s laugh out loud funny. We stopped at Jimmy Neutron after that – where else does your simulator actually do the chicken dance? Sheesh…Then on to see the Beetlejuice show, which we had not seen before. Lots of good classic rock and the performers were really into it. We went to Twister, which DD didn’t like (too scary), and then stopped again to watch the Lucy and Desi look-alikes performing out in the street, before leaving Universal Studios.

these guys were great and boy did they earn their paychecks today -- man, was it ever hot!!!

We walked next door into Islands of Adventure (since we had the hopper passes), just to try a few things. We walked the full loop around the island and stopped to ride the Cat in the Hat (try it – your kids will love it), Jurassic Park (excellent water flume ride) and Spiderman (best simulator EVER). We were very thankful for the Jurassic Park ride, as we were starting to drag in the heat at that point. I felt much better after cooling off in the water. We left Islands of Adventure and walked through City Walk, with the plan being to eat at Pat O’Brien’s (I wanted me some jambalaya) for dinner. Unfortunately, life doesn’t always go as planned, and Pat’s was closed for the evening for a private party. At that point, we decided to walk back to the Hard Rock Hotel.

On the pathway back, I posed a question to my crew: the scheduled plan for tomorrow was to spend the day at Islands of Adventure (taking advantage of still having fotl access on our check out day). What would they think about bagging the parks tomorrow, hanging at the Hard Rock pool until we had to check out and doing something low-key in the afternoon, before we check into the Vistana. We could save our one remaining Universal day for a future trip. This was met with universal (get it?) approval.

Having been disappointed in our dinner plans, we decided to go where we knew we would not be disappointed further. That of course, means the Bahama Breeze on I-Drive. We had figured out that we could drive from the Hard Rock and take the road that runs parallel to International Drive all the way down, avoiding the traffic. It worked great. We waited maybe 5 minutes for a table and ate the following:

Me: Bahamarita (fabulous frozen margarita – mango, lime and strawberry, I think)
Calypso Shrimp –delicious
DH: Mojito (rum drink)
Island Teriyaki Steak
DD: Mac & Cheese, Sprite

Total was $53 plus tip.

They have recently put one of these about 20 minutes from us in Baltimore. We have never had a bad meal at any Bahama Breeze, in any location. If you look through the DIS threads, I don’t think you’ll find a single bad review, either (other than possibly a complaint about the wait, if you arrive at peak times). It’s been absolutely great every time, and the staff is so friendly. I just love coming here.

Drove back to the Hard Rock, jumped into our bathing suits and hit the pool. My one beef with the Hard Rock Hotel, is that when they are crowded, the pool cannot really accommodate the number of people trying to swim and cool off. It was absolutely packed to the gills this evening. The hot tubs were full of people smoking, which was unpleasant for those of us trying to avoid the smoke. We floated for awhile, and were glad that our plans had us pooling tomorrow morning, when (with a little luck) everybody else would be either still asleep or heading off to the parks.

Overall, it was a great day at Universal. We were delighted with our experience (as we usually are – I think a good attitude is always the key) and looking forward to more!

Stats: 7.96 miles walked (even considering we walked all the way around IOA – hmm)
Food: lunch $28, dinner $61 with tip = total $89. Went over budget . Bad bad vacationers!

STAY TUNED FOR THE NEXT EPISODE: Hard Rock waterslide and Gatorland!

 

[dmthoma76]

Great trip report you have going, giving me a lot of insite on "offsite" adventures!

~Donna

 

[missmun52]

Your time at universal seems to be going so great. I have not had the pleasure of going to the one in florida but have gone to the one in CA and I loved it so much.
Your trip report is really good and i look forward to reading the rest.

 

[ely3857]

Great stuff



Jodie

 

[SRUAlmn]

There was a big crowd to get inside and order, but we had a nice chat with people behind us in line (DD’s Ravens cap is always a conversation starter), and soon enough we had our little tag with the number on it to set on our table…..if we only had a table! Had to do some serious hovering to score a place to sit.

We are HUGE Ravens fans and my fiance always wears a Ravens (or Orioles) hat when we go too! It's amazing how many people we meet based on conversations started about his hats


Loving your trip report, and LOVE the OMNI!! (I pulled up the website )

PS We also LOVE the Bahama Breeze in Towson- yum!!

 

[Kristina]

Looks good, I'm in, subscribing ! Lovely pictures of your family, and I love that pool!

Ely, I noticed that you will be staying at the Pop for the very first time and I just wanna say hold on to your hat, because you are going to just love the place! We are coming up on our 3rd trip staying there and are really excited!

 

[zigzagzerr]

quick shout out to say thanks to:
Missmun52 -- you are so awesome, thanks for your nice comments

And to everyone else as well -- I do appreciate it so much.


DAY 5
Wednesday, June 21

Plan: Islands of Adventure – not gonna happen this time!


As you may recall, the gang voted to skip Islands of Adventure in favor of time in the Hard Rock Hotel swimming pool in the a.m. The goal was to actually get a chance to enjoy the pool without 5 bazillion of our closest friends joining us. So now the plan was to swim up until the 11 a.m. checkout, have lunch, and then spend the afternoon visiting the creepy critters at Gatorland.

Let me just say that the Hard Rock Hotel has a lovely pool (that doesn’t open until 9 in the morning, but I suppose they have their reasons) which is much much lovelier and more enjoyable when it is not choked with people. We arrived a few minutes before it opened up and as soon as they gave the signal, we were in! I hopped back and forth several times between the (empty – yea!!) hot tub and the pool, and even managed quite a few turns down the slide –which, yesterday afternoon, had a line at least 20 kids long. It was nice to go up and down the slide without worrying that I was taking a turn away from a little kid. I know these are not the greatest pictures, but the point I want to make with them is that there is NO ONE ELSE close enough to be in the picture.

hubby resting up (he's knows he'll need it)
(will resize this pic and repost later)

playing on the slide:

After dragging ourselves out finally, we went back to the room one last time to change clothes and check out of the hotel. DD voted immediately for lunch (as she generally does – plus the swimming does take its toll) and in particular voted for Wendy’s, as she had seen the sign up for the 99 cent chicken sandwich. Okey dokey, 3 of those, 2 fries, a frosty and a large Dr. Pepper ($8), and we’re stylin’!! Pretty funny….we actually ended up eating here 3 times on our trip and pretty much ordered the same thing every time. This Wendy’s was on the south end of International Drive near Sea World, and apparently, this is where all the Sea World employees eat lunch. In fact, we saw this one guy eating there two of the times we were there. I guess it’s cheaper for them than eating in the park.

Okay, what can I possibly say about Gatorland? (what can I say that will not get me thrown out of the DIS world forever?) What the heck --- Gatorland is the BEST!!! We went on our trip 2 years ago, and absolutely loved it. Kinda hard to say why. There is something about the fact that this place existed pre-Disney and has continued all this time in business. Despite all the “Disney-ness”, it has continued to find its niche, and I admire that. Also, I likes me some gators! Can’t go to Florida and not see a gator. Okay, funny story. My husband works with a vendor from Chicago who is a DVC member, and she goes to Disney World every year. After we came back from our last trip, we were singing the praises of Gatorland because we felt it was cheesy and fun and rednecky, and just a really good time. So she determined to try it out next time. And of course, she hated it. And will probably never take one of our suggestions ever again. I personally think she hated it, because it didn’t feel like Disney. To which I would say, “of course not!” And truly, why would you want it to? The fact that this is not a slick place is what makes it fun.

Okay, it's kinda embarassing that we took more pictures here than anywhere else:
Cute, huh?

Anyway, we certainly had plenty of company at Gatorland, so there must be many who agree with us. We had to show up 20 minutes early for each of the 3 shows (on a Wednesday afternoon!). I will say that Gatorland has gotten a little more commercial, and they have come up with more ways to turn a buck (like $10 to sit on a live gator and get your picture taken, and they had ‘em lined up 20 deep to do that), but since the money goes to support the wildlife, I can’t really be too offended by it. The walk around the lake (provided it’s not too hot and you have plenty of water) is glorious with tons of birds and fish and gators. Also, you can get gator nuggets at the snack bar – I wasn’t about to try that, but just thought I’d let you know.

Hard to find another place where you can yell “yeehaw” and watch gators jump up in the air for chickens. Did you even know gators liked chicken?

Gator Jumperoo:

One of the best parts of Gatorland, in DD’s opinion, is the lorikeet aviary. For a couple of bucks, you can get a cup of nectar and go into the aviary where the lorikeets will immediately bombard you, land on you, (sometimes) nip you, and pose for pictures, if you’re lucky. DD gets such a kick out of this. This time, one of the birds demonstrated a real fondness for DH’s hat, attached himself to the back of it, and would not let go. It was quite a show and very amusing to all of us watching (wisely) from outside the cage.

DD with the lorikeets (SRUAlmn, note the Ravens hat):

DH with his fan club:

After seeing all the shows, walking the trails and playing with the birds, we decided we were very hot and needed some air conditioning, like maybe the Gatorland gift shop, for instance. I think my baby brother (not so baby anymore) will enjoy his shirt with a big gator that says “bite me”. Poor taste, I know, I know. I’m sorry. But I’m pretty sure he’ll like it. I also got a nice little resin gator to put on my desk at work and scare away the riff raff. So far it hasn’t worked, but I’m still hopeful….


Finally we were ready to go. One thing to mention if you decide to give Gatorland a try, is that the road is torn up with construction, so the going can be a bit slow. We eased our way out and headed back to International Drive to check into the Vistana Villages, our (thankfully) last hotel on this journey. We arrived at the front desk at around 5 pm, and to our dismay, the room was not ready! DH looked on the verge of a small fitsky, so I suggested to the front desk person that perhaps if we left and had dinner, it would be ready on our return in about an hour. Capiche? She agreed, so off we went in search of vittles. Decided on Don Pablo’s a little ways up the road (we have eaten at this Don Pablo’s on several occasions, but have never eaten at the one at home, go figure) DH had steak fajitas and a beer, and pronounced it good. I had chicken enchiladas (so-so) and a margarita, and DD had chicken fajitas which she wasn’t thrilled with. (however, we brought the leftovers back to the Vistana, and DH and I devoured them later as a snack, delish!!). Total before tip was $40.28

We went back to the Vistana, successfully checked in, and received our delightful 1 bedroom condo. Loved the screened in deck with a full table and chairs overlooking the pool and the lake. Really really loved the king sized bed, the full fridge and the microwave for heating up leftovers. Also loved the full sized coffee pot (bring your own coffee and filters – they provide enough for the first pot). We took a swim. The pool is amazing – I’ll post some pics later. We found the quiet pool very relaxing and little bit warmer than the big pool. The hot tubs were quite large and very comfortable. All in all, we were thrilled with this. The swim was very nice and we felt unstressed and relaxed. Ready to tackle another Disney day tomorrow. Hope to see you then.

Miles walked: 2.87
Food: $8 lunch, $40 plus $8 tip dinner = $56 (good vacationer today, making up for yesterday)

STAY TUNED FOR THE NEXT EPISODE: My birthday at Epcot, spent Soarin’

 

[SRUAlmn]

Gotta love the Ravens hat AND the O's hat! Glad to see that Lorikeets are also fans

 

[missmun52]

you know I love this report when my eyes can barley stay open but i cant go to sleep until I finsh.
Its 1am and i just finished after breaking for a while to clean the kitchen of the dinner mess.
keep it up

 

[heaven2dc]

I'm really enjoying your report and am glad you included pics (really pretty hotels)! I always wondered how others enjoy their stay at "off property" hotels but it seems you've picked all winners

I was considering an offsite hotel next trip but my kids love the ambience of the Boardwalk (our one and only trip in 97 was renting 3 1-bedroom villas for 12 of us and loved being able to walk to Epcot & MGM). We paid rack room prices with a little discount but next trip we are renting from a DVC owner for about the same price as your rooms were. So now am pondering which way to go Plus we rented a car the last trip but didn't drive anywhere but my DS13 wants to go to Gatorland too plus Universal so maybe an offsite stay for 2 nights w/rental car - any suggestions?

 

[kathymc]

enjoying your reports - hoping to one day stay at hard rock for the line access - but I dont think we'll be making it over to Gatorland any time soon!

thanks for sharin

 

[ely3857]

I cannot wait to spend a day chillin' by the pool at HRH



Jodie

 

[zigzagzerr]

DAY 6
Thursday, June 22


The gang woke up bright and early. Having gotten the redneck need satisfied at Gatorland yesterday, we were ready and willing to tackle the (somewhat more sophisticated) world of mouse again. To Epcot we go…..

We had a couple of goals in mind for the day.

1) Gotta ride Soarin’ and also see Turtle Talk – these are new since our last trip
2) Today being yours truly’s 38th birthday, I wanted to taste some of the great food around World Showcase. Calories, schmalories……

We got to Epcot a little bit early and slathered up with the sunscreen while waiting in one of the (thankfully) shaded turnstile lines. Once they let everybody through, we were held up again at the ropes until the park officially opened about 10 minutes later. A group of obnoxious tourists (aren’t we all glad we’re not like that? ) tried to sneak through by way of the Electric Umbrella restaurant and were summarily booted back to the teeming hordes by the cast members. Bwa ha ha……too bad for them. There was funky robotic versions of Disney songs being played over the loudspeakers --- I guess that’s supposed to be in keeping with Future World motif.

Anyway, they finally opened the park and we all (well not all) followed the cast members in a staid and dignified manner over to Test Track. We were obviously able to walk on with no wait this early, and then went next door to ride Mission Space (again the weenie version for us girls while DH the manly man rode the barfy side). After that, we made the trek across to the other side of the park for the Land pavilion and fast passes to Soarin’.

As an aside, I was not too sure about the potential success of this touring plan, which came from the Unofficial Guide. I really wasn’t sure if it would be a good idea to ride Test Track and Mission Space before going to Soarin’. I kept reading on these boards how incredibly crowded Soarin’ got, plus the first day when we arrived here in the afternoon, there weren’t any fast passes left, and it was still pretty early. I didn’t think that boded well for us. As it turned out, getting the Soarin’ passes wasn’t bad at that point, but I still think I would modify this plan. If I had it to do over again (which I will during free dining in August – yea!), I would ride Test Track first, skip MS initially, and then go to the Land Pavilion. The reason being that everybody rides the Living with the Land boat ride while they wait for their Soarin’ time. And so did we….which meant that the boat ride line was very long. The posted time said 10 minutes, but I’d say we waited at least double that – and considering that it was only about 9:45 am, that’s pretty substantial, in my opinion. So, anyway, for what it’s worth, that’s what I would do.

After securing our fp’s and riding the boat ride (really like the greenhouses in there), we left the Land and turned left towards the Living Seas pavilion to visit our buddy Crush in Turtle Talk. Wow, what a change from the last time we saw this place. You don’t go through the front entrance and the movie at this point, just straight into the pavilion. And pretty much the only thing you can see are the roped off lines (in the dead center of the room – like the HM ref?) filled to the gills (hee hee ) with people. Because the lines wind around and around, basically as you walk in, it just looks like a massive crowd of folks are gathered in a big ball. All of them looking pretty bored. Because, since Turtle Talk is a theater thing (small theater, by the way, that’s why all the crowds), nobody moves at all until the next show lets out. We didn’t really want to, but we took a deep breath and joined the sea (ho ho) of humanity waiting in that line. And thank goodness we did, because the line got massively longer afterwards. We still had to wait through like 2 cycles of the show before we got in. It is very very cute that the turtle on the screen can talk to the audience members, and the kids sitting up front were having a wonderful time. So I’m glad we got to see it (I always like to see the new stuff), but I definitely would not wait long to see it again. If you or your kids need to see this, I would suggest you go here first, then to Soarin’. The small theater makes the wait longer and I suspect that it’s much worse later in the day.

After hanging out for awhile with the Turtle Dude, it was finally time for us to go Soarin’. I didn’t know much about this, other than that you fly over California. So I didn’t know which seats were good or bad or anything. As it turned out, we were really fortunate and got to sit in the front row (so no feet dangling in front of us). And wowie, we loved it!!! DD and I kept saying whee! And lifting up our feet to avoid landing in the snow or the water (or the people in Disneyland). That was so much fun, especially since I grew up in California and visited Disneyland so many times. It was just great, and the gang totally agreed. So we did what any sensible person would do and grabbed another set of FP’s for later on. And we decided it was time to hit the World Showcase and find us some chow.

My idea for the birthday lunch was this --- there are many things I enjoy eating in Epcot but the only day we would be here for lunch was today. So I decided that we could all share one lunch, but at several different places. That way we’d get a little taste of many things. To start things off, we got an order of Fish and Chips ($8.51) at the stand in England. We were fortunate to find a nice shady table to eat at. While we were chewing away, DH’s cell phone rings, and it’s my parents, calling to wish me a happy birthday. I proudly announced that we were eating Fish and Chips in Epcot and they were duly jealous. We talked a bit about how the vacation was going and how the weather was (my parents are big on the weather discussions), and then we signed off. The fish was delish by the way, nice and hot. Everybody enjoyed their bites. From England, we worked our way around until we got to France. DH had a brilliant idea – “it’s your birthday, you need a glass of French wine and dessert”. Well, we weren’t done with lunch yet, but what the heck….who am I to argue? So DH got me a glass of white wine (I know the red is better, but it was HOT outside) and a crème brulee from the pastry place ($6.87). We shared the dessert but I drank the wine all by myself!! DD took one bite of the crème brulee and decided it wasn’t her thing. Finally, we decided to finish off our culinary adventure with a shawarma chicken sandwich in Morocco, at the Tangierine Café ($10.60). Again DD did not like this, it reminded her too much of a gyro sandwich (she had had an unfortunate experience with one earlier in the year). No matter….DH and I were happy to finish it up, and boy was it tasty!

After lunch we went next door to America and waited a short time for the Fife and Drum Corps to perform. I had never seen them before and it was a really good show. As were the Voices of Liberty. The lady next to me was tearing up when they were singing – they were very impressive. We all went in to watch the American Adventure, which was just okay.

Speedily our way around the rest of World Showcase with a quick stop in Mexico to look in the shops and ride the boat ride, and a quick (wine for me, beer for dh) in Germany before heading toward the Land pavilion once again for round 2 of Soarin’. Got the 2nd row this time, and quickly understood how lucky we had been the first time. People wearing flip flops all day have nasty nasty feet! Now, I know that probably sounds mean, but we got to then experience even more “feetly” joy in the Circle of Life movie. Not many people in the theater so you could sit wherever you liked. (Of course) this meant that the Icky’s had to join us. Have you ever wondered what attracts these people to you? Mr. Icky settled down in his seat and proceded to take off his shoes and prop his yucky wet stinky socks on the seat in front of him. Meanwhile, his daughter, young-icky sits down, takes her stinky feet out of her sandals and starts to chew on her toenail! Yummy, no? Not sure I paid much attention to the movie, but I was quite glad to leave.

DD insisted on another ride on Journey into Your Imagination. I think we need to work on the brainwashing some more….but anyway, we then took a trip on Spaceship Earth before heading out of Mouse-Town for some dinner…..

The original (before we left home) plan for tonight was dinner at Bahama Breeze. As it turned out, we had ended up there several days earlier, so we figured we’d drive down I-92 in Kissimmee and see what we could find. Not too far down the road, we found the Macaroni Grill. We have one of these at home and I love it. So why not? Had my 3rd glass of wine for the day (good heavens!) with a glass of the house chianti, then had my favorite Penne Rustica and a caesar salad. DH had create-your-own pasta (although I can’t remember what he created) and DD had mac & cheese. Total was $36.18 before tip. Our whole meal was pretty amusing, because our waiter was in training. We know this because the smarmy (approximately) 17-year-old boychild who was training him, announced to us that our waiter was in training and if we had any trouble with him, to let him know. Our poor waiter spent the whole meal with this little snothead breathing down his neck. I guess you have to find your sense of importance somewhere. Anyhow, we got some giggles out of all this…

With stomachs fat and happy, we headed back for just a little more Mouse. We decided to spend just a little while at MGM. We didn’t want to stay for Fantasmic, but figured that maybe we could see some attractions while everybody else was lining up for it. We walked in and saw the Great Movie Ride (another ride which is always a wait, it seems, no matter when you go). We caught a showing of the Little Mermaid. Then walked into an entirely empty preshow for Muppets, and laughed our heads off. A few more folks came in toward the end and we went into the theater and enjoyed the movie, as always. DD wanted to ride the Rock and Roller Coaster, so we thought we’d check out the wait, figuring that maybe everybody would be in Fantasmic. No such luck. The standby line at 9 pm was 50 minutes and there were no FP’s left. So it wasn’t to be, tonight. As we walked up towards the entrance (and DD pouted her way along), we thought we’d try for a treatie at the candy shop on the way, but that was not to be either—the line was outrageous. Guess everybody had the same idea…

So, no problem, we walked on out and headed back to our plush digs at the Vistana. We were tired, but it was another really great day!

Stats:
Walked 8.78 miles today.
Food: lunch $8 plus $7 plus $11. Dinner $36 plus $6 tip = grand total of $68

STAY TUNED FOR THE NEXT EPISODE: A day gone wrong……

 

[SRUAlmn]

Another great day! I LOVE reading your trip report because we won't be able to go for at least a year (I teach so the only time I can go is in the summer.) I love living vicariously through everyone else!!

 

[DebIreland]

Oh my sweet Lord!!!! That photo is just something else!!!!

Enjoying your trip report.... skipped ahead to see your photos so I'm going back now to read it properly!!! Great stuff. Thanks!

 

[DebIreland]

Shamelessly bumping this up to where it belongs on Page 1.