susiebrown
Earning My Ears
- Joined
- Dec 17, 2003
- Messages
- 67
March 16
Woke up about 8:00, and it was POURING outside! A very sad sight. Good thing we did IOA yesterday, I thought. The girls were really bummed. I called the front desk and requested a late checkout, knowing that we might want to come back and dry off and so DH could get some work done in the room. We ate a danish and drank coffee in the room, got dressed and went through the gift shop on the way out and bought the blue ponchos. (Packing the FREE ponchos from home was DH's job.) We headed out in the rain. We weren't sure if the ferries were running based on last night's experience, so we walked. The ferry passed us on the way. Again, the walk is no bigee.
Went in US and hit Shrek first. No waiting with combo of FOTL pass and weather, but I did notice that the estimated wait time for the regular line was already 30 minutes. We loved this show. We even liked the pre-show, especially the talking pigs! I'm going to watch Shrek (movie) again just to hear them talk. We went on Jimmy Neutron (ok), Twister, JAWS, BTTF (it was rough, but not as rough as I expected--maybe I was prepared) and maybe a thing or two more that I am forgetting. We ended up at MIB. We rode it about 3 times in a row. For my first time, my score was 210,000. It came up about 10,000 each time, but I could never figure out what I was doing right and what I was doing wrong. Oh well. By that time, the girls were getting hungry.
We met DH (who was working that morning) at Citywalk and went to Latin Quarter. We ordered an appetizer that was ok (some kind of cheese dip), 2 lunch fajita specials, a couple of kids meals and drinks (DH might have had a beer or two.) Service was just ok, but food was pretty good. At any rate, our total with tax and tip added was $49. I had the $50 GC but noticed it said it couldn't be used for tip or tax. I was prepared to pay this part of it in cash, since the waiter agreed that we couldn't use it for that portion. Anyway, he disappeared one last time, and came back and said we were square. I offered again to pay the tax and tip, and he said everything was ok.
I thought we would go back to the parks, either to IOA to do more favorites, or US for DH to see a few things, but everyone else was about ready to hit the road. DD13 wanted to stop by Starbucks so we went by there and headed back to the RPR. The good news/bad news: It had stopped raining! I tried one last time to get them to go back to the parks, but no luck. Check-out right around 2:00 was a breeze, and we sadly left for our 2nd leg of the journey, to Sarasota.
Flyfly, if you are reading this, thanks to you and others for all the info on Sarasota. The weather was beautiful, Siesta Key Beach fantastic, and we really enjoyed our stay through Friday. We ate at Captain Curts and Phillippi Village Oyster Bar and enjoyed them both. DH and girls were content to hang out by the pool for the rest of the time. We left on Friday morning, and headed back to Orlando for an unexpected additional day. Some good news: Our Bulldogs were playing in the 1st round of the NCAA tourny, so we got to see them play (and beat) Monmouth Friday night. Unfortunately there was no way we could hang out until Sunday to see the 2nd game, so we headed back home Saturday morning after a Priceline stay at the Amerisuites, an ok place to stay. The bad news (for us anyway): The Dogs lost to Xavier in Sunday's game.
Thanks again to everyone on this board for all the invaluable info received before our trip!
Notes: We really enjoyed this trip as much as our previous trip to WDW. (But remember DH thinks 5 days of any theme park is too much!) Not to start any more Disney/Universal debates, but we were really impressed with Universal. I don't know where some folks visited, but Universal couldn't have been any cleaner, all employees encountered were great, theming was fantastic (definitely not a Six Flags) and the FOTL passes, as I and many have said, cannot be duplicated. If we get to return soon, there are parts of Disney we'd do again and parts of Universal.
Woke up about 8:00, and it was POURING outside! A very sad sight. Good thing we did IOA yesterday, I thought. The girls were really bummed. I called the front desk and requested a late checkout, knowing that we might want to come back and dry off and so DH could get some work done in the room. We ate a danish and drank coffee in the room, got dressed and went through the gift shop on the way out and bought the blue ponchos. (Packing the FREE ponchos from home was DH's job.) We headed out in the rain. We weren't sure if the ferries were running based on last night's experience, so we walked. The ferry passed us on the way. Again, the walk is no bigee.
Went in US and hit Shrek first. No waiting with combo of FOTL pass and weather, but I did notice that the estimated wait time for the regular line was already 30 minutes. We loved this show. We even liked the pre-show, especially the talking pigs! I'm going to watch Shrek (movie) again just to hear them talk. We went on Jimmy Neutron (ok), Twister, JAWS, BTTF (it was rough, but not as rough as I expected--maybe I was prepared) and maybe a thing or two more that I am forgetting. We ended up at MIB. We rode it about 3 times in a row. For my first time, my score was 210,000. It came up about 10,000 each time, but I could never figure out what I was doing right and what I was doing wrong. Oh well. By that time, the girls were getting hungry.
We met DH (who was working that morning) at Citywalk and went to Latin Quarter. We ordered an appetizer that was ok (some kind of cheese dip), 2 lunch fajita specials, a couple of kids meals and drinks (DH might have had a beer or two.) Service was just ok, but food was pretty good. At any rate, our total with tax and tip added was $49. I had the $50 GC but noticed it said it couldn't be used for tip or tax. I was prepared to pay this part of it in cash, since the waiter agreed that we couldn't use it for that portion. Anyway, he disappeared one last time, and came back and said we were square. I offered again to pay the tax and tip, and he said everything was ok.
I thought we would go back to the parks, either to IOA to do more favorites, or US for DH to see a few things, but everyone else was about ready to hit the road. DD13 wanted to stop by Starbucks so we went by there and headed back to the RPR. The good news/bad news: It had stopped raining! I tried one last time to get them to go back to the parks, but no luck. Check-out right around 2:00 was a breeze, and we sadly left for our 2nd leg of the journey, to Sarasota.
Flyfly, if you are reading this, thanks to you and others for all the info on Sarasota. The weather was beautiful, Siesta Key Beach fantastic, and we really enjoyed our stay through Friday. We ate at Captain Curts and Phillippi Village Oyster Bar and enjoyed them both. DH and girls were content to hang out by the pool for the rest of the time. We left on Friday morning, and headed back to Orlando for an unexpected additional day. Some good news: Our Bulldogs were playing in the 1st round of the NCAA tourny, so we got to see them play (and beat) Monmouth Friday night. Unfortunately there was no way we could hang out until Sunday to see the 2nd game, so we headed back home Saturday morning after a Priceline stay at the Amerisuites, an ok place to stay. The bad news (for us anyway): The Dogs lost to Xavier in Sunday's game.
Thanks again to everyone on this board for all the invaluable info received before our trip!
Notes: We really enjoyed this trip as much as our previous trip to WDW. (But remember DH thinks 5 days of any theme park is too much!) Not to start any more Disney/Universal debates, but we were really impressed with Universal. I don't know where some folks visited, but Universal couldn't have been any cleaner, all employees encountered were great, theming was fantastic (definitely not a Six Flags) and the FOTL passes, as I and many have said, cannot be duplicated. If we get to return soon, there are parts of Disney we'd do again and parts of Universal.
Thanks for the great report! 
Thanks for shareing!
