**The Unexpected Engagement - Day 2**

[Tinks1984]

Castmembers

Me - Rachel
DBF (for now! ) - Simon
Dad - Dennis
Mum - Jennifer
DB - Chris

Friday 7th May - Discovery Cove

Now, many of you are probably thinking, why Discovery Cove on day 2? Well, we were there for 16 nights as I mentioned, but only had Disney's Ultimate ticket, which covered us for 14 days - hence, we didn't want to run out of Disney days towards the end of the holiday, so we opted to use our 'spare' day to hit DC

We'd set our alarm clocks very early again as we planned to leave for Discovery Cove for 7am My Mum, Dad and Brother had never done DC before and I was really excited to see what they thought about it. Myself and Simon had done it on our previous trip and loved it, so we had to take them there to experience it

I had a little bit of a shock when my Dad announced I'd be driving to DC this morning Now, I'd never driven anywhere else but in the UK, so terrified didn't even come close So many things to think about, wrong side of the road, wrong side of the car, only two pedals and then just generally getting used to how the American's drive! Needless to say, I was a little nervous, but none the less, got in there!

Well, a little while later we arrived here...

And boy was I relieved to see that sign, it meant we'd survived my driving! We got checked in around 8am and bagged ourselves a 11.00am dolphin swim.

We followed the map and path around to the breakfast area and tucked into a delicious all-you-can-eat morning treat! (Now sorry to all you guys who love to see the food pictures, but sadly, I don't have any, I'm not one for taking photo's of food - sorry!) After brekkie, we headed off down to collect our wetsuits and got ourselves changed.

As my Dad's a bird lover, I took us off to the bird aviary so he could see some of his favourites.

(My brother - Chris)

(Me )

We found the Sun Conure's to be the most friendly, or greedy, as they were forever coming down to land on you and say hello. After the tour around the aviaries, we headed back out and to the stingray lagoon, where they were just out for their morning feed, so they were very active.

By this time, even before the dolphin swim, my Dad was already swept away with how beautiful DC really is. He loved everything about it and plans to return on his next trip.

After lounging around for a while longer in the sunshine, it was time to head over to the Seahorse cabana to get prepared for our swim! We did our pre-swim safety checks and watched the short video before being told that our group would be swimming with the dolphin named Jenny! Now, at this point, I could have cried. In 2008, myself and Simon had swam with Jenny and I couldn't, and neither could the DC trainer, believe that we'd ended up with the same dolphin again this trip, two years later!

Me and Simon

My brother having Jenny drag him back to shore

My Mum giving Jenny - her namesake, a little kiss!

My Dad with Jenny

We had the most amazing swim, and everyone really enjoyed themselves. We sorted our photographs once we were done and then headed for some lunch. I had the salmon, Simon, Chris and my Dad, a massive burger and my Mum had the Cob Salad.

Cont....

 

[Tinks1984]

Part two...

We hung around for a while to let our food settle and then headed over to the Tropical Reef to swim with the fish and rays. My Mum is very claustrophobic and I was expecting her not to do this with having to wear the mask and snorkel, but she surprised me and was eventually the one who spent the most time in the pool I truly is amazing swimming in there, the rays and fish are so graceful and aren't bothered at all by your presence in their waters.

We finished off at DC at around 5.30pm and showered and headed back over to the resort. By this time I was literally crying out for a Disney fix and decided we'd head over to Downtown Disney for the evening

We got off the resort bus and headed straight into the Christmas shop were I found these little beauties...

And so I made my first Disney purchase of the holiday This little alien and a Stitch (which I had personalised) were shipped off back to the resort!

We wondered aimlessly around DTD really, but it didn't matter, the look on my family's face was a picture, so I really didn't care. They were back and loving every second. I eventually found the Pin Trading station and was in Pin Trading heaven

I bought myself a couple of pins just to keep myself satisfied before we headed off to the Earl of Sandwich for tea. I decided we'd go here after reading about this place on the Dis. I'd heard many say it was really good - and you guys weren't wrong! Delicious!

After that, we hit the World of Disney and had a good nosey around there, me searching out the Dooney & Burke section, in order to eye up which one I'd like to purchase later in the trip After another long day, we headed back to Sports and crashed out...

Day 3 coming up ASAP - it's time to hit Disney

 

[Tinks1984]

PS. As you can see, I'm struggling with resizing photos...anyone any advice? I use Photobucket for uploading and have tried using their re-size, but it doesn't seem to be working!

Sorry Louise...I'll try sort them ASAP!

 

[wickesy]

Another great report Rachel. I've never done Discovery Cove but every time I read about it it sounds great. Congratulations on your first go at driving as well, I remember how nervous I was the first time I drove over there.

As far as resizing photos goes you can get Photobucket to resize automatically as you upload. If you look under the big green Upload button you'll see "Tip: Hold down CommandCTRL to select multiple files." next to that it says "More options". If you click on More Options it will bring up a box that says "Resize my images to" with a number of settings. I use 15" screen (800x600) for my trip reports, which I think should be small enough for everyone. Let me know if you have any problems and I'll try to help you out.

 

[Chilly]

I hope to do Discovery Cove one day.

 

[buzz for boys]

PS. As you can see, I'm struggling with resizing photos...anyone any advice? I use Photobucket for uploading and have tried using their re-size, but it doesn't seem to be working!

Sorry Louise...I'll try sort them ASAP!

Oh no now I feel bad

you have your pics on Facebook dont you ? why dont you use Facebook as a host to your pics.

If you have a tab open with your facebook picture on and then right click on the picture you will se an option for properties !!
Click on properties and you should see info - triple click on the address (url) and it should highlight the url so you copy it ( right clck choose copy)

Then open the dis tab again - click on the insert image option !
Delete the text in box and then paste the url from your facebook pictures !!

Hey presto no need to change settings and no need to upload all your pics to phtobucket again !!

Hope that all makes sense and im im really sorry - if you strugggle go back to big pictures and Ill stop my moaning

 

[Tinks1984]

Thank-you David

I'll try that for tomorrow's uploads and let you know how I get on!

 

[Tinks1984]

Oh no now I feel bad

you have your pics on Facebook dont you ? why dont you use Facebook as a host to your pics.
If you have a tab open with your facebook picture on and then right click on the picture you will se an option for properties !!
Click on properties and you should see info - triple click on the address (url) and it should highlight the url so you copy it ( right clck choose copy)

Then open the dis tab again - click on the insert image option !
Delete the text in box and then paste the url from your facebook pictures !!

Hey presto no need to change settings and no need to upload all your pics to phtobucket again !!

Hope that all makes sense and im im really sorry - if you strugggle go back to big pictures and Ill stop my moaning

Please don't feel bad Louise, it's good for me to learn tbh!

David's just given me some tips, so I'll be trying them asap

EDIT: I've tried it - are those sizes better Louise? lol:

 

[wilma-bride]

Great first full day Rachel - Discovery Cove is so amazing, it's a lovely day out and so relaxing.

Can't wait to get to the engagement bit

 

[Tinks1984]

Great first full day Rachel - Discovery Cove is so amazing, it's a lovely day out and so relaxing.

Can't wait to get to the engagement bit

Thanks Joh - not too much longer to wait now, I promise

 

[jjk]

what a great day, I really hope I will be able to go to Discovery cove one day

 

[PJB71]

Oh how lovely you got the swim with the same dolphin

Another full day

 

[suzycute]

Sounds like you had a fantastic day!

(Many thanks to David and Louise for resizing photos info - I just couldn't figure out how to resize mine for my trippie last year!)

 

[buzz for boys]

yay you did it !!!!
I love the alien decorations im gonna have to get myself one of them !!!

 

[jockey]

Great day, we also love DC, I can't wait until the kids are old enough to swim with Dolphins

 

[Muscateer]

Looks like you all had a fab day at Discovery Cove.

 

[tinks_1989]

Im patiently waiting for an update

 

[ely3857]

Fab DC day. EoS is fab-u-lous!

 

[Tinks1984]

Im patiently waiting for an update

You shall have one tonight - I promise!

 

[florida sun]

Great day at Discovery Cove, and Earls is one of my fav eating places. Looking forward to more