Park Hoppers

We're baack!

I know I know, its taken me a little too long to post something up here about our trip. I've just been trying to figure out how to put it into words, but I have finally given up. I'll use a lot of words, but none of them will do this vacation justice. So here we go...

Oh, but before I go on and on about how amazing our vacation was, please keep a few things in mind: Ben and I are big kids (ok, so Ben helps me be a better big kid), we love all comical amusement, animals, and family time, Disney World really is magical, and Shamu makes me cry. Ok, so lots of things make me cry, but you already know this.

We drove down to Orlando last Saturday afternoon, met up with Ben's brother and parents, checked into our hotel, and our first stop was Medieval Times for dinner. I had been a few times several (as in 20) years ago with my family, but Ben and his family had never been, and it was a blast. (Except for the fact that they tell you to get there over an hour before your show starts, and I listed to the instructions. What we found out is that really means come hang out in our souvenir shop until you are so bored you have to buy something. We got creative and posed for pictures with all the armour instead. And I jumped onto the queen's throne for a picture. I couldn't help myself.)

You get a paper crown, your cheer for your knight, are served by a wench (seriously, they ask you to call them that...) and eat everything with your fingers on pewter saucers. We cheered our hardest, but our blue knight fell in the jousting round and got skewered with a sword. Those medieval dinners are dangerous!

Sunday we got up and headed off to SeaWorld, one of my favorite places of all times. Ben and his family had never been here either, and I think they had a pretty good time. Especially when I sat us all in the 'Soak Zone' of the Shamu show. =D. See how happy they look??
Anyway, we all loved it. We're definitely going back. If you have never been its worth the trip, and if you have but haven't been back in a while, go. They've taken it to a new level. Like I said, Shamu made me cry, and the seal and walrus (Clyde and Seymour for you SeaWorld fans) are the best comedy duo ever. If you don't believe me, go see that walrus dance. I was rolling. And they had this mime at their show that I wish I could have gotten a video of. He had to have been one of the funniest people ever. We went back and saw him twice. Ben and I also went to the dolphin cove to try to pet those sweet animals. Sweet elusive little suckers. Instead of getting to pet one, it would come within 2 inches and flip that little tail, then swim off. Dolphins have attitude, ya'll. Then the last time he came back around and out of no where jumped out of the water right by Ben's nose. I am not exaggerating. We, in turn, jumped back. It was wild.

Monday we went to Disney's Magic Kingdom in the morning... Ah, but I am getting ahead of myself. First, you need a visual.
Here is the explanation to this visual; we spent a lot of time each day at the parks. I'm talking 8am to 11pm. The general estimation was that at least 2 hours of each day were spent doing this:

This shot was not staged. I was standing there, looked over, and thought, I have got to get a picture of this. This sums up our trip.

Here are some quotes from several of us during our park-navigating experiences:

"These maps are SO not to scale!"

"Wait. That blue part on the map isn't water! I thought it was water. Its concrete! We can walk on it to get there, we don't have to go all the way AROUND it!" (which we already did.)

"It's over here. I mean, over here. Wait.... DANGIT!"

"Getting this lost is not normal."

"You need an internal GPS or something. You need help."

On the positive side, we did see all, and I mean all, of each of the parks. It was hilarious. The only thing not laughing were our feet at the end of the day, but a little pain did not stop us from doing it all over again! Each evening was a test of stamina and endurance to see just how long you can really stand on your feet.

So Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday were Epcot, Hollywood Studios, Animal Kingdom, and Magic Kingdom. We had the park hopper pass, so we hit up the extra hours (parks open an hour early or stay open late for people who are staying in a hotel on the resort). The fireworks and laser shows at Epcot and Hollywood Studios were breathtaking. We rode the Tower of Terror atleast 2 or 3 times. We placed bets on who would score the highest on the Toy Story Mania ride. Mr. David and I stopped for icecream every day. We made the boys suffer through riding Its A Small World, we rode Mt. Everest atleast twice two days in a row. We went to see the Beauty and the Beast play. We went on the Motion Space simulator, which really throws your equilibrium off. We went on the Animal Kingdom Safari twice (Ben and Chris did it three times). We walked through Germany, France, Africa, Mexico, Japan, China, and England. We survived traveling in a time machine to pick up a dinosaur, and riding along with a new pilot in Star Wars. We screamed when the bugs started crawling on us in Bugs Life. We laughed so hard our cheeks hurt. We lived it up and loved every second.

Thursday Ben's parents had to leave, but Chris, Ben and I stayed behind and went to Universal Studios. It was awesome, not as great as Disney World, but still pretty good. Thursday we hit Universal and Friday we wore our swimsuits and got drenched on all the water rides at Islands of Adventure. Then Friday night we went to Pirates Cove for some putt putt. Who got the only hole in one of the evening??!! Oh yea, thats right!



The pictures are not cooperating in uploading right now, so I will try those again later. Until then, as they say in Disney, have a magical day!!
xoxo
D