Lance Caros - March 1999 - Offsite

[Trip Reports]

March 6 through March 18, 1999

WARNING: This is my first trip report and it's very long. I wrote the report for my family and it will most likely include details that will bore others to tears. In fact it may bore my family to tears. So, having been forewarned, proceed at your own risk.

The family:

Lance, I'm in my mid 30's and work as a commercial underwriter for an insurance company. I'm the trip report writer, husband of Jenny, and Dad to Megan and Bryce. I've been a lifelong Disney fanatic thanks to my parents who took us there frequently and my grandparents who lived in California. I truly believe Disneyland is the happiest place on earth and Walt Disney was the greatest person of the 20th century. My mom (the greatest mom in the world) tells me that we sat next to Walt at a breakfast on Main Street when I was 9 months old and they chatted briefly with him. Except for 2 or 3 years I've been to Disneyland at least once every year of my life (probably more than 50 trips in all). This is my fourth trip to WDW.
Jenny, my beautiful wife of almost 9 years and mom to Megan and Bryce. Works part time as a customer service rep for the same insurance company. The most organized person I have ever met. She married me knowing about my Disney addiction. Thankfully she acquired one too. She's been to Disneyland many times and this was her fourth WDW trip.
Megan, our beloved first born. She's almost 6 and is in kindergarten. Thankfully she got her mom's looks and smarts. She loves to draw and wants to be an artist when she grows up. She's very tall for her age and meets all attraction height requirements. She was born into loving all things Disney. She first went to Disneyland at 6 months old and has logged 10 trips there so far. This was her second WDW trip.
Bryce – Our beloved second born. He's almost 2 and goes to a daycare 3 days a week at the same school Megan attends. He's generally a pretty happy guy. He's also tall for his age and like his dad he loves to eat. He loves Winnie the Pooh, Mickey and Minnie, Barney and the Teletubbies. He's been to Disneyland 3 times starting at age 6 months. This was his first WDW trip.
Previous trips - This was my fourth trip to Walt Disney World. The first was approximately 1978 with my parents and sister. I believe we spent one day at the Magic Kingdom and one day at EPCOT before leaving on a cruise. Jenny had gone as a senior in high school as part of a FBLA trip. Our first trip together was in May of 1990 for our honeymoon. We spent a week offsite in the Orlando Stouffer before going on a cruise. We liked the hotel but looking back on it now I really regret not staying on site. Our next trip was in 1995 with then two year old Megan and my mother and stepfather. Jenny and I were in a bit of commando mode on that trip. I was a lifelong Disneyland kind of guy but for the prior few years I had started accumulating every WDW guidebook available. I began realizing how vast WDW was and how much of it we had missed on our honeymoon. We were determined to see it all in 1995 on a 10-day trip. With the help of my mom and stepfather staying back with Megan sometimes we were able to do most of what we had planned. We saw all three (at that time) Disney parks, all three water parks as well as Universal, Pleasure Island, the Disney Village Marketplace, a very fun pontoon boat rental and lot's of visiting the various resorts. We stayed at a condo off of HWY 192 about 10 miles from the middle of WDW. It was a clean, nice three-bedroom condo with full kitchen and sleeping for 8. We liked the unit itself and the spaciousness (about 1200 square feet) but you got absolutely none of the magic of staying on site. The complex was fairly empty for the most part and there just seemed to be no activity at the place at all. There was a pool but no clubhouse. It was fine for a comfortable place to stay especially at the $100 a night price but we swore that next time we would stay on site.

Pre-trip planning – In early 1998 Jenny and I were discussing what to do for our 10 year anniversary in Y2K. We were definitely taking the kids. Both of us traveled extensively with our respective parents when we were children and I can't imagine vacationing without the kids. We settled on Disneyworld fairly quickly as our destination. Jenny had been crunching the vacation budget numbers, which were looking very good, and she came up with the idea of going a year early in 1999. I didn't need any further convincing so in about March of 1998 the planning started.

I have about every guidebook ever written about Disneyland and Disneyworld but I stocked up on the latest annual updates on all of them and got to work. I enjoy every guide but for us I found the following the most helpful.

Kim Wiley's Walt Disney World with Kids. It is packed with great information on travelling to WDW with children.
Birnbaum's Official Guide to Walt Disney World. This one has some information you just can't get anywhere else and some fun little details. There are a couple of really good maps as well. This isn't the best guide in my opinion but it does come in handy.
Sehlinger's Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World. This one is packed with a lot of good information. I like this guide for all of the little details it provides. I imagine this book would totally overwhelm most casual WDW tourists by the commando approach it takes. The downsides are that I find the guide too critical and it seems like Sehlinger and company are unable to appreciate the magic of WDW.
Rita Aero's Walt Disney World for Adults. I really like this guide. This book has a real enthusiasm for WDW that is so lacking in the Unofficial Guide. Some of the maps are very good and there are wonderful descriptions of the resorts and restaurants.
Perlmutter's Walt Disney World for Couples. I love this book. These folks really know how to do WDW right. This book has hands down the best descriptions of each of the WDW resorts. Great restaurant reviews also. It's a bit lacking on the attraction section but more than makes up for it with wonderful descriptions of romantic things to be found at WDW.
Around March 1998 I got hooked up to the Internet and quickly became obsessed with finding all things related to Disney and especially WDW. The guidebooks are all wonderful but there is nothing like the Internet for diversity of information and up to the minute details that the printed guides by their very nature can't provide. Here's a list of what I feel is the best WDW information on the Internet.

Brian Bennett's Trip Planning Resource. This is the first site I go to every day when I log on. I'm totally addicted to trip reports and have read every one of them on Brian's site. There's also loads of useful information about planning a WDW trip. I can't say enough about this site. In reading Brian's own trip reports I've really gained a respect for him as a father, husband and fellow Disney fanatic. His website is at: http://members.aol.com/DVClubber/dvchome.htm
Rec.Arts.Disney.Parks also known as RADP. This is a Usenet discussion group dedicated primarily to WDW. As with any unmoderated discussion group this one can go off the subject and there can be people who are less than civilized. However, this is one of the best places to go for questions that you can't find the answers to elsewhere. It also had the very latest news about WDW. The discussions among the regulars can be very entertaining. Most Internet service providers offer a newsreader for Usenet newsgroups. If yours doesn't you can visit: www.dejanews.com
Deb Will's Unofficial Walt Disney World Information Guide. This site like Brian's provides ton's of great planning information and lot's of little secrets to make your trip special. The menu section here is fantastic and a great way to scope out where you want to eat so you can make those priority seating times from home before you leave. Her site is at: http://www.wdn.com/dwills/contents.htm
Pete Werner's Disney Information Station. This site is another must see for anyone planning a WDW trip. There is a huge amount of information here. There are also message boards where you can ask questions or share tips with others. The folks that visit and moderate these boards are very nice and very helpful. Pete's site is at: http://www.disneyinfo.com/disintro.htm
With all this information at our fingertips we had to get down to decision making. The first decision was when to go. This was actually fairly easy. We live in Carnation, WA a small town east of Seattle. Jenny and I are both native Washingtonians and would never move out of the area but sometimes the long winter and the constant rain get to us. So, looking forward to getting out of the rain we decided to leave at the end of winter so when we came back spring would be starting. With the kids being so young it didn't really matter when we went as far as their school time. We wanted a balance of somewhat less crowded conditions in the parks yet decent weather so we could go to the water parks. We finally settled on early March, which appeared to be a pretty good mix of crowds and weather.

The next decision was how long to stay. Our last trip of 10 days just did not seem to be enough time to see what we wanted to see. The Animal Kingdom was also a new addition which would add another touring day so we settled on 12 days which is about as long as the budget would allow for anyway. The official dates would have us leaving on Saturday, March 6th and returning on Thursday March 18th.

With the dates decided the next step was to decide where to stay. I started looking into what we could afford (either the moderates or the value resorts) and checking their Magic Kingdom Club rates. The Caribbean Beach Resort really appealed to both of us. The architecture, activities and feel of the place just seemed like a good fit. I also considered Dixie Landings or Port Orleans as well as Coronado Springs. We kept coming back to the Caribbean Beach idea but the thought of staying in a standard size hotel room with a toddler and 5 year old was sounding less appealing. We began to think how nice it would be to have another bedroom to put the kids in, a kitchen for preparing breakfasts, a washer and dryer etc. As much as we really wanted to stay on site the reality of vacationing with two young children was setting in. I debated the onsite versus offsite idea for quite a while. My thoughts were:

The early entry privilege of staying on site is somewhat negated by how crowded the parks are on their early entry days.
The transportation issue wasn't really a selling point for us. I felt that we could stay offsite and travel as quickly to and from the parks via a rental van as we could by staying at an onsite moderate and taking the Disney busses. Plus we would be travelling to each of the parks with quite a bit of baggage. Bryce is still in diapers and has a bottle. That requires a lot of preparation and carrying a lot of supplies with us. Trying to load and unload the two kids, a stroller, 2 backpacks and a small cooler on and off the bus every day just didn't sound like the way to go in our situation. We would also be going Universal and some offsite dinners. We would probably get a rental van regardless of if we stayed onsite or off.
Priority seatings are no longer only an onsite guest privilege. I called the Magic Kingdom Club 1-800 phone number and made many of our priority seatings 120 days or 60 days in advance.
The only thing I felt that we would miss out on by not staying onsite was being in the middle of the magic 24 hours a day. This is a real consideration. All Disney resorts including the value and moderate resorts have that special Disney magic about them. With the price differential for a room offsite versus one on site though I was willing to forgo that. We had a fairly long vacation planned and we would be experiencing lots of that Disney magic in the parks. We would also be spending a lot of time exploring the resorts on our off days from the parks.
So, we started scouring the Internet and all the tourist publications for suites, homes and condos. I was amazed at some of the deals out there. What we settled on was the Hampton Oak Plantation resort in Kissimmee. It is located about 10 miles away from most of the Disney areas we would be visiting. We decided on a two-bedroom condo with 2 full baths, a full kitchen, washer and dryer, daily maid service, free continental breakfast, 2 swimming pools and a kiddie pool. We got the brochures and just loved the look and layout of the resort. At approximately 1,100 square feet our unit would be several times the size of a room at the Caribbean Beach and would be much more comfortable. There were several discounts available for the resort and the best one we found was on www.floridakiss.com. It offered a coupon that gave each third night free with the purchase of two nights. Our 12-night stay would cost a total of $1,107 or $92 per night including all taxes. It seemed like a deal that couldn't be beat so we made the reservations.

Next decision was a rental car. We have both a sport utility vehicle and a minivan at home and I'll take the minivan any day when it comes to transporting young children. It is much easier to load our youngest into the car seat and easier for our oldest to get in by herself. Plus if the kids are fighting it's possible to put them in separate rows of seats. I also didn't like the idea of getting a compact car that would be hot (vans have deep tinted windows and stay much cooler) and difficult to load the toddler into several times a day. So, even though the rental price of a minivan is approximately twice that of a compact car I decided to go for it. We would take our own car seat with us. We would just ship it as another piece of luggage to save the $60 rental charge for our stay. It later turned out our rental van had integrated child seats but it was still nice to have our own car seat. Bryce usually falls asleep in the car and it was much more comfortable for him to be in his own seat with lots of head support for sleeping.

I checked the Internet, my credit cards, the Magic Kingdom Club, frequent flyer programs and newspaper ads for car rental discounts. I was scared off by the first initial quotes of $600 per week. I worked on this for several weeks until I found the very best deal from Dollar at $199 per week and $36 per day. This was using a TAG code on the Dollar website. I also had a $10 off per week coupon from Costco that I was able to use. The total with all taxes, fees and other gouges was $460.47 for the 12 days. I checked each of the rental companies weekly until the time our trip arrived and never found a better rate.

By now it was just after Thanksgiving and we decided to try to talk my sister Sonya and her husband Dom (mid 20's) to join us in Orlando. They currently live in Nashville where Dom is a medical school student at Vanderbilt and Sonya is a second grade teacher. They would be finding out where Dom would be doing his residency soon after the vacation ended. (It later turned out they got their first choice of Tucson.) This would be a stressful time for them thinking about where in the country they may end up so they really liked the idea of getting away from it all for a little while. We convinced them to fly down for a weekend. The minivan will come in handy here since it will easily seat all 6 of us.

Now it was time to start "the plan". This was to be my schedule for each day's activities. I didn't want to go overboard and plan out the bathroom breaks but by the same token I didn't want to be standing at the Tree of Life at noon staring at a map and trying to figure out what to do next. My goal with the plan was to have an outline of what to do each day but to keep it very flexible with alternate plans in case we wanted or needed to change things around. So, the following considerations went into making the plan. The first was obviously that we would not be staying on site and would not be eligible for early entry. I avoided the early opening days at each park like the plague. Another consideration was that we would be driving approximately 20 minutes each way and packing a lot of stuff. We don't want to push the kids or ourselves to the point of no one having fun but we probably won't be going back to the condo for a nap. Megan doesn't nap anyhow and Bryce can nap quite comfortably in his reclining stroller. We are hoping that mild temperatures and moderate crowds will allow us to stay at one park each day for the majority of the day. Park hopping sounds great when the kids get older but just would require too much time and effort at this point. Since we would be doing long days at the parks we would try to take every other day off. We will go to the waterparks, shopping, resorts or swimming pool on these days. Also, we are an early to bed and early to rise family. We plan to be at the opening of each park every day and come back to the condo to relax after dinner and turn in for the night.

The schedule I came up with after much refinement looked as follows:

Day Time Itinerary

SAT 3-6 11:15AM United flight from Seattle to Denver to MCO. Arrive at 8:45PM

Get rental minivan from Dollar. Promotion code TAG. $199 per week and $35.99 per day. Use coupon at check-in and give them the frequent flyer number.
Drive to Hampton Oak Plantation - 4100 Enchanted Oaks Circle - Kissimmee, FL 34741 1-800-578-0140 Check into 2 bedroom condo. Approx. $92 per night with Internet coupon.
SUN 3-7 9:00AM Go to Wal-Mart and pickup snacks, picnic items and beach toys for the day.

10:00AM River country open until 5:00PM. Follow the signs to Fort Wilderness and then to the day visitor parking area. Take the Gateway Depot bus. Stop at petting farm at Fort Wilderness either before or after River Country.
Purchase River Country/Discovery Island combo tickets. Use MKC card.
Stake out a spot at Kiddie Cove with umbrella and lounge chairs.
Rent life jackets for both kids.
Go on the Whoop 'n' Holler Hollow slides first.
Ride the White Water Rapids.
Play in the pool.
Afternoon Go to Publix or Wal-Mart and stock up on groceries.
Dinner at TGI Fridays at Crossroads.
Optional plans

Downtown Disney, tour the resorts, Belz Outlet Mall for Character Warehouse, Boardwalk, Winter Summerland or Fantasia mini golf.
MON 3-8 9:00AM EPCOT open until 9:00PM.

Leave condo by 8:00AM to arrive early and purchase 2 adult four-day hoppers and one child 5-day hopper. Use MKC card. Use the old tickets for entry this day.
Pick up map and schedule of live performances.
Spaceship Earth first if nothing else is open then Test Track as soon as it opens.
Go across to Honey I Shrunk the Audience the to the Land.
See Circle of Life, Living with the Land and Food Rocks (open the crates out front).
Stop at Ice Station Cool. Watch everyone try the Beverly!
Watch the Fountain of Nations behind Spaceship Earth across from the Fountainview Café. Shows every 15 minutes. See Cast in Bronze nearby.
Find the talking water fountain by the Centorium. Another one is near the kid's fountain. The third is by a restroom between Innoventions and Honey I Shrunk the Audience.
Find the talking trash can by the Electric Umbrella at Innoventions.
Go to World Showcase and start in Canada. Buy a passport. Try to see Off Kilter. Go to the gardens in Canada.
Stop at each country for Kidcot stations, passport stamp and candy.
Find the secret park by the water in the United Kingdom and find the maze.
Try the melon Kaki-Gori shave ice in Japan.
See Impressions de France in the France pavilion. Try to see the Living Statues and Bubble Nicolas.
See the American Adventure at America. Listen to the Voices of Liberty.
Look for the model train in Germany.
Try to see the Pu Yang Acrobats in China.
Ride Maelstrom in Norway. Skip the movie. Play on the Viking ship.
Ride El Rio de Tiempo in Mexico.
6:30PM Dinner PS at San Angel.
See the sidewalk lights after dark on the way out.
Go to the Living Seas for a quick tour.
Stop by the IBM exhibit in the Innoventions building and send electronic postcard e-mail to relatives.
Stop by Universe of Energy to see the show.
Optional plans

Disney-MGM Studios, Universal Studios, Animal Kingdom
TUE 3-9 9:00AM Magic Kingdom open until 8:00PM. Leave the condo by 8:00AM

Alien Encounter then Space Mountain. Follow the path alongside the Tomorrowland Power building to the small park with a view of the trains. Continue the path to Toontown.
Toontown for Barnstormer and the Judges Tent to see Mickey; Fair Hall for the other characters. Take a walk through Mickey and Minnie's houses
Fantasyland for Peter Pan, Legend of the Lion King and Small World.
Go to Liberty Square to see the Haunted Mansion. Get a turkey leg & churro.
See the Hall of Presidents, Country Bear Jamboree then Pirates.
Look at the spitting Tiki statues in Adventureland next to Bwana Bob's.
Get a Dole Pineapple whip. Rest in the area behind the Christmas shop.
See the Tropical Serenade and ask a CM where to sit to catch the feather.
3:00PM Magic moments parade. Stake out spot early and look for CM's handing out stickers.
4:00PM Early dinner PS at Tony's. Ask for a table on the patio. Use the MKC card.
See the flag retreat ceremony in Town Square at 5:00PM
After the Parade check the wait times for Splash Mountain and Big Thunder.
If lines are too long there then ride the skyway from Fantasyland to Tomorrowland.
Do Buzz Lightyear then Carousel of Progress. Ride the Train.
Ride the Liberty Belle Riverboat. Ask to go up to the wheelhouse with the captain. Get a certificate.
Go to the Kodak Camera Center on Main Street and send e-mail postcards.
Optional plans

Disney-MGM Studios, Universal Studios, Animal Kingdom
WED 3-10 10:00AM Blizzard Beach open until 5:00PM. Leave condo by 9:30AM. Take a picnic lunch.

Stake out spot at Tike's Peak with umbrella and lounge chairs. Rent life vests for both kids.
Take the chair lift up to the top and go on Teamboat Springs.
Take Bryce back to the kids area. Let Meg & Jenny go on Runoff Rapids.
Trade off and let Lance do Summit Plummet.
Float in the tubes around Cross Country Creek.
Take Meg over to the Ski Patrol Training Camp.
Have picnic lunch.
5:45PM Character dinner PS at Chef Mickey's in the Contemporary.
7:30PM Magic Kingdom fireworks. Watch from the balcony of the California Grill after dinner.
Optional plans

Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Universal Studios, Animal Kingdom, Typhoon Lagoon
THU 3-11 9:00AM Disney-MGM Studios open until 7:00PM

First stop is Tower of Terror. Ask to sit in the seatbelt seat. Then go to Beauty & the Beast at the Theater of the Stars.
Voyage of the little Mermaid followed by the Great Movie Ride.
See the Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular (pull the rope in the well outside) at 11:45AM then go to Star Tours and Muppetvision 4D.
Go to the Backlot Theater for the Hunchback of Notre Dame show (look for the Singing in the Rain umbrella on a streetlight outside the theater) at 1:45PM.
Then on to Honey I Shrunk the Kids Playground. Climb the stairs between the garden hose and the slide coming out of the roll of film. Have Meg put her hands in the dog's nose.
Explore the New York Street Backlot.
3:00PM Mulan Parade. Find a spot along the parade route near Star Tours.
4:30PM Dinner PS at 50's Prime Time Café. Have a shake and try the s'mores for dessert. Use the MKC card.
See the Doug Live and ABC Sound Studio shows if there is time before the parade.
Optional plans

Epcot, Universal Studios, Animal Kingdom, Blizzard Beach, Typhoon Lagoon.
FRI 3-12 10:00AM Discovery Island open until 5:00PM. Bring a picnic lunch. Park at the Contemporary and take the ferry.

Take the Monorail to the Polynesian for a look around then the Grand Floridian. Ask to sit up front in the monorail and see if they have a co-pilots license for Meg.
Rent a pontoon boat from the marina and explore.
8:50PM Dom and Sonya arrive from Nashville. Take Megan to the airport to greet them.
Optional plans

Blizzard Beach, Typhoon Lagoon, Universal Studios, Disney-MGM Studios, Magic Kingdom
SAT 3-13 7:00AM Animal Kingdom open until 6:00PM. Leave by 6:15AM. Use MKC card to buy Sonya & Dom's tickets.

Go through the Oasis, into Harambe and onto the Kilimanjaro Safari.
Walk through the Pangani Forest Trail.
Go to Camp Minnie-Mickey. See the first showing of Festival of the Lion King.
See Pocahontas at Grandmother Willows Grove.
Go to the character greeting area for hugs, pictures and autographs.
Return to the Tree of Life and see It's Tough To Be A Bug. Examine the carvings in the Tree of Life while waiting in line.
Go to Dinoland U.S.A. for Countdown to Extinction.
See the Journey into the Jungle Book show at the Theater in the Wild.
Lunch at Restaurantosaurus or go back to Safari Village for the Flame Tree Barbecue or Pizzafari. Sit along river by the Flame Tree. Use MKC card. Be sure to check out the inside of Pizzafari.
Let the kids play at the Boneyard.
Walk through the Maharaja Jungle Trek.
Go on the Kali River Run. Squirt water at people with the elephants.
Explore the Oasis on the way out.
3:00PM March of the Artimals parade.
Afternoon: Leave the Animal Kingdom and drive over to Downtown Disney Marketplace.
Rent a pontoon boat at the marina for a cruise
Go up the river past the Treehouse Villas then check out Port Orleans and Dixie Landings. Cruise back by Old Key West.
Stop at the Boardwalk after that if everyone is up to it.
Rent a 6 passenger surrey bike.
Check out the Luna Park pool area and the Rose Courtyard at the Boardwalk Inn.
Play the midway games and win Meg a stuffed animal.
Pick up a pizza at Spoodles take out window.
Optional plans

Universal Studios, Epcot, Blizzard Beach, River Country
SUN 3-14 10:00AM Typhoon Lagoon open until 5:00PM. Leave by 9:15AM. Use MKC card to buy Sonya & Dom's tickets.

Stake out a spot with shade and chairs in Ketchakiddie Creek.
Rent life jackets for both kids.
Head up to the family raft ride.
Dom & Lance do Humunga Kowabunga.
Go on all the water slides.
Play in the wave pool and see shark reef later.
Float around Castaway Creek.
Have picnic lunch.
6:00PM Rainforest Café for dinner.
Look around Downtown Disney before dinner and afterwards. Use the MKC card for any purchases. Leave by 7:30PM. Take Jenny and Bryce back to the condo. Meg and Lance will drop off Sonya and Dom at the airport.
9:30PM Dom and Sonya's flight leaves.
Optional plans

Animal Kingdom, River Country, Universal Studios, Magic Kingdom, Epcot
MON 3-15 9:00AM Universal open until 7:00PM. Leave at 8:00AM. Use the $2.50 off coupon for ticket purchase.

First stop is the Funtastic World of Hanna-Barbera. Meg and Jenny go to the motion simulator seats. Bryce and Lance watch from the stationary seats.
If the wait is not too long see Terminator 2: 3D
Go on the E.T. Adventure
Back to the Future
Go back to A Day In the Park With Barney.
Let the kids run wild in Fievel's Playland.
See Jaws next.
Earthquake.
Kongfrontation.
Twister.
Nickolodeon Studios Walking Tour.
late lunch At Hard Rock Café. Use coupon for free appetizer.
Back to the condo for a swim.
Optional plans

Animal Kingdom, Epcot, Disney-MGM Studios, Typhoon Lagoon, River Country
TUE 3-16 See the Resorts day.

Drive to the Caribbean Beach Resort. Go to Old Port Royale. Check out the pool. Walk over to Parrot Cay and find the playground.
Go see Coronado Springs next. Walk to the Dig Site. Explore the pool and find the playground. If it's time for lunch stop at the Pepper Market.
Drive to the Yacht & Beach Clubs. Look at the lobbies and Stormalong bay. If it's time for lunch stop at Beaches and Cream at the Beach Club.
Walk over to the Boardwalk. Stop at Seashore Sweets. See the Boardwalk Inn if we didn't already see it Saturday. If it's time to eat stop at the ESPN Sportsclub.
Go to Dixie Landings and see Ol' Man Island.
Walk over to Port Orleans for a look at Doubloon Lagoon.
Go to the Wilderness Lodge if we are up to it. Get a list of hidden Mickeys to look for in the lobby.
Optional plans

Blizzard Beach, Typhoon Lagoon, Magic Kingdom, Disney-MGM Studios, Animal Kingdom
WED 3-17 9:00AM Magic Kingdom open until 9:00PM

Go first to Splash Mountain then Big Thunder.
Visit whatever was missed on the first day or whatever we want to repeat.
Go to Tom Sawyer's Island. Have lunch or snack at Aunt Polly's.
Afternoon Take the monorail (ask to sit in front) to Epcot. See whatever was missed on the first day or whatever we want to repeat. Return by monorail (ask to sit in front) to the Magic Kingdom. Leave Epcot by 6:30PM.
8:00PM Spectromagic. Watch the parade from the tables at the Sleepy Hollow restaurant.
Optional plans

Animal Kingdom, Blizzard Beach, Typhoon Lagoon
THU 3-18 10:30AM Leave for airport, return car.

12:15PM United departure. Layover in Denver. Arrive at SeaTac 4:24PM
So, if the pre-trip planning hasn't already bored you to tears it's on to the actual trip report that unfortunately will go into even more detail.

Day –1, Friday, 3-6-99. The day before we leave (but almost don't).

Busy day. I drop Meg off at school and I go to work to try to clean up as much of the ugly stuff as I can before we leave. Jenny had scheduled a follow up doctor appointment for Bryce who was recovering from one of his many ear infections. He seemed better but we didn't want to take any chances before leaving. The first surprise came when Bryce woke up with his eye nearly swollen shut. Not a good sign. Jenny took him in for his already scheduled appointment and the doctor was concerned about his eye. The doctor looked him over and said that it probably was not serious but Bryce would need two antibiotic shots to help clear it up "and if you go on the plane tomorrow"….. I think Jenny kind of blanked out after that phrase. She was naturally concerned about Bryce and the prospect of not going on the trip also brought her close to tears. The doctor must have realized how upset she was because she then softened up a bit and told Jenny everything would be fine with his eye but they needed to make sure it was better before we left. She assured Jenny that if the eye cleared up Bryce would be fine to fly. They scheduled another appointment for 9AM the next morning for another shot if the eye did not clear up. Thankfully his eye starting looking better that evening. We were pretty concerned and didn't sleep too well but we all finally drifted off.

Day 1, Saturday 3-6-99. Departure day.

Woohoo! Bryce wakes up and his eye looks fine. The doctor said we were fine to go. What a relief! The skies are blue today for the first time in a very long while (we are getting close to 100 straight days of measurable rainfall). We leave a little early at 8:30 and arrive at my mom's house near Sea-tac at 9:30AM. We visit for a little while and then it's time for mom to drop us off at the airport. We pull right up to the United skycap and check-in there which turns about to be a great decision. The lines inside are really long. Well worth the $3 tip for our 3 bags. We get to go straight to the gate. The skycap says our plane has been delayed from Hong Kong and United has moved us to another flight leaving within a few minutes of the original time. He says it will be a full flight but our seats are confirmed and to be thankful we aren't going to Chicago which is having lots of delays. He gives us the tickets and gate number and off we go. We arrive at the gate at the end of a long line of people and a very surly gate agent. He's yelling out that the flight is full and if you haven't already checked in at the gate then you are too late and not getting on the plane. I was starting to get concerned when I saw that the flight was to Chicago instead of our destination of Denver. The skycap had just put down the wrong gate number. Thankfully we left that madhouse and went to the correct gate.

It turns out our flight is also overbooked and they are offering free round trip tickets in the continental U.S. if you agreed to be bumped. Great deal but there is no way are we missing this flight with the kids in tow and 3,000 miles of travelling in front of us. Our kids are experienced travelers but they are still kids. Bryce would be on my lap for both flights and that's a lot of confinement for a toddler. But we have made similar length flights before to Hawaii and we were just hoping for the best. The idea of the bulkhead seats really appeal to me because I'm tall (6'2") and there would be no seats in front of us for the kids to kick or bump. Unfortunately, with the bulkhead seats there is no space in front of you to store your carry on baggage. We had two backpacks full of kid essentials so we needed to have them with us. So, the bulkhead was out. Our seats turned out to be in the very last row. At first I thought this was great. There would be fewer people for the kids to bother if they misbehaved. We sat down and scored again. Kids under 5 and their dad occupy the seats in front of us! I'm beginning to wish that we could fly all the way to Orlando like this. I've flown in the last row before and forgot that it does have a few drawbacks. You are the last to be served beverages and meals. You also get to spend a good deal of the flight with people's backsides crowding your space while they wait for the restroom.

Bryce fell asleep just before lunch. I held him while Jenny and Megan ate. Jenny had ordered special meals in advance. This is a great way to go and doesn't cost anything extra. She had ordered a kid meal for Megan. It was a McDonald's happy meal with a cheeseburger; cookies, applesauce and raisins along with a little toy United truck with Ronald McDonald driving it. Meg has had these before but she loved it just as much this time. It's quite a bit of food and a real treat for kids. Jenny had ordered a low fat meal for herself. She doesn't have any dietary restrictions but has found that the special meals are often times of higher quality than the regular meal. It was a BBQ chicken breast on rice with mushrooms and red peppers and was fairly tasty. I had the regular lunch of penne pasta which was your ordinary airline quality food.

The flight went well with Bryce taking a good nap. We landed in Denver and made the long trek over to the gate for our next flight to Orlando. I sure do like the moving sidewalks they have at the airport here. We basically walked up to the gate and boarded the plane. We did hear an announcement that this flight was also overbooked. They were offering a $200 travel credit on a future flight if you took the bump. The next flight to Orlando was 2 hours later so it seemed like a pretty good deal but once again nothing was going to stop us from continuing on. We left Denver about 20 minutes late. We sat right in the middle of the plane with three middle-aged men in front of us. None of them looked too pleased to have kids seated by them. Can't say as I blame them.

It was already starting to be a long day and another 3 hours on my lap is not what Bryce had in mind. Overall though both kids were about as good as could be expected. It wasn't a comfortable flight by any means but considering no one had a melt down I would consider it a successful one. We landed on time in Orlando.

I took Bryce to the car rental desk while the girls waited for the luggage. There was no line at Dollar but every rental agent was busy with customers. I had about a 5-minute wait. During that time I overheard a few of the rental agents really putting on the hard sell for upgrading the car, insurance, etc. It took just a couple of minutes to complete the paperwork after I politely but forcefully declined the insurance. I'm glad I'm knowledgeable about insurance and not timid because they really do try to push you into buying the extras.

Bryce and I went back upstairs and Jenny was just loading the last piece of luggage on to the luggage cart. We went back downstairs and across the street to where the Dollar cars were located. It was a pretty short walk. We got a forest green Dodge Caravan. We would later find out that Florida state law requires every 3rd vehicle on the road to be a forest green Dodge Caravan. They were everywhere. The van was OK but I really missed the power sliding door on our Chevy Venture.

We exited the airport via the toll road ($1.50 total in tolls) and then took the John Young Parkway. Our condo was about 30 minutes from the airport. We arrived at the Hampton Oak Plantation Resort at 10PM. Check in was quick and easy and the staff was very courteous. I was impressed that they had quite a few employees at a somewhat late hour and they were all very cheerful.

We immediately knew we were really going to like this place. It's located just a few blocks from HWY 192 but on a quiet side street in a pretty forest setting. The entrance is gated with your room key card activating the gates. It really felt secure without giving you the feeling that there were security concerns in the area. It was very well lit all night long and there were always employees around.

We drove to our building and found our room. We had requested and received a ground floor unit (all of the buildings are 2 stories). We didn't want to be lugging our backpacks, strollers and children up and down the stairs everyday. Also, I felt that we wouldn't worry so much about the noise the kids made if we were on the ground floor. We loved our room location. Most of the buildings are situated around a large pond that has two fountains in it. Our unit had a very nice view of one of the fountains from the bay windows of our breakfast nook. Across the pond were tennis courts and a full basketball court. Nearby at the end of pond was a very nice gazebo with tables and chairs with a vending machine for duck food. The pond has several resident ducks and geese as well as a few interloping egrets and cranes. Also, nearby were a small game room, a very nice playground and an area to wash and vacuum your car. The pond is set about 15 feet below the level of the grounds. The grassy banks of the pond slope rather sharply (I'm guessing to discourage anyone from getting the idea of wading). Surrounding the pond is a very nice walking path that is lit well all night long. Along the way there are those speakers disguised as rocks that pipe in soft music. There are lots of trees and quite an army of squirrels.

The pool area is at the other end of the pond less than 100 yards away. There are two nice sized swimming pools and an "interactive kiddie pool". The kiddie pool is great. It's about 1 foot deep and in the middle of it there are four large, brightly colored pipes. The pipes shower down water in different ways. One of them sprinkles down like rain, another like a waterfall, a third shoots out a stream of water and the last requires a pull of a rope to start a shower like flow. Megan says it looks like a Nickelodeon fountain and I agree.

As we unloaded the luggage in the room I looked at the activity schedule the front desk gave us at check in. Each day has about 5 activities. They are all pretty low-key but something fun for the kids to do if you happen to be around during the day. A few of them involved a small charge of $2-$6. Some of the activities were aqua aerobics, kids games and balloon toss, bead bracelet making, root beer floats, air hockey tournament, flower pot candles, ice cream social, tye-dye t-shirts, water volleyball, penny dives, balloon art and face painting. We had a very full itinerary so we didn't really get to any of these. Also, on Thursdays they have the "little gator club" from 5-9PM. It costs $15 for the first child and $10 for the second. They do group games, arts and crafts and have a pizza and ice cream feed. It looks like it would be a nice option for parents who want to have some time alone or a dinner without the kids.

Our condo unit was great. Upon entering you were in the living room, dining room, and kitchen areas. Each area was open to the others so it was basically one very large room. The living room had a large sofa that turned into a queen-sized sleeper. There was a coffee table in front of it and end tables with lamps on either side. There were two comfortable chairs. On the wall across the room was a large dresser that housed the 25" TV and VCR with four drawers for storage. The breakfast nook had an average sized dining table with four chairs. I noticed some of the other units had six chairs. Bay windows let in lots of light and provided a beautiful view of the fountain. The kitchen had a small pantry, double sink with garbage disposal, full sized refrigerator with ice maker (came in very handy), dishwasher, blender, toaster, range with self cleaning oven, full sized microwave over the oven, a complete setting for 8 of dishes, silverware, cups, coffee mugs, glasses, bowls etc. They also had a nice supply of knives, kitchen gadgets, pots, pans and the like. It was pretty much what most people have at home. The full sized washer and dryer were in a walk-in closet next to the kitchen.

On either side of this area were the bedrooms. Each was large and had a full bathroom, 19" television, phone, overhead lights, lamps, dressers and a closet. The master bedroom had a larger walk in closet and contained a king-sized bed. The other bedroom had two twin beds. There was the standard assortment of soaps, shampoo, lotions etc. in each bathroom and towels and washcloths for 4 people. There was daily maid service that came each day at approximately 3:30PM. It worked out well because we generally were not in the condo at that time. As part of the maid service they even did all of your dishes in the dishwasher and put them away again. Wow, I could live like this. The interior colors were kind of Key West themed with pale yellow and pale pink walls. Everything was very clean and fresh looking. There were no signs of wear and tear.

It was about 10:30PM and we were still settling in. Jenny was unpacking while the kids and I were checking out the place. I had planned to go to Wal-Mart the next morning for a few picnic supplies and sand toys for our day at River Country. We were still on Seattle time of 7:30PM though and everyone was wide-awake. I decided to do the shopping tonight and take Bryce with me. The Super Wal-Mart on HWY 192 was less than a mile away from our condo. What a huge store! That's not to say it was in any way attractive or a particularly pleasant place to shop but you had to give it credit for it's sheer immensity. I picked up bottled water, milk, beer, wine, soda, chips and beach toys. I took my time and wandered about the store to tire Bryce out. We made it back to the condo at 11:30PM. Jenny and I each took one child into separate bedrooms in the hopes of getting them to calm down and get some sleep. They both crashed about midnight. The girls were in the master bedroom and the boys in the other room.

Day 2, Sunday 3-7-99. River Country. Weather report – Cloudy with just a few sprinkles. Cool in the morning and evening. High temp in the upper 60's.

On our prior trip 4 years ago we started at River Country and we wanted to do the same again this time. We woke up around 6:30. Meg, Bryce and I went to the resorts "plantation pantry" for the complimentary continental breakfast. This was another very pleasant surprise. It was a great benefit of staying here. It was self-service with plenty of tables and chairs. There were lots of windows overlooking a pretty park like area. There was also a big screen TV usually tuned to morning news. The buffet consisted of about 6 different kinds of donuts, several kinds of mini muffins, bagels, bananas, apples, corn flakes, raisin bran, english muffins, waffles, coffee, milk, orange juice, apple juice, passion-guava juice, orange-peach juice. They also had free USA Today newspapers. There were packets of butter, syrup, cream cheese, cream for the coffee and toasters for heating everything up. I thought it was a very nice spread and the kids enjoyed it also. It was so convenient because you could take as much as you liked and take it back to your room. Most people arrived with one of the large pots from their unit and filled it up and went back to their room. We normally went back and toasted the english muffins, waffles and bagels in the room and sat at the table in our breakfast nook overlooking the fountain. It was also nice to have a couple of extra bagels and fruit to take with us to eat later in the day. This place was turning out to be a fantastic value.

We left for River Country a little before 9 to allow plenty of time before the 10AM opening. It was a neat feeling going up World Drive and seeing everything along the way. It took about ½ hour to reach the Fort Wilderness parking lot. We could tell right away that River Country wouldn't be too busy today. We waited about 5 minutes for the bus then loaded up the kids and all the gear (stroller, collapsible cooler, sand toys, backpack with baby supplies, sunscreen, towels, sunglasses, snacks, extra clothes etc.). We arrived at the River Country entrance at 9:40 and there were two other people waiting. We looked around the beach area for a few minutes and the ticket window opened at 9:50 so we bought our River Country/Discovery Island Combo tickets. The total using the MKC card for 2 adults and one child was $57.82.

It was still a bit chilly and it rained a couple of drops while we waited for entry. About 6 other brave souls were on hand for opening. We made our way over to Kiddie Cove and staked our claim on some chairs next to an umbrella. We borrowed life jackets for the kids. No ID was required to do so. At the other water parks you need to leave your drivers license or other ID as a deposit. We brought out the bucket of sand toys and let the kids get busy digging. After a half-hour or so we finally braved the water. It was chilly but tolerable, at least for us northwesterners. It seemed like summer to us. We got some strange looks from the cast members, most of who were wearing sweatshirts. Meg and I decided to go on the white water rapids tube ride. It took a lot of convincing her as we got to the top and she saw that the first thing you go through is a waterfall. The CM working the rapids was wearing hip waders, a sweatshirt and a coat. She still looked cold. We took the plunge and got drenched. Poor Meg was shivering on the way down. She enjoyed the ride but not the cold water. The water here was much colder than the shallow waters of Kiddie Cove. She was in no hurry to go on this one again.

The kids played in Kiddie Cove while Jenny and I chatted with the CM's. They didn't have too much to do since it was only our kids and two other families in the area. One CM had been on the new Fear Every Drop sequence of the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror. She said she really enjoyed it and the drops seemed unpredictable. Another CM said that Test Track was not worth much of a wait in line. His opinion was that it is no big deal to go 60 MPH in a car because he does that every day on the way to work. I had not yet been on Test Track so I just smiled and nodded but I kind of thought that was like saying the Tower of Terror was no big deal because you ride an elevator every day at your office building. All of the River Country CM's were very friendly and we really enjoyed talking to them.

Bay Cove was still cold so we went to the heated swimming pool. I went down the upstream plunge, which is a fun slide with a 7-foot drop into the pool. Meg said I made the biggest splash of anyone on the slide. I don't doubt it. It wasn't a pretty landing nor a painless one but fun nevertheless. We broke into the snacks and drinks we had brought with us in our collapsible cooler. The cooler came in very handy. It fits in the basket underneath the stroller and has plenty of room for drinks and sandwiches. Later we bought a hot dog kid's meal from Pop's place for $3.99. It included potato chips, a drink and a plastic pail and shovel. We also got an order of cheese fries that were not very good. The fries were OK but the cheese part was a little cup of that bland, gooey cheese from a big can. It didn't stop us from plowing through the fries mind you.

While waiting for our food Jenny said that the Pop's Place CM's had an order of fried chicken and they couldn't figure out whom it belonged too. She thought it was funny because there were only a few people in line. So, as they were yelling out "who ordered the chicken?" Jenny said "I think he did" and pointed to a rooster walking in front of the restaurant. She said everyone got a pretty good laugh out of it.

After that I decided to go on the larger of the two body flume rides. Yeeow, the water was still cold! It was a fun ride but nothing too memorable as far as water slides go. After this we washed the 40 pounds of sand off Bryce and changed his clothes so we could put him in his stroller for a nap. Jenny walked him around the Cypress Point nature trail until he fell asleep. She came back and convinced Meg to go on the tube ride again. Meg was thrilled that the CM held Jenny's tube under the waterfall and got her soaked. Bryce was fast asleep so I took a turn pushing the stroller along the Cypress Point boardwalk. This is one of those little, overlooked, out of the way things that makes Disneyworld so special. It was a beautiful walk. I think the cypress trees with the Spanish moss are just so romantic. Perhaps more so because they are so different from anything in the Northwest. The trail continues out and into Bay Lake and it offers some of the most spectacular scenery in WDW. The views of Discovery Island, the Contemporary and especially the Wilderness Lodge are stunning. There are some telescopes along the way that provide great close-ups of the flamingos, shipwreck and hammocks on Discovery Island. They also allow for a closer look at the imposing and stately Wilderness Lodge.

I went back to check on the girls and they were having a good time. It was still a little cool but Jenny decided she had to do at least one waterslide today so she went while I stayed with the kids. Bryce woke up soon after Jenny returned. I didn't want to change him back into his swimsuit and then clean him up again later so I took him on another stroll along Cypress Point. We both got to enjoy it since he was awake this time. He liked pointing out the lizards and ducks. It was fun to see all of the different watercraft on the lake and Bryce waved to every single one of them.

On the way back I picked up some of the Arctic Dots I had read about on RADP. They are tiny little ice cream BB's. My sister later told me they have them in the malls in Nashville. I really wish I could find them back home. They were a big hit with everybody. We got half chocolate and half chocolate mint, yum.

We decided to pack it up and call it a day about 2:30PM. On the way out we walked by the petting farm and saw Minnie Moo (the cow with Mickey markings on her side). As we were walking and looking at Minnie, Jenny stopped suddenly and got a strange look on her face. I asked her what was wrong and she motioned to what we were all snacking on. Beef jerky!!! None of us felt like anymore jerky after that. Sorry Minnie!

We waited a couple of minutes for the bus. We were the only people getting on. While folding up the stroller, grabbing the cooler, backpacks and kids we didn't notice the signs saying to not enter by the rear of the bus. The driver came back and pointed out the signs we missed and the reasons for them. He was very nice about it but he did go on for quite a while. We deserved every minute of it but we were tired and just wanted to get back to our van. We sat sheepishly in the back of the bus for the ride to the parking lot.

Here is my first rant of what will probably be several through the course of this report. I thought I had a good feel for all of the roads by studying the property maps before I left and taking along the official WDW guidebook which has a good property map. I quickly realized that Disney has very specific ways of how they want you to get from place to place. These routes were not always the quickest or the ones I wanted to take. What is really frustrating is that the road names or numbers are rarely shown on Disney property. The signs tell you how to get to an area but not which road you are on. The signs leading to HWY 192 were few and far between and in some cases the signs that were there were misleading.

It's probably no surprise by my gripe above that I got lost. We were all tired and wet and just wanted to get back to the condo to clean up. It took 25 minutes to get back so I suppose it could have been worse by I was angry with myself for not knowing the routes better. This didn't put any of us in very good moods and I was rethinking the wisdom of staying offsite. Still, 25 minutes back to the room is not too bad and I know that the busses can take that long to get to the Disney resorts so I got over it.

We got back to the condo and cleaned up. The kids were coloring at the dining table and watching a Barney video. I went into the bedroom to read some of the hundreds of Disney brochures I had picked up and watch the weather channel. We all had our space to relax and my faith in staying offsite was quickly restored.

Jenny left for the Wal-Mart to stock up on some groceries. She was back fairly quickly. It turned out she had waited through 3 or 4 traffic lights to turn into Wal-Mart and every spot in the parking lot was full. She wanted no part of that so she came back to the room to regroup and find another grocery store. She eventually found a nearby Cash N' Carry. She tried charging the groceries because the traveler's checks were in my name. The cashier told her she needed her PIN. Jenny told her that there was no PIN because she was using a credit card and not a debit card. The lady waiting in line behind her got all snotty (and probably spotted Jenny's Washington driver's license) and said, "well in this state you have to have a PIN to use your card!" Jenny politely thanked her for her input. After a few more unsuccessful attempts a manager that understood the difference between a credit and debit card finally came over and the groceries were quickly paid for.

It was around 5:30 and we were all hungry so we decided to head out to the nearby TGI Friday's we had spotted on our earlier trip to River Country. Somehow, we must have passed right by it because we kept going and going with no signs of it and we were nearly back to I-4. We kept looking along HWY 192 for restaurants that were not packed. The Macaroni Grill and Chilis both had lines out the door. I then got the brilliant idea to go to the Friday's at the Crossroads Mall. Jenny said it would probably be busy and was she ever right. It was packed, as was every other restaurant in the area.

Our foul moods from getting lost earlier returned. I started back toward the condo and got lost again. Neither Jenny nor I were very patient with each other at this point and it's times like these when I really wish I could be a better person when things don't go well. We finally got back on track and spotted a Taco Bell. Jenny suggested we just go through the drive-through and pick up something to take back to the condo. $10 and 10 minutes later we are all in much better moods and eating at our dining room table from our great big bag of Taco Bell. We kind of laughed at our misadventure and our cheap dinner. We all agree that any meal with all of us happy can't be too bad. We got to sleep around 10PM tonight.

Day 3, Monday 3-8-99. Epcot day. Weather report – Some cloudiness. No rain. Cool in the morning and evening. High temp in the low 70's.

I woke up around 6:30AM and went over to the breakfast buffet to load up. I brought back food for everyone. Jenny had bought some deli sliced turkey breast so we put a few slices on the bagels and cream cheese. We packed this into our cooler with a few sodas, juice boxes and bottles of water. In the backpack we had fruit snacks, goldfish crackers, beef jerky (hopefully there will be no bovine sightings today), pretzels, Pringles and granola bars. I know it's against the rules to bring this into the theme parks but kids our age need to eat frequently. It's not always possible to find something they like plus it's a hassle and expense to wait in line each time they want a snack. We are discreet with it and try to be courteous of others.

We left the condo at 8 and arrived at the ticket window at 8:25. We bought two 4-day park hopper tickets for Jenny & I. We planned a total of 5 days at the Disney parks and we each had one day left on passes from the last trip. Meg got a 5-day park hopper. The total came to $483.80 with the MKC discount.

We entered the park and asked a CM if Test Track would be open today. She said that it would be closed so we went right to Spaceship Earth. It was open early at 8:40. We all enjoyed the ride. I liked Jeremy Irons narration but I had a difficult time hearing him. Unlike most attractions that have ear-piercing volumes, the narration on this one was strangely quiet. It may have been because the speakers are set fairly low and my head was quite a bit higher than they were. This sure would be a much more relaxing ride if the darn seats weren't so uncomfortable.

After that we walked towards Honey I Shrunk the Audience. We caught a few minutes of the Jammitors on the way. They are very entertaining and basically the same idea as the Trash Can Trio that we have enjoyed at Disneyland.

We had just a short wait for the next showing of HISTA. The theater was mostly full. We have seen the show several times at Disneyland. I liked it a lot the very first time I saw it. The next few times, however, I thought it didn't hold up too well for repeated viewing because you know what to expect. I started to miss Captain EO which I had always liked. Somewhere around the 4th show though I finally caught on that the real fun of the attraction was watching the people around you react to it. I got lucky this time. Seated next to me were a nice couple in their 50's who had never seen the show. They knew that it involved 3-D but they didn't know what to expect. The wife's glasses broke and Bryce generally doesn't wear his anyhow so I traded his for hers. It turned out to be a good move. The couple both did a major flinch when the sign explodes and the wife ended up kind of hitting me as she tried to get out of the way of the debris. They both got the giggles after that. When the mice came out she let out a huge shriek and then neither of them could stop laughing. Each effect got her going again and both of them just had a blast. So, now I really love this attraction. It's so much fun to see other people having so much fun. There was an effect, the part with the lion where they get you with the air jets, that we have never noticed before at Disneyland. We all got a nice surprise and a laugh out of that part. Well, actually Bryce didn't. The lion is too much for him and he usually will turn around and nuzzle his head into my chest so he doesn't see it.

We walked to the Land pavilion next and saw the Circle of Life movie for the first time. There was no line and no wait until the next show. The theater was only about 1/3 full. I thought it was a good show with a good message. I suppose the message may have been a little heavy handed but I still liked it. Bryce chanted "Timon" about 30 times in a row when he saw Simba's meerkat buddy on the screen.

We then went downstairs and took the Living with the Land boat ride. We hadn't been on this since it was Listen to the Land. I really preferred the new version. My sister still has bad memories of being bored out of her skull at EPCOT when she was a kid. The part she hated the most was the Listen to the Land song, which is no longer there. So, being a typical older brother I really missed something that would cause my sibling grief (even though she's not yet here with us).

We headed to Food Rocks which was a first for us. I remember on our last visit that I was in such a commando mode that we skipped it because the next show didn't start for 7 minutes. We had about a 10-minute wait so we had a friendly CM take our picture by the fountain at the Sunshine Season Food Fair. We also played around with the boxes where you open the lid and guess the smell. We all liked Food Rocks. Jenny and I got a kick out of trying to guess which of the songs may have been done by the original artists.

We made a stop at Innoventions. This place has just never appealed to me. I know there are lots of fun things here but Epcot just has so much to see and do that I would feel I was wasting my time cooped up in a huge video arcade. I went in though to look for the IBM exhibit and to send some electronic postcards. I was so happy I had read about this on RADP. The postcard stations are tucked away inconspicuously near a large screen computer display where a CM puts on a presentation. I'm sure most people miss them. There was no one else here so we took the opportunity to send half a dozen cards to friends and family. We had to make sure to send one to my sister because today was her birthday and we wanted to say hi. After we got home everyone told us how much they enjoyed the postcards. What a fun thing to do. It's little things like this that really make the trip magical. I sent a copy of the postcard to my own e-mail and saved it as wallpaper on my computer at work. It's a fun reminder of the trip.

We stopped by Ice Station Cool next. We probably would have gone in here and looked around briefly before walking out if I had not read about the place beforehand. Fortunately, I had read plenty of discussions on RADP about the Italian soda Beverly. I had warned the others to avoid it so we drank the Lilt pineapple soda from the UK as well as the ginger ale. We would walk around with our cups and discuss amongst each other how delicious the Beverly was. We had plenty of eavesdroppers because sure enough others would fill up their cups with that vile brew and take a big ol' chug of it. We would be standing nearby trying to contain our laughter but the victims generally found us out. Some of them then would get their loved ones to try it. If the kids would have let us I think we could have spent the rest of the day playing our mischievous game. Coke should sell one of those "Bloopers" type of tapes with shots of people trying the Beverly.

We walked out and caught of part of the Cast in Bronze performance. The music was great. It was definitely something different. Looking back now I'm just amazed at quality and quantity of live entertainment at Epcot. There were so many things we enjoyed yet so many that we missed. It's definitely a park that you can visit repeatedly and never get tired of.

We went to the Electric Umbrella and found the talking trash can. Meg got a kick out of that. Outside was a cart selling passports for World Showcase. I had been excited to get one of these for Meg and we really had fun with it. It was $8.95. We also bought Bryce a Pooh bear hat that came with sunglasses. It was on clearance for $4.99 which was a great bargain.

It was getting close to the World Showcase 11AM opening but Jenny discovered that the camera battery was finally dead and the replacement battery she purchased yesterday did not fit our camera. So, off we went to the camera center near the front gate. I tried not to worry about the backtracking and lost time but I made some comments about getting the right battery next time. I regretted saying them. It was another moment I'm not particularly proud of. Thankfully she shrugged it off pretty well. We were still on vacation though so I got back in a good mood in a hurry, determined to make up for my grumpiness.

New battery in hand, we set off for Canada and arrived at 11:20. I was a little disappointed to see that the Kidcot stations did not open until 1PM. I was really looking forward to Meg participating in these at each country. I knew we would get to plenty of them eventually though. We leisurely strolled through Canada and saw all of the sights we had been too busy to visit during our previous commando trips. Meg loved going into the English style phone booths. Her favorite movie is the new version of "The Parent Trap" so she reenacted a scene from the movie involving the phone booth for us. She also picked up an Anne of Green Gables paper doll book for $12. Seemed overpriced to me but it was her money from Grandma to spend how she pleased. (Thanks Grandma!) Off Kilter was playing later in the day. I really wanted to see them but I knew that we would probably not make it back here. That's OK though, it's fun to have something on the must do list for the next trip.

The United Kingdom was our next stop. It was so fun to see so many things that we missed here on previous trips where the Rose & Crown was about as far as we got. In the park area with the small hedge maze, Tigger came quietly out of a door and snuck up on Megan with a big hug. Bryce got a high five and bouncing time with Tigger also before people realized he was even there. What a special moment! Bryce loves all things Pooh related so this was really fun for him. There really seemed to be a lot of "spontaneous" character greetings like this in Epcot. I wish the other parks could do more of this. The waiting in line to see a character takes away from the experience a little. Having said that though I certainly understand the need for crowd control. Nothing gets me angrier than to see Megan patiently wait for a character and then have a parent walk right in front of those who were there first and push their child right up to the character. This happened once at Disneyland and when the half dozen or so pushy people left, Tigger came over and was really playful with Megan. He wrote, "I didn't forget about you. Love Tigger" in her autograph book. She still talks about it.

I wanted to see the park area next to the Rose & Crown so we walked over there. What a nice view but the seagulls were swarming the area so we didn't stay long. Meg got her passport signed in a shop by CM Stuart from Scotland. We all loved to hear him speak. He was very charming.

It was off to France next. We stopped in the perfume store for Meg's passport stamp. There were no other guests in the store. The CM's were friendly and I think they were looking for someone to talk with. The girls tried a few perfume samples. Jenny pronounced one of them too "foofy". The CM's in the store did not have a strong grasp of English to begin and they were very puzzled by that word. She had an interesting time trying to explain what she meant. We all had a good laugh out of it.

We briefly toyed with the idea of seeing "Impressions de France" which Jenny and I loved the previous trip. The kids weren't in the mood though so we moved towards Morocco after a brief meeting with Perla, one of the mice from Cinderella.

I really like the feel of Morocco and it was fun to just stroll around. While waiting for Meg to get her passport stamped we listened to a CM explaining to a guest that there were currently 20 CM's from Morocco. Most of the countries had far more. The CM said she likes WDW but that she was homesick. She was very sweet with Meg and spent quite a lot of time writing a long message in her passport and showing her how to write her name in Arabic. Outside the pavilion we had a quick meeting with Aladdin.

We made it over to Japan and the Kidcot stations had opened up so Meg got her passport stamped and colored a bookmark there. We picked up a rainbow Kaki-gori and we all enjoyed it. I liked the melon flavor the best but I couldn't tell any difference between the Kaki-gori and the shave ice we have enjoyed many times in Hawaii. I did miss the option of a scoop of ice cream at the bottom of the cup that you can get with shave ice. We stopped to watch the Matsuriza drumming group that we had been hearing all around the World Showcase. They were very impressive.

We hurried over toe the American Gardens Theater because Jenny had noticed Disney's International Songbook Show was about to start. This was a good show for kids. There were lots of characters and singing (in the characters native languages). It was well done for young kids but I probably would have skipped it for older children or adults.

Jenny left the show a few minutes early and met us outside the theater with a smoked turkey leg. What a gal! Meg and I love these. I think Jenny likes them but the sight of us gnawing on them like cavepeople kind of grosses her out. She picked off a few dainty bites but Bryce, Megan and I tore into the turkey leg like a pack of weasels. Ahh! Carnivore heaven.

Bryce was clamoring for milk so I went with Meg to the Liberty Inn for that and a Rice Krispie Mickey treat for Meg. It was around 2:30 and I thought there wouldn't be any people there. Boy, was I wrong. The place was packed. I thought it was kind of strange that with all the fun places to eat at Epcot that there would be so many people eating basic hot dogs and hamburgers. But, then again, not everyone makes priority seating and without it you can often times be out of luck finding a place to eat.

Meg loved her krispie treat (with chocolate coating on the ears) as Bryce did his bottle. He fell asleep in my arms listening to the Voices of Liberty. It didn't take long into the American Adventure before Meg joined Bryce in catching a few winks. Jenny also nodded off for a brief moment. I really enjoyed the show. The Golden Dreams segment with the photos of the Challenger Crew, Michael Landon, Ronald Reagan and Walt Disney got me choked up. Bryce woke up near the end of the show.

Meg got her passport stamped and made an American flag windsock. She spent about 20 minutes coloring and decorating it. It was quite a work of art by the time she finished. The CM at the Kidcot station was especially nice. While we were there Mickey, Minnie, Goofy and Pluto came out so we had a brief visit with a few of them.

We went to Italy and Meg got another passport stamp and made a Pinocchio "animation". Basically it was two drawings that she colored and then attached to a pipe cleaner. When you spun it between you hands it appeared that Pinocchio was dancing. Jenny found Rondo Masquerade and fell in love with them. The music is beautiful. I asked a CM if they had a CD available and she said that the group had many but Epcot was currently not selling them. She said the group was formerly Rondo Veneziano. They went on vacation for the month of February and when they returned they were known as Rondo Masquerade. She said that there was a problem with their record label, BMG, and until it got resolved they wouldn't have their CD's. She said that some record stores would still have them though. I made a mental note to check the record stores back home and Steve Soares wonderful web page about WDW entertainment.

In Germany, Jenny got a large cup of Beck's ($7.50). I was holding out for my favorite beer, Red Stripe from Jamaica, which I heard they had at the Outpost next door. No such luck though when I went over there. We all liked looking at the model railroad in Germany. Meg got her passport stamped and made a paper hat at the Kidcot station. The kids spent a few minutes playing with all the drums at the outpost.

China was next and I was a bit disappointed that our timing was not going to work out to see the Pu Yang acrobats. It will be something to add to the must do list for the next trip. The Kidcot station here was closed so we went into the Yong Feng Shangdian store looking for a passport stamp. We asked the first CM we saw and she told me where to get the passport stamped but I didn't understand her very well. I went the way she pointed though and asked another CM. Again, I couldn't really understand what he said but I followed the direction he was pointing to. Apparently I went too far because my third and fourth attempts led back in the other direction. Wow, this is a very big store especially when you see every corner of it! The CM's were all friendly but I just couldn't understand what they were saying. Eventually though we found the correct counter.

We made it over to Norway and lined up for Maelstorm. This was our only real wait of the entire day. It was close to half an hour by the time we got on the boat. Jenny really dislikes the "cattle lines" they have here and at some other attractions. They are the types of lines where you go back and forth between metal railings in the same area. It was warm in the building especially with Bryce on my shoulders but we eventually got there. We all enjoyed the trolls putting the curse on us. We exited the boat and I primed the family to go right through the theater to escape the movie. We've seen the movie before and I enjoy it but I didn't feel like corralling the kids into sitting still for it. They didn't seem to be in a travelogue frame of mind. Just as we got out of the boat the doors for the theater closed so we had to wait in the landing area for another 5 minutes before we could skip past the movie. On the way out I admired the "fantastic" ½ price sale on the sweaters. Originally $220 marked down to $110. They are high quality sweaters but I can't imagine spending that kind of money on one, even at half price.

Meg stopped at the Kidcot station and made a cutout Viking ship that she colored and pasted lots of things to. I wanted to hurry over to see the Pu-Yang acrobat's last show but our little artist was really getting into the Kidcot activity so after she was done we went to the Viking ship play area and let the kids burn off a little energy. I was ready for a beer so I decided to try the Ringnes that I had read was very good and indeed it was. Jenny's Norwegian dad will be proud when I tell him.

It was a few minutes before 6PM and we made our way into Mexico for the El Rio del Tiempo boat ride. This was a fun little diversion. We had 6:30 priority seating at the San Angel so I thought I would go put in our name early. The place was packed and I heard the wait was 1-½ hours for walkups. I checked in with the very friendly hostess, Ale, and asked if it would be possible to wait for a table by the windows. She laughed and said "which windows would that be sir?" I laughed at my brain freeze and told her I meant to say a table by the water. Still laughing she said the wait was running two hours for those tables but she would see what she could do. I told her we would just take whatever table was available. She said it would be a 15-minute wait and gave me a beeper. I met up with the family and we strolled around the Mexican marketplace. Jenny went outside to retrieve something from the stroller. Not 2 minutes later the beeper went off so I went with the kids into the restaurant. Jenny came back just as we were entering. We were led to a table right along the water! Woohoo! Thanks Ale, you really made this a special occasion for us.

We loved this meal. I would probably even wait an hour for a table by the water as we often have for the Blue Bayou at Disneyland. They brought out the high chair I had requested when making priority seating along with crayons and kids menus for the children. Jenny and I both ordered Corona's and just marveled at what an awesome atmosphere the restaurant has. The feel of it is very to the Blue Bayou, which is quite a compliment from me. I have loved that restaurant since I was a little boy and have lots of special memories there.

We were not overly hungry, as we had been snacking all day long so we each decided to get an appetizer. I picked the Queso Fundido ($9.25) and Jenny had the Nachos ($9.25). Meg had the kid's meal with two burritos ($3.99) that she shared with Bryce. We proceeded to tear through the basket of chips and salsa as if we had not eaten in days. So, much for not being too hungry. The chips and salsa were very good. The waiter came out and made the queso at our tableside. That was kind of fun. We both shared the appetizers. Jenny loved her nachos and I loved the queso but Jenny thought it was too greasy. While enjoying our meal we had our only glimpse of a Brazilian tour group. They were on El Rio del Tiempo chanting and singing. I got a laugh out of it but was glad this was our only encounter. What a great meal this was. I really scored points with the family for making all those priority seatings 120 and 60 days out. I figured we could always cancel them if we didn't feel like eating at a particular time but this one just worked out beautifully.

It was around 7:30 when we left the restaurant and we talked about what to do next. I suggested the Universe of Energy since we had never seen it before and I really like local guy Bill Nye. We were pretty tired after finishing dinner and a long day of touring. We all really liked Ellen's Energy Adventure but I had forgot it was a 45-minute show. We were pretty well wiped out after this and we had no desire to be near the Illuminations crowds. So we took the relatively short walk back to the van and made our way out.

Well, I did it again. On the way home I saw a sign for HWY 192 and I followed it. The road then split and the only signs were for I-4 either east or west. I knew our condo was to the east so for some stupid reason I went east which unfortunately goes north and away from 192. I knew better but I had been expecting another sign for 192 and there never was one. So, we started making our way up and past Seaworld. Arghh! There was no place to turn around. We eventually got headed east after going many miles out of our way to the north. This was starting to get frustrating and we were all tired and grumpy again. I was kicking myself for not bringing the more detailed maps from the condo. We finally got back to the condo. It had been 25 minutes since we got in the van at the Epcot parking lot so I suppose the drive time could have been worse. Back at the condo we watched some TV and I wrote in my notepad about the days events. It was lights out fairly early for the rest of the family but I ended up writing for about 2 hours.



Day 4, Tuesday 3-9-99. Magic Kingdom day. Weather report – Mostly sunny with no rain. Cool in the morning and evening. High temp in the mid 70's.

We left the condo at 7:45AM today to allow plenty of time for the Magic Kingdom's 9AM opening. It took 20 minutes for the drive to the Ticket and Transportation Center. We parked way down at the end of a row but it wasn't too bad of a walk to the tram. We loaded everything up and arrived at the ferry and monorail landing about 8:20. They didn't start running the transportation to the park until 8:30 so we waited for 10 minutes. Upon arrival at the Magic Kingdom we were able to enter Main Street but had to wait until 9 for the rope drop. We waited at the Plaza Restaurant entrance where we were going to cut through on our way to Tomorrowland. This was a much less congested spot to wait. There was quite a crowd at the bridge for the main Tomorrowland entrance.

We made the dash for Alien Encounter since we had never been on it before. I had been warning Megan for months that it was a very scary attraction in the dark. I had read the WDW for Kids by Kids book to her and she had checked out the attraction on the WDW Explorer CD-ROM. Every time I read another report on RADP about a scared child on the attraction I reminded her that it was really scary. She kept assuring me that it would not be too scary for her. Well, we got in line and she said she didn't want to go. That was a relief. She's been on every ride at Disneyland but I was worried about this one. So, Jenny went on first while I waited with the kids in an area that the CM directed us to for the baby trade (AKA the kid switch). While we were waiting a nice CM said we could go over and ride Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin and still make it back before Alien Encounter was over.

The kids and I loaded up onto the Buzz ride and off we went. We all really liked this one. Bryce sat in the middle and had control of the spin lever. He made good use of it. We felt like we were on the teacups for part of the ride! I was busy trying to hold onto Bryce and our backpack while I was figuring out how to fire the lasers. Meg had the other laser and was busily firing away. It is much more difficult to aim the laser and score on a target than it first appears. When you shoot you just see a dot where the laser strikes. Often there are several people shooting at the same target so it is difficult to tell which laser dot is yours. Also, you need to shoot a very small area where the Z is in the center of the target in order for it to score points. After a minute or two learning process though I quickly got the hang of it. I ended up with a final score of 773,300 that I was very proud of for my first ride. Megan had 0 though and she wasn't too happy about it. I told her that she helped to scare the bad guys away to my side where I shot them so we made a good team. That seemed to appease her. We went back to the waiting area after our ride.

About 5 minutes later Jenny came back out of Alien Encounter and I immediately went in. I knew most of what would happen so there were no great surprises here. Jenny knew little about it beforehand but even so we were both disappointed in this one. Jenny felt it was not really scary at all. She expected much more movement in the theater. I guess the shoulder harness led her to believe there would be a need for it and the actual theater would be moving. I can't really put my finger on it but I just didn't think the execution of this attraction was done well. The tone was certainly dark for the Magic Kingdom and there were many people screaming. It just didn't do much for me. I'm glad we did it but I have no real desire to see it again. While I went on this Jenny took the kids on Buzz again.

We made our way over to Space Mountain. I love this ride. I remember seeing it being built and waiting so eagerly for it to open at Disneyland when I was a kid. I very clearly remember how special that first ride was with my dad. I hope Megan and eventually Bryce have similar memories. We had about a 20-minute wait. Megan and Jenny went on first while Bryce and I waited at the exit for them. Jenny rode in the front seat and came off the ride with a grin that went from ear to ear. This ride just seems so much more exciting when you are in the front. Megan was raring to go on it again so off we went back up the exit ramp since we were doing the baby trade. Meg was excitedly telling me about all of the differences between this and the Disneyland version. The track layout is significantly different. Jenny and I have the Disneyland version ingrained into our memory so it's as familiar as the route to work. It's mostly a series of very tight right turns with a small dip in the middle. The WDW version was that much more thrilling for us because it was so unpredictable. I still prefer the Disneyland version with the awesome soundtrack by Dick Dale, king of surf guitar music.

As an aside we disliked the baby trade setup here. We all had to wait in line together which is a hassle. Bryce was on my shoulders and pretty squirmy. The baby trade is still a great benefit for parents so I won't complain too much about it but I really prefer the way it is handled at Disneyland. At all of the "mountains" as well as Indiana Jones at Disneyland they give a pass to the parent who waits with the child. The pass allows that parent (plus one other guest) to go directly into the exit of the ride and get on with no wait. We prefer it because the parent waiting with the child is able to go shopping, buy a snack, visit the restroom etc. while waiting for the other parent to return.

After our Space Mountain ride we found the "hidden" path from Tomorrowland to Toontown. It is to the left as you face the Tomorrowland Arcade. It's a fantastic place to escape the crowds. There are lots of shade trees and benches with perfect views of the WDW Railroad trains passing by. I could be perfectly content to sit there for hours with a box of popcorn and just soak up the atmosphere. Jenny took some video showing the four of us alone on the path.

We arrived at Toontown right by Goofy's Barnstormer so Megan and Jenny went for a ride. When the came back they said there was no wait so Megan went back on with me this time. It's a fun ride but at only 30 seconds long it's not worth much of a wait. The ride itself is very similar to Gadget's Go Coaster at Disneyland.

We took a quick look at Donald's boat. For some unknown reason that I'm grateful for Megan does not like to get wet unless she's in her swimsuit. So, she stayed away from all the fountains and areas where you get sprayed. Bryce, on the other hand, had to be restrained in the stroller to avoid getting soaked. He would have been drenched from head to toe in less than a minute if we would have let him loose.

We quickly moved out of that area and into the Hall of Fame. We were discussing which group of characters to see when Megan suggested Winnie the Pooh because he is Bryce's favorite. She can really be a sweetheart sometimes. We had a 15-minute wait. I really like the character greetings here. We were let into the greeting area with 5 other families. We all rotated between meeting with Pooh, Tigger and a strangely colored Piglet. The limited number of people really allows quality interaction with the characters as well as photos and autographs.

We made our way over to Fantasyland and noticed that things were starting to get crowded. Fantasyland just didn't feel the same to me. I'm not sure exactly why but it didn't seem to hold the same charm for me as the original at Disneyland.

The Legend of the Lion King show was our first stop. We had a 10-minute wait before we entered. Everyone really liked it. The puppetry was very impressive and so different from most of the Disney stage shows we had seen. Bryce especially liked it although he did hold onto me tightly a few times during the dark parts with Scar.

All of the attractions in Fantasyland were getting busy so we made our way to Snow White's Scary Adventures. This one rarely has a line at Disneyland. I'm not sure if the same holds true at WDW or if we were lucky but we had under a 2-minute wait. This version is vastly superior to Disneyland's. The story line is much more cohesive and it's just happier and more fun.

Megan had her mind set on finding a Mickey ice cream bar so we found a vendor near the Character Festival (by the old loading area for the submarines). We also bought a Hercules bar. It turned out to be one of my favorite treats. It was a chocolate ice cream bar covered in caramel and then a chocolate coating. We polished these off quickly and made our way over to Liberty Square.

We sat at the picnic tables outside of Sleepy Hollow and had bagels, chips and soda. While we were there a man came over and asked Jenny if she happened to have sunscreen. Jenny set him up then a few minutes later someone came over and asked her if she knew where the restroom was. Soon thereafter another person asked for the same. She steered both of them in the right direction. Earlier in the day while waiting for the ferry someone asked her for a tissue. I guess she just has that aura about her as a very organized person. I've always thought so anyway. It sure is nice for me to know that wherever we go Jenny has planned in advance and will have everything we need with us.

After playing Good Samaritan we went to the Haunted Mansion. I really enjoy how different the exterior is from the Disneyland version and I think I prefer it overall. It was fun to see the ceiling rise in the stretch room here as opposed to the floor lowering. There were a lot of little details that we liked finding including the new face on the bride.

On the way to Adventureland we stopped and looked briefly at the little park area behind Ye Olde Christmas Shoppe. There were only a couple of people there. It looked like a great place to escape what was starting to be the busy time of day. In Adventureland, Jenny and Megan went through the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse. After they returned we looked at the spitting (although they weren't spitting at the time) tiki statues next to Bwana Bob's. We then took a ride with the Pirates of the Caribbean. The queue here is more interesting than at Disneyland but the ride itself will never compare in my mind. It's just not the same without the Blue Bayou along the water. It was still lots of fun. I noticed that the political correctness updates were a bit different between the two versions. I was surprised to see that the portly pirate next to the barrel asking "Have you set your eyes on a bewitchin' maiden?" hadn't been changed as it was at Disneyland. I'm can't remember how the rest of his spiel goes but it seems like some people could be offended by it. Bryce loves the song and tried to his best to sing along as only an enthusiastic toddler with a limited vocabulary can.

We tried to see the new Tiki Room show but the holding area was already closed off for the next show following the one that was in progress. Since when does it routinely fill up? I guess Iago and Zazu injected some life into it. I hope that's the case because the last few times I visited it about half the audience walked out of it during the show which was really disappointing.

We went over to Frontierland and the line for Splash Mountain was an hour long so we decided to wait for another day. Big Thunder Mountain had a 25-minute wait so Jenny and Meg rode while Bryce and I watched the geysers at the exit and the boats on the river. They lucked out and rode in the very last car. We did the baby trade so Megan and I went through the exit and asked the CM for a seat in the back. We got it after waiting 2 trains. Just as Space Mountain is better in the front, Big Thunder Mountain seems to have a much better ride in the back. There is no real front car here since the "engine" is in front and blocks the view for the first couple of cars behind it. On longer coasters like this I've always thought that the back is best. I like this version better than the one at Disneyland. The one there takes you up a final lift where you are really expecting something big to happen and then nothing does. The final section after that is the slowest part of the ride and a real let down after what is otherwise a great ride. This one just seems better all the way around in terms of the ride and theme.

It was around 2:30PM so we quickly went back to the area with the picnic tables by Sleepy Hollow. I had read that this was often a good spot to watch the parade from. It worked out great. Most of the surrounding areas were completely filled along the curbs but we were able to get a spot right in front. I found a cast member handing out stickers and got a Snow White one for Megan. We patiently waited for the parade while trying not to have our space totally invaded by pushy people. I'm just amazed at how rude and/or ignorant some people are when it comes to the parades. Virtually every inch of curb space was filled up by people who had been waiting at least half an hour and invariably some yahoo would try to stand in front of them ahead of the taped off area. I'm glad the CM's were so patient yet diligent in their enforcement of staying behind the tape. I had to give a few pushy people my "I'm a pretty big guy and you don't want to mess with me" look but the CM's took care of most of the others. I got a laugh out of the harried father yelling at his kids to hurry up about 1 minute before the parade started. He then looked around at the crowds that were 3 people deep at that point and asked the CM "how do I get a spot in front?" I can't remember the exact tactful wording the CM used but it was something along the lines of "you can either stand in the back or get here early for the next parade like all these people did for this one". The parade was really cute. The interactive parts with the kids really made it special. The coach came out and Meg practiced a dance with all the other Snow White sticker kids. When Snow White arrived with the seven dwarfs (is this how Disney spells it as opposed to Dwarves?) all the kids went out and danced. Megan held hands with Dopey and Sleepy. It was so cute. We got lots of pictures and some good video. On her way back Grumpy followed right behind her with his hands on his hips. It was very cute.

We hung afterward for a few minutes waiting for the crowd to subside. We made our way through the shops on Main Street so we could avoid the sidewalk since the parade was still going on there. We arrived at Tony's at 3:45 but it had not yet opened for dinner and our 4PM-priority seating. I didn't realize that there are a couple of hours in the afternoon where they are not open. There were a few people finishing up lunch on the patio area though. We were seated right at 4 and I was going to ask for a patio table but they seated us right next to the Lady and the Tramp fountain. It was so pretty there that we decided to stay. The décor here was so much nicer than I had anticipated. I was expecting a casual family type Italian restaurant with the red and white checked tablecloths so this was a nice surprise. Jenny and I loved the bread and olive oil with basil. Our waiter, Jim, was just fantastic. He ran through the specials and discussed his favorites. He brought out crayons for the kids to color their menus while we decided what to eat. Megan settled on the Mickey shaped pepperoni pizza ($4.75), Jenny had the prawn fettuccini ($21.50) and I ordered the seafood special that I thought was mixed seafood pasta but when it arrived was a salmon filet ($20.25). That was fine though since it had been my second choice.

I was looking around for the wine list when it finally dawned on me that we were still in the Magic Kingdom and alcohol is not available. We had a very nice salad that came with the meal.

Bryce was starting to get cranky at this point. He had not had a nap and was not in the mood to sit in his high chair for a nice meal. Jim, the waiter, was great. He brought out more bread for the kids. Then he loaded up a salad plate full of olives and tomatoes and brought it over for Bryce. Unfortunately, that didn't keep him entertained for long so I put him in his stroller and we went and watched the Lady and the Tramp video playing in the waiting area. I gave him a bottle and his blanket hoping that he would nod off but no such luck. After a few minutes Jim came out to let me know our meals were ready. That was very nice of him. So, Bryce and I went back in the restaurant to give it another shot. Very few of the surrounding tables were occupied so I let Bryce stand by the fountain and that seemed to be what he wanted.

Megan thought her pizza was just OK but she really liked its Mickey shape. Jenny loved her fettuccini. I liked the salmon a lot although the strawberry glaze on it was something I had never had before. The salmon was from the Atlantic and had much less flavor than the salmon back home. The portions were very large. I guess they should be though considering the price. This was a very nice meal and just a great way to unwind a little (although Bryce didn't make that easy) when we were just starting to get tired and wanted to escape the crowds for a while.

We walked out of the restaurant just in time to see the flag retreat ceremony. I really enjoyed it. I'm fairly patriotic to begin with but even if you are not this is another one of those easily overlooked things that makes WDW so special. The color guard folded up the flag and presented it to an elderly gentleman. I was curious about who he was. I assumed he was a veteran but not a cast member. I later found out that you can go to City Hall to request to be in the ceremony. What a neat idea.

We went over to the Main Street Gallery and looked at all of the beautiful artwork that was way out of our price range. There was an artist drawing characters at the front of the store. Megan could have watched him for the rest of the day. He was very friendly and talked to her while he was drawing. Megan told him she wanted to be an artist when she grew up and his advice was to draw all the time. He said he would draw while he was on the phone, watching TV or whenever he had a free moment. The most important thing was to just keep at it.

We were kind of winding down our day so we took a ride on the railroad for a complete circle of the park. I prefer the train here because you are so far removed from the outside world. At Disneyland you get an occasional glimpse of the surrounding area and it's not pretty.

It was about 6PM and we didn't want to quite call it a day quite yet so we went to Tomorrowland with the intention of riding Buzz Lightyear again. The line was very long so we skipped it and went on the wait free (as always) Tomorrowland Transit Authority. This made me miss the Peoplemover at Disneyland. Rocket Rods, which replaced it, is disappointing in my opinion. The ride is just not that thrilling unless you sit in the very front seat. The story line is also very weak. It's certainly not worth the lines it generates. So, this relaxing ride with no lines and comfortable seats was a welcome reminder of the past.

We kicked around the idea of seeing the Carousel of Progress but thought that we would all probably fall asleep. This was our second long day of touring so we decided to call it a day before any of us started getting cranky. Good decision.

We took the ferry back to the Transportation and Ticket Center and then the tram back to our van. I decided that the best route for us was to take the Osceola Parkway back to the condo. It's a toll road but it's much faster and less crowded than HWY192. The road construction on 192 was really starting to get old. The $.50 toll on Osceola is well worth it. We followed the signs that initially listed Osceola but as we went along there was never another sign for it. We ended up back on HWY192 and plodded along to the condo. It was about a 25-minute drive from the TTC.

We were all tired so we made an early night of it. The kids fell asleep quickly despite the children in the unit above. We could never hear any voices or noise other than it sounded like they were running laps above us.

Jenny and I stayed up to watch the weather on TV. They were predicting some nasty weather on Sunday, thundershowers with strong winds. Ironically we had planned that day at Typhoon Lagoon. We reversed our itinerary for the weekend. We would do Animal Kingdom on Sunday and Blizzard Beach on Saturday (since Typhoon Lagoon would be closed Saturday). We both drifted off during the 10:00 news.

Day 5, Wednesday 3-10-99. Typhoon Lagoon day. Weather report – Sunny and warm with no rain. High temp in the mid 80's.

We woke up to sunny skies for what would turn out to be our favorite day. I went to the breakfast buffet and brought back food and drink for everyone. We were able to take our time this morning since Typhoon Lagoon didn't open until 10. We packed everything up for the day, changed into our swimsuits and sunscreened our pasty white (does not apply to Jenny) Washington bodies from head to toe. We left the condo at 9:15 and caught the Osceola Parkway. It only took us 15 minutes to get there so had a bit of a wait but we got to park right in front. We purchased 2-day water park passes that turned out to be a great deal at $82.58 for two adults and one child. We were unable to use the MKC discount since the tickets were already discounted but I wasn't complaining. I was anticipating this one-day only to cost us over $70 so it was a real bargain to get the second day for just a few more dollars. The only catch was the second water park day had to be used within 7 days, which we would be doing anyhow.

There was a CM out front with a bullhorn entertaining the people who were waiting. Some busses started rolling in from the resorts but there was still just a small crowd on hand at opening. We made our way to Ketchakiddie Creek to set up base camp. We found a group of chairs with an umbrella and a great view of most of the areas the kids would be playing in. I made my way back to borrow life jackets for the kids.

Both Megan and Bryce fell in love with Ketchakiddie Creek. It's kind of like a kid size version of the rest of the park. There are a couple of little water slides, a tube ride, a shallow "river" and a bunch of water cannons to spray parents and siblings with. We played with the kids in the water for about half an hour and then decided to take turns on the slides. Jenny went first while I stayed with the kids. She went on the smaller of the tube rides and had a great time. It was already nice and warm by this time. When she came back I went on the larger of the two tube rides. There was just a minimal wait. For a tube ride you really zip down fairly quickly in these.

I went to Humunga Kowabunga next. I remember on our trip in 1990 Typhoon Lagoon was fairly new and this slide was the scariest thing going. It's funny now to see all of the 7-year-old kids lining up for it with no fear at all. It's a great view from up at the top. The ride was over very quickly. There was no real wait so I went again. I must be getting old though because I was starting to feel a bit beat up by it after the second ride. I went on one of the storm slides after that and enjoyed the smoother landing. On the way back to Ketchakiddie Creek I saw that the surfing waves were going so I swam out to the rope and then rode in on a couple of waves.

When I went back we had lunch from the picnic supplies we had brought in the cooler. After lunch we all went on Castaway Creek and had a blast. This is one of the things I was most looking forward to. I just love floating around on the lazy river on those tubes. It's so relaxing and the landscaping is gorgeous. We had a nice half-hour ride.

Back at Ketchakiddie Creek Meg discovered one of the kid's slides and that kept her entertained for about 45 minutes. I was tired just watching her. She must have done that slide dozens of times and I thought she would be totally worn out but she just kept going. For some reason she had not wanted to do the kid's tube ride earlier. I think she may have thought she would have to go under a waterfall like at River Country. So I went up with her and once she rode it she never went on anything else. It was her new favorite ride and it was a joy to watch her on it. She made a few friends and they were just giggling and continuously going over and over on the ride.

It started to get fairly busy after noon, as it was quite warm. My only complaint with the park is that it is packed with chairs and it's difficult to claim and defend even a small amount of space before people start crowding you. It was getting near Bryce's naptime so we changed him into dry clothes. Jenny put him in the stroller to go for a walk and he promptly nodded off. We parked him in the shade and just kicked back and watched Megan having the time of her life.

When Bryce woke up I didn't want to change him back into swimwear so I went for a walk and pushed him in the stroller. We had a good time sitting in the viewing area for Humunga Kowabunga and watching everyone come of the slide and deal with the atomic wedgie it had produced. We also went into the shipwreck that provides an underwater viewing area for Shark Reef. Bryce liked looking at all the fish. We walked around just enjoying the theme of this park. I love the landscaping and music. I'd be here every weekend if I lived nearby.

We made our way back and decided we better pack up for the day. It was around 2:30 and we wanted to go back to the condo to clean up for dinner at Chef Mickey's. I'm proud to report that I found the Osceola Parkway and it only took 15 minutes to get back to the condo. I finally felt like I was getting to know my way around the property despite the lack of road signs.

We left the condo at 5 to drive to the Contemporary. We arrived at Chef Mickey's about 5:30 and were seated right away. There was quite a line in front of the restaurant for people without priority seating. I was very glad I had made PS so far in advance. I had read so much about this restaurant that I was hoping I wouldn't be disappointed once I got there. None of us were disappointed. We loved this place and I'm pretty sure it will be a must do for each future trip. The buffet was very good. The selection was large and the quality above average. The kid's buffet was such a neat idea. Jenny and I took turns getting food. I tried one of the chicken tenders that I had got for the kids and was hooked. I think I came close to eating my body weight in chicken tenders that night. I knew Jenny would enjoy the Parmesan mashed potatoes I had read so much about so I made sure she found those. We both tried the prime rib and couple of different types of fish but the mashed potatoes and chicken tenders were our favorites. Megan liked the ham, cheese and olives from the salad area. She also had a mini hot dog, pizza and macaroni and cheese.

The characters were so fun here. It was such a welcome change to have the characters come up to you rather than you having to line up for them. They spent lots of time hugging the kids and posing for pictures and video. It was never more than a couple of minutes until the next character came around. Meg and Bryce got a kick out of the occasional songs where the characters would lead the kids in twirling their napkins. The food, atmosphere, characters and noise level made this probably the most kid friendly restaurant we have ever been to. We all were stuffed but tried to make room for the great desserts. Megan made a cupcake that was 7 parts frosting to 1 part cupcake. Jenny and I made ice cream sundaes.

We rolled ourselves out the restaurant about 10 minutes after 7PM. The fireworks were scheduled for 7:30 so I wanted to hang around and wait. Jenny suggested we take the monorail for a full circle to kill time. I was worried that we wouldn't make it back in time but went for it anyway. We were making small talk with the CM at the monorail loading area and we asked about riding up front. He said no problem so we were excited. It turned out that he was our pilot so we really enjoyed the ride and chatting with him. I had planned on watching the fireworks from the balcony off of the California Grill at the top of the Contemporary. The CM pointed out the stairwells on the upper floors were also a great place to see the fireworks and they would be less crowded. We arrived back to the Contemporary and he gave Megan and Bryce monorail co-pilots licenses. They are about the size of a business card and make a neat memento.

We got in the elevator and noticed that a room key was required to access the top 2 floors of rooms. So, we went back to the original plan and made our way to the California Grill at the very top. We had never been up here. Jenny and I were surprised at how nice the restaurant was and we both felt underdressed. I'm glad I had read about the route to the balcony because I would have felt awkward spending much time here looking around for it. We walked right out to the balcony and marveled at the view. It was just after 7:30 but the fireworks were late. That was OK though because we spent the time watching the castle changing colors. It was just so beautiful. Bravo to whomever came up with the idea. The fireworks started at 7:45PM. I had read they pipe in music to the balcony but we didn't hear it if it was there. It didn't matter though because the fireworks were so spectacular. This was a perfect ending to one of the most perfect days of my life.

We found our way to the Osceola Parkway and made our way home in 20 minutes. We went to bed full and happy. I wish every day could be like this one.

Day 6, Thursday 3-11-99. Disney-MGM Studios day. Weather report – Mostly sunny and warm with no rain. Highs in the high 70's.

We woke up around 6:30 and got ready for the day. I brought back breakfast from the buffet. Originally we had intended to go to the studios with my sister and brother in law when they arrived on the weekend. Before we left home I found out that there would be a cheerleading competition at that time so we changed studio visit to today. We packed up for the day ahead and left the condo a few minutes after 8. When we arrived, Hollywood Boulevard was open but the rest of the park was still closed until the official 9AM opening. We rented a locker to store one of the backpacks with extra clothes in it. The weather was pleasant so we probably wouldn't need sweatshirts. We patiently waited but the rest of the park didn't open until 9:10. A fairly large crowd had gathered by this time. We made our way to the Tower of Terror but with unloading Bryce and figuring out the baby trade we were not among the first wave of people to enter. The line was already long. It started right at the front gate of the fenced grounds for the hotel. This is another attraction where I did not like the baby trade setup. We had to take Bryce in line with us. He wanted to run around and burn off some energy but the line did not allow for that. It was about a 35-minute wait until we got to the service elevator but it seemed longer. We did get to enjoy all the wonderful details along the way though. This is one of the best lines to wait in.

Bryce and I were escorted to the "chicken exit" and rode the regular elevator down to the waiting area. I had told Jenny to ask for the seat belt seat and she got it. She loved the ride. Megan came out of it with her eyes wide saying "that was so much fun but I never want to do it again!" She said she liked it but not the part where she floated up off her seat. She didn't want to ride again and I don't blame her. I don't think I would have come anywhere near the place when I was her age. She had been determined to ride though and was pretty proud of herself. I went and rode the chicken elevator back to the service elevator and asked for the seatbelt seat. Wow, was that a good move. Without the lapbar to hold onto, this seat really seems to make the ride more intense. I apologized after the ride to the people next to me that I hit while I was flailing my arms. I think they were too busy screaming to notice. In our last trip in 1995 Jenny and I were a little disappointed in the Tower. I think it had just a single drop then. The new "Fear Every Drop" sequence made it seem like an entirely different ride. It was so unpredictable and an incredible rush.

It was already after 10 by this time so we missed the Beauty and the Beast stage show. We walked over to the Voyage of the Little Mermaid Theater but the show wasn't starting for 15 minutes. So we went to the Animation Courtyard and saw Mickey Mouse dressed up as a movie director. There were very few people here and we got some quality time and pictures with him.

We went back and got in line for the Little Mermaid. Megan saw this show four years ago with grandma but doesn't remember it. It was a first for the rest of us. It was very cute. The effects were great. The theater itself combined with the bubbles, lasers, fog and mist really gave you a feeling of being underwater. I thought they really chopped up the story though. I realize they can't fit the entire movie into a 20-minute show but the story seemed to jump around too much.

We were going to go on the Great Movie Ride but the line was quite a ways out the door so I figured another show letting out must have temporarily swelled the line. We decided to try it later. We went back down Sunset Boulevard to see Beauty and the Beast. We enjoyed the a cappella group that entertained before the start of the show. The show was very good. We are all big fans of the movie and this one seemed to follow the storyline of the movie in a much more logical way than the Little Mermaid. This ended up being Jenny's favorite show. It was in my top three also.

After the show we made our way back to the Great Movie Ride and had a 5-minute wait. We rode on the bank robber side. Bryce didn't like the fire from that scene and he buried his head into me but was fine after that. Both kids loved the Munchkinland scene. The audio-animatronic wicked witch of the west is just amazing. I remember when Jenny and I first went on this in 1990 I thought the witch was an actress. I liked seeing the movie clips at the end. I can see why some people complain about this one needing an update though. The movie history represented seems to end in the mid 1980's. Still, it's a very good ride.

After that we took in the new Doug Live! show. We had a 10-minute wait and while standing in the waiting area with Bryce on my shoulders I felt him put his head on top of mine. Next thing I know he is sound asleep and snoring up there. He slept through the entire show. The show was just average in my opinion. The effects were OK, the actors pretty good and the story all right. Overall though I really missed the Superstar TV show that Doug replaced. I like the Doug television show quite a bit. I think it has a positive message and a lot of it reminds me of being Doug's age. It's probably too low key for a lot of kids but Megan and I like watching it together. We've since seen Doug's First Movie and now I feel that the whole Doug "franchise" has lost the low key appeal that drew me into it in the first place.

After the show Jenny went over to Min and Bil's Dockside Diner and picked up milk for Bryce and an ice cream sundae. We sat for a while and had the sundae and snacks from our cooler. The weather was just about perfect. There was no humidity and the weather was warm but not hot. We kicked back and people watched for a few minutes.

We made our way over to Star Tours but the line was very long so we skipped it. The Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular had just let out and the throngs that leave there really affect the lines at the other attractions. We were in front of most of them though so we got in line for Muppetvision 4D. We were there just in time for the pre-show. I pointed out "a net full of Jell-O" and the birdcage "perch" to Jenny. I especially liked the part of the pre-show where Sam Eagle is going to put on a "stirring 3-hour tribute to all nations but mostly America". For some reason I can't get that phrase out of my head. The show was great. Megan really enjoyed it. Bryce didn't keep his glasses on but he had fun pointing out the Muppets to me (although he called most of them Elmo). This is such a fun show. It's got a lot of humor aimed at adults but plenty of action and humor that the children appreciate also.

We went to the Backlot Theater and they had already started seating for the Hunchback of Notre Dame show. The theater was mostly full but I saw that there were a few rows on the right side of the stage down in front that were empty. We went down there and sat in the second row (the first row was for wheelchairs) and we had a terrific view. Matt the juggler had already started his pre-show entertainment and he was fantastic. I taught myself to juggle when I was kid and it took a very long time to get somewhat proficient. I can't imagine the countless hours Matt must have put into perfecting his routine. Hunchback was a beautiful show. It was my favorite of the entire trip. The performers were just fantastic and it was fun to see them up close. We all liked the fact that the performers actually sang rather than lip-synching like some of the other shows.

On the way out we stopped by the singing in the rain umbrella. Megan really got a kick out of it. Jenny pointed out a funny sight along the way. There was a billboard up at the top of a building and it had two large lights to illuminate it at night. The lights cast shadows from the sun that formed perfect mouse ears on the billboard image of Diane Sawyer.

We found our way to the Honey I Shrunk the Kids Playground. The kids probably could have spent the rest of the day here. They had a great time climbing on all of the larger than life items. It wasn't too crowded and the temperature was very pleasant so we just let them explore. I remember that it was so hot and crowded in here that we really disliked the place on our 1995 visit. There was a really great CM at the entrance named Moses. He was playful with everyone who came in and I liked his sense of humor.

We finally convinced the kids to move on so we went to check out the line for another ride on the Tower of Terror. It was a 60-minute wait at that point so we quickly turned around. On the way back up Sunset Boulevard we walked along with three Streetmosphere characters that just cracked me up. It was a middle-aged couple and the husband's mother. The husband had on a plaid sportscoat and pink polyester pants. He wore tacky 70's style sunglasses and had what little was left of his hair in one of those greased down combover styles to hide the bald spot. The white shoes and belt set off his outfit perfectly. His wife looked like the mother of Fran Drescher on "The Nanny". She wore loud stretch pants, high heels, leopard print blouse and very big hair. The mother was all dressed up with a fur coat and large pink umbrella. They bickered the whole time and were so funny. The husband was upset that they were going so slow and was hurrying the others on to "Go see the Mooloo parade". The wife corrected him and said, "It's the Mulan Parade" and berated him for his lack of class. The wife got into a big argument with her mother-in-law and all three of them were soon yelling at each other. I stopped to get a soda from a cart on the street. The CM was cracking up and saying how much she loved the performer who played the wife. The routine was very well done and I was surprised to see some of the improvisation they did with the guests. It was funny to see some guests who didn't realize the Streetmosphere people weren't fellow tourists.

The Mulan Parade was going on and it was quite crowded. We had seen the parade at Disneyland before so we had no desire to fight to find a place up front. Bryce and I watched the parade from in front of the Brown Derby restaurant while Jenny and Megan went shopping. Our view was not too bad. The parade was very similar to the Disneyland version that I prefer since it has evening performances. The dragon was there and Bryce enjoyed growling at him (from a safe distance).

After the parade we went over a few minutes early for our 4PM priority seating at the 50's Prime Time Café. I was really looking forward to this meal. I knew not to expect too much from the food but I couldn't wait to see the atmosphere and the cast members. Since we were a couple of minutes early we looked at the Tune-In Lounge next door. Jenny and I were cracking up at the décor. Some of it was exactly what each of us had in our households while growing up.

We checked in and asked for a table with a television. I wanted one of these rather than some of the tables that are in the open areas. It just sounded like more fun and I thought it would probably be easier with the kids. We led to our table after just a couple of minutes. Our server was Uncle Mike and he immediately reminded Jenny and I of the actor Jay Thomas who was Carla's husband, Eddie LaBeque, on "Cheers". He was very nice. He brought out crayons, kids menus and drinks for Bryce and Megan.

We noticed that one of the CM's seemed to be a roving character playing a Jerry Lewis type part. He was hilarious. He would go around to different tables and chat with some girls and then would go running back to the kitchen all excited and yelling "Mom, I think I got a date for the sock hop!" He was continuously circulating around the room just acting goofy and doing pratfalls. Uncle Mike was fairly reserved but he did get on us a time or two for elbows on the table. A dad at the next table kept getting in trouble for putting his elbows on the table so "Mom" came out and made him stand up and sing "I'm a little teapot" in front of everyone. Later one of the boys at the same table came back from the restroom and his "Uncle" asked him if he washed his hands. The boy nodded so his uncle asked him what color the soap was. You could see the boy trying to think of an answer but he started giggling. His uncle marched him back to the restroom to wash his hands. His family really got a good laugh out of it.

We liked the theme of the restaurant. There were so many little details that just captured the 50's era perfectly. Lot's of little knick-knacks and appliances filled our kitchenette seating area. For our meals Megan selected the kid's chicken tenders. Jenny and I both decided to just have appetizers. She had the nachos ($4.75) and I had Dad's catch ($12.50). My food was delivered in a miniature Red Flyer wagon. There were chicken strips, mushroom "fries" (breaded and deep fried sliced portobellos) and deep-fried battered little strips of onion (not one of my healthier meals this trip). There were three dipping sauces, a honey-mustard that was delicious with the chicken, a marinara for the mushroom fries and spicy mustard that was so salty it was almost inedible. The chicken tenders were the best part. Jenny's nachos were a nice presentation with different colored chips but she said they were a bit stale. The overall quality was OK but I'm glad we stuck with the appetizers rather than the entrees. The table next to us had shakes. I had heard that they were very good here and they sure looked like they were.

Megan's kid meal included ice cream for dessert. We got it to go and made our way over for the last showing of the Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular. For some reason we had never got to this show on previous trips so this was a fun. Megan liked it a lot because Indiana Jones is her favorite ride at Disneyland. It was very pleasant in the theater watching the show and seeing the sun start to go down.

We all agreed that we had enough touring for the day so we made our way back to the exit. We had missed a couple of the shows but we had seen them before. It was more important to me that we end the day with everyone happy than to try to cram too much into one day.

Day 7, Friday 3-12-99. Downtown Disney, Discovery Island and the Boardwalk day. Weather report – Partly cloudy and warm with no rain. Highs in the mid 70's.

We woke up at 7 and did the normal breakfast buffet back to the room routine. I had been noticing that our resort conducted a lot of tours in the morning. I assume they were the typical 3-hour long, view the resort, talk with a high-pressure salesperson and then get some free gift deal. I was glad we had just paid for our unit and didn't have to waste our time with that. We were staying just like regular unit owners with no sales pressure.

We left at 8:30 and drove over to check out Port Orleans. I really like this place and would definitely consider staying here when the kids are older. The atmosphere is a lot of fun. The kids discovered the playground so they took off running for it and had a great time. After a while we went to the pool area. Megan loved it and wanted to go swimming. She posed for pictures with the alligators playing musical instruments. We went down to the river and walked on the path for a little while. It sure is a fun setting. On the next trip I want to rent one of the surrey bikes and take this path from Port Orleans to Dixie Landings.

We then made our way over to Downtown Disney. We were amazed at how much this had changed since our last visit. Our first stop was the Lego store and I'm surprised that we were eventually able to pry the kids away from the place. We didn't actually go in the Lego store; we just played out front. I'm sure both children would have gladly stayed day and night here for the remainder of the vacation. The Lego statues were just incredible. The kids were running around to each of them and when they finally tired of that they got busy at all of the Lego play areas. Megan and I enjoyed building cars to go down the Lego racecourse. Bryce loved the playground equipment.

We finally bribed them with gifts from the World of Disney store to get them to leave. I had read about how large this place is but it still amazed me. It's huge. We just kept walking from room to room discovering new areas. The store seemed to go on forever. I was a little disappointed with the selection of books, CD's, videos and CD-ROM's though. It was fun to look around but it didn't take long before we were in sensory overload. The place is just too much to take in. We were here soon after opening and already it felt busy. I would hate to be here when it really is busy. Meg picked out a sticker book and a basket full of stuffed animal Dalmatian puppies. Bryce got Winnie the Pooh silverware and a cup with a lid that you can sip through (we've got to start work on getting him off the bottle).

We escaped the store and went down to take a look at the rental watercraft at Captain Jack's Marina. Last trip here we rented a pontoon boat and cruised down the waterways by the Treehouse Villas, Dixie Landings, Port Orleans and Old Key West resorts. It was one of my favorite things on that trip and I was really looking forward to repeating it. I checked on operating hours, prices and boat availability for later in the week.

We went back to the condo to finally get some pool time in. We spent a couple of hours by the kid's pool. I wrote in my notebook the whole time. I was falling miserably behind in my trip report. I realized that instead of trying to write the report I should have been concentrating on just making notes of the highlights and memorable things from each day.

Around 1:30 we left Jenny at the pool and the rest of us got cleaned up and headed out to Discovery Island. Bryce had a nap while getting there. We parked at the Contemporary and took the boat launch over to the island. We arrived there at 2:30. We loved the place. The views from the island were gorgeous, as was the landscaping. We strolled around looking at the wildlife and noticed that the reptile show was starting at 3:00 so we made our way to the little theater. The show was great fun for the kids. There were only about 20 people in the audience so everyone had a good view. A CM brought out a turtle, alligator and water monitor and discussed each of them. He asked everyone to name another type of reptile. We all sat there thinking for a couple of seconds when Bryce shouted out "snake!" This got a good laugh out of everyone and the CM declared Bryce a boy genius. The funny part was that I believe Bryce was saying snake because the water monitor kept sticking out it's tongue as snakes do. The snake, by the way, was a fairly large python so avoid this show if you don't like snakes.

After the reptile show we went to the feathered friends bird show at 3:30. Again, there were only about 20 people at the show. It was interesting to see some of the exotic birds. Several of them were fed chunks of meat or mice so this may be a show to avoid if you are squeamish. Megan particularly enjoyed on long legged bird that eats lizards. The CM gave the bird a plastic lizard to show how he would throw it against a rock to kill it. Meg thought that was pretty cool but she laughed when the bird did not want to give the lizard back to the CM. It took over 5 minutes for the CM to get it back. I think it reminded Meg of sharing toys with a certain little brother.

After that we did a quick walk around the entire island. The views were spectacular and the hammocks on the beaches looked inviting but we kept pressing on. The kids enjoyed the giant tortoises and the alligator pond. At one point when we were walking near the beach there were over one hundred vulture-like birds. We were the only people on this stretch of beach and Megan was kind of freaked out. I don't blame her. They were pretty creepy looking and they all seemed to be looking at us as we walked through. We high tailed it out of there quickly and made our way back to the boat launch.

It was about 4:30 when we caught the boat. The island closed at 5:00 so we were there fairly late but I was amazed at how few other people were there. I would guess there were no more than 50 guests on the island during our visit. I forgot to mention that I considered it to be a minor miracle that none of us received a direct hit from above. There were birds everywhere! Some parts of the island almost appeared to be whitewashed and I really wished I had brought umbrellas for us. Luckily, we escaped unscathed. I was really saddened to hear about Discovery Island closing several weeks after our visit. It was such a relaxed and uncrowded little sanctuary to escape to. We will really miss it.

We went back to the condo, picked Jenny up and went to the Boardwalk. I had really been looking forward to this and we were not disappointed. The lobby area of the Boardwalk Inn was beautiful. We made our way out to the actual boardwalk and I was amazed at what a fun and vibrant spot it is. There is a fantastic mix of shops, restaurants, nightclubs and entertainment. The surrey bikes looked like a fun way to travel. We will have to rent one on the next trip. We stopped by the ESPN club to see about dinner but the wait was 2 hours so we passed. I knew this was a sportsbar but I really expected it to have more table seating. There were very few tables and most of the seating was at the bar.

Meg stopped and got her face painted. They had some beautiful and fairly intricate designs available. At $6 these were a good value. The CM was really amazing. She was very quick and did great work. Megan couldn't wait to show her face to Aunt Sonya who we would be picking up soon. We soaked up the atmosphere for a little while and then walked over to the bridge between the Swan and Dolphin hotels. This was a very pretty area. We had never been to these hotels before and I guess I always dismissed them somewhat as being non-Disney and a bit gaudy. At night at least they were very pretty. We walked back to the parking lot and tried to find the van. We kept finding green minivans but not ours. Jenny thought she saw it so she went one way with Megan and I thought I saw it elsewhere so I went another way with Bryce. I found it first so I loaded up Bryce and drove around looking for the girls. Unfortunately, they were in the valet parking lot where I couldn't enter but we eventually found each other.

We drove back to the condo and went through the Taco Bell drive through for dinner. We ate in the room and a few minutes later Megan and I left for the airport to pickup my sister Sonya and brother-in-law Dom. I didn't realize how big the Orlando airport was. They were arriving at gate 99 that was quite a trek from where we parked. I was worried we would be a few minutes late but we walked up to the gate just as they were getting off the plane. Perfect timing. Megan ran up and hugged Sonya and the two were pretty much inseparable for the rest of the weekend. They didn't check any bags so we made a quick exit back to the condo. We all chatted for a while but made an early night of it to be rested up for the next day.

Day 8, Saturday, 3-13-99. Blizzard Beach day. Weather report – Mostly sunny and warm with no rain. Highs in the mid 70's.

We woke up around 7 and got ready for the day. We all fueled ourselves up at the Plantation Pantry breakfast buffet then got into our swimwear. We arrived at Blizzard Beach about 9:40 so we had a few minutes to kill before opening. I went to buy tickets while the rest of the group took a look at the Winter/Summerland mini-golf course. We made our way directly to the Tike's Peak children's area as soon as the park opened. We were able to score one of the covered shelters with a picnic area so we piled our stuff upon it, nabbed a couple of lounge chairs then followed the kids into the water.

There are so many fun little fountains, slides and tube rides here for the kids. Bryce especially loved the little alligators that shoot water from their mouths. He stood in front of those just getting soaked. We later discovered that he lost a tube from one of his ears. I guess this is probably where it happened.

After a half-hour or so I stayed with Bryce while the rest of the group went on the family raft ride, Teamboat Springs and the tube slides, Runoff Rapids. When they came back Jenny and I traded places and I went with the rest of the group back to Teamboat Springs. We took the chairlift up to the top of the mountain. It's such an odd feeling to do this in your bathing suit instead of being bundled up with real snow all around. We all enjoyed Teamboat Springs. It's nice and long, fairly quick and the best part is that the rafts are hauled up via conveyor belt so you don't have to lug them to the top as you do at Typhoon Lagoon. There is a nice view from the top. We saw Coronado Springs and the Animal Kingdom. It's amazing how the Animal Kingdom just blends in with the surrounding territory. The only distinguishing features were the Tree of Life and a large building that I assume was Countdown to Extinction.

After our ride Sonya took Megan to the pre-teen are, Ski Patrol Training Camp, while Dom and I went to Runoff Rapids for a turn on the enclosed tube. After that I convinced him to go on Summit Plummet. We climbed to the top and waited about 10 minutes before our turn. The wait in line really enhances the scare factor of this slide. The top of the mountain is tall enough but climbing that the three story platform to the slide is pretty intimidating.

I had been on Summit Plummet 4 years ago and still remember it as being one of the few rides that has scared me (and I'll go on any roller coaster no matter how wild). I was also determined to heed the warning of keeping your ankles crossed. Last time I got to the bottom and thought I had slowed down most of the way so I uncrossed my ankles. Big mistake, I had to sit down and think happy thoughts for about 15 minutes. It was a pain I didn't soon forget. I thought Megan would have to be an only child but thankfully there was no permanent damage. Dom took the first ride down. I went next and made the mistake of looking down the slide, which appeared to be close to a 90-degree angle. I made it down though and it wasn't nearly so bad as I had remembered although both us commented on how it felt like we had received a couple of good punches to the back and sides.

We went back to Tike's Peak so I could stay with Bryce while Jenny went back to the slides. Jenny told us a story when we got there. There was a family that sat nearby us. The father took the son on some slides while the mother went with the daughter into the water near where we were. They had a baby sleeping in a stroller and they just left him with their stuff! He woke up after a few minutes and saw that his family was nowhere near so he started crying. Jenny went over and tried to comfort him and tell him that his mom would be back soon but Jenny couldn't spot her anywhere. Finally after 10 minutes the mother comes back and says to the group of people now gathered around "How long has he been crying like this and how did he cut his lip?" Jenny thought it ironic that the lady suddenly gained an interest in the well being of her son after leaving him unattended for quite a while.

So, after we heard the story and gave the mother dirty looks I stayed with the kids while Jenny went with Sonya and Dom on the Toboggan Racers mat slides. When they came back, Jenny and I traded places and I raced against Sonya and Dom a few times. Dom won each time. We all liked the fact that the mats are now carried up the mountain on a conveyor so you don't have to lug them with you. After that we came back to the picnic lunch Jenny had prepared. It was nice to have the food and drink ready right at our picnic table and not to have to wait in line or walk a long ways for it. Thanks Jenny!

After lunch Jenny stayed with Bryce while the rest of us went on the lazy river tube ride, Cross Country Creek. It's cleverly themed and I could float around for hours but I prefer Typhoon's tropical version to this one. We had a great time relaxing and just letting the current take us around the park. I think I was starting to win over a couple of new Disney fans in Dom and Sonya. At least I hoped so. We would love to have them stay longer with us next time.

After we had our fill of the park we left about 3PM and headed back to the condo to clean up. We all just rested for a while then Jenny drove to the grocery store and also stopped and picked up a couple of pizzas from Pizza Hut. We fed the kids a few slices and saved the rest for our later return. In the evening we drove to the Grand Floridian to show Dom and Sonya where we will be staying once we hit the lottery. I suppose I would actually have to play the lottery though to win, so we just dreamed about being rich.

The Grand is even more beautiful at night. We were just in awe walking through the opulent lobby. We walked down past the pool to the beach. Jenny loved Narcoosee's restaurant that sits over the water. When the kids are older I'd love to drop them off at one of the Disney kid's clubs and take Jenny there for dinner. We went back to the lobby and rode the elevator to the second floor where we caught the monorail for a tour around the Seven Seas Lagoon. It was very pretty at night. On our way back to the condo we drove by the Wilderness Lodge to give Dom and Sonya a quick peek at it.

We were all pretty tired so we went back to the condo and polished off the pizza. We went to bed fairly early to get ready for our big day at the Animal Kingdom. Sonya and I had both been fighting colds. Mine was pretty mild and more of a nuisance. Sonya bravely kept up with us all day but was fairly tired. Unfortunately, she was up most of the night with her cold.

Day 9, Sunday, 3-14-99. Animal Kingdom and Downtown Disney day. Weather report – Cloudy and cold in the morning. Miserable the rest of the day with lot's of thundershowers and rain. Highs in the mid 60's.

We woke up bright and early at 6AM. I checked on Sonya and Dom. They had very little sleep and Sonya was pretty miserable with the cold. They told us to go ahead without them and they would rest up. Megan was pretty upset. We told her Aunt Sonya was sick and needed to rest but we would have a good time at Animal Kingdom and then come back and have more fun with her.

We finally convinced Megan to go so we loaded up the van and made it to Animal Kingdom by 6:45. We waited for the official opening and then made our way through the Oasis. I had read so much about the Tree of Life and had seen so many pictures of it that I was hoping I wouldn't be disappointed in seeing it for the first time. I wasn't. It is breathtaking. When you come out of the Oasis you can't help but to look up at it and just stare in awe. Words and pictures can not do it justice.

We made a beeline for Countdown to Extinction. This turned out to be totally unnecessary. There was absolutely no line. Jenny and Megan went first. While they were riding which took 20 minutes I saw 5 other people enter the ride. It was cold and cloudy but at least it wasn't going to be busy today. Meg and Jenny came out all smiles. They both thought it was very scary but loved it. Megan said once was enough so I went alone while they waited outside with Bryce. I really enjoyed this one. I had read some comments about how the ride technology was similar to Indiana Jones at Disneyland but the actual ride paled in comparison. I love Indiana Jones so I wasn't expecting much out of this one but I was pleasantly surprised. It's no Indiana but it's a very good ride nevertheless. I suppose it may not hold up well to repeated rides but I liked it. It was fairly frightening especially since there were only 3 other people in my vehicle with no one ahead of or behind us for as many cars as we could see.

Megan was pretty tired today so we went back to the entrance and rented her a stroller. They are pretty neat here and not like the clunky old ones at the Magic Kingdom and Epcot. She was too big for it but she folded her legs up in it and appreciated the rest her feet got.

We went over to Kilimanjaro Safaris and again there was no line. We hopped right on the vehicle. I think we all would rate this as one of our very favorite attractions. We've been to the Wild Animal Park outside San Diego several times. They have a vehicle that takes you among the animals and it's good but nothing compared to this. Everything is so well done leading up to the ride that you really get a feeling that you are in Africa and will be going on a safari. The animals were out in full force. I can't begin to remember everything we saw but I do know that we saw elephants, which are Megan's favorites as well as lions, which Bryce liked. Several giraffes were very close to the vehicle as we went by. The hippos were in the water but there was a little baby hippo walking on the shore. It was one of the cutest things I've ever seen. We came upon some rhinos blocking the road and we had to wait a couple of minutes for them to move. As we started to go by them, one lowered his head and rammed our vehicle. That was quite a thrill. It shook the whole vehicle. Our guide was OK. The poacher storyline seemed unnecessary. The ride itself is so beautiful that there is really no need for it.

On the way out we walked through the Pangani Trail. We liked seeing all of the tropical fish and especially the gorillas. They were fairly docile so we made our way out somewhat quickly. Also, the hippos were at the far end of the pool away from the glass so we couldn't get a good look at them. The trail is a very pleasant walk but I'd hate to be pushing a stroller when it is crowded and hot. I bet it can get very uncomfortable on busy days.

We went over to Camp Minnie-Mickey and caught the very first Festival of the Lion King. I had read many comments that this was the best show at WDW. I was a little disappointed after all of the hype. It's very well done to be sure but I guess it just didn't touch us the way Hunchback of Notre Dame did for me or Beauty and the Beast did for Jenny. I think part of the problem was that a lot of it seemed to be recycled from the Lion King parade, which was our all time favorite parade at Disneyland. The performances were very good and I would certainly recommend it to most people but I don't think we will be in a hurry to see it again. Once was enough.

Afterwards we went to the Tree of Life to see It's Tough to be a Bug. The queue area was very long which was fine because it gave us time to inspect the tree. We stopped several times to let people by so we could look at the tree longer. I could happily spend most of the day just looking at it and all of the wonderful "carvings". The CM's said we could take the stroller with us through the line and that worked out nicely. We parked it at the stroller parking near the exit of the ride that is on the opposite side of the tree from the entrance. It would be a bit of walk to go back and get the stroller if you parked it at the entrance.

We loved It's Tough to be a Bug. The effects were great and it was just a lot of fun. Bryce was a little scared a few times and cuddled up with me but Meg loved it. The only effect that really got me was at the end when the cockroaches exit the theater under your seat. Jenny's seat didn't have the effect but Megan and I sure jumped. The bee sting was startling but fun.

There was a girl about 10 years old a few rows behind us. She just lost it after the first few effects and was sobbing uncontrollably. When the "bug spray" came out she started screaming "get me out of here!!!". We are very lucky that our children our fairly brave but we never push them into something that they will not enjoy and we do not make them stay if they aren't enjoying it. Bryce was scared at several points on some rides as I've mentioned but he never cried, seemed truly terrified or bothered others. He quickly got over it and watched the rest of the show. I can't understand why a parent wouldn't immediately take a child out of the theater when they are obviously terrified. It makes it difficult for others in the audience to enjoy the show and just seems to be cruel to the child. End of lecture.

The kids were getting hungry at this point so we went to Restaurantosaurus, which was just changing over to lunch at 11AM. We went in and ordered a chicken McNugget Happy meal ($3.49) for Bryce and a hot dogosaurus meal ($4.85) for Megan. After getting the food I decided I was hungry also so I got the dino-size cheeseburger meal ($5.85). I loaded it up with the sautéed mushrooms and onions that were at the topping bar but it was a disappointing burger. The beef had that off taste so common with Disney burgers on both coasts. I would have preferred a regular McDonald's hamburger to this. I definitely won't be back for a burger. The kids loved their meals though and we all liked the fries.

After our refueling we went into Dinoland, USA to explore the boneyard. Bryce fell asleep and strollers aren't allowed in the boneyard so I ended up lugging him around in there. There were lots of great places to play. The weather was still cool and there were only a few people inside so it was very pleasant. I kept thinking to myself again how miserable it must be here when it is hot and crowded. Megan especially liked the dig site. She spent lots of time digging out the fossils. The sand here is very coarse and easy to clean off which was nice. We all liked the "radio station" soundtrack that was playing. There were some clever jokes by the DJ's and I loved the mix of music (Walk the Dinosaur by Was not Was, The End of the World as We Know It by REM, Bad to the Bone by George Thoroughgood).

Afterwards we went to Asia and the Maharajah Jungle Trek. This was another beautiful walk that was so amazing because you really felt as if you were in Asia. The level of detail is stunning. We liked the tigers the best. They were just lounging around but they were right on the other side of the glass.

When we got out Jenny suggested that I go on the Kali River Rapids ride so I took her up on it. She gave me my Mickey rain poncho and off I went. I'm glad I had the poncho. You can and most likely will get really soaked by this one. I was in a boat full of German tourists and they seemed to have no idea that getting wet was a possibility. They looked at me strangely in my poncho. It didn't take long before they were squirming all over each other to avoid the water. They had a good time and laughed it up though. The ride didn't do much for me. It really felt more like a Universal Studios ride. The storyline didn't seem well executed and the ride itself was the standard raft ride at many amusement parks. Perhaps it would take another ride or two and I would enjoy the storyline more. I did like the ending though with the elephant statues. Guests on a bridge above can activate the elephants to spray water on the rafts. Some guy was having a great time hogging the button. He yelled down to each and every raft that he was the one who just sprayed them.

We then went to the Journey into the Jungle Book show. It started raining just about the time we were parking the stroller. I covered the stroller with one of the rain ponchos and that turned out to be a very good move. The other strollers were drenched when we got out. About the time that the show started the rain started coming down in buckets. We were glad to be undercover at the show. The show was fairly entertaining but less than halfway through they stopped and said the remainder of the show was cancelled due to a performer injury. I hope it wasn't anything serious. It was still raining very hard and they told us we were welcome to remain in the theater to wait out the rain.

After about 10 minutes it seemed to let up slightly so we made a dash for it. There was some thunder and lightning so we decided to leave Animal Kingdom for the day. We made it to the exit when a deluge started. I've seen my fair share of rain in Seattle but we rarely get rain that comes down like this. Jenny and Megan decided to ride the tram to the car and I decided to powerwalk with Bryce in the stroller. I beat them there by about a minute but was totally drenched. So much for my efforts of keeping dry on the Kali River Rapids! The wind was starting to whip up and was driving the rain so hard that it actually hurt when it hit you. I kept trying to cover up Bryce and he kept pushing back the canopy of his stroller so he could get rained on. Strange child, he must get it from Jenny's side of the family.

The timing actually worked out fairly well. We saw most of what we had planned and with the early start we were ready for a break back at the condo. There was still plenty more to see at the park and we will definitely be back. We missed Conservation Station, the Cretaceous Trail, the bird show and most of Camp Minnie-Mickey. I would also have loved to explore the Oasis and so many of the little nooks and crannies of the park.

We made it back to the condo and Dom and Sonya were rested up. Sonya was feeling a bit better but had gone through a couple of boxes of Kleenex. It was still pouring rain at the condo but the weather appeared to be heading east away from WDW. We had planned to rent a pontoon boat at Downtown Disney but I called and they were closed due to the weather. I was disappointed because this is something I really wanted to do with all of us together. So instead I talked Dom and Sonya into going to the Boardwalk with Megan and I. Jenny stayed back in the condo with Bryce. Unfortunately, the weather was still terrible when we got to the Boardwalk. We made a quick dash into the lobby and looked around. We then went over to check out the pool, Luna Park. I'd love to stay at this place someday. We made a dash outside to the Boardwalk and tried to stay under the awnings. There wasn't much to do though because all the Boardwalk activities were shut down and the place was nearly deserted. So, we didn't stay too long before deciding to just go back to the condo.

About the time we got back the storm had pretty much run it's course and the rain had stopped. So, we picked up Bryce and Jenny and set off for the Marketplace at Downtown Disney. Megan wanted to show off the Lego store to Dom and Sonya so we went there first. Meg had fun leading Sonya around. Bryce was attached to his buddy Uncle Dom. This was nice to have somebody else to help entertain the kids for a while.

We went over to the World of Disney store and it was very busy but I was starting to get the impression that it's probably always that way. Sonya had brought money that our mom had sent to use for souvenirs. Megan wanted a $25 Little Mermaid "Barbie" type doll that I vetoed since it was expensive and she has dozens of Barbies already. My sister did a very good impression of mom though and bought the doll for her anyhow. It was very sweet and it made Megan's day. Bryce got a new Winnie the Pooh video while Jenny and I picked out the Animal Kingdom CD (which is beautiful by the way. The songs are all similar but it's very relaxing music.)

We were early for our 6:30 priority seating but went over to check out the Rainforest Café. We checked in and we received our pass for the Gorilla room. I was so glad I had made the priority seating so far in advance because they were telling walk ups that the wait was over 2 hours. This was the first visit for all of us to a Rainforest Café and we all really liked it. It was very kid friendly, which was nice, and we all loved the menu. We were seated by an aquarium and close to the gorillas and the elephants (which really pleased Megan). We were all a bit thankful that we were not in one of the booths where fog constantly circulates. I'd think that would get old very quickly.

We had a tough time deciding on what to order because everything sounded good. This dinner was compliments of mom (did I mention that she's the greatest mom in the world?). We ordered two appetizers. The description from the menu of each is listed as Chimi Cha-Cha, crisp wonton skin with roasted chicken breast, sweet corn, black beans, citrus zest, roasted red peppers, and four-cheese blend, served with salsa for $7.99. Rainforest Pita Quesadillas - Sauteed peppers, caramelized onions, grilled chicken and melted cheese on grilled pita. Served with salsa, sour cream and guacamole for $7.99.

Jenny and I had each had the quart of Foster's beer (which at $6.95 was a comparatively good deal to the other 12-ounce beers).

For dinner I had Maya Pastalaya - Fresh cooked linguine, topped with strips of chicken breast, shrimp, fresh bell peppers, sweet Bermuda onions, and fiery Andouille sausage, and tossed in a spicy Cajun sauce. Garnished with fresh diced Roma tomatoes and scallions $16.99. This was a great dish. It was nice and spicy. I love Cajun food. The portion was huge and I normally finish everything on my plate but not this time.

Jenny had Rasta Pasta - Bow tie pasta, grilled chicken, walnut pesto, broccoli, red peppers, spinach and fresh herbs tossed in a garlic cream sauce $13.99. She loved it. Again, this was a huge portion and even sharing some with Sonya she was able to get only half way through it.

Dom had Mojo Bones - Oven roasted tender ribs, basted with our Smokin' Mojo BBQ Sauce Served on a bed of crispy friend onions accompanied with our wild waffle fries $16.99. This was the half order and it was huge. Dom made a real effort though and finished most of it. The full order would easily be enough for two people.

Sonya had The Mambo Deli - Turkey roasted fresh daily, sliced ham, salami, lettuce, sweet Bermuda onion, peppers, bacon, Swiss cheese, lettuce, tomato, and Rainforest Rescue Sauce. Served on nine-grain bread $9.99. This was basically an enormous club sandwich. Sonya liked it and Megan loved stealing the bacon and ham out of it.

Megan had the pepperoni pizza from the children's menu. I believe the price was $4.99. She didn't care for the pizza sauce that was fairly sweet so she helped Sonya with her sandwich.

We sat through several "thunderstorms" during our meal. The kids loved it. It's a very bustling and very loud restaurant. It's fun with kids but I wouldn't go there as a couple. We had a great meal and we enjoyed the time we got to spend together.

After dinner we drove back and dropped off Jenny and Bryce at the condo. They said their good-byes then Megan and I took Sonya and Dom to the airport. We were sad to see them go. Our time together was definitely too short. Jenny and I are already hoping to convince them to join us for a full week next year.

We went back to the condo and everyone fell asleep around 9:30PM.

Day 10, Monday, 3-15-99. Universal Studios day. Weather report – Cloudy and cold all day long. No rain. Highs in the low 60's.

We woke up around 6:30AM and went to the breakfast buffet. We left the condo at 8 and arrived at a long and very slow moving line of cars waiting to get into the Universal garage. It's kind of a pain to park here and it's quite a walk to the entrance but they do have moving sidewalks. We finally got to the ticket booths and bought our one-day passes ($117.13 total for 2 adults and one child after the $2.50 off coupon from the Econoguide).

The wind was really kicking up and we were pretty chilly. Once official opening rolled around we went straight to the Funtastic World of Hannah-Barbera ride. The kids especially enjoyed seeing the familiar cartoon characters. Bryce and I sat in the stationary seats while Megan and Jenny sat in the motion simulator seats.

After that we ducked into a nearby store looking for another sweatshirt but we didn't find anything that we liked at a reasonable price so we moved onto Twister since it was nearby. We had about a 15-minute wait for the next show. This was our first time on this one and it was better than I expected. It reminds me quite a bit of the Backdraft attraction at Universal Studios Hollywood. It's pretty intense and in retrospect I don't know if I would take Bryce again. You stand in a movie set while the tornado whips the wind and rain up around you, which isn't too bad, but the noise level is very high. I held Bryce in my arms and he was clutching onto me pretty good. He did moo at the cow as it went flying by though. Megan thought it was a little scary but she liked it.

After the show we noticed that people were lining up across the street for Kongfrontation. Apparently this is one of several attractions that open at 10AM. It was almost 10 so we got in line and had a 10-minute wait. I was surprised when a tram went out with just the guide and two other employees who sat there with clipboards and "graded" him. Another employee said they were training a new guide. I thought this was totally tacky and I couldn't believe they would do this right in front of the guests. I can't imagine Disney doing the same. It really took something away from the "show". Still, I really like this attraction. I think it is one of Universal's better rides. The aerial tram is a clever ride device and the sets are fantastic. Bryce clung onto me a few times but then made some monkey noises at Kong so I think he liked it overall. Megan didn't think it was scary at all.

We ducked into another shop after the ride that offered discontinued merchandise. We didn't find any sweatshirts we liked so we moved on. At least the kids were warm but Jenny and I were still chilly. We went to Back to the Future but the wait was 45 minutes. I was surprised that the line was so long already. I guess we should have gone there first. So, we backtracked to ET and found that it was closed. There was a CM out front so I planned to ask him if the ride would be open later. He was busy talking to another CM and eating a large pretzel. This just seemed so strange. He was obviously on duty because he was positioned behind a rope in front of the ride. I didn't want to interrupt so I waited for him to finish his discussion then I asked him if the ride would be open later. He answered (with his mouth full) that the ride was closed and he didn't know when it would be open. His answer itself wasn't rude but I was really starting to miss the Disney cast members.

We found the theater for a Day in the Park with Barney. There was a line for the next show but it didn't start for another 20 minutes so we took the kids to the play area that is just outside the exit of the theater. This turned out to be a great move. There were very few people here now but when we exited the show the place was packed. Both kids loved all of the interactive little play areas although I'm sure anyone over 6 years old would probably be bored to tears. We saw Hercules and Xena for the first of about 10 times we would see them throughout the day. They seemed pretty out of place in Barney's playground. After 15 minutes of playing we got in line just about the time that the pre-show started. The kids loved seeing Barney. The characters perform on a stage in the middle of the theater so all of the seats provide a good view. They sang all of those songs from the show that the kids know by heart (and I do too, God help me). After the show all of the audience lines up along the stage and Barney comes around to each person for a hug. We have a pretty funny picture of Barney hugging Bryce. Barney's mouth is open and he appears to be devouring Bryce's head.

We went over to Fievel's playland and had a good time running around and trying to warm up. We quickly ruled out the little raft ride that appeared to get you quite wet. There were lots of little areas to play in but we all preferred the Honey I Shrunk the Kids playground.

We walked back towards Back to the Future and the wait was one hour so we passed it up and went to Jaws. While we were in the Jaws line an employee opened up a chain right next to us to form a new section in the line. A couple of us looked at her for a second and she said "go ahead" so I went along the new route and she starts yelling "Hey, where are you going! I didn't say you could go down there". We walked back to our spot and I said to her "So, when I looked right at you and you said 'go ahead' that meant that I should remain where I was?" She said that she was telling people at the end of the line to go into the new line. I just walked away in mid-explanation as the line started moving. Man was she snotty! I don't envy anyone who has to deal with the public but I really try to be a conscientious guest and I thought this was an unprovoked little outburst against me. This combined with a couple of other employee encounters really soured me on Universal. I won't be back anytime soon although I probably will go to Islands of Adventure.

Anyhow, we had a fun ride on Jaws after a 15-minute wait. The guide was very good and the shark surprised Megan a couple of times but she enjoyed it. Bryce didn't have too much reaction to the big fish.

As we got out we noticed the Wild West Stunt Show was starting nearby so we made our way over to the theater. When we got there it was standing room only but there were two seats that Jenny and Megan found so they stayed while Bryce and I went out and looked at the San Francisco area outside the theater. I have seen the stunt show many times at Universal Hollywood and I enjoy it but I didn't feel like standing in the back with a squirmy toddler.

When they came out of the show we decided to try Back to the Future again but the wait was still an hour so we gave up for this trip. We were a little disappointed because it's our favorite simulator ride but it's not worth that long of a wait. We went over to the Terminator 2: 3D show and got in line. It was a 25-minute wait. It took quite a while to get seated in the theater because Universal strictly enforces the move to the end of the aisle routine. We had to get up and scoot over a few seats several times as people moved together to fill the empty seats. It always ticks me off when people don't move all the way over so I'm glad Universal enforces this but they carried it to the point of being quite rude to some people.

Jenny and I both thought this is the best 3D show we have ever seen. It was just amazing. The actual 3D effect is perfect and has none of that double image problem that I have experienced at every Disney 3D movie. The live action was great with the actors running through the theater and into and off of the movie screen. This one attraction would almost make me want to come back to Universal. Bryce did not like it. Too much gunfire and loud noises so he nuzzled his head against me for most of the show. Megan was kind of ambivalent towards it.

Later we went over to Nickelodeon Studios for the tour. It was getting near Bryce's naptime so Jenny decided to stay back with Bryce and shop while Megan and I took the tour. We had a 20-minute wait. The tour was very entertaining for kids. I like Nickelodeon but as an adult the tour didn't hold my interest. You get to see some soundstages and control rooms as well as a game show where one "lucky" kid gets slimed. Megan was pretty tired but she really liked the tour.

When we came out we were all starving so we went to the Hard Rock Café. While Megan and I were on the tour Jenny had scoped out the restaurant and the line had been very long. So, we were planning to go elsewhere but when we walked by the entrance the lines had shortened considerably. We had a 10-minute wait for a table. Bryce was sleeping so we wheeled his stroller in and got seated at a great table in the middle of the restaurant. Jenny and I each had a Foster's Lager ($4.50) while we perused the menu. Jenny settled on the veggie burger ($7.99), I had the pig sandwich ($8.99) and Megan had the kid's hot dog meal ($5.99). The waitress brought a free glass of milk so we could fill Bryce's bottle. We had a coupon from the Econoguide guidebook for a free appetizer so we ordered the nachos (normally $7.99) and they were huge. We worked these over quickly and were not so hungry by the time our meals arrived. Jenny liked her veggie burger but didn't have room for much of it. Megan loved her hot dog. I was in heaven with the pig sandwich (barbecue pulled pork). It was great and despite being somewhat full from the nachos I still polished the whole thing off. It was excellent.

We were all full and tired after lunch. We were able to see most of what we wanted to and we didn't want to push too hard and get cranky so we left at 4PM. We went back to the condo and relaxed for a while. Jenny was doing some laundry and Bryce was entertained by the new Winnie the Pooh video. I had told Jenny earlier that I'd like to go shopping at some point so she suggested I take Megan to Downtown Disney.

At Megan's request we made our first stop at the Lego store. We played outside for a while but it was getting dark and very cold even though we had long pants and coats on. So, we went inside the store for the first time. It's really amazing inside also. We spent quite a bit of time looking at all of the different types of Lego's available. We had a very good time here but didn't buy anything.

When we were done we set out for my real destination at the West Side that I had kept secret from Jenny. It's quite a walk from the Marketplace and since it was so cold I decided to hop in the van and drive over. We went into the Virgin Megastore hoping to find a Rondo Veneziano CD for Jenny since she had enjoyed them so much at Epcot. We went to the world music section and they had hundreds of titles from Italy but no Rondo! We went to the classical section and no Rondo there either. Oh well, I decided I would look on Steve Soares website and find out how to order one of their CD's when we got back home. We didn't do anything else at the West Side but I would like to spend a more time here on the next trip. It looks like a fun place. It was getting late so we went back to the condo and everyone fell asleep quickly.

Day 11, Tuesday, 3-16-99. Magic Kingdom day. Weather report – Mostly sunny and warm. No rain. High temperature mid 70's.

We woke up this morning at 7AM and I made a quick dash to the breakfast buffet. We were out of the condo by 8 and at the Magic Kingdom at 8:30. We waited for the rope drop at the Crystal Palace restaurant. This was another good place to wait. Our first stop was going to be Splash Mountain and most people were gathered at the entrance to Adventureland. It was a little more relaxed waiting here plus there was a restroom nearby. After the rope drop we quickly made our way to Splash. Megan and Jenny went first while I waited with Bryce. I was thrilled with the baby trade arrangement here. There is a very cute little Splash Mountain playground underneath the railroad trestle that is for kids and parents doing the baby trade. I waited with a bunch of moms (seems most of the dads rode first) and gave out advice to some of the WDW novices who were asking me about the baby trade.

Bryce and I took a look at a cart around the corner selling Splash Mountain plush merchandise. Bryce gave the CM a big smile and said "hi" as she caught him playing with a Brer Bear. She showed him all of the animals and neat things in the cart then gave him a few stickers and asked me how to spell his name. She then presented him with just the coolest certificate. It says something about being a future Splash Mountain rider and that when he's tall enough he can go find his laughin' place. The certificate was a little secret I had never heard of so I was thrilled. It's a fantastic memento and the CM was just wonderful. After a few unpleasant encounters at Universal yesterday this just further convinced me that Disney CM's are really at the heart of what makes Walt Disney World so special.

The girls exited the ride and they were pretty soaked. There is a fountain type thing that sprays a stream of water intermittently after you go down the final drop and it got both of them. Jenny got Megan's jacket out of the backpack and sent us on the ride. I requested the back seat since it was still a little cool this morning and I didn't want to get too wet. Also, I had Megan sit on the right side of the log since she had her jacket on and I knew the waterfall on the right side at the end of the ride could sometimes get you wet. We had a great time floating in our log and noticing how many things were different in this version of the ride as compared to Disneyland. We all preferred this version with it's side by side seating configuration. You do get more wet on this Splash Mountain. We stayed fairly dry on the final drop and also managed to miss the streams of water but the spray from another passing log got us pretty wet as it went down the final drop. Then our log was backed up right next to the waterfall for a couple of minutes. I was glad I had Megan sit on the right side. Her jacket got soaked but she was dry underneath. The man in front of her looked like he had been swimming.

When we got off the ride we made our way over to Big Thunder and Megan and I rode first. I requested and got the back seat and it was a great ride. We performed the baby trade so Jenny went right through exit and on for a solo ride. When she came out we decided to go to Fantasyland since we didn't see many attractions there last week.

Peter Pan was our first stop and it was a 10-minute wait. This has always been my favorite Fantasyland attraction and I actually preferred this version to the one at Disneyland. The scenes seemed more elaborate and told the story better than at Disneyland. After our flight we went on the carousel with just a minimal wait for the next ride to end. It's a Small World was next. The exterior of this version really pales in comparison to Disneyland. The inside is very similar but there are a few different scenes. Bryce really got into this ride and pointed out all of the things he thought the rest of us should be looking at.

When we were exiting I saw the Skyway and I just had to ride. I really miss it at Disneyland where it was so fun to pass through the Matterhorn. When we got in line I remembered what I didn't miss about it, the long and slow moving line. We had a 20-minute wait but the weather was very pleasant and the scenery in the area is beautiful so we didn't mind. The ride was much longer than I remembered. Bryce enjoyed sticking his head out the side of the gondola like a dog in a car. This made Jenny nervous but I had a tight grip on him.

When we reached the other side Megan decided she wanted to drive a car on the Speedway so she got in line with Jenny while I carried Bryce on my shoulders back to Fantasyland to retrieve his stroller. I got him loaded up and he was thirsty so I stopped and got an apple juice for him. In the 30 seconds it took to buy the apple juice he had fallen asleep. I took my time looking around and eventually made my way back to the Speedway where I found Megan and Jenny just finishing up a Hercules ice cream bar. The line at the Speedway was 40 minutes so they decided to pass and take an ice cream break instead.

It was getting fairly crowded by this time so we decided to get out of Fantasyland. We went to Adventureland and looked at the Tiki Room but a show had just started so we went to Pirates. Bryce was still asleep in his stroller so the girls went on the ride and I had a fun time walking around Adventureland. I love the area music that is the same on the WDW Explorer CD-ROM. I saw a stand selling nuts and I remembered reading on RADP that several people said these were very good. So I got a bag of cinnamon and sugar glazed almonds and they were indeed tasty. I continued walking around until I found the eggroll cart. I'm the only one in the family who likes egg rolls so I picked one up and didn't feel guilty for not sharing after I practically inhaled it. Continuing on my snacking frenzy I found the Aloha Isle stand and picked up the family favorite Dole pineapple whip. I waited outside of Pirates for just a couple of minutes and then Jenny and Megan appeared. Megan went at the Pineapple whip with gusto and we finished it off quickly.

Bryce woke up but was still tired as we all were after our third day in a row in a theme park. We were a little burned out and the crowds were getting heavier so I suggested the Liberty Belle riverboat. I asked the CM at the loading area about riding with the captain. He instructed us to wait outside the stairs leading up to the wheelhouse. There is a little captain's cabin there and we enjoyed looking around. After a few minutes the captain arrived and led us up the stairs. It was an incredible view from up there. This turned out to be one of my favorite things that we did at the Magic Kingdom. The captain pulled away from the dock and sounded the horn, which the kids thought was fun. Then the captain turned the wheel over to Megan. This was so much fun for her. She "steered" us around the river and was really getting into it. I didn't take long though before people started wandering up the stairs and kind of crowding into the wheelhouse. I didn't expect this to be an exclusive ride alone with the captain. However, I don't think others realized we had asked beforehand to ride up here. I didn't mind people coming up here but a couple of kids were kind of pushy and grabbed the wheel. The CM explained to them that captain Megan was at the helm. Megan was very nice though and stepped down and allowed the others to take turns steering. Also, several people irritated me by asking the captain if he was really steering the boat. He said "No, I'm not steering, Captain Megan is". It was a good answer and I'm glad the fantasy wasn't ruined for Meg. When we pulled back into the dock the captain presented co-captain certificates to both Megan and Bryce. These were very nice and are a special reminder of our ride. Thank you to Deb Wills (and the person who contributed this tip) for all the fun overlooked things like this that are detailed on your website.

This seemed like the perfect way to end our last visit to the Magic Kingdom. It was warming up and the crowds were getting heavy so we decided to go back to the condo for a swim. On the wait out we spotted a cart where they make hand painted parasols. We asked Megan if she wanted one and she was very excited trying to decide which one to get. We found out it would take 40 minutes to make one though and we really didn't want to stand around that long as Bryce was getting restless and slightly cranky. Megan was not happy about leaving without the parasol but I remembered that I had seen a similar cart at France in Epcot. I told her we would try to go there later but if not we would definitely get the parasol on our next trip to Disneyland where they have them in New Orleans Square. She reluctantly agreed and we went back to the condo.

Megan made a friend at the pool and the two of them spent about an hour and a half playing in the pool with the other girl's dad (thanks anonymous dad, I owe you one). Jenny kicked back in a lounge chair and kept an eye on Bryce in the kiddie pool while I sat in the shade writing my trip report and watching Megan.

We went back to the condo and Jenny suggested Megan and I go to Epcot and look for the parasols. This turned out to be a great little trip with just the two of us. We had to park way at the back of the Epcot lot but it was just the two of us with no stroller, backpacks, cooler and little brother (who we still love dearly) in tow. We felt so mobile and free! We hopped on the tram to the entrance and started the long walk to France. I suppose we could have saved a lot of walking by parking at one of the Epcot resorts and coming in through the International Gateway. I assumed that was kind of breaking the rules though so we used the main entrance. (Notice earlier though how I didn't seem to have a problem with breaking the rule about no food in the park? Don't ask me what the difference is.)

Along the way we spotted a whole slew of characters near the United Kingdom. There were most of the Winnie the Pooh characters, several from Mary Poppins, Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan and Robin Hood. There were so many characters that you could have probably gone up to at least one of them with a short wait but there was quite a mob of people in the area and it didn't look very organized. We continued past them and arrived in France. Hooray! They had the parasols. We placed our order and told us it would be about a 30-minute wait but that we could come back to get it. I felt really stupid at this point when it dawned on me that we probably could have done the same thing at the Magic Kingdom earlier. Oh well, this was even better. An umbrella painted by a real Frenchman. Megan selected a miniature white parasol with pink lace. The decorations were flowers, clouds, rainbows and a fairly detailed version of the Eiffel tower along with her name.

Since we had a bit of a wait I thought I would go over to Italy to see if they could tell me of any local music stores where I could find a Rondo Veneziano CD. I stopped at the first cart I saw and there it was! I was so excited. The CM said that they had found some boxes in storage of this particular CD (Rondo Veneziano 2000) and he said it was his personal favorite. I'm not sure if the story I got from the CM on our first visit was accurate but we got the CD so I didn't care. We later gave it to Jenny and she loves it. The songs all start to sound similar after a while but they are still beautiful and we listen to the CD frequently. While still in Italy, Megan watched the chalk artists for quite a while. She was just fascinated to see them doing their sketches.

We went back to France and watched the mimes for a while. They had attracted a very large crowd and were very good. We went back to the parasol stand and we got to see the CM putting the finishing touches and writing Megan's name on it. I saw in the schedule that Off Kilter was starting another performance in a few minutes so we high tailed it to Canada. On the way we briefly watched British Invasion in the United Kingdom. They were very good. I'd like to see more of them.

We arrived in Canada and were able to find a seat on the benches just as Off Kilter got started. We both loved the music and the guys in the band are so entertaining. They posed for pictures right in the middle of songs and just really seemed to enjoy themselves. After a few minutes we left the benches though because it was really loud sitting that close. We went to a nearby cart and found a CD. I came very close to buying it but decided against it since I had just bought the $23 Rondo CD.

Megan said she was starving so we stopped at the Refreshment Port and grabbed a hot dog. She unwrapped it and said it was too hot to eat so I told her we would go to Ice Station Cool to cool it off. We went in and filled up again on the Lilt pineapple drink from England. It's very sweet but our favorite. We tried to trick some people in trying the Beverly by saying how delicious it was. Most people were wise to us though. I decided to get a sugar buzz and try each one of the drinks. The pineapple was still my favorite but I did enjoy the ginger ale also. I summoned up all my courage and filled up a cup with Beverly. I hoisted the evil brew to my lips as Megan watched in horror. Ok, it wasn't as horrible as I thought it would be. Don't get me wrong, it's fairly vile stuff and I wouldn't normally drink it of my own free will. However, I expected something that would make me gag and spew it out all over innocent bystanders. It was very bitter almost like super concentrated grapefruit. It did leave an incredibly nasty aftertaste and I worried it wouldn't go away. After several cups of Lilt though it faded into just an unpleasant memory.

Meg's hot dog had cooled off so we sat down at some seats by Spaceship Earth. I chatted for a while with a very friendly CM who was selling Coke and ice cream from a cart. Megan proclaimed her hot dog the best one she has ever had and her favorite "snack" from the entire trip. We considered going on Test Track but the wait for 75 minutes so we gave up that idea quickly. We had already packed quite a lot into today so we decided to just go on Spaceship Earth before heading back to the condo. We had a 2-minute wait to get on. I scrunched way down in my seat to get my head near the speakers. It wasn't very comfortable but I was able to hear the narration better this time. It was a nice relaxing ride and I daydreamed and thought about how much fun it was to have this special time alone together with my daughter at Epcot. Today sealed the deal. Epcot is now officially my favorite park.

After the ride we tried calling Jenny from one of the phones at the AT&T exhibit in the exit. We were running a little later than I had planned and I wanted to tell her not too worry. No answer though so she must have been at the playground with Bryce. Megan and I made the trek back out to the van and found our way back home.

After relaxing a while at the condo we decided to go to the Caribbean Beach Resort for a look around and dinner at the food court. Jenny and I both liked the resort a lot. The atmosphere is fun and it seemed to suit our tastes more than any other resort. We were able to park right at Old Port Royale so we had just a very short walk to the food court. Parking at the moderate and value resorts is much easier than at the deluxe resorts where visitors are relegated to the far corners of the property. We really liked the food court. It was a fun atmosphere and there were a lot of choices. Bryce had fallen asleep in his stroller and Megan wasn't too far from nodding off herself. They had played hard. I bought a cheeseburger meal while Jenny had a pasta dinner that she shared with Megan. Both were just average. Megan perked up a bit when she saw a kid's area in the food court with toys and a Disney movie playing. There was a really sweet elderly CM who looked at Bryce asleep in his stroller and told Jenny and I to enjoy every moment with the children because they grow up so fast. She said her husband had passed away and her children were grown and she missed having a house full of activity. She was such a lovely southern lady and she didn't make it seem like a sad story at all (she was actually quite upbeat) but it still almost made Jenny and I cry.

After dinner we were all wiped out from a long day of touring but we took a short walk out to Parrot Cay Island. We looked at the playground and thoroughly enjoyed the atmosphere of the island. The setting at night is so pretty and we liked the piped in cricket sounds. I could definitely stay at this resort and love it. We walked back by the pool and once again we were amazed at how elaborate all the Disney pools are. This one was awesome with a neat feeling of being in a Caribbean fortress. Megan really wanted to stay here once she saw the pool. Hopefully we will when the kids are older.

We drove back to the condo and we all fell asleep quickly.

Day 12, Wednesday, 3-17-99. Blizzard beach day. Weather report – Sunny and warmer. No rain. High temperature about 80.

We woke up around 7 today and did the normal breakfast buffet routine. I could definitely get used to this although I would end up even more portly than I am now. We had originally planned to go to the Magic Kingdom today but we switched around days so we could enjoy the warmer weather today at a water park. We let Megan pick which water park and she decided on Blizzard Beach again. We slathered sunscreen on everybody, packed a picnic lunch, got all of our gear together and headed out the door at 9:00AM.

We went first for a visit to the All Star Resorts. We parked at All Star Movies and walked around the grounds. Megan really liked the 101 Dalmatian buildings. The Mighty Ducks and Sorcerer's Apprentice pools were also very neat. The themes of each area are well done and they almost disguise that boxy Motel 6 feel of the buildings. I can see the attraction of staying here but for only a few dollars more I'm much happier staying where we are and just visiting the All Stars. We took a look at the food courts then went into a nice gift shop and for some souvenir shopping. We picked up the Day in the Parks video and some things for the kids. I was disappointed later when we saw the video that it is basically an edited version of the old tapes we have from a prior trip. There was some new footage though and I've never met a Disney video I didn't like so we still will get our money's worth out of it.

We arrived at Blizzard Beach a couple of minutes before opening. We went directly to Tike's Peak again and piled our stuff on the same picnic table shelter area that we were in last time. It was nice and warm but not hot today. The kids had a great time in this area again because they were so familiar with it this time. Jenny and I didn't spend as much time going on the slides today but we did get a chance to go off on our own once or twice. Jenny went on the Snow Stormers and when she returned I went on the Slush Gusher which wasn't as bad as I had remembered. I thought you caught more "air" when going down it. It was a fun ride but not worth the 15-minute wait. I'd rather go on the Toboggan Racers or Runoff Rapids, both of which usually have much shorter waits.

In the afternoon Jenny and I alternated turns taking Megan on the family raft ride, Teamboat Springs. This was Megan's favorite ride in the park. Megan and I decided to take the chairlift to the top of the mountain for our ride. We had a 10-minute wait. While in line the two kids in front of us asked their dad what was at the top of the mountain. He said he didn't know so I piped in (eavesdropping is one of my worst faults) and gave the whole family a rundown on the park. We started talking about where we were from. When I said we came from near Seattle he looked surprised and asked why we wouldn't just go to Disneyland. I told him that Disneyland is basically similar to the Magic Kingdom but that is all that is there (until the California Adventure opens). He was from New York and really surprised that there was no Epcot or Disney-MGM Studios in Anaheim. The lady behind us got into the discussion and asked if they had any water parks. It was interesting to me that both of these East Coast folks had no idea what is (or more appropriately, what is not) at Disneyland. This is similar to so many people at home that have absolutely no idea of how much there is to see and do at Walt Disney World. I think a lot of people on the West Coast think Disneyworld is the same as Disneyland but with Epcot thrown in as a second park. When I tell people back home that we went to Disneyworld for 12 days they are just shocked that anyone could spend that much time there. It's so hard to try to educate the masses to the wonders of WDW but I try!

Megan and I made it to the top of the mountain and went on Teamboat Springs. We were the only two in our raft and I probably wouldn't do that again. We sat across from each other. Keep in mind that I weigh 4 times more than my daughter, so every time we went into a banked turn I was at the bottom of the raft and she went to the very top and had to hold on for dear life to avoid dropping straight down. She said it was a very scary ride this time!

We packed it up about 2PM today and went back to the condo to get cleaned up. We then went to the Wilderness Lodge for the first time this trip. I love this resort. It reminds me so much of the Timberline Lodge on Mt. Hood in Oregon, which is where a good portion of the movie "The Shining" was filmed. Jenny and I were commenting on "The Shining" feel of the place as we walked into the lobby and then heard the creepiest music I've ever heard at a Disney resort. It was so dark and almost gothic. I was just totally blown away by that music because it sounded exactly like it could have been music from "The Shining" soundtrack. Has anyone else noticed this before and is it intentional? Meg, Jenny and I looked at each other and almost in unison we said, "whoa, that music is scary" and then started laughing that we all said it together. We spent some time looking around the lobby and what a stunningly beautiful place it is. We then took a look at the pool on our way down to the marina.

We had wanted to rent a pontoon boat but we discovered they only had two of them here and they were both rented. The only thing available was a canopy boat. I was a little disappointed but we got it anyway. You have to pay in advance so I paid $40 for an hour rental and left my driver's license as a deposit. When we got to the dock the CM said, "I'll have to see if we can get this thing running. Nobody ever rents these." It didn't seem a very Disney like comment but he finally got the motor up and sputtering and we were off on our way.

The boat was a real clunker with a top speed of about 5 miles per hour but that is all the faster we wanted to go anyhow. We cruised over first to Seven Seas Lagoon since they would be closing off the passage between it and Bay Lake at 5:30. It was about 5 when we got over to the Magic Kingdom area. It was so much fun to see everything from the water. We were a little envious of the people passing us in the water mice but the kids are still a bit too young to ride along in those. There sure is a lot of water traffic in this area. We had to keep a constant watch for ferries taking people to the Magic Kingdom as well as those zippy water mice. We got amazing views of the Polynesian, Contemporary and the Grand Floridian. The garden wing rooms of the Contemporary look much more appealing from the water than they do from the land. They have nice views and are right on the water. We made our way back to Bay Lake and puttered around Discovery Island and River Country. The timing worked out about perfect. We made it back to the Wilderness Lodge about 10 minutes after our hour was up. They didn't charge us anything additional, which was nice.

We drove over to Coronado Springs Resort next. I was happy that the parking here was as easy as the other moderates. We parked right next to the main registration entrance area. This is a very nice resort. I would be hard pressed to choose which moderate resort to stay at with this one now thrown into the mix. I like the theme of the resort but the drawback would be the convention facility. There were a lot of people walking around with name badges and it somehow takes away from the magic of the resort. Of course we saw the same thing at the Contemporary but somehow it was different. The Contemporary really feels like more of an appropriate place for conventions.

We had dinner at the Pepper Market and really liked it. It's a step up from most food courts in atmosphere, service and food quality. I liked the fact that you are seated by a host/hostess and your drinks are brought to you and the table bussed. I certainly had no problem with the automatic 10% service charge they add to the bill. Bryce had milk and I had a Coke to drink. The girls had water. Jenny got the taco salad, I had the nachos and Megan had the kid's hot dog meal. The portions were huge and none of us finished but we gave it a valiant effort. The nachos and taco salad were about average but it was nice that they had lots of help yourself condiments (onions, jalapenos, salsa, and sour cream) to go along with them. The total with tax and service charge was $25.23. I really wanted to see the Dig Site area with the pool and playground but after a big dinner we were pretty wiped out. It was also a bit chilly so we decided to load up and make an early night of it. It was sad leaving the Disney property for the last time this trip.

We went back to the condo and the kids watched TV while Jenny and I discussed coming back next year. We went to bed early and tried not to think about going home tomorrow.

Day 13, Thursday, 3-18-99. Going home day.

We woke up at 6:30 and did the usual breakfast buffet routine. Jenny had already packed up most of the bags so we just hung around the condo for a little while left about 9AM. It took half an hour to get to the airport. The rental car return was very easy at Dollar. Our flight left on time at 10:30. It was a long haul to Denver and the kids were pretty restless on the flight. The movie was "Babe2. Pig in the City". The flight attendant very nicely gave us two free headsets for the kids so that kept them entertained for a while at least. We eventually got to Denver though. We had a few minutes to burn at the airport before we caught our next flight. The kids relished their momentary freedom and started running around. This probably wasn't a good idea. I was hoping it would wear them out and they would nap for the next flight but it just got them wound up instead.

Bryce was trying to run away from Jenny and as she scooped him up he started loudly vocalizing his displeasure. He wasn't quite throwing a full fit at that point but he was loud. As Jenny was trying to calm him down an airport employee came up to her and asked if she had time for a story. I'm sure she was thinking "just leave me alone, I've got my hands full" but she said sure. The guy told her this story about going to the grocery store one day and seeing this little girl throwing a raging tantrum. Her mom was calmly saying, "It's OK Bonnie. We can do this. We will just get our groceries and everything will be fine." The guy said he went about his shopping and every few aisles he would see the still screaming child while the mother calmly said, "We are almost done Bonnie. We can do this." He ended up in the check out line right behind the pair. He commented to the mother that he was impressed out how calmly she was speaking to her daughter Bonnie. The woman replied that her daughter was Katie. The woman said she was Bonnie and she had been talking to herself. It seemed like a fabricated story but I still like it a lot. It really stuck with me.

I checked at our gate and found that the flight to Seattle would not be full so I asked if we could split up into two rows. I thought the gate person had said that we would have these aisles to ourselves but no such luck. The plane ended up mostly full with Jenny and Megan in a window and middle seat in one row and the same for Bryce and I in the row behind them. Unfortunately, both aisle seats were assigned to other people. This was not going to work. I asked the man next to Jenny and Meg if he would mind taking my window seat in the row behind. He declined because it was a window and he wanted the roomier aisle seat. I don't blame him a bit. The window is definitely more cramped. Jenny and I were starting to stress out because the rest of the plane was filled up. I was really kicking myself for changing the three seats together that we originally had. Luckily the guy next to Bryce and I traded his aisle seat for Jenny's window seat in the aisle ahead. This was very nice of him (especially because he then had to fly in front of two young children). We thanked him profusely and promised to restrain the children to the best of our abilities. This is the last time I get a bright idea to switch the seats around! Thankfully this was the shorter of the two flights today. It was a long day of travelling but we finally arrived back in Seattle at 4:30PM (PST). It was a nice surprise to come home to gray skies but no rain. Hopefully the end of the winter of our discontent is finally at hand. Our luggage was waiting for us when we got to baggage claim. Mom came and picked us up then we made the hour long drive home.

Epilogue

This was a wonderful trip. We had so much fun that Jenny and I discussed joining the Disney Vacation Club. Since we come from the left coast though we decided it probably wouldn't be worth it for us. Within a week after coming home we had decided to visit for a full two weeks next year. We wanted to visit during Megan's spring break so she would only miss one week of school. We just found out the dates so we can start the planning. I made the minivan rental last night ($199 a week through Dollar again using the KISS code). We will be there from April 1 through April 15th, 2000. I'll probably spend some time planning each and every day from now until then. Maybe we will see you there.

Lance Caros

Lancar@netzero.net