Magic Kingdom

Wednesday, July 29, 2008

I am sitting here on the beach to the lake watching the boats transport people to and from the Magic Kingdom. They have a kids play area and Jake, Josh, and Jenni are playing tether ball with some kids that they met. I can’t express enough how much we love camping for this reason alone. If we were in a hotel, we would go to our room, and not even see other people. The kids are constantly meeting new kids. The people in the site next to us are from Texas. I just love the interaction with other people.

Today was my dream come true. At least one of them. We went to the Magic Kingdom. We got there early enough to watch the opening program. The mayor comes out and dancers and singers welcome you to the Magic Kingdom. Then at just the right time the old steam engine train pulls up with Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Goofy, Donald, Chip and Dale. It was so awesome. Then the whole bunch of people gathered there all try to enter main street at once. That was OK because we just took it slow. We have adopted a two by two approach. Each adult and Jessi holds a hand of one of the three littler ones. We haven’t lost anyone yet. We got into main street and there was Pluto and Chip and Dale. We got their autographs and pictures. I was a little disappointed there weren’t as many photographers today. Before we left Tim bought this deal where every time they take our picture in the park, they scan a credit card type deal. When we get home we order the disk and get all the pictures they took in the park on it. Every character has a photographer with them so we will have pictures of all of us with each character. The kids have already filled up one autograph book.

We headed down main street to the castle. This is every little girls dream. Even mine. It was so beautiful. We headed toward it and had our picture taken every few feet. Then we went into Tomorrowland. The futuristic section of the park. The first thing we hit was Stitches Adventure. You walk into this theatre thing as a new recruit. The stitch robot spits at you , burps in your face. Very wonderful. Josh loves stitch but started to cry. Of course later in the day Jessi, Tim and him went back again.

Next we walked down to the race car track. It is on a guided track. Josh was driving me and we bumped back and forth the whole way. He needs some driving lessons. Next we walked over to the Buzz Lightyear ride. You were in a car that spun at your direction all the way around. You had little lazer guns that you tried to hit targets inside the ride. It kept track of your score. It was painted bright neon colors. The winner was me with 306,000 points. The second ride Jake got 301,600 and Josh got 298,000. The rest of them barely got over 65,000.

The next ride was the timeless tea cups. I was just in pure joy here. You always associate those tea cups with Disney World.

Next we went to line up for the Cinderella’s Royal Table. We went inside the castle and met Cinderella. She signed the autograph books and took pictures with us all. Then up about 3 flights of stairs that went in a circle into the dining room overlooking the park. It was so awesome. They called us the Royal Family and the boys princes and princesses. Tim really outdid himself here. We ate and were visited by the other four princesses. Snow White, Aurora, Sleeping Beauty, Jasmine. They all signed the kids books and did photos with them. Then they had a make a wish ceremony. It was so cool and the food was excellent. It was the highlight of my trip so far!
Then back out to the park. We road the Snow White ride, the Pooh ride, The flying Dumbo ride when it was starting to rain. Fortunately we were under the covered line when it poured. By the time we got to the front it was barely sprinkling. We toured Minnie’s house and Mickey’s house then rode the train that went completely around the park.

We decided to head back to the front and found a neat little Hot Dog baseball themed place to eat dinner. With our plan here at Disney we have a sit down meal, a counter service meal, and a snack each day. We really have been well fed. I think it is really worth the money. The princess dinner alone was over $240 which are plan included. I highly recommend it.

At the front of the park they had hula hoops and a girl with a bubble maker. The kids played out in the street for about 45 minutes. Then we loaded the boat that takes us back to the campground. It was a bit more crowded today than yesterday. We still didn’t have to wait in any line longer than about 25 minutes which was the Winnie the Pooh ride. Believe it or not we didn’t even get through half of the park. We decided to go back tomorrow and see the other half of the park.

We are bringing Tim, Josh and Jenni down to the dock tonight to see the boat parade and the fireworks.

My next post will be Friday night. I’ll catch you up on Thursday and Friday. Sorry but I don’t want to spend all my spending money on this crappy WIFI. Starting to miss everyone and home, but I’m having an incredible time.

Animal Kingdom

WOW!! Today was our first full day and our first in a park. We decided to go to animal kingdom. We didn’t get a real early start but it was surprisingly light crowds. We never had to stand in any line more that 15 minutes and that was only once.

We road the Disney Bus to the park and entered with no problems. We went in and were surrounded by beautiful plush greenery everywhere. When you finally get into the park area, you see the beautiful Tree of Life. It is this huge tree with lots of carved animals all around the trunk. We headed around the tree to go to the safari ride. Someone told us to go early because the animals would be out. You get in these large jeep type vehicles and drive through to see all the animals. It was really neat. Mostly normal zoo animals but they have gone to incredible lengths to make it look like Africa. We also road this last in the day around 6:00 p.m. and we actually saw more animals then. We were held up by an ostrich in the road and the giraffe and rhino were like 7 feet from the vehicle. It was truly amazing.

After the Safari ride we went and had pizza for lunch. We skipped breakfast and it was about 11:00. The kids were finding the characters to get autographs and pictures. We saw Lilo and Stitch, some monkey, Donald, Mickey, Goofy and Minnie. Josh is really getting in to the autograph thing. We have also all bought lanyards and are collecting the disney pins. You buy some and trade for some. Tim even got one before we left the park.

Our next stop was the Lion King Musical. It was beyond awesome. The dancers, singers and animitronics were amazing. Highly, Highly recommend this one. Next we ventured to the it’s a bugs life 3d movie in the tree of life. Literally in the tree of life’s trunk. I thought the kids would love it. Josh hated it. You are spit on by a bug. A big stink bug lets one rip and it actually smelled. Then the bugs pretended to get even with you for all the ways we try to kill them. You are sprayed with fog like a fogger and a bee stings you which is a part of your chair pokes you in the back. Tim and I loved this. The kids were not impressed.

Next we walked over to Dinoland. Not much interesting here. On our way to Asia we stopped at the Finding Nemo musical. It was almost as awesome as Lion King. Basically followed the movie in 30 minutes.

We only got to see the end of the parade. Then circled around and did the safari again. Kids weren’t interested in the Everest Roller Coaster thank goodness. I sure wasn’t to keen on getting on it.

This park was really neat. We all had a great time. Of course we are all exhausted!!!! We made it back to the RV and ate sandwiches. The kids and I went over to the pool. After the pool Jake, Jessi and I went down to the boat dock and happenend by chance to catch the boat parade. Neat lights set up on a series of boats, and the fireworks from Magic Kingdom. They truly are magical beyond measure.

I forgot to download the pictures off my camera before making the trek to the WIFI hotspot so I'll add pictures tomorrow.

Yes mom I know I should have gotten the card for my computer.

WE ARE HERE!!!!!

Today is the day!!!! We got up and messed around this morning. We can’t get in to Fort Wilderness till after 1:00 and check out time here is 11:00. We only have a couple hours traveling left so I made pancakes for breakfast. Cleaned things up and then we were on our way.
The drive was really quick. And somehow Rita (GPS) and I came in the back way. There was hardly any traffic at all. It was so thrilling to drive under the arch that announced that you were at disney world!

We drove right up to the Fort Wilderness entrance. We were only behind one other trailer. Everything was set we got our cards and away we went. Out site is incredible. Nice and roomy! We backed in with no problems at all. Set out the awning, hooked up the electric and water. We needed ice so Jake, Tim and I walked up to the trader’s outpost. It is only about a block and a half from our site. Got the ice went outside and it was pouring. Now if we hadn’t had the ice we could have waited it out but instead we decided to go. We were soaked to the bone!
We decided to go see if we could get our golf cart a day early because this place is really really big. We are close to the pool and campground fire sing along place but getting to the bus stops that take you to the other places would wear you out. They had some in so we were able to get one. We drove around to explore for a while. This place is truly amazing!!! Then we decided to go to the downtown Disney and eat dinner.

The downtown Disney area was awesome. All the stores are Disney themed. It was really cool. There is an area of night clubs. Tim wanted to eat at Bongo’s. This is the restaurant owned by Etevez lady. Anyway the appetizers were great but the main dishes were only OK. Of course this was my first try at Cuban food.

After dinner we walked around. Tim and the kids got candy. It has really been hard controlling their and my spending. I want it all. They have so much really cool stuff. I got each of the kids one of the autograph books for the characters and each of them the lanyards that the pins go on. Pin trading is a really big deal here. I even got me one.

I came back to try to get on the interenet to leave posts for my blog. I was so disappointed to find out that it would cost me $10 a day and I can’t even get on at my campsite. I don’t know what I’ll do. I think the kids are excited but I think I’m probably the most excited. Tomorrow we are off to animal kingdom.

Travel Day Problems

Well today we got up to a rocky start. We wanted to get an early start. We were ready to pull out at 8:45 and the generator wouldn’t start. We had no idea what to do. We drove up the road to a camping world we had passed coming in. Tim went in to get someone to help us. As I was getting back in the coach, I noticed the electric battery disconnect was off. I turned it back on and tried to start the generator only I was pushing it to turn off. Tim and the guy from camping world came out and he pushed the button on the generator and it started right up. Tim said I looked at him and asked what did you do. That was all it was. So yeah!!!!

We drove on all day. It seemed like forever but in reality it was only about 6 hours. We even ate in the RV going down the road.

Tim had picked out this little RV park in North Ocala Florida. The web page looked awesome! In reality it was a little run down. Still pretty nice. When I got out to go get our site registration off the door, it was so quiet. Eerily so! Our site was a really nice pull thru. The moss in the trees was really neat looking. It really wasn’t that bad. The pool was really nice. It was almost 7 feet deep in the deep end and we were the only ones swimming. Heck we were the only ones here except for about 10 other people. The park was full of trailers that looked like people just leave them there and come on weekends and winters.

Tomorrow is the big day! On to DISNEY WORLD!!!!

Disney's crappy WIFI

Ok friends and family. Sorry it has been so long. The wonderful world of disney sucks when it comes to WIFI. They charge you $10 a day and it doesn't even reach the RV. So I have a new revised schedule of posting. I paid the price tonight at 11:00 which gives me 24 hours. I will catch you up todate tonight. And post again tomorrow night. Then I will skip Thursday and post again Friday night and Saturday night. Skip Sunday and post Monday and Tuesday night then it will hopefully be Friday night on our way home. I'm sorry! I loved doing this. It helps me remember everything we did each day. Thanks for your patience!

Our Day at the Beach

We let the kids sleep in this morning. Last night while I was at the beach with the little kids, Tim and Jessi worked on the laundry. So we are back to all clean again.

When we did get around, we headed for the beach. The city had the two chairs with umbrella for rent. It was $25 but well worth it. I didn't want to go buy a couple of chairs and umbrella. We wouldn't have room for it in the RV. The kids played and played in the surf. It was low tide so their were tons of sea shells for them to pick up. We got each of the kids boogie boards and me an air mattress. We sat there for about 4 hours. Tim even got in the ocean today. He also got a terrible burn on the bottom of his legs. He put sunscreen on his chest and back but not the bottom parts of his legs. They stuck out of the umbrella shade and he didn't even notice. He almost got the whitest guy on the beach award. He was in the lead until a couple of old guys showed up. I think Tim would make a really good beach stud!!!

I could have photographed and made a book about what not to wear to the beach. There was one grandmotherly lady that had on one of those white one piece suits that splits all the way down to the navel and has practically nothing on the back except the back of the pants. She was horridly pudging out of every open spot on the suit. Jake and Josh even commented how gross she looked. I have teased them all day that I was going to buy a suit like that. It was so funny tonight at wal mart they had one. I held it up in front of me and told Josh I was buying it. He wrinkled his nose and pretended to throw up. Later when they were acting up I told them I was going to get that suit and wear it every time they fight. They quit fighting.

We came back to the RV and all took a shower to get the sand out of every known crevice on our bodies. Jenni was the funniest. She said "uh mom, I have sand in my butt" I told her it would probably be there for days.

We rested a while then drove over to the Wharf in Orange Beach. Kind of a neat shopping area with a couple of restaurants. A Build A Bear Workshop was there and my kids didn't even ask to stop. Yeah!!!!

We then decided to go try LULU's again. This is the restaurant that Jimmy Buffets sister owns. We still had to wait about 35 minutes and it was 3:30 in the afternoon. It is really neat and well worth the stop. The outside has a gift shop, bar, sand play areas for the kids. Lots of chairs and picnic tables to wait at. They have live music at 6:00 p.m. We got a table right on the water. It is on the inter coastal waterway. Lots of boat traffic. You can even dock your boat right at the restaurant. There was a big sign that said she was going to be on the TODAY show Monday. I assume its for her cookbook or something.

Tim and I had these wonderful mango colodas. Oh my gosh. I was in heaven. We had fried okra and chips and salsa for appetizers. I had a "Cheeseburger in Paradise" literally! It was so good. You could add anything you wanted. I had grilled onions and pineapple. Tim had another fish dish of some kind. He loves it and where better to get it than down here where it's fresh. The kids played and played in sand even after dinner.

Then we were off to Wal Mart to get some more milk, cereal and water. Tim is busy looking for our next stop. The kids are really getting excited. Now they know Disney is just around the corner. We will try to drive the rest of the way into Florida tomorrow only leaving a couple of hours for Monday's drive. I am doing another load of laundry to get all the sand out of our beach towels.

So this is the last post from Gulf Shores, Alabama. This really is a neat place. Not too commercialized but lots to do. I am definitely thinking this will be another vacation just in itself.

Answers to comment questions.

Someone asked who we brought along to take all the family photos. Most of the pictures of all of us are the automatic timer on the camera. The picture of us in front of the fish was taken by the deck hand. Occasionally I will ask a passer by to take our picture. I haven't lost a camera yet...


Mom stated I should keep a list or something of what the kids think of the trip each day. I have done one better. Every night we are having BNN (Beebe News Network) each kids sits in the chair and reports their day. I always ask each one what their favorite part of the day was. These have been hilarious. I tried to upload the first day on the blog but I couldn't get it to work. I plan to make dvd movies. Josh has been hilarious. He gets a coffee cup and starts. He talks in the third person, like he was an observer of us during the day. He may have a career in this area.

Love you all! Heading to the beach!!