Last full day

Our trip is coming to an end and we have a very long trip looming ahead of us.  Today, I was tired.  I'm ready for home.  I miss healthy food, my dog, my Mum, my own bed and QUIET!  There has been constant background noise for 2 weeks and I just long for stillness. 

We headed back to Disney World today and I was determined to use public transport so we had to take 2 busses.  It was lovely to get back onto Disney property - such friendly staff and happy guests.  The weather was quite chilly and rain was forecast, so there weren't many people at Typhoon Lagoon and we could do the waterslides without waiting too long.  They were lots of fun but not as scary as other water parks.  There was a really great ride which had 3 routes that you took on a double tube and it was like a rollercoaster because it went down AND up.  They also have the largest pool in the world there and it is a wave pool - making an enormous, powerful 6ft wave every 2 minutes.  It was great.  We stayed for about 2 hours and did all the slides and then I was cold.  So we all had tattoos done and then headed off.

I wanted to go back to Hollywood Studios so that the kids could see the Little Mermaid show.  We had to get another 2 busses to get there and then we had to queue for over an hour.  I got irritable and grumpy.  We were the last people to get in the theatre and couldn't find 3 seats together so went right to the back and I sat on a vacant wheelchair.  Luke refused to sit on "somebody else's" wheelchair so he sat on the floor where he couldn't possible see the stage.  I got furious with him and instructed him to sit on the damn wheelchair.  Then later when he asked for a gobstopper, I refused to get it for him because he hadn't said "please".  I'm just tired and ready to go home and I'm afraid that I got a bit grumpy.

Then it started to rain.  We got ANOTHER 2 busses down to Downtown Disney because we wanted to go to Disney Quest.  Our fairy must have been cross with me for shouting at Luke because our tickets had expired and DQ was full anyway.  So then we went to wait for ANOTHER bus to take us to SeaWorld and we waited for nearly an hour. 

Eventually I gave up and we hailed a cab and travelled back to SeaWorld quickly and in style. 

SeaWorld was great and we all perked up.  We saw 3 great shows.  The first one was "Pets Ahoy" which was about 30 mins of dogs, cats, rats, birds and pigs doing some amazing stuff that the SeaWorld trainers had taught them to do.  It was especially great because all the animals had been saved from animal shelters.  The kids loved it.

We also went on the Journey to Atlantis simulated helicopter trip to the Arctic Circle.  And we walked through this amazing pipe of sharks.

Then we went to a comedy show with some sea lions where they mocked the rest of the shows at SeaWorld.  It was really funny.

And then finally, we went to another Shamu show (the killer whale).

Luke and I got to ride on the Manta one final time - it really was like flying.  Ali looked after the bags.  And then the kids went down the wet ride twice and got absolutely soaked through. 

So it all ended up fine, but it hasn't been the best day.  To airport tomorrow.  Really looking forward to getting home.

Too much of a good thing

With the idea of "saving the best 'til last", I had planned 2 big days today and tomorrow - the best Orlando attractions - Sea World and Universal Studios' Islands of Adventure.  We got to SeaWorld this morning before it opened so we could do the roller coaster rides without a queue and then spend the rest of the day at the numerous shows.  The first ride, Kraken, was tame compared to Busch Gardens - quite smooth, upside down about 4 times, enjoyable.  Then we went on Manta and it was amazing.  I couldn't take my camera, but here is a pic from the net:

When we got on the roller coaster, it was a normal kind of seat but our feet were also clamped into position.  Before the ride started, the seat was tilted 90 degrees forwards so that we were facing the floor and kneeling and that's the position that we stayed in for the duration of the ride (only a couple of minutes or so I guess).  So, when we went down the inside of the biggest loop, we were going head first and the g-force pushed us right back into the seat.  It was great. 

When we finished the ride, we noticed that there was a 'single rider' queue - ie: we could jump to the front of the queue and fill up any single gaps when the roller coaster was being loaded.  We decided this was a quick way to get back on the ride so we did it.  We all got on the same ride and did it again and it was just as fun - only it seemed quicker. 

But... when we got off the ride, Ali was in tears.  Oh dear!!!  She felt nauseous on the ride and was hot and clammy.  So we went outside and she lay down for 30 mins or so and she didn't feel any better.  I went to the first aid room to find out if they had any beds for her to rest and, when I went back to pick her up, she had vomited and was really unhappy.  We took her to the first aid bed and she rinsed out her mouth and had a sleep.  The sheet and pillowcase on the first aid bed were disposable!

After a couple of hours, she was feeling better, but wanted to go back to the hotel.  I managed to persuade her to go to the killer whale show because it's the high point of the park and, if we didn't go back again, she'd be sad to miss out on that.  So we did a slow walk to the Shamu Stadium and watched the show.  It really was incredible but the kids didn't really enjoy it to its full.

What a pity!  We're here only for another day and they have run out of steam. 

After the show, Ali wanted to go back to the hotel so we did.  Oh - what a waste of a precious day here!  I wish there was something I could do to give these kids just one final little bit of energy.  Ali just wants to rest and Luke is reading a good book.  They love the hotel room and just haven't got the energy anymore for one final push!  There is so much to see and do at SeaWorld and we've only just had a little glance at it.  What a waste!!!

As a big final day treat, I had purchased tickets for Universal Studios and I'd also purchased express tickets so that we could jump the queues and ensure that we'd get through the whole park in a day.  Even with express tickets, it was going to be a long day.  But Ali just hasn't got the energy and it's a huge waste of money if they're going to konk out before lunch.  So, with dragged feet, I got a refund for my tickets (lucky that they agreed).  I gave Luke and Ali a choice of about a dozen things to do tomorrow and they've both chosen to go back to Disney World to go to Typhoon Lagoon - the water park that we missed out on.  I'm holding thumbs that they have a tiny bit of energy left at the end of the day to go back to Hollywood Studios to see the Little Mermaid show and the fireworks.  Oh I really hope they do.  It will be sad to end the holiday when the kids are just too pooped to enjoy the very last day.

When Ali was comfy in bed in the hotel, Luke and I went out for lunch.  We had a yummy Greek lunch, but I struggled to talk to Luke.  He just wanted to get back to his book.  When I asked him if he'd learnt a lot on his holiday, he said, "No, not really."  So I feel a bit deflated now.  This really has been an amazing holiday and I guess that, when the kids read this blog in a couple of years, they will remember the great time that we've had and hopefully will reflect on all the things that they did learn about different cultures, health, the size of our planet, efficiencies, safety, currencies, how privileged we are to live in Africa so close to real wild life, what it feels like to walk the streets without constantly being reminded of the inequality gap in SA etc etc.  It's been a very varied and interesting trip and I guess that we're just too close to it right now for the kids to really be able to reflect on the holiday and appreciate it. 

Got back to the hotel and Al's feeling much better.  We had a game of cards together and I think she understands it now... or nearly... she did ask, "What if we've both got the Heart Ace?" 

Maybe I should leave the kids in the hotel for the evening and go back to SeaWorld ...  I've still got heaps of energy and really don't want to waste our last 40 hours here!  Ho Hum. 

...

Later... I did go back to SeaWorld for 2 hours or so.  Kids happy in the hotel room with a movie.  I saw a dolphin show which was really brilliant.

I'm sure tomorrow will be a good day.  The kids have had a good recharge this afternoon.  I definitely overestimated how much energy they had - I thought I'd be the one struggling to keep up with them!

Fun in the sun

Every morning when we wake up, I've got to nag Luke to get up and get ready and, most mornings, when Ali and I are ready, Luke hasn't put on his shoes, or sunscreen or or or.  So this morning I made a checklist (with little tokkies for him to tick) and a time that all must be done by.  It worked a treat.  He was ready before me this morning.  Yay!

So we had a wet day in the sun today.  We went to Aquatica - a water slide park.  We got there before 9am and did a few slides before the crowds built up and boy, did they build up!!!  It got super busy.

The slides were really good.  The first one, we had to sit on a single tube and the turns turned us around so that we couldn't help going backwards.  It was great.  Then we went on a double tube down a slide in the dark and when we shooted down into the pool, Luke was catapulted right out of the tube!  There was another slide that had a section of the tube that was see-through and went through a tank with dolphins swimming around.  Another slide shot us into a type of spiral bowl that we circulated about 3 times before continuing down the chute.  Then there were toboggan races which were really fast (and the wait wasn't very long). 

One of the best rides of the day was on a large tube that we could all sit in and we zooted really fast down a straight slide with bumpy plateaus.  Unfortunately, this slide also had the longest wait and I got frustrated because they could have run the slide much more efficiently.  Happily though, I really haven't had any reason to get frustrated with inefficiency on this holiday - what a pleasure!

There was also a wave pool which the sun beds overlooked (just like a real beach). 

There was a really fun circular current pool that pushed us along in a whirly current - it was terrific. 

We loved the double tube ride and the wait wasn't too long so we did it quite a few times.

So, it was all just really fun and good.  But 5 hours was enough and then the sun and chlorine got the best of all of us.  Here are some wrinkly fingers especially for you, Flops.

And here's a picture of how hectic the queues got:

I had to have a giggle at some of the people at the park.  The coast is really not that far away, but some people chose to come and sit at Aquatica all day and I'm pretty sure that this couple didn't get wet:

These parks all have the same overpriced food so we opted for the healthier option...  McDonalds.  How scary is that - for me to consider McDonalds more healthy than theme park food.  Ali got into one of her uncontrollable giggly moods afterwards and talked about McEverything.  The funniest was the McWrap on the menu which sounds rude if you say it quickly. 

By the end of this holiday, I think I would have had enough of theme parks to last me the rest of my life.  Once you've paid the entrance fee, the park is hell-bent on getting more money out of you:
- they have photographers all over the place issuing out numbers on armbands of pictures that they took of us that we could purchase for a cool $20 each.
- if you want a locker, you've got to pay again each time you open the thing.
- bagels, ice-creams, candy floss, popcorn are all on sale for exorbitant prices.
- you can rent a towel for the day.
- today we saw another money-making racket... here's a family dryer for $3!!!

We stopped off at Walgreens afterwards.  How's this for a choice of chewing gum:

And you can buy a baby alligator head if that's your thing:

We're having a relaxing afternoon.  Seaworld tomorrow and they're open from 9am - 10pm.  I intend to get there before it opens and there's enough to see and do there to keep us busy until closing.  So a bit of a rest this afternoon is probably a good idea.

I've just done a naughty at the hotel 'business centre'.  I ordered some Dermalogica because it's cheaper here than in SA.  The postage cost $10 and then the hotel wanted to charge me an additional $10 handling charge.  And, to make it worse, Drugstore.com packaged my order in 2 boxes, so the hotel wanted $20.  Argh!  I got out of paying the first $10 by promising to pay the second.  But they have really been useless.  I've been down there 5 times to pick up the package and haven't managed - they don't even bring it to the room.  I told the lady behind the desk that I'm going to write a bad review on TripAdvisor, so she went to call her manager.  She came back with the package (which she hid behind a screen), but no manager.  After waiting for nearly 10 minutes, I just reached over the screen, took the package and walked out.  Everybody wants their piece of the tourist wallet!!!

Then we played shaya tuffel but it was a bit like playing against myself twice.  I must have said, "Ali, your go", "Luke your go", "You must follow suit", "a 2 of trumps beats any other suit" a gazillion times.  We didn't finish the game and ended up with a massive pillow fight.

ADRENALIN!!!

Today has been a long day but utterly fantastic. We got a bus down to Busch Gardens which got us there some time after 10am. As I said, I was really concerned that we'd spend the entire day in long queues, but it wasn't that bad. There were 2 rides that we had to wait for an hour or so, but I think we got lucky for the rest. We were on the go non-stop from 10 to 7 and then flopped into the bus. The rides were fabulous – like Ratanga on steroids.  I’m sure that this is many of your worst nightmares, but we enjoyed it. Sorry - not many photographs because my camera spent most of the day in a locker, but there are a few.

We stared off with Montu in Egypt. A great smooth, long ride with our feet dangling Cobra-style.  The queue was only 5 minutes or so and the ride set the tone for the rest of the day.  It was awesome!  We went upside down about 4 times on the ride and it was really fast.

Then we went to ShieKra in Sanleyville.  The vote is unanimous – in terms of thrill, this ride is at the top of the top for all of us.  We went up a very steep up and then a plateau at the top.  The ride nudged us to the edge of the plateau and then… stopped… and hung there with our feed dangling… down a VERTICAL cliff!!  Then, after about 4 seconds, it just dropped us down the cliff.  It was terrifying and exhilarating.  There was another cliff further down the track but no precarious hanging before that one.  The funniest thing was the pictures at the end of the ride.  I didn’t want to spend $20 on the print, so I sneakily tried to take a picture of the picture.  It’s not a great pic, but… check Luke’s face!!! He was terrified!  
 

Afterwards, Luke said, “ShieKra has changed me for life.”  He actually lost his nerve a little after the ride.

I tried to take some pictures of the ride to give you an idea, but when I was standing there waiting for the big drop to happen, it didn’t because they were experiencing technical difficulties – so we were lucky to get on the ride twice.

 

After ShieKra, we went to Kumba in Congo.  Kumba was also having technical difficulties.  We decided that we’d just join the queue anyway in the hope that the ride would start up again soon.  And… just our luck.  As we joined the queue, the ride opened again.  So we only had a 5 minute wait.  Kumba was also great.  Similar to Montu, but our feet weren’t dangling.  It was also smooth and went upside down.

Then we went to Gwazi in Morocco.  Gwazi is “The Southeast’s largest and fastest double wooden roller coaster”.  We waited in the queue for over an hour.  It’s a very old roller coaster so there are only 2 cars taking 24 people each, so the turnaround time is quite long.  I didn’t hold out much hope for this ride because it seemed so old fashioned.  But I was wrong… it was awesome.  The thing that made is scary was that it was so bumpy and rickety, but really fast and long.  I was terrified that it would fall of the tracks! 

The bumps got to Ali who had a bit of a headache to start the day.  At the end of the ride, she went really quiet – her head was throbbing.  I took her to the first aid room and she took a Panado and was back to her normal smiley self about 15 mins later.  Gotta love those little white pills! 

On the topic of headaches - giving up coffee has cured mine for sure!

These theme parks really rip you off when it comes to food, so I had decided that we going to eat outside of the park… at McDonald’s.  We had not yet had a McD since being in the US and it’s such a part of their culture.  I thought we had to have at least one.  The walk was long and hot because we had to walk right out the parking area (bordered by a wall) and then back along the main road.  We sat at quite a funky table:

 
The food was actually quite satisfying.  As usual, this is out tray of rubbish to throw away after the meal:

There is nothing light about my ecological footprint after this holiday. 

We went back to the park and queued for another hour to do the Cheetah Run.  One part of the queue was along a wall that was rough and bumpy and covered with squished pieces of chewed chewing gum…  yuck!  Then, further along the queue, somebody had puked… ewwwgh.   When we (finally) got on the ride, the attendants kept on giving the thumbs down because their equipment told them that things were not A OK.  Eventually, they had to ask Mr Fat Guy to please get off the ride!  This also happened at SheiKra!  It that was me, I would have been so embarrassed, but they didn’t seem to mind.  The ride was superfast and long and a real thrill.

Then we saw a ballroom dancing show which was glitzy and fantastic – not your traditional ballroom.
 

Then we went to the Phoenix which is like the Congo Queen but it goes all the way over.  The kids didn’t like the Congo Queen at Ratanga and they didn’t want to do the ride.  I have had a bet with the kids and they are not allowed to chicken out of any of the rides.  This one beat them, so I headed out on my own.  It was scary and dangling upside down for a couple of seconds really turned my tummy.  I gloated when I got back and then we went on the ShieKra again.  But the Phoenix ate Ali up and we had to go back to give her another chance.  Luke chickened out – can you believe it!!! So Ali went all on her own. 

Here she is returning triumphant!

 

She persuaded Luke it wasn’t that bad and then we all went on it together.  So nobody has completely chickened out of anything… yet.

And that was that… 7pm and time for the bus back to Orlando.  Take away pizza and now time for a good sleep.

Our fairy is still very much with us. Turns out that the Florida schools went back today (no Easter Monday public holiday in the US).  So the queues were much worse over the weekend.  Also, I was beginning to think that we should have done Disney at the end of our trip, but it's turned out really well with the way that we've done it. The Busch Gardens roller coasters were a much bigger thrill than the Disney rides so the kids would have been disappointed if we'd done Disney last. Disney was awesome with its creativity and the build-up to the rides in the queue. Busch Gardens queues were just boring queues, but the thrill factor was bigger than Disney for sure.

I’ve deliberately missed out the fact that Busch Gardens is centred in a big zoo.  My worst thing.  I just closed my eyes to all of those sad animals.

Another funny thing that happened.  On TV last night, in preparation for April Fools Day, there was a demo on how to apple pie a bed.  When we were on the bus on the way home, Ali whispered to me, “When Luke is in the shower, can we do that thing to the sheets in the bed?”  I just laughed and said, “You do realise that you have to sleep in that bed with him?!”