A cure for the post-vacation blues....

Okay, so we're a little sad to be back in the real world of cover letter writing, bill paying, and grocery shopping. Never fun. But it's hard to feel too sad when the weather is a perfect 80 degrees and sunny with a gentle breeze. There is no humidity to speak of, and there is just a touch of fall in the air. Perfect, perfect late summer weather.

Sunday for us is Flour day. If there is one thing both of us love, it is a perfectly executed baked good. Cooking is definitely a skill and sometimes a difficult one at that, but baking is an art. Northampton offered us some good baked good options, but none that can top the creations that we get each Sunday morning from Flour. Usually we sample their muffins and super strong coffee, but today - in honor of our post-vacation blues - we splurged and brought home some of Flour's famous sticky buns:

If possible, they are even better than they look, and they look pretty darn good.

Bunny, too, is enjoying the nice weather and the long weekend:

More updates to come when we figure out how to enjoy the rest of the long weekend.

It's over. (The vacation, not the blog.)

It's over, folks. Now that we're home and unpacked I thought I'd offer my final thoughts on the trip. From here on out, look for this blog to be a chronicle of our "staycation" activities in Boston and a general place to record our activities, near and far. In the meantime, we reflect.

AFG's Trip Down Vacation Memory Lane:

The Good:

-JetBlue. Good (free!) snacks, good seats, good on-board entertainment to distract from the prospect of plummeting to one's death. How can you lose?

-Our lodging, both at the Omni in Orlando and at the Saratoga Springs resort on Disney property. Both of these properties were - in different ways - pretty spectacular. The Omni was beautiful, modern, and luxurious. Saratoga was a bit more family-friendly and worn in, but Disney gets the details right. Disney solves problems. Any issue we had was a) minor and b) solved incredibly quickly, often before we even noticed a problem.

-California Grill, Contemporary Resort. I know I raved about this in an earlier post, but several days have gone by and I am still thinking about my meal. Friends and I have spent much time discussing the demise of "fine" dining here in Massachusetts (our standards aren't even that high, but when nearly every restaurant now requires you to bus your own dishes, you start to long for something better), so it was refreshing to have a meal that involved good food, service, views, and company. We really are missing the boat by rejecting slow food. Just saying.

The Not-so-Good:

-Florida weather. August is not for the faint of heart. When you're not dodging tropical storms and hurricanes (See: Fay; Gustav; Hanna), you still have afternoon thunderstorms, oppressive heat and humidity, and evening temperatures that rarely fall below 80. Even in our air-conditioned room, we could still feel dampness and see mold growing between the panes of glass in the windows. Bring the Benadryl, folks; you're going to need it.

-Bad parenting. I know I sound like an 85-year-old curmudgeon, but seriously parents; let's do some parenting, ok? I'm not sure when personal boundaries or clean language went out of style, but it was weird to feel out of place because I wasn't touching strangers lewdly or swearing at the other members of my party. Isolated incidents are one thing, but we saw a lot of bad behavior from both kids and parents.

-Disney bus system. I generally had high hopes for Disney in this age of environmentalism, but my hopes were dashed. The bus system is now so inefficient and unreliable that I can see why the masses bring their cars, RVs, and Hummers-replete-with-car-toppers. If you're a family with a limited time schedule, you don't want to spend half of your day in the hot Florida sun waiting for a bus that may or may not come.

And on that note, wherefore art, Disney, thou innovative recycling system and energy efficiency plans, etc? Disney has a captive audience of young minds it could educate about the importance of recycling and resource conservation, and yet generally does little to earn its "green" lodging designation. It was nice to see plastic recycling receptacles in the theme parks, but our hotel room/buildings didn't have receptacles to recycle anything, plastic, paper, or otherwise. I shudder to think at the amount of unnecessary waste Disney creates in a day. I mean, COME ON - even Wal Mart has gone green (?!).

-Disney Dining. Disney has made changes in dining options and prices that punish users who don't buy the Disney Dining Plan, and yet sometimes punish those who do, as well. Confused? So were we. If we go again we may buy into the Plan, but I think I'll need to obtain an advanced degree in calculus to figure out the cost benefit analysis. And while prices in general were lower than I expected (we spend more on food at Fenway for similar things), I think the quality has declined in some areas.

The Horrible, and/or Will-Never-EVER-Do-or-See-Again:

-Universe of Energy, aka Ellen's Energy Adventure, Epcot. With gas nearing 5 bucks a gallon, do we *really* need to see free advertising for Exxon? I mean, I know it's novel when you combine propaganda with a moving ride vehicle, but enough is enough. Two thumbs WAY DOWN.

-Beverly, the Italian (and Coke-produced) beverage featured at Club Cool, Epcot.

OK, so for those of you who aren't familiar with this particular "attraction," it's basically Coca-Cola propaganda disguised in the form of a beverage tasting center where you can taste Coke products from around the world. Some of them, like the Coke/orange soda mix from Germany are quite good. Beverly from Italy has a notorious reputation as being disgusting; stupidly, I doubted this and thought that other tasters must not have discerning palettes. I was wrong. So wrong. So wrong I actually spit it out of my mouth in public, manners be damned. Never again.

Other thoughts:

-It's readily apparent that the American dollar has tanked. During the week we noticed many American visitors (like ourselves) eating lower-cost meals or snacking while many European and Canadian visitors flocked to the more expensive signature restaurants and stayed at the deluxe resorts. There is no judgment meant by this observation, except to suggest that it's really a strange turn to think that so many Americans cannot as easily afford amusement and leisure in their own country, to say nothing of our inability to enjoy the value of the dollar abroad. I suppose we were overdue for this. We spoke to many Canadians throughout the week who were laughing at our present misfortune; one woman said that never in her lifetime had she seen the Canadian dollar higher than the American!

-Disney is still great, but it's not the Disney of my youth. I suppose this is true for most things in our lives we try to revisit; they never stay as they were. But I think there is an undeniable reality that in this time of economic uncertainty, Disney is cutting costs with the best of them. It really did feel at times like Disney had outgrown itself, and you could see these new found limitations in a decline in service, a rise in wait times, and a lack of property upkeep that would be unthinkable just ten years ago. I'm about to read this book to learn more about this shift.

Nevertheless, we had a great time and agreed that Disney has an edge on hospitality and professionalism that most other tourism outfits can't match. Our left-brain critiques were no match for our right-brain fun, and thus, we find ourselves eager to return. If and when we do, expect a report here!

In the meantime, we're busily crafting our list of fun, blog-worthy things to see, do, and recount. Stay tuned!

Vacation, Day 9

This post brought to you by Hennepin (tm) beer and Barack Obama! Well, our sponsors aren't so official; actually, last night we toasted Obama's acceptance speech while having some very nice Belgian beer. So here's to you, Barack...nicely done.

Anyway, greetings once again from Massachusetts. We're back. It's....Massachusetts. The weather is nice, it's great to see our cat and our stuff, but I'm still a little sad. There is always post-vacation letdown, no?

Onto our last night in Florida. Yesterday was another abbreviated day of touring, thanks mainly to the oppressive heat. We spent much of the morning packing up and doing laundry, and then headed out around 2pm to do some final shopping and to ride a few rides. Our game of bus roulette was not fun yesterday. Instead of taking the Downtown Disney bus that went by 1....2......3.... times, we waited close to an hour for the Epcot bus to arrive. This experience, coupled with a later bus excursion, really did confirm for me the value of renting a car. (More on that later.)

As we waited for the invisible bus, we took some final shots of the Saratoga Springs Resort:


My review of the Saratoga is generally positive; the rooms are well-appointed and the facilities are lush with very thoughtful landscaping. In general, the buildings are far enough apart that claustrophobia is never really an issue, and public spaces are planned out in such a way so as to avoid crowding. That being said, the resort is almost so large as to be unwieldy and was so far removed from everything that both taking buses to the theme parks and walking the path to nearby Downtown Disney took a great deal of time away from the business of having fun. The public areas are nice, but lack the themeing that really unifies other Disney resorts. Plus, Saratoga is the host Disney Vacation Club resort for visitors looking to see model units and learn about ownership, so there is a steady stream of visitors that can be cumbersome, especially if you were staying in our building, Springs 33. The positives, however, far outweighed the negatives, and at Disney the issue is usually one of mere personal preference, not major problems.

Anyway. We finally caught our bus to Epcot, and once disembarked from said bus, we hightailed it to Soarin' to obtain FastPasses for a ride later in the day. Next, we decided to hit Test Track and see how long both the regular and the single rider lines were. The single rider line was only 20 minutes, but we decided to ride together and go in the 40 minute line:

This is my old car, the Malibu, after several run-ins with the barrier test and a host of other safety inspections. nice, huh?

As I've said before, a 40 minute wait usually turns out to be shorter than that, and this ride was no exception. After maybe 20 minutes we boarded our test car, and were delighted to find out that the track crew (ahem) was allowing us to stay in our car and ride the ride again with no wait. Nice! Would have been even better if the ride hadn't broken down while we were on it the second time (Test Track is notorious for this), but still a great ride. Here, a video I took while going out on the test loop at 65+ MPH:

Unfortunately, the g-forces felt at about the end of the film above made me accidentally hit the "off" button on my camera, so you can't see the end of the ride. You'll just have to go yourselves!

By this time it was blistering hot and humid out, so we decided to take a bus back to our resort, clean up a bit, and walk over to Downtown Disney to do some final shopping. According to the Lego Loch Ness Monster, a storm was brewing:

By walking quickly, we were able to complete all of our tasks before the deluge, including another stop at the Ghirardelli Soda Shop to have an iced mocha. Incidentally, NCH, CPA is correct - the mochas here *are* incredible!

Just as the first raindrops started to fall, we packed up and were ready to head back to Epcot. For some reason, I thought that one could easily find buses at Downtown Disney that would go to each of the theme parks. I was wrong. Our next plan was to take an Epcot resort bus - one that would take us to a hotel within walking distance of Epcot - and simply walk from there. We were buyoyed to discover that a bus for the Boardwalk Hotel showed up within minutes, and thought that we would get to Epcot quickly.

We. Were. Wrong.

After boarding the bus, we did not proceed directly to the Boardwalk Hotel. No, our bus stopped first at Typhoon Lagoon, a water park that closed at 6pm (the precise moment we boarded the bus) and was full of half-naked tourists running with wet hair, arms flailing behind them. And of course, all of them wanted to board our bus, because it wasn't just a bus for the Boardwalk, but also for the Yacht Club, Beach Club, Swan, and Dolphin hotels. (You can see where this is going.) So now, we're on a hot bus full of damp, cranky people and we have to stop at all five hotels before we can exit.

This was a long trip. Never, ever again will I do Disney without a rental car, even for a day. This goes against nearly every "green" principle I espouse, but I think blame goes two ways. There is much, much more Disney could do to improve transportation efficiency; until it does so, I can see why 70% of people choose to drive to Disney on their vacations. I may rant about this in the future, but for now, we continue....

Back to Epcot! We have arrived. Finally! We now have six minutes left on our FastPass to ride Soarin', and as the rain really starts to come down, we run through the World Showcase and Futureworld at an alarming clip, nearly taking down small children in the process. We make it to Soarin', and are thrilled to see that our FastPass line moves right along.

Until it turns the corner.

And we wait.

And wait.

And wait some more......

The posted line wait time for Soarin' was 60 minutes. By my watch, we waited nearly 45 minutes to ride, even with FastPasses. I don't know if this is a design flaw of the ride queue itself or a human failure to load riders efficiently, but WOW did we end up in line with some grumpy people because of this. When we *finally* gain entrance, we are rewarded with the top seat of the glider, giving us an unobstructed view and full immersion into the film. I can't speak highly enough of this ride. If you are ever in Orlando or in Anaheim at either Disney park, it's worth the price of admission to do this just once.

After Soarin', we decide to finish our last night in the World Showcase, seeing and doing the few things there that we missed on our first four (seriously!) visits to the park this week. We vetoed the Mexican boat ride, both because the Mexico area is always mobbed and the ride has been updated in a vaguely racist way that I just can't really get behind. Next up was Norway, where we rode the Malestrom boat ride, a short but very cute ride through forests full of ogres and trolls.

After leaving Norway, it was off to China and Japan for some shopping, and then to Germany for a pretzel to stave off hunger. Within moments, the evening IllumiNations program began, and we walked quickly to the front to beat the crowds and catch our bus to go back to the hotel. It was hard not to linger; in spite of everything - my liberal critiques, my bad experiences working there, my cynicism - it is always hard to leave this place.

But we did. Twenty minutes later, we were back in our room, watching Obama give his speech, packing our bags and readying ourselves for the 4:45 am wake-up-call.

Vacation, Day 8

Ah, the end of vacation is near. And with it, mixed emotions.

On the one hand, we've had a great time in Florida; I knew we'd have fun, but even I am pleasantly surprised to find my cynicism about Disney and this tourist mecca waning. Sure, critiques are warranted, but if you can suspend disbelief and just allow yourself to have fun, it really can be a magical place.

It's also been incredibly restorative to have a block of time in which we could really do nothing but have fun. Yes, we've done some job searching and even interviewing and have done some worrying (neither one of us has been employed since early summer; we've both come heart-wrenchingly close on a number of occasions, but have yet to close the deal), but mostly we have slept late, relaxed, and felt free to take a slow pace and just observe. I notice I even drive more slowly here! (Note, also: we really *do* drive poorly in Massachusetts!)

On the other hand, I will speak only for myself and say that I am - at least in part - ready to go back to reality, ready to see the cat and cooler weather and to start moving forward with a plan. Now that family medical drama is (hopefully) wrapping up and we are a bit more energized after a tough start to the year, it's time to think about career and five-year plans and all that good stuff. I miss my bed, my food, and all the small things that make daily routines so comforting.

Enough waxing philosophical. Onto the trip report!

Yesterday found us doing our now patented mix of relaxing in the hotel room and going out later in the day in (somewhat) cooler weather. Our day also had a somewhat unnatural break in it, because we had to return our land yacht of a rental car at a nearby hotel and walk back to Disney property. On the way, we stopped at Downtown Disney to visit the Ghirardelli Chocolate Shop and have a sundae:

My traditional hot fudge sundae is on the left (verdict? Great fudge; I've had better ice cream. Admittedly we are spoiled living in Massachusetts, what with Herrell's and Christina's and the like), and CP's "Midnight Royale" is on the right.

We spent an hour or so browsing the shops, not so much because we wanted to buy, but because it's quite fascinating to see what Disney sells and to whom. Around 2:30 we headed to the Regal Sun Resort (not so regal, actually) to return our car, after which we walked back to Downtown Disney to catch a boat back to our resort, which you can see in the background of the picture:

By this time, it was about 96 outside with 80% humidity, so we holed up in our room to watch convention coverage and catch a nap. Later, and now without a car, we headed to the bus stop to play bus roulette and take the first bus that came our way. Moments later, we were headed to Disney Studios again.

Our stop here was brief; things were surprisingly crowded and there wasn't much we wanted to do again, so we headed to the Tower of Terror for another drop. When that was finished, we headed to the exit to once again play bus roulette; this time, we boarded a Magic Kingdom bus and ended up at the Transportation and Ticket Center, where we decided to take a walkway to the Polynesian Resort.

Now, this is one of my favorites. The exterior is certainly dated, but somehow its datedness is comforting. It's also one of the oldest Disney resorts, meaning the designers were much more liberal with open space and a precise design aesthetic. The results are pretty breathtaking.

Some of my first (and fondest) Disney memories are from the Polynesian, so it was a fun few minutes of nostalgia to walk the beaches and tour the Great Ceremonial House:


Next, we hopped on the monorail and rode it back to Epcot. Our intention was to head back to Japan for another kaki-gori, but they were all out of shaved ice and we had to settle for frozen drinks from Morocco instead.

Although it was almost fireworks time, we decided to beat the crowds and head out. Instead of walking all the way through Epcot again, we took the World Showcase exit and hopped a boat headed toward the Epcot resorts. We exited at the Boardwalk Hotel:

I wish the picture was better, because the Boardwalk is a surprisingly beautiful hotel. Something about the buildings and the landscape and the actual Boardwalk just works. We poked our heads into the bakery and the candy shop and the ESPN restaurant (where we even got to catch some of the Sox/Yankees game), and then headed out to catch a bus to Downtown Disney. From there, we quickly fled the crowds and found the walkway back to our resort. After some convention coverage, we turned in for the night.

Today is our last day, and as you can see, we're not out cramming every last minute in that we can. It's once again blisteringly hot, so we're doing free laundry, packing, and even some job searching. Later today, we'll head out to get some final time on the rides at Epcot, and maybe will find a few souveneirs. Then, I'll start taking more drugs in preparation for my favorite (ha!) thrill ride, flying.

More updates to come!

Vacation, Day 7

Again, another late post. I keep meaning to come back at night and instantly post, but a) we're tired and b) we keep getting sucked into the Democratic Convention, and without wireless internet here (Disney is a little behind on this front, I'd say), I can't post and watch at the same time. This post is long, and has a lot of pictures. Enjoy (?).

Anyway, Day 7. Still hot, still humid, but sunnier, so it's not all bad. We began our day yesterday with a breakfast at Boma, a restaurant in the Animal Kingdom Lodge reputed to have the best breakfast buffet on property. Being vegetarians we usually don't get our money's worth out of a buffet (probably not a bad thing, but still), but after several days of Kashi bars and bottled Starbucks for breakfast, we were ready for some protein and fruit and such.

Upon arriving, CP and I had a debate about whether the Animal Kingdom Lodge "essentializes" African culture. I'm not sure we reached a conclusion, but see for yourself:


I'm divided on the issue. What would a non-essentialized African "resort" look like? And couldn't one make the argument that all properties at Disney - even the American-themed ones, like the Boardwalk Hotel - are essentialized?

As we pondered these big questions, we headed to breakfast. I've had better (hard to top Esselon pancakes, in my opinion), but for Disney it definitely hit the spot. After, we wandered around the hotel and stopped to take this picture for MK and BB:

If you want some, we'll pick them up :-)

Next, we ran back to our hotel because I forgot my wallet, but this gave us time to load up on sunscreen (55 SPF and I am *still* a little burned. How do people live here??) and then head out to Disney's Hollywood Studios. As I predicted, CP really liked this park and found the architecture and costuming to be the best of any Disney park:


Next, we walked toward that pink building in the background, the Hollywood Tower Hotel, also known as the Tower of Terror:

Amazingly, we walked right on this ride and had little time to enjoy the design and themeing, which admittedly is pretty great:

As always, a great ride.

Next, we checked out the Aerosmith Rock n' Rollercoaster, for which we grabbed FastPasses and headed on our way. We saw the Muppets 3-D movie, and then tried to ride the new Toy Story ride, which had an 80 minute wait and no FastPasses left. By this time, it was incredibly hot and even more humid than when we arrived, so we decided to go back to Rock n' Rollercoaster and wait in line, figuring that the wait would be much less than the posted 40 minutes. The wait time itself wasn't bad; the line moved decently and had plentiful fans and even some air conditioning. The worst part was that we were sandwiched between two families, each containing between 3 and 5 children, all who had no conception of personal space or boundaries. They yelled, kicked, screamed, fondled us, pushed us, slapped us. This went on for nearly half an hour, until we subtly stood by the wall and let all of them pass us in line. We finally boarded the ride and thoroughly enjoyed it, even though it further destroyed my hair and left me crying from the speed.

By this time it was the hottest part of the day, so we decided to grab some ice cream and head toward the exit:

Incidentally, it was just about time for the 3 o' clock parade. Did you know one of the most frequently asked questions in Disney World is "what time is the 3 o' clock parade?" Seriously. In spite of our shared disdain for most parades, we lingered for a few minutes to eat our ice cream and see what it was about. Much to our delight, Pixar!


We then headed back to our hotel, spent a couple hours napping, snacking, and catching up on convention coverage. Next up? An evening at Epcot. We only had a few hours til park closing, but we wanted to walk through the World Showcase, have a snack, and watch the evening fireworks before heading back to watch more convention coverage (notice a theme here? It's hard for nerds to turn off the TV during an election, even on vacation.)

One could make another essentializing argument about the country representations in Epcot, but generally I think Disney does a pretty nice job with the food, shopping, and cultural depictions in each location. Of course Epcot is no substitute for visiting the real thing, but I think for those people who for whatever reason can't or choose not to travel abroad, it's at least a decent introduction.

On Sunday we had seen Canada, Japan, and Britain, so we skipped around and visited France first:


Next, we stopped in Morocco, which I think is one of the most interesting country pavilions in Epcot. It's run by the Moroccan government, not Disney, and according to CP who has actually been to Morocco, it's quite an accurate representation.


We then breeze fairly quickly through Italy and Germany (Italy is the weakest pavilion, I think, and Germany was too mobbed with visitors to really see thoroughly. I returned later for a pretzel and beer, though!), and then stopped in China:

We then visited Norway and Mexico at the end of the World Showcase, both of which were too mobbed to really see thoroughly. Even the bizarre-and-usually-empty boat ride in Norway had a 30-minute ride, so we peeked in the shops and went on our way. By now it was after 8pm, and when we stumbled upon a good location where we could sit and watch the fireworks, we camped out.

In spite of my Disney ambivalence, I have always been a sucker for the Epcot fireworks display, IllumiNations. I think it has a good message about global cooperation and human progress; it's accessible; and it's really, really pretty and has a great score. I was less impressed last night, however, because the central piece of IllumiNations, the giant globe, is sidelined for refurbishment. Without it, I don't think the story comes through as well. Nevertheless, we enjoyed.

Did we go out after this and party late into the evening? Nope! We came back to the hotel and watched Hillary's speech. Sadly, for us, this is a great way to spend a vacation.

Vacation, Day 6

A slow news day, so to speak. Actually, it's a slow news day in part because we've been watching the news. Lots of news! It's Democratic National Convention time, and frankly, we are riveted. (us=nerds. it's okay; go ahead and say it.)

We began the day with intentions to once again visit Epcot before CP had a phone interview for a job at 2:15 (interview went well, thank you for asking!). After being at the Magic Kingdom until 1am last night, we didn't even get up until 9am, so we were off to a slow start. By the time we arrived at Epcot around 10:30am, it was unbelievably hot and humid and Epcot was mobbed with visitors. Almost as soon as we arrived, we decided to go back to the hotel. This is the nice thing about having a rental car and flexible park tickets; you really can come and go as you please and not feel like you're missing out.

When we returned to our resort, we took care of our internet problems, stocked up on bottled water (realized during said hot morning that we were really dehydrated. How do people live here full time??), and went to the laundry room to do free - yes, FREE! - laundry. In a beautiful facility! In brand new machines! One could get used to this. (You can tell we've been renters for too long, huh?) CP had the phone interview, and we spent much of the rest of the afternoon hiding from the heat and watching coverage of the convention in Denver.

The day wasn't totally spent in the hotel, however. Around 5pm, we departed for the Magic Kingdom area for our 5:30 reservation at the California Grill, one of Disney's (supposed) best restaurants that sits on the top floor of the Contemporary Resort. The Contemporary is one of my favorite Disney hotels; I have fond memories of being three years old and staying there on my first trip to Disney. (At some point I'll scan pictures of that and post here.) CP was quite taken by the architectural style of the hotel:

Incidentally, we read in one of our Disney guidebooks (yes, we have them) that the Contemporary was the site of Nixon's infamous "I am not a crook" speech.

Once inside the Contemporary, we checked in on floor two and were whisked in a private elvator to the 15th floor. We were seated immediately (I love early bird dinners!) at a table right by the window overlooking the Seven Seas Lagoon. From our table, we could see the Magic Kingdom, all of the Magic Kingdom resorts, and even Epcot and the Disney Studios in the distance. The view was breathtaking, but short lived. I couldn't get any good pictures, but a MASSIVE thunderstorm rolled in, and we had perfect views of cloud-to-ground lightning on all sides. Maybe it wasn't as exciting as seeing the Magic Kingdom fireworks from our table, but I thought it was pretty exciting nonetheless.

Onto the food. As vegetarians, we are pretty used to restaurants being accommodating of our "dietary needs." At the California Grill, we were not accommodated. We were wowed! Without asking, we were informed of every vegetarian item on the menu, and were also told of vegetarian options that were not on the menu that the chefs would make special for us. Disney or no, this experience was unusual.

We both started the meal with an heirloom tomato, roasted garlic, and provolone flatbread. Next, I had a salad with roasted peaches, blue cheese, candied pecans, and an orange-honey vinaigrette, and CP had an heirloom tomato salad with red onion, sherry vinegar, ricotta insalata, and microbasil. Both were excellent. For our entree, each of us had the chef's special, which looked like this:

On the top left is handmade zucchini ravioli with roasted tomatoes, kalamata olives, and fried squash blossoms. On the top right is taro gnocchi with corn butter sauce, rosemary fingerling potatoes, confit garlic, currant tomatoes, and eggplant. On the bottom left is goat cheese polenta with button mushrooms and sauteed haricot vert. On the bottom right? I have no idea. I was too full to get there! I believe it is an off-menu impromptu flatbread creation, but we were both stuffed and couldn't quite get there.

The nice thing about the California Grill - or at least the nice thing about how our server handled things given the massive line at the door - is that we were able to have a leisurely meal, which allowed us to digest between courses and really enjoy the food. All told, our dinner took three hours! We concluded by splitting a Valrhona molten chocolate cake with apricot sauce and house-made apricot ice cream. Amazing. Just amazing.

We rolled ourselves out of the hotel - here is a picture of the monorail rolling into the hotel:

We're really hoping to stay there if we make a return trip. It's retro in all the right ways, and tastefully updated in others. Plus, it's literally steps from the Magic Kingdom, and has a monorail! We are fans.

Now, we are in our hotel room, watching the DNC and its tribute to Ted Kennedy. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a bit teary. Waiting for Michelle Obama now.

Tomorrow, we get back to the business of being "real" tourists. I think we're headed to the Animal Kingdom Lodge for a good breakfast, and then we're going to either the Disney Studios or Animal Kingdom. Much depends on the heat, I'm sure. We'll keep you posted.

Part Two of Day 5

See, I really am making up for lost time. Here's the conclusion of our activities yesterday, alternately titled "Extra Magic Hours? Not so Magical." Yes indeed.

After an impromptu dinner of Thai noodles (thanks! Thai Kitchen microwave products! You're amazing.) and other snacks, we hit the road again for our second night at the Magic Kingdom. Because we're staying on Disney property we could take advantage of the Extra Magic Hours, meaning the park would stay open for us until 1am, three hours after the normal 10pm closing.
Here's a shot of the sunset over our resort as we left:

After arriving by monorail (let's be honest; we're going to ride it every chance we get), we headed over to Tomorrowland (another area of Disney that looks about 20 years overdue for a rehab) to get FastPasses for the Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin. To kill time before that ride, we went and saw Mickey's Philharmagic, a 3-D movie and music experience that incorporates smells, sounds, and other special effects (including being doused with water). Hands down, the most amazing 3-D experience ever, and usually I could care less about 3-D.

Next, we rode It's a Small World (I know, I know. What were we thinking???) Surprisingly, this ride is much nicer than I remember, due I believe to a recent rehab that improved the sound quality and restored the visual elements to their original World's Fair vibrance. Here, a shot taken when we got stuck at the end of the ride waiting to disembark:

The ride itself was fairly unremarkable, save the Darwin-Award-winning child who sat in front of us and constantly stuck her arm into the water and under the boat, playing with the boat track and narrowly missing amputation. I am not stating this too strongly; as a child, I was at Disney when a girl did exactly the same thing and ended up horribly disfigured when her arm became trapped between the boat and the loading dock. After grimacing for most of the ride and silently cursing out the girl's parents, we disembarked. For such a child-centered ride, it was quite a tense few minutes!

Next, we returned to Buzz Lightyear to use our FastPasses, and exited the ride at just about 10pm. We debated watching the 10pm fireworks from Tomorrowland, but decided instead to walk through the crowds to go to the back of the park and ride some of the bigger rides that would be open late. Well, we barely made it through the hoardes of screaming children (and parents!), but we did manage to snap some pictures on the way to Frontierland:

Incidentally, I know from working at Disney that the Magic Kingdom has to have several fire trucks on hand each night during the fireworks show, as invariably the fireworks catch brush, weeds, and trees on fire with surprising frequency.

Next, we hurried to Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and found it had a posted wait time of 40 minutes. Undaunted, we entered the line and found it to be more like 5 minutes. (We have learned that if a sign says 5 minutes, it really means 40 and vice versa.) After riding, we debated riding BTMR again, but were HORRIFIED to see THRONGS OF PEOPLE (again, can't state this too strongly) EVERYWHERE!! Naively, I sort of thought that the park being restricted to resort guests only would mean that it would be emptier with far shorter waits. Well, I was dead wrong about that.

Abandoning our hopes for another BTMR ride, we decided to ride Pirates of the Caribbean again, thinking maybe it would be as empty as the previous night. Not a chance. We did get on, although not quickly, and found the ride to be a bit less fun when filled to the brim with stinky, screaming boatmates. After PoC, I took CP for a cruise on Walt Disney's journey-into-the-heart-of-colonialism-ride, otherwise known as the Jungle Cruise. Again, the 5 minute posted wait time turned out to be more like half an hour, but we perservered and were rewarded with a very funny skipper. The corny jokes are even cornier than when I was a kid.

By this time it was close to midnight; we were tired and hot (no storms yesterday, so no relief from the heat), so we decided to check out Space Mountain and then hightail it out of there. As we crossed through Fantasyland, I noticed that Cinderella Castle was finally open for visitors (it used to be an open walkway all the time, but now during the day showcases some kind of Princess show), so I snapped a couple pictures of the Cinderella tile mosaics:


On a whim, we rode the Winnie the Pooh ride since CP is an AA Milne fan; a good ride, but I wouldn't wait more than 10 minutes or so for it. Clearly, I am not in the 4 year old demographic they are shooting for! Space Mountain turned out to be MOBBED - at least an hour wait, and no FastPasses left to avoid the crowds - so we gave up and exited the park.

To get to our car we again had to take the monorail, which normally would be a thrill. Not during Extra Magic Hours. During regular park hours there is an express monorail that takes visitors directly to the parking area, but during the late hours only the resort monorail runs, which means making extra stops on monorails even more crowded than normal. If the cattle-car feeling wasn't bad enough, our line-mates were obnoxious whiners (I'm referring to the adults here; the children were all up way past bedtimes and at least had an excuse for bad behavior) who hurled expletives and instructed their children to commit bad behaviors all in service of cutting the line and boarding the monorail faster. This was backed up by a chorus of screaming coming from the hoardes of toddlers who clearly weren't used to staying up until 1am. Absolute madness. Madness!

Around 12:45 we poured ourselves into the rental car and headed back to the hotelresort. It's definitely nice to stay on property where the drive "home" takes mere minutes, so we were showered and sleeping shortly after 1:15.

A final note about Florida weather, with some visual evidence. The humidity here is KILLING us. It's hard to breathe (my allergies HATE Florida, to boot), it feels uncomfortable, and it's doing crazy things to my hair. Exhibit A: My hair before leaving the golf resort yesterday morning:

Exhibit B: My hair after a day in the Florida heat and humidity:

Sadly, this was not as bad as it was the day before. It's lucky for me that no one knows me here.

Next up - politics, good food, and Hollywood.

Vacation, Day 5

Okay, so I lied about the whole "super special two posts in one day!" thing. We had technical difficulties upon arriving in Disney; namely, the problem was that I couldn't locate an internet cord that was supposed to be in the closet. Problem solved, so today - really! - you will get at least two super exciting, picture-and-drama-filled posts about our second (and third) day in Disney World. Warning: this one is a long one! Feel free to skip along.

After departing our golf resort yesterday morning, we set out in search of some real food. My parents have some strange eating habits - my mother doesn't eat much, my stepfather works long hours - so consequently, since arriving on Wednesday we had eaten approximately two real meals. We ended up driving aimlessly for awhile in search of food. We first visited Celebration, a planned community (city, really) started by the Disney company in the 1990s, but recently sold to private developers. It still looks creepily like a scene from the Truman Show, but a little less Disney-fied:

Above, the Sunday morning farmer's market in downtown Celebration.

Next, I took CP for a drive up and down US-192, a main road through Kissimmee, the heart of central Florida tourist territory. It was totally, totally tacky, and I just can't bear to post the pictures. Other than Denny's and Chili's and other chain restaurants, we didn't really find any decent food options. We then headed to Downtown Disney, the main shopping area on Disney property, and grabbed a sandwich here, a chain restaurant that claims original creation of the sandwich some 250 years ago. I'm not sure I buy that, but it was definitely better than the Earl of Panera, so we were satisfied.

After eating, we took a few minutes to walk around Downtown Disney and poke around in the shops. One of my perennial favorites - and I think CP's new favorite - is the Lego store. In addition to having every Lego piece ever created, they also have some pretty fantastic Lego sculptures:

Here, a close-up:

Finally feeling relieved of hunger, we ventured over to our hotel (ahem, resort, to use the official Disney parlance) to check in. Our room was ready three hours early, so we were able to move all our stuff in and get settled.

By this time, it was about 2pm, and we were just now ready to start our day in the parks. With the extra magic hours (more on that later), we were able to start at 2pm and end our day at 1am, so we got in nearly a full day of activity without having to endure the hottest part of the day. This turned out to be a good plan, and as you can see from the time of today's post, it's a plan we will continue throughout the week. It is just too darn hot out there.

Anyway, our first stop was Epcot, my favorite park in spite of having a fairly tragic work experience there several years ago. After entering, we rode Spaceship Earth, the ride inside the giant golf ball, which is newly updated with an entertaining Judy Dench narration. We got FastPasses for Soarin', one of the newer (and most popular) Disney rides, and then killed time by riding some of the less crowded ones. The most notable (and horrifying!) ride was the Universe of Energy, which is a 37 minute audioanimatronic/movie ride narrated by a mulleted Ellen DeGeneres circa 1997. Not only is this ride horribly outdated, it was 37 minutes of pure propaganda for Exxon (coincidentally, the ride's sponsor! Imagine that!) I guess the good news was that the ride was air conditioned and we could sit?

Oh! Requisite golf ball pic:

Still killing time before our ride on Soarin', we decided to take a ferry boat across the Lagoon to the World Showcase to walk through a few countries. Our boat arrived in Morocco (one of two country pavilions in Epcot run by their home country; the other is China), and we walked to Japan and browsed the Mitsukoshi department store, another entity not run by Disney and thus a bit more authentic than most of what you'll find on Disney property. It had a nice mix of kitsch and home goods and clothing, and we found a few things we liked and will bring back for some friends and family. A picture from Japan:

We then stopped for kaki-gori, Japanese shaved ice, and walked through France and into Britain. There, we browsed a toy store; saw Mary Poppins (and no, she didn't fly through the air on a string and hit the tourists. So hard not to think of Arrested Development and Wee Britain!); and watched Alice (of Wonderland fame) run screaming looking for her rabbit. A quick walk through Canada ensued, and then we headed back to Future World (note: Epcot really needs a rehab, unless the future looks like 1984? Just saying.) to ride Soarin', a simulated hang glider ride over California. It was, and I can't say this strongly enough, absolutely amazing.

By this time, we were tired, hungry, and hot, so we headed back to our hotel (resort!) for a quick dinner and refresh before headed to the Magic Kingdom for extra magic hours. More on that in the next post.

Vacation, Day 4

Admittedly, this post is a bit late. We're exhausted. Tired. Spent. (You get the picture). So, today you get an exciting two! vacation posts in one day.

Yesterday was our final day at my parents, and was spent primarily doing laundry and packing. Yes, exciting. Speeding ahead to mid-afternoon, we gassed up the car and headed out on Florida's Turnpike to Orlando. The drive was fairly unremarkable, except for (I'm sure this comes as a shock) the most intense rainstorm I have ever driven through. We drove at 35mph in a long line of cars all with their hazard lights on (not sure drivers in Massachusetts would ever be that safe or courteous?); eventually the rain dissipated, but it was a tense drive nonetheless. And, of course, the rain made pictures impossible, which is sad because I really wanted a picture of Yeehaw Junction, a notorious tourist trap located off the Turnpike in the middle of nowhere. Also notable about Yeehaw Junction? According to the previous link (you know, I am using Wikipedia on this blog more than I ever have in my life. Where are my principles?), Yeehaw Junction was originally named Jackass Junction. I guess the new name is better?

Anyway, we arrived in Orlando around dinner time and checked in to our hotel for the evening, and we're both in agreement that it may be the nicest place we've ever stayed. Instead of eating dinner, however, we decided to head right over to Disney. Now, I have mentioned before that I have some ambivalence about Disney, but by the time we arrived here, that was pretty much gone:

I swear, Disney must put something in the air that makes tired, cynical adults turn into clapping, giddy children. Not that we did that. Right.

We had decided that the first stop on our Disney excursion should be the Magic Kingdom. It's iconic, and I would bet that for most people who repeatedly visit Disney, it's the first place you go when you arrive. That was the case for me throughout my childhood, so it was a fun bit of nostalgia to anticipate seeing the castle for the first time. It didn't disappoint:

If you're wondering (probably not) why we didn't get one of those nice pictures of the castle while walking down Main Street, it's because we had inadvertently arrived during a parade. I'm not a huge parade fan, but it's always nice to see Mickey, right?

After dodging the parade crowds, our first stop was CP's favorite ride from childhood, Space Mountain. As we waited in line between screaming children and smelly men, the ride - of course - broke down. I was starting to think this might be a bad sign, but the issue was resolved quickly and we were soon hurtling through space. Next, CP indulged me in riding my favorite ride from childhood (yes, I am that sad), where I snapped this photo of CP. I promise CP is not actually on Space Mountain in this picture:

Next, we wandered through the crowds to Adventureland, where we stopped at the Aloha Aisle soft serve stand to try the infamous (by Disney standards, I guess?) pineapple Dole Whip. The verdict? Not bad! As we ate ice cream we headed toward the Haunted Mansion, another of my favorite childhood rides and one that has been significantly updated since my last visit. The ride itself isn't actually blog-worthy, but the people with whom we stood in line definitely were. There are no pictures of these people because I was afraid I might get knifed for taking one. Seriously! We were sandwiched in line between a group of surly teenagers hurling expletives at each other (when they weren't threatening to kill each other) and a group of mulleted, sleeveless-shirted men with Southern drawls who were far less well-behaved than the childreen they were with. For no reason that I could discern, one of the mulleted men would periodically bang on the nearest garbage can and grunt. I wish I had audio of this, because it is far scarier than I can describe with mere words. (Also, we could hear him bang on his ride vehicle and grunt loudly all through the ride.) Needless to say, we left this ride pretty quickly.

Things improved as we headed over to Big Thunder Mountain Railroad (awesome at night; in all my visits as a child and an adult I have never ridden in the dark, which is so much scarier than riding during the day.) and the newly updated Pirates of the Caribbean. The Johnny Depp audioanimatronics are CREEPY, in that they are so lifelike. We had an entire boat to ourselves and MAY have (can't confirm or deny this) sang the "yo ho, yo ho, it's a pirate's life for me" song throughout the entire ride.

By this time it was almost park closing and we wanted to get out ahead of the crowds, so we exited and decided to take a loop around the Magic Kingdom resorts on the monorail, which might be my favorite thing in all of Disney. Even though the technology is old and now significantly outdated, there is still something novel about it. As we rode around, we experienced a bit of the "Disney magic" when the monorail made an unexpected stop to hold for traffic. We were high above the ground over the Seven Seas Lagoon opposite the Magic Kingdom, and at that moment, the evening fireworks display at MK began. I've never seen it from such a great vantage point, and it was definitely a nice way to begin what I hope will be a relaxing week.

More to come - we are just about to depart our golf resort to move over to Disney. Later today, we hit Epcot and maybe the Magic Kingdom again for Extra Magic Hours, which keeps the park open until 1am tonight. I think we're going to be tired after this week.

Vacation, Day 3

Today was a day of frustration of varying degrees. Much of the frustration doesn't need to make an appearance here, but I will say that the weather in particular has been disappointing thus far. Just when we think the sun is going to come out and stay out, the skies open up and it rains for hours. If you were expecting pictures of sunny beaches and seagulls and such, you'll have to find a new blog.

At my mother's behest, we visited another behemoth mall today. Perhaps I should change this to a blog about malls? I'm sure this schtick is getting old, so I will refrain from a long commentary on this mall experience. Suffice it to say, if you've seen one mall in Florida, you have pretty much seen them all.

Later, we waited out a Tropical Storm Fay-related thunderstorm and then headed out on what we hoped would be a scenic tour of Palm Beach, home to some incredibly wealthy individuals, including this guy who fires people and also my archenemy who gets hit in the face with pies during her public speaking engagements. No, we didn't see anyone famous while on the island of Palm Beach; in fact, we saw little more than rain, clouds, and palm trees. See, for example:


Our sightseeing excursion wasn't a total wash, however, as we did see some interesting architecture and see a side of Florida very different from most of the touristy areas. CP snapped a nice picture of this church, built in 1925:

Yes, that picture is full of raindrops. What can you do?

Next, we spent some time on the Rodeo Drive of Florida, where we saw many upscale boutiques including John McCain's favorite cobbler. The architecture and landscaping on Worth Avenue are actually quite beautiful, but it's hard not to feel overwhelmed by the grotesque display of wealth and consumer excess. You can put a dress on a dog, but it's still a dog, if you know what I mean...

Now, I'd love to show pictures of our trip down Worth Avenue, but as I said, it was a day of frustration and the camera died mid-scenic tour. So as not to disappoint, I am going to shamelessly steal (borrow?) from Wikipedia so you can get the full visual experience:

This picture is misleading, however, because we have barely seen sunlight since arriving in Florida. But Worth Avenue was almost this desolate today; summer is the quiet season on the island, so other than us and a few hundred lawn maintenance crews, it was fairly empty.

The rest of the day was spent doing laundry and getting organized for the next leg of our trip. We had a good dinner out with the family and now are listening to the Red Sox on satellite radio. Since this is probably not a photo-worthy development, I leave you with a picture of my mom's new guide dog, Joey:

Of course, it wouldn't be fair to exclude Paul's guide dog, Fido (I know; he came with the name), who is not new but who is also quite cute:

I think that's it for now....updates to come tomorrow from Orlando, where (we hope) it might not be raining.