Seeking, seizing the Kingdom

Joy and I got on opportunity to do something we’ve never done before… go on a vacation. My uncle and aunt had planned a trip to Walt Disney World for mid-October, that’s right about the time when the MN temps drop into the 50s and 40s during the day, while FL keeps a steady mid-80s spread. Joy and I had been there for our honeymoon, but that was 5 years ago, and there was so much we had forgotten, and so much more to take in. When we got the chance to tag along, we had to take it!

Both Joy and I have very stressful jobs, with her nursing job at the community hospital, and my management of a development team of 7, more than half of which are overseas. It’s been a rough couple of years, moving, changing jobs, not to mention the social and spiritual aspects of those changes. We’re settling in now, but one thing we really needed was a rest.

Now we’re getting it.

Saturday morning, we got up around 4a to make our 8a flight. A very good friend, Trish, drove us down to the airport where we met up with my uncle, aunt, and two cousins. The flight was pretty uneventful (just the way we like them these days). We picked up our rental cars (hint: use online check-in and avoid the lines!), and drove to the WDW Boardwalk Resort.

It is so cool to stay right in the middle of all the parks. You can walk or boat from the resort to MGM studios and Epcot. You can take the monorail from Epcot to/from the Magic Kingdom, and a bus takes you to the Animal Kingdom.

Once we checked-in, we freshened up a bit, then hit Ecpot. We sampled some soda drinks from around the world at the Coca-cola store, went on “The Land”, the new attraction, Soarin’, Finding Nemo, then we trekked around the World Showcase. We finished off watching the final show that happens in the bay around Epcot. We marveled at how everything was rigged for precision, every light, firework, sound, drawing the senses in. There’s so much there to see, I’m hoping to spend more time there today or tomorrow morning. After the flight and the first park, we were pretty shot. I slept like a rock.

Sunday, we got up in time for a great breakfast at Spoodles, followed by a great day at the Animal Kingdom. We got a FastPass for the safari, then took in Dinosaur, and the spinny ride next to it. We walked past Expedition Everest (the newest attraction, a roller-coaster), and people were stuck up near the top of the mountain. Next, we saw It’s Tough to be a Bug 3D show, Finding Nemo the Musical (wow!), then cashed in the safari FastPass. We saw so many animals on the safari, it was amazing. A lot of baby animals were with their moms.

From there, we headed over to Expedition Everest, and my goodness, that was really exciting. Then in the last couple minutes before the park closed, we high-tailed it to the river ride. My aunt had been complaining about that ride since the start, because she always gets soaked. Sure enough, this time was no exception. In fact, it seemed that all the girls got far more wet than the boys. It was a grand finale to the day. Or was it?

We came back to the resort, and freshened up with a change of clothes (pants this time, the temp had dropped into the 60s), and took the boat to MGM studios, which stayed open an extra hour for some of us who stayed in the resorts. We saw the Muppets 3D show, screamed through the Hollywood Hotel, and the Rockin’ Roller-coaster. I was so wiped, we got some pizza and wound down, back to our room. Again, I slept hard and fast.

Today is a new day, and we’ve covered so much ground, and have so much more to cover. I’ve got to admit, I’m really excited to head out to Vero Beach for a couple days of some slower-paced activities and lounging on the beach by the ocean. I guess they have free internet too, so that’s probably where I’ll post this from. Later.

This entry was posted on Monday, October 15th, 2007 at 8:40 am and is filed under Entertainment, Family, Food, Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.