Everest

The View from the top. Hard to believe that you are looking at the heart of Disney's Animal Kingdom. It's so green, doesn't look like a theme park from here. They did not clear cut the environment when constructing this park. 

How about these kids?

They are growing up so quickly. At least I have been able to pass my fashion sense along to Keegan. 

EPCOT at Night

If I ran Disney, this is where I would live. 

Clock Store

Well, not well placed on this blog, but here is the outside of the clock store. It was in the German pavillion in the World Showcase in Epcot.

EPCOT itself is actually a sore subject for many. Walt's plan of Epcot was for it to be an Experimental Prototype Community Of Tommorow. While I think Walt would be happy with this theme park, it is clearly not what he had planned for Epcot. It was actually supposed to be a designed town with housing, employment, recreation and transportation, but it was supposed to be real, with actual homes, people, soccer games etc. He was on the cutting edge of the Neo Urban movement. I love neo urban or neo traditional ideas. Cities should be walkable, but that's another blog... 

The Sky Was Angry My Friend

This is a shot of Disney's Boardwalk from the Beach Club. About 30 minutes later it poured! 

Our WDW Wheels

While you may have read about the Magical Express, I'm not sure that I let you know about the Disney Transportation system. It's quite remarkable. It seemed like the average wait was around 10 minutes and many times less. We took busses, boats, and trains to get around each day. While it's very handy, Disney does have an alterior (sp?) motive. If they make sure you can get around without needing a car, you're less likely to leave Disney property. So the Magical Express, that saved us about $100 in airport transportation fees, also brought in more money for Disney, because without a car, we never left WDW. 

Buff is Back!

OK, actually he never went anywhere at WDW. They still have the Country Bear Jamboree! The voice of Buff is the same guy who did many of the voices at Disney, like the Haunted Mansion Ghost Host and he was also the voice of Tony the Tiger. You can find these guys in the Winnie the Pooh ride at DL, but you have to know where to look! 

Carousel of Progress II

This is the last room, and has been quite updated. While the dishwasher doesn't pop up in the middle of the table, it does feature grandma playing a virtual computer game with the kids, video phones and computers.. 

Carousel of Progress!

It was great to see the C of P again. I remember it as a young kid visiting DL, but it was soon replaced by America Sings, and now Innovations. While I haven't seen anything still at DL from the C o P, I have seen the America Sings birds in Splash Mountain. Anyway, this was the second scene, they just got electric lights and with the advent of the automatic wringer, laundry only takes 8 hours instead of days.

Will our kids believe that we didn't grow up with color TV, microwaves, and computers when we were kids? I started college with a IBM Selectric Typewriter! Did you know that the keys for typewriters were placed where they are so that most words would use alternate sides of the keyboard to keep the hammers from getting stuck. We didn't even have the internet until after we were married! How did we live?

Indy Raceway

Katie was a pretty serious driver and I hoped that when she really does start practicing driving she doesn't swerve as much! The WDW version of DL's Autopia has more a feel of a race, while at DL, it's more of a Sunday drive. I think that DL's version is more creative. But this one had a race announcer, that was fun. 

WDW Vacation Re-Run: Enhanced Version

I have decided to re-live our vacation with you through these photos. While we were actually there I tried to blog, but there just wasn't enough time to tell the story. So I'll do so now, as I get around to it.

The Haunted Mansion is very different on the outside than our version here. You might have been able to guess this was the HM by the coach out front. The inside is very much the same BUT the room actually stretches UP, not the elevator down at Disneyland. We like the DL version better. 

13 years of marriage

What does a wall of Coo Coo Clocks have to do with 13 years of marriage? No, I'm not coo-coo after 13 years (yeah, I know what you're thinking. I was already coo-coo, ha ha) Laura and I went to Disney World for our Honeymoon and we bought a small clock from this very store.

Our anniversary is September 11, which on the day we were married in 1993, was a cool date, it was easy to remember 9-1-1. Now, sadly, it's even easier to remember. However, the date has not been a harbinger of bad news for our marriage. I can truly say that I love my wife more today than the day we were married. She was out of my league when I met here and remains the same today. It's exactly why I started dating her in Dec. of 92, engaged her on April 6, 93 and married her on Sept. 11. There were some who thought that I was rushing things, and they were right, but I felt that I had to (No, no bun in the oven), but before she got away.

Back to these clocks. I honestly don't feel older at 43 than I did at 30. Sure my back hurts when I lift too much stuff, but I don't FEEL older. I do, however, enjoy soaking up moments more. It's not that I feel that I have precious few hours left on this world, it's more looking at others speeding by and not noticing special moments. Fools! We spent 8 days at Disney World and it wasn't enough. There were so many angles for photos that I had yet to discover. I took over 500 photos on the trip and it wasn't enough. I still lament the photos I didn't take. The 500 photos still don't bring enough memories back to me. The wall of coo-coo clocks was a wrong righted for me. I should have taken a lot more photos on our honeymoon, at least now I have the coo-coos. 

First Day of School - Back to Reality

Not quite the air conditioned bus that Disney provides, but here is Keegan on his first day of Kindergarten. He rides the bus with Katie in the morning, and mom picks him up at noon.

Fast Pass News - WDW Epilog

We did end up putting the left over fast passes on eBay. After one day there were no bids, but I did receive an email from a perspective buyer who wondered if I would end the auction early and send the passes to her for $140, over night. She was already at WDW and had three pre-teens boys with her. The overnight shipping charge was $42. SO we negotiated on a price of $170 that included shipping.

She was there over the Labor Day weekend and it must have been packed. With these passes she probably saved 7 hours waiting in lines, times three boys, so it works out to be about $8 per hour per boy. Crazy like a fox?