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? 

Day 8 @ WDW - The last blog

The Semi-Magical Express Bus Arrived and whisked us away to Orlando International Airport. Flying from Dallas to Ontario there was a bad weather area that we had to fly around, about 300 miles out of our way, which meant that our plane arrived 1 hr later @ 11pm, which was 2am EST and that means that we arrived back in Lake Arrowhead @ 3am EST!
The vacation was very fast. Seems like we were just settling in about day 6. I guess that we'll give it another try in 3 to 5 years.

Fun was had by all. 

Day 8 @ WDW

We found the pricing interesting. Originally, knowing that our kids were water bugs, we thought we would save money and only buy passes to the parks for 4 days instead of 7, but the difference between the two for us was only $24 for the whole family, so we bought the whole 7 day package. Here's a good tip. We bought our tickets in advance and they were mailed to our house. We didn't have to wait in line at the park AND from the time we bought them to the time we arrived Disney had raised the prices $30 (That's also why my math doesn't add up, pictured are the updated prices). 

Day 8 @ WDW

Oh yeah, Mozambique has the Krest Ginger Ale 

Day 8 @ WDW - The last day

Had to show you Club Cool. In here you got to sample sodas from around the world for free anytime you wanted. It's hard for me to believe that Disney would allow this to hurt their lucrative sodas sales in the park, but if you're like me, and I know I am, this was the place to head when you were thirsty for something other than water. There can be up to 8 different sodas, but during our stay there was only 4. Vegita Beta from Japan was made with veggies, MezzoMix from Germany was like Coke with orange, Isreal had a lemon-lime soda, and I can't remember the other country but it was Ginger Ale. We all like the MezzoMix from Germany. 

Day 8 @ WDW

Here's a picture of each of the 11 countries represented in the World Showcase at Epcot. Yes, I've heard from you that these collages are hard to see, but the alternative is 11 blog entries! Anyway, can you find:
France, England, Mexico, Italy, US, Morroco, Norway, China, Japan, Germany, and Canada? 

Day 8 @ WDW - The last day

The last day started with Disney's Not So Magical Express. We were supposed to check our luggage in at the resort instead of the airport, but Disney ran out of American Airlines tags, so we would have to take our luggage to the airport ourselves. Also, we had to wait a while to get to the front desk, so instead of leaving for a park at 8am in my plan, we were set at 11am. Just as the bus pulled up, Laura asked the kids if they would rather go swimming instead of just two hours at Epcot - and they both said yes! I still needed to get some more pictures of some countries in the World Showcase and I wanted to see if they found my tripod, so this is the view from the bus with just me on it as it pulled away. 

Day 7 @ WDW - Boat Parade

This was taken of the boat parade. To get the shot even this clear, I rested the camera on the dock. This parade started when WDW first opened in 1971 and was the precursor to the Main Street Electrical Parade (Now at Disney's California Adventure) 

Day 7 @ WDW

Pool hopping at the Wilderness Lodge. 

Day 7 @ WDW

A boat took us to Downtown Disney as we pass by our condo. We were in the lower veranda. If we lived there, you would see our kayaks by water's edge, but I guess the Disney folks frown on kayaks. We actually never saw any neighbors in our complex. But what we did see (and mostly heard) on this trip were a whole lot of New Yorkers in the parks. They were everywhere and all of the women sounded like George Castanza's mom. At the fireworks display later this night you could hear "Oh honey isn't this beautiful, oh honey look at that, oh honey take a picture, take a picture!" It was also funny to think about how those pictures would turn out, taken at night, on a moving boat, with a flash! 

Day 7 @ WDW

Back at the resort for a quick change, we were ready for some pool hopping. A quick rain shower cooled us off 

Day 7 @ WDW - AK II (Cont.)

After a rapid river ride and some more photos we were done by lunch time. 

Day 7 @ WDW - AK II (Cont.)

More Animals 

Day 7 @ WDW - AK II

Reading behind the scenes, Disney is a master at creating a setting for the animals to feel at home without cages and pens. Usually when we visit a zoo the exciting animals are sleeping somewhere just out of view of the visitors. What Disney did was to figure out small rewards for animals to stay in view. So they planted delicious trees close to the tour roads, made sure the watering holes were in sight and even gave the big animals air conditioned rocks on which to rest. 

Day 7 @ WDW - Animal Kingdom II

A quick return to the Animal Kingdom was the choice of the kids for day seven. Laura headed to Asia to pick up Expedition Everest fast passes and as the kids and me went strainght to the Safari in Africa were we secured a safari guide and met up with Laura. This was a planned half day at the park, followed by some downtown Disney shopping and some pool hopping. 

Day 6 @ WDW - Epcot

Epcot at night does not have the crowds like the day. Actually, we only had to deal with a large crowd on our first day in the parks on a Sunday. Florida is already in school and it turns out that the last week in August is the best time to go in the Summer to avoid the masses, but we couldn't avoid the 90 degree temps, occasional rain showers (actually, they were cooling) and high humidity, but life is full of little trade-offs. 

Day 6 @ WDW - Epcot Again

Yes. It was Epcot. This is one of my favorite pictures of the trip. I lifted the kids on a wall, took the picture, and got them off before the Disney police were on to us. 

Day 6 @ WDW

Nothing like a Monorail ride to get you out of the rain. As you can see, Keegan has his dad's gift of fashion!

On to Epcot again! (I think that's where we are headed)