Florida: Escape from the cold

Florida: Escape from the cold 2-23-08

Bob and I decided we just couldn’t take the cold anymore. In a desperate attempt to escape, we decided to go to Florida for a week to celebrate our 15th Anniversary (just a little bit early). Corey and Hal were kind enough to come watch the kids so we could go without them. The following is a detailed account of our adventures:

Day 1: We left in 6 degrees. A massive snowstorm hit the night before which dropped several feet of snow! As our plane tried to taxi out, we slid on the ice. Hmm, never done that before! We landed in beautiful, green, Orlando! We walked out to 83 degrees and there is nothing like the smell of fresh falling rain. When we were at Alamo getting our convertible for the week, the guy helping us said we could walk over to the convertible section and choose any one we wanted. Any convertible?? Wow! This was starting out to be a great trip. Imagine our surprise when we saw that our choice was between two identical cream colored convertible VW Beetles. Hmm...that’s quite a choice, what should we do? After deciding on one, we proceeded to the task of fitting the luggage into the car. The trunk barely had enough room for one of our big suitcases (as evidenced by the picture). The two seats in the back were not fit for any human of normal size- a pygmy midget maybe? Or someone without legs? Anyway, it was an interesting experience. We drove about 1 ½ hours through Orlando to Kissimmee. We checked into our hotel, picked up our attraction tickets, and headed out for dinner.

Day 2: We were one of the first ones to arrive at Gatorland. We spent 3 hours touring the swamp walk, seeing shows (I swear one of them was written by the same people who wrote Evil Planners), eating Dippin Dots, and enjoying the gorgeous weather. We saw a cool Gator Wrestling show and as we walked around I was able to get very close to some alligators for some cool pictures. We saw some beautiful birds nesting in the trees above the alligators: egrets, ibis, etc. As we headed to the next attraction, we tried to put the top down on our convertible, but couldn’t figure it out.
Next we headed to “Ripley’s Believe it or Not” Museum. We got some fun pictures there including a picture of the Mona Lisa made out of different shades of toast. I was also able to take my picture with a piece of the Berlin wall. Then we went to a place called “Wonder Works” (Central Florida’s only upside down attraction. An amusement park for the mind, featuring over 100 interactive exhibits for the entire family to experience). The whole building appears to be upside down; it was cool! We were able to experience a 5.3 earthquake, 75 mile an hour hurricane simulation, be inside a bubble, create a 3-D impression of our body, play a giant Simon game (we broke the days record by the way), etc. Afterwards, we stayed for the “Outta Control Magic Comedy Dinner Show”. The show was very entertaining and we had a great time.

Day 3: We took a scenic drive (about 1 ½ hours) out to Clearwater Beach. We just about died when we saw our hotel room. It was horribly dirty and not even close to what they advertised. The tennis court was facing everyone’s balcony, the pool was filthy, the rooms were gross, and I won’t even tell you what we found in our tub! We cancelled our stay for the next night and decided to spend the rest of the day out of our room. Again, we tried to get the top down. I wish we could have made a video so you could see the both of us pushing, shoving and practically jumping on the car to get it down. No luck. We only moved it about a foot, so we decided to close it back up only to find it wouldn’t close!!! It took a lot of work, but we got it closed and I called the rental company. They had us drive it in and they found that the idiots before us had actually removed the button that opens it! They immediately switched us to an AWESOME PT Cruiser and I think we drove with the top down for the remainder of the vacation!! We drove all around the waterways and soaked in the sun! We drove to Pier 60 and did some shopping along the boardwalk and stores located around there. We walked down the Pier too, but couldn’t see much since the sun had set.

Day 4: Kristina’s Favorite Day!!! What a PERFECT day this was. We cruised all along the beach on Gulf Blvd soaking in the warmth and sun. I even started a small tan! We drove to Treasure Island and then walked along the white sand beach collecting shells to bring home to the kids. We didn’t go swimming, but I put my feet in and it was AWESOME!!!! Oh to be warm again and only wear a t-shirt, shorts and flip-flops. Wow!! We saw pelicans diving for birds; a pretty cool sight! Then we went to the wharf at Madeira Beach and ate lunch at this great pizzeria. We walked along the boardwalk and did some shopping. We saw dolphins, a pirate excursion ship, various water craft rentals and some very interesting birds. We didn’t see the Manatees though.
We drove all the way back to Orlando. Driving on the freeway going 70 mph with the top of the car down is very exhilarating!! We arrived at this awesome hotel in the Disney Land area called Buena Vista Suites (thanks to Corey for the last minute booking of that- since we didn’t want to stay in the previous hotel!) It had a huge Jacuzzi in the room too! We went out to Planet Smoothie for dinner and then we watched our shows “Survivor” and “Lost”.

Day 5: We drove over to Disney’s “Pleasure Island” and went to see “National Treasure: Book of Secrets” We really enjoyed it! Then Bob was sweet enough to spend an hour driving around Orlando to find a Cheesecake Factory for me. We had a wonderful lunch where Bob got a hamburger as big as his face! We also got a slice of the Snickers Cheesecake. Yummy!! Then we drove up to Orlando Sanford to stay in a hotel close to the airport. We stayed up and watched “Terminator 2".

Day 6: We woke up early to catch our flight. It ended up being a long flight. It was very turbulent which didn’t help my stomach at all! A few minutes before we were supposed to land, they rerouted us to Peoria because there was zero visibility due to fog in Cedar Rapids. We had to sit on the tarmac for 30 minutes while they waited for the fog to clear. It was another 30 minutes flight back to Cedar Rapids. We were welcomed by a freezing temperature in the teens! The kids seemed to do well and grandma and grandpa survived! We enjoyed the evening showing our pictures, sharing details about the trip, and even got to see their science presentations they gave this week to Alayna and Tyler’s classes at school. I guess the kids only had 2 ½ days of school this week due to the snow. Guess what else? A massive storm is moving in tomorrow as well. What a welcome home. Anyway, Bob and I had an absolutely amazing and wonderful trip. We must do this again soon!!

PS. I am trying today to make a fun slide show of our pictures. I hope to have it posted to the website by this evening. All the pictures I refer to should be in that slide show. If you see it, let us know what you think about it.