We took our family vacation this year in Orlando. We found a 2 bedroom condo near Disney World that we could trade our timeshare for, making it pretty affordable. We also invited Brett's parents, Dick and Sharon (D & S) with us. Our family drove down on Saturday, spent the night in Macon, GA and drove the rest of the way on Sunday. D&S flew down on Sunday afternoon and rented a car to drive to our condo.
The condo was at a resort called Summer Bay, which we really enjoyed. They had 5 pools and a lake with a beach. We spent most of our free time swimming (it was so hot outside!). Kylie really became a fish, learning to swim underwater, on top of the water and cannonballing. She would have spent the entire day and evening in the water if we let her. Matthew enjoyed the water as well but didn't love it like Kylie did. He liked digging in the sand and looking for fish in the lake but didn't like the sand to stick to him. He said it made him messy.
Tuesday evening we had dinner at Disney World (WDW) at their Whispering Canyon Cafe which we ate at during our last visit in 2008. The food is so good and the atmosphere is very fun, they take "down home cookin'" to a new level.
Matthew had a bad habit of falling asleep on our way to dinner every night. Wednesday we were up early and hopped on the shuttle bus to WDW Magic Kingdom. The shuttle seemed like a good idea at the time - saved us $14 in parking charges and the hassle of driving ourselves. Well, the shuttle was packed and it took 90 mins to get to the park with the pick-ups, drop-offs, ect. So, not much of a time saver. But we did get there and quickly headed to Fantasy Land to ride some rides like Dumbo's Flight, It's a Small World, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh and Peter Pan's Flight. The lines were not long and we were soon ready to head to Toon Town to find The Big Cheese for a group picture. We found Mickey and Minnie in the Judge's Tent and had our picture taken and had them sign our autograph books. I don't care how old you are, everyone smiles when they see Mickey!
Next we hopped on the train and took that to Frontier Land where we were going to ride Big Thunder Mountain Railroad but Kylie changed her mind so we skipped it. Instead we watched The Country Bear Jamboree (not really good but the kids liked it and it was air-conditioned). We ran in to Donald Duck and stopped for an autograph (it was his b-day!) and some pictures. Donald kept kissing Matthew on his head and Matthew would wipe the kisses off, it was funny. Then we headed to lunch at Crystal Palace, which is a character meal with Pooh and Friends. Food was good, seeing those favorite "friends" was better.
After lunch we headed to Adventure Land to ride The Magic Carpets of Alladin, Pirates of the Caribbean and Jungle Cruise (very funny skipper). Our boat overheated towards the end because of a loading delay so Kylie and Matthew got to be honorary skippers and they pulled us to the dock with a rope. Next was Tomorrow Land where we rode Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin and saw the Monster Inc's Laugh Factory show. And then Liberty Square for The Hall of Presidents.
Kylie still wanted to ride The Haunted Mansion so we had Dick, Brett and Matthew find a spot for the parade and Sharon, Kylie and I headed to the ride and did some shopping. We found the rest of the group and hung out, waiting for the parade to start. We only caught part of the parade due to needing to catch our shuttle at 10:00 (which was late, should have driven our own car!).
What a fun, fun day. The kids did great, the lines weren't too long and the heat wasn't too terrible. Magic Kingdom was magical!
....to be continued.
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