Day 30 - Walking walking walking

Alan's turn to blog today with Sarah's comments in pink.

 

Today's plan was to get up nice and early to go on a trolley tour of Washington DC. Unfortunately Sarah slept in and we didn't end up leaving our hotel until 9.30. OK, so I slept in.  I wasn't the only one.  He may have gotten up before me but chose not to wake me so he could watch some English soccer scores.  We walked to the Metro station which is only 5 minutes from our hotel and went down the escalators into the unknown. We found the ticket machines and actually managed to work out our destination and how to buy a ticket without too much trouble at all. Well I did anyway.   Sarah wasn't much help. Excuse me.  If it wasn't for me being on the ball, he would have paid way too much. We found the correct platform and only had to wait a few minutes before our train came along. 6 stops later we got off and headed back up to the street. We got to the trolley tour stop only to find that the tour we had most wanted to go on was closed until after 1pm due to road closures because of a marathon being run today, so we decided to transfer our tickets until tomorrow.

 

After studying the map for some time we figured out which way was which and started wandering west. We all know how clever I am when it comes to maps don't we. We walked for a few blocks and came to the front fence of The White House where there was plenty of tourists taking photos. We joined them for a brief time until police came along and told everyone to clear the area and closed the path. I think they were probably concerned about Sarah being a terrorist or something like that. We were just lucky we hadn't arrived a few minutes later or we wouldn't have been able to see it from that close. 

 

Then we walked around the large grass oval in front of The White House toward the Washington Monument, stopping to take photos along the way. After that we chucked a right and headed for The Abraham Lincoln Memorial which was miles away in the distance. First we came to the World War 2 memorial which had all the American states and territories honoured, plus The Philippines. I didn't realise they were ever under American control.

 

After that we continued our long walk alongside The Reflecting Pool. It always looks so nice in movies and pictures and stuff but in reality it's green and dirty and smelly and full of ducks. As a result it's surrounded by piles and piles of duck poo.  Never own a duck!

 

Anyway after a really long walk we made it to the Lincoln Memorial and climbed the many stairs to the top to see him. It was quite crowded up there and getting photos of Abe was a bit difficult but we managed ok.

 

The unfortunate thing about having walked so far was that we now had to walk all the way back again. Thankfully it's nowhere near as hot here as everywhere else we've been so far. We passed by the Vietnam war memorial and then through a section of the park where there was squirrels everywhere. They're so cute.

 

We wanted to go to the Capitol Building but that was just too far to walk so we'll check it out tomorrow. We did get a photo of it in the distance though. We went to The White House visitor centre and had a look around there but it was pretty boring and obviously no substitute for the real thing.

 

We were getting hungry by now so we found the Hard Rock Cafe and had a steak there as well as taking a few photos. After finishing lunch we went back to the Metro and saw that our train was due in about 3 minutes. We quickly made our way down to the platform but realised it was the wrong one. Lucky we didn't just jump on the train or goodness knows where we might have ended up. We found the right platform just as our train was arriving so we jumped on and had to stand as it was so crowded. It took no time until we were back at our stop and in our hotel. We don't really know how but we'd been out for about 6 hours. No wonder we were tired.

 

We went for a nice Italian dinner tonight. Very nice food although the staff sure didn't look Italian to us.

 

Trivia for the day: Drivers around here seem quite happy to queue across intersections blocking traffic when the lights change and turn corners when pedestrians have a walk signal.

Day 29 - Hello to the nation's capital

Boring day so it must be Sarah blog day.  I doubt Alan will have any comments.  We didn't do anything today. I will too and they're in blue.

 

Yes it is one of those sad travelling days.  We left the hotel about 9am and headed towards the airport.  Firstly we had to fill the car with petrol.  You have to pay before you pump here and although Alan has worked that out, he hasn't worked out how to actually get the petrol out of the pump.  A second trip in to talk to the attendant and petrol was finally flowing. Well it doesn't help that different places have different ways of making the petrol pump work. Whilst doing that, some guy came up to Alan and gave him a piece of paper.  I didn't see what it said but he disposed of it in the bin fairly quickly.  There was some hand gesturing going on and the guy dove into the bin to retrieve the piece of paper.  I then saw someone else hand the guy money for the piece of paper.  The more we stay here, the more we learn. Why should I pay some weirdo for a piece of pink paper with a few words written on it, when he probably found it in a bin in the first place. We got out of there quickly with the guy mumbling something toward us.

 

We made it to the airport and although there were some check-in difficulties, including the fact that Alan I each had a window seat on either side of the plane, we made it through customs without being manhandled. The woman sitting beside me decided she wanted to move elsewhere so Sarah moved over next to me after all.

 

A quick two hour flight and we arrived in a slightly cooler but a lot less humid Washington DC.  The trip in the shuttle was harrowing with the driver doing 20 miles an hour over the speed limit, driving up on other people intimdating them to move over, and swerving all over the road. I don't think he was too bright. There was a state trooper driving around the speed limit and our driver sped straight past him.

 

The hotel is nice.  The bed and pillows aren't as nice as we had in Orlando but we expected that.  NO BED or PILLOWS will ever match what we had there.  If I had some room in my suitcase I would now be the proud owner of a couple of new pillows.

 

We took a walk around the area and discovered the Metro (train) is just over a block from the hotel. Very convenient. We had a late lunch/early dinner at this great place and returned to the hotel. 

 

So that's it.  Tomorrow its off to see the sites of DC. There's no photos today because we really didn't have anything to take photos of. I miss roller coasters.

 

Trivia for the day: The cars around here all have front and back license plates. Everywhere else we've been nobody ever has a front one and plenty don't even have a back one.

 

 

Day 28 - Busch Gardens

It's Alan's turn for the blog tonight. Sarah's nonsensical ramblings will be in green.

 

Sadly today was our last full day in Florida. The only thing we had left to do from our original list of places to visit was the one I'd been waiting for since we arrived here - Busch Gardens in Tampa. The sky was blue as we headed west toward the coast at 9am. No more than 5 miles down the highway we came into some very thick fog which lasted probably 10 miles or so. About an hour later and we were in Tampa and parking in a very empty lot.

 

Upon entering the park we learned that Gwazi, one of the big coasters wasn't running today which didn't impress me at all. In fact he had a giant whinge saying that it is closed for long enough during the off season they shouldn't have rides closed at other times.  I thought he was actually going to stamp his feet and have a tantrum. We came across Gwazi shortly after and were both very happy to see that it's a dual track coaster and one of the tracks was operating. Yes I was happy.  Being with an unhappy Alan is not fun.  Yay! I went on it and it's definitely the highest and fastest wooden coaster I've ever been on. The lap bars concerned me a bit though; they were very loose and wobbly, but I managed to stay in my seat so all was good.

 

Up next was a wander through Myombe Reserve, which is home to chimpanzees and gorillas. We saw one chimp but no gorillas, followed by checking out the alligator and turtle pond.

 

The next roller coaster I went on was Montu. It's the highest inverted coaster in south eastern United States, is the only inverted coaster in the world with more than 6 inversions and is rated in the top 10 of all coasters in America. I can see why because it's an awesome ride of drops, tight turns, loops and all kinds of cool stuff. After I got off Sarah said I had to ride it again because she managed to forget to take a photo of me on it. That was fine by me.  I didn't "forget" to take a photo.  I did take photos but wasn't able to get one of the fear on Alan's face.

 

So after getting off Montu for the 2nd time we decided it was far too hot and humid to walk so we headed for the nearest station to catch the train which takes you all around the park. We got to see all kinds of African animals on our trip around the entire park, along with all the rides that we still had to go on. We returned to the station we had started from and got off to find something else to do.

 

We had a walk around the Edge of Africa animal habitat where we were lucky enough to see 5 lions. One of them must have been in a fight as it had a really nasty looking gash on her elbow which appeared to go down to the bone. We let a staff member know but she said the animal dudes were already on their way to check it out. We then went into the Tutankhamens Tomb exhibit for nothing more than to get out of the heat for a short time.

 

Our next ride was on the Skyride gondola which took us on a scenic flight over the park to the other end up the back where the rest of the rides were that we wanted to go on.  It was nice up there with a cool breeze.

 

First thing we went on after the Skyride was the Stanley Falls log flume water ride. Of course Sarah only goes on water rides these days so she finally had something to go on with me. It was pretty good and we got fairly wet when we hit the bottom.

 

After that we went over to have a look at the daddy of them all - Sheikra. This roller coaster is like nothing I've ever been on before. It's one of only a few dive coasters in the world. After taking off on an extremely steep hill climb to a height of 200 feet, you are left dangling over the precipice of a drop for a few seconds before it lets go and you fall down a 90 degree drop. There is also a second smaller drop of close to 90 degrees. Screams were coming from all around me while I was sitting there partly saying woohoo and partly hanging on for dear life. It also has a great ending where it travels over a lake and blows water 20 feet into the air, drenching anyone standing below watching.

 

After surviving that experience it was time for us both to go on another water ride. We found the Tidal Wave boat ride and half way round we realised why nobody else was keen to go on it. It's really quite boring and the only decent part is a pretty ordinary drop at the end after which you get quite wet. Like Sheikra, anyone standing close will get soaked to the bone.

 

We walked to the very back of the park where I came across another roller coaster - Kumba. It looks like a fairly standard fast, high, 7 inversion mega looper. After riding however, I knew it was anything but standard. It produces some amazing G forces with it's speed and turns, so much so that I nearly passed out twice during the ride. Sarah wanted me to ride it again to get a better photo but I wasn't going through that again unless she came on it with me. Needless to say we gave it a miss.

 

We settled for a more sedate ride after that so we went on the Congo River Rapids which was close by. It was the usual white water rapids type affair and we came off wet like always. We were in a boat with an English family, of whom the mother and daughter seemed intent on showing us as much breast as they could. Not sure what the husband/father thought about the matter.

 

I decided that I couldn't leave without riding Sheikra again so Sarah watched while I took the plunge from way up in the blue yonder. After I came off we took photos of each other standing in the splash zone being soaked by the water from Sheikra.

 

There was just one more ride to go on before we left, the little Scorpion roller coaster. It's small, rough and short, but strange in that it has a loop while only being held in by a lap bar instead of an over the shoulder harness.

 

We headed for the exit and on the way I checked out the Curiosity Caverns which was both a reptile house and nocturnal house. I saw all sorts of snakes and lizards as well as sugar gliders, bats, owls and a sloth. Sarah was too scared to come into the dark caves so she waited outside.  Sarah was hot, bothered and a little bored after spending most of the day sitting around waiting for Alan.

 

So that was our day in Tampa done. We drove back up the I-4 with both of us trying to keep the other one awake. We didn't have lunch today so we went out for an early dinner after we got back to our hotel. We thought we'd try something new and came across a mexican/carribean restaurant. It looked a bit dodgy from the outside but we were hungry so we gave it a burl anyway. Upon entering we weren't really sure what we had walked into. To the right was a fancy looking restaurant setting, in the middle was a sports bar, to the left was a dance floor and what looked like a karaoke stage and the waitress was wearing extremely skimpy shorts. The food ended up being really great but we're still not sure it wasn't a strip club as well.

 

Depending on the weather we'll probably go for a swim in the hotel pool tonight for the last time before leaving for Washington DC tomorrow morning.

 

So it is goodbye Orlando.  I'm a bit sad really.  The hotel is lovely.  The bed and pillows are so nice, the hotel although being conveniently located, it is off the main road and very quiet.  Let's hope the next place is as nice.

 

 

Day 27 - Disney MGM Studios

Sarah always gets the boring days to blog, so of course today I'm doing it.  Alan will probably want to add his comments and they will be in red.

 

With two days left in Orlando, we had a choice to make.  It was either Disney MGM Studios or Busch Gardens in Tampa.  We decided to leave it until this morning as the weather forecast has been anything but reliable.  So this morning we woke up to clear skies with an ominous report of storms so we decided to go to Disney's MGM Studios.  The people we met in the pool the other night indicated we would be there all day but from our quick look at the map provided in our hotel room, we doubted we would be there very long. There's precious little to do at that place.

 

We arrived just after opening, only to discover that the one thing Alan wanted to see/ride, the Rock 'n' Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith was closed for refurbishment.  Of course he was bitterly disappointed and demanding his money back when he found that it was closed. Disappointed and sulking about it, yes, demanding my money back, no. We then wandered around to the Star Tours - the ultimate Star Wars thrill ride. As soon as we walked in I had deja vu.  There was C3PO and I had a flashback to Disneyland with Alan being a dork behind him.  Oh great, we were having a bad start to the day.  I don't like this ride at all.  It was OK this time, I kept my eyes shut the entire time.

 

We then moved around to the backlot tour.  Oh that was funny.  We had a backlot to nothing considering it isn't an actual working studio.  The one cool thing was Catastrophe Canyon where there was an earthquake, a tanker explosion and a flood.

 

After disembarking the very exciting tour, we found ourselves on The Great Movie Ride which isn't really a ride and it certainly wasn't great. You go behind the silver screen to witness great movie moments captured in time with thrilling film clips and lifelike Audio-Animatronics figures (their words not mine). At least it killed 20 minutes while we were waiting for other more fun stuff to begin.

 

From there we went to the Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular which was the best thing we saw all day.   The stunts were very impressive and spread over three separate scenes.  A lot of action, explosions etc. It was so much better than the Sinbad stunt show we had seen yesterday.

 

There wasn't anything else to do except wait another hour for the Lights, Motor, Action Extreme Stunt Show and Alan had had enough.  We started our walk back to the car and it started to rain lightly.  Within 30 seconds of us getting into the car, it started to pour.  We couldn't have timed it better.  That's right, it was my weather predicting skill which made us leave the park at that moment.

 

By this time it was around 1.30pm and we thought we'd return to the room for an early afternoon nap.  However, we had to make one stop first at the local flea market to get another suitcase.  No, we haven't been buying up at the shops. We have a mexican rug, the 2 blankets from Anaheim Angels, Sarah's wedding shoes, 3 stuffed animals we won in Vegas, I've bought a couple of shirts and we've got about 10 magnets, but that's about it so far. No wonder we need another suitcase. My suitcase is still only 3/4 full.   The maximum amount luggage can weigh here is 50lbs per bag, with a maximum of 100lbs per person.  In Australia we are allowed 77lbs in one bag.  When we flew from Las Vegas to Orlando we had to unload a number of items from our luggage and put it in our hand luggage so we weren't fined US$80 for the heavy bag.  So we bought a nice little bag today for $25.

 

Unfortunately housekeeping hadn't yet gotten to our room yet so napping was out of the question.  We did a load of washing and Alan managed to lock us out of our room.  Clever isn't he! Well I didn't see Sarah picking up our room key and taking it with us either. Thankfully housekeeping let us back in.  She then wanted the room so we thought we'd head out and play a round of mini golf.  But before leaving the hotel we stopped in at the games room and found many credits in the machines.  It took us about an hour to empty the credits and then we returned to the room for our nap. There's something odd going on down in that games room. We haven't had to pay for a single game yet. If only we could walk in and find the air hockey table going.

 

We awoke about 5.30pm starving and decided to give a place a go that we had seen heavily advertised, Olive Garden, an Italian restaurant.  They have an endless pasta bowl for $8.95 which we thought we'd try, that was until we saw the menu.  Yum!  We had different things and really enjoyed our meal.  We were initially surprised to find that every chair in the restaurant has wheels but after eating we realised it is so the staff can wheel you out to the car because you eat so much you can't get up.  We've eaten at a number of places where there is a lot of food but they don't come close to this place.  We will definitely be trying another Olive Garden before coming home. The food was absolutely excellent and the service was very good too.

 

So here we are, two more sleeps left before we leave Orlando and head to Washington DC.  We heard this week that our application for a tour of the White House had been denied.  We thought that would be the case.  We didn't find a very friendly response to our request made of the Australian Embassy back in April. 

 

Trivia for the day: The weather around here rolls in really quickly. One minute it's blue skies for miles and then the next there's dark clouds everywhere and it's bucketing down.

Day 26 - Universal Islands of Adventure

Alan's blogging tonight and if Sarah has anything constructive to add it will be in orange.

 

Today's outing was to Islands of Adventure, the other half of Universal. We arrived there at the park opening time which is something of an achievement for us.

 

First stop was the Incredible Hulk roller coaster which of course Sarah opted out of. I went on it and it was barrels of fun - very fast and full of loops and rolls and all that fun type of stuff that I like. You take off slowly as it pulls you up the initial big hill but half way up it all of a sudden launches you at top speed. It's a very unexpected and unusual start.

 

After that bit of excitement we went into the Spiderman 3D ride. We had no idea what to expect going into this one but we both really enjoyed it. It's a 3D thrill ride as you careen through the streets with Spiderman protecting you from all the bad dudes who are trying to get you.

 

Next up was a trip into the wet ride area of the park. First was Dudley Do-Rights Ripsaw Falls, which is a log flume ride similar to Splash Mountain. It's not a bad ride, but the walk to get in there takes forever and actually getting into the boat is ridiculously hard if you're more than 6 inches tall or 6 inches wide. The problem is that they've squeezed 5 seats into a space which houses 4 usually. Both Sarah and myself found it very difficult trying to get in and out of the boat.

 

We didn't get overly wet on that ride, so we went over to the next water one straight after. This was Popeye and Bluto's Bilge Rat Barges which is a white water rapids type thingy. We didn't know beforehand, but clearly the purpose of this ride is to give every person on board a bath because we all came off completely saturated from head to toe. I've never been wetter on any ride ever.  The ride itself didn't get you that wet.  It was the number of hoses that are pointed directly at you ensuring that you didn't have a single dry spot.

 

So with us being totally drenched we thought we may as well keep doing the wet rides and went on Jurassic Park. We've been on this before at Universal in California, but I think this one was longer and more enjoyable. You sit in a boat and travel around a dinosaur infested compound before going down a big drop and getting very wet at the bottom. The first time we went on it, we both banged our knees and nearly flew out of the boat when we hit the bottom, but we were more careful on the subsequent 4 rides. After that we'd had just about enough wetness as we can handle in one day so we went off to find something new.  I had one ride more than Alan because he was incapable of getting a photo of me the first time down on my own.

 

We wanted to go on a little chairlift type ride called Pteranodon Flyers, but with a wait time of 45 minutes we decided to come back and try again later.

 

There was a little childrens coaster called The Flying Unicorn which we both went on. I'm sure for little kids it would be pretty scary and I seem to recall Sarah having a bit of a squeal in my ear.  I was squealing with excitment, not fear.  It could also have been the fact that Alan was squishing me on the corners.

 

Next on the agenda was the big one - Duelling Dragons roller coaster. This is an amazing suspended floorless pair of intertwined duel coasters that are just too much fun to describe. You choose either Fire or Ice and then the coasters take off together and wind in and out of each other, coming within 30 centimetres of each other at one point. Numerous times you think you're going to crash into the other train but then it takes a sharp turn at the last moment possible. Needless to say that Sarah wouldn't go on this in a million years, but I went on both Fire and Ice twice each and there were grown men screaming like little girls at times. Grow some balls you bunch of wussbags!

 

After that exhiliration we settled in for a more sedate experience - the Eighth Voyage of Sinbad stunt show. To be honest I was trying hard not to fall asleep during the show. The queue for Pteranodon Flyers was still at 45 minutes so we didn't end up going on it.

 

We were starting to dry off so we headed back around to Jurassic Park after that so Sarah could stand in the splash zone while I took her photo. It took 3 goes to get a decent shot by which time she was pretty well soaked again. Sometimes I think he plans for me to get wet over and over again. I was planning on going on Ripsaw Falls again so Sarah could get a photo of me, but the wait time was 25 minutes and I decided waiting that long to squeeze uncomfortably into that little log flume wasn't worth it so we gave it a miss.

 

Time for me to have one more ride on the Incredible Hulk coaster before leaving the park and walking next door to Universal Studios.

 

All we wanted to do there was ride the Revenge of the Mummy coaster once again as we'd both really enjoyed it 2 days earlier. We got lucky in that the queue was very short so we had our ride and left the park. It was a bit scarier this time.  Twice I felt myself leave my seat.  Lunch today was at the relatively early time of 3.30pm.

 

With a second straight day of sunshine, we went back to the mini golf course across the road from our hotel to take on the 2nd course. I gained sweet revenge for my unlucky loss the previous day when I kicked Sarah's butt by a huge 11 shots. She was complaining about everything from the ball to the putter to not trying to win. Yeah whatever!  Firstly I thought it was the ball but later discovered it was a bent putter.  It is people like Alan who use them as a walking stick that ruins the fun for other people.

 

We had another swim in our hotel pool tonight but didn't stay in as long as last night as it was getting a bit cool.

 

Trivia for the day: Parking at the theme parks here in America is so well orgainsed. In Australia everyone just drives in and parks wherever, but over here they direct you where to go so all the cars line up next to each other one by one. It makes parking much easier than driving around for ages looking for a spot.

Day 25 - Sea World, Golf & Swimming

Sarah back blogging tonight.  Alan will add his 2 cents worth in green

 

Today has been a very full day.   

 

We have had SeaWorld booked for a very long time as I've wanted to do the dine with Shamu, the killer whale.  We were hopeful today's weather would be clear and it was, although of course it was extremely humid again. 

 

We arrived at Sea World shortly after 9am and went to confirm our time to dine only to learn that it wasn't until 4.15pm.  We were terribly disappointed, as who wants lunch at 4.15pm. Obviously a lot of people aren't happy when they arrive and find out lunch will be so late that we were offered a refund on the spot which we took.  There was no way we could fill 7 hours at Sea World waiting for lunch. 

 

Our first stop was at the sea turtles and then we were on to the stingrays again.  I think we've fallen in love. At the stingray pool you can pay $4 for a tray of food to feed them.  We chose not to do that but the stingrays come up to you anyway just to see if you have anything for them.  One came up to Alan and put his little eyes out of the water begging him for food. It was so cute. The stingrays just keep doing laps around their pool and they seem to enjoy being touched by people. There's also a small pool at one end with about half a dozen little baby stingrays in there. They were so cute.

 

We then moved around to the dolphin pool and watched them get fed.  Next stop was the manatees followed by the crocs/alligators.  We then moved into the stadium to watch the dolphin and whale show.  If was great although there isn't much photographic proof.  The camera is too slow.  I said THE CAMERA Alan, not me.  By the time it focuses on the dolphin, it is back in the water again.  I have lots of splash photos if you'd like to see them.

 

We then decided it was ride time.  A quick trip onto Journey to Atlantis saw us get totally soaked.  Probably shouldn't have sat in the front row. I really should take the travellers cheques out of my wallet before going on wet rides because they get really wet. Alan then went on Kraken which is a very scary looking rollercoaster with 7 inversions. He said it was very smooth but I'll just take his word for it.  There were enough people screaming to tell me that the ride wasn't for me. Yes, it's a floorless roller coaster; tall and fast and very smooth and does indeed go upside down an amazing 7 times. It even goes underground briefly. I loved it.

 

Next was the penguin enclosure.  They were so cute. Then we moved on to the seals.  Again you could buy food for them but we preferred to keep our fingers smelling fish free.  But, my goodness they made a loud noise.  They scream for their food. Most of the people trying to feed them kept throwing their fish too far away from the seals and seagulls got it instead.

 

Sarah forgot to mention that we went to the shark and dangerous fish exhibit in here.

 

By this time it was time for the Shamu killer whale show.  The place was packed, not a free seat in the house. The show was OK.  I've seen better whale shows at Sea World in San Diego.  Again, a lot of photographic proof was just splashes but I was lucky to get a couple of nice shots.

 

After the show we ventured into the Wild Arctic where we saw beluga whales (which didn't look white at all), walruses and a very angry polar bear.  He needed a friend or at least some toys to play with.

 

We then returned to the rides where Alan and I went on Journey to Atlantis separately just so we could get the photographic proof.  After that, Alan went back to Kraken and I decided on another trip on Journey to Atlantis.  It is a strange ride.  It is part water ride and it turns into a rollercoaster just before the end. You really don't expect that the first time you ride it.  However, on this trip, it broke down.  Why does it always happen to us?! Thankfully I was still in the queue - the next one to get on actually when it broke down and I didn't get stuck on the ride like many others. I was sitting around waiting for her to come back for ages. I should have gone on the roller coaster a couple more times.

 

It was then time to leave but we had to go via the stingrays again.  Once you've touched one, you just can't stop.

 

We ended up taking 170 photos today.  They will be thoroughly edited before we upload them.

 

We had a late lunch again, like we did yesterday.  Right now we are only paying for one meal a day.  A great money saver.

 

We then returned to the room for a late afternoon nap.  Unfortunately Alan hadn't washed his hands before getting into bed and they were still smelling like stingray, YUK.  When we woke up it still wasn't raining, a first for us in 6 days.  We decided there was no better time to hit the mini golf around the corner.  Maybe Alan should have stayed home because he got his bottom kicked by me.  What a legend putter I am! It was very dark and I couldn't see what I was doing. I'm sure Sarah probably cheated without me seeing. At one point I almost fell in the river while taking a shot too.

 

It was still very humid and still not raining so I convinced Alan to come down to the pool.  I couldn't believe it, he actually went swimming, although it took him a good 15 minutes to ease himself in. The water was absolutely freezing. The water was beautifully warm and we met a nice couple from Boston here on their 30th wedding anniversary.  They told us that there are some raccoons that came down to the pool earlier at night so we might have to have a look tomorrow and see if we can see them.  I've not seen a raccoon in real life before.

 

We've put in a video of the seals making a racket begging for food.

 

 

Day 24 Photographs

Sorry for the delay on yesterday's photographs but the problem wasn't ours.  Windows Live was have a tantrum and refused to upload them.  However, it appears to be playing nice and yesterday's photos have now been loaded.

 

Hopefully it will continue to be nice later when I upload today's collection.  

Day 24 - Universal Studios

Alan's doing the blog again tonight because Sarah's being a big lazy bed monster. If she decides to get up at all to make some comments they'll be in green.  I've been out for seven hours today, standing around and I'm tired.

 

At breakfast this morning I had a slice of French toast. I may as well have not bothered. It didn't taste French and it didn't taste like toast, it tasted like I was eating nothing. I could feel the food going down my gob, but I swear I was eating air. Is it always like that?

 

Anyway today was a trip to Universal Studios. We had been to Universal in Los Angeles on our trip here 8 years ago, so we were trying out the Orlando one this time around. The first thing we did once arriving was checking out the Twister experience. It's a sample of being in the vortex of a tornado while it destroys everything around you. You get wet by rain and also roasted by exploding petrol tanks and it's really cool.

 

Next up we walked a couple of streets over to where a Blues Brothers street show was beginning shortly. I enjoyed it but we had to leave half way through to get inside as it was so hot and the humidity today was just unbelieveable. It must have been the most humid day in history anywhere ever.

 

We went over to the Revenge of the Mummy roller coaster but before we went on it we had to put our stuff in one of the lockers provided. To access the lockers you have to scan your fingerprint. Everyone else seemed to be doing this without a problem whatsoever but when we tried the scanner just refused to read our fingerprint. We tried for ages without luck - maybe it doesn't like Australians or something. Eventually, after countless attempts, Sarah's print was accepted so we stuffed our junk in the locker and joined the queue for the ride. After a few minutes of standing in the line, a voice came on telling us that there was technical difficulties and a lenghty delay would be happening so it was back to the locker in the hope that it would read Sarah's fingerprint and we could retrieve our stuff. Oh and by the time we got out it was starting to rain a bit but that didn't last too long.  Don't ever come on a ride with us.  This wasn't the first time something hasn't worked while we've been in the queue.  At Epcot one of the rides broke down while we were waiting, at DisneyWorld Splash Mountain stopped while we were on the ride and now Revenge of the Mummy.

 

The locker opened after a while and we next went on Earthquake. You get on a train and experience an earthquake while in the San Francisco subway. It's kind of lame but at least it was inside and we didn't have to wait long to get on it.

 

Our next stop was a nice boat ride with Amity Tours around shark infested waterways. Jaws kept trying to attack our boat whilst being hit by gas pipes, electrical lines etc. Eventually he bit the dust and we made it back to dock safely. Lucky us.  It was very hot with things exploding. Too hot I think.   

 

What was next.... oh yes it was the Beetlejuice Graveyard rock and roll revue. This was a stage act with Beetlejuice, Frankensteins monster, Dracula, The Wolfman and the Bride of Frankenstein dancing and singing rock songs. I really enjoyed it but Sarah was bored and I think she may have fallen asleep. She just doesn't feel music the way I do.  OMG, Alan has no idea about how to feel music.  He never enjoys anything unless it's Guns 'n Roses.  He just wanted to stay and perve on the girls in the show, of which, I think, two were actually male.

 

We thought we'd give the Revenge of the Mummy roller coaster another chance and this time it was working. After waiting in line for ages we got on it and it was great. It's an entirely indoor coaster that goes forward and backwards through darkness with unexpected drops and humps. If only it wasn't such a short ride. Even Sarah enjoyed it, despite trying to wuss out of riding it the whole time we were in the queue.  Yes, we all know that I don't like rides. 

 

After that the sky was looking pretty menacing and there was lightning in the distance, so we made our way around to the Men in Black ride. Another locker situation occurred but this time it accepted my print fairly quickly. Obviously the scanner likes me better. We got in the queue which was luckily undercover as seconds later the heavens opened big time. The Men in Black ride is really cool. You ride along in a six seat carriage through alien infested streets and alleys. Each person has a zapper gun with which you have to try to shoot the aliens to score points. That was lots of fun. There was nobody else sitting on our row of 3 seats so I got to have 2 zapper guns. With my right hand I blew away a huge amount of aliens and even with my left I still managed to beat Sarah's pitiful effort. Fair dinkum I'm good.  Fair dinkum he's full of it!!!!!

 

By this stage we were both getting really hungry as it was well and truly past lunch time so we decided to see one more attraction and then off for a bite to eat. The last thing we wanted to see was the Terminator 3D show. It's similar to the one at Universal in LA, but it's been updated with better effects and stuff. It's a fantastic mix of live action, special effects and a 3D film, starring Arnie, Linda Hamilton and Edward Furlong - the actual Terminator actors. I didn't expect to get wet again inside a ride.

 

So after that we left the park and went next door to the world's largest Hard Rock Cafe for a very late lunch.  3.45pm is a very late lunch. The food was great as it always is at Hard Rock and we were served by a screaming fudgepacker who is absolutely obsessed with the movie Muriel's Wedding, and wants to live in Australia. Weird!  At least he recognised the accent.  Normally we get "where are you from?" or "you're not from around here are you?"

 

The photos are being naughty and don't want to upload at the moment. We're working on it.

 

Trivia for the day: Americans don't seem to know how to park their cars rear to kerb. If they can't drive in frontways, they find somewhere else to park and we get strange looks whenever we do it.

 

 

 

 

Day 23 - Disney's Animal Kingdom

Sarah's being a lazy turnip today so Alan's writing the blog again. Her comments are in blue.  I'm not lazy, he made me write two in a row this week so it was his turn.

 

We arose early again this morning and headed off for Disney's Animal Kingdom. We had no idea what to expect of this place with the obvious exception that we might see some animals. It's basically an open range zoo with the odd ride thrown in for good measure.

 

Our first order of business after arriving was to go on the Kilimanjaro safari, where you are driven around a huge area of savannah/jungle in an open air tour vehicle. Many African animals roam freely within this area and could theoretically attack the bus at any time if they felt hungry enough. We were able to see lots of different animals in the wild including lions, hippos, crocodiles, rhinos - both black and white, giraffes, gazelles, zebras and elephants including a couple of adorable little baby elephants playing with each other.  Unfortunately the bus never stops so getting a decent photo was difficult.  Alan got some nice shots of the truck pole and the back of other people's heads.

 

After finishing our safari we walked to the Asian section where a bird show was just about to begin so we took our seats in the pavilion. It was really good and there was such birds as hawks, vultures, storks, parrots and a bald eagle. Next was a trip through the Maharajah Jungle Trek where we saw a komodo dragon, giant bats and 3 tigers, one of whom rolled over and showed us his tummy. He was just like a kitten; if only we could give it a rub.

 

After that was a ride on the Kali River Rapids, a trip on a white water river where we both got drenched. There's a huge fake tree in the middle of the park with lots of differet animals carved into its trunk. It looks great. Next up was the big one - Expedition Everest - a big roller coaster. I somehow managed to convince Sarah to come on it with me and I think she enjoyed it despite almost deafening me with her girly screams. It's fast, high and goes forward and backwards through some pitch black tunnels and unexpected drops. Just the sort of fun I like. Not the sort that I like but I had to go on one rollercoaster during the trip.  I have now fulfilled my quota.

 

We then wandered around to DinoLand, a dinosaur themed area of the park and went on the Dinosaur ride. For those who have been to Disneyland in California, this ride is just like Indiana Jones except that it's dinosaur based of course and a whole heap rougher. We were really thrown around a lot so we decided not to go on that one again. Time for one more ride before we left and Sarah agreed to go on the coaster again. I think she really does enjoy them after all and only pretends to be a big nancy most of the time.  I'm a nancy and proud of it.  It was worse the second time.  I think I preferred not knowing what was coming.  What was coming after that ride was almost a revisit of breakfast.

 

We were ever so impressed with this park. It's very authentically done in the way it looks and they really make you feel like you're actually in Africa or Asia ...... or dinosaur country as the case may be.

 

Late this afternoon we were about to go across the road to play some mini golf when the rain started pouring down so that's been postponed once again. We couldn't really decide what we felt like for dinner this evening so we just took a drive and eventually came across a Thai restaurant the we thought we'd try. The place was really nice and the food was excellent but I suspect it may have been a front for a Thai brothel.  When we came out of the restaurant, there was a car parked half in a parking spot and half in the driveway.  He was either very drunk when he parked it or someone forgot to put on the brake.

 

After getting back to our hotel, the games room next to the lobby was deserted so we went in to check it out. There's video games and pinball machines in there and we got lucky in that we found a South Park pinball with a credit in it so we played that. We also found Maximum Force - a shoot the bad guys type thingy, and Galaga the classic from 1981 with credits on them so we played those too. Better than having to pay for them. We must remember to check every night for unused credits.

 

No tornado alerts tonight, by the way.

 

Trivia for the day: Television here is strange. No matter how long a movie may be, they manage to fit it into 2 hours. If it's too short they throw in a heap of commercials and if it's too long they just cut out chunks here and there.

Viewing the Wedding - Now on Youtube

For those who didn't catch the live viewing of the wedding webcam, it is now available on youtube.

 

The link is:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxUwAWjUum4

 

 

Day 22 - Disneyworld

 Alan's writing the blog today with Sarah's thoughts in pink.

 

We woke up this morning to find that the roof was still on our hotel and the overnight tornados had passed us by. We chose Disneyworld, also known as the Magic Kingdom, for todays destination and drove there without even a hint of getting lost. I'm getting pretty good at this driving and directions caper now. Someone has to given Sarah's complete lack of map reading ability.  My skills as you all know are brilliant.  His ability to listen has NOT improved.  He's only good here because all the parks are extremely well sign posted.

 

Once we parked the car we got on the tram which takes you from the parking lot to the park. We arrived and got off only to find that we then had to catch either a ferry or the monorail to get to the entrance because it's on an island in the middle of the Florida swampland. So a short monorail ride later and we were finally at the gates.

 

We made our way inside after the obligatory bag search and found ourselves having a strange sense of deja vu. It looks almost exactly the same as Disneyland in Anaheim. After checking our map and wandering for a short time we came to the conclusion that it is indeed the same park except that it's missing 3 of the best rides - Indiana Jones, The Matterhorn and Finding Nemo. Oh yes, it smells too. Bad. I'm not sure if it's always like that, or if other people were even aware of the smell but it sure bothered us. Maybe if they're all Florida residents, they might all be used to it.  It smells like a mixture of garbage and stale beer.

 

So without those rides there really isn't all that much for people to do when they don't have young children with them. I'm sure kids would have a great time because most of the park is geared toward them but for us it was hard to find things of interest. We went on Splash Mountain 4 times during which time we got thoroughly soaked and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad twice and that just about did us. At least the queues here are much shorter than in Anaheim.  Both the rides are a little different than Disneyland.  Big Thunder Mountain Railroad isn't as rough and Splash Mountain here you get a lot wetter.

 

We left and caught the monorail back to the mainland and as we were getting off we heard that the monorail was broken down and out of action. We're glad we didn't get stuck half way along the track over an alligator infested pond or something.

 

Later in the afternoon we decided to head across the road from our hotel to a little place called Fun Spot USA which is like a travelling carnival type thing except it's always in this one spot. I went on the Vortex go kart track which is allegedly the steepest track in the world with a 32 degree drop. It was lots of fun and I managed to get through without a single crash and not even spinning out or anything. Gosh I'm skillful. Next door to Fun Spot is a place called Old Town where there's lots of shops and games and rides and people with hotted up cars and stuff like that. We wandered through the crowd until we found a little roller coaster which, of course, I just had to ride. It was small and tight but fun anyway.

 

After leaving there we were going to walk up the road to a mini golf place when we saw some lightning in the sky. We figured that holding metal golf clubs during a lightning storm may not be the best idea in the world so we headed back to our room for the evening. I ordered a pizza from the pool bar downstairs and after waiting an hour and a half I went down to find out where it was. Supposedly the person knocked at our door but we didn't answer, even though we'd been here the whole time. But at least we got it for free because they made us wait so long.

 

Some of our Disneyland photos have a water spot on the camera lens.

 

Trivia for the day: Florida has annoying tolls on some of their main roads. Every few miles you come across another toll booth and have to pay either 75c, $1 or $1.25.

 

 

Day 21 - Epcot, rain, lightning and tornados

Sarah is writing the blog again today. Alan was due to do it but he's just received the news that his only uncle has passed away so he's not really in a blogging mood right now.

 

As I write this, there has been a tornado warning for Sumter County and Lake County, which is the county to the immediate northwest of us. Thankfully it appears to be heading away from us. Let's just hope it continues to do so.

 

Alan did some planning yesterday on places to visit while we are here, with the least amount of walking scheduled for today to give my ankle a break.  So today we went to Epcot but not before we tried out the free continential breakfast.  Yum.  Yes, finally a breakfast worth getting up for.  Cold cereals, fresh fruit, waffles, pastries, toast, yogurt (if you like that sort of thing), juice, coffee and a different hot dish every day.  This morning it was scrambled eggs with bacon bits.

 

We checked out our hotels "free shuttle" to the Disney parks and discovered that there are only three shuttles in the morning and the return three shuttles don't start until 6.45pm.  We therefore chose to drive even though all the parks around here charge for parking.  We thought that would be the case which is why we decided on having a car the entire time we are here.

 

Finding the park was easy, even for Alan.  Although we knew that the day was humid when we left the hotel, by the time we got to the park the sun was out and the humidity was worse.  Thankfully walking around the park wasn't too bad as there was a bit of a breeze.  We discovered early on that there really isn't much to do at Epcot.  It is mainly an educational centre for kids with a few rides thrown in, of which we went on two.  The first was Test Track which is like a car testing centre and we were the crash test dummies.  There were steep slopes, rough terrain, sharp corners with and without ABS brakes and, at the end, a fast speed test.  It was a lot of fun.

 

The next ride was a Space Mission which was a simulator of a voyage to Mars.  You could choose orange or green.  We went on green as the orange apparently has a lot of spinning.  Good that we did as the orange kept either breaking down or people were getting sick and they had to keep cleaning it up.

 

We went to have a ride of Soarin' which we thought was probabaly like the Soarin' over California we went on in California Adventure but the waiting time was 40 minutes, and what we had discovered already today, that their time estimations were out by about 20 minutes on each ride.

 

So we left and headed to Dennys.  Yes, I know what you're thinking ... DENNY'S but we were dying for a chocolate milkshake and they have the best.  We followed the milkshake up with a chicken salad which was lovely. We stopped by a local car dealer on the way back to the hotel to test drive a couple of cars. I chose a big Hummer and Alan picked a little Pontiac sports car which he could barely even fit into it was so tight.

 

We returned to the hotel just as the storm clouds rolled in and retired for an afternoon nap.  I think both of us are still trying to recover from the three hours lost when we few from Las Vegas to here. When we awoke the rain was really coming down and a thunderstorm had just started.  It is still hanging around five hours later. 

 

We settled down to watch CSI which was the first show we've seen that hasn't been a repeat the entire time we've been in the USA.  It was the season finale which channel 9 haven't yet shown in Sydney so we were kind of excited.  Then, about 15 minutes in, they broke in with a tornado warning about 20 miles north west of us.  When we returned to the show, they had cut out the bits we would have seen had it not been for the tornado warning.  This happened about three more times and we missed a lot of the episode.  Darn Americans.

 

So we are keeping an eye on the tornado.  In the last few minutes the news has reported a severe storm warning for just a few miles to our north, with the potential to turn into a tornado.

 

Thankfully we had enough to eat at lunch to not have to go out tonight.  Too much rain and of course the tornados.

 

Trivia for the day: American milkshakes are like Australian thickshakes. They don't seem to have the equivalent of Australian milkshakes. 

Day 20 - Swimming with Dolphins

Blogging with Sarah today with Alan's usual annoying comments in red.

 

 

Today we woke up to our first full day in Orlando. Yes, it was raining and the humidity was 100%.  Thankfully it wasn't too hot, probably around the high 20s.

 

We skipped the free breakfast in the hotel, even though it has been mentioned that it is pretty good, for the breakfast at Discovery Cove.  I've been looking forward to this for a long time.  Even the nasty weather and my sore foot were not going to stop me from enjoying this.  Discovery Cove is a place to interact with dolphins, birds, fish and sting rays in an all-inclusive setting. Attendance is limited to 1,000 guests per day and is reservations only. I reckon there were probably no more than 300-400 people there today. It's very exclusive and extremely expensive, but it's a once in a lifetime thing so it's totally worth it.

 

We arrived at Discovery Cove at about 8am, after a short stop at the chemist for a bandage for my foot. We checked in at the main reception where they took our photo and gave us our individual ID cards for the day.  We were also given our dolphin swim time of 10.50am. There was a staff member in  the reception area holding a sloth. He was really cute and we gave him a pat. We joined an introductory tour and then made our way to breakfast.  A pretty good spread and much better than we'd had anywhere else.  Tables under umbrellas were a bit scarce so we joined a couple of ladies from Tampa.  They gave us horror stories about alligators and from now on, we will avoid any pool of water bigger than the size of a puddle. 

 

After breakfast we made our way to get our bag of goodies; wetsuit/vest, mask, snorkle, sunscreen and towels and placed our stuff in the provided lockers.  Our first stop in the park was the coral reef.  Alan being a wuss with water, decided not to join me. Well Sarah is much better insulated than me so I tend to feel the cold a lot more. However, it took only one second of me putting my head in the water and seeing all the fish, Alan was quickly in the water behind me.  You can't tell from the shore that there are any fish in there and just how deep it gets.  The stingrays are huge and I chose to keep a wide birth even though we had been assured that all their barbs had been removed.  After spending about an hour feeling comfortable in this environment, we decided to give the ray pool a go.  The stingrays in this area were a lot smaller and easier to touch, and that's what we did. They were so soft and slimy. We bought a waterproof camera which is how we got all our cool underwater photos.

 

We made our dolphin swim time with a few minutes to spare.  You are not allowed to wear any jewellery except a waterproof watch, which we didn't have.  It makes knowing the time a little difficult.  We were broken up into groups of eight and off we went with a trainer into the dolphin pool.  First we got to meet Astra, a 27 year old dominant female.  She had come to them from Sea World.  She's very lovely.  Just ask Alan. He went in for the passionate kiss and then the big hug. You can see them in the photos.  After a number of rubs of Astra she was replaced by 7 a year old whose name we can't remember. She was lovely too, quite a bit smaller but very fast.  Her job was to give us our dolphin rides.

 

30 minutes went by really quickly and we had to bid our new dolphin friends goodbye.  Our next stop, lunch.  It was very yummy and there was almost too much to choose from. Sarah had grilled chicken with vegetables and ceasar salad and I had lobster salad. We both had lemon cake and fresh strawberries for dessert. The food was fantastic.

 

Once lunch was over, we went back to the coral reef and snorkled for about another hour or so.  A quick stop in the stringray pool and we made our way to the resort pool.  It is significantly warmer than the other pools and we knew once we had been in there and the tropical river which runs off it, we wouldn't be back in the other two areas.  The pool has a large waterfall which was pretty painful if you let it fall on you.  We hit the tropical river which was lovely.  The water flow kept you moving until you did the lap back to the resort pool, which took about 20 minutes. 

 

By this time we were total prunes and decided to call it a day, that was after Alan took a few packets of Oreo cookies. We wanted to get our money's worth for the day, which we certainly did. Anytime you want any food or drink you just go to the nearest snack bar and get it with no charge.

 

We returned to the hotel and showered before starting our mountain of washing.  We then went to Walmart and bought some supplies for the fridge.  Tonight we popped out and got some hamburgers from Chilli's and brought them back to the room. 

 

That brings us to the end of today.

 

Trivia for the day: The majority of people at Discovery Cove today were from England. There was also one dork from Wollongong.

 

 

Day 19 - The Sunshine State

Alan's writing this blog entry, albeit a little late. If Sarah has anything to add it will be in purple.

 

Our 4 and a half hour flight from Las Vegas to Orlando passed by quickly as we both slept through most of it. We arrived in at 5.45am, which was 2.45am Vegas time and made our way to the car rental place after picking up our bags. We were second in line but unfortunately at that time of morning there was only one person serving at the counter and the person in front of us took over 30 minutes to complete his business. Eventually we finished there and ventured outside, at which time we were instantly hit by a wall of humidity. Once again, we asked for a compact vehicle and were again given an upgrade because they had none left. Actually he offered us an upgrade for US$9 a day and we didn't want it.  It would appear we got it anyway.  This time we are driving a Mercury Grand Marquis, which is big and very luxurious.

 

We made our way out onto the streets just as it was getting light. We quickly found that Orlando, or probably all of Florida, have the ridiculous habit of naming their main roads and freeways by 3 or 4 different names as well as a number. This makes it pretty darn difficult for someone who's never been there before. After driving around for ages we finally found our hotel and were very lucky that they let us check-in early in the morning. Actually, I had detailed instructions including the fact that we needed to get to the 192.  He thought it should have been I-92, so he took the 92 NOT the 192.  Had he taken the 192 we would have made it here a lot earlier. We were desperate for a shower before we hit the road again to Kennedy Space Centre.

 

A quick phone call ensured that our places were still reserved on the tour as we didn't fancy driving a 3 hour round trip if we weren't going to get in. Despite being barely able to keep our eyes open we headed off toward the Atlantic Ocean, including a 37 mile stretch of dead straight road. We made it in one piece and made our way inside.

 

Sarah decided to have a clumsy attack once again and managed to somehow hurt her foot making walking very diificult for her and at a snails pace. Hardly a clumsy attack.  It happened whilst I was sleeping on the plane.  I thought it was just a cramp but it got worse over the day to the stage where I really couldn't walk. Luckily for us the tour was by bus and we only had to get off now and then to look at something. I can't really go into too much detail about the tour as I fell asleep every time we got on the bus and was pretty much sleepwalking when we got off to view bits and pieces.  The tour was really interesting and I enjoyed it. 

 

I was actually awake on the bus ride returning to the main entrance when we saw a big fat turtle making it's way across the road ahead of us. The driver tried to stop, but came to a halt with the turtle under us and it took about a minute before he thankfully came plodding out the other side seemingly oblivious to the danger. There were a few more things we could have seen and done but we were too tired and Sarah's foot was hurting too much.  And Alan was in grumpy sleepy mode.

 

After getting back to our hotel we went straight to sleep for a few hours before waking up for dinner and an hour of television and then it was back to bed for a decent nights sleep. The hotel is brilliant. It is in a very quiet area and it is a totally non smoking hotel.  Another plus, it has a laundry, and we needed it!!

 

Trivia for the day: There sure is a lot of rainfall here for a place called The Sunshine State. Jacksonville is currently underwater and rain is predicted for every one of our 10 days here in Orlando.

Day 18 - A big hole in the ground, plus leaving Las Vegas

Sarah's writing the blog while we sit in the airport. Alan's comments will be in green. 

 

Hello all.  Yes, as Alan said, we are at the airport bidding farewell to Las Vegas, finally!!!  I have well and truly had enough of the smoke and the noise.  Why can't those slot machines just shut up!

 

We had an early morning today as we needed to be checked out of our hotel, bags stored and be outside for the pick-up for our Grand Canyon Tour by about 9.05am.  It was a lovely morning, a fair bit cooler than we have had.

 

The pick up occurred at 9.15am and we were driven to the tour organiser's office.  After the embarrassing weigh-in, we were kept waiting for about 45 minutes before we were on the way to the Henderson Executive air strip.  I was not expecting the size of the plane. I was. I thought we would be on a plane which would hold about 30 people.  How wrong I was.  I vowed never to get into a light plane but having paid millions of dollars for the trip, Alan said I had to get on the plane.  It was a tiny Cessna 206 which had six seats, including the pilot.  There was only four in our group and Alan got a row to himself with me playing co-pilot for the trip. I was playing photographer during the flight as I had a better view. We were surprised that hardly any of the photos turned out blurry, given the amount of turbulence. It was about 45 minutes and bumpy at times but the view of the mountains, Lake Mead and Hoover Dam was pretty nice.  We arrived at the west rim of the Grand Canyon about 12.10pm and were told to get on a bus to get our lunch but we had to be back at the air strip by 1pm to get our helicopter flight to the bottom of the canyon.  We and the newly married English couple we were partnered with looked at each other wondering how on earth we were going to do it.  But, we boarded the bus anyway in the hope that we would make it to lunch.  That didn't happen.  By the time we reached our destination we had to turn around and return.  We made our helicopter booking with minutes to spare, only to have them make us wait about 15 minutes.  Had we known this would happen, we would have eaten lunch.

 

The trip to the bottom of the canyon was quick and uneventful except when we landed the silly woman helping us disembark the helicopter decided not to wait until I was free of my seat to wrench me by the arm, almost pulling it from its socket.  From there we hiked down a fairly rocky trail and boarded a pontoon boat for a 15 minute trip along the Colorado River.  It was a spectacular view however we had a number of Japanese people with us and a boat driver who was Japanese and I really think he told them more about the history than he did us.  I don't remember him using the words "mountain goat" whilst speaking English to us.

 

We got off the boat and back up the trail and were soon back on the helicopter, in the hope that when we returned to the top we would then have enough time to get some lunch before our 3pm departure back on the really really really small plane.  However, this wasn't to be.  When our pilot came to check on us we informed him that we hadn't had time for lunch and he very nicely rustled up some grub for us which was really tasty.

 

The trip back to Vegas wasn't as long as the trip out but still bumpy. Sarah looked pretty green by the time we landed and the bus ride after didn't do her any favours either. My vow is to NEVER get into a small plane again, from this point forward. I'll do my research a bit better next time. Our plane to Buffalo is going to be small, but maybe not quite that small.

 

It wasn't long before we were back at our hotel.  We collected our luggage and thought we'd make an early trip out to the airport, just in case they wanted to strip search us this time.  Thankfully that didn't happen and we passed through the security without them blinking an eye lid.  Oh, there was one problem ... one of our bags was overweight.  Must be all those souvenirs that Alan has bought. The airport is amazingly quiet.

 

So here we are, three hours early for our flight but at least we are ready for an early departure in case it happens.  Yes, I thought that was weird too but they just announced another flight was having an early departure and they were chasing passengers.

 

An overnight flight and we will be in Orlando.  Let's hope the weather there has improved from what we've been seeing on the news for the past two weeks.

 

Trivia for the day: Las Vegas airport is so big that we had to catch a train from the terminal to the gate.

 

 

Wedding video

Our wedding video is still viewable if anyone has yet to see it.

 

 

http://webcasting.cashmanpro.com/shalimar/

 

You will need to put in Saturday's date on the date selector to find our names and click on the "VIEW NOW" to watch it.

 

We have no idea how much longer it will be there to watch.

Day 17 - The first day of our new life

Sarah has told me that I have to write today's blog as she's busy packing. We don't have much time so it will be short. If she wishes to add any comments they'll be in blue.

 

Our life as a married couple began with a mid-morning trip to the bridal store to return our wedding clothes. We're glad there was no cleaning charge on the clothes as the train on Sarah's dress was filthy. On returning to our hotel we phoned Christie, Steve and Cameron to arrange a meeting time for the days activities. Sarah and I had planned a visit to the Showboat Casino but when we checked the address on the internet we found out that it was demolished 5 years ago. It had a 106 lane bowling alley and also, the last time we were here we got the majority of the licence plates we needed for our licence plate game.  Oh well, never mind, we didn't have enough time anyway to be honest.

 

We drove to The Bellagio hotel, where our rental car was due for return by 1pm this afternoon. We arrived nice and early by about 12.20 and thank goodness for the security guard on the driveway, otherwise we would never have found where we were supposed to park the car. However, after finding the rental company office, there was a note on the door saying back at 1pm. We took a stroll through the Bellagio and went outside to watch the magnificent water display which goes off every hour. The usual large crowd stood waiting for it to start when a voice came over the PA saying it was cancelled this hour due to high winds (which we couldn't even feel). What a load of bollocks! It's just water. It won't get hurt if the wind blows on it.

 

Anyway we returned our car keys and then made our way back to our hotel after which Steve, Christie and Cameron came and met us. We headed down the strip and parked at New York New York. We walked over to the MGM Grand first to have another look at the lions. The others were hungry so we also had a very late lunch in the Rainforest cafe, where thunder and lightning go off every now and then and you're surrounded by trees and animals.

 

After leaving there we went a short way up the strip to the world's largest m&m shop. Oh my god! 4 floors of everything you can possibly imagine with m&m plastered all over it. We spent well over an hour in there, including watching a 3-D movie about m&ms.

 

Next up was something I'd been waiting 8 years to do again; ride the Manhattan Express rollercoaster at New York New York. I went on it when we were last in town and at the time it was the scariest coaster I'd been on. Sarah, Christie, Steve and Cameron were all huge nancies and none of them would come on it with me so I joined the queue all by myself.  Someone needed to be available to ID the body if something happened.  About 40 minutes later and I was strapped in next to some English dude and ready to go. It's like I remember, still darn scary especially because twice you take sharp turns while overlooking the road below from a great height. It really feels like it's going to fly off the track and plummet down onto the strip. It also does a negative G barrel roll which is pretty freaky if you're not expecting it.

 

I made it back alive and went off to find the others who had been spending all my quarters in the amusement arcade. Cameron had some 2100 tickets to redeem at the arcade gift shop and I think he must have bought one of just about everything on display. Someone came up to us and gave us about 1900 tickets.

 

Another hour or so spent at the Luxor and we were ready to return to our hotel. They dropped us back here and we said our goodbyes. It will most likely be another 10 years or so before we see them again. Christie was more than happy for us to take Cameron back to Australia with us but we just don't have the space in our suitcases. He can be a handful at times but he's also ever so adorable and fun to play with. We got along ever so well and we're now Uncle Sarah and Aunty Alan, or something to that effect.

Day 16 - The Wedding

Sarah blogging, Alan commenting in red

 

Sorry for the day delay on yesterday's details but really, we sort of had better things to do. That's right. Sleep was required.

 

The day started pretty much like any other day.  A late rising for me, although Alan had been up for hours.  He said it was to watch the English soccer scores but I think he was actually nervous and couldn't sleep. Rubbish, I didn't even remember what we had planned for the day.

 

We ventured down to the bridal hire store and picked up our gear for the wedding and returned to the room.  Alan then went and had a lie down, which was a good thing as he was a bit grumpy from not having enough sleep.  Finally he woke up and we joined our guests at their hotel for a light lunch. We then retired to the amusement arcade and played a number of games to relieve the tension. 

 

At about 2.20pm we agreed it was time to return to our room to get ready.  Christie, Steve & Cameron were to join us at 3.30pm so we could get some photos taken before the limo driver was to call at 4.30pm.  However, we underestimated the traffic on Las Vegas strip on a weekend and after 40 minutes of driving some 2 miles, I started to get a bit anxious. I took a detour through the backstreets but that didn't help much either due to a turn light which simply would not change to green! Alan dropped me at the door of the hotel (which is still about 5 minutes from our room) and I ran up to get into the shower.  Alan arrived about 10 minutes later. Yes, thanks to the worlds slowest driver whom I got caught behind in our carpark. Try taking your foot off the brake once in a while love. While he was in the shower, the others called at 3.10pm to say they were on their way.  I was to meet them down in the foyer and decided to leave getting dressed until they arrived.  I thought they would be about the same amount of time that we were.  Oh how wrong I was.  They didn't arrive until 4pm.  Now I was pretty panicked.  We quickly returned to the room and Christie pulled out the curling iron and started on my hair.  Finally I stepped into the dress at 4.25pm and waited for the limo driver to call.

 

He called about 4.35pm and told us he would pick us up betwen 5.15 and 5.20pm.  Why couldn't they have told us that WHEN we let the chapel know we had arrived, days earlier?  All that rushing for nothing.  Anyway, it gave us plenty of time to go and have photographs taken in front of the waterfall at our hotel.

 

From there we moved to the entrance where the limo driver said he would pick us up.  We were then rather confused when we saw him drive past.  We quickly tried to run over to where he was, which is hard to do in a long wedding dress with a train, but thankfully 6 foot 1 Christie with her long legs, ran over, jumped in and got him to come around and meet us.  And then we were on our way to the chapel.

 

When we arrived there were brides coming, brides going, drunk guests (not ours), angry grooms (the buffoon in a photo with me) and of course slot machines.  I had noticed that their weddings often run late and I know why.  With the limo not picking us up until 5.20pm we were never going to be the chapel by 5.30.  There was another couple, this would be the angry groom, who was telling anyone who would listen that their limo had been over an hour late picking them up and they had been waiting for them to take them back to their reception for over an hour.  All their guests had already gone. Yeah boohoo, tell your story walking peckerhead.

 

Everything happens very quickly; completion of paperwork, professional photos, meeting Elvis who, by the way, was an absolutely lovely person, and then on with the show. We didn't even meet the minister before the event. 

 

It went so quickly, I'm just glad we have it on DVD to watch, which we've done already.

 

We know that some people, including my sister/brother-in-law where my parents were, had problems with the webcam.  Others didn't ... it is just one of those hit and miss things.  But thanks to Kerrie & Greg for paying for a 24 hour viewing, most of you have now seen me as a giant white marshmallow and Alan misplacing the ring. Ah, men!!!  We toyed with the fact of having Steve & Christie's son, Cameron, being the ring bearer.  We probably should have as I'm sure a 7 year old would have been more competent than Alan.

 

Then, the wedding was all over.  We received our certificate, photos, DVD etc and journeyed back to the hotel and had a lovely dinner at the buffet.  We had booked a much more expensive dinner where basically we were paying for the view, but the food at the hotel buffet, as you will know from an earlier blog this week, was really good.  Also, it was quiet and relaxed and we had a lovely time with our dear friends.

 

So that brings us up to when we returned to the room and that's all you need to know.

 

 

 

 

 

Day 16 - Just another day

 Blog to come soon.

 

We are aware that the webcam at our wedding may have been unviewable for some people.

It can be viewed until about 10.30am tomorrow Sydney time through this link.

 

http://webcasting.cashmanpro.com/shalimar/

 

Just find our names and click on the "VIEW NOW" to watch it. If Sunday's list of weddings are already there you will need to put in Saturday's date to find our names.

 

We will also be attempting to upload it to youtube when possible.

Day 15 - Guests Arrive

Sarah doing the blog again tonight as Alan chose to go and gamble.  If he feels like adding some comments, they will be in pink

 

This morning we got up about 9am and then just hung around in the room waiting to hear from my friend Christie who was flying in for the wedding from Salem, Oregon with her husband Steve and their seven year old boy Cameron.

 

The call came through about 11am and we ventured down to their hotel, the Luxor.  We hadn't arranged a place to meet, which was kind of silly, but we found them in the check-in line without too much difficulty. It took us a while as the Luxor has 2 different check in areas.

 

We then went with them up to their room.  Bad mistake on my part.  I thought it was strange that instead of the signage saying "elevator" it said "inclinator".  The guest rooms are situated on the outer walls of the pyramid and are reached by riding in the "inclinators" that travel along the inner surface of the pyramid at a 39-degree angle. You can really feel it moving sideways when it takes off and stops.  But that isn't the worst of it.  The hotel has open hallways leading to the rooms overlooking the hotel atrium, which is the largest in the world at 29 million cubic feet (820,000 m³).  They are staying on the 21st floor and those who know me, know that I don't like heights and this was pretty high and scary. You might be able to gauge it from Alan's photo.  I wasn't going near the edge to even see what he was taking a photo of. The atrium is so huge it can house nine 747 jumbo planes.

 

After dropping off the bags we went and got into our car, not just because it is the people mover but because it was parked closer than their car.  A quick trip to the Hard Rock Cafe was made that little bit longer as Alan's directions were a little off and when we reached the place, he had troubles finding the car park. Well it's hardly my fault that they hide the entrance now is it. A nice lunch was had by all and we then went to Circus Circus hotel.  The first stop was the Adventuredome, the giant indoor amusement park with Alan, of course, eyeing off the Canyon Blaster rollercoaster.  I had my eye on the water flume ride.  It didn't take too much persuading of Christie before the five of us boarded the boat for the flume ride.  Yes, we got a bit wet but that's the fun.  Then the boys decided it was rollercoaster time.  Christie wasn't too sure about Cameron going on the ride but he wanted to go.  We took the required photographic proof of their ride and waited for their return.  As they started to walk towards us I turned to Christie and asked what was the look on Cameron's face.  We couldn't tell whether he was smiling or whether his face was frozen in fear.  It turned out to be the former.

 

We then ventured over to the midway games and caught a couple of the free circus acts at the big top.  Then the five of us hit the camel races that I had been so successful on the other night.  This time though I was defeated by Steve three times, Christie once and then someone else won one ... can't remember who exactly. I won 2 thankyou very much!

 

Before leaving we returned to the Adventuredome where Christie, Alan and Cameron played a round of putt putt golf. Alan cheated and won.  He never lets the kid win anything. I beg your pardon. I did not cheat. I won with pure skill and I also let Cameron beat me in a game of air hockey. We dropped them back to their hotel about 6pm with the idea that we would meet up later.  However, Alan fell asleep when we returned to our hotel room and didn't wake up until 8.45pm.  I called the others, hoping they hadn't been waiting dinner for us, and spoke to Steve.  The other two were sleep so we gave the rest of the night a miss. 

 

Alan and I went down to the foyer and bought a ham and swiss cheese roll to share and returned to the room.  About an hour later we were discussing who was going to write the blog when the fire alarm went off.  We quickly ran around and grabbed all the important things; laptop, travellers cheques, wedding papers and were about to evacuate the room when a voice over the loud speaker told us to hold on while they investigated the fire alarm.  Pity though they didn't turn it off while they investigated it.  I think I'm now deaf.  A few minutes later another message told us it had been a false alarm.  Thankfully it wasn't in the middle of the night. 

 

So this brings us to the end of my last night as a single woman, again.  This time tomorrow I'll be a married woman and, hopefully have managed to get myself loose of the wedding dress. 

 

Keep your eye out tomorrow for the big marshmallow in white.  That will be me.

 

For those wanting to view the webcam, here are the details again.

 

At 5.30pm Las Vegas time, Saturday 15 September ........ 10.30am Sydney time Sunday 16 September go to:

 

http://webcasting.cashmanpro.com/shalimar/

You will see our names on the list but do not press the "buy now".

 

Above that there is a "watch live" button, click on that.

You will see instructions when you come in that this page doesn't automatically refresh.  If nothing happens, press the refresh button under
the viewing window.  If nothing still happens.  Try again in a few minutes. Sometimes weddings start late.

If it freezes up, try refreshing the page again.

I'm not sure whether the number of people trying to view it may cause problems.  However, it is the only chapel we could find in Las Vegas with a free webcam and even those that offered a paid service wouldn't guarantee that it would work.

If you are not successful in viewing the event live we will be endeavour to put it up on youtube and will be posting the link here when it is available for viewing. I'm sure we'll have plenty of photos in tomorrows blog entry as well.