Orlando Trip Day 7: Beware The Yeti...And Bees

7:30 a.m. - Get up, Yada Yada Yada, we are ready to go. The only thing of note is that we don't bother going down to breakfast because we have so much darn food from leftovers. However, I do take Logan to get a picture of the Alligator sign right by the pool of the hotel because we hadn't done this yet.



9:30 a.m. - We get on the parking lot tram. They are waiting an extra long time to go this morning. As such, we get to hear the safety message about keeping our arms inside the vehicle and not standing up and so on and so forth so many times. We have heard this same message over and over the whole week. Abby is sick of it. She can recite it word for word and does so in a sarcastic manner.

10:02 a.m. - Don't know what made us think that going on the one ride that would get us wet first thing in the morning was a good idea, but we are on our way to ride the Kali River Rapids. Shockingly, we get wet. I mean realllllly wet. Poor Logan looked like a drowned little mouse as he tried to walk with all of his soaking wet clothes. It is funny how cold 65 degrees can feel when you are soaked as opposed to not soaked. Abby and Braden want to go again so Shannon goes with them while I trek it to the little cart selling...towels??? It is like they knew this was going to happen. Those devious theme park people. Meanwhile, my wife becomes a garbage picker and pulls a poncho out of the trash. The good news? She stays dry. The bad news? SHE PULLED IT OUT OF THE TRASH!!! It was like she was George Castanza with the eclair or something. Oh well.







10:46 a.m. - We went to the Bug's Life 3D movie. My son Logan who has an irrational fear of spiders gets a little freaked out. I don't know if it was the foot long black widows that come out of the ceiling in the midst of a massive fog or not, but I am thinking they might have had something to do with it.



11:09 a.m. - Ready to go on Expidition: Everest. This is a roller coaster that starts out going really high forward and then backward for a little while and then forward down a massive drop. Abby chooses not to go claiming the need to recover from her previous night's throwing up incident. By now, the whole arguing with her desire has just gone out of me so we leave her near the stroller.

And the review of this ride? AWESOME!!! Logan had his face buried in my arm the entire ride so he didn't get to see a whole lot, but it was really cool. So cool that we fast pass as soon as we get off.



11:34 a.m. - We decide to eat lunch at a restaurant called Yak and Yeti's. Ok, I think we actually ate at a place right next to Yak and Yeti's but I really like the name Yak and Yeti's and can't remember the other name so we will just go with Yak and Yeti's. And you didn't think I could get the work yak and the work yeti into one sentence three times each now did you? As we sit down, we quickly become aware of several bees near our table. Braden's approach is to get mad, yell at the bees and run from his food and then stare at it from a distance while being unable to eat it. My approach is to sit there and just make sure I don't accidently put a bee in my mouth. After about 10 minutes of Braden going through the different stages of anger, I finally make him come by me and we have this discussion:

"Braden, how many times have you been stung using your approach to the bees?"

"None."

"How many times have I been stung using my approach to the bees?"

"None."

"That's right. But the difference is that I get to eat and you don't. Please take my approach and sit down and eat."

He doesn't like my approach and would like to argue with me, but there really isn't an argument. I think this makes him even more angry, but at least we finally get to finish our lunch.

12:44 p.m. - We go the Dinosaur portion of the park and ride...Dinosaur. We follow this up with Primeval Whirl. While standing in line, I look and I see a guy about 15 people in front of us who looks exactly like Andre Agassi. Now I know that Andre Agassi lives in Florida. What are the odds that I am seeing Agassi in Walt Disney World. Well, in fact the odds were not good as it wasn't him upon closer inspection. However, I was pretty excited there for a while.



1:23 p.m. - There is nothing worse than getting in line for a time killer ride while you wait for other people only to have that ride break down and you end up taking far more time than you meant to. This happens to Shannon and Logan as they ride the Dinosaur equivalent of the Dumbos.

1:46 p.m. - We go into the area where you can see Tigers and bats that are indigenous to Asia. The tigers are awesome. They always are. Just amazing animals. We then walk into the bat room. No it isn't a cool room with lots of gadgets that Batman uses on his down time. I was pretty disappointed when I found this out. Anyway, we are looking at the bats (amazing and disgusting all at the same time) when we realize they have this hideous recording spouting facts about the bats. It is totally monotone voice that is pitched at the worst possible level. It has to be a recording meant to keep the room from getting crowded because a human can only stand this sound for two...maybe three minutes at a time. Who one earth would commission a recording like this for a theme park attraction? Oh wait, it isn't a recording. It is the guy right behind me with a microphone. Unbelievable. I hope I didn't say anything too rude about the "recording" while I was standing close to him.



2:07 p.m. - It is time for Expidition: Everest again. YEAH! Abby still doesn't want to go so we have five fast passes for four people. We all go and then Braden says he wants to go again even if it is all by himself. All right. I went over to get a picture of him coming down the big drop. Long story short, right as I am ready to take the picture, I look over at the exit and see that Braden is already back. And he is talking quite animatedly to the man sitting next to him. When I went to get him at the exit, he informed me he had met a man named Morgan that he had sat next to on the ride.

"Did you and Morgan have a good conversation?"

"Yep, I told him all about the ride. I told him what was coming next the whole time so that he could get a preview."

I happened to see Morgan about this time and Morgan didn't seem overly impressed with his preview.

"Did Morgan talk much to you?"

"No, I did most of the talking."

Might be time to have a discussion about social rules and such. But he was so excited about how much he had helped Morgan. I decide that conversation can wait for another time.



2:48 p.m. - We decide now is the time for ice cream.

3:12 p.m. - We have saved the marquee ride in this park for the last. It is the safari where you ride in a vehicle that take you right next to the animals. After a pretty long wait in line, we are finally off. It was worth it as we had African antelopes run right next to the vehicle. I mean like within two feet. Pretty cool.



4:11 p.m. - Ready to leave the park and go over to Epcot for a little bit before calling it a vacation. When we finally get back to the tram, we have a little more fun at the tram recording's expense. Fortunately, it doesn't seem to have feelings.

5:03 p.m. - When we get parked at Epcot, we are in that horrible situation where we are close enough that if we walk, we will probably get there faster than if we wait for the tram, but it means more walking. What to do? What to do...We walk.

5:18 p.m. - Get told that even though we have an extra day on the ticket, we can't get in because it isn't a park hopper ticket. Now I had specifically asked this question when I bought the tickets if we could use them in this manner just using an extra day if we went to two parks in one day. We were told we could. Now we are being told we can't. Fortunately, I held it together pretty well for a man who has just spent a week exhausting himself in a theme park setting. I even managed not to yell. At least they credited back the cost of the extra day that we couldn't use. However, I was really disappointed because I had wanted to go back to Epcot just one more time. Oh well. Meanwhile, Logan has taken his shoe and sock off and his feet are still not dried out from that morning. He has a serious case of prune foot. We head back to our car. And by the way? Screw it, we are taking your dumb tram and we are not walking again.



6:00 p.m. - We decide to go back to Downtown Disney and eat at the Earl of Sandwich one more time and get the pictures we wanted to the first time when I didn't bring the camera. And yes, I was reminded that it was me who didn't bring the camera. Highlights include:

Earl of Sandwich - Even better the second time. Highly recommend the Hawaiian BBQ chicken sandwich.

Braden walking into everyone's pictures - He must have done it no less than four times. Just not paying attention and walking directly into the line of someone trying to take a picture. So who knows what part of the world might have a picture of our son floating around in it.

Getting all of our pictures - We had a good time posing with the pirate wheel and on the Harley Davidson motorcycle.

















8:08 p.m. - We head back to the hotel. On the way, the kids are so tired they are hyper. I tell them we have to play the quiet game. We had done this several times to get them to be quiet. It hadn't always ended well. Which lead to this comment by Braden as we started, "The quiet game makes everything worse." Now there is a marketing campaign for any product.

10:00 p.m. - All in bed as we have to be at the airport at 6:00 a.m. the next morning.

The following day is a blur. There was the 4'8" woman who made anyone with children get in the family line at the TSA which only made everything worse and everyone more grumpy. But isn't that what the TSA is for? We flew for what seems like twice as long as when we were on our way to Orlando. We saw Kathy again and she was on our flight from Memphis to Phoenix. That made for a nice bookend on our week. Lamar picked us up, but we didn't stay long at their place as Danae had just gotten strep.

Long story short, we finally walked into our own home at a little after 5 p.m. that afternoon. It was a wonderful week, but it was good to be home.