General Inquiries:Â
How was the trip??Â
           One word: amazing. From beginning to end it was a total blast. I kept having to remind myself I was actually back in Florida… the whole thing was very surreal. IMHO we couldn’t have planned anything better.Â
What does IMHO stand for?Â
           In my humble opinion.Â
And you’re favourite attractions??Â
          Well, there’s different classes of attractions kind of. You can’t compare apples to oranges.  Here they are:Â
Coaster: Sheikra @ Busch GardensÂ
Dark ride: Spiderman @ Universal Islands of AdventureÂ
Show: Mickey’s PhilharMagic @ Disney’s Magic Kingdom it was new since my last trip.Â
Cheesy Nostalgic Ride: Ah… good ol’ Splash Mountain @ Disney’s Magic Kingdom Â
Did you wait in tons of lines??Â
               Actually… no. Our longest wait was probably just over 20 minutes. That was for The Mummy at Universal Orlando. We just stopped briefly at that park on the first night because we got that pass for free.  All the other parks we had MAJOR strategies for so that we could make the most of our time. At Islands of Adventure we bought a Express Plus Pass which meant we could go to an “exclusiveâ€? line while other people waited over an hour. At Busch Gardens we had Joilee (I’ll explain later). At WDW we had… well… me (someone with an above average Disney IQ).Â
How was the weather??Â
            Amazing. No rain, ever. Every night was nice and warm too. We could eat on patios… walk around comfortably… and even get some colour in the sun. Â
Did you get me anything??Â
             Chances are… no. Unless you are one of my students (who get something tiny) or in my immediate family my souvenir to you will have to be a drink/dessert out while I tell you all about the trip.  Â
Pictures??Â
            The second they’re developed, I’ll post ‘em.Â
Day-by-day Inquiries:Â
I heard you held up the entire plane for an hour. How is this possible?Â
           Ah, the good old Airport Transfer. In Newark, NJ (where we could see New York) our plane was a bit late. i.e. we had less than 15 minutes to make our next flight. We barely made it, get in, hear the safety spiel… *pause*… announcement: “sorry for the delay folks. We had a transfer from Cal..gr.. Canada and their luggage needs clearance before we can take off.â€? Everyone is super angry because we literally are in the plane for an hour. They’re like, “let’s go… they can get their luggage later.â€? Quietly we are thankful that this won’t be the case. We weren’t the only two from Calgary, though.Â
So, you did Universal the first day. How was it?Â
           So so so great. For 95% of the day we were on the Islands of Adventure side of the park. Express Plus passes are totally worth it. We wouldn’t have been able to do all the attractions we did without it. Allan’s incredible friend, Tricia, was a hostess with the mostess. We conquered the park. Right from our first coaster: The Hulk the day was a total blast. Super warm. Tons of screaming. I will definitely be back! Â
You were a V.I.P.? You had 12 to 14 year old girls swooning all over you all day? How did you become such a big deal at Busch Gardens?Â
           Our day at Busch in Tampa was nuts. We ended up buying [we being Allan] tickets for a V.I.P. Adventure Thrill Tour. It was not cheap but something I’ll remember for a long long time. Basically we are in a park with no alternative to long lines (no FastPass / Express Line system). We, as tour participants, get escorted to the very front of the line [via the exits] and have our choice of seats on each and every attraction. I literally felt like a celebrity going into a night club. We had to practice not making eye contact with the people waiting well over an hour. On the tour we had total choice on what attractions we wanted to do… this park is jam packed with some big big big coasters. We did all the major ones multiple times: in the very front!! It was AWESOME.  Â
           There were about half a dozen junior high girls on our tour. At first, they were a bit “too muchâ€? for me. They talked super fast and super loud and super constantly. Next thing I know they are like our best friends. Allan had them hanging on every word (so basically they were swooning over him mostly). We taught them all about Canada. We took pictures together… and had a very sentimental good-bye. I gave them a the address for this blog so if you’re reading this and are from Oscano, FL be sure to post!!Â
I hear you are a Walt Disney World drill sergeant? Any truth to that?Â
           In short, “yesâ€?. It runs in the family. We did the Magic Kingdom at WDW and doing the Magic Kingdom means you need to know how to rise above the sheep. At WDW we met up with my best friend David and his friend, Ricardo… so there were four of us. Knowing how I like to do Disney Parks I was a bit worried about the other three but I will say that they did very well. In fact, throughout the day they thanked me for my tireless leadership saying they wouldn’t have been able to figure out the logistics without me. : )Â
            We were there from Open to Close. (9am to 10pm). We did all the major rides, Mountains and all, fireworks, and of course, the good ol’ SpectroMagic nighttime parade. If you want to picture how ‘die hard’ we were you need to understand the FastPass system. Basically you make appointments for attractions about an hour ahead of time. You are only allowed to have one appointment at a time, or one appointment every two hours (whichever amount of time is less). So not only was I dictating which rides we were doing ‘next’ I was dictating which appointments we were making one, two, and three rides after each attraction and when lunch/snacks/shopping would fit into that. For supper we took the monorail to the Contemporary Resort which was a nice break from the crowds and logistics.Â
Did you see anyone so drunk that they nearly drown, and then when they “came-toâ€? they decided to run around the beach naked?Â
          OMG [G= gosh not God] it was crazy. Thursday was our Sanity Day. We did outlet shopped… went downtown to Orlando… then went to Cocoa Beach so I could stick my toe in the Atlantic for the first time. At Cocoa Beach we see this guy passed out in the water. He’s not doing well. His friend needs help getting him out of the water. Two minutes later he’s this fat man running around naked with everyone in disbelief. Some people should not be allowed in public.Â
There’s a ski resort in Florida, really?Â
            There was supposed to be. Florida got snow but it ended up being very short term… so what was going to be Florida’s first Ski Resort ended up getting turned into a waterpark. Disney’s Blizzard Beach was awesome. We caught some sun, did some slides, cruised in a tube down a creek. I love this waterpark. I will point out also that TWICE I won the toboggan race (out of eight people).
What’s a Serk Newbie?Â
          It’s spelled Cirque as in Cirque du Soleil. It was my first time. We watched La Nouba. Man this is an intense show. It’s like the choreographer kept saying, “No, not hard enough… we need to make this more impossible and add 34 more elements on top of thisâ€?. From start to finish I was spellbound. In the end I even got a clown nose that I will wear with pride.Â
Tired? What kept you going? Â
          Friday we had a VERY early flight. The whole trip was jam packed with so much. We are lucky we aren’t comatose. I slept most of the flight and most of the day afterwards. I don’t think we could have fit in any more than we did into this week. Amazing food (and short breaks) were the secret to our success. We ate at some really really great places. Most noteworthy were probably Seasons 52 (Thanks Tony for that one!!!), Wolfgang Pucks (where we even got a free appetizer after a few serving errors which NEVER happens to me), and the Contemporary Resort (where we had a super-duper server) who told me she wasn’t my bi*** (affectionately which is still very un-Disney.) Even breakfast was covered each day because our hotel had a Contiental Breakfast that was quite impressive (it even had make-them-yourself waffles which baffled me a bit requiring some assistance from Allan). The only food less-than-good was our food at the World’s Biggest McDonalds. Ick. The food wasn’t bad but the place was super trashy. They had weird food too like Seafood Pasta. It was trying to be too much.
You’d do it again?Â
          IN A HEARTBEAT!!!