"Some day my Prince will come" Part 1

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Our last week in Florida.

What can you say about Disneyworld ... Walt is so good at make believe and fake destinations. It's time-travel on a budget -yes in one day you can visit Asia and Africa by just turning a corner or crossing a bridge . So a walk round the lake at Epcot saw us wandering from Paris to Morocco, Norway, Italy and Mexico to name just a few countries and on the way you can rub shoulders with Alice, Snow White , Donald Duck and Mary Poppins will make sure you are on your best behaviour. From the Tree of Life and Swiss Family Robinson's home to the African Savannah and Tom Sawyer's Island we were whirled around on mono-rail, old fashioned trains, paddlesteamers and rafts for 4 days visiting Epcot, Magic Kingdom, Hollywood Studios and on one day while I did Animal Kingdom Suz went to Universal to do the "Harry Potter Experience.

We saw musical shows, puppet shows, 3D shows ...a wonderful illuminated parade ( well I had to sit on the kerb for about 1.30 hours to save our place and get a good view) action shows with Indiana Jones, Fast cars and the AMAZING fireworks and laser show at the Magic Kingdom Castle as well as the dancing fountains and fireworks at Epcot. (I did think it was being rather ridiculous of me to take photos of a fake thatched cottage when I have them on the doorstep here in Sussex.)

These were long days - falling into bed about 11 pm each night and we were fortunate to have a shuttle bus transport each day from our lovely resort so I could leave the car behind... which was good point as it had taken us two circuits around Disney world to find our resort - Disney has commandeered all the exit signs so you can easily find anything to do with Disney but the street names and Exit numbers were sadly missing from the highway as we drove into Orlando - so once at the resort we were afraid to drive out in case we never found it again!! We found that the Fast Pass system which you get with your day pass was great - we could choose 3 favourite rides/shows etc and these were then timed so you could just walk in - and so for other things we never had to queue for more than 15 mins.

At Animal Kingdom the Kilimanjaro African Safari experience was very good with lots of wild animals to be seen - but the rest of animal kingdom is really a walk through the Disney version of an old African town or a falling to bits Indian Palace or a street in Nepal. But like I said Walt does fake really well and it's clean and tidy, not smelly and the toilets are good - so as a traveler who has been to lots of different countries including Asia you have to take this with a tongue in cheek attitude and just enter into the spirit of it and have some fun. Which brings me on to some of the rides - SOARING - very good strapped in you are lifted up and the large screen in front of you depicts you flying/soaring above some of the iconic sights in the US. Star Wars and other simulations - good fun and didn't make me sick. But the EVEREST RIDE was the scariest thing - and you can see from the photos the angle of incline that the train ascended and descended at SPEED - and inside the mountain you were hurled about backwards and in the DARK. That is defo the last time I do a big roller coaster - in hindsight I was lucky I didn't get a detached retina!! Well that was my excitement - give me the Thunder Mountain Railroad any day.

Suz and I were staying at Bonnet Creek Resort - it was very luxurious with 6 towers and a lake each with its own pool and 2 lazy rivers and a very nice restaurant which served the biggest meatballs you have ever seen. It was a pity we only had one day to enjoy the sunshine and laze by the pool but then it was time to pack to bags find our way out of Disneyworld and back to Tampa for our flight home.

So here I am at home now and after a few days of jet lag what else is there to do but begin to think about where to next.

There are lots of photos so I will put them in 2 blogs - Part 2 to follow.

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Photos

Everest Yeti Ride
Yes that's a train going down and yes thats how steep it it!!

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[D MJ Binkley]

The Happiest Place on Earth
Sometimes you need a day or two in a pretend world.