Jodi: No, we're not talking about Cleveland, you sillies! We're talking about Main Street, USA. A humble little town with a homey, classic Italian restaurant, quaint little shops, a bakery, an ice cream shop, and oh yeah, a huge forced-perspective Castle at the end. We love Disney World.
Randy and I went to Disney together for the first time on our honeymoon, almost six (!!!) years ago.
This time we went with Mom, Dad, Bryan and Ashley, for a much-needed, but always too short, long weekend trip.
We were really lucky that even though it was Orlando in the summer, we had some great thunderstorms that cooled things off.
One of the great things about Randy in Disney is that he's like a little kid. Every time he goes on a ride, it's like it is his first time on it. Here we are on the Jungle Cruise, and Randy's paying attention like we are really going on a boat ride through the Amazon.
Randy loves the characters. When we were there on our honeymoon, we were walking down the main street in Hollywood Studios. Out of nowhere, Randy gasped loudly and ran off. By the time I caught up to him, he was already next in line to meet Chip and Dale.
He was mad at me because I wouldn't let him go stand in line to meet Goofy. We had things to do and the line was long. Besides, this was the first character we saw. Everyone knows you don't wait in line for the first character you see, right?
...But he cheered right up for the Pirates of the Caribbean.
A secret dream of mine is to take a River Boat cruise down the Mississippi so I can pretend I'm Mark Twain. A couple of years ago, I saw the family on "Little People, Big World" go on the cruise and I was totally jealous. I looked up the river boat they took and found out they don't offer those cruises any more. So until the boat company start answering my letters and e-mails, we will have to make do with the Liberty Belle.
Hold the phone! I just googled river boat cruises down the Mississippi and found this article. Future vacation? I think so!
I'm not sure what Randy is doing here. Demonstrating how wide the life preserver benches are?
It was a nice little cruise around Tom Sawyer Island, and even though it started to rain. It was nice and relaxing in a sea of summer theme park craziness. Maybe I'm getting old, or maybe it was just really hot and crowded. In the summertime, it's nice to go on the less popular rides, the things maybe you haven't done before, or haven't done in a long time and then hit the roller coasters and such when it's cooled off a little and all the little kids are in bed.
I like going on the carousel, and there was no line. Doesn't Randy look thrilled?
Here I am afraid that the carousel horses will come to life and lift right off the carousel to join a fox hunt and a horse race. Just kidding.
Who doesn't love the tea cups? I love everything about them. Tea, cups, teapots, doormice...
Then we ran over to Epcot to have dinner with the family, and we saw.............
It was the best day ever!
Would you believe we had to stand in line to get our picture taken with shrubbery? Totally worth it.
Then we turned towards the World Showcase and saw this:
If you haven't been to Disney lately, you can go on an adventure to save the world from Dr. Doofenschmirtz! An Agent P mission? Sign us up! I think we were the only ones without kids who did this, but it was still fun. You pick a country in the World Showcase, and they give you a flip phone which you use to communicate with Carl and Major Monogram to get your mission. We chose Mexico for two reasons, 1. We had dinner reservations there, and 2. We're lazy.
Randy: We didn't choose South Africa because we're against Apartheid.
Jodi: That's reason number 3.
Major Monogram gives you a mission, you carry it out, he gives you another mission, you complete that, etc., etc. The missions are actually integrated into each country. In Germany, Dr. D is actually in a cuckoo clock wearing lederhosen.
At the end of the mission, Carl tells you where to drop off your flip phone. We dropped ours off just as the texts starting coming in (on my iPhone, not the Agent P flip phone) from Bryan that our dinner reservations were in 5 minutes. Agent J and Agent R had successfully completed their mission and were all ready to turn back into mild mannered Jodi and Randy for dinner.
We had dinner at La Hacienda de San Angel which is new since last Randy and I were there. We've eaten at The San Angel Inn many times over the years and liked it a lot. La Hacienda is even better, and if you get reservations for close to 8pm, you can watch the fireworks from your table! Randy got the pork tenderloin with mole sauce (it was so yummy, I tried it!) and Mom, Ashley and I got the Pollo al Pastor. It was the perfect combination of spicy, sweet and savory. A little bit of sour cream makes it less spicy, but brings out all the flavors. Sooooo good! I like spice, but I don't like too much spice, or spice for the sake of spice. If there is no other flavor to my food, why eat calories I can't taste? That's just my philosophy. Randy disagrees. He actually challenged our wonderful waitress to bring out a salsa too hot for him. They're not on the menu, but if you like hot, ask for them.
Just a shout out to our great waitress. She not only put up with our crazy family, but smiled and recommended a great tea. Red tea, have you tried it?
They play the music for the fireworks inside the restaurant, so you don't miss anything. Disney sure has the experience down.
Then we all went back to the hotel and soaked our feet. Bryan's idea was a good one, and we filled the bathtub with hot water and stuck our tootsies in. Mom had some shampoo, and just as Bryan said, "I don't trust you enough to let you do that..." Mom put in a huge triple squirt of soap. The bubbles were overflowing the tub, and Ashley and I had them stocked up to the level of our heads.
Too bad we don't have any pictures of that!
The family that soaks together, stays together.
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