FRIDAY 25th May 2001
IOA, RAIN & PEBBLES RESTAURANT
Up relatively early this morning at 07:30 a.m. considering yesterday.
Laura still not impressed with the early mornings!
We managed to eat in between yawning and set off for IOA. Awful walk
again but at least this time we are under cover - JP 404, thanks Alexandra!
This time we are going for it so hold onto your seats and look out!
We started at Dr Doom on our own - girls still happy to drink and eat
Pringles! Shaun wasn't toooo sure about this, but WOW, that upwards
blast is great!
Over to Suess landing for the kids and Shaun & the girls do Cat in
the Hat again while I go off to get the Express Passes for Duelling
Dragons, JP River Adventure, Popeye and Bluto, and Dudley do-rights.
They met up with me at Duelling Dragons and we rode on Ice. This is
a great coaster! After Hulk it was the best in Orlando in our opinion
(even better in the front row - but more of that later!)
Hunger sets in already! Never mind - the lines are shorter before midday!!
So we stopped for food at Burger Digs - YEEEUUUCCCHHH! The burgers were
COLD, so we took them back and got some lukewarm ones- BLLAAHH! The
problem was that they weren't cooked "on demand", but stacked up like
Macdonald's. We had got there early so we were unlucky. Maybe we should
have taken them back again but we just couldn't be bothered!
It's packed today and I noted some of the many school trips: -
North Miami elementary
Pinewood Hills Baptist church
The Egyptians
And a cast of thousands, all running and shouting etc
Shaun went off to have another go on Hulk (using the singles line)
while me and the girls spend a long time in the JP Discovery Centre,
which we all enjoy. This is a very clever area mixing your DNA with
that of a dinosaur and seeing raptor eggs hatching. There's even a CM
being a scientist behind glass and talking to people explaining things!
It was great (as well as being cool in the heat of the day!)
When Shaun gets back he has a quick go on a couple of the machines
and it's off to JP River Adventure. This was VERY good themeing and
one of the best rides here. Didn't get too wet on this one although
we did change into pool shoes to be on the safe side! Before you ask,
no the girls didn't do this ride!!
Over to Popeye & Bluto - whatever you may read about this YOU WILL
GET SOAKED FROM HEAD TO FOOT!
You have been warned but it's a great ride.
Dudley do-right had broken down, so we went over to Suess landing to
get changed into dry clothes that we had placed in the lockers near
the entrance.
Shaun had yet another go on The Hulk - he still can't get over they
way it blasts you out of the gun!
We went to Duelling Dragons, which we had Fastpasses for and queued
up to ride the front of Fire. Riding in the front seats is absolutely
awesome. We stayed and got in the queue for the front of Ice, but a
storm was gathering so all of the outside rides were cancelled.
By the time we got the girls it was coming down in stair-rods! - this
was real biblical proportions! There were people fighting over the last
of the poncho's and huge pools of water every where!
We dodged back to Suess landing and went on Cat in the Hat to use up
some time hoping the rain might have cleared a bit by the time we got
out. No such luck! We hung around for another 20 minutes or so but in
the end we decided to run for it! Well, if the walk feels long usually,
you can imagine what it feels like when you are soaked, it's raining
very hard, you're wading through pools of water about 6" deep in places
and I ended up carrying Laura in places!
We got absolutely DRENCHED!
Made it back to the car in the end (with Alexandra's help - we'd have
got lost without her on more than one occasion this holiday!)
We got back to CBR (having soaked the car seats in the process) and
got changed then headed straight out to Crossroads. We were going to
TGI Fridays but the queue was coming out the door! So we decided to
try Pebbles Restaurant. This was not recommended to us previously but
it was really good and we were the only Brits in the place - this is
what we want!
We ate:-
Chicken Nuggets and chips & Pizza for DDs
1/2 rack of ribs Chicken Vesuvius & pasta
Jacket Potato
Key Lime pie
2 x ice cream and strawberries
2 x coffees
2 x soft drinks
1 x beer (may have been more!)
Total cost $52 (incl. Tax)
Excellent service, food great and good value - Check it out!
Bypass TGI Fridays and venture over here for a pleasant change!
Back to CBR to ponder what to do about Memorial Weekend (if we thought
it was crowded before what on earth were we going to do this weekend!)
Tomorrow: MGM & BB
Day 15...