~ the Equinox Adventures ~
3/10/2010
Well, it is a sunny morning here in the Happiest Place on Earth. It is 57F now, but slated to get to 79F under partly cloudy skies. That is an improvement over the forecast yesterday. And a sight warmer than the 33F (with a predicted high of 58F) that it is back home. Here is the morning view. Still not sure what we are going to do today. I guess we'll have to decide when Carol gets out of the shower. One thing I do know is that this is the perfect hotel to transition out of a cruise vacation with! Its really sucks. We will be happy tomorrow when we leave it. Not like disembarking the cruise ship at all! I guessit is not that it is terrible, its just not anywhere as nice as you would expect of a Doubletree or of something somehow associated with Hilton - or even something on a Disney property. So, for all you Disney-bound people, don't stay at the Doubletree. Stay next door at the Hilton - much nicer, as we found on our last cruise! I know, I can hear all the votes of sympathy going out for me from everyone. Tough! Its my blog, and I'll complain if I feel like it! (chuckle) Well, that's about it for the moment. Hope all is well in your neck of the woods, and we'll talk more later today!
2118 - Back at the Doubletree Wow! What a great day! We decided that our final full day in Florida should be spent at Epcot. So we drove over to the Yacht Club Resort, and told the guard we were there for breakfast (it was about 9:30am), and we parked for free at the hotel (they charge you if you drive into the Epcot parking lot - not to mention that the lot is HUGE!). We walked thru the lobby of the hotel (it is gorgeous), and out the back, toward the lagoon. Across the lagoon is the Boardwalk Resort. We hung a left, and walked about 200 yards until we got to the gate of Epcot. This gate leaves you between England and France on the World Showcase. If you are ever going to Epcot, this is the way to go!
We made the left on the World Showcase, and entered England. At the moment, they are having a big plant festival, that features all sorts of fabulous topiaries. This is the first one that we came across, and was probably my favorite!
In the English Gardens (and they have some nice ones), there were all these teacups, holding spices, plants to make teas, etc. They were really neat.
Then we found Bambi!
As we headed past Canada, we found some amazing planters that I might have to try to build for us at home this summer. They are great ways to get vertical spikes of color throughout the yard.
Now the topiaries, as you probably know are mostly made up of plants, to create the shapes, colors, and textures of whatever is being made. Of course, this is Disney, and they tend to take things to whole new levels, especially when it comes to topiaries! These gals are so whimsical!
Then we headed off the World Showcase, and onto Future World - where the not-country-based exhibits are. Our first stop was the World of Imagination to check out the new 3D movie - Honey I Shrunk the Audience. The last time we were here - over 10 years ago - it was Captain Eo (starring Michael Jackson). While we waited, we watched the kids play with the "living water" and remembered our kids doing the same thing, nearly 20 years ago!
The movie was okay, and about all you could hope for from a short 3D movie. I think I like the Muppets one over at MGM better (presuming it is still there...!). Then we went to the Land. When we got in, we found out that there was a Backstage Tour (called Behind the Seeds) that was slated to leave in 10 minutes, so we signed up. I was really looking forward to getting to see their aeroponic systems while we were there. It was really neat, and I highly recommend it if you have the time and the $16 (per person) to spare. You also get to wave at the people taking the free ride thru the greenhouses.
Here are a couple of their aeroponic systems - this one is static (as in it doesn't move) and made from little styrofoam coolers made for aeroponics
And this one moves on a track and chain system - way beyond anything I would dream of doing in the basement!
The next greenhouse featured some interesting plantings and their support systems. The watering systems are drip systems - directly watering just the plant. The wire support systems allows for some unusual growing of plants. Like this cherry tomato plant that Joe would kill to have in his apartment! It can live like this for 18 months, giving off thousands of fruit. This plant is about 9 months old.
The same sort of system was used to raise a pumpkin plant
and this other fruit, that I forget the name of. But I do remember that they harvest the fruit when they weight about 75 pounds.
The next room was strictly about aquaculture. They were raising all sorts of stuff there - from eels, catfish, striped bass, and tilapia (which we got to feed in this tank).
They were even raising alligators. Apparently they raise them for about 2 years (until they are about 5 feet long), and then send them to a farm to be "harvested" for their tailmeat and skins. It was a really neat tour. Afterwards, we needed to get something to eat, and decided that we would try the restaurant at the Sea. I always knew they had a nice restaurant there, but had never been. And given that we had just been in the Sea on the cruise, it just seemed to make sense!
The place is interesting, and poses one of those Disney conundrums - is the price of the meal worth the experience? If it were for the food alone, no way. But this restaurant has one wall (a pretty big wall, too) that is the side of an aquarium. For the experience, definitely. And Carol and I got to sit at the glass - front row seat to the excitement. My only complaint would be that the lighting sucks in there! But you should be able to see the stingray
he giant grouper
a couple of sharks
and a diver who all "shared" our meal with us. In some ways, I didn't care about the meal too much (although I was quite hungry) because of the view we had of the sealife. It was a great experience, and again, something I would highly recommend if you have the chance! Next I got to do the test track test drive - pretty cool, as I got to 60 mph in an open air car, pulling postive Gs in the banked turns. THat was fun. We skipped Mission to Mars - way too long a wait.
Then we were back on the World Showcase. China had a great acrobatic show going on, with a pretty big crowd.
Then as we were going along, we got to see something you don't see very often (okay, I have never seen it before, and I have been here a few times) - they were moving the globe for the Illuminations Show out onto the lagoon. Its HUGE! It really doesn't look anywhere near that big during the show!
Then we walked thru Italy, looking for inspriation fountains for the Oasis.
We decided to see the American Experience. While the show has not changed, the animatronics has definitely been upgraded! And of course, the singers were there doing a well appreciated pre-show.
Morocco had a live band featuring a belly dancer.
By then we had been around pretty much the entire park, and had been there for over 8 hours. Time to call it quits. So we hopped a ferry and decided to go walk along the Boardwalk Resort. It is pretty there.
The last time we had been there was the Christmas after Carol's Dad passed away, whenwe took Melba there so she wasn't without us for Christmas. It made walking around there bittersweet. But that didn't stop us from watching a couple of the shows done by street performers there. This guy was doing juggling and spinning of stuff (hats, mostly) - with a little girl from the audience in this shot.
And I shot this of the Yacht Club Resort as we waited for the ferry to take us over there (that's where the car was). Thinking of all you chocoholics out there, we thought that the best way to close out the night was to go over to Ghiardelli's and have a hot fuge sundae. They are the best! So we stopped at the Marketplace, and partook - thinking of you guys, of course. Like I said, it was a great day! And a fabulous way to end this vacation. Tomorrow the flight is at noon, so we will be heading out early (relatively speaking). Hope you are all doing well, and planning your next vacation! Anyone interested in coming with us for the next adventure? It looks like it will be in December! We have slots open! Talk to you soon!
Keep Smiling!!!
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