Tuesday, October 14, 2014

Orlando 2014

 In May we Alan had a conference in Orlando and we decided to tag along and go to Disney World, BEST DECISION EVER!! This was our first time and it was awesome! First thing Disney World is HUGE! It is not like Disneyland where you can walk from one park to the other there are major roads between each of the four parks. The plan was to spend one day in each park, but after the terrible day in Animal Kingdom we changed our minds. We spent one day in Animal Kingdom, one in Hollywood Studios and then 2 days in Magic Kingdom. Lizzy dressed up like Cinderella because we were going to her castle, too adorable! This picture was taken right before we ate our breakfast taco waffle (super yummy)
 The castle was amazing, much bigger then the Sleeping Beauty castle and more royal. Everything was bigger in Disney World. I loved how you could meet the Fairy Godmother and the Evil Step mother and sisters.
 Woody and Jessie were over by Splash Mountain, which we never got wet on so the Disneyland Splash Mountain is way better. They also had a tree house play area right next to Splash Mountain so kids that could not go on the ride could have something to do, GENIUS!
 Meeting Rapunzel
 Cinderella, Lizzy was way excited to meet her because she was twins with her
 Tiana and Prince Naveen
 William was totally flirting with Tiana and she came over to him to say hi
 Ariel as the mermaid, waiting in this line was like waiting in a 30 minute sauna, not fun!!! Good thing we had one of the water fans
 King Triton Statue
 The wait to meet Elsa and Ana was 5 HOURS, no joke!! We on the other hand were smart and the second day we went to Magic Kingdom we got there before the park opened and were at the very front of the line to get anywhere in the park. We had to follow workers to get into that particular line but we only waited about 40 minutes, totally worth it! Lizzy was sad that Kristoff was not there.
 Aurora, Sleeping Beauty, Briar Rose Whatever you want to call her
 Gaston was the BEST!!! He was amazing!! So they have Gastons tavern and just outside of it you can meet him. On the first day we were just walking and looking at stuff and headed to that area, Gaston was with other people and Lizzy saw him and screamed 'It's Gaston!!!!" He stops and turns to us and says, "yes princess, yes it is and you are welcome!" We were laughing so hard! We did not get into line to meet him that day. The next day it was the same guy I was so excited!!! He treated Lizzy wonderfully!
 Let's just say she was excited to finally meet him

 Tinker Bell was buff
 Ariel/Prince Eric's castle
 These were Lizzy's souvenirs, an Ana/Elsa doll and an Ariel Piggy bank
Gaston's Tavern looked just like it does in the movie, super cute!
 Rapunzel's tower

 We also went to Gatorland, yeah I could not resist. They were everywhere!!! Little ones, big ones and huge oness.

 They had four white gators, they were HUGE!
 We are on a platform in this picture and gators right underneath us
 Yeah that is a gator about 3 feet away from my little girl


 The big animal tree in the back ground. The Animal Kingdom was a big let down, it was just a glorified zoo and not enough Disney. It was freakin hot that day too and there is NO place to sit in this park people were sitting everywhere on the ground and all over in shops, but Alan and I discovered the best lemonade slushy treat ever while we were here, that was one of the highlights of the Animal Kingdom.

 Inside the Animal tree is the Tough to be a Bug movie, which is always fun Lizzy loved wearing the glasses
 Lightning McQueen and Mater were in Hollywood Studios. Hollywood Studios was way awesome!!
 Lizzy met Phineas and Ferb and she freaked out when she saw Ducky Momo (from Phineas and Ferb) so we had to get a picture
 I thought this was appropriate
 We took the plunge and it was way better than the one in California Adventure. It is actually a ride where you move forward on a track. I LOVED IT!!
 I was super excited to go on the Aerosmith Rockin Roller Coaster. It was awesome. I compare it to Space Mountain only you can see where you are going because there is black lights with road signs. I loved it!
Sophia the First. Hollywood Studios was great. We went on a summer weekend and I guess they do all out Star Wars stuff on the weekends in the summer. They had Star Wars characters walking around everywhere, parades, stage performances and they even had actual actors from the Star Wars movies there signing autographs. Overall it was one of the BEST vacations EVER! Next up Disney Cruise at the end of October!!