Almost there!

We deviated from the logical path to Houston to visit friends in Ruston, LA and family in Ft. Worth, TX. It was well worth it! From New Orleans, we headed north to Ruston where our friends Paul and Emily live. Tim and Paul grew up together and went on their first road trip together, where Tim and I met! So it was special to meet up with Paul near the end of our trip and the guys could compare stories. It think our trip was a little cushier than the guys first trip. Hey, I'm not complaining:).

Paul and Emily live in a cute little apartment close to where Paul is finishing up his doctorate. Emily is working for a church nearby and her friends there had been asking her to come to a high school football game for some time. This was the last of the season, so we all headed out to the last football game of the season for West Oachita High School. While the game was less-than-victorious, the fans were great, and I was quickly reminded of what a Southern accent should sound like. We rounded out our evening with a bite at Bennigan's and a great night's sleep.

New Orleans

After our day in Destin we packed up, assessed our sunburns, and headed towards New Orleans. It got cloudier as we got there, so we decided to stay in a hotel for the night. The problem was, our laptop had been acting up (read: randomly freezing), so we weren't sure if it'd behave long enough for us to get a room booked. Thankfully on our way we found some free wifi (thank you Mississippi rest stop!) and the laptop behaved for long enough for us to get a room booked for the evening. That secured, we made our way to the Bon Ton Cafe in downtown New Orleans for some dinner. Again, it was recommended by our Road Food book and marked as a deal with entrees under $10 (this is important for later). So we got there and parked downtown without much incident and made our way to the restaurant with me in shorts and a tshirt and Katherine in capris and a tank top. When we arrived at the restaurant, we noticed cloth napkins on the tables and a dark quiet atmosphere and a sign on the door that said "Proper dress required". Uh oh. So we went in anyways and were greeted by what we figured was the manager. Katherine asked, "So, what sort of dress is required?". "Oh, business casual", the manager answered, then stated, "I'd say you're casual, so come on in". The restaurant was fairly empty at this point, and the current patrons were mostly in khakis and button down shirt attire. We looked at the menu and found that while perhaps you could order an appetizer for under $10, there was no way that entrees were that inexpensive. I felt a bit uncomfortable in my blue tshirt with Texas logos and tried to scoot under the table to hide the fact that I was wearing shorts. I sat up extra straight and put on my best manners to try to pull off the "well cultured person who is too cool for dress codes" look. The staff was all very kind, though I did hear someone talk to the manager and heard something like him defending us saying "Well, the dress code is business casual and they are dressed casually", heh. Our waitress came and took our order, with Katherine ordering Red Fish Bon Ton and me ordering the Crawfish dinner. It was all excellent, and I got to try 4 new dishes in a night with my order. All dress-related awkwardness aside, I'd have to say it was the best restaurant-cooked meal of the trip. We finished dinner with their excellent bread pudding with whiskey sauce then conspicuously made our way out of the restaurant and to our car. With no ticket on the car, we were happy campers and made our way to the hotel for the night.

Destin, FL

We packed up the car from our four day Disney vacation and hit the road for Key West, the next trip destination. When we programmed the GPS, it said Key West was like 7.5 hours away! Earlier in the trip, we had done some calculating and thought it was like 4.5 hours. We did some quick math and determined that if we went to Key West, we'd only be able to go for one day, then we'd be driving 8-10 hour days to make sure we made it into Houston on time.

We nixed our original plan and immediately headed to Destin, our next trip stop. It took about 4-5 hours, but we made it in to Destin with 15 minutes to spare to check in to our campsite. We had the nicest park ranger ever there, and he hooked us up with a sweet spot right by a lake. We sure hoped this wouldn't turn out like our last lakefront campsite... a tent full of water and a night at a motel. Well, everything was just fine. We hit the road by 7:30 and were on the beach by 9.

Destin is a beautiful little beachside community. There are lots of neighborhoods and shops... really anything you could possibly be looking for. I was really scoping it out because my friend Stacey and her husband Trae are being stationed there in the spring. I think they lucked out and will have a ton of visitors, us included! We made our way to the beach with all of our beach garb. It was warm enough, so we put on our swimsuits. We staked our claim with beach towels on a 10 foot square of beach, and I immediately lay down to work on the pasty-factor. My poor body hasn't seen sun in 4 years - it practically glows! Well, I set out to get a lot of reading done, which was great, but I got a burn that was no fun. I'm still itching a week later!

Tim had a great time. He actually went all the way in the water and swam a bit. I was a pansy and only got in to my ankles. Hey, if it was 90 out, it would be a different story! He also flew his new kite a bit. He still hasn't watched the stunt instruction video, but he was improvising pretty well with some of his own tricks. We wrapped up the morning with some PBJ's and made our way to the next stop - New Orleans.

Day 4 - Epcot again

Well, we love Epcot, what can I say. On our last day it looked cloudy out, so Tim checked the weather, with it saying it would be clear with a high of 80. So I decided to brave the misty weather in shorts, knowing it would warm up soon. Well, it never did! I was pretty chilly all day. Oh well, we mustered through:).

Since we spent our first day at Epcot at the World Showcase, for the most part, this time we explored all of the rides and other exhibits. We did the GM Test Track where we sit in a car and experience all of the road tests a new car goes through before it is put on the market. OK, so I think it was dumbed down quite a bit from the real thing, but it was still fun and educational. The last test we went through was a crash test, where they slam the car into a wall. They shot us off and just as we were about to hit the wall, it opened, and we shot out onto a test track instead. We flew around this track at over 60 mph... without a roof! It was pretty exhilarating, and well worth the wait just for the speed. What can I say, I like fast cars:) We also picked out our new vehicle... you like?:)

We also went on a "Living with the Land" tour where we learned about different initiatives to harness energy, grow food, and live well with the earth. It was pretty neat -- not too hippy:). We got to tour through some of the Disney vegetable gardens too where they use a lot of cool techniques to grow food. It made me want to have a greenhouse. I'll have to get one of those after I get my courtyard:)

We also went to a center where they have Segway demonstrations. The times I have seen Segways, my impression has been, "man those things look dorky". After the demonstration, I feel the same way, but am much more impressed with the technology. These scooter type machines are ultra sensitive to your movement, and the slightest pressure on your toes triggers it to go forward, and conversely, the slightest pressure on your heals causes it to stop. These things can also literally turn on a dime. They really are a great way to get places, travelling at 4 times the speed a human walks (12 mph). All in all, a cool thing, but I still think walking is the better option for me.

The last ride of our day was Soarin'. We had been a couple of years ago, and I didn't think I was too impressed, so I had low expectations going in. The ride was a very pleasant surprise.. I'm not sure why I didn't like it the first time. You sit in these gliders that have about 10 seats each, then when the ride begins, you are raised over a huge IMAX screen, slightly tilted forward. That way, when they rush you over mountain tops and through canyons, you really do feel like you're soaring. They even pump orange scent into the room as you fly over an orange grove.. oh Disney:) I have decided this is a pretty cool ride. It was my least favorite line to wait in though... man was it long!

Day 3 - Animal Kingdom

Today we went to Animal Kingdom. This park was built in 1998, and we did not go on our last trip, so this was our first time. Walking into the park, it was not at all showy like the others. There was no huge globe or hat to make a statement, but instead, you walked in through a forested area. It really felt like you were walking on a rain forest path. The park was divided into several countries that each had different rides and exhibits.

I would say Animal Kingdom is a cross between an amusement park and a zoo. We walked through a zoo-type area that had tigers. They were lounging about as tigers do. We also saw a hippo, from the top in this picture. You can walk down below the hippo pond and see into the water from the side. It was amazing to see this gigantic animal bobbing around in the water. Also, we found out that hippos don't swim, they walk around on the bottom of the lake. They're such cute animals... but in reality, they are super territorial and aggressive. So no cuddling with hippos, ok?:)

There was another part of the park called Disney Animal Safari. I have never been on a safari in a wild animal park and was way psyched to do one. You wait in a line, like most Disney attractions, then board a large truck with about 10 rows of seats. There is a safari guide, and he is pointing out all of the animals along the way. From the start we saw some crazy animals I'd never seen before - an okapi. It looks like a cross between a zebra and giraffe. They are pretty cute. Then we saw giraffes, wildebeests, funky cows, funky deer, rhinos, lions, ostriches, warthogs... the works. There was a path we drove on, and the driver made every discovery of a new animal seem like the first time he'd ever seen them. It was funny.. One thing I wondered, but realized later, was that there were a ton of animals all in one place, and many of them eat each other. In order for this not to happen at Disney, they have cattle guards and chains between each section. These are things that aren't very obvious as you're driving, but all part of the master plan of Disney.. pretty clever.

From the Safari, we went on to Expedition Everest, a roller coaster that went through Mount Everest. The story behind the ride is that you're on a train up Mount Everest as an explorer, but you have not honored the yeti of the mountain. He is very angry and has ripped up the tracks, and you go on this death ride all through the mountain, mostly in the dark. Near the end of the ride, you come face to face with the yeti... in the dark. I'll have to admit, it's pretty scary. I wasn't feeling the best when I got off the ride. Not because of the scary factor, but because of the queasy factor. We went and ate some barbecue and I quickly felt better:).

We ended the day with the Jammin' Jungle Parade and hit the sack.

Day 2 - Hollywood Studios

Well, we chose to go to Hollywood Studios today. The weather forecast looked like it might be a little overcast and rainy, so we thought we'd do more indoor stuff here. We did not go to Hollywood Studios a couple of years ago when we were here, so this was our first time since little kids! I had forgotten a lot of it, but did remember going to a Honey I Shrunk the Kids area and having my picture taken with Antee. I was pumped to see that he's still there and I got the "20 years later shot". I think last time I was riding him:). I didn't want to push the little kids off this time...

One of our favorite parts of the studios was a new ride called "Rock N' Roller Coaster with Aerosmith". You walk into the area under a suspended car on train tracks. There is a huge red guitar as you walk in - probably two or three stories tall. We stood in line for some time, but one thing we have discovered about Disney is that they put as much time into their lines as they do their rides. There is always something to look at, watch, touch, or do as you wait. Those Disney folks... so smart! So we got into the last holding area before boarding the coaster. We entered what looked like a studio where Aerosmith was finishing up an album... they "saw" us there, then invited us to their concert. They left in their limo, and we had another car coming that would take us an alternate way to bypass the NYC traffic. We climbed into this car-type roller coaster, heard a lot of noise, then a 3-2-1 and it shot us from 0-60mph in 3 seconds I think. It was an indoor coaster that went upside down, sharp turns, steep drops.... it was awesome:) I really enjoy roller coasters. I don't like ones with sudden drops though... and I usually get a little nauseated after a couple of hours on them. Disney is nice though because there is so much to do, you can take your time with everything.

We also went to the Indiana Jones Stunt Show. It was a little cheesy, but the stunts were pretty cool. This picture of Indy is right before he falls in a pit. I wish I could post the video I took of the escape scene where he and the girl jump on an airplane, then he has to fight this big guy who winds up getting shredded by the airplane propeller. It's pretty amazing how they do all of the stunts. We also went on a back studios tour that showed us how they did some of the shots from the movie Pearl Harbor. It all looks funny watching it, but when it's played back on video with editing, it is very convincing.

The craziest part of our day was at the "Lights, Motors, Action: Extreme Stunt Show". It was a awesome stunt show with car chases, jumps, and effects. They showed many car chase and motorcycle chase scenes. The last part we saw was this scene where a guy gets top secret information, jumps on his motorcycle, and is chased around the city. He took this one jump off a ramp and when coming down the other side, he hit and flew off his bike, hitting the ground and skidding for awhile. We all sat there watching, waiting for him to move, and the "film crew" halted things... all part of the act, we thought. Nope, he really wrecked and they shut the show down. The ambulance came while we were exiting, and we saw Mercy Flight overhead as we walked away. Nuts. We did just check online and it says the guy is ok... but still! That was crazy. And I got it all on video, kinda crazy.

We also saw a stage show of Beauty and the Beast, my favorite Disney movie. It had the general plot and all the best songs from the movie. It was very large scale on stage... not quite the Broadway show I've seen, but still pretty impressive. They also do the whole thing in 30 minutes, which impressive as well.

To end the night, we saw Fantasma, a lights, water, and stunt type show. It has Mickey from Fantasia, having a great dream where when he raised his arms this and that way, the water would shoot up around him in different colors. They also projected scenes from different movies onto the water.. which made some amazing affects. Then began his nightmare and the witch from Snow White took over and summoned all of the other Disney villains who had a hey dey with Mickey's dream. At the climax, there was a huge real-life dragon that appeared. Mickey eventually slayed the dragon and peace was restored to his dream. Then a cruise boat with all of your favorite Disney characters came along. Overall, a very impressive display. Very larger than life.

Yay Disney!

Day 1 - Epcot
The last time Tim and I were in Disney was in December of 2005 when we were still dating. Since we dated long distance for almost two years, it was always interesting to see where we would meet up. Most of the time it was in New York or Ohio where I was living at the time. Sometimes it was in Pennsylvania and Texas where our families are... and then this one time it was at Disney World:). My college roommate Sara Joy was living in Gainesville, Florida for a year and we planned a Disney meetup trip for the three of us. We stayed in this super shady Days Inn where there were literally bugs in our beds and we woke up to a woman crying... not the best accommodations. The park, however, was fabulous. And this is why we built in a Disney portion to our trip.

We began our Disney vacation with Epcot, what we remembered to be our favorite park. It was a lot like I remembered as we walked in and the huge spaceship earth globe stood in front of us. This is a great focal point when you're trying to find different attractions! We immediately made our way through all of the rides and attractions to get to the World Showcase, a collection of different countries from around the world, all situated around a large lake. Each country has a distinctive architecture style that houses an attraction like a film or an educational ride. There are also gift shops with items for sale from that country, a restaurant with native food, and both are typically operated by natives of the country. All of these things really make you feel like you are in that particular country. That night we stopped for dinner at Morocco where we got this delicious shaved beef and chicken with a cream sauce on it, hummus, a parsley salad, and a piece of bread. It was very enjoyable. Afterward, we strolled through the shop that was in an adobe-type building. The shop clerk said hello to us and asked us if we knew Arabic. We said no, and he asked our names, then wrote them for us in Arabic. He said the Arabic alphabet has five or more letters than the English alphabet. These letters allow them to write many sounds that our alphabet doesn't. He demonstrated some of the more throaty sounds known to that region and then pointed out where they were in our names. It is very interesting and makes a lot of sense. Such an educational trip:)

OK, so it wasn't all educational, a lot of what we did was EAT. There was a wine and culinary festival going on while we were there. In addition to the little food shops at all the countries, there were booths set up that had three different foods not found on the typical menu. It was a lot of fun to stop by all of these booths and get samples of foods we'd never tried or heard of before. My favorite was a dish native to Cape Town called bobotie. It was like meatloaf in consistency, but with raisins, and then a mango chutney poured over the top. It was a great combination of salty and sweet. We tried many other things like creme brulee from France, scallops from ?, wild mushroom soup and pierogies from Poland, and tres leches from Buenos Aires. It is super easy for these little samples to add up in cost, but I think it is still worth it, because where can you try foods from all over the world in one place?

We also saw some films in circlevision, which is a room you stand in the middle of and there are screens in a circle around you. It creates this great affect as you swoop through canyons and cities. It is very neat to look in front and back to see everything at the scene. We saw shows for Canada and Japan. We also caught some musical acts. There were The Beatles in London, of course, and then there was a band in Louisiana called the Pine Leaf Boys. There were an awesome zydeco band - a type of music I love. You can't not listen to it and smile. I think it's the accordion that makes me smile. I feel the same way about steel drum music - it's just happy music. Another show we saw was in China. It was an acrobat show with about 10 young guys. They say they're 16, but the verdict is still out... kidding. These boys were amazing! It's like their feet are spring loaded. They bounce forward and backward, upside down.. so effortlessly. There was also a guy there that had a board on a cylinder that he rolled back and forth on, and flipped bowls on top of his head. I'm not even sure how you come to acquire this skill.. I'm sure through a lot of trial and error.

We ended our day at Epcot without the fireworks, because there was quite a crowd and we didn't want to wait for the bus for an hour. We retired to our Disney resort (value resort, we're not too hoity toity:)) - The Pop Century Resort. It was an interesting place, decoratively speaking. Our section was supposed to encapsulate the 50's and 60's, and had bowling pins and yo-yos for staircases. The buildings were also a lovely violet color. Not sure I'll be incorporating what I've seen into our next home. Thankfully our rooms were fairly plain in their decor so we could go to sleep at night:)

PS - As a sidenote from Tim, we've opened up commenting to everyone and not just those with openid accounts.  So feel free to comment!

Cumberland Island

We decided to go ahead and go to Cumberland Island today. I reeeeally wanted to see those wild horses:). We took a 45 minute passenger ferry over to the island where we were greeted by a kooky park ranger named Rene. She has loved the island since she was a kid and when she was old enough, she got a job there, and hasn't left since... and she is in her 50's I'd say. She describes herself as a geographically undesirable woman, therefore never having married. She seems perfectly content with her island though.

So we embarked on a tour with Rene where she recounted the history of the island which once belonged to Native Americans, then was inhabited by different settlers and owners. She had us (10 adults) standing in as actors as she recounted the story. Overall, it was amusing. I got to be Catherine Greene, who was very popular amongst the men, and kind of a modern woman.. wearing pants when she rode horses, wowee! Hearing all of the stories and side stories gave life to the place. There are ruins of several mansions on the 15 mile long island. The mansions were destinations of the rich and famous at one time. In fact, the island was owned by the Carnegies until 1972 when they gave it over to the park service. The deal they struck was funny though, and some family members still live in the houses there. It was interesting to walk around, wondering if the other people there might be cabillionaires.

After our walk around the ruins of Dungeness, we walked through the sand dunes to the beach. We walked for awhile down there, picking up shells. We found several good ones, but no big ones. Cumberland Island is also near a submarine base, and the Navy had to dredge a couple of passages for the submarines. The stuff they dredged up now lines the roads that go through Cumberland Island. I found a shark's tooth out on the road! After walking the beach, we headed inland through an oak grove. These were the coolest oaks I'd ever seen. It felt like we were walking through an enchanted forest, the way the limbs started at the ground and sprawled everywhere as they tried to reach the skies.

As we made our way to the front of the island, our time on the island was coming to an end... and we hadn't seen horses yet! I was very glad we came, and in retrospect I would have come without seeing the horses, but I still wanted to see them! As we got back to where we arrived, Tim saw one! And then three more! There were several grazing at a distance, and I was happy:). We still had an hour to kill, so decided to walk back to the ruins where we had been tipped that we might see more horses. Sure enough, there were about ten more that we saw. There were some young ones, and older ones, all looking very different. These horses belonged to Andrew Carnegie's mother, and when she died, in her will she said to let the horses go on the island. Apparently she had Morgans, Mustangs, Appaloosas, Thoroughbreds... many different kinds of horses. So the horses there today are mutts.. but very pretty mutts.

I'm very glad we went to the Cumberland Island National Seashore, and I would love to go back sometime and camp. It is an island you could spend a week exploring!