MMMMmmmm... Bacon Wrapped Shrimp!

 

Vaca 2020 - Day 9 - Orlando Area (post 1)

I believe this was day 9 but I could be off a day by now...  no matter, it was our first morning in Orlando and the surrounding area.  This is where the family split 2 & 2; Rob and Mama going to Harry Potter World at Universal, me and Caleb doing whatever the heck we wanted.

One of the fun things that I found to do was a mile long go-kart track where you get 11 laps.  Caleb was SOOO excited about this for a month before we left.  We also wanted to go hiking somewhere, but since it's tough to find a mountain or anything similar to it around Orlando, we found a wilderness area that was relatively close to the go-kart track.  Well, when I say, "we found", I mean that while we were eating breakfast at an IHOP and we found it on a map! The directions did NOT lead us there tho and we ended up walking around a housing development with the same name in close to 1000 degree weather. 

It was still cool tho and Caleb got to see differences in houses in Florida from those in Iowa, so a cool little bit learning for the lad.

This was on the drive to what we thought was the nature preserve with hiking.  It's the Gatorade plant and it's HUGE!!!  You can see the G logo on one of the tanks towards the middle-left of the picture.

The housing area where we had a good walk.

This is at Kissimmee Go-Karts, where they have a croc-pond outside of the ticket/arcade building.

An aerial shot permanently borrowed from the Googles.  This is the mile long track, with the gator pond in the very middle of the pic on the bottom.  SUPER FUN!!!

Caleb's in the white car that's coming from under the bridge.  His car was a bit faster than mine, possibly due to the excessive girth holding my car back.  He had some dang fine passes of another family that was racing us.

Happy boy when it was all over and done with.  He was ready to go again, but since Dear ol' Dad almost needed to be helped out of his kart, that wasn't happening!

At this point, I have no idea what is happening as I (Ted) was with Caleb and Rob and Mama were together.  So, Mom takes over here.

Harry Potter world was amazing.  The details that have been built into this place are unfathomable.  One thing that everyone who visits HP world needs to get is some butterbeer.  They sell it frozen, which is a bit like a slushie, and regular.  Very tasty but quite sweet.  

A cute picture of Robby in Diagon Alley with the dragon on top of Gringotts in the background.  Diagon Alley is in Universal Studio and Hogsmeade is in Islands of Adventure.  

A picture of Hogwarts.  Again amazing.  The castle was detailed inside as well.  It was my very favorite ride.  Ever.

Sneaking in pictures of Robby where I could.  Looks like we are waiting to get on the Hogswart Express.  We rode the train 4 times.  It was a good time, a place to cool off, and due to Covid-19 each group got a car to themselves so it was nice to have some space.  

Luggage and Hedwig the owl.

The train engine. 

Another picture of Hogswart with the street of Hogsmeade in the foreground.  

I think this is a picture of Hagrids Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure.  An excellent and surprising roller coaster. 

Another picture of the roller coaster.

The sorting hat in the castle. 

Robby and I in the Hogwarts express car.

Robby and his butterbeer.

We had lunch at the Leaky Cauldron (of course we did!).  Here is a picture of the leaky cauldron.  We had a good time at HP world and we both like HP, however we aren't huge amusement park fans.  It was hot and we stayed until early to mid afternoon each day, arriving early because we stayed at Cabana Bay which is a Universal resort.  We did ride a few Jurassic Park rides including a water ride which scared Robby due to a 75 foot drop and got me soaked.  A pretty fun time.  

So another adventure is in the books!   These were good times!

Vaca 2020 - Day 5 - Orange Beach, Alabama (more days than just 5!)

It took a bit to figure out which building our new "home" was in, but once we found it and figured out what we had to do to get our stuff up to our quarters during the Covid32 - 19, we found this!

And this...

And this...  not bad!

I spent a good number of hours sitting out on the patio just listening to the ocean rolling in.  Such a wonderful, relaxing sound.  Caleb and I were out there at night and started noticing these red lights on the beach to the East.  The lights slowly progressed their way to the West but it wasn't any clearer as to what they were doing as they went by right in front of us.  What was clear is that there was a driver and then a few people in each pick-up that got out and "did things".

So what these peeps are doing is hunting crabs.  What was truly interesting is that there was no "hot-spot" from one night to another.  The first night, they stopped right in front of our building and spent a good bit of time there.  The next two nights they pretty much drove right by with very brief stops.

What is this???  I have no idea and hope you can tell me!

Mama and Caleb down on the beach in the morning.

Bands of rain from the hurricane South of us.

Looking mostly West (a bit North) from the porch on the front of our building.

Looking straight North from the same location.

And looking Northeast from the same location again.

We vacation pretty hard... he was whooped.

This guy was happy to have his own room and spent a whole lot of time in that room!

This fella was happy to be out on a shopping trip with Mom when this was taken.  I have no idea where this was taken at as I was probably back at the condo listening to the ocean.

Someone tried to "snap into a slim jim' but lost their grip on said sausage...  It was a cause of great enjoyment and laughter from us.

A storm rolling in...  from the South side of our domicile.

Storm rolling out from the North side of our domicile.

No comment...

We were about 3 floors down on the right side of the building in this picture.  Such a great unit to rent, but not cheap.  We enjoyed it immensely! 

The boys out in the water.

I am scared of ocean waters, but these two and their mama are not!!

My loves!!!!  I love them even more when they are peaceful together!

This was the area betwixt the condo's and the beach.  I don't recall what the sign says they were trying to accomplish, but you could NOT go into this area and disturb the natural habitat.

One Tomato, Two Tomatoe

When a high school buddy saw this photo he decided to send us some disc golf discs as apparently Caleb has good form.   If that's good form, I have a LOT of learning to do!!!