Carolyn, I apologize in advance for stealing some of your photos. I hope you will forgive me. :) On Friday, August 10, Mom, Dad, Josh, Amy, and Paul woke up at 3:30 am, drove down to Denver, and flew to Orlando. We met Carolyn and her family in the airport, where we also got our rental cars. We checked into our hotel and went swimming there. We ate at Steak N Shake for dinner, and then Maria and her family arrived at the hotel. We went swimming again with their kids. On Saturday morning, we drove to the Disney Vero Beach resort. Here are Kip and Carolyn in the resort:
Paul, Lainey, and Nora:
We went straight to the beach while we waited for our room to be ready, and afterwards, we dipped off in the pool at the resort. When our room was ready, we settled in there and then went to Vittorio's pizza for dinner.
Lainey and Rosie at Vittorio's:
After this, the girls went grocery shopping. At Vero Beach, there are lots of wild lizards, so one of Will's favorite activities was catching these. He caught at least three, and one was named "Guilty" and another "Lava." On Sunday, we went to sacrament meeting and then spent a lot of time at the beach and the pool. We ate all our meals in the room with the groceries we bought. That night, we walked on the beach and watched Muppets. Here are Carolyn and Nora in the resort:
Here we are during our walk on the beach:
On Monday, we again spent most of our time at the beach and the pool.
Paul, Josh, and Will at the beach:
We rented a boogie board for the beach, which was tons of fun. Evelyn and I would bob in the waves together, and she liked to name the size of each wave (small, medium, etc). Here's Will with a crab we saw near the beach:
That night, we got ice cream at Baskin Robbins.
On Tuesday morning, we went to the beach for a while, then drove to the airport. We dropped off Maria, Clark, Will, Rosie, Adalyn, Carolyn, Kip, Lainey, Evelyn, and Nora there, while Paul, Josh, Mom, Dad, and Amy drove the rental car to the Contemporary Bay Lake Tower resort near the theme parks. Here are some pictures from our hotel:
We swam in the pool there after checking in, and that night, we again went grocery shopping and had pizza for dinner. Around 7, Mom, Dad, Paul, Josh and Amy went to Hollywood studios. Paul, Mom, Dad and Amy rode Rock 'N' Rollercoaster once, and then Mom, Dad, and Josh rode Star Tours and Muppets while Paul and Amy repeated Rock 'N' Rollercoaster and rode Tower of Terror twice. On Wednesday morning, Paul and Amy woke up early to ride a new rollercoaster, Expedition Everest, during the extended hours at Animal Kingdom. While Paul and Amy were there, almost everyone else went to the princess breakfast at Cinderella's castle, which the young girls absolutely loved. They got to meet all of their favorite princesses and they didn't want to leave.
After that, we all spent the day at Magic Kingdom. We rode Space Mountain, Splash Mountain, Winnie the Pooh, Pirates of the Caribbean (which really scared Evie), Haunted Mansion, "it's a small world," Dumbo, and the Tomorrowland speedway. Here are Lainey and Amy at the speedway:
The Dumbo ride:
Paul and Nora on "it's a small world":
Some other photos from the parks:
We also saw the Main Street parade and a performance at Cinderella's castle. We ate lunch and dinner in the park, and we were worn out by the end of the day. It was absurdly hot in Orlando, so we had been sweating all day and walking everywhere. However, Paul, Amy, Kip and Carolyn found enough energy to visit Hollywood studios that night, where we rode Tower of Terror and Rock 'N' Rollercoaster twice each. We had fun making silly faces at the camera in Rock 'N' Rollercoaster. On Thursday, we all spent the day in Animal Kingdom. We rode the safari ride, where we saw hippos, elephants, giraffes, warthogs, cheetahs, lions, and rhinos.
We also rode Expedition Everest, and we even convinced Josh to ride that one. We rode the Kali river rapids, where we were grateful to get wet and escape the heat. Will, Clark, Paul, Josh, Mom, and Amy rode a dinosaur ride, which was actually quite scary, and we all saw Finding Nemo: The Musical, It's Tough to Be a Bug (a 3-D movie), and the Festival of the Lion King (one of our favorite shows). We ate dinner at a restaurant in Bay Lake Tower, and then Paul, Amy, Clark, and Maria went to Hollywood studios. We rode Tower of Terror and Rock 'N' Rollercoaster twice each. On Friday, we took the monorail to Epcot. We realized that lots of us girls were wearing purple, so we took a picture:
And here are the ones not wearing purple:
At Epcot, we all rode Soarin' (Rosie said "I just want to come to Florida every day and ride this!") and The Universe of Energy (featuring Ellen Degeneres and Bill Nye the Science Guy). Some of us rode Mission: Space as well (Will asked "were we really on the moon?"). After that, we all saw the 3-D movie, Captain Eo, which was pretty strange. After lunch, we caught a bus to Hollywood, where most of our group went to Beauty and the Beast and Paul, Clark, and Amy rode Tower of Terror twice since the line was super short. After that, some of us went to Star Tours while the rest went to Muppets. For dinner, we ate at Pizza Planet.
After we ate, we all split up; Paul, Amy, Dad, Mom, and Josh went to Hollywood studios, Carolyn's family went to buy souvenirs, and Maria's family also went to buy souvenirs. Paul, Josh, and Amy shopped for souvenirs while Mom and Dad rode Tower of Terror, and then we all went to Rock 'N' Rollercoaster.When we returned to Bay Lake Tower, we watched the fireworks with Carolyn and her family. On Saturday (August 18), we said goodbye to everybody and returned home. It was a fantastic trip. We loved spending time with the family and visiting the beach and the parks. Paul and Amy rode Rock 'N' Rollercoaster 7 times overall and Tower of Terror 8 times! :) It was an incredible vacation.
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