Orlando/Tampa trip
Cold, cold everywhere and no place to hide! As you wonder why am I writing about cold when we just visited Florida, let me just say that this visit to Florida will be remembered not because we visited warm and sunny Florida, but because we all had a lot of fun in spite of the cold :-)
We boarded our Airtran flight to Orlando (MCO) on Thursday, Dec 31 around 12 noon having a quick bite at Einstein's Bagel on terminal A. Except for the "anti high-price lotion" in the restrooms and advice written on the snack bags, the flight was pretty average :-). Upon arrival at MCO, we met up with the other party in crime (aka Pragya and Amit) and while Amit guarded the luggage (and d some office work), we caught a bite at my favorite (Panda Express) fast food joint and then boarded Disney's so-called "Magical Express" and just as 'magic' we were in our room (uhh.. that was a very long ride from the airport to the Pop Century Resort)
While I and Amit were doing the manly thing (i.e. standing in line) the girls asked the Concierge about the fun stuff and food (of course). We found out about a yummy sandwich place in downtown disney (and apparently the concierge made sure that we understood that she really meant "yummy"). We all went to the room only to discover a miniature room with the bare essentials (they call it a "Resort"). But we were quite impressed by the external decor of the buildings. As the name suggests, the building had a "pop culture" theme depicting the culture from the 1950's all the way to the present time. We waited for the last and the final criminal of our gang (aka the most notorious one, Ranjana). After getting cheated by her GPS (only to later discover that she inputted the wrong address), Ranjana finally made it to Pop Century and we headed off to Downtown Disney (as suggested by the Concierge). Among the sea of creatures (humans), shops and restaurants we managed to find the sandwich place (Earl of Sandwich) and decided to respect the wishes of the lovely concierge. While Pragya and Tina got the sandwich the rest of the gang headed off to Wolfgang Puck Express. As for the food, let us just say we could have all kissed the concierge and Mr. Puck didn't fail us either :-). We had a lovely meal.
With our tummies full, we headed off to see all the other fun stuff in downtown Disney. The hot air balloon looked interesting and after standing in the infinite line waiting for our chance, we decided to give up :-( We--and I mean the only people who drink--had a few drinks in a bar and suddenly realized that we are standing on the edge of a passing year with just a few minutes to go. The fireworks started (at one of the parks -- Disney or Universal -- not sure) and we stood there staring at them from a distance, marveling at the bygone year, and wondering what the next year would have in store for us.... We headed off to our "resort" and tired that all of us were, we couldn't think of anything but sleep (Ranjana and her phone might disagree :-)).
Friday started off pretty lazily and after waking up much past breakfast time, we headed off to our resort cafe to find out that 3 of us vegetarians had nothing but cereal and cold bagels to eat (after breakfast we'd discover the badly located toaster). Tina decided to try her luck and asked the chef if he could bring us nice fluffy pancakes from his magic hat (ummm...... yummmy) ... and there they were (well more than we needed at the time) ... warm and nice and yummy.... and the perfect recipe for the start of a great day!
Unfortunately, it was all cold and wet outside and the drizzling wouldn't stop..... we decided to head over to Kennedy Space Center rather than "donate" precious dollars to Disney. Ranjana volunteered to let us be the first victims of a group drive in her new Scion! We got there around 2:30 only to discover that we were amongst the last of the batches even though Kennedy's website clearly says that it closes at 5:30 PM. One thing which I have realized is that Floridians aren't very tech savvy (and don't update their websites very often). I guess the sunshine has it's effects :-)
KSC was fun as we watched over the nation's premier shuttle launch facility in the frigid Florida winter (thanx to Tina, I had to do the right thing and give my wind breaker to her (granted she made me pack it); but all I could imagine was hot coffee). We visited two of the three tour stops (the third was closed) and then waited--outside--in line for the shuttle simulation ride. We finally made it back to the car around 6:30p, starving (note, we only ate breakfast that day). We would have eaten each other (think cannibals) had our breakfast pancakes not come to our rescue (yes, we had ended up buying 5 extra pancakes in the morning)!!! After devoring them in the car, we used the newly acquired glucose to locate a Thai restaurant (aha, I found some use of my new iPhone) and on the way stopped over to ponder the beauty of earth's only satellite rising over the gorgeous ocean [moon]...... Thai food was good (the lack of any hot coffee in the restaurant was a bit annoying). The non-vegetarians in our gang had a lot of fun eating their snapper (wait, it wasn't eating, it was devouring).
Saturday was Disney day, the main reason we were in Florida. Having gotten our lesson about breakfast the previous day, we woke up bright and early (well... earlier) and ate whatever our souls might have desired the previous day (yummy waffles.....). The non-veggie souls had gotten hungry earlier and headed off to breakfast a bit earlier than the veggie folks. They also got the tickets for Epcot. At Epcot, we hurried into completing as many rides and attractions as we could (I wish we had understood the importance of Fast Track tickets sooner). The Space Adventure was fantastic (better than the simulation at Kennedy). The undersea adventure with Nemo and family was also cool (though a bit kiddy-oriented I would say). Around 5, us hungry souls wandered off to the food pavilions only to discover very limited options for the grass-hoppers (or might I say the vegetarians). Amit got the orange chicken from the Chinese pavilion and the vegetarians got stir-fried vegetable with rice. Ranjana devoured beef sandwich at the grand American pavilion (and the 3 V's ate veggie burger and fries). Having gotten a bit of energy, we managed to venture into the Test Track (which all of us were incredibly scared off). Tired that all of us were, we hoped that this wouldn't be the deal breaker (i.e. retiring one of us). It turned out to be an incredibly fun experience as we zoomed in the old GM car's test track!!!
Dinner at Epcot was another story altogether. We were so exhausted at this point that we could have become cannibals. We ended up in the Moroccon pavilion and had falafel. I and Ranjana also had a glass of cheap Moroccon wine :-) Following dinner, the only thing which kept us going in the Arctic Epcot (that's not a new ride, that's how cold it was for us) was the fireworks which proved to be one of the best fireworks which all of us had seen. The majestic Epcot center glowed in the dark while the firework in the sky and the lake beneath was just awesome!! We hurried off back to our rooms completely exhausted and totally cold from within and outside. Ranjana narrated some bedside stories and drove off in the night to her much-desired "comfy" bed in Gainesville.
Sunday was the day of bifurcation for the 2 couples. While Chi and Amit headed off to Miami/Key West early in the morning, we took it a bit easy and then headed off to the airport for our car rental in the Mears coach (still don't know what Mears is) provided by Disney. At the airport we realized that the Hertz car rental location was actually an off-airport location and fearing that it might cause problem with us on our day of departure, we decided to use the services of Enterprise. How convenient..... huh... they almost ripped us off... and we got our lesson about not doing walk-up rentals :-( Perhaps in an effort to salve our wounds, the car rental guy gave us an upgrade and we walked out with a nice Hyundai Sonata! We decided that now that we have an expensive car (well relatively), we might as well enjoy it and zoomed our way to St. Petersburg. On our way we decided to satisfy our appetites with our one true friend- Taco Bell (in Plant City, FL) and we had a satisfying lunch (both pocket and tummy wise -- can't beat the Taco Bell deals). It was one of those n number of times when you are so glad that Taco Bell exists on earth... it's almost like the savior of vegetarian travelers...
We reached St. Petersburg and drove towards the Dali Museum. We bought a ticket for their last guided tour at 3PM. Although, I am not a big fan of museums, I have to admit that this one was cool and definitely needs attention of all you folks out there.... This artist (Salvador Dali) is a bit eccentric (by that I mean a lot) and although most of his creations don't make any sense, the ones which do will totally blow your mind.....and taking the tour definitely helps in making sense of surrealist art.
Following Dali, we sped off to our Comfort Suites jacuzzi room wanting to maximize every penny we paid. On the way, we wandered on small roads observing small Florida towns, people and getting a feeling of our hotel neighborhood. We stopped at a Walmart and got a bottle of wine and chocolate cake (the perfect accompaniments for the evening) and got clothes for my iphone (a casemate cover). By the time we reached our hotel it was already 9'ish and we were hungry. We checked-in and headed to the nearest Olive Garden (we're still proud of the variety of food we had during the trip). We were almost dying to eat the addictive salad! The waiter was really helpful in giving advice as to where to go the next day and what to do. We ordered just one entree (u could see the face of the poor waiter) and ate tons of salad (not that we even finished one bowl of it). Having satisfied our most natural craving (food that is), we headed back to our hotel and had a good night sleep on the lovely king bed.
We woke up next morning bright and early hoping to not have missed the hotel breakfast. After a standard continental breakfast (plus warm waffles) we headed up to book our hotel for our last night in Florida. Our main criteria- cheap and close to MCO as neither of us was sure that we would wake up on time for our early morning flight (9am). We decided to give priceline.com a shot based on Amit's recommendation and believe it or not got a room at the MCO Hyatt Regency for 40 bucks (plus tax)!!! Unable to believe our luck--we thought we would get the worst room available--we went on with our day. We headed out the door with a long list of places that we wanted to see before heading back to Orlando.
By any stretch of the imagination our list was pretty ambitious. It included "honeymoon island", clearwater beach and the most exciting of all Mixon fruit farm!! On the way to clearwater beach we stopped at a few pretty spots overlooking the lovely ocean..... if it wasn't for my impatience we would have been surely late for the fruit farm as it was almost an hour drive (and Tina just couldn't resist stopping at nice view points). I had to employ the best of my driving skills to reach Mixon on time only to discover that we were the only 2 people on the tour. For better or worse, us eager beavers got a private tour of the orange and citrus grove :-) The dude giving the tour also showed us a few of the wildlife his non-profit rescued from cruel owners/public mistreatment and were now unable to reintroduce into the wild. We saw a baby croc, a burmese python, a florida deer and several other creatures up close and got to even touch the croc and the python !!! scary, but a lot of fun....
As we headed out of Mixon, it was pretty close to sunset and we rushed back to Orlando. On the way of course, Tina could not resist stopping at another beach to watch the sunset. On the highway, in utter darkness, I suddenly had a strange realization..... the Hyatt we booked was the same hotel which is inside the MCO terminal... actually inside MCO !!!!! When we had arrived at MCO, we were actually wondering what it would be like to stay inside a Hyatt in the airport and suddenly without meaning to, we booked it on priceline. Of course, we reached MCO and checked into our room thanking God that the room was not the roach infested room we had imagined, but a totally normal, gorgeous Hyatt room overlooking the security line at the airport! Excited, we rushed to return the rental and enjoy a great roasted veggie sandwich and heirloom bean chili at the hotel restaurant.
Final day in orlando... we were ready to head out... I watched the security line growing more and more every passing minute... TSA was a total mess... couldn't handle a few hundred people and also made us throw our Jalapeno jelly which we bought from Mixon. But oh well, we didn't complain too much... we were still basking in the glory of booking a Hyatt room for 40 bucks :-) Tina had said we should just kill the night in the terminal, but I know she didn't mean in the Hyatt.
We were headed back to DC... back to the cold recalling not of the warmth of Florida, but rather the fun of it... there is always a silver lining in the clouds....
We boarded our Airtran flight to Orlando (MCO) on Thursday, Dec 31 around 12 noon having a quick bite at Einstein's Bagel on terminal A. Except for the "anti high-price lotion" in the restrooms and advice written on the snack bags, the flight was pretty average :-). Upon arrival at MCO, we met up with the other party in crime (aka Pragya and Amit) and while Amit guarded the luggage (and d some office work), we caught a bite at my favorite (Panda Express) fast food joint and then boarded Disney's so-called "Magical Express" and just as 'magic' we were in our room (uhh.. that was a very long ride from the airport to the Pop Century Resort)
While I and Amit were doing the manly thing (i.e. standing in line) the girls asked the Concierge about the fun stuff and food (of course). We found out about a yummy sandwich place in downtown disney (and apparently the concierge made sure that we understood that she really meant "yummy"). We all went to the room only to discover a miniature room with the bare essentials (they call it a "Resort"). But we were quite impressed by the external decor of the buildings. As the name suggests, the building had a "pop culture" theme depicting the culture from the 1950's all the way to the present time. We waited for the last and the final criminal of our gang (aka the most notorious one, Ranjana). After getting cheated by her GPS (only to later discover that she inputted the wrong address), Ranjana finally made it to Pop Century and we headed off to Downtown Disney (as suggested by the Concierge). Among the sea of creatures (humans), shops and restaurants we managed to find the sandwich place (Earl of Sandwich) and decided to respect the wishes of the lovely concierge. While Pragya and Tina got the sandwich the rest of the gang headed off to Wolfgang Puck Express. As for the food, let us just say we could have all kissed the concierge and Mr. Puck didn't fail us either :-). We had a lovely meal.
KSC was fun as we watched over the nation's premier shuttle launch facility in the frigid Florida winter (thanx to Tina, I had to do the right thing and give my wind breaker to her (granted she made me pack it); but all I could imagine was hot coffee). We visited two of the three tour stops (the third was closed) and then waited--outside--in line for the shuttle simulation ride. We finally made it back to the car around 6:30p, starving (note, we only ate breakfast that day). We would have eaten each other (think cannibals) had our breakfast pancakes not come to our rescue (yes, we had ended up buying 5 extra pancakes in the morning)!!! After devoring them in the car, we used the newly acquired glucose to locate a Thai restaurant (aha, I found some use of my new iPhone) and on the way stopped over to ponder the beauty of earth's only satellite rising over the gorgeous ocean [moon]...... Thai food was good (the lack of any hot coffee in the restaurant was a bit annoying). The non-vegetarians in our gang had a lot of fun eating their snapper (wait, it wasn't eating, it was devouring).
Saturday was Disney day, the main reason we were in Florida. Having gotten our lesson about breakfast the previous day, we woke up bright and early (well... earlier) and ate whatever our souls might have desired the previous day (yummy waffles.....). The non-veggie souls had gotten hungry earlier and headed off to breakfast a bit earlier than the veggie folks. They also got the tickets for Epcot. At Epcot, we hurried into completing as many rides and attractions as we could (I wish we had understood the importance of Fast Track tickets sooner). The Space Adventure was fantastic (better than the simulation at Kennedy). The undersea adventure with Nemo and family was also cool (though a bit kiddy-oriented I would say). Around 5, us hungry souls wandered off to the food pavilions only to discover very limited options for the grass-hoppers (or might I say the vegetarians). Amit got the orange chicken from the Chinese pavilion and the vegetarians got stir-fried vegetable with rice. Ranjana devoured beef sandwich at the grand American pavilion (and the 3 V's ate veggie burger and fries). Having gotten a bit of energy, we managed to venture into the Test Track (which all of us were incredibly scared off). Tired that all of us were, we hoped that this wouldn't be the deal breaker (i.e. retiring one of us). It turned out to be an incredibly fun experience as we zoomed in the old GM car's test track!!!
Dinner at Epcot was another story altogether. We were so exhausted at this point that we could have become cannibals. We ended up in the Moroccon pavilion and had falafel. I and Ranjana also had a glass of cheap Moroccon wine :-) Following dinner, the only thing which kept us going in the Arctic Epcot (that's not a new ride, that's how cold it was for us) was the fireworks which proved to be one of the best fireworks which all of us had seen. The majestic Epcot center glowed in the dark while the firework in the sky and the lake beneath was just awesome!! We hurried off back to our rooms completely exhausted and totally cold from within and outside. Ranjana narrated some bedside stories and drove off in the night to her much-desired "comfy" bed in Gainesville.
Sunday was the day of bifurcation for the 2 couples. While Chi and Amit headed off to Miami/Key West early in the morning, we took it a bit easy and then headed off to the airport for our car rental in the Mears coach (still don't know what Mears is) provided by Disney. At the airport we realized that the Hertz car rental location was actually an off-airport location and fearing that it might cause problem with us on our day of departure, we decided to use the services of Enterprise. How convenient..... huh... they almost ripped us off... and we got our lesson about not doing walk-up rentals :-( Perhaps in an effort to salve our wounds, the car rental guy gave us an upgrade and we walked out with a nice Hyundai Sonata! We decided that now that we have an expensive car (well relatively), we might as well enjoy it and zoomed our way to St. Petersburg. On our way we decided to satisfy our appetites with our one true friend- Taco Bell (in Plant City, FL) and we had a satisfying lunch (both pocket and tummy wise -- can't beat the Taco Bell deals). It was one of those n number of times when you are so glad that Taco Bell exists on earth... it's almost like the savior of vegetarian travelers...
We reached St. Petersburg and drove towards the Dali Museum. We bought a ticket for their last guided tour at 3PM. Although, I am not a big fan of museums, I have to admit that this one was cool and definitely needs attention of all you folks out there.... This artist (Salvador Dali) is a bit eccentric (by that I mean a lot) and although most of his creations don't make any sense, the ones which do will totally blow your mind.....and taking the tour definitely helps in making sense of surrealist art.
Following Dali, we sped off to our Comfort Suites jacuzzi room wanting to maximize every penny we paid. On the way, we wandered on small roads observing small Florida towns, people and getting a feeling of our hotel neighborhood. We stopped at a Walmart and got a bottle of wine and chocolate cake (the perfect accompaniments for the evening) and got clothes for my iphone (a casemate cover). By the time we reached our hotel it was already 9'ish and we were hungry. We checked-in and headed to the nearest Olive Garden (we're still proud of the variety of food we had during the trip). We were almost dying to eat the addictive salad! The waiter was really helpful in giving advice as to where to go the next day and what to do. We ordered just one entree (u could see the face of the poor waiter) and ate tons of salad (not that we even finished one bowl of it). Having satisfied our most natural craving (food that is), we headed back to our hotel and had a good night sleep on the lovely king bed.
We woke up next morning bright and early hoping to not have missed the hotel breakfast. After a standard continental breakfast (plus warm waffles) we headed up to book our hotel for our last night in Florida. Our main criteria- cheap and close to MCO as neither of us was sure that we would wake up on time for our early morning flight (9am). We decided to give priceline.com a shot based on Amit's recommendation and believe it or not got a room at the MCO Hyatt Regency for 40 bucks (plus tax)!!! Unable to believe our luck--we thought we would get the worst room available--we went on with our day. We headed out the door with a long list of places that we wanted to see before heading back to Orlando.
By any stretch of the imagination our list was pretty ambitious. It included "honeymoon island", clearwater beach and the most exciting of all Mixon fruit farm!! On the way to clearwater beach we stopped at a few pretty spots overlooking the lovely ocean..... if it wasn't for my impatience we would have been surely late for the fruit farm as it was almost an hour drive (and Tina just couldn't resist stopping at nice view points). I had to employ the best of my driving skills to reach Mixon on time only to discover that we were the only 2 people on the tour. For better or worse, us eager beavers got a private tour of the orange and citrus grove :-) The dude giving the tour also showed us a few of the wildlife his non-profit rescued from cruel owners/public mistreatment and were now unable to reintroduce into the wild. We saw a baby croc, a burmese python, a florida deer and several other creatures up close and got to even touch the croc and the python !!! scary, but a lot of fun....
As we headed out of Mixon, it was pretty close to sunset and we rushed back to Orlando. On the way of course, Tina could not resist stopping at another beach to watch the sunset. On the highway, in utter darkness, I suddenly had a strange realization..... the Hyatt we booked was the same hotel which is inside the MCO terminal... actually inside MCO !!!!! When we had arrived at MCO, we were actually wondering what it would be like to stay inside a Hyatt in the airport and suddenly without meaning to, we booked it on priceline. Of course, we reached MCO and checked into our room thanking God that the room was not the roach infested room we had imagined, but a totally normal, gorgeous Hyatt room overlooking the security line at the airport! Excited, we rushed to return the rental and enjoy a great roasted veggie sandwich and heirloom bean chili at the hotel restaurant.
Final day in orlando... we were ready to head out... I watched the security line growing more and more every passing minute... TSA was a total mess... couldn't handle a few hundred people and also made us throw our Jalapeno jelly which we bought from Mixon. But oh well, we didn't complain too much... we were still basking in the glory of booking a Hyatt room for 40 bucks :-) Tina had said we should just kill the night in the terminal, but I know she didn't mean in the Hyatt.
We were headed back to DC... back to the cold recalling not of the warmth of Florida, but rather the fun of it... there is always a silver lining in the clouds....
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8:36 AM
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