I Can Fly Like An Eagle

Sunday morning started out exactly like Saturday, with Lori having to get up way too early to be at the Full Marathon by 4:30. We of course, slept in a while. We eventually got up around 9:00am, and headed towards breakfast at Olivia's restaurant. We ate a big breakfast, and the boys and I headed for Disney's Hollywood Studio.

Normally, we always find a place on the course to wait on Lori, and cheer her as she runs by. Today would be different. First, she was running the marathon with a few of her friends, so they would be there for encouragement. Secondly, she was running through 4 different parks, and stopping to ride roller coasters and taking pictures with all of the Disney characters along the route, so we just decided to get in a couple of fun Disney hours before meeting mom back at the room.

The boys and I got to Hollywood Studios around 10:00am. Wow, this place was cool. I'm a bit embarrassed that I did not snap more pictures. Normally, I have help corralling the boys, so taking pictures is easier. Because I was a single point man, I only took one picture. Here are the boys showing their anticipation as we headed for the Star Wars Studio exhibit.

Speaking of the Star Wars exhibit and ride..........wow. This is a "ride" only to the senses. You enter into a briefing area, where it is explained to you that you will be part of the new recruits of the Galactic Alliance. You board a "shuttle", and once you are seated and strapped in to your seat, your view out of the shuttle window is enabled. The shuttle "takes off", and you are on your way to an adventure. Here is the thing, at no time are you ever in motion. The chairs you are sitting on are moving in rhythm with the shuttle view, and you feel like you are actually flying through space. It is a truly fantastic feeling. It amazes me that I can be "tricked" like this. The boys absolutely loved, loved, loved that ride. I did to. It was really cool, and I'm sorry Lori missed it. Technology is cool.

After checking out a little more of the park, and cheering on the runners who were making their way through Disney Hollywood, I got an alert on my phone letting me know that Lori had finished. A few minutes later, Lori called letting me know that she was doing OK. I am always really happy when I get that call. Whew.....she did another one, and finish safely.

Congratulations Lori, including the Mickey Mile, and the Half and Full marathons, you ran 40.3 miles and walked at least 15 additional miles at the parks, all in just two days. Incredible, we are so proud of you. What a gifted athlete you are.

The boys and I headed for the busses, and made our way back to our villa. About 20 minutes after we arrived, Lori stepped through the door. She looked great. Wow. She was a bit sore and tired, but after a long hot bath, and putting on her compression socks, she was ready for our last day at the parks.

Today was Epcot day! I had really been looking forward to this. From a learning, experiencing, and information's stand point, it can't be beat. You could spend days in this park alone.

We arrived at Epcot around 2:00pm, and made our way toward the entrance. At the entrance, you are immediately greeted by the iconic Spaceship Earth Sphere.

The geodesic dome is really a site to behold. Unfortunately for us, on this day, our last day to visit the parks, the 15 minute Spaceship Earth ride was down for maintenance. Oh man, I was disappointed. Oh well, next time.

I have to admit, when we go back the next time we will be much more organized. Epcot offers so much to explore, you really need a plan of attack. We just kind of went off the cuff, and we ran out of time before we could experience everything the park had to offer.

First order of business, get a picture of Lori wearing her Goofy Medal, along with a matching Hat.

Let me tell you, it's pretty special when you wear your Goofy finisher's medal at the parks. She spent the majority of the day being congratulated by not only park staff, but many of the patrons as well. If I had earned that medal and gotten all of the praise she received during the day, I do not believe that Goofy hat would have been big enough to contain my swelling head. Lori on the other hand, took it in stride, and being the humble person she is, acted like it was no big deal.

I guess I need to bite to bullet, and include one picture of the blog writer. Here's me, with my two favorite primates.

Next in line was The Land.

The Land is a huge pavilion that houses rides and is themed around human interaction with the land itself. It has a few different rides, the first of which is Living with the Land. Living with the Land is a boat themed ride that takes you through various exhibits, all while explaining the parks research into various approaches to living in different environments. Very relaxing and informative.

The second attraction at The Land is a ride call Soarin. It is the number one attraction at Disneyworld. When we got off the boat ride, we went to check out Soarin. The wait was almost an hour and a half to get on the ride, so we got our FAST PASSES for a return trip for 7:30 that evening. We were all very excited about this.

As we left The Land, Christopher spotted Nemo. Ok, next up.....Nemo's adventure.

Uhh, talk about indigestion....

The Nemo ride was pretty fascinating. While you ride along a track seated in giant Clam shells, they somehow project the character images from the movie Nemo into a live aquarium setting. Simply Cool. After the ride was over, we walked through the aquarium, as it surrounded you from all sides. We were all fascinated.

Twilight was starting, and it seemed like we had just gotten there. If you are not familiar with Epcot Park, it has areas devoted to the culture of Mexico, Norway, China, Germany, Italy, Japan, Morocco, France, the United Kingdom, and Canada. Each of these areas is built in the architecture of that particular country and the shops and restaurants are staffed by citizens of these countries.  It is all part of Disney's Cultural Representative Program.

When you visit each country within the park, you actually get a real feel of what it would be like to visit the actual location. I was super excited about this, so we headed to that part of the park. On our way, I took a picture of the park as the sun was setting. I was quite beautiful.

It was getting late and we were getting hungry, so we decided to eat in Mexico. There are a number of different restaurants to choose from, but we wanted a nice sit down dinner, so we picked La Hacienda de San Ángel. It was a beautiful restaurant, that overlooked the lake in the center of the park. The food was very good, and the custom made Margaritas were out of this world.

Dinner took a while, and after getting back outside, we realized that there was no way that we were going to be able to visit each country and take in the atmosphere properly.  Like i stated earlier, you really could spend at least a whole day just visiting the countries in the park.

After looking at my watch, I realized that the FAST PASSES that we got earlier for the ride Soarin were going to be available for use in about 45 minutes. That would give us just enough time to walk through each country on our way back to The Land. I would have loved to experience each country the correct way, but that will have to wait until next visit. Here is a few pictures that I took while we were making our way over to Soarin.

We made it back to The Land, and made our way to the ride. Keep in mind, this is the number one attraction at Disney, including all of the parks.

Soarin is a simulation that has you hang gliding over various terrains and scenery. None of us really knew what to expect, but with it being a simulation and not an actual "moving" ride, I thought "how scary could it be".

We used our FAST PASSES to jump to the front of the line, and waited for our turn. Now, I hope I don't bore you, but I am going to spend quite a bit of time describing the experience, for it was one of the coolest things I have ever done. I was blown away by this ride.

After you walk into the giant room, the first thing you notice is the enormous 80 ft tall OMNIMAX screen. It looks like someone took a giant egg, and cracked it in half. You then make your way over to the seats. It was at this time that Aidan and I both realized, that this particular "simulation" was going to lift you off the ground about 30-40 ft or so, and insert you into the half egg screen.  Ummm......what?  I was able to control my dislike of heights, and tell myself that I would be strapped in, so there is nothing to worry about. Aidan however, was having a much more difficult time reaching this conclusion. He was not a happy camper, until one of the ladies that was working the ride came over and spoke to him. After that he did fine.

As the ride begins, like I said, the chairs that you are seated in, are lifted up by huge hydraulics, and you are literally inserted into this large concave screen. It is the only thing that you can see all around you. The simulation starts, and it is quite startling. Even though you are not "moving", you have absolutely no way of telling that. Your senses do not allow it. As far as your mind and body are concerned, you are actually hang gliding.

The screen fills with a 48 frame per second, IMAX HD film that starts with you gliding over the Golden Gate Bridge. Oh my God! Like I said, I have never been a huge fan of heights, and now I was hang gliding over San Francisco Bay. It was terrifying at first. In every direction you look....up, down, right, left, you see exactly what you would be seeing if you were flying. Not only that, each scene that you experience, you also experience what ever the scene depicts. You feel the breeze in your hair, each shift in direction is simulated by the chair you are sitting in, and the wind direction change. When you fly over the Ventura orange blossom fields, you smell orange blossoms. When you fly over the evergreen forest, you smell the evergreens. It was GLORIOUS!

When the ride ended, I had genuine remorse. I wanted it to go on, and on. Wow. That ride only lasted 5 minutes, but I will remember that experience for the rest of my life. It was that incredible and intense.

It was now closing time at the park. Each night at Epcot the day is ended with a fireworks, laser and water fountains show called IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth. It is timed to a musical score and done over the Lagoon in the middle of the park. It was a sight to behold. Like I said earlier, my phone does not take very good pictures at night, so please forgive the blurriness.

The crew looked on with amazement.

After the fireworks were finished, we made our way back to the bus, and headed home to villa for a good night's sleep. We were all pretty exhausted, and had not trouble sleeping.

We woke up Monday morning a little depressed. It was time to go back home. 3 days were simply not enough time to experience all of the wonders that the parks had to offer. Next time, we will stay longer.  I snapped one last picture before we left our villa.  Here is Lori, showing off all of the BLING she earned running her races.

We had a good breakfast and took the bus to the airport. After a short wait, we boarded our flight, and we were on our way home. Everything going well until an hour into the flight, Christopher woke up and said..."mommy, I do feel so.....RALPH!!" Yep, it happened that fast, with no time to find one of the wonderful bags that the carriers are so nice to supply.   It was all over Christopher. Lori, being the wonderful mom she is, handled it like a champ. She got him all cleaned up, and the rest of the now stinky flight was uneventful.

We landed, picked up our luggage, and got home around 3:30pm on Monday afternoon. It was a fun trip, but way too short. We will remedy that the next time.

William