florida trip: the coolest golf course ever

Okay, that would be the coolest mini golf course ever.

We all know how well we mini golf here in The Circus. (here if you missed that post.  The video of me says it all.)  We are professionals.  We walk our ball to the hole, hit it repeatedly until it goes where we want it to, spend a lot of time bailing our balls out of water, and use our hands when necessary.  We never keep score.  (We went mini golfing with Grandpa Brent and Grandma Julie this weekend and while Grandma Julie fit in with our antics, I think we drove Grandpa crazy.  I'll post about that later when I get the pictures off my camera).

We spent our last day in Florida at Universal Studios.  We had a three day pass and had already spent two days there (here).  The crowds were minimal and even with the rain on one day (it was warm rain so unlike Utah, so what did we care if we were wet?  We were still warm.) we were able to see most everything and ride all the rides.  Our last day there was the begining of spring break for Florida so it was going to be busy.  Luckily it seemed the masses of people wanted Harry Potter and we'd already been there, done that.  We did hit Harry Potter first thing and rode the dragon ride (our favorite!) and then we left the Island Adventures Park and went over to the regular park where the crowds were not so thick.  We finished up with the few shows we hadn't yet seen and then...

well, now what? 

We had a couple of hours to kill before we had to head to the airport and we'd covered every inch of the two parks.

On our way to and from parking we'd been passing a golf course that looked too fun not to notice.  I mean seriously, how can you pass by this and not want to check it out?

So we did. 

When we paid they asked if we wanted the alien side or the haunted side.  No brainer for me.  A chance of having a slice of Halloween in March? I'm in!  Aliens aren't my genre.

The swamp monster under the bridge sprayed you the entire time.  Florida is serious about its water usage.  They want you wet!

Isn't The Man so handsome?

The tree below would be the part where The Man hit his ball in full force skiwampus and it bounced around this area, almost taking out two other parties.  They all stopped cold and looked at us.

"Sorry!"  I yelled.

And then one of the "victims" yells "Fore!" and everyone started to laugh. 

Why does it feel like somebody's watching me? This song totally went through my head.  This song also used to scare the crap out of me when I was a kid.  I'm still not sure I'm comfortable with it.

I've decided that my yard must be fashioned after this golf course come Halloween.  It must!  And I've decided that this year my witch curtains on my porch have to be purple.

Finally it was time to head back to The Circus.  Time to head home and spend time with Tayler's strep throat.

Poor Bug.  Thank goodnes for antibiotics.

Florida trip: Universal Studios Orlando

A couple of things...

First, who wears high heels to an amusement park? Why would you do that to yourself?  Why?  I just don't understand.

Second... no, that's all I had.  I'm pretty dumbfounded by the women tripping along in heels from one ride to another.  My feet and legs were killing while wearing flip flops and tennis shoes, I can't even fathom wearing heels.

Usually when we take a vacation I do day by day posts about it.  I think I'm going to do this trip differently.  Even though it was five days long, it really was comprised of two parts so I think I'll post it in two posts by the events instead of in five days.

First and foremost, my "twin" brother got married to a crazy fun lady.  I'm happy to call her sister now.  But I'm waiting for other family members to post some pics of that so I can steal them for my blog :). 

So the other part of our trip was Universal Studios Orlando.  To say that I was excited to see the Harry Potter world would be an understatement.  I was bouncing in my seat to see it, and it didn't disappoint me.

We flew into Orlando on Thursday night and I could instantly feel that the air felt "heavier".  I could feel the difference in the moisture of the air compared to the dry air of Utah.  It felt good.  By the time we rented our car and left the airport it was 1 am (Florida time) and we had yet to eat dinner.  A detour to Denny's (oh how sweet Denny's is with their 24 hour goodness).  Our GPS more than paid for itself with this trip and got us to our hotel by avoiding any toll roads. 

Friday morning our friend, Mr. GPS helped us find Universal Studios. 

We had a breakfast reservation at the Three Broomsticks and I wasn't about to miss it.  We walked into Hogsmeade and I literally gasped.  It was so... perfect.

 Breakfast in the Three Broomsticks:

West got the traditional English breakfast with baked beans and black pudding, I stuck with fruit and English scones.  We both tried pumpkin juice.  It was like Halloween in my mouth, amazing!  Pumpkin, cloves, nutmeg, and it was ice cold.

After breakfast we saw the sights and rode the rides.

Mandrakes :)

Dumbledore's staircase

The pictures really moved.

The sorting hat

Olivander's was Awesome with a capital "A".

They did a presentation, straight out of the book, where Olivander himself picked a child from the group and went through the process of helping that child find the right wand.  After a few spells gone awry, a light sparking, boxes shifting on shelves, the right wand was finally found.

We tried butterbeer

This is what happens when you have to share a lap bar with people who are bigger than you are... my question is, if this is okay for me in the name of safety, why do we need it at all?

The Man was able to eventually drag me away from Hogsmeade to see the rest of the park, which was pretty cool too :).

I don't know how it is where you live, but where we live the water rides at our amusement park (you can check out how the circus reacted to our local park here and here) are just teases.  You come up on a waterfall and just when you're about to go under it, it subsides. 

Not so at Universal Orlando.

When they pull out the water, they intend to use the water.  After three water rides were completely drenched from head to toe.

Which was just as well since by the time we hit our third water ride the rain started anyway.

What is it with torrential Florida rainstorms that only last 30-45 minutes?

We spent the entire day wet.  We shivered inside the heavily air conditioned buildings and walked around in the rain.  But the rain cleared up. 

Sort of.

All I can say is don't tease the cartoon rain gods.  :)  I spent the rest of the day with my jean shorts dripping down my legs.

Here's a fun picture sequence (at least it amuses me because I know how much I love to capture it all with my camera, and how much The Man doesn't).

I crack myself up.

We caught a live "Fear Factor" show with audience participants.  Those would be real people on the hoods of the cars grabbing for flags.

They even drank a gross concoction and put scorpions on a lady's head.

If you're still with me after all of that then you deserve a prize.  And I even cut out a lot of the pictures I took. 

I loved being with The Man and laughing.  Talking.  Eating.  Lots of eating.  We rode crazy fun rides and people watched.  We spent three days at Universal Orlando and I think my favorite day was the first day in the rain.  The rain was warm and it thinned out the crowds for us :).