Dad’s Taxi Finally Runs Out of Words – Part 11 – Fin

[Dads_Taxi]

So, I’ve finally got around to documenting the last couple of days. It may not be a strictly accurate report as the memories are fading, but I can remember the highlights.

Thursday April 17^th is Kayleigh’s official 5^th birthday, having enjoyed her un-birthday at Epcot yesterday. Against all odds, yesterday Mrs Dad’s-Taxi managed to buy a Frozen princess dress, and so lucky Kayleigh gets exactly what she asked the Birthday-Fairy for. Phew!

Today’s destination is SeaWorld, so off we trundle in the van for a reasonably well-planned day. The first stop is Shamu Stadium to see the new show. We actually get there too early, the doors aren’t open yet, but it’s not a long wait and then the dash to get decent seats commences. We don’t do particularly well in the scrum, and considering how early we arrived I’m disappointed at how far back we are sat, but it’s still a good view. In 2012 I reported that the when recruiting for the Shamu show, adverts for whale trainers must say “must have masters degree in marine biology. Good rhythm and dancing experience essential”, but this new show has thankfully become less of a demonstration of the singing and dancing talents (I use the term kindly) of the marine biologists and more a showcase of the talented whales. The show was in its infancy in April so there were still some creases needed ironing out, but overall it was a big success. One thing I did notice was that the whales were more inclined to perform to the right side of the stadium (from the audience’s viewpoint). I expect this has been addressed now but at our show far more enthusiasm was shown by the whales that were furthest from our seats! Typical.

As always I took lots of photos, most of which turned out to be of plumes of water showing where a whale had just landed! This is one of the better ones:

We did all the usual stuff. The Blue Horizons show was as brilliant as ever,

Although unfortunately the huge bird that flies over the audience was off on sick-leave, which was a shame as we had sat top left of the stadium to get the full effect as it flew over from just behind our seats.

Despite knowing every joke in the Clyde and Seamore show, it is a compulsory trip so we can see what the mime guy is up to.

He never fails to have us rolling with laughter, and on this occasion we saw a new (to us) trick where he stole a baseball cap from a guy several rows back in the audience, does all the usual threats to dunk it in the pool, then threw the cap Frisbee-style into the audience where it landed on the owner’s head! Impressive. The Clyde and Seamore Take Pirate Island show has now ended, so I hope the mime returns as a warm-up act at another show soon.

Scroll down folks, more waffling continues…………

[Dads_Taxi]

As well as the shows we fed the stingrays, which I discovered is quite difficult to get a decent photo of.

And we visit the viewing area for the Shamu show stars

It has been a busy day, and as yesterday we had such a long day at Epcot, Kayleigh is getting very tired and the usually bouncy fun-loving girl is becoming irritable, so we take one last photo of the birthday girl and get back to the van.

It’s still quite early and lunch comprised mainly of kids meals from Voyagers Smokehouse, so we agree that a trip to Sweet Tomatoes would be a good way to end the day. We promise Kayleigh it will be a quick visit, and after a tasty dose of healthy food and stodgy pudding we head back to the villa for an early night.


Friday 18^th April is our last day. It’s also the day the Falcon 9 rocket has been re-scheduled to launch. We check the Nasa website to see what the latest news is, and it is all dependant on the weather. The day is grey, very low cloud cover and not a patch of blue to be seen, so the consensus is that a 140 mile round trip for a potential 10 second glimpse of a rocket before it goes into the clouds probably isn’t worth it. Instead we decide to have a final browse around Walmart, not quite as exciting but more likely to deliver the goods! At the scheduled launch time Lydia and I were outside Walmart in the car park, with the compass app on the phone making sure we were looking towards the Space Centre, but launch time came and went and we saw nothing but grey clouds. Later on, back at the villa, we did check on the Nasa website and the rocket had launched bang on time. Oh well, win some lose some.

Friday evening, and indecision reigns when we try to choose somewhere to eat. So, we decide to find somewhere new for dinner. Despite staying in Davenport on several occasions we have never really ventured along Highway 27, so we set off to make new discoveries! First we head North. Beef O’Brady’s is not given a second glance, the name alone deters our vegetarian contingent. We stop at Applebees, I’ve heard good reports on the forum I recall. A deputation is sent to check the menu and quickly reports back that vegetarians are not well catered for. I point the van North again and drive. And drive. Nothing to see here folks, turn around. Half an hour or so later we are back at the intersection we started at, and head South. This looks more promising. Cracker Barrel looks inviting but I am out-voted, “drive on” I am told. Bob Evans is our next stop, albeit a very brief stop whilst the increasingly fussy veggies check it out and dismiss it! We pass a couple of pizza places – “not pizza again” I hear. This is getting ridiculous.

Eventually we reach Haines City, and spot a combined gas station and Denny’s. It feels like the ideal place to complete our Road Trip experience! The road trip feel is reinforced when we walk into the restaurant and see three genuine truckers eating at the counter. A few families are seated at tables around the place too, and the whole restaurant turn to look at us as our fog-horn voiced Kayleigh announced “THERE’S NO KETCHUP SAUCE” as we are shown to our table. I move the menu, revealing the bottle of sauce, and she is placated.

We had another nice meal, and afterwards we wandered around the gas station section, bemused by the wide and wonderful selection of things they had on sale. I think they had a bigger candy section than Walmart!


Saturday morning has to come along and break the spell. Two wonderful weeks have flown by. Our flight check-in opens at 13.30, so we decide one last lunch, albeit an early lunch, at Sweet Tomato is in order. We get to the restaurant at 11.30, and I’d like to say I enjoyed it but I spent the whole meal looking at my watch and watching the traffic on the 192 get heavier and slower by the minute. The slower the traffic was moving, the higher my blood pressure went! I reluctantly force down a brownie with ice-cream (ha, not too reluctant) then we join the sloth-like crawl that is the 192. Pretty soon I am convinced that we have blown it, more so when I spot that the fuel computer on the van reckons we have enough gas to get about 3 miles beyond the airport. It takes a while but eventually the traffic clears, Steve the SatNav declares we will make it in time and the fuel computer becomes more optimistic about our range. Returning the car was a breeze, and by 13.30 we have joined the line for our check-in.

And what a line. I estimate there’s a couple of hundred people in front of us, and to my bemusement there are soon a couple of hundred behind us too. Hold on, we’re not all going to fit on this plane. It’s a slow moving line and by the time we get to the check-in desk there are hundreds behind us. I query the capacity of the plane and I’m surprised to hear that the flight will be two aircraft. I’ve never heard of this before. All I can say is that if they can fill two Airbus 330s at a grand a seat, then Thomas Cook must be in profit today.

The flight home was as smooth as the flight out. Bang on time, correct seats, correct meals. A big YES vote for Fly Thomas Cook from us.


And that’s it, I’ve run out of things to say! Well almost. If you’ve struggled through all fourteen and a half thousand words of my eleven reports, then I do apologise for being so verbose. I’ll finish off with one last picture that needs no words, I just need to say that this was omitted from the Magic Kingdom report whilst we were still in Florida as it didn’t seem right to let the forum readers know before the grandparents:

Fin.

[LiesaAnna]

awww how lovely... so what did she say???????

[Tony G]

Another excellent installment!

What did the veggies eat at Denny's?

[Dads_Taxi]

Liesa, Molly said yes!!

Tony, they raved over the vege burgers, went down very well apparently. (I stuck to meat)

[vickk]

We have flown Thomas Cook once and check in both ways was chaos as they were also checking in 2 flights at the same time at the same desks. going out the flights left within 1 hour of each other and coming back 1 was to Manchester and 1 to London. Everything else though was good, in fact I have just booked with them again for next May. One difference is I am trying the new direct service to Miami that they are doing next summer.

[Lyn]

All you need to do now is plan your next trip, or you may be helping plan a wedding.

[kitch50]

Cracking good trip reports Dave, have loved all your waffling, thank you for sharing your lovely memories with us [msnsmile2]

[FraserLynn]

What a lovely ending to a very entertaining set of trip reports

[LiesaAnna]

yayyy great news! oooooooo what about a florida wedding!!!! [cheers][cheers][cheers][cheers][cheers]


and thankyou for such a brilliant trip report!! oved every bit of it! xxxx