Disneyland (or something like it)

We got up early Thursday to head for Orlando. We were supposed to be there by 1 to check in. We got to the hotel right at 1 and headed in to the welcome center. We were supposed to pick up our 100 dollar voucher and skip the time share presentation, because Bonnie and her Friend had already went through one right before they cruised to the Bahamas last winter. The guy was really trying to get us to go through one of the presentations and offered us 2 fully paid tickets to Universal Studios and a 4 day 3 night stay in Las Vegas. Ok...I said, I'll do it...much to the surprise of Bonnie. She hates these high pressure presentations. I like the challenge...keeps me sharp. I hope this sales guy is good...

Here is the hotel we are staying at.

The room...I get the one closest to the TV

We went to our room and unpacked our stuff. it was only around 2 and didn't have to go to the presentation until 9 in the morning. We had passed a couple of thrift stores on the way in...so off we went.

Notice the Goodwill in the background

Flowers everywhere..

 We got back to the hotel about 7 and headed straight down to the buffet (we had free meals included) and ate way to much. Back to the room by 8 to catch the elimination round of Idol. After that it was down to the pool, not to swim, there was a tiki bar right out beside the pool. We had a couple of drinks, then off to bed. We awoke with great interpretation, excited for the challenge, would we buy a timeshare or would I really piss those guys off? We got to the place to see the presentation.

This should be fun...

 Some lady came over and asked us a couple of questions, which I could only presume was to size me up for the right sales guy. They brought over this sharply dressed guy, he sat down and started to compliment us on some bullcrap generic stuff. They took us down to this room where each couple sat at a table with their sales person and watched this really boring lady use a slide show presentation (subliminally) showing us how we can not afford to continue to take vacations because of the rising costs of lodging, (I actually agree with this portion of the presentation) Then it was off to see the model rooms. We stopped our guy and told him not to waste any more time cause we we not buying anything. He acted shocked, of course, and took us to get our tickets (code for taking us to the "closer guy") He sat us down in a room with a bunch of people they were trying to sell (big mistake) and sat us down right in the middle of the room. The sales guy gets up to get out tickets and returns not with the tickets, but with the "manager" who wants to talk to me about how I cannot afford to not make this purchase today. I only wish I had my camcorder in there with me because it was a pretty funny situation. I will cut to the end...After a couple more managers and some ticked off salespersons..We got our tickets and no timeshare.

Off to adventure land or er ah Universal Studios. We got there around 1 and it was packed. We had to park about a mile from the front gate and walk.

Small crowd..

We finally got to the front gate and got in. It was big and it was busy and it was hot as heck out. 91 degrees hot. But we were excited to be there. We had heard about this place for years. Here it is in pictures...

I should have angled this to look like I was holding it up...

Harry Potter! I love Harry Potter!

That kid is toast.

Where is Will Smith?

BART!!!

If you remember this place...Your old!

Scooby DOO...

The following video is the line on every attraction

It was a neat thing to see, but we didn't see the value in the 100 dollar per person tickets. We basically thought of it as Adventureland on steroids. Probably fun for the kids, but quite expensive.
We left at 6, as we were both OD'ed on juvenile delinquents. We went back to the hotel, ate the buffet and went down to the bar to grab a beer and watch tourist karaoke. It was pretty entertaining. We couldn't stay late as we had to get up early for garage sales. We really like the traveling garage sales experience. We hit around 15 to 20 sales on our way to home. By 1:30 we were only halfway home so we stopped for lunch at this little beachside inn.

Do they have food here?

It was about 90 miles north of Lauderdale. It was all by itself outside of a small town.
The views were awesome.

I love Florida!

And the beach was pristine and very remote.

Where is everybody?

And there was a band playing.

It was a nice pit stop.....I love living in paradise!!!
After diner we drove the rest of the way home and got unpacked, relaxed watching a bit of tv.
I have to get to bed...I got white line fever from all the driving.