On July 14th, I flew out to Denver, Colorado. In the airport, I met this girl from Iowa walking around. My layover was about 30 minutes, but our flight was delayed a few hours, so Andrea, who had just arrived from Cedar Rapids, and I went to eat at City Wok. Then, we explored the rest of the United terminal until boarding the flight to Jackson, Wyoming.
The flight to Wyoming was about an hour. Dad met us at the airport. There was not a jet bridge, so we walked down a ramp. Dad had made a welcome sign. We then drove to Grand Teton National Park. We had a cabin at Colter Bay. We had nice gift bags on our bed upon arriving. They were souvenirs from Dad’s Western exploration prior to us arriving.
On Saturday, we woke up and it smelled so good. As we arrived at night, we did not see much coming in. On Saturday morning, we could see the trees and the mountains. It was really nice. We have many memories at Colter Bay. I love the General Store there. We went there first and then went down to the lake and cooked breakfast. Andrea really cooked breakfast. She really likes to cook. We used multiple Christmas presents to create breakfast.
Afterwards we drove to Jackson by way of the Wilson – Teton Road. We went to the Farmer’s Market and walked around the square. We began to notice the increase in Chinese visitors in different bathroom signs, maps, etc.
We went to Albertsons which is my favorite grocery store in Jackson. Fortunately, cherries were on sale. We ate at a nearby park.
For dinner, we ate leftovers at Two Ocean Road. Dad and I saw a moose (which a picture of it is in the hallway at home) there a few years ago. We drove around more afterwards and went up to Signal Mountain.
In what was one of the better days of the year, on Sunday, we went on an early morning boat ride. I thought we were agreeing to go on a boat with a wheel, but it was really a motorboat – a jon boat. I controlled it out of the marina and down to Hermitage Point on Colter Bay. It was really fun. We were going to kayak, but I think the boat was better as we were able to see so much more. It was really peaceful.
Afterwards, we ate at our favorite place, Leek’s Marina and Pizzeria. Then, we drove and went to the Chapel of the Transfiguration.
Andrea found online a new restaurant in Teton Village. After 5 p.m., you can ride a small gondola up the side of the mountain to the restaurant. We had so much edamame and a few pork sliders. I climbed the hill further. It really felt like we were in the Alps in the summer time.
Everything we did that day really formed a perfect day.
(I will upload more tomorrow night. I will also upload my animal pictures and some of Dad’s pictures at a later date as those are with other cameras.)
Andrea arrived on Friday night. I went to Sea Thai which is near my apartment and got some coconut milk soup. I knew she might be hungry as her plane didn’t land until after 11 p.m. I also made her a strawberry and blueberry parfait. When we arrived back to my apartment, we cleaned out my closet. We were able to get rid of eight sacks of clothing.
On Saturday morning, we went to the Winter Park Farmer’s Market. This is a standard visitor stop. We had the spinach artichoke cream cheese, vegetarian pumpernickel bagel. We went to Panera and drove down to the outlets. For lunch, we went to Hawkers which is like a hipster, Asian street food place. I really like it there. We shopped a little more going to a running store and a few other places before heading to Yanbin’s home. We had fun trying to spot alligators from his dock. He lives on a lake where it is estimated to have over 13,000 alligators, so spotting alligators is pretty fun.. Andrea spotted a really big one. Many are just babies.
Andrea wanted to experience a normal weekend with me which I believe she did for the most part. We went to the 8:30 a.m. service at church. Then, we went to IKEA for their $2 breakfast. I usually do that and lately, I have been coming home, but we went down to Magic Kingdom. We had a lunch reservation at Be Our Guest. We ate in the library. It was a really good meal. Andrea had the very cheesy french onion soup and I had the braised pork with vegetables and mashed potatoes. Afterwards, we went on Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and the Dwarfs Ride. We found out that if cancel the third FastPass, we could pick one up at another park, so we got a FastPass for Toy Story Mania.
We went to check-in, but our room wasn’t ready at Pop Century, so we went to Sweet Tomatoes. Afterwards, we went to Hollywood Studios to ride Toy Story and see Pixar Live which is the park’s new orchestra music. You see various clips of Pixar movies with an orchestra playing. The orchestra was amazing!
On Monday, we went to Hollywood Studios to ride Toy Story and Star Tours. We picked up the Soarin’ FastPass in the tricked we learned on July 2nd.
We stopped and ate at Big River Grille at the Boardwalk. I always wanted to eat there and it was really good. Andrea and I both had a hamburger from the grill. It tasted like the Fourth of July.
We walked over to Soarin’ for our FastPass. We walked a lot and it was quite hot. I am beginning to really like hats which help with the heat. We walked over 33,000 steps on Monday as we walked back to Hollywood Studios and back to our car in the last row of the parking lot. After decorating our hotel window (there was a supposed contest), we went back to Magic Kingdom. MK has their July 4th fireworks on the 3rd and the 4th. We ate at Pecos Bill’s, picked up a FastPass for Big Thunder, and made our way to Main Street.
The fireworks were just ok. Magic Kingdom is a park to be avoided. You think you have a great spot until dad’s put their kids on their shoulders. I know the park is for kids and kids need to see, but so do others. It is a hard problem to correct. I will not go back to that park until October or another visitor arrives.
The crowds on the 3rd were bad. The 4th would have been horrible. Our best transportation option seemed to be the boat to the Polynesian, so we went over there and had a Hawaiian flatbread before heading back to our hotel.
Andrea and I woke up really early to get to Animal Kingdom. We wanted to get on the new river ride at Pandora. When we arrived, the boat ride was down and the Flight of Passage was a 165 minute wait. All other rides were like a 5-minute wait. We went on the safari and then, we decided to go to Animal Kingdom Lodge to eat at The Mara. Disney is celebrating its 45th Anniversary, so annual passholders get 20% off many restaurants. Andrea had a raisin, apple breakfast quinoa and I had the bobotie with pap. While I love Boma for breakfast, this was really good for less than $10 for both of us.
Afterwards, we went back to Animal Kingdom and rode Dinosaur. We ate lunch at the new restaurant in Pandora. It seems like the future is arriving as while in Dinoland, we could order our food on the Disney app, walk to Pandora, and pick up our food without waiting in line. It seems like we eat a lot. I guess we eat a lot of small meals. Andrea and I shared the slow-roasted beef bowl with sweet potato hash, bobo balls, and chimichurri. It is always really good. As we were sitting there, I looked on the Disney app and found the river ride had just re-opened for the day. We ran over there and waited about 10 minutes to board. Usually the ride is at least an hour wait. The river ride is beautiful, but kinda boring. We might appreciate it more if we have seen the movie.
After the river ride, we rode the Flight of Passage which is the best Disney ride or ride I have ever been on. It is amazing. Here is a link to the ride:
After the ride, we went to Epcot. Due to volunteering for the races, I have tickets, so I gave one to Mireya. We met her there as the ticket is only a one-day ticket, not a park hopper. She had already been to Spaceship Earth, Test Track, and the character pals photo place. Somehow, I found a random FastPass to Soarin’ on the app, so I reserved it for the three of us.
After we rode Soarin’, we ate at the quick service place in Japan. We saw the 5:30 p.m. performance of the Voices of Liberty in the American Gardens Theatre. This is one of the best performances as they sing the Armed Forces medley honoring people as they stand up and some the Fab Five walk out in Colonial costumes. It was cute to see Mickey, Goofy, and Donald with their hands over their hearts when the Star Spangled Banner played. After eating some dessert in Norway, we went back for the 8:00 p.m. show as the Armed Forces song is really nice.
We met Bev and her son, Rusty in Japan and watched the fireworks there. Later, cast members were giving out carnations. It was a really fun night.
This morning, I took Andrea to the airport around 7 a.m. and then, I went to work. I will probably not update again until my next adventure on July 14th (I will have limited access to internet, so I might not update until July 24 when I return to Orlando).
I have a new hat for the next adventure. Until then…thanks for reading my blog.
It was my turn to speak at the Hostelling International group. I haven’t been there in about a year, but the leader signed me up to speak tonight.
The group has actually dramatically increased in size. There were about 15 people there. Dad sent me the book I created for him for Father’s Day, so I was able to show it. I also created a video which I did not show as there were too many people. It follows the book (It is not perfect. I put it together really fast last night and some pictures are out of order).
Two good things came from going: 1) I heard about the WOW airline which has cheap flights 2) I was the winner of the Panera Dough gift certificate, the only door prize… before you think I win everything — It was for $5.
On May 29th, we went to the Monteverde Cloud Forest. We stopped at a fruit stand and we went to a beach looking for monkeys. We also went to a hummingbird area. We walked on many hanging bridges and saw some birds, but we didn’t see other animals.
It was pretty bumpy on the roads as they were not paved for the last 12 miles headed up there.
On May 30th, we joined a large tour to go to Tortuguero National Park. We stopped for breakfast and found a blue jean frog. We also stopped by a banana plantation. It was pretty cool to see how they were working manually to bring the bananas in. Some of the pictures are not grouped together in the correct order as I am combining a few cameras. There was also a sloth jam on the side of the road on the way to the National Park.
We boarded a boat and took a tour of the Tortuguero Canals. We were not too far from Nicaragua. The boat ride was pretty long, but we made it to the park. Between July and October, turtles lay eggs at the park. I think each lays like 400 eggs and around 25 survive due to nature like jaguars (not joggers like Dad thought the tour guide said).
We walked around the village and then, we went back on the boat and went to a really neat resort for lunch.
On the way back, we saw many animals like monkeys, a caiman, a macaw, and Jesus Christ lizard (as it walks on water).