March Trip reports

We were at MK this morning. Had a FP for SM early and had a nice morning strolling around. Lots of people.

Had lunch at Whispering Canyon at the WL and will be heading back to MK later tonight.

We're napping at the campsite. At least I'm supposed to be napping...

Mickey Bar is calling...
 


Made it to Pennsicola in time to eat at Peg Leg Pete's at the beach. Ocala tomorrow for 2 nights and then the fort on Thursday. Made loop and site request update by phone. CM seemed to be very helpful and had our packet in hand. Thanks BamaEd for all your help.

That is great time! We underestimated how often we would have to stop. Our car also did not get out of the shop for us to get on the road the first day early. It all worked out though.

Old River Country water slides are a pile of rubble in the middle of the pic. RiP.

Taken from the boat to MK tues 031219 at 445pm.



More tommorow.

Bama Ed

Ed, on Friday, the slides were up when we got on the boat heading to MK, and were gone by the time we got back. it was sad to watch. Also sad to hear people ask "what is that out there?" Hubby rememered going to River Country.
 
Great to see family tonight and we had an AWESOME sunset to the west looking back across the Banana River. The strip of land here is very narrow so we were on the Atlantic coastline but MY my what a view out across the front lawn.

Here is sunset starting:



and here it is finishing:



Tigers and Red Sox tomorrow.

Bama Ed

PS - either tomorrow or Friday I'll get up and get a pix of sunrise on the Atlantic here at Jetty Park Campground.
 


We had a nice easy start to the day today. It was in the 70s all day here at the coast but in Lakeland where the Tigers play, it got into the mid-80s. Not as hot as Monday and there was a little breeze which made it a very pleasant day for a ball game.

It's a bit of a drive to get to Lakeland from Cape Canaveral but the route ends up going down I4 just south of Disney and you pass the Power Pole Mickey where World Drive merges into I4.



Dog-n-Suds report #2 from Tigertown: huge disappointment. Average dog ($5), no souvenir beer glass so had to get the souvenir soda cup. The domestic beer I got was a Coors Light which is not my first choice in domestics but Yuengling and Miller Lite were among the other choices. Total was $18.25 and pretty forgettable. Scoring at home I give the dog a 4.0, the beer a 6 for a 5.0 average then subtract 1.0 for having to buy a soda to get a souvenir cup. That's an overall 4.0 and equals an "awful" rating.



The game was actually quite outstanding to watch. It moved briskly, had some starters on both sides, and ended in a 4-4 tie between the the Red Sox (in the red shirts) and the Tigers (in the black shirts).



No, no, wait. That's not where my seats were. I ordered tickets for this game in the first hour of the first day that individual game tickets could be purchased. Nope - my seats were way out here:



As it turned out, not bad seats at all. 8th row down left field line and we saw a lot of action with hits into the corner (several doubles) and a home run that just made it into the fan space. For the earlier Braves game we had been in 13th row behind home plate. But the game between the Tigers and last year's World Series champs the Sox was technically a sell-out. A lot of Sox fans made the trip from Fort Meyers for this game. And the Tigers have a faithful following in Lakeland in this their 83rd year of spring training in that town.

We did, however, have a partially blocked view of the scoreboard.



All in all it was a good day. Drives both ways weren't too bad.



For dinner we followed a recommendation from our poster Jets70 for an italian place that was full when we got there (that's a good sign) and the food was delicious and plentiful. That was Papa Vito's in Cocoa Beach on Hwy A1A.

Papa-Vito-s-Italian-Restaurant-and-Pizza-Storefront_2f766f49-d334-6604-626eefc741dcba35.JPG


Thanks for the rec, Steve. :thumbsup2

Tomorrow it's the Mets and Nationals down in Port St. Lucie (another 90 minutes each way). Should be sunny and low 80s so hopefully another great fan day. And the long-awaited rocket launch is still scheduled for just before 7pm. I think I'll move down to the ship channel with my folding chair for that one. It's been really beautiful weather wise all this week so far too.

We leave for home on Saturday.

Bama Ed
 
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@bama_ed Glad you enjoyed Papa Vito's. Did you try the garlic knots? :thumbsup2:thumbsup2 Really enjoying your trip pictures, especially the ball games. Would love to go down and see some Spring Training games but the spring is just a difficult time for us to travel to Florida.
A nice baseball stadium, TigerTown, just screams for a panoramic picture. Here is mine from our last game at Kentucky Proud Park. That 3rd base line seems to offer a good perspective of a ball field.
KPP 2019.jpg

Enjoy your trip and safe travels Ed.

Steve
 
@bama_ed Glad you enjoyed Papa Vito's. Did you try the garlic knots? :thumbsup2:thumbsup2

We did get the garlic knots, Steve, and they were delicious with the warm side of mama's sauce that came with it. Plus the salads that came with our meals. I got the shrimp paramigiana and it filled me up.

Three years ago I tried to do this from the Fort with 3 games and got rained out of all of them ("oh-fer" so to speak). This year it looks like I'll go "three for three". Weather and games so far have been great.

Would be hard to top this week unless I pulled the Aliner out to Arizona for a stretch of Cactus League action. Which is where my Cleveland Indians are. Maybe some day.....:rolleyes:

Bama Ed
 
WE ARE HOME! It went by way too fast and I really don't even feel like we really were there at all! I'll have to look at all our photos so we can soak in the trip.
The drive took much longer than we expected because we had more stops than planned, and we had a 8 hour delay. We also left later so we did not get as far the first day, so we checked in around 2pm, got to our site and came back just in time to get the golf cart and groceries.
The kids were so excited to chase lizards behind the trees, and there was a hawk and rabbit that hung out in the field every morning and the Fort is gorgeous. We set up and went to the pool for an hour to cool off, then went looping some and headed to the Sing Along and ate at the food truck.


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Trails End rocking.jpg
I did not get a chance to take a proper TE foot photo, but yup, we did it. And it was nice.

The girls were nervous about riding the boat to MK, but the boys loved it (At least, until we were on the small boat, that did make them all a bit weary.)

IMG_1177.JPG

DAY 1- Magic Kingdom
We did not quite RD, but did arrive before the heavy crowds rolled in. I lost my MB after Philharmonic, but it was a super simple and quick replacement- and they give you back your color instead of the grey bands now :)
All the crowd calendars were wrong and what should have been a 6/10 day was an 8/10 day. We rode 3 rides and went to Tom Sawyer island then went back to the campsite until it cooled off. We had a much better evening and were able to get on more things.

We spotted the Nautilus nod on the Little Mermaid ride queue and grabbed our first of many Mickey Bars.
My hubby told our 2 year old "Hands Up" on Small World and it was the running joke on every other ride he was able to ride after that (even the bus). He would say "Hands Up" and we all would comply.

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We had a 9:15 FP for Peter Pan and then finished the night with Small World and the Carousel, and got to watch the Kiss Goodnight twice.
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We had a nice easy start to the day today. It was in the 70s all day here at the coast but in Lakeland where the Tigers play, it got into the mid-80s. Not as hot as Monday and there was a little breeze which made it a very pleasant day for a ball game.

It's a bit of a drive to get to Lakeland from Cape Canaveral but the route ends up going down I4 just south of Disney and you pass the Power Pole Mickey where World Drive merges into I4.



Dog-n-Suds report #2 from Tigertown: huge disappointment. Average dog ($5), no souvenir beer glass so had to get the souvenir soda cup. The domestic beer I got was a Coors Light which is not my first choice in domestics but Yuengling and Miller Lite were among the other choices. Total was $18.25 and pretty forgettable. Scoring at home I give the dog a 4.0, the beer a 6 for a 5.0 average then subtract 1.0 for having to buy a soda to get a souvenir cup. That's an overall 4.0 and equals an "awful" rating.



The game was actually quite outstanding to watch. It moved briskly, had some starters on both sides, and ended in a 4-4 tie between the the Red Sox (in the red shirts) and the Tigers (in the black shirts).



No, no, wait. That's not where my seats were. I ordered tickets for this game in the first hour of the first day that individual game tickets could be purchased. Nope - my seats were way out here:



As it turned out, not bad seats at all. 8th row down left field line and we saw a lot of action with hits into the corner (several doubles) and a home run that just made it into the fan space. For the earlier Braves game we had been in 13th row behind home plate. But the game between the Tigers and last year's World Series champs the Sox was technically a sell-out. A lot of Sox fans made the trip from Fort Meyers for this game. And the Tigers have a faithful following in Lakeland in this their 83rd year of spring training in that town.

We did, however, have a partially blocked view of the scoreboard.



All in all it was a good day. Drives both ways weren't too bad.



For dinner we followed a recommendation from our poster Jets70 for an italian place that was full when we got there (that's a good sign) and the food was delicious and plentiful. That was Papa Vito's in Cocoa Beach on Hwy A1A.

Papa-Vito-s-Italian-Restaurant-and-Pizza-Storefront_2f766f49-d334-6604-626eefc741dcba35.JPG


Thanks for the rec, Steve. :thumbsup2

Tomorrow it's the Mets and Nationals down in Port St. Lucie (another 90 minutes each way). Should be sunny and low 80s so hopefully another great fan day. And the long-awaited rocket launch is still scheduled for just before 7pm. I think I'll move down to the ship channel with my folding chair for that one. It's been really beautiful weather wise all this week so far too.

We leave for home on Saturday.

Bama Ed
Ed, did you see the rocket launch? It was around 8:26pm. It was really cool, perfectly clear sky so we could see it for a few minutes. I bet your view was amazing.
 
Dinner at TE was great as usual. We got to the Fort at around 2:30 and did some looping and took the small launch around to the other resorts before our ADR. Went and visited the horse barn and walked around the pony area. Sad seeing all the stakes in the ground everywhere for the new construction. When we come back down in October it will probably look a lot different.
 
Ed, did you see the rocket launch? It was around 8:26pm. It was really cool, perfectly clear sky so we could see it for a few minutes. I bet your view was amazing.

Sure did. Because of the 90 minute delay, it was a night launch which was pretty neat.

I'm turning in now and will do the Friday update once I get home tomorrow. Today was a good day all around.

Bama Ed
 
Dinner at TE was great as usual. We got to the Fort at around 2:30 and did some looping and took the small launch around to the other resorts before our ADR. Went and visited the horse barn and walked around the pony area. Sad seeing all the stakes in the ground everywhere for the new construction. When we come back down in October it will probably look a lot different.

Did you see the new pony foal? I have seen videos, it is so cute.
 

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