DIsney World!

My hope for years was to visit Disney WOrld. I read stories about the different venues.
When I really wanted to do was when Disney Animation was stationed there--if I went I could watch real animators do their thing. But now it's not there anymore.

But I still wanted to visit. And this Spring, while vacationing in Florida, it became possible for a 1-day visit. My dear wife Penny made my dream come true. (more later on this)

We drove to Orlando and entered the grounds--4 or 5 lanes of traffic going through gates where we paid $14. Then funneled into gigantic parking lots, we found our spot. Next we walked to admission gates where we stood in line for almost an hour, and finally paid $80 each (no discount for seniors). Then we took a ferry ride to the Magic Kingdom which was our destination for the day--I'd chosen it over the other offerings as having the most bang for the buck.

Finally we walked into the Kingdom. Noise and lots of kids--thousands of them. Dazzled, we walked along the historic reconstruction of an Early American small town. Then we saw the Castle and that focused our walk. We stopped a couple times along the way to see things and then were caught up in a Parade. Friends had told us not to miss the parades.

And it was fun and noisy. The song was something about Celebration--let's celebrate ourselves for all we are and do. A Feel Good song. And it was so upbeat, and the performers who sang and danced as if there were no tomorrow, really sold the idea. By the end, I had tears in my eyes from the sheer enjoyment of the event.

We went through two other parades, with different casts and characters but essentially the same message. In the last one were Mickey and Donald. I had worn a T-shirt with art of Donald on the front and this message: "Donald Duck has had the same fowl attitude since 1934", the year he was "born". I so wanted to dance with the Disney Donald and Penny finally got a photo of the two of us together, though all the action was so frenetic that it was tough.

Here we are:

Weather here

Penny, River (our dog) and I drove down to Nokomis, FL and arrived a week ago Tuesday, at a rental house provided for us by the same fellow who built our home on Martha's Vineyard.

Generally, the weather here is warmer than in Mass and NJ, but still gets cool enough that we are grateful for the forced air heating system in this very small cottage, as well as the gas fireplace.

The best thing is being 25 feet from a canal; our house has its own dock. Across the canal and on our side as well are small boats tied up. We can sit with our morning tea on the dock and watch fish swim by and cormorants and other water birds taking smaller fish for food. Plus, a pelican flies by every morning.

A few miles down the highway is a Dog Beach, provided by the town. We went there today and found many other dog owners and their pets having a grand time. We flung tennis balls for River and he enjoyed the entire scene. People along the edge of the water were seeking and finding shark's teeth. One woman showed us her catch; she had tiny black teeth from prehistoric sharks.

And we've found some friends from NJ who moved down here. Next week we're going to Disney World, a longtime hope for me. Penny feels she can enjoy it too.