**It's Smiley Kylie's First trip report!**- DAY 8- BUSCH GARDENS

[xxSmileyKyliexx]

INDEX:

INTRODUCTION
DAY 0-TRAVEL DAY
DAY 1-UNIVERSAL STUDIOS & CELEBRATION
DAY 2-ANIMAL KINGDOM & MNSSHP
DAY 3-SHOPPING AND OLIVE GARDEN
DAY 4-MY BIRTHDAY, MAGIC KINGDOM & EPCOT
DAY 5-DISCOVERY COVE
DAY 6-ISLANDS OF ADVENTURE & SHOPPING
Day 7-SEAWORLD & BAHAMA BREEZE


I woke at 7am today; god knows why as we didn’t even leave the villa till 9ish so surely it didn’t take me over 2 hours to get ready?! Well in fairness this could have been the case, I don’t half faff about in the mornings. I was probably dossing around waiting for the others to get up! I scoffed down some lucky charms for brekkie and soon enough it was time to leave. Today me, Benj and Daddy bear were going to be spending the day at Busch Gardens. Being that Asty doesn’t like big rides she thought it was best to leave this park out so Carys stayed with her and they had a mummy daughter day Astrid dropped us off to SeaWorld as we were catching the shuttle bus. We had pre-booked this with Mears transport free of charge. Dad could have borrowed the car but then Asty and Carys would have had to taxi it around so just made sense to jump on the peasant wagon We said our goodbyes and trotted off to find the bus.



There were about 4 different coaches waiting to take people, all the drivers had everyone who had booked names’ written down and were ticking them off, took a bit of time but by 9:30 we were on our way. It felt strange without Astrid and Carys, but it was nice to be spending time with my little bro and daddy. What was I letting myself in for; these 2 are complete wind ups and always messing about some way or another!


Christ! Ben looks half asleep still; this is exactly how I look after a week of avin it large in Ibiza ha!

The journey was uneventful; we didn’t have to make any stops at other locations to pick up others so just one direct trip. It took about an hour and 30 mins overall, I spent that time sleeping and freezing to death in the air con! Which was also making me need a wee wee so that was my first stop in Busch Gardens. Weather wise it was a lovely day! The sun was beaming, not a cloud in the sky, nice and hot! I was very happy Last time I came to Busch gardens with Carley it was a bit of a pooey day and we couldn’t enjoy it as much! We collected our maps and headed off anti-clockwise around the park. Our first stop was Montu! I remember the first time I went on this, I was petrified, I kept changing my mind as to whether to ride it or not, when I finally plucked up the courage I loved it! So this time round there was no hesitation. This ride is unbelievably high! You can see the car park and cars below, your legs are dangling and then drop down and round you go! AMAZING! There was no queue which is always a bonus! Here is a slightly unflattering picture of ben and dad, but it shows how high montu is!



So next we followed our map and came across a few of the animals. Meer cats, zebras, giraffes, hyenas, lions, elephants etc etc were all chillin out in the sunshine. Wow I just googled it and there are more than 2700 animals living at Busch Gardens! How mad is that! You can see that they are well looked after as well It’s obviously not home to them but you can see that the time, attention, love, security and space have all been inputted for all of the animals to feel as much at home as possible. They all looked happy and are away from any danger they could possibly come across living in the wild.







I particularly loved the elephants. There were a few of them interacting with the keepers when we came past. It was amazing to see, the keepers had like a whistle and were using this to get the elephants to perform little dance moves and stuff. They were also being fed and we saw one elephant having his/her feet washed which was cool! Are they feet? Or paws? No they can’t be paws they are massive! But you know what I mean ha!





We moved on and Ben and dad went on The Phoenix. This is the gondola boat thingy that swings sideways and then goes upside down. There was no way I was going on it! I can’t even handle the little kid one at Paultons Park ha! Last time dad came on this he had change in his pockets as he stupidly didn’t empty them so he lost it all ha silly daddy! I was stood enjoying the sun which was feeling very hot by this time and trying to snap pictures of them! Whilst waiting I spotted a group of 4 that I’d sworn I’d seen before. Usually I wouldn’t recognise the same faces but 2 of the lads had big muscles with lots of tattoos, and I LOVE bulky men with tattoos, then I remembered that I had seen them in islands of adventure ha! How random! They were yummy! If I was with Carley I probably would have said hi! And looked like a massive stalker ha!





We went on to a little ride called Sandserpant which had no wait, it’s similar to Primevil whirl at Animal Kingdom, we couldn’t stop laughing all the way round and it kept bashing my leg, swear I was bruised after that ride! The next ride we came across was Kumba. Not before a quick selfie though!


Jeez my hair looks horrendous today!

Kumba was fun but it did a lot of head bashing! I came off their feeling like I’d been on the wine all night! There was no wait for this either! The park seemed really quiet today, the weather was perfect; we couldn’t have chosen a better day!

[xxSmileyKyliexx]

We had thought that Congo River Rapids was closed this day but when we went past we saw it was well and truly open. This made us all happy, love a good water ride! I remember that we shared the boat with an elderly couple. And I actually adore elderly people so I thought they were so sweet huddled up together! Dad had to help them with their seatbelts too, bless them. We all got absolutely soaked, including the cute couple who appeared to love every moment, which I could have cried at, when I see elderly people happy and loving life it gets me slightly emosh! I hope I’m still enjoying the Florida parks when I’m an old lady! We have a resident in the nursing home I work at who has photos up of her at Discovery Cove and of her in a goofy hat in Magic Kingdom; it makes you appreciate life and opens your eyes to how life could end up. I often sing Disney songs and hum ride songs to her to see if she remembers. Dementia is such a sad illness

Anyways, went slightly off track there, here’s Benj and dad looking wet from the ride.



We were getting hungry by now; I’d only had a bowl of lucky charms which was probably about 5 hours ago! I needed food! We headed to the Bengal Bistro. It was nice here, nothing special just your usual counter service dining restaurant. I had the meatball sub with cheese, fries and a coke. We sat outside in the sun which was nice, there were birds surrounding us though scavving for food which was slightly off-putting but what can you expect being in a 335 acre animal theme park!





With our belly’s full we mooched around for a while, checked out the Bengal tigers and orang-utans in Jungala and just generally admired how beautiful this park is! Oh also bumped into the tattooed lads again, NOM! We soon came across Sheikra, it had no wait! Oh good lord, were Ben and dad seriously going to get me on here! Well yes they did! I had never been on Sheikra before, on previous visits it had either been closed down or I hadn’t built up the courage to go on! This time I wasn’t really given a choice they pretty much dragged me on! I was slightly apprehensive as we’d not long eaten and I was feeling so nervous! I don’t usually get nervous on rides but this one was just so scary! I literally thought I was going to vom my meatball sub back up!



Not only did they get me on the ride, I was outnumbered and we ended up on the front row! There were only a few people in front so I really didn’t have time to talk myself out of it! Soon enough we were belted up and ready to go. I was proper panicking saying I wasn’t done up properly and that the bars weren’t pulled down enough, I even asked the man to double check me ha! Drama queen or what! We made our way up the steep track I was pretty much facing the sky, I had to hold Ben’s hand, I was petrified as it was getting higher! They were laughing so much at me, I was not impressed I was trying to calm down telling myself that I was secure and that this was not going to be the death of me. So we got to the top and it was really high, I mean like majorly high and soon I was going to be plummeting vertically back down the track at a high speed. Being at the front when it hung us over the edge, my goodness I was a shaking mess. Heart pounding, breathing heavier, I think I actually yelled out as well shouting ‘oh my goddd’. Then there it was the DROP, I screamed like a big girl but all my nerves and any previous feelings I had were soon gone and I was loving it! It was by far the best rollercoaster I’ve been on! I can’t wait to go back and get Carley on it; it’ll be her first time as well! Although saying that we have both been on them really high rides on top of the Stratosphere hotel in Vegas! Those were truly the most terrifying rides I’ve ever been on in my life! So Sheikra in comparison was actually not that bad! I was shaking for about 10 minutes after!



We chilled out in Timbuktu enjoying the sun for a bit, had a toilet stop and took some piccies. I love how each section of the park is an African country’s name by the way, Egypt, Nairobi, Congo, Morocco etc. It’s all very cleverly themed throughout the whole park!







We headed into the Dessert Grill ready to watch the ‘born to rock show’. We had no idea what this was about. It was indoors, I think we were actually in a restaurant. Then this weird guy was acting really strange interacting with random members of the audience, I was thinking who is this strange person! Turns out he was part of the show. It was well random though, he slightly freaked me out! The show wasn’t bad actually had lots of singing, dancing and even some circus acts. It was fun =)
We had planned on catching the sesame street show which just happened to be wayyy over the other side of the park! We legged it round to get there in time, I was actually knackered! Like I’d just run a marathon. It was totally not even worth it either! We missed the start and then realised it was actually aimed for the children. We sat down for 5 minutes, probably to get my breath back! And then left ha! What a nightmare! Should have guessed it was for kids! We went into the nearby shop and had a raspberry blue Fanta ice drink which was very refreshing. Took a slow walk back the way we had just ran! This time having time to appreciate the bird gardens and pink Christmas trees ha!




Being flamingos

We came past a show which was about to start so thought we’d join the audience and see what it was all about. It was actually really good, I’ve forgotten the actual name but in my notes I have it written as ‘animal show thing’. It was similar to pets ahoy at SeaWorld. Lots of different animals took part and I thought it was very clever! Kangaroos, pigs, flamingos, porcupines, cats, dogs, birds and llamas all paraded around on stage. It was very impressive and we really enjoyed it! I did nearly poo myself though when some big old bird came flying towards me!





We headed round to Gwazi. WOW! Is all I can say about this ride. I nearly wet myself from laughing, surprised I still have any teeth left, nearly lost my sunglasses, may have bought up a bit of my Fanta drink and felt every lump and bump on my body wobbling about whilst riding it! The boobs could have actually knocked me out! Jeez what an experience! The thought of Ben and dad in front of me shaking all round the place is actually cracking me up! It was fun but seriously I felt like I couldn’t walk after or breathe from laughing! If you have no idea what I’m talking about then YouTube it or go on yourself next time and you’ll 100% know what I mean!

We grabbed a banana split ice-cream from Sultans sweets, it was to die for! This and the coke went down nicely whilst enjoying the ‘let’s get loud’ show. Me and dad got well into it singing, clapping and dancing whilst Ben sat their wanting the ground to swallow him up ha! It was a decent show, lots of brilliant singers and dancers, it was thoroughly entertaining. It was nice to sit down for a bit and chill.

[xxSmileyKyliexx]

Busch gardens is such a big park, it knackers you out being there all day and exploring every area of the park. I really wanted to do rhino rally but unfortunately it was closed whilst there, so def will be doing this next time! After the show we headed to cheetah chase, this was a first for the others as it wasn’t here last time they came. I’d been on with Carley and thought it was brilliant! There was no wait! I don’t think we waited for anything today, was such a lush quiet day, no crowds or anything, bliss Cheetah chase is quite a long lasting ride, it’s really fun and it is actually really fast as the name of it would suggest! Although I was expecting the beginning bit to be like rock n rollercoaster where it zooms off mega fast, but it didn’t give me the same feeling!
After this we went back onto Sheikra, me volunteering the front row this time! This time I knew what to expect so wasn’t so panicky or nervous! It was getting close to 5:30pm so thought we’d better leave to catch our coach back. We’d really enjoyed the day, the sun hadn’t let us down, it was actually quite relaxing as we knew we’d have to stay until half 5 because of the shuttle so we paced ourselves (apart from when running to the stupid sesame street thing!) ha! I felt like we had got as much as we could out of the park and did everything we wanted to do. We left there feeling very happy and content. We left at about 6pm and arrived back at SeaWorld at 7:15pm. Asty and Carys were there waiting for us It felt like we hadn’t seen them for weeks, we hugged and exchanged stories of how we spent our day. They had had quite a chilled day, spending time at the villa and did some shopping. They went to the loop and really enjoyed it, I’ve never been, it’s on the list for when I next go! En route back to the villa we popped into the market place supermarket for some food for din dins.



I loved it in here! We’d always driven past but never gone in! It was more expensive than Walmart and Supertarget mind. I picked up some cheese sauce (which is currently still in the fridge) I’m saving it! I must check the best before date actually I also bought a Minnie mouse towel wrap thingy which was a good buy because I use it to death now! I’ll be buying a new one when I’m back. We got back to the villa at 8:30pm, it had been a really long day but I really loved it! Asty and dad put on a few pizzas, some chicken, made up a salad and some garlic bread and we had a nice bottle of rose wine to accompany. It was so simple but really lovely to all sit round the table at our villa enjoying each other’s company and still talking about the wonderful day we had all had


That garlic bread is massive!

I scoffed down some of my cheesecake for dessert, can’t believe I still hadn’t finished it! Literally like a 3 day jobby! Soon I was showered, tanned and in bed for 10:30pm. Cream crackered!

Tomorrow we visit Hollywood Studios and I taste lobster for the first time at Red Lobster.

Until then

I must add here that this has taken me forever to write! I am easily distracted, during writing this I have watched Saving Mr Banks, Frozen (for the 50th time) and listened to Craig David’s born to do it album about 3 times ha! I’ve probably also scoffed the contents of the fridge!

[skye00]

am loving your reports xx

[Guest]

Love your trippies! Busch Gardens is one of my favourite parks

[Taffy1959]

Really good day we love busch gardens, wouldn't bother with Rhino Rally though it's been cut down to make room for Cheetah Chase and it's very poor now

[4andcounting]

Really enjoyed your latest installment!

[Milner]

Another great read.

[stephy]

This is my first trip report of yours and im hooked! Looking forward to reading them all. Know exactly what you mean about Gwazi... your comments made me chuckle x

[Jesslydevie1]

Ooohh been waiting for the next instalment it didn't disappoint ,just wish I was there now !