Pizza, Wings and Stranger Things 2019 Day 15

[wizzo]

Day Fifteen – 25th August 2019

THE INDEX IS HERE

After yet anther great stay in St Pete Beach it was time to head off to Orlando for the final leg of the holiday. We were all up and ready to leave by 8am and the following photo pretty much sums up our time so far. We jettisoned all the crap we no longer needed and checked out.



Our ‘tip’ includes a boogie board, empty miniatures, last years designer hand bag, some snickers wrappers and a boarding pass and god knows what else you can’t see. I’m sure you’ve all left hotels/villas in a similar fashion.

Okay readers, you’ve got a couple of option next. You can look through a series of 'classic' Lynn photos of the drive up or you can watch my time lapse of the whole journey (don’t worry it’s speeded up).























Oh look an Aldi!



Oh look a Disney World!





And now for my time lapse (stopping briefly at Publix for breakfast items). I’m fully expecting most of you to skip this time lapse but I know some of you reading this are familiar with this drive from St Pete, Clearwater etc up to Orlando and will watch it out of a sense of nostalgia. Highlights include the Howard Franklyn bridge, downtown Tampa, a lot of I4 including the county fairgrounds, Dinosaur World, the villa resorts of Highway 27, US192 with it’s tat shops, WDW, and into the Renaissance Hotel next to SeaWorld.

Enjoy (or skip on).



We arrived at the Renaissance Hotel bang on 11:30 and were lucky enough to get checked in and straight into a room.





Everyone was up for some rides so the cases were popped, park attire donned and we headed over to SeaWorld. We did stop briefly at the ‘Navigator Desk’ or whatever they call it to get our free Quick Queue tickets (the only real perk in this hotel but it’s a good one). Any paying guest gets one Seaworld Quick Queue ticket per day.



Trading your code for your Quick Queue tickets is a doddle at a machine outside the park and we were quickly in and marching straight towards Manta.





Manta had a queue (I didn’t make a note of how long) so me and the kids went in the quick queue line instead. We got straight on the next train into the station. You get one ride on each of the main attractions and the ride attendant is supposed to put a tick in the box with a pen to say you’ve ridden it. In our case he didn’t even tick the box so we could go in the quick queue again later if we wanted.

We had only been in the park a matter of minutes and we were already moving on to Kraken. In this case Lynn rode too and it was a walk on, no need to even contemplate using a quick queue.

Lynn and I sat Journey to Atlantis out as we always do now what with it being ever so slightly rubbish. The kids love it though and thankfully they are old enough to go on it on their own! They used the quick queue line again and once again the ride attendant didn’t even cross it off their tickets.

We took drinks on board next as it was bloody rampant, hence the decision to go in Antarctica: Empire of the Penguin purely because it will be cool. This turned out to be a terrible idea because despite having quick queue tickets, there was a medical emergency inside and we had to wait for 30 minutes to get in. It was absolutely sweltering in the wait area as depicted by my sweaty back. I don’t normally sweat much but everyone did that day!





Gross!

Once inside it was bloody freezing.











Looking back at those photos has reminded me that on that day, I had an epiphany whilst watching these penguins stood on that freezing ice and deduced that a penguin’s balls must be a lot higher up their body than on a bloke. Let’s face it, if they were dangling down from the top of those stubby little legs, they would be in real trouble! Brrrrrrrrrrrrrr 😊

Next up was Mako, which the kids rode on their own. Lynn is petrified of this ride because it doesn’t have shoulder restraints and I’d rather sit in the sun than go on this ‘Hyper’ coaster as I think it’s dull. I know I’ve said it before but a coaster needs to go upside down! The exception to my dislike of hypercoasters are the launch type like Stealth (Thorpe Park) which is bloody brilliant!

The kids had two goes on Mako, we pottered about the park a bit, bought a Tervis mug for Lynn and exited after a whistle stop tour shortly after 3:30pm to go and secure some food.



Having had a quick freshen up in the room and got the car we made the long journey (a mile) over to Buffalo Wild Wings for ‘tea’. By now it must have been all of about 4pm.



We started with Chilli con Queso to share as we always do and as always, it lasted seconds.





Goes without saying that we had wings for mains. I had the combo like I always do and chose half Buffalo hot and half Nashville hot (still can’t contemplate Blazin’). Lynn and Maddy shared 20 boneless honey BBQ and Lauren got 15 BBQ boneless to herself and ate the lot!







Once done and BWW sauces secured to take home, we made our way back to the hotel where the kids dicked about on their phones, I watched sport and Lynn had a nap. We didn’t rest on our laurels for long though and by 6:30 we were suitably refreshed to walk back over to SeaWorld for some more rides.

We stopped briefly in the lobby to try the free cocktails they were handing out.



Once inside the park it was noticeably quieter than it was a few hours ago and a little cooler too. Me and the kids did Manta in the quick queue line again and as last time, still didn’t get a tick in the box. Then the kids went on it again while me and Lynn got drinks.

Lynn’s absolute favourite thing in SeaWorld is the dolphin nursery, always has been so we made our way there next. I haven’t had a good moan for ages in my trip reports but I’m going to have to now. There was a woman hogging a viewing window that really pee’d me off. There were kids there that wanted to have a look at the cute little dolphins but she had to take 12,000 photos, 743 videos, 34 selfies and 12 slo-mo’s all with a queue of little kids waiting to have a look too.

Not only that but then she had to review them all. Did she get up and stand to the side to look at them all? No, she sat in the viewing window to do it, completely ignoring the dolphins swimming past in favour of likes on sodding Instagram!

If this was you, you’re a shallow, self-centred, vacuous human being love, and supposed to be a grown up. No wonder you were on your own.



Be a bit more considerate people. The world doesn’t just revolve around you. Rant over.

Eventually my kids and many others got to look at the pretty little dolphins while ‘Like me Sally’ sauntered off.

I won’t bore you with a list of every ride we went to, but the rest of the evening was spent mainly on Manta, Kraken, Mako etc interspersed with drinking gallons of Icees. It’s lovely now the kids can go off on their own and do coasters while we sit and watch the world go by. This was a great evening and the weather was perfect.







Shattered, we exited at 9pm and headed back to the hotel.

Now I really like the Renaissance but as I sat and watched my beloved Steelers on the TV in the room it was driving me mad. More specifically, the volume on the tv was driving me mad.

10 was too quiet.



11 is an odd number so can’t stop on that.



12 didn’t exist!

13 is an odd number again so couldn’t stop on that.



And 14 was too loud!



I was in a right pickle all because 12 didn’t exist. It would have been the perfect volume too. Anyone else can’t leave the telly on an odd number? 😊

I don’t really have OCD I just can’t leave a telly on an odd number! It’s wrong! Goodnight.

Tomorrow – Aquatica and Red Lobster

[Jannyjan]

I think you are weird!

[Rob & Jan]

Nothing wrong with Lynn's photos-they are better than the ones I take!

[ely3857]

HaHa! I love the volume on an odd number, if only to freak people out when they realise 😂

[danisleigh]

I can’t have the volume on an odd number either! DH thinks it’s hilarious to keep changing it to an odd number for me to keep changing it back!

[Mariaherself]

Love your trip reports and they always make me laugh.

Gotta say that I think that the Penguins have similar legs to owls so there balls are probably pretty high up

[princess allie]

Sadly I can’t load the time lapse footage. Another great day.

[mick]

A good change over day Mick doesn’t like the volume on 13 but think he is ok with the other odd numbers

Joan

[wizzo]

Originally Posted by princess allie

Sadly I can’t load the time lapse footage. Another great day.

See more...

Should be working now

[RachelE]

Having the volume on an odd number is just wrong.