Day 2 - Disney World!

Day 2 in Florida started VERY early - 5 AM to be exact. We were excited to begin the extra special part of our trip and packed our bags. We got to my sister's house right on time (grammy is NEVER late) and picked up L and my nephew C. My brother-in-law and J would join us later tonight as they had a baseball game that day. So, we headed out and were on the road by 6:15 AM. It takes about 3 hours to Orlando from my sister's house so we settled in for a long ride. About halfway there we stopped for breakfast on the turnpike and then continued our journey. It wasn't long before we saw the magical entrance and then we really began to get excited. We were headed to the kennels first as my mom was going to board her dog Lily there for the two days we would be there. The kennels were quite lovely, clean and friendly and though Lily didn't want us to leave, we were confident she was in good hands. That taken care of, we headed off to find our hotel. We were staying in the "value" hotel called All Star Movies and after several wrong turns, my sister finally guided us to the right place. It was all very disneyish and we parked and went inside to register. The hotel was large and absolutely crawling with people. L and my mom went to register and I took the kids to the lobby gift shop to see what we could find. I immediately found hats for me and Lulabell and a cool little ID card thingie on a retractable line for C, who was thrilled. I was surprised to find that Lulabell's hat was on sale for $5! What a bargain. So, with our gifts we headed back to the front desk to wait. L and mom completed the registration and we decided to head right to Epcot as our rooms were not quite ready yet. So we gathered our things, parked the car and headed to the buses that would take us to the park. It was already hot at high noon and I was glad for the hats. Mom is wearing oxygen now and has to rest frequently but we were fine and pretty soon our bus arrived and we boarded, excited to be starting our adventure. In no time at all we were pulling up to the park and we exited the bus to begin the long walk up to the ticket lines. Mom had to rest every now and then but we made it and purchased our tickets. We immediately headed to the scooter rentals and mom was soon ensconced in her little scooter, which we immediately filled to the brim with our bags and supplies. We headed immediately to the center of Epcot, the big round golfball, which is actually a ride, Planet Earth. We were pleased to discover that having a scooter was going to be a big boon as we were immediately escorted to the handicapped entrance of the ride, where we literally waited 2 minutes before we were inside and seated on the ride! YIPPEE! Mom is our golden ticket! The ride was a slow moving car in complete darkness with fun computers in the cars that required us to answer questions and such. Very enjoyable. The ride soon ended and L wanted us to head to the Land section of the park so we could go on the ride, Soaring - a simulated hang-glider ride that was supposed to be awesome. Unfortunately, there was no handicapped entrance and we had to stand in line like the rest of the people. This line took us about 65 minutes and we were entertained by huge movie screens that we could play games on. Still, it was a little tedious standing there and unfortunately, somebody very close to us had a gas problem and periodically we were treated to noxious fumes that we couldn't escape from. My sister kept accusing me but I think it was the strange boy and his mother ahead of us that were the culprits. At one point, L sat down on the ground and her head was strategically placed exactly at the level of the kid's butt in front of her and I made sure she was aware of the danger she was in. Soon we were escorted into the ride itself, mom parked her scooter and walked to the actual seats where we were strapped in right in front of a huge screen that curved around us. The ride lifted us up and the screen started and suddenly, we were flying over the Golden Gate Bridge! It was tremendous and there was wind and sounds and even smells to experience. This was a knockout ride and lasted for about 10 minutes. Truly, it turned out to be just about my favorite ride at the park. We exited the ride and found ourselves inside a huge room where we made our way down to the lower level and decided we needed to eat lunch, along without about 1000 other people with the same idea. After some confusion about what to eat, we finally got our food and then the trek began looking for somewhere to sit down to eat. We had sent the kids out earlier to scout for empty tables but they came up empty-handed. Finally, L found a table that would accommodate us all and we gratefully sat down to eat. We finished up and headed to the elevator that would take us back up to the level we needed. Mom was still a little iffy about steering her scooter and nearly took out a little kid as she backed onto the elevator but we made it and pushed the buttons. We waited a few minutes and finally figured out that we hadn't moved. We determined the elevator was broken and exited where we started to inquire about a different elevator. Unfortunately, that was the only one and we were told to be patient because it was slow. So, we headed back onto it and finally made it to our desired floor exited into the bright sunshine. We headed to Nemo's Undersea experience and again, had almost instant access to the ride. This was a lovely ride and we headed to the next one. It was probably about 4 o'clock by this time and I was feeling an uncomfortable burning sensation in the bottoms of both my feet. I was determined to ignore it though and we continued our trek through the park, stopping for ice cream. We were heading to a new ride (Test Track) and Mom decided she didn't want to go on this one. We were disappointed because we knew without her, we would have to wait in line with the rest of the peons. Finally, a light bulb went off and I figured out that I could ride the scooter as the designated handicapped person, thus assuring our good place in line. So, mom sat on a bench and I got on the scooter. My sister insisted that I had to wear mom's oxygen as well, which I was hesitant about as I didn't particularly want to stick that thing up my nose (no offense to my mother). However, she persisted and I relented and off went went to the ride. Sure enough, we were escorted right to the front of the line and I parked the scooter and walked to the cars. The attendant walked up to me and asked if I thought I would be able to walk down 3 flights of stairs if an emergency occurred and I had to exit the ride. I didn't know what to say, but said "would I have to walk UP 3 flights of stairs?" in my sickest, most pathetic voice. He assured me it would only be DOWN the stairs and I told him that I thought I could make it, with my sister snickering in admiration of my acting abilities next to me. We got on the ride and it was great, like a race car zooming along. We got out and I staggered to my scooter and hurriedly donned my oxygen, just to make everything look good. We headed back to mom, victorious in our scheme. We decided then to head over the countries at Epcot and began the long trek. My feet were definitely burning again and I was afraid to take off my shoes for a look at what was causing this pain. The evening was cooling down and Lulabell and I realized we had left our sweatshirts in the car. We felt we would be fine as we had come from subzero weather and it would only get down to about 60 or so, which was like a heat wave for us. The sun was setting over the lake and it was absolutely gorgeous as we meandered through country after country. By about 8 PM we were definitely hungry and headed to America for dinner. We grabbed our food and sat outside to eat in the dying light of day, enjoying an expensive dinner of hamburgers and fries. It was close to 9 PM and we decided to head to the lake to catch the fireworks. Somehow we got separated in the crowds and L, Lulabell and I tried to find grammy and C. We found ourselves next to a store and we just waited there while L went off in search of Grammy. The fireworks were just about to begin when I heard a god-awful crash in the store just behind me. I turned slowly to see what the commotion was and in horror noted that the source of the sound was my mother as she was dragging a display that had gotten caught in the wheels of her scooter. I rushed over to assist her while my sister stood in front of her, berating her for going too fast. The top of the display was filled with little glasses that were now falling off and crashing to the floor, one by one by one. My mother had thankfully stopped the scooter with the display just inches from crashing into the plate glass window. The store clerks had rushed over by now and were trying to untangle her from the display. I stooped down to try to pick up the shattered glasses, or least get them out of the way so my mom wouldn't crush them with the scooter. The clerk turned into some sort of demon as she growled at me "DO NOT TOUCH THE GLASS". I was taken aback at the tone of her voice but decided to do as I was told and backed slowly away. My mother by this time had been freed from the display and motored out of the store. My sister and I decided it would be best to distance ourselves from her and stood apart from her while the fireworks started over the lake. I looked back at mom and noticed a strange look on her face, one I knew only too well. It was a look brought on by the strain of trying not to laugh, with her body shaking with the effort of holding back the giggles. This set me off instantly and I burst out laughing. I walked over to her and when she saw MY face, well, that did it and we all three dissolved into those helpless giggles that you just can't stop. We have a history of setting each other off and everytime we looked at each other, the giggles started anew. Finally, the fireworks were over and we decided it was time to head back to the hotel. We giggled intermittently all the way back to the scooter rental place. The attendant approached us and I asked about a wheelchair that could take my mother back to the bus as she really could not walk all that way. Here is what he said (I think) "yesth, you can useth a wheelchair and then leave it at the busthsthtop where we will pick it up". Well, I didn't quite hear him the first time what with his lisp and all and said "okay....ugh, what did you say". He repeated himself once again and this time I caught the jist of it but was struggling mightily with myself not to burst out laughing in his face. I handed him the rental receipt and he said "oh yesth, I will alstho need your vistha card". I bite my tongue and retrieved my mother's vistha card to complete the transthaction (I mean transaction). So, we grabbed a wheelchair and headed to the buses. There was a HUGE line at the bus stop and we ended up waiting a good 30 minutes. Little did we know, because of the wheelchair, we could have bypassed the wait and headed straight to the front of the line (Disney is SO good to handicapped people), but we just waited and soon we were on the packed bus back to the hotel. It was about 10:00 by this time and we were whipped. I was barely able to walk by this time as my feet were just burning bricks of goo. But we made it to the rooms and found that they were adjoining so we could flit between our rooms. Lulabell kicked off her shoes and we were instantly assaulted by the worst sweaty foot smell that I had ever experienced. Even my sister could smell it all the way in her room and she came to the door to inquire what in God's name was that smell? I hurriedly instructed Lulabell to take her shoes outside and threw her socks into the tub with water and soap to let them soak. I sat on the bed and peeled off my shoes and socks to get a gander at my feet. Sure enough, I had HUGE blisters on the bottoms of both feet, which certainly explained the burning I had been feeling for the last 6 hours. I literally crawled to the shower to soak my feet. I was very disturbed as I knew tomorrow would be just as walking intensive as today was and how would I manage? I made the decision that tomorrow, I would be renting my own scooter as there was just no way I would be able to enjoy myself in pain. So, happy with my decision, we headed to bed, anticipating the tremendous day in store for us at the Magic Kingdom! Check back for day 3 tomorrow.