Enjoying the sunshine in Florida!!!

April 29th to May 5th, 2009



Dave and I went to Orlando, Florida on April 29th. We got back on Tuesday night. We had such a fun time! The weather was perfect the whole time we were thereJ! The first day we were there, Thursday, we went to Islands of Adventure and Universal Studios with Greg and Kami. We had a blast; Islands of Adventure has 5 different island theme areas that all surround a big lake.
Our favorite ride was called Dueling Dragons. Two roller-coasters take off at the same time and then in the middle of the ride they head straight for each other. It looks like they are going to crash into each other then at the last minute they both go up. It is exciting.
That night we hung out at the hotel pool and sauna. We stayed at Caribe Cove Resort. We had a suite with 3 bedrooms and a nice big deck surrounded by bug screens. All the houses down there have a big area surrounded by the same screens in their backyards. Pretty smart!! The hotel was great. It had a huge kitchen and family room and a wash room. We could live there and be happy!
Friday Greg and Kami went to Disney World and Dave and I drove to Cocoa Beach. It was about an hour and a half away on the Atlantic side of Florida. I guess it is a great surfing beach and while we were there lots of people were out surfing. The waves were a great size for learning. The biggest ones were only about 70 feet out from shore and they went along the entire coast area. They also broke very consistently…. So we decided to surf! We had so much fun. Dave had never really surfed before but after a few tries he started catching every wave he went for! He was a lot better than I, and I surfed a bit when I lived in Hawaii a few summers ago. We are now surfer bums! LOL!!
Saturday we decided to try out a gulf side beach. My parents were in Florida the week before us and they found some beaches that they loved. They told us about a beach in Sarasota called Siesta Beach. We decided to go there. The sand and water were amazing! The sand was like powdered sugar or flour. It was so white, soft and fine. We decided that it was the prettiest beach we had ever seen. The water was crystal clear out as far as you could go. Dave had a blast snorkeling around looking for sea creatures. He found 2 big hermit crabs and a sea slug. The sea slug was so cool! It was about a 8 inches and had a suction strip down its entire belly. It suctioned to Dave’s arm. I thought it would feel slimy, but it was really smooth and soft. It had the coolest “wings” J It would close them and just look like a slug, but when it was swimming they would open up and it looked like it was gliding through the water.
That night evening we went to Magic Kingdom in Disney World. We rode all the fun rides… and one awful ride. Ha Ha. The Stitch ride/show was terrible! I would not recommend it to anyone! We stayed there until about 10:30. We left after we watched the fireworks.
Sunday was such a nice day. Greg and Kami got up early to go to an Atlantic beach where they were going horse-back riding on the beach. Greg proposed there! She said yes of course! She was so excited and the ring is beautiful!
We got up after they left and found a church. It was fun to go to church in Florida. It was a really nice meeting. The people were so friendly. After church we went to a state park that was only about 15 minutes from our hotel. We had a picnic there and then explored the area. It was so pretty. There were lakes and trails all over. We talked to a Ranger and he told us where to look for land turtles and alligators. We walked along a trail and found tons of Gopher Tortoise holes. They dig and then live in these huge tunnels. I guess some of them are so big that 32 could live in one! We walked for a long time before we found a turtle… but then we saw a spot that looked promising. We made our way through the area and found a turtle hole. We knew we couldn’t be too far from finding what we were looking for! A few minutes later Dave found it. A Gopher Tortoise had heard us and was making his way quickly back to his little hole. Dave caught him... or her. We took lots of pictures with him and then followed it home. We were much more excited to find it than it was to find us!
We finally started to head back to the car, and on our way we heard a knocking sound. We looked around and saw a woodpecker with a red Mohawk in a tree right by the trail. Dave snuck close to it to take some pictures and found that it couldn’t have cared less that we were right up next to it. It was busy eating its dinner and paid us no mind. It was fun to watch it hammer the tree with its head.
We left to go make dinner at the hotel around 5:30. We talked to Kami and Greg when they got back about the proposal! Then we went back to find an Alligator. We saw one in a beautiful little lake, but it was pretty far away, so we didn’t get to really look at it well. The park was so beautiful, especially at sunset. The lake and trees looked so brilliant with the sun setting behind them.
Monday we went to a beach called Clearwater, which was misleading because the water wasn’t even half as clear as it was at Siesta beach. It was a fun beach though. There were little shops up and down the road and we found some cool shells there. Kami and Greg left for home that afternoon. We were tired that evening so we went to dinner and read in our hotel room that night. Tuesday we played around at Islands of Adventure again and then flew home. It was a fabulous trip!