Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Road Trip: Day 2

 Day two we took our time eating breakfast.  Forget about waking up at the crack of dawn and hitting the road.  This was a good way to avoid stress.  After breakfast we packed up and headed down the road.  In the Starbucks parking lot, the kid realized that his Wendy's kid's meal toy had been thrown away in the hotel room,  so we headed back and got that sorted out.  Then we hit the road again, and thanks to a mini vacation guide provided by Jason Luque,  we hit several highlights along the A1A.  (thanks for the offer to make breakfast, but I think it was lunchtime by the time we drove past your town).  We rode the St Johns' River Ferry, and drove south.
 Somewhere, we stopped on the beach to walk and chase seagulls.
 And then we stopped at Marineland.  I remember stopping there as a kid, a long time ago.  I don't remember anything else.  I do have a bumpersticker from the place, but that's it.  Maybe that's all we did,  just stopped in the gift shop and bought a sticker.  Anyway, we paid the fee and entered the gates.  We got a personal tour of the aquariums,  and got to stand 2 feet from where the dolphins were surfacing to check us out.  It was a very different experience from when I swam and sailed with the creatures in the Caribbean.  It was great to stop and experience that with the wife and kid.  A peaceful time.
And then we headed south again, stopped at another beach, stepped on some sand burs,  and finally wound up on I-4, heading towards Legoland.....until we hit traffic in Orlando.  If you live in Orlando, get out while you can,  if you don't,  don't move there.   15 miles of 8 lane interstate crawling along at 10mph,  that's a lot of traffic. 

We made it to Winter Haven,  passed on the $139 hotel and found a decent one for a lot cheaper and hit the hay with sweet dreams of legoland dancing in our heads.

1 comment:

allan said...

I-4 is a beast. One of the reasons I left was the traffic.