Our Visit to the House of the Mouse and Other Spring Break Stories....

We recently returned from a spring break trip to Orlando and also tacked on a couple of days visiting Rob’s Aunt at Atlantic Beach outside of Jacksonville. You might ask why a family of three with an almost 15 year old son would voluntarily subject themselves to Disney World. After all, the Magic Kingdom is heavily attended by members of the stroller brigade. There are lots of things to do though that appeal to teens as well as to their parents and well had a great time.

The last time we hit Disney City, Wheeler was seven or eight. We still had tickets with three days of park entry paid for, so we figured that without having to buy any tickets, a Disney trip was a reasonable option. I have to say, I enjoyed the whole experience much more than last time as we had no small children to worry about losing. We also spent a day at Universal Studios where we rode lots of roller coasters. Now coasters are something that I guess you either love or hate, but all three of us love ‘em. We were flipped, spun, and rolled until we couldn’t take it anymore. It was a blast. Also, at almost 15, Wheeler actually has an attention span, so we could take in some of the shows and exhibits the aforementioned stroller brigade misses. What could be cooler to a teen boy than learning about gruesome make up techniques. Trust me, our visit to Universal was well worth the time and I wish we’d had more that one day there.

One scary note though, there were virtually no lines at any of the theme parks. Good for us, very bad sign for the economy. Spring break should be one of their busiest times. We didn’t wait longer than 20-30 minutes for anything, and that was in the middle of the day. We could often walk straight onto headline rides. Very scary!!

We also managed a stop for lunch in St Augustine and a quick tour of Castillo de San Marcos National Monument.

We had beautiful weather in Orlando, sunny, low eighties, but weren’t so lucky at the beach. Jacksonville is a little too far north for early March beach fun, but it was nice just to relax for a few days.

I do love the beach in the fog though.

All in all, we had a great time. If you're still with me, thanks for letting me bore you with my vacation pics and stories.