My return.

My sister's have been pushing me to fire back up the old blog, so here I am. It's been two years since my last post - jeeze, that's embarrassing. I've been to Disneyworld, Yellowstone, Chicago, and then some and back since my last post. It only took me 28 years to see the our country. No big deal.

We visited Universal Orlando and Disneyworld in December before Christmas and had a great time.
        Universal was amazing, but with a lot of scary rides - specifically Harry Potter and the forbidden journey. We waited in line for 45 minutes for this 3D ride. Now - I've ridden many 3D rides before, so I was not thinking it was going to be bad at all. 3D rides are fun to me. This 3D ride - not so much. I should've known that things were going to get critical with all of the warning signs, but I just assumed that Universal was being overzealous. We got to get on this ride and it latches over our chests, while we are on a track. Suddenly, the track under our feet disappears and  our feet are dangling, chair is moving forward and backward and we are in the air. It was one of the scariest rides I've done in years. I'm basically scarred. Needless to say, we were a lot more cautious of 3D rides before we rode them at Universal.
      I found it pretty interesting to see how much my kids have changed since our last visit to Disney two years ago. Bonnie was a fearless rider, riding every ride with her dad. While Tristen, was much like me, cautious and nervous about any ride and unwilling to ride something crazy.  This year, it was the complete opposite. Even rides that I wanted to ride, Bonnie was hesitant about. Tristen? He rode everything fearlessly. We rode every roller coaster except for Expedition Everest, which I plan to ride when we go back. We took zero regard to our diets and ate whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted. And let me tell you, Disney has superb food. One of my favorite meals was a quick service lunch at Be Our Guest - Disney's newest restaurant for Beauty & The Beast. The atmosphere was amazing and the food was great. I had a roast beef sandwich, fries, and an eclair stuffed with orange cream. The stuff dreams are made of. All in all, it was a great trip where we made wonderful memories.
    The only bad thing that I have to report was that a bag got taken from our room. We didn't realize it until the night before we were leaving, as we were loading up. The bag had various items that we had purchased at Disney and my Canon Powershot camera with all of my memory cards from the past 4 years in it. It was extremely upsetting to lose such an invaluable item, as well as expensive. We filed a report with the hotel manager, Disney claims department, and police. Turns out, there is no point what so ever in filing a report with Disney hotel or claims, because they will tell you that they will "investigate", but they will not do a thing. 3 weeks after we left, the claims department contacted me to tell me that it was a criminal matter and needed to be handed over to the police. It felt extremely reassuring to me that "they handled the situation seriously." So, needless to say, we will never stay at the Disney All Stars Sports resort again. I would love to say that we will never visit Disney again because of the case of my stolen bag and the way that they handled things, but that would be a lie. It's Disney. However, it taught me a great deal on how I will handle my future hotel visits.
  In conclusion, is the happiest place on earth still the happiest place to me? Yes, however, the hotels and management there? Not so much.

~ RGB