Tag / Minions

by admin

Travelling The 50 States – Florida

Over my 47 years, I’ve done my fair share of travelling across these United States.  I thought it would be an interesting experiment go look back at those trips to each of the 31 states I have visited (62% isn’t bad, is it?) and see if, and when, I may be returning.  Working in alphabetical order, we start today with the 27th state to be added to the Union: Florida.

State: Florida
Joined the Union: 1845
Visits: 10 (at least)

At some point in the mid-1980s, my grandparents bought a condo in Clearwater, Florida, which has helped make the Sunshine State one of my most visited states.  I’m fairly certain my first trip there would have been in the summer of 1988 and my most recent was last year, with a number of visits in-between.

From what I can recall, my first trip to Florida came the summer of 1988, following my eighth-grade graduation.  I’m pretty sure a collection of seven family members got in the car the day after Mike Tyson’s 91 second knockout of Michael Spinks for the two-day drive to Clearwater.  I’m not clear on exactly how long we were there, but I know there was a one-day excursion to Disney World.  Aside from that, we saw all of the tourist attractions that my grandparents thought were interesting.  Which means nothing that was really all that interesting.

We made another trip two summers later.  I don’t remember much of this trip, aside from the trip home where we came up through southern Illinois and listened to the White Sox somehow beating the Yankees 4-0 despite being no-hit by Andy Hawkins.

My sister and I made a return trip over Christmas break in 1991, our first time on an airplane.  Again, I don’t have many vivid memories of the events of this trip.

My fourth trip to Florida came during March of 1997.  I had an interview with GTE Data Services and turned it into a mini-vacation during spring break, staying with my grandparents.  The highlight of the trip, aside from nailing the interview and getting a solid job offer, was a trip to Ed Smith Stadium in Sarasota to watch a spring training tilt between the White Sox and the Twins. Continue reading →

by admin

Vacation Recap – Universal Studios

UniversalAfter a whole 9 weeks since my last trip to Florida, I woke up early on the morning of June 1 for a 6 AM flight to Orlando with the family.  After landing, we caught the shuttle to the Hard Rock Hotel, where we had a long wait for the rooms to be ready.  After a quick lunch and a round of mini golf at the Citiwalk, Dennis, Angelina, Danny, and I went to Islands of Adventure for a quick re-introduction to Harry Potter land and the Jurassic Park ride.  We then headed back to the hotel, finally got in to our rooms, had dinner with appearances from a minion and Scooby Doo, and then called it an early night due to the early flight.

Thursday morning we got an early start and started at Universal, where we had a breakfast date at the Leaky Cauldron in the new Harry Potter area.  After breakfast, we headed to Olivanders to pick up wands for the boys, then went through the line for the Gringotts ride, before my mom and I begged off before the ride began.  It was at this point I got a text message from Jeff asking me to get him a wand.  As you may recall, I was at this very spot with Jeff less than 2 months ago and he could have purchased his own wand, but he was being a bit of a baby.  So, I went and bought him a wand, putting more thought in to it than I probably should have.  Once everyone was done at Gringotts, we hopped on the Hogwarts Express for the ride to Islands of Adventure.  Later, we wound up back at Universal, where Danny had an encounter with the shrunken head on the Knight Bus.

Friday was back to Universal for a character breakfast at Cafe LaBamba, followed by a return trip to Harry Potter land. After a quick trip back over to Islands of Adventure, we headed back to the hotel for some fun in the pool.

Continue reading →