ORLANDO

We cannot believe our round the world tour has come to the end!!! 5months have gone so quickly and now when we only have a day left I started to feel a slight panic returning back to the UK…to our everyday life… but we are at the same time looking forward to some kind of routine for the girls and especially getting Miia back to school, home schooling just isn’t for us!!! We are also happy to hear this heatwave is on its way to UK so will look forward to a nice Easter!

We are all also missing our family and friends, so look forward to catching up with you all. Even Emmi said couple of days ago, can we go back to Budleigh Salterton now!

I have to say America has been a real surprise for us, in a positive way!  We have had a great time here and this has definitely become one of our future holiday destinations. There are always bad points and good where ever you go but we were so surprised how nice people here are (ok they can be a bit over the top sometimes, I give you that)! and how safe we have felt in the US.

 We are also looking forward to the proper homemade HEALTHY food back in UK, just had enough of all the fast food places, diners, pancakes and Mexican food! Also it has been very noticeable how nice we in UK and European countries teach our children to speak and be polite! Here the children sound like spoilt little divas, the way they speak to their parents or to other people. Unfortunately our girls like copying these American ways, speaking all kind of slangs… which we cannot stand, so that is another reason to return back home.

Orlando and the Kissimmee where we have been staying for the past 12days have been great! Another place to return one day… Cannot really fault it at all, yes there are lot of places and stuff we wouldn’t do but all the things we have done and parks have been amazing. Disney does a great job with that. We stayed in Radisson hotel which was good. Steve was happy to find a gym here and the girls were occupied in the 3 pools and 2 Jacuzzis they had here! Resort is very close to all the Disney parks about 10-15min drive. Also to the down town Disney and the many outlets are nearby. Most hotels offer a shuttle service to the parks but we found it easier to drive there. Parking is expensive though but that way we don’t need to rely on timetables etc.

We didn’t want to do park after another, from morning till night…so spread our days so that we had in between days when we went to the waterparks, outlets, hotel pool, Disney downtown. We happened to be here over St Patrick’s Day, which is quite big event over here. We joined them downtown Disney to listen some live Irish music and drinking Irish cider.

Our favourite water park was the Typhoon lagoon. Splish, splash, splosh! Our plan was to spend a week on the beach after 12days in the Disney parks, but now our house sale is going through we needed to return back to the UK a week earlier to be out by end of the month. Still, another reason to return Florida one day! Today we finished off our holiday in a magical way by spending the evening at the Magic Kingdom, watching the amazing parades and fireworks… lovely way to finish our 5months journey. Even Miia managed to perk herself up after having a temperature overnight! We have been very lucky to get this far without been ill, so fingers crossed Miia’s temperature stays low for tomorrow’s flight back home.

We would like to thank you all for following our adventure. I have enjoyed writing this blog and will cherish all our moments (highs and lows) for years to come. You will probably hear from me again in few weeks’ time when we are struggling to adjust back to our Devon life, adios ;) 

DALLAS

We were a bit worried how cold it would be in Dallas as previous weeks they have had quite a bit of snow and it has been the coldest winter for years in US. Luckily the snow had melted by the time we got there and yes it was colder than in LA (where we left a +30’C heatwave behind)! But, we really enjoyed our time there. Our rental car dramas were continuing though… in LA the hire company had our car booked for the wrong dates, which took some time to sort us a car when we arrived to the airport. Now in Dallas, they didn’t have a car for us… apparently it can say online that they have a car for us and they are quite happy to take money from us but it doesn’t mean they have a car ready. They straight away said it was the company’s internal fault and they would find a car for us… We did point out that it couldn’t be any car, pointing towards all our luggage! (We left the UK with 6bags including 4xhand luggage… now we had 9bags)! 

So we profited a bit as they didn’t have the size of the car we had booked but had slightly bigger and better. We were loving our Chrysler for next 4days.

The only reason we stopped at Dallas was to visit the Gas Monkey Garage and I am glad I trusted Steve on this. Unfortunately they were filming so only could get to go in the shop which was next door to the garage. We did see Jason and Daphne (Richards’s sister) and got a hand shake and few words out from Jason.We also went to the Gas Monkey Bar and Grill which was awesome. Great food and a great atmosphere.

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We visited the city, which was really interesting thanks to the trolley (bus) tour we took. Had a very amusing and enthusiastic driver who gave some great commentary as we drove the hour around the city.

Loads to learn, Saw the exact spot JFK was shot, they have marked the road with a X. Saw the route the parade took and the building the shot was fired from on that fateful day. 

History around JL Hunt, a super wealthy Dallas resident, no relation unfortunately!!

We also went for lunch in the ‘tunnels’. A network that links a load of buildings selling food! Apparently, that’s why you don’t see loads of officer workers around at lunchtime! All eating in the tunnels. Watergarden in Fort Worth was impressive.

Fort Worth Stockyards was well worth a visit and we went there twice. Beautiful old cowboy town, cobbled streets with wooden buildings, Loads of massive pick up trucks and plenty of cowboy boots and hats.

We went and watched the famous Pawnee Bills Rodeo show, brilliant, really impressive. Cowboys and girls showing off! Some real talent there!

The end of the day was the local herders in full cowboy rig herding some massive cattle through town.

We also rode on the Grapevine vintage railroad which the girls loved, and so did Steve especially when they announced that we were about to play team games against each carriage…right up Steve’s street!!! 

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SAN DIEGO

We stayed three nights in San Diego and had a good look around the city. We visited the Old Town State park where we explored all the old buildings, shops and restaurants. It was very interesting and good way to show the girls how things worked in the olden days. We really enjoyed exploring a few hours there and got some great little finds in the craft shops.

Next we managed to walk a hundred meters in Little Italy when it started to pour down with rain, so we dived in the nearest restaurant and had some amazing Italian food.

Luckily meanwhile the rain had stopped so we took a stroll around Gas Light Quarter and went for ice creams in Ghirardelli chocolate shop.

Before it got dark had another stroll around Seaport which was really nice. So quiet, relaxing and beautiful to walk on harbour side. We saw the USS Midway Aircraft carrier and learnt about all the soldiers who fought and lost their lives in WW2. Unfortunately we were there at end of the day and didn’t have time to get on board it before the closing time.

Following day we had pancakes for breakfast as it was pancake day here. That day was spent in Legoland which was lot of fun. We all love the one in Windsor so it was great to be in the California Legoland. It is their winter season and being there on a school day was great as it was so quiet and hardly any queues .

To finish our day, we had dinner in the Kansas City BBQ famous from Top Gun film. It was interesting to see the bar and the corner where the film had been filmed.