2012 USA – Orlando
It was the year of my 60th so I got to choose where we went on holiday. I had no hesitation in choosing Disneyland in Orlando for what better time to go on a Back to Childhood Tour than before creaky bones, senility and incontinence pads loomed up on me? It was somewhere near the bottom of Federika’s list of desired destinations but she was always happy to give something a try and agreed on the condition that we incorporated it with a trip to Costa Rica where we could stay with an old childhood friend that she hadn’t seen for many years. Before setting off, Federika and I had our usual argument about when to arrive at the airport. I always like to arrive three hours before and Federika prefers the last-minute method. This is one of the few times I get my own way with the unspoken condition that we leave 15 minutes later than agreed. After takeoff I always look at my watch and wonder how I am ever going to survive the boredom but thanks to my new netbook I was able to play bridge, solve some tricky Sudoku puzzles and look at a selection of my favourite videos. It was just as well as the entertainment system on the Virgin Atlantic flight was terrible.
There was a huge queue at Orlando airport waiting to get through immigration even though we were the only flight that had recently landed. Heaven knows what it must have been like when several planes landed around the same time. I was a bit nervous about getting through immigration as they had a new system where you apply for a visa over the internet (an ESTA) and they made it clear that if I made a single mistake I would be refused entry with undertones of Guantanamo Bay. I needn’t have worried as they didn’t even look at my ESTA although they still insisted on a full set of fingerprints and a mugshot. I had hired a car for the time we were in Florida and was impressed at how well-organised it was. At the Avis car hire desk we saw our name on a large display telling us which bay to pick up our car. The keys were in the ignition so all I had to do was show my driver’s licence to the security guard at the gate.
The next day we left free so we could recover from the journey and do some shopping in what they refer to as Outlet Stores, although I had no idea how they differed from any other store. The shopping centre was packed as the sales were still on. In one shop I spent half an hour choosing a pair of trainers but when I went to pay there was a massive queue so I put the trainers back and accepted I had just wasted half an hour of my life. Back at the hotel, there was a desk with someone selling tickets for Disneyland and Universal Studios. Before reaching the desk we were ambushed by a woman offering us a special deal saving us a lot of money. After negotiating for half an hour I was about to hand over the money when she asked,
“What time would you like your tour tomorrow, at 9.30 am or 1.30 pm? We will also give you a free continental breakfast.”
“What do you mean tour?” I asked and she pointed to a card showing an apartment building. Alarm bells started ringing.
“Are you trying to sell us a timeshare?”
“Yes.”
Anyone against the death penalty might consider that the only thing that stopped me from strangling her was that Florida still had the death penalty, even for killing timeshare sellers. I went to walk away in disgust but she stopped me, saying,
“Our tour only lasts two hours and in return, you will save 300. That’s got to be worth it?”
Federika was tempted but I didn’t trust her figures and didn’t want anything to do with timeshare regardless of how much it saved. We bought our tickets at the desk and calculated we would only have saved 40 dollars if we had accepted the timeshare offer although I wouldn’t have been surprised if there were other tricks up her sleeve.
Timeshare sellers have special powers that can vaporise all common sense in even the most sensible people. I used to work in a hotel in Madeira that used to promote timeshare and people were making fortunes from the fallacy that by handing over a large sum of money you would be part owner of a property. As for the methods they used to suck people in, my parents once asked someone for directions to a church where they wanted to go to mass and the person told them the mass was cancelled and asked if they wanted to go to a timeshare meeting instead. They had been tricked once before so ignored the offer and went to mass which of course was never cancelled.
Wednesday 4th 2012
We got up early to go to Disneyland Magic Kingdom. On the news, they said that the day before we arrived was the coldest day for decades and frost had killed a lot of the orange trees which were a major industry in Florida. We were heavily dressed in winter clothes and while waiting for the boat to take us from the car park to Magic Kingdom I wondered how we were going to survive such arctic conditions. Once we were in the theme park it warmed up quickly and I instantly felt the Disney magic which connected me to my childhood. 
They were still playing Christmas music with that unique Disney sound. We both hated any kind of roller coaster so a good place to start was The Tiki Room. It was in a large straw building with toy birds in every conceivable place singing a really catchy song. It was nothing much really but I loved it and was surprised and delighted to find that so did Federika. 
We did brave the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad which by roller coaster standards was pretty lame but still just about our limit. I had been worried that the queues might be bad but we were allowed a certain number of fast passes which we used for the attractions with longer lines so there was never more than a 15-minute wait in most places. I loved all the silly little rides like It’s a Small World which took us on a boat around the world with a catchy tune playing during the journey. I loved the processions that went regularly around the theme park singing and dancing to old Disney tunes. When it got dark the fairytale castle in the middle of the park was lit up with millions of tiny blue lights and was just magical.
The next day we went to another of the Disneyland theme parks Epcot. I had heard a lot of good things about it but had no idea what to expect which is always a good place to start. As soon as we entered the park we walked straight into one of the main attractions Spaceship Earth which was housed in the huge silver ball which is the Epcot trademark. It took us from the dawn of man through to the present day. The park was divided into different countries and we started in Mexico in a lovely little village square selling authentic Mexican goods and a Mexican restaurant set at the base of the Chichen Itza ruin. There was even a ride in a small boat that toured through Mexico with hundreds of puppets singing and dancing.
Outside, an excellent Mexican band was playing and everything about the place made us feel like we were really in Mexico. From there we strolled along a large lake through Norway, Venice, Japan, Morocco, England, France, Germany, and China and in each country, you could eat the local food which was a relief after the fast food served everywhere else.
There were a few rides which didn’t look too scary and we queued for one for half an hour before being told it was a roller coaster so we had to abandon it and walk back down again. There was another ride called Soaring which we were assured was not a roller coaster. It was so busy that we took a ticket with a time slot five hours later. When our time came we joined the small queue and having already had to chicken out once that day we were concerned this was also going to be scary. The problem was that all rides in all the parks had the warning “DON’T RIDE IF YOU HAVE ANY OF THE FOLLOWING” and then they listed every human ailment known to man. I suppose it is there to protect themselves against lawsuits. Because these warnings were shown on all the rides, regardless of how fierce or tame they were, they had no meaning. The ride Soaring had the usual warnings so we were already a bit nervous when they opened the doors and led us into a large hall with what looked like medieval torture chairs. We nearly chickened out again but a member of staff assured Federika it was a virtual ride and if things got scary we just had to close our eyes. We sat in one of the contraptions and a bar came down to hold us in place which did nothing to calm our nerves. The next thing we knew we were hang gliding over California. It was amazing although I had to close my eyes when it looked like I was going to crash into the San Francisco Bridge.
The great thing about Epcot was you never knew what to expect and at every turn there was something new to experience. In the area dedicated to the southern states of America they had a choir dressed up like a scene from Gone With The Wind and they sang exquisitely.
Turn another corner and a man was doing a balancing act with several chairs stacked on top of each other. In England, some of King Arthur’s loyal subjects put someone from the audience on trial causing hysterical laughter in the audience. 
We had lunch in Turkey while a belly dancer entertained us. Then she invited the audience to join her in some Turkish dancing and of course, Federika was the first to volunteer.
At night they finished the day off with a spectacular firework display over the lake. It was a great day and I think I enjoyed it even more than Disneyland.
The next day it was Universal Studios and by now the weather had turned so warm we were able to walk around in tee shirts which was a great relief. We started off with a 3D version of Shrek and I was confused as to why they needed the usual warnings before going into the cinema. The film started and apart from the 3D effects being astonishing, they came complete with other effects that were attached to our seats. When the donkey sneezed, something was spayed on our faces to make it feel like donkey snot. A disgusting 3D spider hovered near our faces and then we felt a puff of air on our legs to make it feel like one was climbing up our legs. Funniest of all, was when Shrek got into a horse and cart a rode along cobbled stones while the chairs jerked up and down as if we were in the cart with them. What a great start to the day. We went to one place where they got members of the public to appear in a film about an earthquake on a subway. They shot the film in 20 minutes and almost immediately played it to us which was so impressive.
There was an area they called Animal Actors which was a large arena where they showed off the animals they had trained for using in films. There were so many things going on and I loved it all. Even just walking around film sets was thrilling. The only thing I wasn’t keen on was the Simpsons Roller Coaster. It was a simulation so I knew all I had to do was close my eyes when things got scary. I ended up keeping my eyes closed most of the time but the problem wasn’t being scared, it was the car we were sitting in was being thrown around so much I ended up feeling sick. I had to lie down on the grass for a while afterwards to recover. We ended up having dinner there so it was quite late when we left and yet I still didn’t want to leave. Federika admitted to me that when I first told her I wanted to go to Disneyland she was “dreading it” but I was very happy to hear that she enjoyed it as much as me.
Saturday 7th 2012
I woke at 5.30 am to go on a six-hour bass fishing trip while Federika went shopping. I met my guide who had his boat on a trailer and we drove the few miles to Lake Toho. Looking at his boat it was not surprising the fishing trip was so expensive but it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience and Florida was famous for its bass fishing. It was a small boat but full of the gadgets needed to fish in those waters and had a 200 HP engine. 
It was a beautiful morning but being so early it was still very cold so when we took off across the water at high speed I was frozen. My hands were especially cold because I couldn’t put them in my pockets as they were needed to keep my woolly hat from flying off. We stopped near some tall reeds where the bass were usually found. The large lake flowed into the Everglades and was packed with wildlife making an abundance of noise. It was so quiet with the water like glass and when the sun rose the entire sky turned red. 
We moved from place to place but the fishing wasn’t very good. I ended up catching four bass with one of them being 3 lbs but I reeled them in like they were small sacks of potatoes without any fight. The next day I was chatting to someone at the hotel who was a keen fisherman and he said the lake was overfished so there was rarely anything above 4 lbs. I really enjoyed the day but won’t be doing it again.
Universal Studios Island of Adventure was sold as a separate theme park to Universal Studios even though they were next to each other. We had no idea what it had to offer but as a package, it only cost a little extra so we decided to go there on our last day. The main attractions were roller coasters and a couple of water rides. There were two water rides, the first was Jurassic Park where we went slowly through prehistoric times while occasionally being attacked by a dinosaur or some other kind of scarydactus It was fun but not that scary considering the models looked like they had stepped out of giant Christmas crackers. At the end of the ride we went down a steep water chute into a small lake creating a big splash at the bottom. People at the front got wet but as we were sitting at the back we didn’t do too badly. The other water ride was the Popeye Raging Rapids Water Ride where a group of us sat in a round rubber raft. We inspected it beforehand and saw people getting off very wet so we thought we would be clever and paid an exorbitant price for two plastic ponchos. We were with a family of Brazilians who had not bothered with ponchos. I thought the idea of the ride would be to go to places where one or two of the people got a bit wet but I couldn’t have been more wrong. The whole thing was designed to give everyone a thorough soaking and if you managed to avoid one drenching you were spun around and thrown into another one. One minute we were directly under a waterfall and the next, water cannons fired at us from every direction. Of course it was hysterical and the two young children in the raft loved it but all Federika and I could do was try and manoeuvre ourselves into positions where we could stay as dry as possible. It was futile and the stupid ponchos had press studs on the sides which came undone in the first few minutes. I did manage to keep my tee-shirt reasonably dry but my shorts and underpants were drenched. Fortunately, I had a spare pair of shorts with me but I had to spend the rest of the day without underpants with my John Thomas flapping around so by the end of the day it was quite sore. Federika had to buy a skirt so at least we were both dry but we saw the Brazilian family an hour later and they were still soaked to the skin.
There was also a large area dedicated to Harry Potter which Federika and I knew nothing about but it was still good fun and we enjoyed riding around the park on a witch’s broomstick.
2012 USA and Costa Rica
