Florida Trip Days 5 + 6

Day 5 of our trip is when Jared started to feel sick with fevers, so we just hung around the pool area at our condo resort (Summer Bay). These Sandhill Cranes were at our condo all week. At one point, they were totally blocking the sidewalk to the pool, so I decided to circle back and go all the way around the building to enter the pool from the other side. I was NOT about to mess with these huge birds! There were some pretty flowers by the outdoor grills that were available to us. We didn’t end up using the bbq’s at all, as we only ate a total of 4 suppers at our condos. This was the fountain next to the pool that we could see from our balcony. This was one of 6 pools at the resort and this was the one right behind our building. During our stay there, we ended up going to 4 of the pools. One of the many lizards that were scurrying around there. I actually didn’t mind them. On day 6 (Wednesday Nov. 11), we decided to go to Aquatica. We had bought a combo ticket for Busch Gardens, Sea World and Sea World’s water park Aquatica. 3 days at those parks cost the same as one day at Disney. Anyway, Jared had woken up with a fever (still from the day before), so he took an Advil and then it went away. He decided we should go but later regretted that decision. I loved how there were palm trees lining the roads! By the time we arrived at Aquatica, Jared’s fever had returned, so he spent all afternoon on a lounge chair shivering (it was +29 or 85 fahrenheit) while I went in the water and on the slides with the kids. One of the bonuses about going to Florida in November before Thanksgiving was that except for Disney World, all of the rest of the parks were fairly quiet with very little or no line-ups! You can see there is a water slide under the water…that ride is called Dolphin’s Plunge. It goes through the water where there are black and white Commerson’s Dolphins. I didn’t end up going on it as I had to take care of the kids. I couldn’t get over all of the beautiful flowers and plants! I really enjoyed all of the bright colors at the park. This was the kids’ play area (or splash park on steroids) called Walkabout Waters. It was incredible! It was also a bit difficult to keep track of the kids here! Since Blake didn’t want me to take his picture, I took a picture of him from a distance. Kiera deliberately went under the big bucket at one point to get soaked. Kiera and I went on mats down these fast slides called Taumata Racers. The drops got my heart pumping but it was fun! I was the fastest one down but then a guy passed me at the bottom.

This is where we got lunch from and ate outside at a picnic table. I had seen people walking around with these huge turkey legs, so I decided to try one. It was a bit dry but a decent meal. We then moved on to a different kids’ area with water slides and a shallow pool. We spent the rest of the afternoon in that area, except when Jared watched Blake and Haley while I went on some tube slides and in the wave pool with Kiera. These are the tube slides Kiera and I went on: Omaka Rocka and Whanau Way

The wave pool

A beautiful sight on the drive back to our condo. The weather while we were there was about 10 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than usual, so we were extremely blessed with the hot weather during our time there! I know the Floridians were just waiting for cooler weather but I was thrilled with the heat! The day we left to come back home was the coldest with a high of 26 or 79 Fahrenheit!