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So. The last couple of days have been absolutely *insane*. But let me go back to the beginning, and give you the trip run-down in detail!
Day One - As I said in the previous entry, we spent the first day in the car. We drove from Toronto through the border crossing at Sarnia (no rude border guard to report this time), through Michigan, Ohio, and into Kentucky. It rained off and on the whole way, but wasn't too bad. We pretty much drove straight, with no stopping, and arrived in Bowling Green, Kentucky right on schedule. After spending an hour driving around trying to locate a Catholic church (lots of Baptists in Kentucky! :-), we finally got to one 10 minutes before Mass started. So we did that, and then went out to the KOA campground just south of the city. Bowling Green itself was pretty run-down and ugly, but the campground was nice! We had a very cute camping cabin, with a porch swing and a TV inside! We were really roughing it. ;-)
Day Two - We got up around 7:00 and checked out of the campground, and drove back up north a little bit to Mammoth Cave National Park. We took the "Frozen Niagara" tour of the caves, which sounded the least strenuous of them all, as Mom was a bit concerned about the physical demands. But it was fine! We started off by descending 250 feet pretty much straight down, and then climbed back up at a gradual ascent over the next 2 hours. Mammoth Cave is the largest cave system in the world, carved by the Echo River, which is still at work, way below where we were. Our tour leader, Ranger Grace, said that we were in about the third level of caves, and the river was down in the 6th level. My mom thought Ranger Grace probably doesn't have much of a social life. ;-) Anyway, one really neat part of the tour was when they turned off all the lights and let us just stand there in the complete darkness and silence for a while, which is what the cave would actually look like normally! We also saw some "cave crickets", which look far too much like spiders for my liking. They were especially noticeable near the opening at the end of the tour, so I was not too sorry to get out of the cave.
After finishing up there, we then drove down into Tennessee, and stopped in Nashville just to take a quick look around before heading on to Memphis (while listening to Michael Ball's version of "Walking in Memphis"), and checked in at the Heartbreak Hotel! Our room had large framed black and white pictures of Elvis above the beds, 24-hour Elvis movies, and a heart-shaped pool outside. :-) That night we just walked over to Graceland to look at the gates and write our names on the wall outside, swam a bit in the pool, watched the end of an Elvis movie, and called it a night!
Day Three - this was our Elvis day! :-) We had breakfast in the hotel's "Jungle Room Lounge", which included waffles you could make yourself in these iron skillets. So I was standing there trying to decide exactly how you go about beginning one of these, when a very nice dark-haired man with sideburns and a southern accent offered to show me how it's done. ;-) We had booked our Graceland tour at 9:30, so we took the shuttle across the street to the mansion, and did the tour of the house and grounds, which took about an hour and a half. My mom thought it was smaller than she had always imagined it would be. But it was still really interesting! And I have to admit, I got a little teary-eyed at his grave.
After that, our tickets also included entrance to a film ("Walk a Mile in my Shoes"), the Elvis Automobile Museum, a display called "Sincerely Elvis", and a tour of two of his private aircraft. And, as if that wasn't enough, we then went downtown to "Elvis Presley's Memphis", and had a late lunch there, including deep-fried pickle chips, apparently one of the King's favourites, though we were unable to finish the plate. :-)
The restaurant was located on Beale Street, so we walked down there a bit afterwards, and then up to the Peabody Hotel, where the Peabody Ducks live. We sat in the lobby and watched them play in the fountain for a while, until a crazy man came over and decided we were his new best friends, at which point we left. :-) We then walked over to the Mississippi River and sat in the park there for a while before our riverboat cruise. The cruise was nice, though the tour guide was pretty uninteresting. When we were going against the wind, it was really nice, but when there was no breeze, I was just about ready to jump into the river to get some relief! It was HOT! We finally made it back to the hotel, watched the end of another Elvis movie, and went to bed.
Day Four - After another breakfast in the Jungle Room (where I, confident in my new waffle-making skills, decided I could do two at once, and managed to completely decimate my breakfast), we checked out of the hotel and took the shuttle back downtown to Sun Studios, the recording studio where Elvis made his first records, and many others became famous as well. The tour there was very interesting, and my mom got to hold the microphone that Elvis used (very exciting - pictures to follow ;-). That was all the time we had for Memphis, so we got back to the car and headed out of the city and into Mississippi. Along the way, we passed Tupelo, the town where Elvis was born, so we stopped there to see the very tiny house he grew up in - just a *little* different from Graceland! We then drove through Alabama and into Georgia, where we stopped about 2 hours south of Atlanta for the night at a rest area.
Day Five - We left Georgia and drove into Florida, arriving at our campground at Palm Harbor at about 11:00 a.m. After checking in and settling in about, we drove out to the beaches at Clearwater, which were absolutely *gorgeous*! White sand and warm Gulf of Mexico water...I just went out and floated around for a while. It was like a big, warm, salty wave pool. :-) I also tanned a little bit (very exciting for me, who doesn't tan!). After a couple of hours there, we drove over to Tampa and looked around a bit, and then returned to our campground, stopping along the way at the biggest Christmas store either of us had ever seen!!! So many cool things, but I hadn't brought my purse to the beach, so the $3 I had on me wasn't enough to make any purchases. :-(
Day Six - DisneyWorld!! We left the campground at 6:45 and drove about an hour and a half to the DisneyWorld resort. We managed to park, take the tram to the ticket area, buy our tickets, take the monorail to the Magic Kingdom, and arrive *right* as the park was opening at 9 a.m. Pretty good timing! Our original plan had been to go to Splash Mountain first, but it was not working when we walked by, so we went on the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad instead. Next was the Haunted Mansion...while we were waiting to get in, we were reading the tombstones outside the house. Mom asked me if I would make her a rhyming tombstone when she died. I said maybe...if she died in a zoo. Or out of the blue. ;-) Anyway, after that, we went to the Hall of Presidents, which was new to us, as they don't have it at Disneyland in California. The animatronic figures were amazing, although the American propaganda was a little much for me. In Adventureland we did the Jungle Cruise and Pirates of the Caribbean, and then the Mad Tea Party, It's a Small World, and Snow White's Adventures in Fantasyland.
After all that, it was time for our lunch at Cinderella's Royal Table. We entered the "grand hall" to await our names, and when it happened, they rang this big gong to let us know it was time to go up. :-) The dining room was very pretty, and our waiter called us both "princess" the whole time. :-) The food was alright, though a little pricey, but it was definitely an experience!! After finishing up there, we did Peter Pan's Flight, and then went over to Tomorrowland, where we went on Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin (another new one for us - really fun!). We did the ExtraTERRORestrial Adventure after that, and then Space Mountain...I had finally convinced Mom that it wasn't scary, and then, just as we were about to get on, they had to stop the ride for 15 minutes because of technical difficulties. That didn't make her feel any better. :-) But it was fine!
I haven't mentioned yet that it was brutally hot in the morning, but by early afternoon it was raining intermittently. By late afternoon, it was raining non-stop. So the evening parade was cancelled, unfortunately, so after all our rides and some shopping, we drove back to Tampa and our campground and fell asleep pretty much immediately!
Day Seven - This was the last day I updated you on before - our plan had been to hit the beach, but it poured *all* day. After waiting until about 2 p.m. to see if it would clear up, we decided we would make the most of the rest of the day, and drove into Tampa to see the Florida Aquarium. It was pretty cool - some *very* large sting rays and sharks, and the craziest fish I've ever seen, called a "leafy dragon"...it honestly looks like it's part plant! I'll scan my postcard of it later. After leaving there, we went to a movie theatre and caught the evening showing of "Seabiscuit", which we both enjoyed very much, and that was the end of that day!
Day Eight - Another early morning - out of bed, packed the car, checked out of the campground, and out on the road towards Orlando by 7:00! We arrived back at DisneyWorld and parked at Epcot at 8:30, just before the park opened. We spent our morning in FutureWorld, checking out some cool attractions like Ellen's Energy Adventure, Cranium Command, Body Wars and the House of Innoventions. We got a FASTPASS for the "Test Track" ride, and then had lunch and took the ferry across the lagoon into the World Showcase!
We started in Italy and looked around the shops there and then walked over to Germany. We had just got inside one of the stores there when it started raining again, and didn't let up for the next 7 hours! :-( So we had to explore the rest of the world in the rain! After Germany we went to China, which had a very cool 360 degree film about the country, and lots of cool stuff in the shops there. Norway was next, which had a ride where you were in a Viking longboat and some trolls came and sent you down a river - fun! There was also a brief film there. Mexico also had a boat ride, and a very cool market and mariachi band! That was one of my favourite exhibits.
After that, it was time to go back to the Test Track, but because of the rain, it wasn't running. So we went instead to the Imagination pavillion and went on a couple of things there - Journey Into Imagination and "Honey, I Shrunk the Audience", a fun 3-D show. We also took a picture of ourselves and edited it a bit...here's the result:
:-)
Back to the world showcase, and we went to the U.S. next. There was a film/stage presentation with more animatronic figures and *far* more Americanism than I could stand. :-) We escaped from there to Japan, where I bought a bonsai tree for Susan and had supper at a teriyaki place, and watched some really cool drummers. Morocco was next, which might have been my very favourite of the countries, it was really interesting.
After that was France, where there was another very interesting film, and we had dessert at the patisserie there. The guy who introduced the film told us he was from Marseilles and asked if anybody knew where that was. The bright Americans around us replied, "France?"
The U.K. was next, and I bought a Galaxy chocolate bar there, and had an enthusiastic conversation with the guy at the counter about the many virtues of Galaxy chocolate bars. :-) (All the people working in each pavillion are actually from the country there are representing!) And finally, was Canada, where we watched another film, and wandered through stores of Roots merchandise and Anne of Green Gables dolls. :-)
That took us to the end of the day, by which time the rain had finally stopped, so we were able to watch the firework and laser light show over the lagoon, which was wonderful! After making it out of the park and parking lot, we drove through Orlando and stopped at a rest area just outside the city for the night.
Day Nine - Another day of driving! We drove up the eastern coast of Florida, through Georgia again, and into South Carolina, where we actually took a more rural route and passed through old plantation areas and swampland, which was very cool! We arrived in Charleston around noon, checked into the hotel, and headed for the beach! The water wasn't *quite* as warm as in Florida, but it was still a very nice day, and I tanned some more! There was a mini-marathon of Tom Cruise movies on HBO when we returned to the hotel, so that pretty much did me in for the rest of the day. ;-)
Day Ten - After checking out of the hotel, we drove into Charleston and parked downtown. We walked around the Market for a while and then took an hour-long carriage ride of the historic district, which was *really* good. Our guide was very knowledgeable and funny, and we got to see Rhett Butler's house (well, kind of ;-). That was pretty much it for the day, as we piled back into the car, drove out of South Carolina, through North Carolina, Virginia, and into Maryland, where we stopped at our hotel just out of Washington, D.C.
Day Eleven - We got to sleep in until about 8:00 on this day. ;-) We drove to the Metro station, parked the car and took the Metro into Washington! We went first to Arlington Cemetery, where we found JFK's grave, and the Iwo Jima monument. It was *hot* this day too, and Arlington is huge, so we were pretty worn out by the time we made it back to the Metro - and that was just the beginning! We got off downtown and walked down to the Lincoln Memorial and up to the Mall. We consumed large amounts of liquids and took frequent breaks, and were still barely making it! We got our views of the Washington Monument, the White House and the Capitol, and stumbled into the air-conditioned Air and Space Museum, where we only had time to view a few of the exhibits (which were very interesting), before heading over to the Museum of American History to try to catch a few things there before the museum closed. When we were kicked out, we went and sat out on the Mall for a while before finally mustering the energy to return to the car. :-) I don't know if I can honestly say that I *enjoyed* my day in Washington, but it was interesting.
Things were about to get more interesting that night. We drove out of Maryland and into Delaware. We came to the New Jersey border and the start of the New Jersey turnpike, and decided to pull off the highway to figure out what we wanted to do that night. We were in a little town, the name of which I'm not sure, and we pulled off into a residential section to talk for a minute or two. As we parked, this woman and her child that were going up the steps to their house across the street were just *staring* at the car, and continued to do so for the next minute. As this was making us pretty uncomfortable, we decided to drive away and stop somewhere else. So we did - and within a minute, the door of a house opened and this man came and stood on his porch, staring at us. So again, we started up the car and left. As we pulled out of the street, a police car drove by, and my mom said jokingly, "I wonder if they called the cops on us!". We were back out on the highway, heading towards the turnpike, when all of a sudden, not one, not two...but THREE state police cruisers came up, with lights flashing, and pulled us over!!! The officer comes up and says, "We have reports that you stopped outside a house and turned your lights off. What were you doing?" SERIOUSLY!!!! So we explained, and he asked for my license. Which wouldn't have been a problem, except I had taken it out of my wallet in Florida, and didn't remember where I'd put it. I offered him my passport instead, which he took, and then asked if the car was registered to us. We told him it was a rental, and he asked for the rental agreement. Which would have been fine, except the car was a mess and we didn't know where it was. After much searching, we located it, and he went back to his car to run my passport and ensure I was not a wanted criminal in Canada. :-) Finally, he came back and told us we could go, and gave us directions to the turnpike, and then drove behind us as we drove out of town. After we took the ramp, there was *another* police car there, waiting to make sure we were actually going!!! Is that not the craziest thing you have ever heard?? Anyway, we can now honestly say that we have been run out of town in Delaware!
Day Twelve - We spent the night at a rest area off the turnpike, and got up in the morning and headed into New York City. We parked at Port Authority, and took the subway downtown. Our first stop was the World Trade Center site, and then we walked down past Trinity Church, down Wall Street, and down to Battery Park. It was another very warm day, and our feet were tired from the previous day, so our tour of Liberty Island and Ellis Island was not quite as enjoyable as it might otherwise have been, but we made it through! After finishing up there, we returned to the car, got our stuff and went and checked into our hotel. After that, I decided we needed to size up our financial situation, and it turned out we were nearing the end of the money supply. :-) So we had to make a choice between going to a show that night, or skipping the show and staying an extra day. We talked about it, and decided we would try to do the show, and just leave the city early the next morning. I *will* take my mom back to New York some day!
So leaving Mom in the air-conditioned hotel, I ran up to the Neil Simon to try for the Hairspray lottery. There were nearly 65 people there for the lottery - I couldn't believe it!! And they only draw 12 names - but ours was the last name drawn! Yahoo! So I went back and got Mom, and we walked up Broadway, for a quick walking tour of the theatre district (including a moment of silence at the Minskoff windtunnel), and up to the theatre. The show was *wonderful*!! We really enjoyed it! Marissa Jaret Winokur and Kerry Butler are both gone, but their replacements were both very good, and I must admit, Harvey Feirstein was hilarious. Mom and I both had a great time. We were far too tired for stage-dooring, and just headed back to the hotel.
Day Thirteen - This was meant to be a very calm day of getting back to Toronto, picking up Tiger and unpacking. And it started that way - we left New York at 7:00, and drove back across the border (another uneventful border crossing - maybe my string is broken!), and into Toronto. We had just pulled into downtown when all of a sudden the traffic lights went out. Thinking that was pretty odd, I pulled onto a different street. Still no lights. Our radio had gone out as well, so we looked around for a different station, and finally found one that was working, where they said there was a power blackout. So, we decided we'd pull off and get gas, since we were on empty, and then go back out. Well, no power means no gas. We sat at the gas station for about 2 hours, and finally they said on the radio that they figured it would be hours before power was restored. So we decided we'd try to make it home, even though we were about half an hour away, and on empty. After a harrowing drive through the streets with no functioning traffic lights, we pulled into the apartment, and just stayed in for the night, as there was nothing else we could do!
Day Fourteen - The power was still out when we woke up. It finally came on around 11:00 a.m., so we went out to get gas after a couple of hours. There were big line-ups, and as we were waiting to pull up, a woman walked by and said, "Do you guys know your tire's flat?" Well, we hadn't, but it sure was. So after we finally got some gas, we then had to pull over and call for a serviceman to come and change the tire. Which, of course, took *forever*, because of the traffic problems. Finally, we were able to get to Susan's and pick up Tiger, and take the car back, and come back home on the bus, rather than the subway, which still wasn't running.
So, that was all pretty terrible, but it could have been worse - our original plan had been to still be in New York on the day the power went out, so we could have been trapped in the subway, or unable to leave the city. I think our running out of money was a very lucky break!
All in all, we drove 6900 km and passed through 15 states. It was a very, very busy and fun trip, and now my mom is still here for 4 more days, so I am going to get off this computer and go spend some more time with her!
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