M-I-C-K-E-Y M-O-U-S-E

We took a week to spend down at Disney World with one day away for Universal Studios. It was busy, but fun. I'll try to keep it brief with some highlights.
It all began with a bus ride on the "Magical Express" which takes you from the airport to the hotel. Right away, the atmosphere is obvious at the hotel.

Despite some rain, we made it to the Magic Kingdom. At one point, we had to break down and buy ponchos because the rain was pretty steady and it only cost me $16.
We got to wear some pretty cool glasses for the Buzz Lightyear ride where you shoot at aliens for points. Matt only beat me because I was taking pictures. The Animal Kingdom is pretty much just that. There is a great sculpture in the center called the Tree of Life which has hundreds of animals "carved" into it. Sorry, no picture. We went on Everest, a roller coaster where you encounter the Yeti (Bigfoot). It was great and I think we rode it three times in a row because we were there for the extra hour in the morning before the park opened to non-resort guests. There's also a Safari ride you go on where you see animals from Africa as well as some exploratory zones with other animals. I especially enjoyed seeing this hippo breathing under water and the meerkats.We were both amazed at the gorilla and it's likeness of us humans.
We ate at an Irish restaurant one night. These were some tasty little cocktail sausages we had as an appetizer. Even though it rained some more, we still got a chance to take a ride on some sweet motorcycles!
Hollywood Studios has another Toy Story based ride which is a little different. You sit in a car and shoot at five stations like a shooting range game. It's pretty fun, but the waits were over an hour, so we went in the single rider line to have a shorter wait. This park also has the Rockin' Roller Coaster which plays Aerosmith musich and is completely indoors. Very fun! Probably my favorite though, is the Hollywood Tower of Terror. It is based on the Twilight Zone and you are in an elevator which eventually drops from 13 stories. The crazy part is knowing you are going to drop, but each time is different so you have no clue what is going to happen. I made some video simply for you to hear screaming. As a result of this effort, I hit the off button 2 or 3 times trying to make sure I didn't drop the camera, but you still get the idea.

At Epcot, the focus is on different countries around the world. We had delicious pastries from France, a wonderful lunch in China where the chef prepared our food in front of us and I found this little spot in Italy of particular interest.