An Afternoon At Disney World

Today we finally did something we've talked about for many months; we rode the Disney World Monorail. Since we were in Sanford again, we decided to drive down to Disney World. To avoid paying for parking, we parked outside Planet Hollywood and waited for a bus to the Disney Grand Floridian Resort & Spa. The monorail has stops at three of the Disney resorts: the Grand Floridian, the Contemporary, and the Polynesian. We chose the Grand Floridian because the name conjured up an image of southern elegance. After ten minutes, the bus arrived and we stepped on board.

The ride on the bus was great. Along the way, we passed several Disney attractions. Before reaching the Grand Floridian, we picked up passengers at the Disney Wilderness Lodge. This lodge looks fantastic. If we had more time, we would have stopped to look inside. As the bus pulled away, I noticed a group of deer near the horticulture Canadian Geese. After a few seconds, I realized that the deer were actually living, breathing animals. At Disney World, it's easy to assume that everything is make-believe.

As the bus approached the Grand Floridian, my image of southern elegance came to life. The building was truly stunning. I felt like I was going back in time and arriving at a southern mansion. We followed the fence-lined path toward the stairs leading up to the monorail platform, only to find that they, like most things in Disney, were purely for show. We continued towards the main entrance and our jaws dropped as we entered. The entryway opens to a large, open floor surrounded on all sides by five floors of open balconies. The second floor contains shops, while the remaining floors have guest rooms. A large, open elevator on the right side of the floor and a wide, wrapping staircase connect the main floor to the second floor. An immense chandelier hangs from the ceiling five stories above.

From the second floor, we found our way to the monorail stop. After a few minutes, a train arrived, but was on the opposite track. After another few minutes, another train came through in the opposite direction. Finally a train arrived on our track and we eagerly climbed aboard.

The gold train took us first past the Magic Kingdom, the through the Contemporary resort, and on to the Transportation and Ticket Center. At that point, we got off the gold train and boarded the red train to Epcot Center. We rode this train around the 'white death star' two times, then jumped on the silver train back to the Grand Floridian. We soon realized that we were on the Magic Kingdom train instead of the resort train. We quickly switched once again and returned to the Grand Floridian.

The sun had set and we enjoyed watching lightning bolts illuminate a distant cumulonimbus cloud. From the Grand Floridian, we tried to watch the fireworks over the Magic Kingdom, but they were blocked from site. We caught the next bus back to Downtown Disney.

We got off the bus outside Planet Hollywood; the 'blue death star'. Susan and I wanted to see inside, but Andrew was reluctant when he saw the UFO that was crashed into the entrance. We convinced him that it would be awesome inside and in we went. We walked up the stairs to the top of the sphere, then took the elevator back down to the bottom.

By that time, it was 10:00PM and we still had a two hour drive ahead of us. Andrew announced that he would like to fall asleep, and quickly followed through with his plan. We arrived home just after midnight.