It is approximately 1,000 miles from our house in Texas to the condo we stayed at in Kissimmee. We made this journey by packing up Expedition after work on a Thursday evening, and leaving around 10:30 pm. I sat in the front passenger seat; Sam, Ellie and Mary Lou took the second row; Maddie and Ben filled out the back - separated by a pile of last minute stuff we forgot to put in the suitcases. The kids slept through most of the night, and I took over driving duty around 6 am. Dave tried to catch some Zs, but only managed to get an acute case of motion sickness. After he recovered, he told me that while we were stopped on the side of the road he was seriously contemplating turning back, or better yet just staying right where we were.
At noon, Dave took the wheel again. Things started to get a little hairy in the back seat by then - children were not meant to sit in the car for 1/2 days at a time. Sammy was continually unbuckling seat belts, chewing on his shirt collar, and just being a general fart. While digging through my CD case, I came across Smithsonian Folkways Children's Collection. This became our soundtrack for the rest of the trip. While not my music of choice, it's better than the monotone zombie children that are featured on the kid song CD's I copied from a friend a few years back. The little kids fell in love with it, and now know every song by heart.
We finally arrived at our condo around 4 pm. We rented this place from All Star Vacation Homes. It was perfect for us. There were three bathrooms, which is a key factor when you've got 7 people. Each room had its own television. An odd triviality is that the kitchen table in the condo is identical to the one we have in our breakfast room at home. There was a small heated pool on the back patio, and a heated pool and clubhouse a short walk away. We made a quick trip to a local grocery store and tried (unsuccessfully) to retrieve our prepurchased tickets from Kissimmee Guest Services. More on that fun later. Suffice it to say their website does not give accurate office hours.
1 comment:
Wow...I have so been there in the middle of a car trip, too far to turn back, but still far enough from the destination to consider giving up. I grew up on that Folkways stuff: Pete Seeger, the Weavers, etc. It is MUCH better than that bland KIDSONG stuff.
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