I'd like to keep up with our travel experiences. I'm backposting our honeymoon in Florida to keep me excited about our upcoming vacation to Utah. When Sammit and I got married, we decided we wanted to alternate each year with domestic and international travel - but so far, domestic is winning out.
Orlando, FL - November 2010
How we got there & Where we stayed:
We stayed at the Sheraton Vistana Villages - a timeshare that my boss booked for us as a wedding present - which we're told cost less than 500.00 for the week. Our suite had a kitchen and a washer/dryer, which was glorious. It was larger than our first apartment. We booked our flight from Detroit to Orlando and our Hertz rent-a-car through Orbitz, which cost us about 1000.00. The first thing we did after checking in was head to the market and buy food for breakfasts and lunches for the week.
The Fun Details: Sea World, Busch Gardens, Medieval Times
We spent an afternoon at Sea World, about which we both had mixed feelings. We liked seeing and learning about the animals - many of which were rescued from boating accidents. We liked the conservation aspects of their mission. But we didn't like the small areas and isolation or the vast amounts of plastic and packaging.
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| Sea Lions hanging out in the sun. |
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| The Shamu Show |
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| Because it was November, there were "trees" and christmas music playing everywhere. It was weird. |
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| My favorite: The Flamingoes. |
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| The turtles are all in rehabilitation from boating accidents. Many had cracked shells or missing fins. |
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| Little kids around us loved seeing "Nemo" |
On a similar note, we drove a few hours to Tampa for an afternoon at Bush Gardens. On a weekday in November, we were able to see the entire park and ride every ride in just a 5 hours.
We went to Medieval Times for dinner one night - the food was good, but we really went for the show. I'm glad we went, but I can't say we'd do it again.
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| Our Menu and Pewter Dining ware |
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| We were fans of the green knight. |
The Food Details: We ate out for dinners, many of which were covered partially with birthday discounts. I had two favorites, Texas de Brazil & Bernie's Steakhouse.
First, Texas de Brazil - its a chain, but not a large one. The first one in Michigan is opening in Detroit June 13th (excited!). There are other brazilian style steakhouses, but this one was particularly spectacular. The salad bar has 60 some items on it including sushi and smoked salmon - 3 or 4 types of potatoes. There was a great lobster bisque. Our meal came with cheese popovers and fried bananas to cleanse the pallet between meats. Oh, and the meats. Every kind imaginable, brought to your table and slice off a giant sword of charcoal-y goodness.
Second, Bernie's Steakhouse - a family owned place that's very had to get into. You have to make reservations no more than a month in advance but no less than 3 days. The waiters have to work there for a year before they're able to be on the floor, then another year of probation before they get a "gold jacket." The first year they work in every aspect of the restaurant - the garden, as a bus boy, shucking shell fish, chopping onions, cutting steaks, etc. So when you ask your waiter about some aspect of your meal or their menu - they know and can tell you in great detail. We took a tour of the kitchen and their wine cellar, which is one of the top three in the country (world? I don't remember - I don't like wine). All this and they really didn't seem as snooty as I thought they would. The food was delicious. We started with a salad (they make their caesar salads table side) and their lobster bisque soup. We moved onto home made potato sized fresh fries with a black truffle creme fraiche dip. We split a steak with mashed potatoes and baby vegetables.
I was too enthralled in dinner to remember to take pictures, but we had dessert upstairs, where we remembered to take pictures.
The top pictures are from our booth. The buttons played different genres of music including broadway hits and the live piano playing downstairs. My dessert is on the left, a raspberry cheesecake - but it was oh so much more. Sammit's was a pumpkin trio, including pumpkin ice-cream.
