Yee Haw! First Offermann/Reeves family rodeo. Bonner County Fair. Hiking. Swimming in Lake Pend Oreille every day. Skate boarding. Bike Riding.

While I do believe there is no greater sign of blog lameness than to post about a summer vacation the following January, I am going to move ahead anyway.

We took a no Internet, no stress, no frenetic traveling approach to our summer vacation plans last year. Our goal was to carve out some time where we had no schedule and no worries. We chose Sandpoint, ID as our destination. Big enough to have grocery stores and some entertainment, but small enough to feel isolated and away from the city! And really, there is no more beautiful setting; Sandpoint is a city sandwiched between mountains and a gigantic deep lake. Bliss! (In the interest of full disclosure, there there was one spot in the house we rented, where for brief moments, I could piggy back on a neighbor’s WiFi signal. But it was so intermittent and unsatisfying, that I gave up trying.)

We were lucky enough to be able to attend the Bonner Country Rodeo. The barrel racing falls were a bit stressful, as was the steer wrestling..and bull riding…heck, who am I kidding, we found it all enthrallingly, entertainingly stressful. Even the wee tots getting run over by their mounts in the bareback sheep races caused us to hold our breath!

Mom, Dad, Ian and Deborah came to visit us for a bit and we dropped by the Bonner County Fair. Now, it would be hard to top the Tillamook County Fair, which is simply the greatest fair in all of the United States. But, this small rideless fair was a delight. We perused livestock, 4H cake decorating, and various crafts, cooking, and canning. Some of which are pictured below.

A favorite, and incomprehensible, activity we engaged in while everyone was visiting was to dredge up large rocks from the lake bottom, swim them out to the ladderless dock, and then place them atop the planks. At one point, we had stacked so many upon one edge, the dock had a decided list. The Zs would do this until they were literally ready to drop with exhaustion. (Rocks on the dock photo below courtesy of Deborah…by courtesy, I mean that I stole it off of Facebook!)

Then a wedding party arrived and our rocks disappeared…we think perhaps it made a poor backdrop for their photos.

I’ve been meaning to post about this for awhile!

A few months ago, I was puttering around the house and glanced out the window to find a ton of people milling about near the train tracks, where they intersect with NW 9th Ave to the north of Union Station. Let me assure you, this is not a normal occurrence. There is absolutely zero reason for Portlanders, some with cameras, to be besprinkled between and betwixt the tracks. (Generally, the only crowds we get are when the Portland Police park next door at the mounted police training facility to get suited up in riot gear for protests. There was not a law enforcement officer to be found in this group though. I checked.)

Intrigued, I decided to observe this group milling around for a bit, but nothing was happening, so I continued on with my day…irritated that I couldn’t figure out why everyone was chilling at a nondescript intersection. As I was mentally setting aside their puzzling behavior, my puttering was interrupted again, this time, by a vibrating exhalation that reverberated through our place, shaking everything.

I ran for my camera while my brain was piecing together that a steam engine must be parked at Union Station. Sprinting for the balcony, I could hear it lumbering by, and I managed to catch the shot below of a lovely Art Deco steam engine starting its journey to a train show in Tacoma.

According to Oregon Rail Heritage Foundation, this beauty is called the Southern Pacific #4449

Built in 1941 as a 4-8-4 GS-4 locomotive, she is 110′ long, 10′ wide and 16′ tall. With locomotive and tender weighing 433 tons and a boiler pressure of 300 psi, her eight 80″ diameter drivers and unique firebox truck booster can apply 5,500 horsepower to the rails and exceed 100 mph. The only remaining operable “streamlined” steam locomotive of the Art Deco era, this grand Lady of the High Iron pulled Southern Pacific “Daylight” coaches from Los Angeles to San Francisco over the scenic Coast Route and then on to Portland until 1955.

Retired to Oaks Park in 1958 for display only, many thought 4449 would never run again. In 1974 she was completely restored specifically to pull the 1976 Bicentennial Freedom Train throughout the United States to the delight of over 30 million people. SP 4449 has also operated numerous excursions since. She is arguably one of the most beautiful locomotives ever built and kept that way by the all-volunteer Friends of SP 4449.

The juxtaposition of highrise condos with a steam train was captivating for us all who watched her get underway. (Click on photo to the right to enlarge.)

Unbeknownst to me at the time all of this was happening, Tom was stopped by the train as he was walking home on NW 9th Ave with Zelda. He too could not deduce why people were loitering, nor imagine upon what they could be waiting. Lucky Tom and Zelda were both right there as this piece of machinery demonstrated its ability to achieve some serious pressure in its boiler…the noise and heat was quite visceral for them.

Thanks babe for snapping the great close up shot of all that water vapor using your phone (pictured top left)!

You can tell we haven’t road tripped in awhile due to our wildly naive plan to depart for an Idaho lakeside vacation at 6:00 am on a Monday morning. (Don’t laugh!) Google Maps estimated the drive would take us about 7 1/2 hours, without stops. We figured, with a few breaks, we would take maybe 9 hours. Images of a scenic and relaxed drive with two rested adult drivers ready to take the helm at a moment’s notice danced in our heads. (As if the words “rested” and “6:00 am” have ever belonged in the same sentence for Tom and I.)

Unfortunately, life had other plans. The week before our getaway, Zoe had soccer practice every day, a whole slew of work meetings came up at the last minute filling the calendar I had oh so carefully cleared, an eleventh hour trip to California for work sprang up, and Zoe had a soccer tournament where her team made a run to the finals, coming in second. Of course, we had to attend the barbecue afterward.

All of this to say, we didn’t even return home, much less begin packing/planning for our 6:00 am Monday start, until mid afternoon the day before.

Believing all was not lost, we marshalled our family resources and became whirling dervishes of activity to get organized for our extended absence.

Did it help? No.

By 2:30 am Monday, less than four short hours from when we were supposed to be departing, Tom and I were pooped and nowhere near ready to go. So, we did what any smart American who has lived as an Argentine expat would do — we radically postponed our departure date.

Not surprisingly, instead of leaving at o’dark thirty, we ended up rolling out of the building in the mid afternoon Monday. “Okay,” we told ourselves, “this isn’t so bad…8 hours late, plus or minus.” [Insert shrug]

The good news about the first leg of our journey is that we made it to Gresham in record time! The bad news is that we stopped there, only thirty minutes to the east of Portland! This unscheduled break was prompted by the Z’s car DVD player giving up the ghost. One screen just stopped working. Kaput. And no, it wasn’t the cables.

What are bad parents to do without video screens on a long drive with kids who have not absorbed the notion that children should be seen and not heard and who love to vocalize every little personal discomfort as if the rest of us really want to know?

Stop at Target in Gresham and buy another car DVD player! (I know, horrible, right?)

Of course, it took us forever to select, purchase, assemble, and connect it all so it was functioning. But eventually, we got the job done. (By “we” I mean Tom — I took the kids car snack shopping while he played with the electronics.) The blessed silence on the road that resulted from this lengthy, unscheduled stop induced Tom to say, “That is the best $144.00 I have ever spent.”

“Amen to that,” I replied. A subtle giving and taking of a parental high five ensued.

The rest of our trip was equally ridiculously slow for various reasons related to food, gas, bathrooms, an auxiliary jack for music, etc. All in all, it took us about 9 hours to drive from Portland to Spokane, WA, still 2 hours short of our destination. It’s an embarrassment really, for someone who grew up in a hard core, drive ’til you drop, West Coast family.

But the trip was relaxed, the big orange moon that rose over the horizon as we neared Spokane was breathtaking, and the scenery was beautiful (all of these pictures were taken with my phone as Tom was guiding our car through the Columbia River Gorge).

And yes, we made the Zs turn off their movie and actually interact and look around from time to time. Eventually though, they would start bickering and/or complaining, prompting us to direct them back to their movie for a little crack hit of screen time.

Do you think they were doing it on purpose?

Our second winter break excursion was a quick drive up to Hood Canal, Washington, where we were going to spend a few nights as a gift to the Zs for Christmas (trying to go heavy on experience and light on crap). This outing had a bit of frenzy on the outside and and gooey wonderfulness on the inside. (The”outside” would be the beginning and end of our journey.)

Once again, we were traveling via Zipcar, this time in a Scion xB. Tom picked up the car in the morning while I raced with Zoe via light rail to the downtown Portland Swimwear store to buy her an emergency suit. (We figured out at the last minute that we must have tossed her too-small gear after the end of the summer swimming season…oopsy.)

We were renting a wee cabin with a kitchen and access to a gas grill. Hence, we not only loaded our little car with bags and hiking gear, but also with a big old ice chest and heaps and heaps of food. There we were, in our cute little vehicle, stuffed like sardines, parked on the street outside of our building engaged in the inevitable husband/wife natter about the best route for undertaking the journey. All was normal…until we simultaneously noticed a yellow indicator light on the dash. It had an exclamation point. Couldn’t be good.

After maybe ten minutes looking through the HORRIBLE manual, we figured out what it was — tire inflation issues.

Next step: call Zipcar. They promptly assured us “it should probably be fine and if the tires go flat, you can just call us.” Mind you, about this time, I lept out of the car to see if any of the rubber appeared obviously low, only to have a heavy downpour of snow, rain, and hail open up from the heavens. We relayed to customer service, very politely, that if we got a flat tire driving to the middle of nowhere with a rain/snow mix coming down, they weren’t exactly going to be able to assist us in a timely manner. Happily, they agreed, and after considerable machinations involving both of our membership cards, we worked out a way to switch vehicles. (Upgraded to a big roomy minivan — oh yah!)

So, we took our clown car to the minivan’s parking lot and in the less-than-ideal weather, opened up both hatches and frantically transferred everything. I am sure we looked completely ridiculous implementing this fire drill, but we executed it flawlessly…by “we” I mean “Tom,” of course. That done, we returned our first vehicle to its home, and we were finally on our way…maybe an hour or two later than we wanted to be, but hey, this is why we don’t fly — it’s too stressful!

I am pleased to report that Hood Canal was its usual breathtaking self, all snug and warm nestled beneath the the snow-capped Olympic Mountains. We cooked yummy meals. We visited with Ian and Deborah. The girls swam and swam. Tom and I watched total trash cable TV until late into the evening (one of the side benefits of not having cable at home). And, we went for a walk through a beautiful estuary, from whence these pictures came. Kingfishers plunged into the cold waters. Great Blue Herons were hunting and doing that funny head shake as they swallowed their prey. Grebes and loons were afoot.

We journeyed home on December 31st, New Year’s Eve, a trip that we had planned to terminate with a stop at the Humane Society to pick up a kitten, yet another Christmas gift for the Zs. We left in plenty of time. We made good progress on the way home…until we stopped…quite literally. An accident on the I-5 Columbia Bridge had completely halted forward progress on the freeway. So close, and yet so far. After about 30 to 45 minutes stalled, we are able to exit and make our way over to the I-205 bridge, and then we circled back to the shelter on the Portland side of the mighty river.

Upon arrival at the Humane Society, we were told that they were cleaned out of all kittens, all juvenile cats, and that they wouldn’t have any more until Memorial Day. May? Really?

What could we do but hop back in the car and race to the Multnomah County Animal Shelter? Good idea, only it was closed early for the holiday. Our plans to get a kitten and spend the last weekend of the Zs’ vacation helping it get acclimated seemed to be dashed. All of us were pretty dejected as we pointed our borrowed auto in the direction of home.

While Tom made a few wrong turns trying to get back to the city, I worked my thumbs away on my smart phone. (God how did we ever live without these things?) And, at the eleventh hour, found a recently-opened cat-only shelter in Lake Oswego called The Oregon Cat. My poor husband gamely rerouted us again and off to LO we went.

We hit the trifecta: they were still open, they had kittens, and there was enough time to go through the adoption procedure.

The rest…well, that’s really a whole other blog post!

Our first trip this winter break was a quick drive to Bend for some skiing, in celebration of Zoe’s birthday. We made the journey via Zipcar and rented a two bedroom place near the slopes. It was snowy and icy on the way, but nothing horrible. The car held its own, the mountain passes weren’t too bad, we made decent time, and prepared a fabulous dinner when we arrived.

By all traditional measures, and believe me, our standards are very low, our adventure started off with a bang (the stupendous meal really put us over the top).

The next morning, it was the usual schlep to get on the slopes. (Thank God for Tom, because the three women in his life hate getting up early, even if it means we get to go ski.) It was dumping snow when we made it to Mount Bachelor, scrambling madly to get the girls to their lessons on time (Zoe took up snowboarding this go around). Of course, lots of whining ensued about the being cold, and the carrying of the gear, and the donning of the boots. But, we made it. (It always feels like an Olympic event just to get to this point.)

Shed progeny…check!

After stowing gear in lockers and prepping ourselves, Tom and I finally took to the slopes. Normally, this is a joyous time, but I was feeling more than a bit nervous since it was my first attempt at skiing post knee surgery. To be honest, I was really hoping for some easy familiar runs on well-groomed intermediate trails.

Unfortunately, my plans were thwarted at the outset since there was a nice windy blizzard brewing. Visibility sucked… really, we couldn’t see anything most places on the mountain…not signs, not the snow, not the trail. Nada. And, of course, there was tons of chewed up powder, making the day even more difficult for me!

It was a rough outing, to say the least. My knee was sore as hell, Zelda was cold and had windburn on her face, and Zoe had contracted some altitude sickness symptoms (such as a mild fever) and was pretty beat up after her first day of snowboarding (She did really well, but had a sore neck 24 hours later after taking a few spectacular spills…always on her front edge with the toe turn.)

We closed out the day wanting to document the family in the torturous winter wonderland, only to discover that our new digital camera was broken. Lovely.

Weary, we headed back to our rented home, and the kids lobbied hard to bag skiing the next day so they could sleep late and go inner tubing instead. Tom reluctantly agreed to the change of plan. (Which I was secretly happy about since my icing/hot tub regimen wasn’t really improving my unhappy joint. Ironically though, the knee protection plan took a heavy hit after my first inner tube run. Some idiot teenage boy — son of very entitled parents — followed immediately behind me instead of waiting, as he was supposed to, and knocked me over like a bowling pin the second I got out of my tube, with Tom frantically yelling, “Watch out behind you!”)

Our inflatable fun had us leaving the mountain at about 2:00 pm. That’s not too late, we figured. All things being equal, we should still get over the pass at Mount Hood by 4:30 pm…just before dark.

Then the snow came…heavy and hard. By 4:30, we found ourselves in Madras, nowhere near the pass. Night fell as we traveled through lonely reservation lands, inching toward Mount Hood, with me trying to tail close behind a semi. Much of the time, I was only 20 or 30 feet from the large truck, and I still couldn’t see it! Both of us were crawling along, feeling our way down the road. The conditions were atrocious and Tom and I were hoping and praying we weren’t going to get stuck or have to double back.

At about 6:30, as we finally arrived at the pass, the snow was easing just a bit… and visibility was improving… and a collective sigh of relief was heaved in the minivan… well, at least by the adults who were paying attention. Of course, right then, all traffic halted in both directions. A downed tree was blocking the road and a vehicle had tried to drive over it and was stuck. The drivers of the trapped cars began a mad search for someone with a chain saw. Thankfully, this being Oregon and all, it didn’t take long! A wonderful guy in his Carhartt‘s had that fir cut into rounds and cleared off to the side of the road in no time.

We rolled down the windows of our van and all thanked him soundly and roundly, in unison, as we inched by, “…Ready, 1…2…3….Thank you for clearing the tree!!!” He laughed and waved back to us.

The quick and dirty: Cool boutique hotel on the inside, crappy post-mid-century modern (read: not attractive) beige building on the outside, with service that was mostly, but not entirely, “ept.”

For those of you who want more exhaustive details, then please keep reading below!

During our recent stint in Tacoma, we stayed at the Hotel Murano, which is owned by a regional upscale hotel chain. It is well located in the center of town and happens to be festooned with an amazing collection of glass art. The hotel itself is in a building that looks to have been erected in the 60s or 70s. So, while they have attractively rehabbed the interior, given what they had to work with, the exterior of the hotel is still less-than-compelling visually.

Pictured below is our standard king room. It was functional, well designed, the bed was comfortable, the view pleasant, and there were two great bathrobes, one of which actually fit Tom. (Often, when we travel, we are supplied with two robes that seem designed for Lilliputians.) We had a few quibbles: the phone didn’t work properly, nor did the television remote or the safe. We asked them to replace/fix the latter two issues, which they did speedily.

For lunch, we tried the hotel restaurant called Bite. I can say this about their food — what it lacks in excitement and quality, they make up for with portion size. The service, well, that’s a bit difficult to put my finger on. I guess it could best be described as accidentally brusque; I don’t think they realized they weren’t providing a good experience, if that makes any sense.

Some interesting features:

• They incorporate a bit o’ whimsy into the mundane. Their “do not disturb sign” says “tied up” instead. And, they have a notice in your room that informs you: “A copy of the News Tribune is included with your stay. If you do not wish to receive the newspaper, please contact the front desk for a $0.18 refund.”

• Each floor has an exhibit devoted to a single glass artist. Shown above is a corset from the artist on our floor: Susan Taylor Glasgow. I was enamored of this piece. She takes symbols related to the domestication of women and makes them into glass forms that are attached via non traditional methods, such as the stitching, shown here. Mesmerizing. (A snapshot of Susan working on this piece can be found below.)

• On the restaurant floor, there was an Argentinian glass artist named Miriam di Fiore, who now lives in Italy. Her work is captured in a photo below, as well.

• The lobby is very lively and appealing, with a bar, and also some fabulous works of art, such as the two canoes suspended from the ceiling.

• There is a seating area outside the lobby, along the sidewalk, with music piped in, an outdoor fireplace, and some cushy upholstered furniture. I was delighted to see a hotel trying to contribute to an active street scene in this way. Bravo!

Tom and I … Amtrak … Tacoma, Washington … no kids … overnight. I must say, we found ourselves entranced with the city’s historic architecture and glass art offerings.

Before our visit, I had no idea that Tacoma was Dale Chihuly‘s birthplace — he graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School. (A quick aside, Dale’s site is shockingly … well, retro … and not in a good way.) I had no idea that so much of his art was on display throughout the city. I had no idea there was a Museum of Glass devoted solely to glass art, right downtown.

And, I had no idea that said museum had a fully functional Hot Shop (glassblowing studio), complete with a guide narrating the action, in which you could sit and observe. In fact, their Web site has a live video feed of the Hot Shop, and you can even ask questions of the emcee online.

To get to the Museum of Glass, we walked across The Bridge of Glass, pictured below, on the left, which is an impressive connector between the beautifully restored, historic Union Station, and the very modern, cone-shaped museum.

There are a multitude of pieces by Chihuly on the overpass, a very impressive selection. The most visually imposing are the towering blue glass sculptures, called the Crystal Towers, that adorn the bridge, shown in two photos below. The towers were rather impressive in the sunlight, not so his remaining masterpieces on the walkway.

Enclosed in frames along one edge of the bridge is an arrangement called the Venetian Wall, featuring some of the largest hand blown works ever created. This exhibit was very poorly lit when we were there, which happened to be on a very bright, sunny day. The natural daylighting was not effective and everything looked washed out and sadly unspectacular. The Seaform Pavilion displays marine-inspired forms in an overhead installation, and again, they were very dull and muted. Both of these displays have artificial lighting for cloudy days and evening viewing. I would recommend the latter to truly enjoy the experience. (I had to play around with contrast on these pictures from the Seaform Pavilion to make them pop.)

Our first reaction to the displays: “They need to call Steve Wynn to jazz this up a bit — he knows how to light a Chihuly!!”

After passing over the bridge, it was off to the museum for us.

Two of the galleries were closed because they were installing new exhibits, so we entered with a discount and went to the Hot Shop, which was really riveting. We learned a ton while watching a team of blowers and an artist crafting pieces that were inspired by the cosmos.

We also toured the one open gallery, which contained, amongst other things, a neat program where they take fanciful children’s drawings and realize them in glass. The final exhibit includes a combined presentation of the child’s original picture and the derivative glass piece. Very entertaining, and technically, quite difficult for the artisans.

All in all, definitely worth a visit. We came away with a real respect for, and an abiding interest in, glass art.

Pictured here, in the center of Seattle, is the aptly named Lake Union, where Tom and I were married almost 13 years ago. We were joined in matrimony aboard a boat equipped with a grand piano and mirrored ceilings (rather elaborate for our wedding party of 8). As a group, we dubbed our party boat “The Disco Vilanti.”

Said ship was a bit handicapped when we were cruising due to it only having one functioning engine, which meant we were followed by a rescue vessel in case of emergency. And, there was the additional excitement (as if we needed more) of almost running aground at the end of our three hour tour. The docking mishap caused a mega freakout on the part of our marrying judge, and we had to keep on eye on her, lest she abandon ship and swim for shore.

All of this to say, we had a ball visiting Seattle this weekend with the Zs, playing tourist…something we rarely did when we lived there.

A bag of cinnamon doughnuts from the Daily Dozen in the market, we met Dee and Eric for brunch at Etta’s (the quality has gone way down, I am sorry to report), the girls put gum on the “gum wall” in Post Alley, we visited the aquarium, rode the monorail, and ascended to the top of the Space Needle, which, when it was built, was the tallest building west of the Mississippi.

Seattle is truly one of the most beautiful places in the world, and the city displayed itself to amazing effect on our little weekend trip for Zelda’s birthday.

Of course, the gorgeous Saturday shown in these pictures gave way to rain and fog for our early Sunday morning train ride back to Portland. My sandals were none too happy about the walk home from the train station in the misty rain.

We had the opportunity recently to chaperone a very interesting on-foot tour of some of Portland’s fabulous historic bridges. Zelda’s school scored Portland bridge historian, Sharon Wood Wortman, to lead the tour and it was informative for the pint-sized and adult-sized alike.

Thankfully, the weather cooperated and it didn’t rain. In fact, as you can see, we were blessed with big light for photos.

We started our tour at the Oregon Department of Transportation and got to check out all of their bridge cameras on the big screen. The kids were even more impressed with the remote-controlled conference table, where you could press a button, and the center of the table would rise up to reveal a bank of 12 phones to be used during weather/transportation emergencies.

Next, we walked over the Steel Bridge as a freight train rumbled past us, and off in the distance, we could see the Broadway Bridge just beginning to open. It was lovely.

These lucky third graders had the privilege of ascending into the the control tower of the Burnside Bridge, and they also got to lay down on the road while the bridge was opened next to them solely for their benefit. (I’m sure the commuters were wondering what the hell was going on — no boats coming through, bridge open, kids laying on the road screaming as if they were “road kill.”)

We learned:

• There are something like 781 Douglas Fir trees under the footings for the Burnside Bridge. (Those are waterproof and rated for 100 years, right?)
• The St. John’s Bridge was originally supposed to be painted with black and yellow stripes. (Thank God they went with the green.)
• The Broadway Bridge was the longest double leaf bascule bridge in the world when it was built.
• The Fremont Bridge is the second largest tied-arch bridge in the world.

First, let me open with a solemn vow that this will be my final Disney post for all time! No, really.

Now, I have not visited a Disney resort since I was a child, nor had I ever been to Disney World (us West Coasters are more fixated on the easier-to-bite-off Disneyland).

Therefore, from a professional perspective, I was very curious to experience Walt Disney’s vaunted service, as the company is generally considered to be amongst the best when people talk about paragons of the hospitality industry. Perhaps my expectations were too high, because I was surprisingly disappointed on many fronts.

WHAT THEY DO REALLY WELL. They are good at what I call the mechanics of keeping the parks running. They move people in and out of rides well, the fast pass system is great, they keep everything spotless, all of the staff are well trained, and there are always people running around dusting and painting.

On a side note, the overly perky employees did drive my oldest a bit nuts, with Zoe saying, “Mom, if Disney is where your wishes come true, then I wish that these people would quit calling me ‘princess’ everywhere I go.”

WHERE THEY DROP THE BALL. We stayed at their top category hotel, in the park, on the monorail. Their rack rate pricing was comparable with other 5 star luxury hotels, and I would have expected an experience similar to what you would receive for a similar price at the Wynn Las Vegas, a Ritz Carlton, or a Four Seasons. Alas, the Grand Floridian was not even close. The myriad ways that Disney dropped the ball:

1. We could make all of our dining reservations up to 6 months in advance, but their online system remained down and we had to do everything over the telephone.

2. We were never able to access our zillion reservations online (each of them with their own 5000 digit confirmation code — ridiculous).

3. They besprinkle their Web site with “WE ACCOMMODATE ALLERGIES.” Thus, we told the resort 3 months in advance that Zelda had nut allergies. Also, once we arrived, we called them again to remind them before our high tea. And, when we showed up for high tea, we reminded the waitress, who still plunked a peanut butter and jelly sandwich in front of Zelda. It took us four restaurant visits before we figured out that someone didn’t put our allergy information in the correct place in their pretty unimpressive computer system, which we finally got rectified. What I find unbelievable is that each time we had a problem, none of the Disney employees fixed the issue.

4. We showed up for a meal having reserved months in advance, for 7 people. When we got there, we were told by the maître d’ that the restaurant couldn’t seat parties of 7. I asked them how their information system could possibly accept a reservation for that amount if the restaurant couldn’t seat us together? He had no good answer and decided to go with rude and unhelpful. In response, I got a little shirty, as I’m wont to do and said, “really, you can’t fit seven people together…can I take a look?” He let me in the room and, lo and behold, there was a banquette of seats against the wall with 3 small tables that could be pushed together. Utterly ridiculous.

5. It was chilly there this winter, but there was really no functional heating…anywhere. It was usually colder inside than outside.

6. They had no wireless Internet available for the rooms. You could connect, for a fee, via Cat5 cable, but even that only worked one of the nights out of seven. Disney outsources their Internet access, so no one who worked for the hotel could ever help or do anything to assist us. They kept referring us to their outside vendor, who was useless. It’s 2010, I’m paying a fortune for my room, I want functional Internet access.

WHERE THEY ARE GOING. As I talked about previously, Disney is in a tough place. They have eschewed really crazy thrill rides for experiential and animatronic rides. Unfortunately, technology is changing at such a pace that it’s hard for them to keep up. If they build a 3D movie experience, for instance, it is outdated within a year or two.

The way they seem to be dealing with this is to offer cool live shows. Hollywood Studios is a prime example. Another of the newer parks at Disney World, it was a family favorite. They had a few real thrill rides, like the Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster that goes from 0 to 60 mph in 2.8 seconds. But mostly, the park is built around live shows, like the Indiana Jones stunt show and the Lights, Motors Action car/motorcycle stunt show. Both were quite enjoyable.