A cabin crew to give you pause! They’re all here, if in a little disarray. Alban is in the co-pilot’s seat on the right, and Alex is behind Charlie’s upside down plane card!
This summer vacation in 2000 started with a flight from San Francisco to Memphis, and on to Orlando. It was no ordinary flight . . . .
We all want to thank Northwest Airlines, and the pilot of their flight from San Francisco to Memphis in the morning of August 15, 2000, for inviting the children into his cockpit and daring to let them all sit there! That gesture gave our Florida vacation a great start. Our pilot and co-pilot were particularly appreciative.
Co-pilot in action!!
August is not exactly high season in Florida. One reason is that it’s the hurricane season, which interested rather than dissuaded our group. Another is that it can be stifling and hot, which again did not give us pause: some like it hot.
But what tilted the balance, apart from our need to fit vacations into the kids’ school holidays, was the low air fares relative to flying to Europe. Imagine paying for eight tickets every time your family gets on a plane!!
Co-pilot in action!
We spent twelve days baking in the sun and exploring this incredible combination of tourist attractions and natural beauty. It doesn’t sound like a lot of time, and 12 days wasn’t really long enough, but there was something for each of us everywhere we went.
One of the high spots was the jet ski that we rented for an hour or two outside the hotel on Key Biscayne. It’s not on the move in the photos, but when it was, it moved pretty fast!
Marie-Hélène seriously enjoyed this little excursion. The jet ski convinced her to swim in the sea, not a common or garden occurrence!
On a jet ski, the sea was not as calm as it looked. There were storms and strong winds circulating offshore which agitated the sea, even where we were, very close in.On a choppy sea, that jet ski was a blast!
Charlie kept telling me to slow down on this ride! The jet ski bounced, even on that calm sea, and there were times when it thumped as it landed.
Marie-Hélène took the first shift, and then the rest of us all took turns. Another photo of the jet ski is on this page, our summary of 2000.
We also went, of course, to Disney World. It was our only trip there, and everyone loved it. Our first few nights in Florida were spent at a fabulous Holiday Inn in Orlando built to house families like us visiting the theme parks. It had suites decorated with cartoon characters for children and enormous swimming pools which seemed to be everywhere we walked. We all fit in one two-bedroom suite.
Charlie and Alex sharing a heart-warming complicity in a restaurant in Downtown Disney.
Driving to the hotel from the airport was a preview of the visit. It was a very warm and very dark night. The airport was an island of bright white and sparkling neon in a sea of surprising blackness, until we started seeing the hotels approaching Disney World. Once we arrived, we couldn’t resist a little exploration even though it was late already. It was odd seeing the strong metal fencing around the entire hotel complex, all white for some reason, and carrying notices about making sure that the alligators kept to their side!
The pools were a big hit with the younger set. Balancing our time between romping in the hotel swimming pools and touring the Disney parks, not to forget choosing the park for the day, kept us all busy.
Splashes from water rides made for great cooling! From left to right, in the forefront of the splash, are Alban, Nick and Tom.
We also needed to keep cool: it was very hot the whole time we were there. The pools solved that problem effortlessly. In the parks, our crew were more creative, and solved the problem in various ways. Nothing like needing spray for inspiring youthful creativity!
After leaving Orlando, we drove down to Miami and Key Biscayne, where we stayed at a wonderful hotel, the Sonesta Beach Resort. It had been found for us by the travel agent at the law firm where I was working at the time, and she made a great find! Again, it boasted a swimming pool to die for, visible in the photo on the left and here.
Again in the water, this time in the pool at the Sonesta Beach Resort. At no other time during our entire 16 years did Marie-Hélène spend so long in the water!
All we did all day long at that hotel was hang around the pool, and maybe walk along the beach every once in a while. “Those lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer!” We didn’t have a lot of those when many or all of us were together, but this was one of those times!
On we moved again, because I tend to keep moving. Marie-Hélène would rather stay put most of the time, but she too enjoyed exploring strange places, and Florida is definitely strange, in ways that are hard to pinpoint. Partly it’s all that nature, and partly it’s the feel of spring break in the air almost constantly. Maybe it all comes down to the heat.
At Kennedy Space Center. Look how tanned they all are!
As the State Tourist Board will certainly tell you, Florida is not all sun and sea. Driving between Orlando and Key Biscayne, we found the time to visit one of the other major attractions, the Kennedy Space Center. This is the home of the USA’s biggest and brightest accomplishment of the 20th Century, putting a man on the moon. Here he is on the right, with Alban, Charles and Daphné.
Back to the sun and the sea, we also drove through Palm Beach, one of the wealthy resorts, and admired the villas. A strangely crowded place.
The artist himself.
And how many of you know that the Salvador Dali Museum is in St Petersburg, Florida? It’s “(t)he world’s most comprehensive collection of the works of Salvador Dali”, which is interesting and, dare I say it, strange. In short, it fits perfectly in Florida, and can be found at http://www.salvadordalimuseum.org/.
We visited the museum, at Marie-Hélène’s instigation, and it was most impressive and as enjoyable to watch as was Dali himself. Here he is on the left, flaunting his later years, in a picture which is NOT ours, by the way.
The natural wonder of the vacation was the Everglades, which we drove across to the Gulf (west) Coast. They are a kind of shallow inland sea, with trees and bushes growing all over as if on land. Enticing and, dare I say it, strange. There are also alligators in Florida, and we saw a few crossing the Everglades. But due to a lack of moral fiber, when we found them off the side of the road we did not seek photographic opportunities. They were big, and looked prehistoric. We are neither big nor prehistoric, and felt that keeping our distance was the more sensible approach.
Safer than an alligator!!
Instead, we found this miniature post office off the side of the road a few miles later on, and boldly took its picture. Isn’t it cute? We don’t have to ask why it serves so few people. The Everglades were already occupied when people arrived. The earlier occupants have very big teeth!
Alban wrote an amazing little summary of this vacation as a school report after we returned. It is reproduced here.
Here are five of us on the infamous “train fou” at Disneyland Paris in 1996. Marie-Hélène must have been taking care of Charlie, not yet a year old. This was one of the photos available to purchase at the end of the ride. Alban has his hands up on my left, Tom is on my other side, Nick is acting cool (he had figured out when the camera was going to flash) and Daphné was definitely having fun.
But nothing that you can buy gave this family more pleasure during our early years together than The Walt Disney Company. Which is quite something if you think about it.
The rides were key. The parents loved the decor and the ambiance, the places in the warm to share a pot of tea (this was in Europe, people!), the wonderful stores, and we did like the rides. For the children, the rides were it, the “sine qua non,” “la raison d’être,” and all those other fancy phrases. The rides were the whole point of the place.
A slower ride, but still it attracted the children and we rode this horse-drawn tram several times.
So much so that when I mentioned to Alban in early 2011 that I was updating the Disney pages here, he reminded me that only Nick could ride on Space Mountain in Paris. I had completely forgotten that. Alban was between five and eight years old during our annual passport period in Paris. Sometimes he claims to barely remember going there during those years. But I mention Disneyland in Paris, and whoosh, straight to the point he goes! The big brother had a big privilege, just because he was taller than the others. The injustice remains.
But you people running Disney, if you should happen upon all our enthusiasm for what you do, please take note. Three days admission to the theme parks at Disney World during the summer of 2000 cost us over $800, and that was with some creative accounting! Isn’t there anything that you can do to keep it down a bit for large families? We’re a relatively rare breed in the US, and a little help, a little thought on your part, would make all the difference.
Alban, as happy as a clam in the “boules” in Anaheim It’s all an attraction!
In fact, we did not make a collective visit with all the children to any Disney Park after that 2000 visit. In part, that’s because the parks are just not as convenient to us in Santa Cruz as they were to us in Paris: the closest, the original in Anaheim, is an eight-hour drive or a flight away. In part, that’s because our adolescents would rather have eaten dirt than accompany their loving parents anywhere! That’s perhaps a little strong: but after they became teenagers, it was clear doing things with the parents was simply less of a priority.
It was March 1999, and this was Alex’s second visit to the original Disneyland in Anaheim. Here he is at a year old with his maman and Alban on a caterpillar ride.
But all of them liked Disney and had warm memories of Disneyland in Paris. Each of them would likely have gone with us to Anaheim if we could have brought along one of his or her friends. Because the cost would have added up to too much, we never offered to bring their friends too (in the US, that is: we did bring their friends at times in Paris), and as a result our teenagers rarely went at all. There’s a little commercial subtlety missing here. In short, Disney people, you’re missing out on a definite potential clientèle.
But in any event, we didn’t have the same relationship with Disney after leaving France. Things had changed. We spent two years living apart, with Nick and Tom in Paris with their mom, and the rest of us in Santa Cruz. Something about that separation kept us away from Disney: at least, that and the eight-hour drive each way kept us at a distance. Another explanation for that sorry state of affairs is here.
In Paris in October 1995. Dumbo!
Our first visit to the original Disneyland in Anaheim, the closest one to our new home in Northern California, came at Christmas1998. Daphné and Alban were visiting Pierre, their father, in St Germain, near Versailles, for the holidays, and Nick and Tom, still living with Sunshine in Paris, were visiting us in Santa Cruz. This was only the fourth time that they had visited us since we moved to the US. At less than a year old, this was Alex‘s first visit to Disneyland, and our first almost collective visit since arriving in the US.
All eight of us finally went together to Disneyland in Anaheim in March of 1999, when Nick and Tom again came to visit. Daphné and Alban were not visiting their father this time. So we could all go together. Finally. It had been 21 months since we left behind our regular visits to Disneyland in Paris.
Below are a selection of rides in a selection of Disney parks.
Another shot during our collective visit to Disneyland in Anaheim in March 1999. Daphné, Alban and Nick are turning, turning, turning at the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party.
This is the truck in the MGM Studios backlot at Disney World in Florida that gets washed away by a flood as you watch. They told us how many gallons of water splash down and make up the flood, but we forget. Sorry!
Okay, there are flaws in any system, including my memory, and I have no idea which ride this was. I do know how happy all the children were, because I can see it!
Some of the rides, you don’t even need to ride on. Tom, Alban and Nick climbing in September 1995.
Here’s the same ride as the top left photo, but in a different park: Alban Nick, Tom and Daphné with Paul Prache in Marne-la-Vallée in early 1997.
This ride was always a favorite: “it’s a small world after all!” October 1996, in Disneyland Paris.
Finally, here’s one of Cath and Jim Stock, my parents, at the original Disneyland in Anaheim in 1976, roughly. They’re in front of the Matterhorn. That’s a ride, and that’s my sole slim justification for fitting this photo on this page!
Dad was 50 or 51 here, and mum 48 or 49. They loved touring California.
They had come over to visit their son and heir, while I was studying at UC Berkeley, and we drove up and down the California coast together. Disneyland was a required stop. I’d been an occasional visitor since my year at Whittier College (1974-5), and knew that they would love it. They did!
Disneyland was then and is now required viewing, whatever your age or style.
Here’s a Mickey that looks a little familiar, in December 1998 at Disneyland in Anaheim . . . . It was our first trip to Disneyland since arriving in Santa Cruz in the summer of 1997. Charlie was three. Fun time!
Check out the sweater!
When our older children were regular visitors at the Paris Disneyland, they each had Disney sweaters, and wore them if we could arrange that. I had one too, and wore it regularly, in the park and outside it.
We bought Disney mugs in the Disney store, one each time we found one that we liked, for the colors or the imagery, for our morning hot chocolate and coffee. We bought Disney swords and shields and other costumes for the children’s parties and disguises.
In 2005, I even bought a leather Disney jacket, which is still (in 2011) my favorite jacket. It commemorates each decade’s anniversary of Disneyland in Anaheim, Walt Disney’s original and extraordinary vision, the tenth, twentieth, thirtieth, fortieth and fiftieth. My first visit was during 1975, the twentieth year, and that 2005 visit was during the fiftieth year.
Here is Tom celebrating his fifth birthday with Minnie, again at Disneyland in Paris. This restaurant was called the California Grill.
Mostly, the jacket was a memento of those wonderful years that we spent, the six of us (or seven after Charlie arrived) on annual passports at Disneyland in Paris. The sweaters are all long gone, and our coffee mugs have mostly broken over the years, and been thrown out. There are a few costumes, or pieces of costumes, left in the costume bins in Alex’s closet, but they’re pretty much gone too. There’s not a lot left of those early years. But I’ve got my jacket, and look after it very carefully.
That’s the only reason now for four Disney pages in this collection of family memories, if you think about it. We rarely go at all any more. Everybody’s gotten older and nobody’s that interested, certainly not in going together. But it’s very important to keep track of the good things. For our little troupe, this was a big one.
Here’s Goofy, or “Dingo” in French. You will notice that the parents were as happy to meet the local residents as were the children! We know, we were older even then, but getting into the spirit of the thing was so much fun!
Daphné was always particularly fond of the “personages,” as she called the Disney characters. (Remember, she didn’t speak a word of English until we moved to California). She would see one across the street or appearing somewhere in the distance, and she would squeal the name and zoom over. There was a lot of squeal and zoom in Daphné’s young life: the squeals were loud and the zooms were fast!
On a few occasions, the four children set themselves the task of acquiring as many signatures of Disney characters as they could during a day’s visit. Little autograph books were obtained for each of them, and little pencils, and off they would charge, here and there (or zoom, in Daphné’s case) pursuing characters and competing madly with each other.
The other parent, equally embraced. “Dingo” was all-round affectionate!
It was an interesting task, because the characters’ appearances in different locations were tightly timed and choreographed, and sometimes one or other character would be obliged to leave as abruptly as she or he had appeared. If one of our four was distracted elsewhere, then that autograph was missed, and great pain resulted. For a few seconds. Then one or other of the four would lose interest or leave the autograph book in a café or want to go on a ride, and that would be that.
Years later, at Christmas 1998, we are still friends with the characters, in this case Nick and Tom with Rafiki:
Still years later, this time during September 2003, we are back at Disneyland, with each of Charlie and Alex exploring illusion and, needless to say, having fun.
We visit Disney parks less often now that we live eight hours away, rather than one hour, and now that the older children have no interest in going there with the parents, but they remain Magic Kingdoms.
Not to forget the Disney Rides. Or the main Disney Page. Or the decor.
This website started out of my hobby of putting together themed photograph albums every two or three years.
A page with a “Canada” theme in that first 1979 photo album: memories of my time in Canada in 1971-2 were still strong.
The hobby started in 1979: I graduated from UC Berkeley that year, and the first album revolved around my years there. Also, Sue Blanc and I had separated in 1978 after five years together, and she too was a major theme of the album.
There were a total of four Canada pages in this first album, reflecting how significant my time there had felt. This one was of the First Edmonton International Pop Festival in 1972.
The themes in that first album, as well as in the later albums, were a way to look at the years each covered and the people who shared those years.
I didn’t plan the themes in advance, or did so very little, but as I put each album together, I needed a way to organize the photos so that they weren’t just a jumble scattered over the pages. Some themes were of family members, and some had a historical or geographic focus.
I didn’t have a lot of photos to work from until around 1980. At that point, after the first summer of law school, I bought my first Nikon 35mm camera, and began to take photographs more consistently. But that initial 1979 album was put together out of the occasional rolls of film taken with the family Kodak cameras. Remember them? 12 0r 20 photos in each roll, 126 or 110 format, pretty good photos if you held the camera still and the subject was within its focal range: the good old days!
“Wheels,” one of the minor themes in the 1979-82 photo album. This page covered work, as a long-distance lorry driver in England in 1973, and as a Humphrey Go-Bart driver at Cal in 1976-70.
After that first album, I put together photo albums in much the same format covering subsequent years, three or four years per album. Each was again organized by themes, with pages devoted to a particular person or holiday or period.
There was one key problem with these albums, which I was rather proud of and wanted to show off to people: no-one was that interested! I remember enthusiastically pulling one or two albums out on a few occasions for lucky guests, only to notice that their eyes and minds wandered much more readily than I would have liked. After a while, I didn’t bother to bring them out any more: they were after all very personal.
I was late getting to the next album, which should have been done in by 1995 if I had kept up with the earlier schedule. But what with Marie-Hélène and I getting together and blending our new family, I did not finally get around to compiling the next album until 2000.
This page of the 1979-82 album covers arriving at law school. Mum and dad drove me up to New Haven, which was much appreciated.
The wait had a significant incidental benefit. By 2000, the possibility was there for a complete amateur like me to prepare the next album digitally. So I did.
It took a little arranging: scanners (both photo and negative) made digitizing photos doable with pretty good quality, and then Microsoft Front Page made it easier to create a photo album on the web. Adobe Photoshop Elements helped format and improve the photos, as well as prepare them for display on the web.
The first version of this web site was the six years from 1994 through 2000, organized on the web in much the same way as it would have been organized on paper, except that organizing pages on the web made them more accessible than on paper.
Doing so was worth it from day one because it enabled the selected family photographs to be shared with everyone in the family who wanted to see them, with no diminution in quality, on their own PCs and then on their own phones. I discovered that the children in particular were much more likely to look at and share this new family photograph album when the parents were not there. This should not have been a surprise!
Over the years that original digital album has grown and grown, with periods and themes added, regular improvements in the quality of the photos reflecting technological advances through broadband internet access, and continuous editing and rearranging. It’s an addictive hobby!
Sue and I shared this house on Alcatraz Avenue in North Oakland for our first two years at Cal, our last two years together. Ups and downs.
The old paper albums sit on their shelves, benignly neglected except for when I browse through them. This digital album actually gets a consistent if modest amount of traffic.
I have become more chatty. 2004 was one visible transition point, because almost a year of unplanned free time enabled me to add new pages, and to focus on elaborating the old, starting to make them part of a journal as much as part of a photo album.
Moving forward after 2004, I consistently gave more detail, adding the year-end summaries of our lives sent to family and friends during the Holiday season, trying to tell something more of our constant and evolving little stories.
A page from the last paper photograph album, from 1990 to 1992, before Marie-Hélène and I moved in together. It is Christmas 1990, and Nick (then four years old) and Tom (just one) had a blast!
I started the current version in 2011, to bring the family photograph album on the web into the present, and beautify it a bit, by converting it out of Microsoft’s Front Page. The site was looking dated, and Microsoft had put the last nail in its coffin by “discontinuing support” for its apparent dinosaur. Some kind of technical migration was required.
The new format is WordPress, recommended by Sol Lipman when he was still at NextSpace.
With Sol in the NextSpace cafe in 2013.
Our family’s collective story together was over when the site was converted. Correcting and reformatting the conversion, I found myself going back, looking at it all afresh, rewriting just about everything.
I went through every photograph that I could find from the 16 years that we had been together – a ton of photos, because I’ve always kept them carefully, organized by date in boxes (for the earlier photos printed from negatives) or file folders (for the later digital photos) – and sorted through and added many to those already on the site. There were new photos which added context or an anecdote, there were new photos for new themes, and there new photos which simply helped complete our portraits and stories, the portraits and stories of the eight of us and our almost 16 years together.
Every family moves on. Not every family has such a record of who it was over the years. That’s what this hobby has given each of us.
For our family as for the world, which had been dreading some bizarre kind of computer meltdown with the start of the new millenium, Y2K passed pretty much without dramatic incident. Accordingly, this year’s annual update was less interesting than some. So we’re going to add to it here and there. There were a lot of great photos, and we’ll add some more of them.
Alban showing unbridled enthusiasm. Not only was he in Disney World, he was also about to convince us to buy him some sweets. Could you resist that smile?!
First, before every Christmas, the children have been convinced to write to Father Christmas to affirm how good they’ve been during the year and state a few preferences when it comes to gifts. Here is a letter to Father Christmas dated December 15, 2000:
Cher Père Noel,
Cette année, je voudrais te demander beaucoup de choses parce que j’ai été très patiente avec mon mari malgré tout ce qu’il m’a fait subir.
J’ai aussi supporté les enfants et si tu vivais ici Père Noel, tu saurais que ce n’est pas facile. Je te fais donc la liste complète mais tu n’es pas obligé de tout apporter tout de suite, je pourrais attendre jusqu’à la Saint Valentin pour le reste :
–un canapé club en cuir marron
Alban in his role of family scamp, guiding his little brothers on skateboards down the driveway. This driveway is steep! Skateboarding is a parent’s nightmare!
– une chemise de nuit blanche en dentelle tout coton
– un humidificateur d’air pour ma chambre
–un meuble pour cacher l’horrible téléviseur qui enlaidit le salon et ramollit le cerveau déjà atteint des enfants
–un casque sans fil pour écouter la télévision sans déranger les ronfleurs (mon cerveau est en bon etat)
–un ensemble de huit belles chaises pour la salle-à-manger, afin que l’on puisse tous etre assis.
You’re right: that was not actually from a child! It was funny, as you will know if you read French. I’m afraid to admit that this modest list took years to fulfill. In 2007, she finally got the chairs!
On to the Christmas 2000 Holiday letter.
Charlie with his preferred number from day one, 5, kicking the ball around with Paul Gooch in front of the garage during the summer of 2000. Paul was there to work on the house. Charlie was thrilled to find an adult to play with.
HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYBODY!!!!
It’s the season to recount our blessings!! If you want to recount with us, you can look up family photographs at www.zinzins.net, our website. The site’s not far along, to be honest, but there are a bunch of photos up there already.
Our furniture finally arrived from France, after three years of Tison’s (the moving company’s) trying to blackmail us into paying double the initial estimate. The furniture makes us feel finally at home, and reconnects us with the years gone by. The worst thing was not having our photos, which we’re now scanning into computer format. The one of my mum and dad at Disneyland in 1976 is quite something!
Alex’s second birthday in January. Happy birthday!!
Nonetheless, all of the kids’ toys and clothes have been outgrown, depriving our older kids of a part of their childhood. Bravo Tison!! We hope that you are proud.
Let’s not dwell on Tison SA, the lying cheating moving company in Coignières or Maurepas, depending on the year, and especially not on M. Arnaud Bourlé, Tison’s undersized guiding force, or should I say chief sleazebag!
For once, we took a summer vacation elsewhere than in France. It was a bit of a risk, because Marie-Hélène needs her annual taste of her homeland. But she spent four days in Paris early in the year, and we all decided that a fortnight in Florida would be an acceptable alternative.
Marie-Hélène did not want to get wet here. So she offered to take pictures of the rest of us, and did a great job! At Disney World, from left to right, it’s Nick, Alban (both drenched), Papa, Charlie and Daphné.
And off to Disney World we went! Three days in three different theme parks gave the kids something else to argue about (that was the best ride! No this was! You know the style). Not to forget Miami, where we spent a few nights in a lovely hotel on Key Biscayne, and Charlie started swimming by himself and without floats, just before his fifth birthday.
Nick started High School this year, and Daphne‘s in her last year of junior high. We are NOT getting older but COLLEGE IS GETTING CLOSER!!
These are the good years, the good old days, but how will we pay for the follow on?! Alban and Tom start junior high next year as well. And we have another brood starting out, Charlie in kindergarten and Alex at Holy Cross pre-school two days a week.
Charlie with his buddie Brigette at the table in the breakfast nook.
Charlie has already informed us that he prefers school to home, which we like to believe is a comment on our marvelous Happy Valley School (and little Brigette in his class) more than on the home! Home can be a bit rough at times, though. The normal petty jealousies and squabbling do get magnified in a “blended” family.
Nick turned 14 this year, and his teenage tendencies were definitely on an upsurge. Here is an excerpt from one his school projects at Branciforte Junior High School:
Once upon a time there was a teacher (who shall remain unnamed), a rather nice teacher that, instead of a final exam, thought of the idea of making his students build a car. This car would have to move six meters with an egg as its passenger. If the egg fell or broke, then the car did not make the final exam.
Here’s a happy Tom. Moving back with us was a hard transition for him. He missed his mom in Paris.
I rather liked this idea but the trouble was that the student had to write a report that was to be about twelve pages long, which made the teacher not 100% nice. I, one of those poor students, was one of those martyrs that had to write an endlessly long report.
I left Wilson Sonsini. It is a fabulous firm, but for one reason and another (mostly tied to my being an outsider here after ten years in France), I was in a box there. I am now working for a chip company (the semiconductor, not vinegar variety!), consulting for the first UK law firm to open a Silicon Valley office (Osborne Clarke, from Bristol) and on the Advisory Board of a net translation start-up. This is the best place in the world for an international lawyer that likes to do deals.
Nick with his first PC, and Alban on the temporary Costco mattress that served as a bed until the furniture arrived later in the year.
Another year banging along in the express train of our lives, our only real regret those we have lost along the way. All the best to you and yours!
* * * *
On to another writing from 2000, this one by Alban, reporting at school on his summer vacation in Florida. I’m leaving it exactly as he wrote it, around his 11th birthday, after only three years in an English-speaking country at an English-speaking school. Quite an extraordinary achievement.
When we went on the plane to Florida this summer, we had such a pretty view that I stayed in front of the window the whole way. We had one transfer in Memphis, Tennessee, that was when the first flight ended. We had to change plane on our way to Orlando, Fl. Once we arrived there, it was burning hot although it was late at night. We quickly rented a car with climatisation and drove towards our hotel.
An early morning limo ride to the airport, on our way to Florida. There were a few difficult moments on this trip. You can almost sense one here.
There were two pools, both closed so we went to the rooms that was so cold that we all froze in a second. Except for that, it was all perfect. The next morning, we woke up at seven o’clock to dive into the swimming pool. We stayed in the hot pool for an hour that seemed like five minutes.
We then had breakfast with our parents. I really enjoyed the all-you can-eat meals they served. When we were full from eating, we went to Disneyworld. Everybody knows how fun it is. We did all the crazy rides, like Thunder Mountain or the Tower of Terror, a twelve-story drop that is my favorite of all times.
Changing riders on the jet ski off Key Biscayne. Good times!! Nick at the back is getting off, to make way for Alban, in the water. Tom stayed on for one more bumpy ride.
The second day, we headed to the Magic Park, my mom’s favorite between the four different parks, and did the Small World attraction, with its well-known song.
Then we got ice cream because we were very, very hot. Back to the hotel, back to the swimming-pool, back to sleep. The third night, after the closing of the park, we explored the town that was very fun. The fun ended when we got lost but we were soon back on the right track.
Tom with Alex in the wonderful pool at the Sonesta Beach Resort, Key Biscayne.
We left Disneyland on the fourth day to visit Miami where the hotel had a pool and the Ocean right next to it . We went on a jet ski ride which was lots of fun, because there were waves, so we jumped several times.
Apart from going to see the alligators, the Cape Kennedy Center and the Salvador Dali Museum, we spent the rest of the vacation in the swimming-pool or in the Atlantic, stopping only when brief, but violent and frequent storms arrived.
