Vacation in Florida?

I can hardly believe it, but it looks like we're going to have a vacation after all! I'm excited, but also a bit scared, since we really cannot afford to spend much. The plane tickets for me and the boys are award travel from our miles and my husband had a voucher that he needed to use before September and which covered half the price of his airfare. That's why we are going in the first place.

We have many Brazilian friends who moved from Massachusetts to Florida in the past two years and we have been looking forward to visiting them for a long time. We wanted to go only for 10 days, but ended up having to book a ticket for two whole weeks because those were the only dates available for award travel. Since we just can't stay at our friends' house for two whole weeks, we're thinking of spending the first week in Orlando, a place that I thought we were going to visit only when the boys were much older to enjoy it fully and when we had more money to spend on vacations.

I have been there twice, first in June 1993 with my husband (then boyfriend, almost fiancee) and his family when we visited almost every theme park, and in June 1997 with my mom and dad (we only went to three parks). Every time I went I always had a very critical evaluation of those places, particularly the Di*sney ones (I don't really like Dis*ney). My sons only know who Mickey is because they have a pair of (Brazilian) flip-flops with his picture in them. Those were a gift, since I avoid buying clothes, shoes, and toys with any characters on them, though I have to concede that I made an exception for Elmo (one T-shirt), andThomas (a T-shirt and underwear - an attempt to suceed at potty training). We also own and some Sesame Street toys and Thomas trains.

I really enjoyed our visits to Sea Wo*rld but I feel really torn about those beautiful animals and their captivity. I don't think they can be "happy," no matter how large those tanks for the whales and dolphins may be. Because of the shows, I fell they are a bit like Circus animals, though perhaps better treated... I don't know. As for the other parks, I always see them as a huge stores pressing all kinds of useless stuff on the tourists with a few fun and even informational rides or pavillions here and there. Of course we never buy anything, but just paying the absurdly expensive admission price makes me feel guilty of wasting money.

Oh, well... we can always just enjoy our hotel and go sightseeing leisurely at other places as well as visit friends (we also have a few friends who live close to Orlando), we do deserve a vacation after all. There's a small catch, though - hubby says that I need to have mostly finished the first draft of the dissertation, so I have to stop blogging right now and go back to work!! :)

One last thing - I just hope there's no hurricane while we're there!!