.........Here's the rest of the gang, from left to right: Manuela, (our niece from Italy), Claudio, (our son-in-law - originally from Brazil, Sonia, (our daughter) , Settimio, (hubby), and Mario in the red shirt, (Manuela's boyfriend from Spain.) Waiting for one of the boats that Disney provides free of charge to take tourists to it's Theme Parks. This was Manuela's 2nd trip to the USA to visit us, but her first trip to Florida. It was Mario's first trip to the U.S.

........Still waiting for the boat to take us to Magic Kingdom ...and all still in good spirits, who wouldn't be!!? You can also get to the Disney parks by car, bus or Monorail. The Disney resort here is called "The Boardwalk" and is beautiful like all the Disney Resorts and Parks.











....Here I am, on Main Street, happy to finally arrive at Magic Kingdom, one of my favorite of all Disney Parks, and they already had it all decked out for the holidays. After all it was November, and the weather was great!!

...........SONIA IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN - WELL, ALMOST!! This is a beautiful Photo Spot at Sea World, and one of my favorite pictures from Florida! But to me MOST of Florida looks almost this gorgeous! AND SONIA LOOK GORGEOUS HERE TOO!!!

........OUR NIECE MANUELA AGAIN, WITH HER SPANISH BOYFRIEND, AT MAGIC KINGDOM. THEY SPENT 10 DAYS WITH US IN ORLANDO AND THE CLEARWATER, FL AREA AS WELL.
The castle is at the end of this "Main Street".

........I guess this is called "Cinderella's Castle" but I'm not sure. I do know that the gold touches were added more recently, as if it's not pretty enough as it is!! There isn't much inside of it to see, though, I think I remember a few stores in there, that's all.

.......We also went on an Animal Safari jeep ride, but we never saw any animals as colorful as this pair of parrots!

At Animal Kingdom there is everything from delicate flamingos to Not-So delicate gorillas!

We got some good photos of these gorillas, but what I remember most of all about them was the awful SMELL!

..........Sonia and Claudio with me in the middle with the hideous hair (which turned out orange in the sun!) I am going back to much darker hair again - there aren't so many nasty surprises that way!! Behind us is the newest thrill ride at Animal Kingdom that none of us would go on!

.........THE TREE OF LIFE, AT ANIMAL KINGDOM. This is an incredible Work of Art, with sculptured animals of all kinds carved into the trunk. Not a real tree, of course, but what's even more neat is the huge cavern inside which holds a theater where they show a 3-D movie called "A BUG'S LIFE" - which has a lot of little surprises!! This is a Must-See, and the kids will love it!

.......THE PARADES AND THE SHOWS AT MAGIC KINGDOM !!

........Well, at least he got the entire castle and the entire Christmas Tree in this photo, which is what I asked! This was an especially spectacularly beautiful area of Magic Kingdom; there were also vast and gorgeous gardens of flowers and bushes to the right that you can't see.

........ CLAUDIO LOVES TAKING PICTURES, ....ESPECIALLY OF HIMSELF!

........Sonia had the idea of us all going to CLEARWATER, FL (where she & Claudio had been several times before), because they loved the white sandy beaches, wildlife , and restaurants there. They even own a small 16 foot boat they dragged all the way there to use!! But that was nothing to them, because they dragged their boat all the way TO FLORIDA FROM MILWAUKEE, WI, behind their car, a trip of approx. ONE THOUSAND miles! (22 hours of driving ). We drove behind them all the way in 2005, to make sure all went well. So anyway, off we headed for Clearwater (2 hours drive from Orlando) where we hoped we would find GREAT SHELLS like this!! (Sonia found these on one of her trips to the Coast).

WE ALSO HOPED WE WOULD FIND BEAUTIFUL BIRDS LIKE THIS......AND

MAYBE EVEN HAVE A DOLPHIN ENCOUNTER OF THE CLOSE KIND!!

OF COURSE WE HOPED TO EAT SOME SCRUMPTIOUS FOOD IN THE MANY FINE RESTAURANTS THERE.....

AND WE WEREN'T DISAPPOINTED !!! WE HAD LESS THAN 3 DAYS THERE, BUT WE FOUND ALL OF THIS AND MORE!! WE ALSO MADE A STOP AT TAMPA ON OUR WAY HOME, WHERE WE CHECKED OUT THE CUBAN COMMUNITY & SHOPS IN "LITTLE CUBA". THE FOOD WAS GREAT, AND SO WAS THE COMPANY! IT WAS NICE TO BE WITH PEOPLE WHO KNEW THEIR WAY AROUND FLORIDA SO WELL, FOR HAVING BEEN THERE ONLY 2 YEARS.

.......SO HERE WE ARE, just arrived! As I said, Clearwater, FL is known for its sandy WHITE beaches, and as you can see, it's true!! I am on the right, next to Manuela, ----you can't see our feet but that sand was HOT and the reflection of the sun off that white sand almost blinded us!!

This is the condo we rented for 2 days. It was immaculate, beautiful and BIG! - Sonia, Claudio, Mario & Manuela are in the background.

SUCH LUXURY!! I wish we had one of these jacuzzis at home!!

The kitchen/dining area, which of course we never used since we ate out both days!

So ya wanna come in and cool off by the pool?? But there was no time for swimming either.... We had lots of unique little towns to visit like the Greek town near Clearwater, which is known for their good food and sea sponge industry. This was also where I bought some sea shells because I wasn't having much luck finding good ones on our beach-combing expeditions. We took drives up and down the coast, saw all the gorgeous homes, and later visited "Little Cuba" in Tampa where Mario bought a big box of Cuban cigars for his father.

......At this boat docking area we got on a tourist boat which took us around the Clearwater Bay area. It was fun but rather tame. What we really wanted was to take that "Thriller" boat ride, (the wet and wild one!!!) But it was temporarily unavailable.

I've NEVER seen a PELICAN in Wisconsin, I'm not sure if we have them, but they're all over the Florida coastal areas. We even saw a bunch of them trying to steal the newly caught fish that the fishermen were cleaning and cutting up on the dock. They were quite persistent about it too, in spite of getting shooed away.

These were some of the sights we saw on that boat ride. We also stopped on patch of land in the waters along the way, and extremely small island, I guess you could call it. But even there we couldn't find any good shells. Too picked over by the tourists on a daily basis.

Of course, we passed some boats along the way too, including this PIRATE BOAT! (for the Tourists)

We passed a lot of rich homes, including one of John Travolta's homes, the guide said. It cost who knows how many millions of dollars, but he said Mr. Travolta only uses it 2 weeks out of the year!!

......The photo of me at the pool is out of place, but I wanted to squeeze in some more photos here of the birds I found so interesting on the beach & everywhere. When we were in our condo & hotels, we left the balcony door open, and they would often fly right by us, and almost into our room!!


The 2 photos above show what I was talking about - how the various birds, but especially the Pelicans, annoyed the fishermen by pecking at the fish that they caught!


We were lucky to get this great shot. I have some of pretty sunsets I might squeeze in too somewhere.

....... MORE CONDO RESORT AMENITIES - I wish we would have had time to use them all!

SONIA & CLAUDIO with us at a beachside restaurant in Clearwater, FL - Don't they make a nice couple?

Here we, Claudio and I, back in Orlando. This is some American-Indian artwork, very interesting and colorful... It is one of the displays in the immense lobby of Disney's Fort Wilderness Lodge Resort. It is always so dark in there though, so the other pictures didn't turn out. It is Settimio's favorite Resort because of being so rustic.

........OOOPS - I almost forgot, while we were in Clearwater, we also drove over to see the VERY, VERY OLD BELLEVIEW BILTMORE HOTEL, where Sonia & Claudio had stayed on one of their trips to Clearwater. It was built well over a hundred years ago and is said to be haunted. (Aren't ALL antique hotels haunted??) But Sonia swears she heard strange noises in the night, and couldn't sleep!! As you can see, it is also an enormous hotel, and very elegant too. We took a look around the inside too, and the pictures below are a few of those we took. Now the hotel is a combination of old and new, and still very popular.

...... THIS IS THE ENTRANCE.....(AT LEAST ONE OF THEM!)

ONE OF THE LONG OLD-FASHIONED LOOKING HALLS ---IT KIND OF REMINDED ME OF THE MOVIE, "THE SHINING"!! Much like this hall is still original, including wooden floors, fixtures, decorations, the Grand Ballroom, and much else.

THIS LOOKS LIKE A CONFERENCE ROOM, BUT DON'T KNOW IF ALL IS ORIGINAL HERE.