USA - Disney World, Ohio & Saginaw (July 1-16) part 2

Our hotel in Disney had a ferry that took us down the river to Disney Springs, so we decided to take a ride one day after we had returned to the hotel for lunch.  There had been some thunderstorms that morning so the ferry had been closed, but it reopened at exactly the right time for us.  We found it was a good way to avoid the heat - we headed to a park first thing in the morning (7:30) and then when it started getting really hot around 12:30 we headed back to the hotel and had a shower and got changed.  We then had lunch at the hotel restaurant and took the ferry into Disney Springs.  We didn't spend long there and then caught a bus from Disney Springs back to one of the parks for the evening when it cooled down a little.

On the ferry

Port Orleans - French Quater

One of the Disney timeshare houses

Another boat

Coming around on Disney Springs

 

Flower arrangement in the shape of Mickey as we rounded into Disney Springs

Disney Springs

Paddle steamer

Welcome to Disney Springs

With Winnie the Pooh

An Old-fashion Selfie, on the lake at Disney Springs.

Our next park was Magical Kingdom, we went there a couple of times, but once was on the afternoon of July 4th to see the fireworks.  It slowly got more and more crowded, but by the time the fireworks were on, it was insane.  We got caught in a crowd that was trying to leave and got pushed towards the exit.  We managed to duck into the train station and got a decent viewing location, but we did miss most of the higher fireworks as the roof blocked the view:

The day started pretty crowed, but the Castle was impressive as always

The crowds got worse as it got later

The start of the show - and the solid mass of people lining the main road

Not quite a busy the next time we came

Happy 4th of July!

The entrance of the park

 Here's our professional shots from Magical Kingdom:

Outside the Beauty and The Beast - Be Our Guest restaurant

Outside Big Thunder Mountain

At the entrance - main station in background

The kids at Gaston's fountain

Outside the Haunted House

One of the ghosts decided to join in

By the side of the castle

Be My Guest castle

Representing Sweden at the castle

Our first ride on Splash Mountain

Posing with telephones on our second ride

Our final park was EPCOT.  As with our last trip, we found that this was the hottest park by far, so we tried to head there at night or evenings, so we didn't have to deal with the heat.

The Spaceship Earth 'Golf Ball'

It almost looks like it's a drawing up close

It was hot!

Tomas making a call in the UK section (or he may have been changing into Superman)

I'm guessing there are still some hard feelings against the English - the English castle doubled as a toilet

Norwegian Stave Church

EPCOT ball in the evening

And at night

Cam trying on the Star Wars Mickey ears

The Spaceship Earth ball again

Trying out the drums

and here's our professional photos from EPCOT:

In front of the Eiffel Tower (back left)

Representing Sweden at EPCOT

The photographer said "Stand on that spot" - pointing to the spot on the ground, so we all tried to stand there

The proper photo

Nighttime shot - with Tinkerbell

Kids and Mickey

This was the Day of the Dead character Cameron created in Mexico Land

In front of the Stave Church

We got a lot more done in the last few days, as the weather really cooled off.  It would be interesting to go in winter one time when it would be cool enough to stay all day at a park.  It was also hard with the public holiday as the parks were packed and the lines were huge.

On Friday we finished up at Hollywood Studios and then returned to the hotel for a swim in the pool, shower and then to catch our bus to the airport.

We were delayed by an hour as the plane wasn't ready, but eventually we were off on our way to Cleveland Ohio.

We arrived around 11:30pm and were met by my cousin and uncle.  It was a bit of a fight to get all the bags in the car, but we made it and we reached their house around 1am.  We sat up chatting until about 4am, then had a big sleep in the next day.

The next day was Tomas' birthday, so we had a cake and presents for him and then he went to Build-A-Bear with his cousins for his party.  Tom made a bear in police uniform named Tasha, Alana made a dog with called Dog Face McGee, and Cameron made a white bear called Snowy in a Poe Dameron outfit.

Cards from Australia - sent to Sweden - opened in the USA

The cousins with their bears

Choosing bears

Tom filling his bear

Alana 'gently' testing the filling on her bear

Tom's bear "Tasha"

The girls picking clothes

Alana is done

Tom and Tasha

Tom designed his cake - yes those are tic-tacs and mentos and sprinkles

We took a trip up to Saginaw for our family reunion and did our customary trip to Bronner's Christmas store, a massive Christmas store in Frankenmuth just outside of Saginaw:

Frankenmuth's official shield

Bronner's ahead

Welcome to Frankenmuth

We were collecting Pressed Pennies but every time we can (3 times in 3 years), Press 6 has been out of order...

Looking down one of the aisles

Steins

Halloween decorations and village

"You're always a Home Run" - this one could have a few meanings..

Fruit themed ornaments

American Passports were for sale (although they were made in Poland)

Cam had a leg injury, so ended up in a wheelchair for the trip

Nothing says Christmas like a big pack of Beef Jerky Ornament

"Welcome to our camp, where friends and marshmallows get toasted!"  Hmmm

Mexican section - jalapenos, tequila and burritos

Scary frogs

Nothing says redneck Christmas like Corona party lights

Christmas village

We also took the time to visit the cemetery where many of my relatives were buried:

Olga is my great-great grandmother (fathers'-father's-mother's-mother)

Henry is my great-great grandfather - Olga's husband

Andreas Leuenberger is Henry's father, my great-great-great grandfather

Adam Marti is Andreas' wife's (Anne E Marti) brother - or my great-great-great-great uncle

Margaretha is Adam's first wife - her grave was still in German (the original settlers were German immigrants)

 The German test on the bottom translates roughly to "Whoever reads this, I call to Jesus and his light, everything else helps you not." - That seemed kinda grim.

After the family reunion, we headed back down to Cleveland and spent a last couple of night before catching our flight back to Adelaide.