On January 4, 2013, I hugged my Dad and my dogs good-bye, and got into the car with my Mom to start the long drive to Orlando. Check in to the Disney College Program was starting in a few days, and we had a resort booked and a few vacation days planned beforehand. Before long, I had moved into Patterson Court with five other girls and had begun my journey as a Disney Cast Member on the World Famous Jungle Cruise.
Four years later, for some reason, I’m still here. I don’t work for the Mouse anymore, I don’t even work for a theme park these days. I still deal in hospitality, and I still meet people who traveled a long way and spent thousands of dollars to be here. Then I meet other people who have lived here their whole lives and never set foot in a theme park. I don’t understand living this close to the magic and not experiencing it. There’s a radio commercial I keep hearing that I have no idea what it’s trying to advertise, but it says something about “living where the rest of the world vacations”. Let me tell you, there’s nothing like it in the world. I hold annual passes to two of the three major theme parks. I get off work and my evening involves roller coasters and fireworks or dinner and a show. Even the places I do my shopping usually involve live entertainment of one sort or another. There’s so much to see and do in Orlando, you can never do it all, but I’m certainly going to try.
Disney will always be my first love. Disney will always be why Florida is now my home, but there’s a million Disney blogs out there. (I should know, I read a lot of them.) I’m going to write about Disney. I’m going to talk about the adventures I have and the races I run and the great cast members I meet and the great memories I have. I’m going to talk about SeaWorld and Universal, but I want to talk about what else Orlando has to offer: about the places to go on your day off on a budget, or when you’ve been saving up to splurge on something you’ve always wanted to try.
Florida can be many things, but it is always an adventure.
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