Epcot and Exciting News

Thursday, we were invited to Epcot by Bob and Mary. Bob works at the Food and Wine Festival, and he gets free passes. Lucky us! We drove (they squished into the back of the Jeep) and we even got free parking! It was a perfect day, breezy, no humidity and light, fluffy clouds. The Food and Wine festival happens every year for 6 weeks during October and November, and this year was it's 15 year anniversary. About 18 countries offer samples of their food and wine and beer from small kiosks located around the World Showcase. We'd get there eventually, but the first item on the agenda was Spaceship Earth. There were very few people in line and we only had to wait 5 minutes. After that ride, we headed over to “The Land” to get Fast Passes for “Soarin’”, a very popular ride. A fast pass allows you to come back within a specified hour to bypass the people waiting in line. We had an hour and a half before our allotted time. So Gary wanted to see the Living Seas, where we dove a couple years ago with a program called ‘DiveQuest'. DiveQuest is a scuba diving experience inside their 5.7-million-gallon saltwater tank. Scuba-certified guests can swim with over 6,000 sea creatures representing over 60 species—including sea turtles, angelfish, dolphins, eagle rays and sharks. It was so awesome to wave hi to our grandchildren from under water through the 8 inch thick glass wall.

The Festival was at the preview stage, but all the kiosks were open and serving their fares. We visited various countries to have fun on the rides, Bob stopped at Norway to check his schedule for next week, but then our tummies were rumbling. Off to England for fish and chips. It was good and crispy even with the malt vinegar sprinkled on it – very British, don’t you know.

We walked around some more, enjoyed the people and asked questions from many workers. Finally, we grabbed an ice cream bar on our way out, and headed home. What a great day. Thank you, Bob!

Gary completed his on-line web interview, and at the end, they asked him to set up a time and date convenient for a face-to-face interview at Casting! He’ll be wowing them on Thursday, Oct. 7th at 10 am. Wish him luck! (I haven’t heard yet)
Yesterday we went on a search for a shirt for his interview and met some more people in our park. Some of these people have been here 26 years after planning to stay about 3 months. Imagine that! I wonder if that will happen to us somewhere.

Last night was dollar-a-dog/movie night. For a dollar you get a hot dog with all the fixin’s, a bag of chips, a drink and a movie! Even though we had seen Seven Nights, Six Days before, it was fun to meet some more residents, Disney workers and enjoy the evening.

It was cool enough to open the windows all night, and tomorrow after donut/coffee morning is Garage Sale day for some of the locals. We’ll be looking for a big floor fan to put on our patio to keep away those pesky love-bugs.