I made one of my blunders that I will always remember. I booked us into the wrong Days Inn, not the nice airport one but a crummy one some distance away where I and my poor aged parents had to walk a long way to the tired rooms. A big relief when a taxi delivered us to the Contemporary Resort. Saw the King Neptune Show in the evening as we were Bay side, suffered an ear-piercing fire alarm, and had a massive lunch including cheese onion soup which may have given Dad and I diarrhoea.

June 25th

Not too bad a day, bombed out on getting mum jam in the morning, we went to Epcot today and found it slightly worse. The journey into imagination has had a “your” Added and is poorer for it, a feeble glimmer of the once brilliant ride with figment, a rollercoaster ride has replaced the wonderful Universe of Motion ride. Least changed were spaceship Earth, no more Walter Cronkite, and the Land. We saw some Chinese children acrobats and Mexican dancers Huitzilin at work and ate churros at the Mexican Cantina a different presentation to before but still good, smoke was the problem today and all of the days. Suffered an appalling Xerox show which was lame marketing, there is a commercial edge here. Monsanto are here and GE sponsored the Epcot fireworks which I took myself to see. GE had some stupid slogan about taking care of the earth. The climax was good but the batteries died in the camera, I took quite a few movies today but not many were really worth the effort. Coming back was slightly weird, a family joined my monorail carriage at the Grand Floridian and had a blazing row for all to hear. Overall Epcot seemed quieter than I have seen it, but leaving post fireworks was still mad. Couldn’t get Internet access which wasn’t a blow in hindsight.

(The Land used to have this lovely revolving restaurant with Mucha-like murals on the walls, and as it revolved you could see down into make believe Saharas and pampas. The murals have gone, and the restaurant no longer revolves. Sigh.)

June 26th

We did the washing this morning much better facilities than before on the second floor of the garden wings. Everything at Disney is more expensive than outside, washing was only one third more which wasn’t so bad. We then headed for the Disney Shopping Village (now Disney Springs]) quick going, an ordeal coming back helped by the kind bus driver dropping us specially at the Contemporary Resort! Had ice cream at Ghiradelli’s, bought presents for Andrew and Beth two fancy torches, admired the rainforest café where fish swam around in plastic pillars watching the shoppers being fleeced, a strong emphasis on selling. Torrid long journey back then in the evening we went to Magic Kingdom and rode Pirates of the Caribbean a little changed but not much, and saw Spectra Magic, the renamed electric main street parade. Good but not as good as I remembered. We had to stand around a lot and dodge smokers, coming back was okay.

June 27th

Today was the Animal Kingdom which was a bit of a washout, if only because the rains came as we were escaping. It is well done for what it is, but it is basically an amusement park with various animals stuck here and there. There are worse zoos true, there is a stupid tree in the middle which doesn’t really work, a cast of T Rex Sue which is only there as an advert for McDonald’s, had a nice sticky rice thing at the Mombasa café. I bungled there as well. I did a little shopping and a photographic tour including snapping a small gecko which was wont to swell a neck sac a bright red, we had a meal on the 15th floor, too rich both for the pocket and my stomach but it was a glorious view over the seven seas lagoon, I worked out four monorail trains working on the contemporary loop. Dad and I watched the Magic Kingdom fireworks from the fire escape.

June 28th

We did the Magic Kingdom today, visiting a lot of old favourites. The carousel of progress, updated reasonably well. It’s a small world, dangerously nice, the WD world Railway not so good, the Wedway which has been renamed and extended, the tiki birds dire, in the evening I went and saw “La Nouba” by cirque du Soleil. Some bits were brilliant, four young girls doing stunning Diabolo tricks and two guys on metal wheels, but a lot was conventional circus, the setting was avant-garde art show and spectacle, I felt I should have been blown away but have accidie or ennui.

June 29th

New belt from Morocco as a birthday present, we looked in the museum which was quite interesting but no one else did, suffered the American adventure again, dad and I watched the Magic Kingdom fireworks again, then we just got back for a full performance of the King Neptune show. Disney were having train problems today at Magic Kingdom, a breakdown? We had a meal at Coral Reef but I failed to ask for and get a table by the big window, this may have been a good thing as avoiding snappers but did mean we got an eccentric waiter called Bung who was rather obsequious. Headache so I chickened out and had a pill.

Very chatty driver took us from the contemporary to Orlando airport, felt strange will I ever come back here and stay again? Not with my parents I know. We flew to Salt Lake City and then it was onto Gatwick.