Subscribe
Your King Has Come - Indelible Grace
ORLANDO: We took our annual winter trip down to the sunshine state last week (8th – 13th), visiting Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure. Here are some random thoughts & things from that trip.
- HOUSE vs. HOTEL – Unless you just liked being cramped in small spaces, don’t ever stay in a hotel for an extended stay in Orlando. For the last three years we have rented a private home for our stay, and the available houses to choose from are incredible. This year we found a 4 bedroom, 3 bath house with private heated pool, spa and gameroom for about $82 a night. Granted, this is the off season, so prices at other times of the year will be higher. But I would recommend you checking into this before you plan your next Orlando vacation.
- CALEB – As we were driving down to Orlando on the 8th, we had just exited off of the Florida Turnpike and were heading down Highway 27 toward our rental house when my daughter, Rachel, made a comment about which direction “Miami” was in. My five-year-old son, Caleb, replied back, “Rachel, where is your-ami?”
- NIKOLAS – We had quite a scary five minutes or so at Islands of Adventure when my four-year-old, Nikolas, came up missing. Pam thought he was with me, and I thought he was with her. We had just been playing in the Jurassic Park playground area when he got lost. I have never had so many terrible thoughts run through my mind as at that moment, and had never pleaded so earnestly with my Creator than right then as well. He was quickly found by a park employee about a hundred yards from where we had been. He apparantly walked up the hill searching for us and someone spotted him looking distressed. God is good. Needless to say that Nik had no trouble holding someone’s hand the rest of the trip.
- WATER RIDE – The best-kept secret at Universal Studios Orlando is the water raft ride
in the Woody Woodpecker section of the park. This is a childrens’ playground with forts, slides, and rope climbs that the adults can also go through. If you continue all the way up a certain flight of stairs, you will come to the water ride. Our kids loved it, and there was hardly anyone else who seemed to know about it. Some of the most fun was watching how soaked the parents would get who had perilously decided to ride down with their kids in the rafts. The heavier the riders were, the wetter they got! That’s Joshua and Caleb in the raft. I think they would have stayed right there and ridden that ride all week if we had let them!
- PIRATES – This is the first time we decided to try one of the dinner theaters. The Priates Dinner Adventure was simply awesome…and the food was not half bad, either.
- PROVIDENCE – As you see over to the right under Noteworthy, and if you go to their website, the Ligonier National Conference is booked solid. Now, Pam and I had been planning to go, but we had been taking our sweet time to register. Wednesday I had mentioned to Tim Challies in an email about wanting to make sure that we got a chance to meet at the conference, and he just happened to mention in his reply back that Ligonier thought the conference may book up as soon as this weekend. Needless to say that got me a little scared, so I immediately picked up the phone and called down to Ligonier to see about registering. The person I was talking to put me on hold for a moment (presumably to check and make sure there was still room) and then came back and said that he would be able to take our registration. After we finished with that process, I told him that I had heard the conference was filling up fast and might book up by the weekend, he said the registrations were pouring in and that the conference might even book up that night (Wednesday). Sure enough, yesterday I went to the Ligonier website and saw the notice that it was full. Thank you, Tim! Actually, thank you, God, for using Tim to get me moving on making sure Pam and I will be able to attend what promises to be an outstanding conference. If Tim had not said anything about it, I am confident that Pam and I would be sitting here right now paying the penalty for our procrastination.
