Vacation #2 - Disney!!
I love Disney, we go every year with my family and it is, for lack of a better word, "magical." We started out as kids, when I was 8 and every year the choice was: Florida vacation, a pool, or air conditioning....we opted for Florida every year. Side note: My parents got air conditioning finally while I was in college, no pool though...However, 10 years ago they came home with a time share with Disney Vacation club - BONUS!!!!
Just to give a little more background, my maiden name is Cipolone which is Italian for "Big Onion." You can follow @bigonion (Anthony) or @bigonion75 (me) on twitter. While this was considered embarrassing in high school, I have embraced it with age (ahem 35 this year...).
In 2002, we started the Big Onion Club Drinking Around the World in EPCOT. We began this little tradition when we met some people in England who told us about this crazy little idea. We tried it and failed miserably. The reason being, as we walked to Germany (from Mexico this is the 4th country) we got side-tracked with shots of jager. You obviously can see why we did not make it past Italy...
Every year, we became smarter, more efficient, like a well-oiled machine. We would pre-plan, we found out that we can order 8oz beers in some countries, therefore, if you didn't want to drink the LaBatt's in Canada (yuck) we could have a smaller one and actually enjoy the larger ones in countries such as Germany and Norway. We learned to only do this time honored tradition when they had "extra magic hours" which meant we could stay later and not have to rush.
We start at a different end every year so that we don’t always look too drunk in pictures in the ending countries (Mexico or Canada). We also go during the food and wine festival which allows us to constantly grab food to fuel us during the “race.” For all you triathletes and runners, this is the same concept as taking a Gu every 45 min to an hour...
So back to 2010. This year was a little different - Mike and I had our OWN time share - 
we bought into the Animal Kingdom Disney Vacation Club.
We have joined the other Disney zombies...
We had some newbies this year - Kaela, Anthony's (my brother @bigonion) girlfriend...
some returning Disney guests - my in-laws - Nancy and Carle LaCouture...
and Tamara, Mike’s sister and her family came down at the same time,
which included some little “onions in training..."
guess you can never be too young to start, LOL (OK THERE WAS NOTHING IN THIS GLASS - THIS IS JUST A JOKE)
Animal Kingdom Lodge was an amazing place - we were able to see animals every morning including warthogs...
and zebras acting like cute little dogs laying on their backs.
While there we did the usual - visit Magic Kingdom and of course were able to get our favorite Dole pineapple and vanilla twist, yum.
Went to breakfast with Disney with the characters, since it was the kids first time, where I had my picture taken with Minnie since I wanted to duplicate my grandmother's picture back in the 80s.
On Tuesday, Mike, myself, and Kaela went to Islands of Adventures to "geek-out" at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter - utterly amazing...
We went to Hogsmeade, where we had saw some Chocolate Frog's Legs at Honeydukes...
We got a little scared when we saw the "wanted" ads.
but then went to the joke shop to check out the Pygmy Puffs.
We saw some owls - complete with owl poop,
including Hedwig.
We drank some pumpkin juice...
followed by the bar to have some Hogsmeade brew...
After a few drinks, we checked out some wands where Mike bought Dumbledore's wand (while wearing his Antoine Dodson shirt - Hide yo kids, hide yo wife....they rapin everyone out here...).
Later, that evening, we surprised Little Ant - with a 30th surprise party!
On Wednesday, we embarked on the "Around the World" adventure at EPCOT...
We started in Mexico where we also saw Donald...
then to Norway (we were a little sad that they took away the boat),
we then went to China (where we saw children in positions that should not possible)
Aww - this was in Germany - how cute...mommy and daddy...
Germany (beir...need I say more)
Italy (homeland)
and to see Dominic the Donkey...
the USA
Japan (ok this is where it starts to blur) and then Morrocco (still blurring, but apparently got through and ate some beef pita thing)
France (where we somehow look sober for our yearly shot - we were engaged here in 2002)
UK (where we hit the bar, real smart moves) and then Canada (apparently)
After all that, at least we didn't get a drinking and driving ticket on Test Track - woa!
The rest of the week went by so fast, fitting in the previously named MGM studios, where Ant got his picture taken with Mulan...
and Animal Kingdom...
It was a fun trip and we finished it off with a dinner at Jiko.
Mike and I spent our last night going out for our anniversary, hanging, napping, Phillies game and then going back for the Electrical Parade.
We have decided we may have to do 10 days next year not 7....
Till next year Disney!
Back to reality, I never thought I would say this but I got a FULL Marathon to train for...
Oh how fun! I love the idea and it totally looks like you had a great time. Man, I wish I was part of the Big Onion family - you guys know how to do it right!
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