Around the United States Archives – Page 16 of 17

Sandy Hook, NJ

August 25th, 2017admin0 Comments

Sandy Hook is a barrier peninsula in central NJ with the Atlantic Ocean to the east and the Shrewsbury River to the west. Discovered by Henry Hudson, it is now a National Park comprised of beaches, a lighthouse, a fort, and an active US Coast Guard station. On a clear day it boasts views of the Manhattan skyline. The majority of visitors come to Sandy Hook for the beaches and recreation. It’s convenient to many parts of Central New Jersey and an easy ride across the NY Harbor for Manhattanites. There are multiple public beaches (including a clothing-optional beach) and …

Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort Review

February 20th, 2017admin0 Comments

Since we had limited time on our trip, we wanted to maximize our park time by staying on Disney property, preferably on the monorail line. Blair has always wanted to stay at The Contemporary, but honestly the theming of that hotel has never interested me. It feels more like an airport hotel than a Disney hotel. I stayed at the Grand Floridian as a kid and would absolutely love to stay there again. All of the resorts on the monorail line are deluxe resorts and tend to be at the higher end of the deluxe price range because of their …

Disney World Tips

February 18th, 2017admin0 Comments

There are literally thousands of Disney planning websites out there with more Disney tips and tricks than I could ever imagine let alone write about. I wrote a very few of my own tips and take-aways for each park at the end of each blog and here I will just offer two reviews and one word of wisdom. On this trip we purchased Memory Maker and the Disney Dining Plan, both of which were new to us. I researched them both extensively beforehand and hopefully sharing my experience can help someone else make their own decision. Memory Maker At …

Hollywood Studios

February 15th, 2017admin0 Comments

We started the morning of our third day in Magic Kingdom and headed to Hollywood Studios a little after noon. For our family, Hollywood Studios holds the least interest. The boys aren’t huge Star Wars fans and Tower of Terror is definitely out as a ride option. (They do thrilling but not scary.) But we have to balance that with the fact that their absolute favorite ride in all of Disney World is there, Toy Story Mania. So skipping it entirely wasn’t an option. We figured a half day would be fine. JB had used a birthday gift card to …

Epcot

February 11th, 2017admin0 Comments

One of my regrets from our first trip to Disney was not spending enough time in Epcot. I was pleasantly surprised at how interested the boys were in exploring the countries and how much time we could have spent there. I wanted to avoid making this mistake again but with limited days and lots of ground to cover, I was left with roughly 8 hours there. We arrived around 1:00 and planned to stay for Illuminations at 9:00. That seemed like ample time to ride a few rides and wander around the countries. But as they say, the best laid …

Animal Kingdom

February 8th, 2017admin0 Comments

In order to fit in a full day at Animal Kingdom and still get to see all the nighttime shows in the other parks, we split our Animal Kingdom time into two days. We spent about three and a half hours there in the morning on the second day of our trip and then returned for our last morning of the trip. On our first visit, we had lunch reservations and FastPasses in Epcot for later in the day so we headed straight to Expedition Everest when we arrived at Animal Kingdom to try to take advantage of lower early …

Magic Kingdom

February 3rd, 2017admin0 Comments

Since Magic Kingdom has the most rides and the most ground to cover, I decided to use the Touring Plans website to map our a general path through the park. I had never used it before and was really impressed. I input our Fast Passes and lunch reservation times, told it what rides we wanted to ride, and it automatically calculated the best route to take through the park to maximize rides and minimize wait time and walking. We are definitely not the type of family to follow a minute by minute schedule through Disney World, but I liked having …

Disney World Trip Planning

January 20th, 2017admin0 Comments

We took our first trip to Disney World before our oldest started kindergarten. We figured the kids would be good ages (3.5 and 5.5) and it would be nice to fit it in before we became a slave to the school calendar. We booked for May 2013 but then had to cancel due to work obligations. In a last ditch effort to squeeze it in before school started, we booked for mid-August. Yes, August. It was a great trip. But it was HOT. I’m absolutely glad we went. But it was HOT. I have always advocated to my husband that …

The Bronx Zoo

September 3rd, 2016admin0 Comments

Continuing the animal theme of this trip, we decided to take the boys into NYC to visit the Bronx Zoo. Getting there from central New Jersey was possible using only public transportation but the trip would have been long and complicated, involving trains, subways, and buses. We decided to drive in, which was not without its own challenges, but we survived the George Washington Bridge and made it through the Bronx with only one interesting question about the surrounding area (“Mom, what are booty-enhancing jeans?”). My sister and her family also drove in from NJ and my brother and his …

Six Flags Great Adventure

August 31st, 2016admin0 Comments

Although I probably went more than twice in my life, I have two main memories of Six Flags Great Adventure from when I was a kid. The first was driving through the safari in the family station wagon. The second was going in high school for “Physics Day”, where we had to complete a worksheet with questions that applied physics principles to the rides in the park. The latter was memorable mostly for the novelty of going to an amusement park for a school field trip. The former was memorable because a monkey jumped on the hood of our car …