Good way to start the day

Not to rub it in or anything, but here's what I woke up to this morning...

Honeymoon: Day 4-7

Just a quick update since the internet access has been unpredictable down here. We spent day 4 relaxing in Orlando. I finally got to play some mini-golf! :)

On day 5 we checked into our room at the Caribbean Beach Resort at Walt Disney World. That night we went to Mickey's Pirate and Princess Party (Denise is forcing me to put all of that) at the Magic Kingdom. It actually worked out really well. We got our passes for like half off and we got there at about 5pm and stayed until close at midnight. That meant we spent most of the time there after the sun had gone down so we avoided the oppressive mid-90s and 90% humidity. Plus the park was less crowded so we got to ride whatever we wanted whenever we wanted (we rode Space Mountain three times!).

On day 6, we spent the morning at Disney's Animal Kingdom. It was really fun and the Expedition Everest ride was awesome! But it got really hot and our feet were tired (and blistered in Denise's case) so we were headed out by like 2 or 3.

Today's day 7 and we've stopped at a little Mexican restaurant in Savannah, GA, called Carlito's Mexican Grill. On the way here we went through St. Augustine, FL, the oldest permanent settlement in North America. It was pretty awesome! After this, we'll heading north and spending the night in Myrtle Beach, SC.

Day 4-7 Route

Update: Lucky us. We just happened to arrive in Myrtle Beach in time for bike week! I can't tell you how thrilled we are!

Oh well, it's hard to complain. We once again played the honeymoon card and got an awesome 10th floor suite with a balcony overlooking the ocean! Pictures to follow...

Honeymoon: Day 3

Today was mainly spent driving so we could get to Florida easily tomorrow. That being said, we drove through some gorgeous terrain in Kentucky and Tennessee.

Other than that, it was all about Denise. We woke up to a free continental breakfast in the hotel, a favorite vacation activity for her. For lunch, we stopped for a quick bite at a Sonic drive-in, a place which I've been promising to take her for a year and a half now but it's fairly difficult to follow through on since there aren't any in Minnesota... for now. For dinner, she'd always wanted to try Cici's Pizza, which we see commercials for but have never actually seen back home. They seem to be way more common in the southeastern US. Although now that I look at their site, their appears to be one a mere 15 miles from where we live. Go figure.

While passing through Atlanta, we tried to check out the Georgia Aquarium but unfortunately they were closed. We stopped for the night in Valdosta, GA.

Day 3 Route

Honeymoon: Day 2

We've decided that Iowa drivers are by far the worst we've seen so far at observing highway etiquette. After proceeding across Iowa, which was about as exciting as it sounds, we headed south to Missouri. Highlights included driving through Hannibal, MO, birthplace of Samuel Clemens (aka Mark Twain) where Denise got her picture taken with a gigantic statue of him. It's also the hometown of Colonel Sherman T. Potter.

The plan was to continue on US-61 along the western edge of the Mississippi but thanks to a flooded roadway, we were diverted into western Illinois for about 40 miles. After that, we crossed back over into Missouri so we could see St. Louis, which neither Denise or I had ever seen before.

First, we ate at a delicious little hole-in-the-wall Mexican restaurant called El Paisano where Denise discovered how delicious Sangria is and got a little... incapacitated. After that, we went to a little ice cream place called Ted Drewes that we read about in a book that Adam and Mandy got us called Roadfood (thanks guys!). It was totally worth it from a cultural standpoint. It was just a tiny little shack but despite being a Tuesday night, there were literally hundreds of people gathered around outside it. A security guard we made friends with told us it's like that every night.

After that, we cut through southern Illinois where we stayed for the night right on the Kentucky border in Metropolis, the hometown of Superman! What entitles them to call it that (other than the gigantic statue of Superman), I have no idea.

Day 2 Route

Honeymoon: Day 1

As Denise and I kept saying, it's a good thing we weren't flying anywhere. What with packing, returning pianos, bringing unopened booze back to the liquor store and dropping my parents off at the airport, today was busy enough without having to worry about departure times and airport security. Not surprisingly, we didn't end up officially leaving until about 4:30 so we had to deal with a little rush hour heading out of the Twin Cities.

We were very excited to officially receive our first "honeymoon upgrade" at Avis. We had a full-size reserved but the dude at the counter upgraded us to a "premium"... namely a black Dodge Charger.

For those not familiar with our plans, we're trying not to plan out more than a day or two in advance. And since we had absolutely no time between the wedding and this afternoon to think anything over, we just jumped on 35 and headed south. So we spent the afternoon taking a very uneventful drive through Iowa to West Des Moines.

Day 1 Route

The Wedding

Well after like 10 months of planning and preparing, the wedding is finally over. Denise and I really want to thank everyone who helped us pull it off! I'm sure there are a few people that we never got a chance to talk to or that we wanted to talk to more but there was just so much going on. But we really appreciate everyone who came more than we could possibly say!

I've already uploaded the pictures from my camera here. We have to wait (very impatiently) about 3-4 weeks before we get our pictures back from our photographer. If anyone has some good pictures they took, please shoot me an email!

The Great Wall of Booze

You gotta admit, 480 bottles of beer and 72 bottles of wine are pretty damn impressive looking!