Christmas at two parks

Posted on by Ian C.

With four Disney parks nearby, and an annual pass, we rarely go to Seaworld (even more rare to Universal); but a trip to Discovery Cove earlier this year gave free entry to Seaworld for a few months, so we went this past weekend to see what they do for Christmas – and we were impressed!
First stop was the Clyde & Seamore sealion show. It was closed when we visited for Halloween and now we know why; it was re-themed for Christmas with different colors, lights, etc (and a Santa themed story)! Next was O Wondrous Night, with nativity story, carols, and real animals!

 

Later, we watched the Sea Of Trees, more than 100 Christmas trees with animated lighting synchronized to music and able to show detailed images (including Shamu!), finishing the evening with fireworks over the water – pretty!


Of course I would claim that Disney is “king of the parks” – at Magic Kingdom there are regular Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party events as Christmas approaches. Unlike Seaworld, these are additional cost (about $60 each); one justification is that the park is quieter as the tickets are restricted, but we arrived to big crowds with hardly a chance to see the Christmas themed parade! Later on, the Magic Kingdom fireworks were very different to normal, enhanced for the special evening – but again crowds left us with a tree-obstructed view some of the time …

It was noticeably quiet in other areas of the park; we were able to enjoy all three Mountains (Space, Splash, Thunder), Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean, and even Ariel’s Journey of the Little Mermaid, with queues no more than a few minutes (and sometimes, just the time taken to walk the length of the empty queue area).

Apart from the shorter queues, and the very nice “free” Cocoa, there was little to distinguish Magic Kingdom; no real Christmas theming on the rides, and minimal theming elsewhere except the lights on Main Street. So really, we were paying a premium for shorter queues. Maybe that’s enough justification, but it did leave me thinking that Disney is less “magical” than it is supposed to be; and more impressed with Seaworld than I was previously.

Stucco started

Posted on by Ian C.

As we expected, there was not much progress at Independence this week for our home – although next door (to the left) did close (purchase) yesterday; we met one of the new owners today, who told us that they completed purchase even though the home is not finished! There were painters working there when we visited today, while the new owners belongings were being moved in to the garage. Lennar are providing temporary housing for them, and they hope to properly move in next week – remember again that November is the end of Lennar’s financial year, so there’s an incentive to close homes!

Meanwhile in our home, electric still awaits completion and inspection, but the “pest defense” tubes were installed; and today they’ve started putting stucco on the exterior – so the outside of our home is getting closer to completed! It seems to be a very labor intensive process; one worker runs the mixer, and then the mix is transferred spade by spade lifted from one scaffold level to the next, till it’s high enough to be applied to the wall! You can see a spade delivering to the lowest level, in the picture:

SONY DSC
SONY DSC

Independence – slow progress this week

Posted on by Ian C.

It seems that my optimism a week ago was misplaced as far as Lennar’s progress with our new home is concerned! I wrote “electrical wiring finished now, and preparations for exterior stucco progressing rapidly”, but a week later, there’s been little change from that position.
Inside, there’s been a few small steps – including framing the false wall in one upstairs closet that hides the AC ducts:

SONY DSC

Inside too, a “second phase” of electrical wiring was completed this week – alarm pre-wiring which brings sensors to the downstairs windows and doors (as well as a bundle of wires in an upstairs closet); but at the same time, the main electrical wiring apparently failed inspection, which then delays any possibility of interior insulation, sheetrock, etc! I don’t know the failure details, but there’s some evidence with a removed exterior power outlet on the rear patio:

SONY DSC
SONY DSC

In the same area at the rear of the home, the upstairs deck has been partially framed – though it’s missing a few horizontal beams:

SONY DSC

 

Unfortunately it looks like the rear deck has cracked some of the block wall, so perhaps that’s a reason why the exterior stucco hasn’t happened yet:

SONY DSC

 

In addition, a big reason for slow progress this week is the two homes either side of ours – both of them are supposed to be sold this week, so a big push to get them completed makes it obvious that the construction focus moves away from our new home. Luckily, we can be patient!