Stalzer/Obele Family Blog

Today we experienced our first real Florida thunderstorm. We were driving back to the house from Tampa Busch Gardens when the sky got darker and darker. Our two biplane pilots were sound asleep in the back of the car. When we had about half of the way, suddenly it began to rain. There was lots of gusting wind and heavy lightning and pretty soon there was so much rain, you almost could not see the street anymore. A lot of cars parked on the side of the freeway and the rest was crawling with emergency blinking on, so you could be seen by the car behind you. We have never seen so heavy rain. To bad the camera was in the trunk - this could have been impressive fotos.

The rain got lighter as we aproached Davenport. When we finally entered the shopping mall for our daily shopping - the rain had almost stopped.

Today we decided again to visit Busch Gardens, Tampa. Last time - when we dropped off Thomas at the Tampa airport for his Toronto trip, the boys enjoyed all the animals very much. So, naturally they were very excited to tell and show dad.

Compared to last Tuesday - today were millions of people in the park, but like Disney, the organization dealing with those masses is excellent. And since we were not there for the thrilling roller coasters - there was no wait for the things we did.

As last time, we started again with the alligators and went on to a Jungle trail where you could observe monkeys and gorillas. The landscape, plants and flowers are just incredible. After that Max insisted that he wanted to go to the biplanes (this is a ride for smaller kids - pure fun; last Wednesday we did´t do this ride).

On the way to the Sky Ride we discovered large turtles, a dromedar, african elephants. Finally we arrived at the biplanes. Both, Felix and Max, weren´t able to stand still anymore. They were so excited and a bit afraid how scary the ride might be. Well, as you will see from Thomas Garmin Map, we spent most of our time at this ride. Both pilots flew several times and it was very hard to convince them to go on - we had to promise to come back later for the ride again.

Then we went on the Rhino Ride. You first drive through the “Serengetti” with a big Jeep and then the Jeep flows down a river. Well, “due to technical difficulties, the water part of the ride was temporarily closed”. This was no problem - the land part of the ride was excellent.

After that we went on the Sky Ride - Felix and Max were very excited to show dad that they were not afraid at all. Max explained to Thomas what he should do in case he got scared. After the Sky Ride - we had to stop by the biplanes again, and again, and again…. I don´t know how often they rode - they had such a great time. We discovered that there was a motorcycle ride a little to the side of the biplanes. Well, as you can see from the pictures the two Stalzer-Biker-Boys enjoyed their ride like the pros. Then, of course, a couple last times on the biplanes, and we went on to try out the train which goes around the entire park. The train ride offers great animal and roler coaster viewing (you almost drive through some of the roler coasters).

After that we decided to go home after an exciting day.