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April 10, 2001
Senior Trip: Day 1
Wow, it came so fast. The Senior Trip. Before any of us knew it, it was here and we were all packing. This trip was the most fun I've ever had in my life, and if any of you are Juniors reading this, make sure you go on the Senior Trip! You will not regret it!
The adventure really starts on Day -1, when I had to drive my folks to the airport for their trip to England. I had good directions to get to the airport, but I forgot to ask how to get back home from the airport. The result: about an hour driving around Philadelphia with no idea where I was. Luckily, Dodge Caravans have compasses built in, so by going east the whole time, I found my way to a sign that said "Warning: Plant Facility Ahead." So I U-turned, found an interstate going east and then found my way home.
Boy did this creep up on me! I finally realized after karate that the trip was tomorrow, and I ran around to stores to stock up on snacks and then I hurried home to pack. All the other seniors were asleep, or at least trying to sleep, since we had to get up at 3 in the morning to get to school by 4:15. Naturally, I didn't start packing until 11 the night before. To top all of that, it was so hot that I couldn't sleep -- I think I finally fell asleep around 2, but I woke up in 45 mniutes and couldn't fall back to sleep. So I really started this trip off pretty well.
| Anyway, I walked to school on time and had my bags searched so carefully (first by the teachers, then by the dogs, and then by the solar-powered robotic nuclear/narcotics squad) that I felt like I was doing something wrong by packing. (I knew this was going to happen in advance, so I considered packing all of my mothers underwear, a globe, rubber chickens, and large portrait of Jesus. I thought this might bring trouble, though, so I just went with the chickens, a sock monkey holding a "Back Off" sign, and 15 cans of Diet Pepsi.) From there it was busride to the airport, plane to Orlando on which we watched a poor copy of Toy Story 2 (I'm still not sure what happened, but that cowgirl chick wasn't too bad). From there, it was on to Universal Studios for the day. |  |
The strangest thing about the first day is that we didn't see anyone else from our school all day, except for the same group, which we saw over and over and over. There were over 100 people from CHS going, and it was a pretty small group, but it seemed like ours and Celeste's group were the only two groups from our school that were there.
Universal Studios, Orlando
Group: Ryan, Dave, Shane
Park Rating: 
At Universal I had my first taste of the newest evil of the modern world: Express Tickets. The basic idea is that greedy SOB's who can't wait their turn in line get into a "special" (i.e. retarded) line which leads directly to the ride. Sure, this is nice if you have an Express Ticket, but since every loser in the park manages to get them, the Express Line can last up to 40 minutes anyway. And it just makes the regular line go over 120 minutes. It's a nice thought, but only about as nice as an inflatable dart board. I waited well over an hour -- a freaking hour -- to go see "Jaws." I almost passed out from heat exhaustion in the line, and I almost passed out from lack of brain activity on the ride. I had to consciously tell myself to breath while on that ride.
Even worse than "Jaws" was "Earthquake, the Ride." This was a Charlton Heston original, which I guess is why nobody had ever heard of the flick. Anyway, after the painfully hot line, I was selected to be the "stunt double" from the audience. I thought this would make my day, since I would get to make a fool out of myself in front of about 300 people. But no! I did nothing at all! I stood in the center, was introduced, then walked backstage for the rest of the show while they made jokes with a crash-dummy they called "Matt Meyer." Then the ride... man oh man... The only good thing about that ride was that the guy sitting next to me was Spanish, so I pretended to be Russian and spouted off all sorts of crazy jargon. It's always good to confuse the foreigners.
And to make matters worse, there was supposed to be a "stuntacular" at night. I was looking forward to this, seeing as the park provided little entertainment. Of course, following Murphy's Laws, this "stuntacular" never occurred. So we had to spend another godforsaken hour in the park. Now, I'm not saying the park sucked; it certainly was no Clementon Park. I'm just saying it could have, and should have, been much better. The rides that made this park worth going to were Back to the Future and Terminator 2 3D. Very cool rides. Also, if you get a "2 Day 2 Park" pass, you can sneak out of Universal and go to Islands of Adventure (which is exactly what we did, hehe).
That said, and Universal being done, we tossed our famished bodies into the buses for the hotel and food. Oh, did I mention that each room got a single pizza and 1 can of soda each? Wonderful. We finished our pizza in under a minute, and left the box and crusts on the floor. The good side of this is that Mr. Dorney stepped in our pizza trash during the room check. It's always good to end the night on a positive note.
Posted by dminky at April 10, 2001 09:41 AM
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