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Donna's Diary Entries Diary Navigation: Choose A Diary Entry -------------------- Latest Entry: 7/23/00 -------------------- 7/22/00 7/21/00 7/20/00 -------------------- Donna's Introduction

July 21, 2000

I set my alarm for 7 a.m., and kept hitting the snooze button until 8 a.m. I don’t know how we did it, but we left the house by 9:30 as planned. I did my usual thing and got a little stressed out while we were packing up to leave. I always do that. I’ll get short with my husband and the kids. For me, actually leaving the house is the hardest part of a trip. I feel like I do most of the work, and that kind of irritates me. Not a great way to start a trip, but I’m usually better before we’re even out of the neighborhood.

The kids were really good during the 3-hour drive. Well, Michael talked so much it drove us a little crazy. Boy, can he talk! Plus he’ll make these annoying little noises when he gets mad. Ugh. Katie was the one I was worried about since she was in a car seat, but she was great! The only time she did anything was when Ashlee or Michael would mess with her. They’ve just got to mess with the little one occasionally. Instead of going to our hotel first, we went straight to Fiesta Texas. We got there about 12:30 p.m.

Fiesta Texas is really neat! When we got there we were all starving, so the first thing we did is pay entirely too much for bad food. That’s one of my problems with theme parks. Where is it written that they have to have bad (and expensive!) food? Don’t tell me they can’t improve the food. You can get better food at a baseball league concession stand than a theme park. We paid $50.00 for two orders of nachos, two individual pizzas, one taco salad and three drinks. Wow. (OK, so the drinks were in souvenir cups.)

After our wonderful lunch we hit the park! They have some really cool rides. When you go with a 2-year-old, however, you are limited as to what you can ride. Luckily, she’s a tall 2-year-old (36 ½”) so she got to ride more than most her age. (You have to be at least 36” to ride most of the kiddie rides.) Richard and Katie waited while I took Ash and Michael on a bigger ride. Of course, I didn’t know it was one that gets you completely soaked. :) I should have by the name -- Power Surge. After the ride you can stand on this bridge and get wet when other boats go down the drop, so Richard walked Katie over there, without telling her she was going to get wet. She got soaked! With it being over 100 degrees, none of us minded getting wet.

One of the neatest places in the whole park was Rockville. It was made to look like a 50s town. You walked in the “street.” There were even old-time cars and streetlights. Very neat. It felt so real I almost yelled at the kids, “Have you gone mad? Get out of the street!” Here we rode the old-time cars. Michael rode by himself, Ashlee and me were in another car, and Richard took Katie. Michael had the most fun on this ride. When Ashlee and I passed him, he was smiling so big. :)

Towards the end of the day, Ashlee rode The Rattler with her daddy. You should have seen this roller coaster! It was the biggest and tallest thing I have ever seen! Ashlee was very hesitant about riding it. She liked it, though. Richard wanted her to ride this other ride with him on our way out of the park. You go forward through these loops and twists, then the ride stops and shoots you backwards through the same loops. We waited at the ride exit for them, and about 10 minutes later here comes Ashlee. She had very adamantly told her dad when they were boarding the ride that she was “NOT going to ride this ride.” He had to ride by himself. When he got off he was complaining that his equilibrium was off. :) Ashlee’s pretty smart, huh?

The ride I thought was the most fun was Bugs White Water Rapids. It was a log boat ride. It kind of makes me nervous putting my baby on a ride that I have no idea what it does. Especially when she’s in the front of the boat with her daddy, and I’m in the back. She did great, though. They take your picture as you’re going down the big drop. I bought the photo after the ride was over. I’m always the one taking the photos, so I’m never in them. Don’t get me wrong, I hate pictures of myself. I am not very photogenic at all! But, I would like my kids, and their kids, to remember me one day! And, the woman in my family tend to go senile, so I can see me arguing one day that I was not there. I’ll need proof. ;)

We left the park about 8 p.m. and headed for the hotel. We stayed at the La Quinta Inn San Antonio. We checked in, took showers, and then watched some TV. The kids had a hard time falling asleep because they kept messing with each other in bed. They giggled, tickled, and picked on each other until I turned off all the lights and got it completely dark in the room. Soon after they fell asleep. I set the alarm for 7:30 a.m. so I could get up and get dressed before everyone else. My kids think the free continental breakfast in the lobby is the neatest thing in the world. Can’t miss that…

Photo: All of us on the Bugs Whitewater Rapids ride.
Photo: The Power Surge that got us soaked!
Photo: The ride Ashlee wouldn't ride. Do you blame her? :)