Disappointed in The Space Coast.

By Wednesday morning, it was very apparent that the blister, and the monster bite were not responding to the expensive creams and apart from my trainers, none of my footware was comfortably wearable. Today the itinary had been to go shopping anyway. OK we had bought dad's Jeans in the first hour of shopping on sunday, and there wasnt any more we really wanted to buy, but I had to have something on my feet. We ended up in the Premier Outlet, a very swanky looking place full of designer names, most of which we had never heard of, so it was no surprise that I (literally) fell in the Clarkes shoe shop, happy to recognise a brand I could trust. (I had been hoping for some flyflots but of course they dont sell in outlets, only on line or mail order). I eventually found a pair that, at the time seemed to touch most of the healthy parts of my foot without agrivating the rotting parts. Later, my feet swelled up in the heat. So once again I was left bare foot and fancy free!

We then moved over to the Florida Mall where I was determined to find The Scrapbook Boutique. Now on all the forums I had been assured it was easy to find, right next to Joann's but we had been there twice and still not found it Eventually, fed up with my hobbling and moaning Martin found an info desk where they gave him a map with the shop marked. No wonder we hadnt found it, it is tucked away around the back, not easy to spot at all. And the Joanns was so small I struggled to see it even when we pulled up in front of it. As it turned out, the Scrapbook Boutique sold mainly paper, which I had decided was too hard to take on the plane and wasnt buying anyway, so I came out having spent only $11 on some stickles and one sheet of chipboard diecuts.

Martin was still insistant that he wanted to go to Cocoa beach, so we snagged a quick lunch and headed out. This was supposed to be a 45 minute drive. Of course that is for people with sat nav, maps, or the savvy to follow the road signs. But for Martin, who assumed that Cocoa beach was at the town of Cocoa, this turned out to be an hour and a half drive, through very deserlate march land, all looking a bit like Romney Marsh on the way to Dungerness Power station. The military notices signposting Kennedy Space station didnt quell my fears much either. And not one sighting of a space shuttle.

Eventually we did reach the beach - well not the beach front because that has all been bought up by hotels and you run along a road with large hotels between you and the sea, but we did finally find a road we could turn up, parked and got out to cross onto the sands.

I was so dissappointed. What I had hoped to do was take the water bus out to a thousand islands to see the manatees. What I got was a large 4ft x 4ft sign listing all the things I was NOT allowed to do on the beach, and then the most miserable looking beach front I had ever seen.


This is not my photo., its one I have borrowed from the net. I didnt bother to even get my camera out. We stayed all of 6 minutes, I didnt dip my toes in the Atlantic, and then we were back in the car and heading back to Orlando.

That evening we thought we would try the famous I-trolly that travels up and down International drive. Its a cute little bus, that has a thamas the tank engine type face pointed on it, and runs about every 20 minutes. You can travel as many times as you like in a 24 hour period for $3. I wanted to try some of the finer eating houses at the top of I-Drive where all the hotels and the conference centre were. We checked out the numbers of our stops, bought our ticket in the hotel lobby, and headed off for the trolley stop immedietly outside our hotel. Where we stood patiently and waited.......and waited.......and waited. After about half hour a trolley pulled up, but it was obviously well overloaded so the driver wouldnt let us on, telling us there was another right behind. So we waited... and waited,,, and then decided that even if one picked us up now, we wouldnt be able to eat and get back before the time the trolleys stopped working. The tickets dont actually start the 24 hour count down until you first use them, so we stowed them back in Martin's wallet and went off to enjoy our third meal at Chilli's. Well I just couldnt get enough of those baby back ribs smothered in brown sugar and chilli sauce.