Freedom Beads

Of course the big story of our Disney trip in late July was Eli's adventure in the Hilton Orlando.  He managed to unlock the door and slip out of the hotel room.  He ran down the hallway and hopped an elevator down to the lobby.

He managed to elude security for a while until they cornered him in an empty conference room.  One of the security guards gave him these beads to play with.  We now refer to them as his "freedom beads."

In addition to having good security, the Hilton Orlando was all around great.  Really nice rooms and incredible pools.  This hotel is at the top of our list along with the Dolphin and Swan.

The only downside to the Hilton is that its location can be inconvenient.  When there is no traffic on I-4, you can get to Disney parks very quickly.  However, I-4 has notoriously bad traffic and we did have to avoid it a couple of times.  When you have to take the smaller roads, it can take a while to get back and forth from the parks.

We only tried one new restaurant on these trips.  We ate breakfast at an off-property eatery called First Watch.  It was delicious.  The food was great but this restaurant is not close to the parks and it is always very, very crowded.  We went very early on a Sunday morning, though, and got seated right away.  Our server told us that there are supposedly several more locations of First Watch being opened around Orlando.  Good news because we will definitely want to go back.