It looks really cool. Who else wants to go?

Star Wars Weekends

Walt Disney World has announced dates for the 2012 Star Wars Weekends at Disney’s Hollywood Studios theme park. The galactic fun begins on May 18 and will run through June 10. Let The Manor at Emerald Island be your vacation home base for these fun weekends

The 2012 Star Wars Weekend dates are:

May 18-20
May 25-27
June 1-3
June 8-10

Star Wars Weekends is an annual event that celebrates the Star Wars film saga and the hit animated TV series Star Wars: The Clone Wars. During the celebration Disney hosts special shows, presentations and offer some out of this world memorabilia.

Now is the time to book your stay at The Manor located on the Emerald Island Resort for Star Wars Weekends 2012.

One last bite for Jaws

On January 2, 2012, one of Universal Studios’ most iconic rides is heading out to sea for the last time. In order to make room for an exciting new attraction, Captain Jake’s Amity Boat Tours is closing. If Jaws is your favorite ride, now is the time for you to visit and experience one final ride of JAWS. Come stay at The Manor at Emerald Island, relive your favorite memories and get ready to scream as the Great White Shark takes its last bite.

Holiday Shamu

Whilst at The Manor on the Emerald Island Resort, you can head to Seaworld and experience the holidays like nowhere else, with special evening shows including O Wondrous Night, Shamu Christmas – Miracles, Clyde & Seamore’s Countdown to Christmas, and more.

Families can share a delicious meal with Santa and Mrs. Claus in Santa’s Fireside Feast - a charming, warm-hearted holiday experience. You and your family will create Christmas memories to last a lifetime as you enjoy this sumptuous seasonal dinner and show.

Now you can enjoy one FREE Kids ticket with the purchase of a full-price Adult ticket valid for visits through Dec. 25th. Click here for tickets

Disney Cruise Line's Crispy Duck with Marquise Potatoes

Bake it Yourself: Recipe for Disney Cruise Line’s Crispy Roasted Duck Breast with Marquise Potatoes by Jonathan Frontado

Crispy Roasted Duck Breast

Serves 4

Duck
6-8 pound fresh or frozen duck
1 tablespoon olive oil

Marquise Potatoes (Potato Cakes)
4 medium Yukon gold potatoes, peeled
4 strips bacon, finely diced
1/2 cup finely diced yellow onions
1 tablespoon finely chopped parsley
1 egg
1/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon all purpose flour, divided
Coarse salt, freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons butter

Pomegranate Jus
1 cup beef stock
1/4 cup pomegranate syrup

For duck:

1. Preheat oven to 300° F.
2. Roast duck for 25 to 35 minutes, or until medium rare. Rest until cool enough to remove breast, thighs, and legs, keeping the skin intact.
3. Heat olive oil in medium skillet over medium heat. Add duck breast, skin side down, and cook for 3 to 5 minutes, or until skin is crispy.
4. Place thighs and drumsticks, skin side up, back in oven for 5 to 7 minutes or until skin is crispy.
5. Transfer duck to cutting board and let stand 15 minutes before carving.

For marquise potatoes (potato cakes):

1. Boil potatoes until tender, drain and cool on a perforated pan. Shred the potatoes with a box grater; set aside.
2. Sauté bacon until crisp in a medium skillet. Add onions and cook until translucent.
3. Add bacon and onions to the shredded potatoes. Mix in parsley, egg, and 1 tablespoon flour. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
4. Form into eight 3-inch cakes. Dredge the cakes lightly in remaining flour, coating both sides.
5. Heat the butter in large skillet over high heat. Cook the cakes until golden brown on both sides.

For pomegranate jus:

1. Heat beef stock in small saucepan over medium heat. Bring to a boil, reduce to low heat, and let simmer for 15 minutes.
2. Pour in pomegranate syrup and simmer for 5 to 7 minutes.

To serve:

1. Place 2 potato cakes on 4 entrée plates and serve with duck breast slices, thighs and drumsticks.
2. Drizzle 2 tablespoons of pomegranate jus over duck and serve remaining jus on the side.

Do you want to drive a supercar during your stay at The Manor on the Emerald Island Resort? Well you soon can. Starting January 16th 2012, Richard Petty Driving Experience at Walt Disney World will offer an Exotic Driving Experience. The Richard Petty Driving Experience and Exotic Driving Experience can be easily reached from The Manor at Emerald Island Resort.
Starting at $199 for 6 laps around the circuit, you will be able to take the wheel of a supercar by Ferrari, Lamborghini, Audi or Porsche.

Petty Holdings recently completed an interior road course-style section at the WDW track, specifically for Exotic Driving Experience. The new section features a series of quick, challenging right and left-hand turns, known as “switch backs.”

Make your reservations at www.exoticdriving.com or by calling 855-822-0149

Dave and Busters

Dave and Busters has opened on I-drive. A Chuck-E-Cheese for big kids, this will sure to be a hit with the teen kids and those big kids at heart.

Dave and Busters opens in the International Drive spot formally occupied by Race Rock. That building was torn down and the new premises built specially for Dave and Busters.

Dave and Busters houses a bar area, a restaurant area and an arcade area. The restaurant area is away from the arcade area, so you are not in the middle of the action while dining.

A welcome addition to the Orlando area which, I suspect will be great for families with teenage kids and young adults.

http://www.daveandbusters.com

Dave and Busters
8986 International Drive
Florida, FL 32819
Phone: 407-541-3300

Hours
Sun-Thurs:11am-1am
Fri-Sat:11am-2am

Current Specials
Happy Hour
Mon-Fri 4:30-7pm
1/2 Price Cocktails
$2.50 Domestic Pints
$1 Off 22oz Drafts

Late Night Happy Hour
Sun-Thurs 10pm-Close
1/2 Price Cocktails
$2.50 Domestic Pints
$1 Off 22oz Drafts

Power Hour
Mon-Fri 4:30-7pm
60 minutes of video
game play for only $10

When someone suggested reading a blog post on drowning by Mario Vittone, I did just that. You can find the post in all its glory here: http://mariovittone.com/2010/05/154/ as well as many more on water safety.

Please take a few minutes of your time to read the article. If it helps save just one life, it will be minutes well spent.

———————————————————————————

Drowning Doesn’t Look Like Drowning
By Mario Vittone
(http://mariovittone.com/2010/05/154/)

The new captain jumped from the deck, fully dressed, and sprinted through the water. A former lifeguard, he kept his eyes on his victim as he headed straight for the couple swimming between their anchored sportfisher and the beach. “I think he thinks you’re drowning,” the husband said to his wife. They had been splashing each other and she had screamed but now they were just standing, neck-deep on the sand bar. “We’re fine, what is he doing?” she asked, a little annoyed. “We’re fine!” the husband yelled, waving him off, but his captain kept swimming hard. ”Move!” he barked as he sprinted between the stunned owners. Directly behind them, not ten feet away, their nine-year-old daughter was drowning. Safely above the surface in the arms of the captain, she burst into tears, “Daddy!”

How did this captain know – from fifty feet away – what the father couldn’t recognize from just ten? Drowning is not the violent, splashing, call for help that most people expect. The captain was trained to recognize drowning by experts and years of experience. The father, on the other hand, had learned what drowning looks like by watching television. If you spend time on or near the water (hint: that’s all of us) then you should make sure that you and your crew knows what to look for whenever people enter the water. Until she cried a tearful, “Daddy,” she hadn’t made a sound. As a former Coast Guard rescue swimmer, I wasn’t surprised at all by this story. Drowning is almost always a deceptively quiet event. The waving, splashing, and yelling that dramatic conditioning (television) prepares us to look for, is rarely seen in real life.

The Instinctive Drowning Response – so named by Francesco A. Pia, Ph.D., is what people do to avoid actual or perceived suffocation in the water. And it does not look like most people expect. There is very little splashing, no waving, and no yelling or calls for help of any kind. To get an idea of just how quiet and undramatic from the surface drowning can be, consider this: It is the number two cause of accidental death in children, age 15 and under (just behind vehicle accidents) – of the approximately 750 children who will drown next year, about 375 of them will do so within 25 yards of a parent or other adult. In ten percent of those drownings, the adult will actually watch them do it, having no idea it is happening (source: CDC). Drowning does not look like drowning – Dr. Pia, in an article in the Coast Guard’s On Scene Magazine, described the instinctive drowning response like this:

1. Except in rare circumstances, drowning people are physiologically unable to call out for help. The respiratory system was designed for breathing. Speech is the secondary or overlaid function. Breathing must be fulfilled, before speech occurs.
2. Drowning people’s mouths alternately sink below and reappear above the surface of the water. The mouths of drowning people are not above the surface of the water long enough for them to exhale, inhale, and call out for help. When the drowning people’s mouths are above the surface, they exhale and inhale quickly as their mouths start to sink below the surface of the water.
3. Drowning people cannot wave for help. Nature instinctively forces them to extend their arms laterally and press down on the water’s surface. Pressing down on the surface of the water, permits drowning people to leverage their bodies so they can lift their mouths out of the water to breathe.
4. Throughout the Instinctive Drowning Response, drowning people cannot voluntarily control their arm movements. Physiologically, drowning people who are struggling on the surface of the water cannot stop drowning and perform voluntary movements such as waving for help, moving toward a rescuer, or reaching out for a piece of rescue equipment.
5. From beginning to end of the Instinctive Drowning Response people’s bodies remain upright in the water, with no evidence of a supporting kick. Unless rescued by a trained lifeguard, these drowning people can only struggle on the surface of the water from 20 to 60 seconds before submersion occurs.

(Source: On Scene Magazine: Fall 2006 (page 14))

This doesn’t mean that a person that is yelling for help and thrashing isn’t in real trouble – they are experiencing aquatic distress. Not always present before the instinctive drowning response, aquatic distress doesn’t last long – but unlike true drowning, these victims can still assist in their own rescue. They can grab lifelines, throw rings, etc.

Look for these other signs of drowning when persons are in the water:

• Head low in the water, mouth at water level
• Head tilted back with mouth open
• Eyes glassy and empty, unable to focus
• Eyes closed
• Hair over forehead or eyes
• Not using legs – Vertical
• Hyperventilating or gasping
• Trying to swim in a particular direction but not making headway
• Trying to roll over on the back
• Appear to be climbing an invisible ladder.

So if a crew member falls overboard and everything looks OK – don’t be too sure. Sometimes the most common indication that someone is drowning is that they don’t look like they’re drowning. They may just look like they are treading water and looking up at the deck. One way to be sure? Ask them, “Are you alright?” If they can answer at all – they probably are. If they return a blank stare, you may have less than 30 seconds to get to them. And parents – children playing in the water make noise. When they get quiet, you get to them and find out why.

Walt Disney World Castle (c. Kay Robinson)

Effective Sunday, June 12, ticket prices have increased at Walt Disney World. The second time in under a year a price increase has occurred.

The price of a one-day ticket has risen to $85 before tax (from $82), up 3.7 percent. But that is just the start!

A five-day ticket will increase to $251 (from $237), up 9 percent. A 7 day pass has jumped 8.1% to $267. The 10-day pass has increased 11.1 percent to $291.

All this is adding an extra ‘ouch’ to your wallet this summer vacation.

Lets get groceries!

One question I get asked frequently by guests to The Manor on the Emerald Island Resort is “Where can I get groceries?”.

The nearest grocery store to The Manor at Emerald Island is the Marketplace in the Formosa Gardens Plaza (7840 W. Irlo Bronson Hwy, Kissimmee, FL 34747). That is at the junction of the 192 and Formosa Gardens Blvd. However I tend to recommend other stores which are just a little further away, but I feel offer a better selection and prices.

At the same junction but the opposite corner is a Walgreens which is 24hours. It has some basic foods and drinks. Enough to get you through the night if you just want to pick up basics on your way in. Of course it has the usual drugstore offerings too, like sunscreen, candies and some Florida souvenirs.

Next nearest stores are Publix and SuperTarget near Orange Lakes (they are on opposite sides of the 192 near the Junction with the 429. I personally head to one of these stores for my groceries and supplies.

Both close at 11pm

Publix - 14928 East Orange Lake Boulevard, Kissimmee, FL 34747

SuperTarget - 3200 Rolling Oaks Blvd, Kissimmee, FL 34747
(closes at 11pm most nights, except Sunday when it closes at 10pm)

Furthest away is Walmart at 550 US Highway 27, Clermont, FL 34714 but this store is open 24 hours, so you can shop for groceries, clothes, (almost anything you need) 24/7 (and yes, I have been in there at 3am getting groceries after landing in the area at midnight local time)

Other options for you.

If you are flying into Sanford International or Orlando International, you can drive to the area via the 419. It is a toll road (so make sure you have cash), but if you come off at exit 3 (which is the way I normally go), you come out close to the Publix at 2925 International Dr Kissimmee, FL 34746-4407. Once you have your groceries, you just drive West along the 192 to Formosa Gardens Blvd and you are there!

Another options is a grocery delivery service such as

www.wegoshop.com

www.gardengrocer.com

both will shop for you and deliver to your Emerald Island Resort vacation home. You would have to liaise with your management company / owner so that the company can get access to deliver your groceries, but it would mean that your groceries could be in your home upon your arrival.

One last thought for our guests from ‘across the pond’ in the United Kingdom. If you are yearning for a touch of home - several stores have British groceries in their ‘ethnic’ section. I know Walmart does and if I recall correctly, Publix does too. Marketplace has a wide selection of British foods, and also newspapers. Just don’t expect to pay the same as you would if you purchased the same item back home!

Have a great time at The Manor at Emerald Island