Category Archives: Bennett Writing

The Must Do’s of Disney World by Bennett

Bennett Writing

Magic Kingdom

Magic Kingdom is the most popular and ‘ride-iest’ of all the parks.

Imagine flying through space at millions of miles per second.  That’s Space Mountain, a fast thrill ride that is dark and jerky.  It is one of my favorite thrill rides in Magic Kingdom.  The first time on this ride may be scary, but the second time you will be ready.  It is in my favorites because of its sudden ups, downs, and turns.

My favorite ride in Magic Kingdom is Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, which I will be referring to as Big Thunder.  Big Thunder was my favorite thrill ride in Magic Kingdom.  Big Thunder is an open air ride that is very rickety and its like Space Mountain with lots of ups, downs, and turns.

My favorite show in Magic Kingdom is Wishes.  It was a great fireworks show that is even better than the one at Disneyland.

Epcot

Epcot isn’t really for kids because it’s mostly displays.  Here are the fun parts:

  1. Mission Space: Use this newest type of rocket ship to fly yourself to the Mars.  This extreme simulator really made me want to throw up.   (It also made dad want to.)
  2. Test Track: Make your own car and test its abilities on the Simtrack.  You can check out how well you did at the finish.  Carter got in the top 5 for the fastest of the day.
  3. Chinese Acrobats: Watch these acrobats flip, balance barrels on their feet, and make human pyramids.  Try to get their a few minutes early so that you can get a good spot.  We got their late and got bad spots.

Disney Hollywood Studios

DHS is made for the movie lovers.  There is a Star Wars Ride, Jedi Training Academy, and The Great Movie Ride.

I’m on the ride, Tower of Terror, and I have my eyes closed and my ears plugged.  Then I’m lifted off my seat and I hear people screaming (even with my ears plugged).

“Woohoo,” I think while I’m on Rock Coaster, the best roller coaster in DHS.  You start super fast and the photos come immediately after you start.  Then you go on lots of turns.  It’s like Big Thunder, but you go upside down and it’s much, much faster.

Lights, Motor, Action is an extreme stunt show that you should really go to.  It is a high action show with everything I wanted to see, firing of guns, cars jumping on trucks, and real fire.  Watch a car jump backwards at this extreme stunt show.

Disney Animal Kingdom

DAK has a lot of rides, but not many thrill rides.  Here is one fun thrill ride: Expedition Everest.  Watch out for the Yeti on this ride or you’ll be sorry.  I had a close call with him.

Here’s a must do: Kilimanjaro Safaris. Watch animals roam these safari.  You can see giraffes, elephants, and cheetahs in this safari.  I was able to see a cheetah run.

If it’s a hot day, you’ll want to go on Kali River Rapids.  One warning: You may get soaked.  That’s what I did.  Once I got off the ride I was soaked from head to toe.

Bennett's Drawing

Summary

Those are the must dos of Disney World.  You should try to do everything (except the little kid rides – unless you are a little kid), but make sure you do the ones I wrote about.   Feel free to ask any questions.

 

Note from mom: Bennett usually reads these to me after he has written them out by hand and then he makes all the edits on the computer.  I can’t help but add commas, etc when I type.  It’s automatic.  Sometimes when he edits he takes them out or makes other changes (making any mistakes entirely his fault 🙂 ).  I just don’t want anyone to think he has grammar down this well.

 

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A Day in New Orleans

Bennett Writing

“Hold still! I’m going to measure you,” said the annoying mechanical voice.  I was in the Louisiana Children’s Museum in New Orleans.  I was fidgeting.  “Do you have ants in your pants?” said the voice.  I just simply walked away because there was better stuff to do.

I went to a room with a big rectangular tub.  It had four spots that water was coming out.  Each spot had a ramp that the water came out on.  Each ramp could be blocked.  At the end of the rectangular tub were lots of plastic rectangular pieces.  You could block or change the direction of the water.  I decided to do a big-ish project.  I made a zig-zag path for the water to go through.  After that I made another track that made the water go backwards.

The museum was a pretty good children’s museum.  They had an air hockey table with a bell in the middle instead of goals.  How you were supposed to “learn” was you were supposed to ricochet the puck into the bell.  Most kids didn’t learn that, but dad insisted we learn.  Altogether it was really fun.

After the museum, we went to a slightly inappropriate Mardi Gras parade.  At the parade they threw out lots of junky toys and other stuff.  They also threw out some candy.  There were lots of fun floats and great costumes.  My favorite float had lots of fake bugs on it with something that said “The SWAT Team.”  There were lots of people walking behind the float dressed as bugs.    A few of them gave out fake cockroaches.

I also liked the people on the balcony above us who every once in a while got tossed a necklace.

There were also bands between the floats.  You could easily tell the difference between the bands who worked really hard and the ones that just wanted to play in a Mardi Gras parade.

I really think New Orleans is a great city and this is just one of the fun days we spent in it.

 

Note from mom: Krewe du Vieux is noted for wild satire, adult themes, and political comedy, as well as for showcasing some of the best brass and jazz bands in New Orleans.   I’ll be writing about how we have taken away our children’s innocence in a later post 🙂

 

The Dam

Bennett Writing
What dam holds up the Colorado River and was finished 2 years before planned?

 

The Hoover Dam.  It is AWESOME!!!

The water it holds up is called Lake Mead and is the largest man made lake.

What we did was go on a tour inside the dam and see the power plant.  The part of the power plant we saw had 10 generators.  One small generator only generated part of the power for the Hoover Dam lights and was completely rusted.  The whole dam capacity is just over two million kilowatts of power.  A normal electric room heater uses about two kilowatts, so the Hoover Dam could run one million electrical room heaters.  After that part of the tour, we walked down a long underwater, underground hallway and every time you said something it echoed back at you.  After we got to the end of the long hallway there was a vent.  This vent was on the non-wet side of the dam.  I stuck my hand out of the vent.

After the tour we found lots of coins under the feet of a statue.  I made about one dollar in coins.  Also before the tour we saw a big hole that also echoed back at us.  The big hole was the overflow chamber for the water.  It helped them build the dam.

There is a bridge nearby that gives a great view of the dam and you can be in two states at one time.

We had a great day.  If you go, take the long dam tour.

 

Arizona Sonoran Desert Museum

Bennett Writing

Museum!!?  I would call it a zoo.  If you consider lots of live animals as a zoo you would too.

Fun things:

  1. Mineral Madness:  All around the park there are tables set up.  At each table  there are high schoolers and they tell about their mineral and teach you about geology.  Each table has its own kind of mineral.  You get to bring home the minerals you collect.   My favorite rock I got was the geode.  Geode is a hollow rock which grows crystals in the middle after millions of years.
  2. “Live and on the Loose” Show: Two venomous animals being handled by humans a few feet away from us.  A Gila Monster and rattlesnake to be exact.

I learned there are two types of rattlesnake bites: Accidental and non-accidental.  Accidental is when someone is doing the right thing but might not be paying attention and steps on a rattlesnake and gets bit. A non-accidental is when someone sees a rattlesnake and decides to mess with it and gets bit.  Most of the people who get non-accidental bites are male, teens and twenties, and have a higher TTR* than average.

* TTR is Tattoo to Tooth Ratio.  My TTR is 0 to 22.  What’s yours?

I think kids 7-9 would like this zoo/museum.

(Mom note: Mineral Madness happens one weekend a year.  We just happened to hit it, but it was amazing.  I can’t emphasize enough how great the high school docents were.)

A Day With Mema

Bennett Writing

What place has two sections, one called North America and one called Africa? The Living Desert Zoo in Palm Springs, California! We went there and saw tons of different animals that live in deserts all over the world (but mostly North America and Africa).
We saw birds visiting from Australia that we actually went into the cage with. Something interesting is every time someone new came into the cage to feed the birds, all the birds made a tornado shape and flew around the top.

Since we were visiting the zoo with our grandmother, Mema, I decided to go on the shuttle around the zoo with her instead of walking with Carter and Mom.Even though I was riding the shuttle, we still got off at the exhibits and waited for Mom and Carter. (Dad was home watching football.)

We also went to goat petting corral. We actually saw some of the goats fighting. In the back of the corral were amazing cattle from Africa with huge horns. See the picture

zoobirds  (This is a video of the bird hurricane at the zoo!

Yosemite National Park

Bennett Writing

Yosemite Falls is the biggest waterfall in North America.

Yosemite is the area that inspired the government to make national parks.

Yosemite has tons and tons of granite.

Half Dome is amazing because long ago it had a dome shaped top but half of it fell off because of some natural disaster.

Carter and I had a lot of fun playing in the snow and having a snowball fight.