We started off today with another place Amanda found in her research. De Leon Springs State Park is a little spot west of Daytona and about 30 minutes from our hotel. It's a beautiful spot with a small restaurant in the park that gets very busy, despite having to pay to get in to the park before you can even get to the restaurant. The restaurant is called The Old Spanish Sugarmill Pancake House. It's built in an old sugar mill right on the edge of the springs. For $5 s person ($6 for gluten free) they bring out two pitchers of pancake mix (1 for the gluten free) and turn on a griddle in the middle of the table. You make your own pancakes. The two regular mixes are an old fashioned mix and one multi-grain. Both were delicious. For an extra $2 I got a bowl of fresh blueberries to put in my pancakes. The were perfect in the regular mix but didn't mix well with the multi-grain in my opinion. Amanda loved her gluten-free pancakes. They had molasses, raw honey and real maple syrup to pick from. I used mostly the molasses, but found a little drizzle on top was plenty. The flavor was strong. They actually recommended trying a small sample by itself before using it.
After breakfast we tried swimming in the springs. It was freezing cold, so we got changed back and just wandered the park and the kids played on the playground for a bit. Then it was off to Orlando.
We decided to check out Disney Springs. It has been updated quite a bit since I've seen it last (when it was still Downtown Disney). We loved the updates, but it is very tan. Extremely tan in some areas. We had reservation for the T-Rex cafe later in the week but decided to see if we could get in. They only had a 20 minute wait. The girls played in the bone dig pit while we waited. Amanda and I had appetizers and the girls had pizza. We wandered around while we waited for our food. The food was good and the girls enjoyed every minute. Other highlights included the Lego store, the World of Disney (and the spitting Stitch) and the Christmas store. Lily got a stuffed Angel (Stitch's girlfriend) and Ari got Merida's bow and arrow set.
After Amanda got her gluten-free cupcake, we headed out and to our hotel on Lake Ida. Another nice dip in the pool and a quick walk to the lake to look for fish (found gators instead) and then a drive around town (Winter Haven) before heading to bed. Tomorrow we hit our first theme park of the trip. Legoland.
Ponce de Leon Springs, Disney Springs and Lake Ida Pictures
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