Leisure … more than a word, it's a lifestyle

This weekend, October 5^th &  6^th, Celebration Town Center transforms before your very eyes as the falling leaves of the season drop on Market Street in the Fall Festival known as Oktoberfest. It’s a chance to listen to the rustling of leaves, relax by the lakeside and rock your troubles away. You can also enjoy some great live music with family and friends in this one-of-a-kind themed extravaganza.

On Friday October 5^th Oktoberfest will be celebrated in the old-world German tradition featuring the sounds of Dan Witucki & Heimatland Musikanten (pictured above). You are invited to join in on the interactive live show featuring everything from yodeling to crowd sing-a-long fun.

Then, come back on October 6^th as Celebration Town Center welcomes a host of rock and roll entertainment for a night of “Rock”toberfest featuring national recording artist-Ryan Cabrera (pictured above).

Hop on a hayride, dance to terrific live music, paint a pumpkin, or just stroll and enjoy the crisp fall air and enjoy the great savings at the lakeside promenade.

Leaves fall daily at 7:00, 8:00, and 9:00 PM.

Parking and Admission are FREE!!!

October 5^th     Schedule

5:30 PM                       DJ Tami Begins/Pumpkin Painting Begins

6:10-7:00 PM              Dan Witucki & Heimatland Musikanten

7:00 PM                       Leaves Fall

7:15-8:00 PM             Dan Witucki & Heimatland Musikanten

8:00 PM                      Leaves Fall

8:15-9:00 PM            Dan Witucki & Heimatland Musikanten

9:00 PM                      Leaves Fall

9:15-10:00 PM           Dan Witucki & Heimatland Musikanten

10:00 PM                    Event Ends

 October 6^th    Schedule

5:00 PM                             DJ Tami Begins/Pumpkin Painting Begins

5:30-6:15 PM                    Jordyn Kane (pictured above)

6:15-7:00 PM                    The Reflections Band

7:00 PM                             Leaves Fall

7:15-8:00 PM                   The Reflections Band

8:00 PM                            Leaves Fall

8:15-9:00 PM                   The Reflections Band

9:00 PM                             Leaves Fall

9:15-10:00 PM                  Ryan Cabrera

10:00 PM                           Event Ends

Tourists were taken aback and traffic came to a grinding halt as a horde of Zombies marched along International Drive.

The event was staged today as a tribute to the late Bill Hinzman who created one of the most iconic zombies with his performance in Night of the Living Dead to kick off the May-Hem weekend.  Make up experts, Post Mortem FX and the infamous Dr. Skull teamed up again to bring death to life and pack the streets with zombies!

A portion of the proceeds will benefit Vitas Hospice, Bill Hinzman’s charity of choice.

May-Hem is running throughout the weekend at the Wyndham Resort on Sandlake Rd/International Drive.

Details can be found at www.spookyempire.com and on our earlier post at http://www.floridaleisureblog.com/are-you-ready-for-some-may-hem

If you are having MegaCon withdrawals and can’t wait for Halloween season to begin, never fear May-Hem is here.

Since it’s humble beginnings back in 2003 in Fort Lauderdale, Spooky Empire has grown into arguably one of the nation’s top producers of horror themed conventions with their annual Ultimate Horror Weekend in October now a can’t miss event, especially as it runs during Orlando’s world famous theme park Halloween events. Last year, they responded to the demands of the fans and added May-Hem to their calendar and it was so successful it is back again this year.

The press release below gives you more information than I could ever, except to say that from the Zombie Walk to the Pool Party this is FUN with a capital F.

Spooky Empire’s May-Hem convention is less than 3 days away….are you ready for, well…the Mayhem?!!

Orlando, FL – May 25 – 27 , 2012 – The show is looking to be an epic event, their last one at the Wyndham Orlando Resort, 8001 International Drive, Orlando, FL 32819, and Spooky Empire wants everyone to join them in bidding farewell to their favorite venue as only they know how.

There is an amazing line up of celebrity guests in store at May-Hem this year, most of which have never appeared at a Spooky Empire event! It’s a never-ending list of heavy hitters, sure to please fans of all kinds. Guests will be available for meet and greets and autograph signings all weekend!

Some of the guests appearing are Linda Hamilton, best known for her role as “Sarah Connor” in The Terminator, as well as the TV series “Beauty and The Beast” and more recently “Chuck”. Vivica A. Fox of “Kill Bill Vol. 1”, “Independence Day” and “Batman & Robin” and Verne Troyer of the “Austin Powers” films and “The Love Guru”. Plus a very last minute addition, James Marsters most well known as Spike from “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”.

For all of you KISS fans out there, here’s your chance to meet the one and only Ace Frehley, original guitarist of the legendary band!

There will be an “Addams Family” reunion featuring John Astin “Gomez Addams”, Lisa Loring “Wednesday Addams” and Felix Silla and “Cousin Itt”.

Roddy Piper will be making a return appearance to Spooky Empire, not only for autographs, but to perform his live “one man show” This performance will require a separate ticket in addition to your admission. Tickets for Roddy’s show are $10 and are available in advance online.

From the hit new TV series “The Walking Dead” is Madison Lintz who played “Sophia” in the hit show. Stars of the TV series Charmed, Holly Marie Combs, Brian Krause, and Michael Bailey Smith. Holly Marie Combs currently stars on the hit new show “Pretty Little Liars”, Brian Krause is also known for his role in Sleepwalkers., and Michael Bailey Smith has appeared in Buffy and The Hills Have Eyes 1 & 2. Also making a rare convention appearance is Joey Lauren Adams best known for her roles in films Chasing Amy, Big Daddy, Dazed & Confused and many more.

To round off the guest list is Kristanna Loken of Terminator 3, Monica Keena of Freddy vs Jason, and Oliver Robins from Poltergeist, plus legendary rock goddess Lita Ford, Marc Price from the film Trick or Treat, and Mackenzie Lintz of the hit new movie based on the bestseller The Hunger Games. The stars of SyFy’s “Monster Man”, special FX artists Cleve Hall and Constance Hall will also be on hand to meet fans!

May-Hem is not just about the guests, there are some memorable events lined up as well. For the first time at May-Hem, Spooky Empire will be hosting their Zombie Walk in memory of the late Bill Hinzman!

The Mucklebones Monster Museum will be set up throughout the weekend inside the hotel. This is an exclusive Spooky Empire event! Spooky Empire’s Tattoo Festival will also be in place featuring over 25 of the country’s best artists. Check out the website to make your appointments now.

Of course there is the huge vendor room loaded with merchandise, collectibles and artists, tons of panels and Q&As, and no one can forget the notorious pool parties with live bands!

Tickets are still available, one day passes are $30-$35, and $50 gets you in all three days! VIP packages are available but going fast! Both are available on the website www.spookyempire.com and our facebook page www.facebook.com/spookyempire

Florida Leisure is today pleased to announce the expansion of its line of vacation home product. Coming soon to its range of available vacation rental properties is 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW  Washington, DC 20500. The new property will be known simply as “The Ultimate Vacation House”

The property is the ideal place for a vacation and many previous guests have remarked how much they enjoyed their experience. Some have even stayed for periods of 4 to 8 years at a time.

The house itself is almost the perfect destination to relax and enjoy a unique ambiance. All thoughts of work will quickly disappear as soon as you enter the 55,000 square foot residence which includes six stories, 132 rooms and 35 bathrooms. For your convenience, there are 412 doors, 147 windows, twenty-eight fireplaces, eight staircases, three elevators, five full-time chefs, a tennis court, a (single-lane) bowling alley, a movie theater, a jogging track, a swimming pool, and a putting green. Here’s the floor plan:

Built between 1792 and 1800, the sprawling and unique mansion has been used as a vacation home by every United States President since John Adams. Florida Leisure is pleased to announce that the home is now available to guests and that reservations should be made quickly as the residence does fill up quickly, particularly around the election and holiday time periods. Reservations can be made simply by turning up at the front desk at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave and asking for the “Presidents Pilar Lofo” discount code.

Wow! An amazing MegaCon 2012 wraps up today and judging from the attendance on Saturday, we can expect another bumper size crowd. I’ve been attending this event off and on for a few years, mainly to see what costumes most folks can dream up year after year, but the sheer volume of people attending the convention yesterday was something I had never seen at this event before.

For those that don’t know, this is THE event of the year for science fiction, fantasy and comic book fans in Orlando. This year has seen some very special guests attend the show, not least of all the legendary Stan Lee (pictured below),  the American comic book writer, editor, actor, producer, publisher, television personality, and the former president and chairman of Marvel Comics.

Lee co-created Spider-Man, the Hulk, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four, Iron Man, Thor and many other fictional characters in comic books. He was inducted into the comic book  industry’s Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame in 1994 and the Jack Kirby Hall of Fame  in 1995.

Also appearing and proving just as popular is Tom Felton, (pictured above left) best known for playing the role of Drace Malfoy in the Harry Potter film series. Other celebrities you can rub shoulders with are Bruce Boxleitner (TRON & Tron:Legacy),  Daniel Logan (Star Wars), the lovely Charisma Carpenter (Buffy the Vampire Slayer – pictured above right with me) and many more.

The convention also features hundreds of booths filled with collectibles, comic books, toys, apparel and merchandise and there are some great panel discussions, Q&A sessions, auctions and demonstrations. Among the highlights of the final day will be a Q&A with Stan Lee at 11.30am, a session with Charisma Carpenter and Nicholas Brendan at 2.20pm as they discuss their respective roles on two of Joss Wheldon’s critically claimed TV series and a rowdy afternoon chat with Esiner nominated comics scribe Brian Clevinger who investigates how werewolves, aliens and conspiracy theorists ruin our love lives!

There’s a lot to see and do, so make sure you head along to Orange County Convention Center on International Drive early. And, there’s lots more photos on our www.Facebook.com/FloridaLeisure page.

Here’s some video from yesterday:

As each year comes to a close, we find ourselves reflecting on the year that was and looking forward to the year to come. We use celebrations, superstitions, resolutions and traditions to properly ring in the New Year and bid farewell to the old one. Here in the US our focus is usually on the big ball that drops in Times Square so it’s very easy to overlook celebrations and countdowns from around the globe. Often we forget that the new year has already started for many others so we’re going to use today’s blog to see just who celebrates first and how far in advance of us they really are!

The first people to celebrate the New Year are … the people of Samoa & Tokelau in the South Pacific. The parties start a full 19 hours before us on the Eastern coast of the United States as the cities of Kiritimati (Christmas Island), Apia and Fakaofo come to life. An hour later the party comes to other Pacific islands and Western territories such as New Zealand. In fact, the Kiwi’s celebrate like most cultures around the world as social gatherings and dazzling fireworks light the sky. The most impressive is at Sky Tower in Auckland City which stands at 1,076 feet tall, which is taller than the Eiffel Tower and the Chrysler Building.

By 7am Eastern Time it’s time for some small regions of Russia to start celebrating and by 8am it’s the turn of some of the Australian regions like Melbourne, Sydney and Canberra to get in on the act. We then leap forward to just 14 hours before midnight Eastern time to Japan where New Year’s Eve, or Omisoka, has been celebrated for centuries.

In India, it’s actually 10.5 hours before EST that the celebrations for “Diwali” begin. Diwali is based on the Hindu calendar and although the Indian New Year won’t officially be celebrated on January 1st, many displays and celebrations are still held in many of the major urban areas throughout the country.

9 hours before midnight EST, Moscow gets in on the act as the Kremlin counts down the final seconds of the year. Many Russians actually send those moments in silence though, rather than cheering and making noise. It’s during this quiet time that they take the time to make wishes for the new year and many actually take the time to write them out. In a rather odd tradition some of them then burn their written wishes, placing the ashes in a glass of champagne, and then drinking this rather weird concoction to hopefully ensure the wish will come true!

Jumping forward to 6 hours before midnight EST, it’s the turn of most Europeans to embrace the new year. In Spain, its the tradition to eat 12 grapes at midnight, while many Danes enjoy the ritual of breaking dishes! For fireworks, then perhaps Paris has the best and most phenomenal fireworks in the whole of Europe until London gets into the act one hour later at 5 hours until midnight EST.

Also, 5 hours ahead of Eastern USA are some Western African countries and also Portugal. At 3 hours before midnight EST it’s the turn of our amigos in South America to heat things up. Unlike many Americans the folks in Brazil will be shorts, tank tops and swimwear as New Year’s Eve in the Southern Hemisphere occurs during the Summer and that allows for many festivities to take place on the beach.

Argentina joins in an hour later before some regions of Canada start to celebrate an hour after that and just one hour before we do! Then, finally, it becomes our turn as the final seconds of 2011 slip away and the Times Square Ball begins its descent. Many folks turn out in New York for this tradition and many others on the Eastern side of the United States gather around their TV sets, grab fistfuls of things that make a noise and then rush to secure a New Year kiss. When the ball finally reaches the bottom of its 60 foot pole, it’s the New Year! Time to party.

New Year isn’t done there though as it takes another four hours for New Year to cross over the USA and to Alaska before it finally reaches its journey’s end 2 hours after that (6am EST) at American Samoa and the Midway Islands. As you can see, New Year has quite a way to travel!

From all of us at Florida Leisure / Florida Leisure Vacation Homes and Florida Leisure Blog, we have enjoyed bringing you our own perspectives on Orlando and the Central Florida area this year and we wish you a very Happy and prosperous New Year in 2012. We do hope we’ll get to see many of you as you make a return visit to our Sunshine State and the “Happiest Place on Earth!”

Happy New Year!

In 2011 we posted over 100 videos (roughly one every three days) from in and around Orlando on our YouTube.com/FloridaLeisure channel. At the last count 53,604 people have “friended” us and 1555 have “subscribed” to us to regularly watch our video content. Through 2011 we’ve covered a wide variety of stories and we’ve shot just about everything there is to do in Central Florida, from the opening of the brand new Legoland Florida theme park to the Christmas celebrations going on all around our fabulous area.

Our videos also passed over half a million views, so we thought we’d take a look back at some of the most popular and some that had the most memories for us. We had a short list of 15 videos that we’ve had to cull but we really couldn’t cut 5 from the list …so we’re including 3 of them as Bonuses before we got to our Top 12! Here we go….

BONUS 1 – Kayaking

BONUS 2 – 2011 Sunburst Convention

BONUS 3 – Halloween Celebration

And now to the countdown… at Number 12… a look at Wet ‘N’ Wild… remembering those hot days of Summer 2011

Number 11 is the Fabulous 2011 Singing Christmas Trees at First Orlando

Number 10 is one of our wonderful Florida Leisure Vacation Homes… what else?

Number 9 features a first look in over 30 years at the Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center… cool!

Number 8 was the chance to go below the water at Discovery Cove at the new SeaVenture…

Number 7 was the opening of Cheetah Hunt and Cheetah Run at Busch Gardens… superb addition to this great theme park…

Number 6 was the opening of The Grand Reef at Discovery Cove….

Number 5 sees the final journey of Space Shuttle Atlantis as the space shuttle program comes to an end…

Number 4 The opening of One Ocean at SeaWorld…

Number 3 As huge soccer fans we loved being involved with a fantastic first season with Orlando City. We featured the Lions on several videos but this one is our favorite…

Number 2 is the amazing “O Wondrous Night” at SeaWorld Orlando. You’ll not see a better Christmas production at an Orlando theme park than this…simply magnificent. We went to several performances and every one got a standing ovation… simply brilliant. We filmed this twice but decided to go with the full length choice rather than the shorter version in our selection … watch it and see why…

Number 1…simply had to be the Grand Opening of Central Florida’s newest theme park… Legoland Florida … and we’re going to cheat a bit here… because we have two videos! Enjoy….

New Year’s resolutions are almost as predictable as the Times Square bell dropping to mark the beginning of a New Year. According to a study by the Scanton Journal of Psychology nearly 45 per cent of adults make New Year’s resolutions. Any guesses for the top three?

Yes, you probably guessed them.

Better management of finances, lose weight / get in shape and to stop smoking.

Frankly, I think we need to add another one… one that can make everyone feel refreshed… taking an Orlando vacation!

It’s well known that during the Winter months there is less sun and that our bodies produce less vitamin D. Vitamin D is essential for strong bones, a healthy immune system and for heart disease prevention. Ever wondered why people in warm climates live longer? Now you know. So, make sure you plan an Orlando vacation as one of your New Year resolutions… make that reservation right now by calling us on 1-800-760-1114 and you can be sure that this will be at least one resolution you can keep that is good for you!

Hope to see you soon!

Miles of garland, ribbon, twinkling lights and glitter transform Walt Disney World Resort into a winter wonderland during the holiday season.  Here’s a sample of what guests will experience throughout the Vacation Kingdom:

• 1,300 decorated trees throughout property
• A wreath 25 feet in diameter adorning the Cirque du Soleil building at Downtown Disney West Side
• 10 miles of twinkling rope lights in the Osborne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights at Disney’s Hollywood Studios
• 150 tractor-trailer truckloads of decorations for 24 resorts, 4 theme parks, Downtown Disney and other locations
• 15 miles of garland strung and 1,314 wreaths hung throughout the Vacation Kingdom
• 300,000 yards of ribbon and bows draping over Christmas trees across property
• 8.5 million lights strung throughout Walt Disney World Resort
• 100 percent of the lighting used for holiday décor is LED
• 11 countries dressed for Holidays Around the World at Epcot World Showcase
• More than 800 performers each night during Candlelight Processional at Epcot
• More than 200 guest choirs during the entire run of Candlelight Processional
• A Christmas tree in Magic Kingdom with a base 25 feet wide
• One 70-foot-tall tree takes center stage in Disney’s Contemporary Resort entrance lobby featuring nearly 35,800 white LED lights
• 6 life-sized creations cooked up by Walt Disney World pastry chefs, including:
  • One 16-foot-tall gingerbread house at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort & Spa baked with 1,050 pounds of honey and involving more than 160 hours of decorating
  • One life-size gingerbread carousel at Disney’s Beach Club Resort featuring ponies made of chocolate and fondant, giant candy cane poles, handcrafted poinsettias and hand-painted portraits of famous Disney characters
  • 100 percent chance of snow flurries during Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party, taking place on select holiday evenings in Magic Kingdom
  • 365 days of the year that guests can shop for holiday merchandise at the Disney’s Days of Christmas shop in Downtown Disney Marketplace

Thanks to everyone who entered our “Disney Sweepstakes” to win 2 x Disney theme park tickets. The winner is announced in the video below…. and we also have a special announcement…. so check it out…