Kissimmee Air Museum & Columbia Restaurant

This morning Chris, Carole, Paulette and Dredsel came over and we split up into two groups. Mike, Dredsel and Chris drove in Chris' car over to the Kissimmee Air Museum that is located at the Kissimmee Airport.

The Kissimmee Air Museum & Warbird Adventure Flights has displays of airplanes from the WWII era. The admission for the museum is $7.00. Judging from how many photos Mike took of the museum, I'm sure the guys had a great time.

From Kissimmee Air Museum

 I drove Carole and Paulette in our car to downtown Kissimmee. We found out when we got downtown that there is a Farmers' Market on Thursdays,

so finding a parking place took a little while.

Our first stop was at Lanier's Antique Marketplace which is huge. We had given Carole a large wooden bowl we had bought in Alaska and she found some gourds that would look great in the bowl. Paulette loves antiques (so do I) and the three of us had a good time there.

We then went across the street to Echoes of Yesterday Antique Mall which is owned by my brother's next door neighbors. It is smaller than Lanier's, but we enjoyed looking around there.

Mike, Chris and Dredsel met us downtown and we had lunch at Joanie's Diner. Apparently there was some confusion in the kitchen, because Paulette's lunch wasn't served with the rest of ours. The waitress checked on Paulette's order and brought it to the table after several minutes (I guess it hadn't been prepared).

After lunch Chris, Carole, Dredsel and Paulette went back to their hotel and we went back to the RV - everyone agreed that an afternoon nap sounded good.

A little before 6 p.m. we drove over to the hotel and had a drinks before leaving for our dinner reservation. Chris and Carole love Cuban food and we had made reservations for tonight for 7 p.m. at the Columbia Restaurant in Celebration.

The restaurant was packed and we were seated out on the back patio which was great. There was only 1 other table of diners there and it was a lot quieter than inside (they had 2 parties of 50 inside).

Since Chris and Carole were familiar with Cuban cuisine, they helped the rest of us and made suggestions. Mike and I ordered the Boliche Criollo (eye of round beef stuffed with chorizo) and we had Key Lime Pie for dessert. The Boliche Criollo was wonderful and the Key Lime pie was good (the best we've had was in the Keys).

From Kissimmee 2012

 Vasile was our server at the Columbia Restaurant. He was very good and we enjoyed just talking with him (he was from eastern Europe).

We went back to the hotel and had drinks on the patio by the pool. There was a raccoon raiding the poolside garbage cans and we had a good time watching him. If we looked directly at him, he would run off.

After a few drinks we decided to call it a night and Mike and I left to go back to the RV.

Tomorrow Paulette and Dredsel are leaving to go back home to Jacksonville (we wish they could have stayed another day), so we're all meeting for breakfast in the morning.