Hello again, LOTG fans! We wanted to update friends and fam on our shenanigans in the past few months. Let me begin by saying once again that being able to wake up and choose our own schedules daily has been every bit the incredible blessing we thought it would be. Because we ultimately plan to go back to work in 2027 before we retire “for real”, we are looking at 2026 as the “gap year” we never took as college kids. 😝

February – March 2026

So upon finishing our big round-the-world (first) retirement trip in January, we temporarily settled back into our home state, place of our births, good old Central Florida, USA! We rented a condo for February and March in the Lake Buena Vista area of Orlando, which is only 10-15 minutes from the Walt Disney parks and Sea World. Our rental condo was super cute, and had fantastic views: on one side we had Lake Bryan and our condo pool, and on the other side we could see the nightly Disney and EPCOT fireworks! Score!!!

Side note: the incredible views from our place also included some night time rocket launches from Kennedy Space Center (still visible despite being over 50 miles away!), the Disney Springs hot air balloon, many great rainbows, and a cool lunar eclipse/blood moon.

If you’ve never seen a night rocket launch before, here is one from over 50 miles away!

Disney Parks

So how did we spend most of our days? Two words: Disney Passes! When we lived in Orlando way back in the last century 😂, we had Florida Resident Disney annual passes and we thought it would be fun to get them again. An awful lot has changed at Disney since we were last pass holders, and given the crazy cost of gate admission, we knew the passes would be a good “investment” after just a few visits. We went to the parks several times each week (about 20+ visits so far since buying the pass in early February), and it has been a blast.

It’s been so much fun getting reacquainted with some of our old favorite rides and shows, checking out the MANY new things that have sprung up since then, trying out all the amazing new foods (Disney has become a real foodie destination!), and most of all, we’ve loved meeting up there with other family and friends who are pass holders. Our pass also includes mini golf and Disney’s two water parks (Typhoon Lagoon and Blizzard Beach). This was especially great given that temperatures have often already reached the 80s or even 90s in February and March. I became particularly obsessed with the Disney Play app’s scavenger hunt games that you can do in each Disney Park. Though he doesn’t love them like I do, I am fortunate to have a partner who supports my interests and tolerates the extra 100,000 steps around the park these hunts entailed.

After watching about 50 TikToks and Reels, we got crazy with sugar one day and decided to sort of make our own Disney food review at the EPCOT Flower and Garden Fest. I hope you appreciate the stellar camerawork, inaudible comments, and general crappiness of these videos. You’re welcome.

Fantastic Friends and Family

Because we both grew up and attended college in Central FL, we are super blessed to have many family and friends that remain in this area. Reconnecting with so many special people has been one of our favorite parts of being here.

Sorry if we missed taking pictures with you, but we value and appreciate all the time spent with our friends and family. And if we missed you this round, we hope to see you when we return to Florida.

Wedding Progress

If you followed our earlier blogs, you probably already know that one of our fall highlights was Jenna and Connor getting engaged this past fall while we were all in Australia! They have set their date for October of this year (2026), found a venue, and taken care of a few other details. One of those boxes was checked when they came to visit us here in Orlando and we went dress shopping for Jenna. With Grammy, Aunt Stacy, and Mom in attendance, Jenna said “Yes!” to the very unique and beautiful dress that she wants for their wedding! So exciting !!

We had such a great weekend with Jenna and Connor while they were here in Orlando. Other fun activities with them included our first visit to Universal Studios Epic Universe. It was a park with big “wow!” factor, for sure!

More FL Fun

In addition to Disney and Universal, we have had more Florida fun visiting the wintering manatees over on the west coast, taking the Lake Apopka Wildlife Drive, and so much more. We were also fortunate that Rob’s (former) professional organization, SETA, had their spring conference right near us in Orlando. As past president, he can attend for free so he enjoyed meeting up with friends/colleagues and we joined in on their Sea World outing. So, we really have hit most of the Orlando theme parks!

Next Up!

So the days have flown by into April, and we are headed back up to Atlanta to do some visiting and leave our car before we start our next Big Adventure: a repositioning Panama Canal Cruise from Foirt Lauderdale to Vancouver, BC, to be followed by a two week driving road trip from Nevada to Texas! We are so thankful for our time with family and friends, but we are also restless and ready to get back on the road. Let the next round of shenanigans in the LeBeau Gap Year™️ begin! Look for regular updates of LOTG over the next 7 weeks, starting on 4/13. Thanks for adventuring with us (again!)!