Good Clean Family Fun in Orlando

Basil Waine Kong

It is our oldest son’s 41st birthday, so Stephanie and I are in Orlando to help him celebrate. Freddie and his wife Tracy are proud parents of two cute and endearing children, Kai (3 years old) and Hailie (18 months). While Kai is active and strong willed, Hailie is as cute as a bug in a rug and in fact we call her Hailie bug. The best moments of our visits are the hugs, welcome to our home, good to see you moments when we first arrive.

While Tracy had to work, Freddie and I played golf at Eagle Creek on Friday afternoon while Stephanie Babysit---which she loves to do for her grand children. I had my usual three bad holes but played well otherwise. Freddie rolled in a 40 footer and chipped one in accompanied with the usual exclamations. We got back home, took our showers, dressed and made our way to his celebratory dinner at Bone Fish Grill, a seafood eatery in Orlando. Although the children were a little antsy, the food was wonderful, service superb and priced well for the quality! Our waiter, Mike, was the best. He should go into business training other waiters. My wife, a very exacting diner, was completely pleased with the attentive and professional service. That made the food taste even better.

The appetizers, bang bang shrimp, entamane (steamed soy beans) and calamari, were a little unusual but very tasty. For our entrées, my wife had the sea bass, pan Asian style with Jasmine rice, Tuna with a beacon jalapeño sauce for Freddie, Tracy had sea bass with mango sauce, and I had crab cakes. The little ones dined on Mac n Chez with steamed Broccoli and lead us in the singing of “Happy Birthday Dad”. We all shared the complimentary warm brownies and ice cream and were in complete agreement that that was a memorable meal.

In addition to the usual hugs and kisses, chasing the grand children, lovely family meals and conversations, swimming, shopping, spa treatments, walks in the park, playground swings and climbs on monkey bars, we spent Saturday at: “Scott’s Maze Adventures” www.cornmaze.com and a wonderful time was had by all--- good clean fun!

Scott’s is a large family owned farm in Zellwood, Florida (about an hour’s drive from Orlando) that is famous for its triple sweet corn. Yes, the corn is sweet and can be eaten raw. Each Fall (Autumn), they convert seven acres of their cornfield into a maze. While the corn maze is the main attraction, children have various “play” options including a spongy wind pillow the size of a tennis court that our grandchildren delighted in jumping, falling and romping around. Kai loved by far, the zip line! The kids sit in a harness and zip down an outstretched line. They can go on and on and our grandson Kai was delighted with each pass. It was wonderful to see the glee in his eyes!

For lunch we dined on fried clam strips and French fries, corn dogs, hamburgers and the usual refreshments. On a day like this, we ignore the usual dietary restrictions like when we go to a ballgame. What’s a baseball game without hot dogs?

After lunch, we go off to the mazes. As corn is called maize in many parts of the world, so, this is actually a maize maze. There are three mazes, the “mini”, the mist and mega maze with three maze quests to play: Kernel B. Cobb’s, Cornelious Quest Picture Find and Poppi’s Secret word Jumble. We didn’t run into any skeletons because they give you a flag on a long stick that you can wave and be rescued it you are hopelessly lost or have an emergency.

Labyrinths and mazes have been around since Ancient Egypt and Greece and is cornfigured as a puzzle with complex branching passages that walkers try to find a route to the exit through the designed twists and turns. In this case, walkers were asked to walk around corncentric circles and find designated stations where answers to paper and pencil puzzles about the environment and alternative energy could be obtained. They did their best to create “cornfusion” with the maze to get people lost but we were able to find the five stations and make our exit in about an hour.

We finally got to the hay ride with the accompanying lecture by our corncierges telling us about the farm’s efforts to make farming environmentally safe and productive. I did not know that each string that makes up the silk at the top of an ear of corn (the cornfer) is connected to each grain of corn.

On our way home, as the children were Cornfined to their seats, the corny jokes were non-stop.
Cornation: countries that grow corn as their principal crop
Corncentrate: thinking deeply about corn
Corncealment: sealing up leaks with glue made from corn
Corncede: what you plant to get an ear of corn
Cornceit: a chair made from corn
Corncerts: breath mints made from corn syrup
Cornscent: things that smell like corn
Cornception: becoming pregnant from eating too much corn for women who need to produce an heir of corn.
corncession: giving an ear of corn to settle a disagreement. And my favorite, if you don’t like them, you can corndemn to hell.

Anyway, the point of this blog is to suggest that this would be an easy thing to implement in Jamaica. How hard would it be to convert a sugarcane plantation into a maze with the accompanying rides, foods and kid friendly activities? Mazes are popular throughout the world. With all the undesirable or non-existent recreational options in Jamaica, how wonderful would it be to have a “Cane Maze?” It would be a terrific tourist attraction as well as a place every Jamaica family would want to visit. It would be lots of fun to “get lost” while raising cane.!