The Florida Trip
(The Rain Forest Cafe)

This place was truly amazing. It is truly devoted to the rain forests. The decorations in this restaurant are quite captivating and I had a lot of fun looking around in there.

This is the entrance. It's actually a mall entrance since this particular cafe is in the mall. I took a couple of pics, being the lame photographer that I am.

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This is the entrance after you walk into the mall. Notice the 8 foot mushroom.

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This is the little river scene. There is a boat in the middle that you can sit in. I wish the camera's resolution was high enough that I could make the little signs in the pictures readable.

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This column of fruit is also in the entrance, just of the left to the 8 foot mushroom.

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This is one corner of the restaurant. you will notice in this picture, and in most that follow, the ceiling is quite thick with foliage. Now, while this foliage may be fake, it is VERY convincing and eye-catching.

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A picture of a tree in the middle of the restaurant. Note the bird. Fake, but still convincing, and a nice testimonial to the painstaking effort the owners put into the realism affect of the restaurant.

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There are several huge aquariums in the restaurant. They are free of walls and are bound by only the floor and ceiling. Each has tropical fish in it and an amazing array of coral which the fish swim in and out of as you might see in the ocean. In this photo you can see part of the seudo sky in middle of the restaurant. It changes colors and has stars in it. It also flashes when the lightning hits. Again, another convincing feature in the endless decor that surrounds you in this place.

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This is Tracy, my friend of over 2 years. I owe all of the pictures to her since she was the one who insisted we go to this place for dinner. I am very glad she did so now. And to think that we almost ate at some Ms. Smokey's barbecue joint. She didn't want her picture taken but I had to get one so that I could give her credit where credit is due.

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Here you can see another corner of the restaurant where the mother and baby elephant stand. Every now and then they come to life and move their heads and trunks. I'm sorry the picture is so bad. I though it came out good but something was lost in the transfer to my PC.

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This is another corner of the restaurant where you can see 2 gorillas who, every now and then, come to life and move around and make noises.

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The free-standing aquarium behind our table.

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In this photo you can see a couple of gorillas sitting in the foliage of an island in the middle of the restaurant. You can walk completely around the island and see all sides of it. It is bordered by bench seats and has tables on both sides.

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This is the back side of that island. you can't see the large gorilla, on the left, very easily, but you can see the baby gorilla hanging from the tree, on the right, and when he comes to life he swings in the tree.

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This is the bilingual talking tree in the gift shop. Yeah, mouth and eyes move as she talks.

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Another aquarium, in the gift shop.

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    See? I told you this was an amazing place. It is the most fun I've had in a restaurant in years. It's also a great place to take the kids. The table next to us held 3 children who were full of amazement as the different aspects of the restaurant came to life during their visit.

    I had a full rack of spare ribs with waffle-cut French fries. It was very tender. I'll say that they have everything, even steak and pizza. While I'm not restaurant critic, I have to say that even if the food was bad, it would still be a neat experience to go there just to take in all of the sites.

    I'm told, after mentioning the restaurant to several people, that they have locations in Orlando and Washington D.C. also. I consider this to be a very interesting experience that I would recommend to anyone. I know I had fun. You can also visit their web site, http://www.RainForestCafe.com.

Thanks for visiting my Florida Trip web pages. Hope I didn't bore you too much.

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