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| Christa Grant's
Trip Report August / September 05 |
| Day
2, Part 1 – Prison or Disney?
To those of you who know me, I am NOT a morning person by nature.
In fact, my college roomies continue to share stories about
my Jekyll to Hyde personality come early morning. However,
I’m pleased to report that while on vacation in Florida,
Mr. Hyde never does rear his ugly head. Despite our lack of
sleep these last couple nights, we were up and at it at 7am.
After showering, I dawned my Disney finest. Yup, my Mickey/Minnie
earrings and my Disney charm bracelet. After all, it’s
always important to make a good first impression when you’re
visiting the mouse.
Cocoa BIL phones at 7:30am to tell us to come meet them downstairs
for breakfast. I couldn’t believe my family actually
made it out the door before us! I must be losing my touch.
We grab our bags and open the door. “Just breathe
it in,” I yelled. “You just can’t beat that Florida smell,
morning dew, with a bunch of palm trees in the horizon”. Goofy Guy, wonderful
guy that he is, usually indulges me at times like this, but today, he had nephews
to see. The hotel room door slams in my face.
We make it to the motel lobby and there’s my glorious family! After 2
years of planning, all the sweat and tears (mainly my tears), our trip was
actually upon us. As if like in a Disney movie script, Splashboy and Boomer
run over to us and give us gigantic hugs. I couldn’t have written a better
script myself. Splashboy LOVED my earrings! I knew I loved that little guy!
All the adults exchange some hugs and some excited talk ensues. I anxiously
wanted to hear about their trip so far and they wanted to hear about our weddings
from a couple days earlier.
In between all the chatter, I somehow managed to have a muffin and orange juice.
The continental breakfast was quite good. I was very pleased since we were
staying here again the night before we fly home. Home? How can I even think
such a horrendous thought just yet? Snap out of it! Within minutes, we pile
into our vans. Goofy Guy and I go with Dapper Dad and Fanlover (it’s
going to take me a while to remember these names – but watch me call
my mom ‘fanlover’ the next time I see her…. ) and ToT Sis
and family went in the other. We were off!
I had forgotten about all the tolls we go through on the way to WDW. Dapper
Dad knew the exact change for the tolls so we were rolling through the tolls
very quickly. That is, until we went through one that had a serious attitude
problem. Dapper Dad threw in the correct amount of money and waited for the
light to turn green. We waited…. and waited. Nothing.
At
the off chance he made a mistake counting his change, he threw
some more money in for good measure. Nothing! He proceeded to
drive away anyway (can’t waste time waiting for lights
to turn green when we’ve got a brunch date with Mickey
and the gang – we can always wait for green lights at home).
Just then, an alarm started and lights were flashing. It’s
official; we were now fugitives on the run.
Who knew your love of Disney could turn you into criminals. Since
we were usually law-abiding citizens, we slowed the car down
and looked for anyone who could help us. Again, nadda, zip, nothing.
Feeling a bit like Thelma & Louise,
we held our breath and burned some rubber towards Disney World. After a few
seconds, we realized no one was chasing us, so we all sighed with relief. So
much for a nice, easy drive to Disney! Our minds quickly returned to the happiest
place on earth as we notice all the fancy Disney billboards around. I could
just feel all my visions of jail time slipping away.
Orange really isn’t
my colour anyway.
We pull into the All Star Movies Resort and I; I mean the boys,
jump around with excitement! The men check-in while the rest
of us enjoys the movies playing on the TV in the lobby. We all
check in with no problem and we clutch our hotel key/park ticket/dining
plan ticket with such awe and respect. It’s amazing how one little
plastic card can hold so much power.
Let’s all share
in a moment of silence please.
Since we had a little time to spare before heading over
to the Polynesian, Goofy Guy decides to get our Hoop Dee tickets.
No problem right? After all, we booked the show 2 years ago.
We interrupt this trip report to bring you another pre-planning
announcement. Dapper Dad secretly paid for all of our Hoop Dee
Doo tickets prior to this trip. Even after he found out about the
free dining plan, he still insisted he pay for this dinner show
so as to save some table service credits for later in the week.
I’m nominating him for father of the year. We now return
you to your regularly scheduled trip report.
After a few minutes at guest services, Goofy Guy asks Dapper Dad
to come join him at guest services. Hmm, this was taking too long.
I decided to investigate. It turns out, Disney ‘said’ they refunded Dapper Dad’s credit
card when we rebooked our trip with the dining plan. Dapper Dad had no record
of this refund. The guest services CM made some phone calls, about 15min. worth,
but she could do nothing to help us. Not wanting to waste any more time, Dapper
Dad lays down his credit card and pays for the dinner again. He decided to
wait and deal with the problem at the end of the trip. Besides, threatening
the poor CM didn't seem like a very Disney thing to do. Okay, so our check-in
didn’t go as smoothly as planned, but if this is our worst problem all
trip, we could manage. Our stomachs were starting to growl anyway.
Since it was only 9am, our rooms weren’t ready. We checked our bags and
were assured our bags would be in our rooms when we returned later that day.
You just have to love that kind of service. Well, almost everyone did. Fanlover
just couldn’t fathom how all 8 of our bags would be put into the correct
room without us foreseeing the whole transfer. We tried to reassure her, but
it became abundantly clear that there would be no believing on her part, until
she saw with her own eyes. I was up for the challenge. Mental note – please
Disney – show Fanlover the magic you’re so renowned for…
We still didn’t need to leave for breakfast quite yet, so we decided
to go to Andy’s playground. The boys were like kids in a candy store.
They were running around loving the enormous Buzz and Woody. Cocoa BIL was
one of our official photographers (with Goofy Guy being the other) so he was
snapping pictures at every direction. He even went up to the third floor of
a nearby building to take our picture. I hope I didn’t have any cranberry
from my muffin in my teeth.
There were some pretty big toy blocks in Andy’s playground. We thought
it would be a great place to put the boys to take, you guessed it, another
picture. Thank goodness for digital cameras or we’d be out of film already.
Just as we lifted the boys onto the blocks, a kind cast member (CM) came over
to us and asked us very politely not to put people on the blocks. It was their
policy so as to prevent people from falling. We quickly lifted the boys off
the blocks – no problem. None of us wanted to repeat our criminal behaviour
from earlier this morning.
However, this particular
CM was full of Disney magic. He then started to talk to the boys
sounding just like Donald Duck! The look on the boys’ faces was priceless. Donald
Duck had transformed into a 60yr old man right before our eyes!
It’s easier being law-abiding citizens when Donald Duck
is so friendly. We were back on track.
It was time to leave for breakfast! Fanlover bid farewell to
her luggage, utterly convinced she’d never see it again.
I said another silent prayer to the gods of Disney. We hopped
back into the vans and headed to the ticket and transportation
center. Hopes were high for a great day, but little did we know a Mickey Mouse
balloon, a string and a broom could bring so much magic to a 6yr old boy. Stay
tuned!
Day 2 - Part 2...
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