Friday, January 24th (continued)
After we landed, we headed to baggage claim to pick up our checked luggage and were delighted to find that they were among the first dozen suitcases to come meandering down the conveyor belt. Another thing that impresses me about Delta, they are the FASTEST airline that we've flown to get baggage off the plane and into the terminal. We had ooodles ad ooodles of time, of course, but now that we were there we just wanted to get the bags, pick up the rental vehicle, and get the vacation started.
With bags in hand, we headed to pick up our rental with Alamo. We experimented this trip and booked a truck for the first time....at $209 including taxes, fees, and a free extra driver (thanks to our Costco membership) the price of the truck simply could not be beat. Our main vehicle at home is a truck, so that's what's "familiar" to us. We figured we would have plenty of space for our luggage in the back seat, and we did.
With Alamo you get your pick of whatever vehicles are in the aisle of your booking class, but pretty much every standard truck was Nissan Frontier. It was fine, though unremarkable. It was fairly new (just 3000 miles on the odometer), clean and in good repair. It wasn't decked out with too many bells or whistles, and was definitely smaller than Steve's Dodge Ram, but the back seat was spacious enough for the suitcases so we were more than satisfied.
We loaded the luggage, breezed through the final checkpoint before leaving the garage (I had prepaid the rental with the fuel upgrade before we left home, so it was just flash the bar code and drivers license for verification and we were on our way), and within 30 minutes from the time the wheels of our plane hit the tarmac, we were on our way to the park. I think we may have set a new personal record.
Since the Vistana's stated check-in time is not until 4 pm, we decided we were better of spending the day at the park rather than waiting around aimlessly for our villa to be readied. Having purchased SeaWorld annual passes on the Blue Friday sales (which are offered over the Black Friday weekend), we were super excited to return to one of our favorite place in Orlando. We hadn't been there in almost a year, and absence definitely makes the heart grow fonder!
Our timing turned out to be perfect, and we were able to arrive for park opening! There were just small lines at the parking gates, so we were through pretty quick. I must say, we liked the new overhead adornments that had been installed since our last visit the year prior. People online had done a ton of complaining about the new signage, but we thought it looked great. The yellow and blue were super striking together!
We had purchased Gold passes on the Blue Friday sale, but had decided just a few weeks prior that we would upgrade to Platinum one we arrived at the park. Nevertheless, we still received preferred parking with the Gold passes so we got a plumb spot just steps from the entrance. I never would have thought preferred parking would be that much of a perk, but I'm hereby convinced. It's da bomb! One of the nicest little upgrades that we enjoyed all trip long!
We activated our AP's at the turnstiles (which necessitated a quick pause for ID photos) and then we were in! Since our annual passes also include a year-long Photokey, we opted to make the most of the photo ops in and around the entrance.
I don't think I've made much mention of the weather just yet, but it was SUPERB. Probably a little on the cool side for my southern friends, but for us Canadian Michiganders it was like stepping from the dark days of winter into a perfect late May day. Sunny, breezy, and temperatures in the low to mid 70's.....park weather at its absolute finest. January in Florida can be pretty unpredictable so we packed for pretty much any weather, but boy, were we off to a fabulous start.
We made a longer-than-expected stop at Guest Services to upgrade our Gold passes to Platinum, which would provide us [in addition to the Gold benefits of no blackout dates, free annual Photokey, free animal encounter and free preferred parking] with unlimited admission to ALL Seaworld Parks & Recreation theme parks and free reserved show seating all each of those parks, as well as a free annual Photokey at Busch Gardens and free Animal Rescue Tour which is offered only to Platinum passholders. We also neeeded to redeem some of our other pre-purchased upgrades which were purchased on the Blue Friday sales. The longer-than-expected stop occurred due to the fact that we were given incorrect information by the call center in regards to the best process and overall cost of the pass upgrades that we were seeking. Long story short, the call center had advised us on the best method of upgrading and told us it would cost approximately $150 total for the two of us.....but the actual cost was over $300 (a bit of a complicated story as to why.....I won't bore you with those details unless you really want 'em). In a nutshell, we should NOT have waited to upgrade at the park as advised, but rather done so over the phone (with said call center agent who provided the bad advice) BEFORE those passes were activated at the gate. No need to panic, however.....the amazing staff at SeaWorld had our backs. A very nice supervisor came over to chat with us, and ended up processing the pass upgrades for us for only $90 all-in. We were SO grateful for her kindness! That was more than $60 less than we had been expecting, and less than the price of just one person's admission to Busch Gardens for one day.....and now we would get a whole year of admission to all these great parks plus the added benefits. We thanked her sincerely and left the Guest Services desk with very happy hearts.
With the "housekeeping" tasks all taken care of, Steve wanted some time just to walk around the park and soak in the peaceful atmosphere that we have come to love most about SeaWorld. The park was super quiet on that mid-winter Friday, and it felt like we had the place all to ourselves.
And.......I just got a message that I can only attach 10 file to each post......drat! I will pick this up again later. Be back soon!