Day 1 - Part 1
The days leading up to our trip had been rather hectic, especially for Judy. A few months ago, Judy started a new job teaching high school math.
It was hard enough to step into a classroom part-way through the year, but here at the end of the year she had to prepare lesson plans (reviewing for final exams), create final exams, administer the exams, grade them, enter grades, prepare lesson plans for the substitute who would be filling-in for her during the last week of school while we were on our trip, and remove any personal items from her classroom. By the original school calendar, our trip was to occur the day after school ended. Not that we planned it that way though -- the beginning of our trip was dictated by when the PChef incentive trip started, and it just happened to be right after school ended. But, throughout the winter of 2009-2010 we had 5 snow days, which pushed the end of the school year beyond the start of our trip. We were able to get the kids excused, and Judy made her new employer aware of it when she took the job, so we were okay, but it made her departure from school rather chaotic. She was working until 11pm every night, including the weekends, which didnt leave a lot of time for trip preparation. Thank goodness our kids are a little older and can pack for themselves. If wed still been in the baby stage, and it had fallen to me to pack baby clothes and food and diapers, it just wouldnt have worked. But I was able to make sure the kids got packed and get most of our park things ready. To top it all off, the Senior Graduation Ceremony was on Friday evening, the night before we departed, and Judy was required to attend. I think she returned home at about 9 or 9:30pm to pack for our departure early the next morning. Fortunately, she had been able to take a few minutes on a couple of occasions during the preceding week to begin packing a few clothes. Before graduation, we took our dog Swiffer, to Camp Kaiser (we always call our dogsitters Camp whatever their names are), and hed be pal-ing around with another Bichon, named Ollie, for the week.
On Saturday, June 12th, we had a 9:10am flight out of Baltimore, which is an hour and ½ drive away, so I had hoped to leave home at about 5:30am in order to get to the airport the recommended 2 hours prior to departure. We got up about 4am, got showered and dressed, woke the kids, and started loading the car. The family got in the car and I made a last-minute look through the house, watering plants and adjusting the A.C. and stuff like that. We drove out of the driveway at 5:45
, a little later than I wanted, but I was confident that the driving would be pretty clear at the time of the day on a Saturday. Fortunately, I was right, and we arrived at the airport parking with plenty of time before our flight. (Is this minutiae boring you yet?)
The bus ride from the long-term parking to the airport provided our first picture opportunity of the trip. After we boarded the bus, a guy got on wearing a flowered shirt and he reminded me a whole lot of Randall from Survivor, mostly due to the shirt. I whispered to Lauren, sitting next to me, and she agreed. He sat down behind Marlene, who was sitting behind Judy and James. A little while later Marlene started making Mickey Mouse ears behind Judys head, to get Lauren and I to laugh. Well we didnt, until Randy put rabbit ears behind Marlenes head. Then I said hold it, lemme get a picture of that. So, here you go.
Judy had a pretty good idea something was going on, but Marlene had no idea until she saw this picture about mid-way through the week. It was a Hey!!! moment.
On the plane, I sat next to James, and Judy and the girls were in the three seats across the aisle. For a snack we were served a package of tiny cookies. They were literally about a half an inch across. Lauren looked over at me while I was eating them, so I went into a Charlie Chaplin-like routine. I held the cookie with thumb and pointer finger of both hands, bit about a third of it, and chewed it thoroughly while staring blankly ahead, like Charlie did when eating his shoe in The Gold Rush, pretending to be thoroughly satiated with this tiny morsel. I told Lauren later what I was trying to mimic and she said she knew, so I must have done a decent impression. Heres Charlies version.
Charlie Chaplin in "The Gold Rush" (And another bonus Chaplin clip. This is one of my kid's favorite scenes
Charlie Chaplin in "A Dog's Life")
James had a little science experiment going on during the flight. I guess hed talked to a teacher before the trip who suggested that he take an empty water bottle with him to see what happened to it and learn about air pressure. So, we tightly sealed an empty water bottle before we took off and when we reached cruising altitude I took it out of James bag. It was tight as a drum. He thought that maybe it would explode or something. Nah, thats a different trip report -- The Most Explosive Free Trip Ever. Anyway
I unscrewed the top and a bunch of air escaped, almost as if I was opening a full bottle of pop (or, what they call soda here in southeast PA). Then, on the way back down, we watched that baby shrivel up until the sides were almost touching each other. Fun with science! James ears really hurt during the descent, so I used the water bottle as an illustration of what was happening to his eardrum. Ouch.
We landed at about 11:20 and headed off to find Magical Express. We found it without difficulty
this time
cause now I know
but I swear I did not see any signs for it until we were almost there. We went through the document check to be told what line to go to, and then another to allow us to proceed along the velvet ropes for our hotel. Does anybody know why there are two checkpoints for this? Seems like overkill, but Ive seen people <ahem Judy> get yelled at for strolling past the second checkpoint guy.
It wasnt too long before we were called for our bus. We walked out and I handed our boarding document to the ME person. (It was one piece of paper, with information for all 5 of us on it.) James and Judy skipped onto bus, while I took their and my luggage over to the driver to load under the bus. Lauren and Marlene came along with me with their stuff. I know you other ME riders probably hate me, making the bus take longer having to deal with my luggage, but Ive heard stories of peoples luggage not arriving until nighttime. We wanted to have access to our stuff soon after arriving. For example, we wanted to swim when we got to the resort, and then we had plans to meet Dan (FauntleroyFan07) and his wife Candi that evening and wed need fresh clothes, and besides, we gave the kids wheeling LL Bean duffel bags for Christmas, so they could get them around easily. Anyway, while I was helping the driver load our luggage, a bunch of other people came out to board our bus, without luggage, so we had to get in line behind them. By the time we get back up to the ME person taking the boarding documents, she didnt remember me at all. I had to explain that I had already given her our papers, and that two people of our party had already boarded the bus. Skeptically, she let us on the bus.
James had grabbed the front row seat and wanted me to sit with him. I figured he knew Id want to get a shot of the Walt Disney World sign, but no, he just likes the front row seat. So, I started in taking the obligatory trip report photos.
One with James in focus.
It was about this time we realized that with mom having been so busy, it had been a while since James had had a haircut. Oh well.
One with the girls in focus.
Quick, get a shot of this before the movie starts.
After a while, I was able to get this picture. Now thats what Im talkin bout!
We pulled-in to Coronado Springs and the bus stopped near the lobby, but the resort workers didnt like where he had stopped and directed him to go further down, towards the convention center. We stepped off the bus and were met by a couple of the PChef travel people who said that they would be happy to take our luggage and have bell services get it to our room. I looked at Judy and she said, No, weve brought it this far. I dont want to have to wait for bell services. So, we rolled and carried our stuff back up to the lobby to check-in. Fortunately, there was almost no wait at check-in, and soon I was at the desk speaking to CM Stephanie. Everything went smoothly, except
.our room wasnt quite ready yet. She took my cell phone number to send me a text when the room was ready, and she said that we could put our luggage in bell services and look around the resort, or get something to eat, while we waited. We finally gave-in to the unrelenting pull that bell services had on our luggage. I mean, it was like some cosmic tug of war against unseen forces that we were obviously never going to win. So we obediently trudged back to bell services and relinquished the only worldly treasures we could give, our undies and toiletries, in rolling LL Bean duffels. The bell services lady had a strange, satisfied glint in her eye as she handed me my claim ticket, and we set off for the Pepper Market for our first Disney grub of the trip.
Up next: Lunch at the Pepper Market
Link to next chapter
's are in order and are going out to:My trip dates are in June next year (I have not yet been in the summer) so I'm interested to see how you battled the heat of the days!
Do you refer to it as soda on a regular basis or are you more of a pop kinda guy? Because every time I say "pop" in Disney, I get some pretty weird looks.
Hope the food was good at the Pepper Market!
