One for the money, two for the show, grab some beer or wine, it's on with the show.
The time has come. Time to find out if our luggage made it, or if it traveled without us again. As you recall, I mentioned we always get a little worried if our luggage makes it to our destination, ever since Lady Hs luggage got lost one time. Her bag traveled without us once to Dallas, and back to Las Vegas before it decided to come back home. How did this happen?
Your guess is as good as ours. It was awfully rude to not invite us to Dallas or back to Vegas. The nerve of it traveling without us. No consideration what so ever.
In April of 2011, we took a trip to Vegas to celebrate my birthday. We each checked a bag and both made it to Vegas. Little did we know, both would not make it back from Vegas. Well back on the same day. When we came back from Vegas and went to claim our luggage, mine came and hers didnt. So we filed a claim with Southwest. After filing the claim, they said to allow them 24 hours to locate her bag. If we didnt hear back from them in 24 hours, give them a call and they will try to give us an update. We allowed 36 hours to pass before Lady H had to give them a call. They said they still didnt have it, but they would try to find out where it is. Hour later, they called Lady H back and told her that her bag was still in Vegas. It would be put on the next flight out. What they failed to mention is, that it would be put on the next flight out to Dallas. 24 hours later, Lady Hs bag is still in Dallas and again told it would be put on the next flight. The next flight back to Vegas that is and then to Albuquerque.
Huh?! So youre telling me you have to send my bag to Vegas before sending it back to me in Albuquerque. Why cant it just be sent from Dallas to Albuquerque? Lady H made that argument but unfortunately SW won. After a while we were starting to come to terms that we may not get the bag back; and we would have to proceed with filing another claim with SW for the value of the bag and all its contents. Finally after being on vacation without us for 5 days, Lady H gets a call from SW close to 10 pm at night and they tell her they have her bag in Albuquerque. Would she like to pick up the next day or would she like it delivered? Delivered please. SW is it ok if we deliver tomorrow?
Cue music from the movie "Halloween." Anyone ever seen Bill Cosbys comedy "Himself" and how he explains what a conniption is and how his wife had one? If you've never seen it, click
HERE to watch it (at 7:50 into the video). Anyways, it was my turn to see one. I knew I needed to run and hide when they asked if they could deliver it tomorrow. I didnt want to be the witness to a murder. Better yet, I didn't want to be the one murdered. Needless to say, Lady H finally got her bag back. After coming out of hiding, Lady H didnt have me break out the bleach to clean up any blood evidence, so Im guessing the SW employee made it out alive. Maybe she played it smart by ringing the door bell, dropped it off and ran.
Which brings us back to claiming our luggage at LAX. We proceed to the only baggage claim thingy that seems to be working. No sign of our luggage yet. We dont even see our flight number on the display yet. On the conveyor belt thingy, there is a bunch of hard sided suitcases. And around each bag is a tie down strap to make sure they didnt open. No one is there to claim the luggage. Then there they were, like a group of army ants. Oriental people. All ladies. And like a group of army ants, they worked fast to get the luggage off the conveyor belt, turned them over on the side with the wheels and marched them away in a single file line. A convoy of suitcases was all you could see. Lady H and I watched as they rolled them away and couldnt help but start laughing. Too bad neither one of us thought to take a picture.
Finally the conveyor belt shows our flight number and bags slowly start coming out.
Oh look. Theres the bag that has all our shampoo and stuff. At least well be clean.
Here comes my bag. At least we know we each have some clothes.
Now were just waiting on Lady Hs bag.
We make our way out to the shuttles for the rental cars. Its not a very big waiting area for all these shuttles to come in and out of. Only 2 shuttles can fit at a time. Were renting our car through Thrifty, so were on the look out for Thrifty shuttles. We waited for about 10 minutes before one finally shows up. It stops and we start walking towards it, right as we get close to the shuttle, it takes off without us.
Did that really just happen to us? I thought about jumping in front of the shuttle to get the drivers attention (because us running towards the shuttle, yelling and waving like crazy lunatics obviously didnt work), but getting run over at the beginning of vacation wasnt high on my priority list. 10 minutes or so goes by before another shuttle drives up. This time we make sure to get the bus drivers attention. Lady H lifts up her shirt and flashes him. He immediately stops as well as all the other buses that just ran into him trying to sneak a peak. Thats one way to get them to stop. Then I look at the pile up and traffic jam behind the big pile of wreckage. Were never going to make it to the rental car place now. Probably going to throw Lady H in jail for indecent exposure. No sooner did I say that did the airport police show up and haul Lady H off to jail. Time to call DMil for bail money.
What? You dont believe that happened? It did happen that way. In my imagination.
Ok, so this is what really happened. It is true the first shuttle drove off without us. 10 minutes or so does go by before another shuttle drives up. We make sure to flag him down this time. We do our lunatic routine again and this time this shuttle makes sure to stop. No other shuttles were stopped at the time, so it was easy for this shuttle to pull up. We hand him
ALL our luggage, Lady Hs bag included, and off we go to the rental car facility. Not before getting another tour of LAX though. This time on the opposite side of the terminal. There were still 7 more shuttle stops along the way. After picking up several more hitchhikers along the way were finally off to pick up a rental car.
When we arrive at the rental car facility and I do my best to get all our bags unloaded while the shuttle driver helps everyone else. The reason Im in a hurry to get them unloaded is because I have no CASH to give the guy a tip. Although at this point neither one of us was really in the mood for giving a tip considering the first shuttle left us and the amount of time we stayed waiting on shuttles. We stayed at the airport close to an hour and we still werent on our way to the resort were staying at.
All the hitchhikers got off the shuttle before we did and are now standing in line before we were. Great this is going to take forever until I saw the pretty sign that said Blue Chip Members Proceed Directly To Car Pick Up.
Ha. So long su........per people. Have a nice wait.
We proceed to the VIP line to get our walking papers, aka rental agreement. As we approach the counter, 2 dudes cant figure out where their vehicle is and ask the clerk if he can help them out. He tells them hes not allowed to leave his station, they need to go back inside for help. They wrestle the poor dude down to the ground and beat him to a pulp until he agrees to surrender and help them. Well they yell and make a fuss anyways. The clerk tells them to hold on while he at least helps us out. He asks my name and hands me the rental agreement. He tells me I can pick from row C and takes off with tweedle dumb and tweedle dumber following right behind him. Lady H and I look at each other. Which way to row C?
We see which way the clerk took off and figured row C must be in the direction he went. We head off in the same direction in search of row C. Luckily enough, it was the first row as we get outside. So we look at row C and its almost empty. There are only 3 vehicles in row C and 2 of them are already taken. All we see left is a Ford Escape. Is that right? Its a SUV. We double check to make sure were in the right row. Sure enough. Looks like the Ford Escape it is. Load up our luggage, start er up, drive up to the guard shack and present him with our release papers. I wanted to pull a Nebo and tell him Is this going to take long? We just got parole for good behavior and were in hurry to get out of this joint, but I decided not too. Nobody at this place seemed to smile, so I decided not to chance it. We were free to go and didnt want to have our parole revoked. Before pulling up to the guard, I made sure to program Drus gps system. I think thats what shes called on the commercials. Dru is the green Android Robot and the reason I know its a she is because shes giving me directions in female voice. Long story short, we slip past the guard and were finally on way to Anaheim.
According to Gurgle (Google) should be about a 45 minute drive to Anaheim. Dru takes us through I-405. Had I not needed Dru for the return trip, I wouldve tossed her out the window. Shes also my smartphone, so she was lucky to be spared. On this day, she dont seem so smart though. As we start to head down 405, we come to almost a complete halt. There was so much construction on 405, traffic was barely moving. I yell at Dru, why did you bring us this way? She had no response, she was dead silent. On top of that, I needed the restroom really bad. I knew I shouldnt have eaten chili the night before. We start to look for the nearest exit and finally take the first one we see. One of the first places we see is Vons supermarket. Pull into the parking lot, jump out of the drivers seat while the vehicle is still moving and tell Lady H to park. We did our best Duke of Hazzard impersonations here.
After I take care of business, we decide since were at the grocery store, might as well get the most important provision of the trip. Beer. Well get everything else when we actually get to our resort and check-in. Now I remember back in the days, beer used to come in either a 6-pack or a case (Four 6-packs in a cardboard tray). Ever notice all the different choices now a days. 6-pack, 12-pack, 18-pack, 30-pack, 4-pack that holds just as much as liquid as a 6 pack.. And thats just cans. I dont even know if they sell the standard case (24 cans) anymore. Only way I see you can buy a case is in bottles. But now here at Vons, just when Ive thought Ive seen it all, theres this new choice; a 36-pack. Well be here a week, so naturally we get the 36-pack.
And for the record, I looked for the 36-pack now that we got back home, cant find them anywhere. Wonder if theyre specific just to California.
Beer in hand, along with a couple of sodas and Dru leads us back onto the 405. Traffic seems to be moving just a little bit faster now. As we get towards the end of construction, it really starts to move. Power merge on over to the carpool lane and now were really moving. Anaheim, here we come.
Being in California for close to 3 hours now, we finally make it to Anaheim and stop by our resort to see if by some chance we can check-in yet.
This is the first view of resort as we drive in.
Maybe by some chance theyll have our room ready. Check-in isnt until 4 pm but just maybe, possibly it will be ready. We go inside to check-in counter. There was one couple ahead of us. A man and his partner (white man and black man). The white man well call Moe, and the black man whom well call Curly, because he had curly hair. Oh great, now I'm making up names like Laura.
Ill try not to talk too much about Moe and Curly, but they did provide us with some laughs; with and without their knowledge. After a brief wait, another front desk clerk comes to help out. She asks our name and 2 minutes into the check-in process the phone rings. She answers it and puts us on hold. After explaining 20 times to the person on the phone that they needed to call the 1-800 to make reservations, she finally returns to us only give us the bad news. So sorry, but your reservation was lost and youll have to sleep out on the street. Here is some complimentary popcorn and candy though.
Ok, ok. Just trying to have some fun with this TR, geesh. Give a bunny a break will ya.
She actually tells us the rooms arent ready yet.
Disneyland is down the street. You can hang out there and well call you when theyre ready.
Well not her exact words, but regardless we had to wait until 4pm to check-in. They did give us a temporary key card to look around, park and access the pool if we wanted to. The resort is gated all around, even for parking. That gave us an added sense of security. They also offered to hold our luggage until such time we were able to check-in.
The front desk clerk verifies our contact information, hands us the key card and sends us on to the next desk where Larry is finishing up with Moe and Curly. I always dread this desk. They call it Resort Host Desk. What they really need to call it is, lets see if we can bamboozle our owners into buying more points desk. At this desk, they butter you up with a little welcome package. Free samples of shampoo and stuff; discount coupons for the local restaurants and free stuff with a minimum purchase of a $100 or more. Its our turn with Larry and he tells us about Moe and Curly. He remembers how they were at the resort last year and how they apparently like to party the whole time theyre there. During their stay last year, they were so drunk that they even provided a free boxing match for the fellow patrons. Well those lucky enough to see it. Larry tells us how Curly got his butt whooped by Moe; Moe done knocked his
out. An hour later, they were back at one of the outdoor tables drinking again as if nothing happened. Larry said he remembered them mostly because of the fight and had us laughing. He also tells us how hes seen some people so drunk, that other people are using the luggage carts to wheel them to their units. Now theres a thought. Lady H and I keep this in mind in case one of us needs it later. I think Larry even told us that Moe had to put Curly on one of these carts one time. Wheeled him to room and left him sleeping outside on the cart.
Were laughing and having good time with Larry. He breaks out what he calls the guys map. A picture map of the local area. He shows us on the map where Disney is, local shopping centers, restaurants and even the new resort that opened up about a year ago that is part of our timeshare group. Which is conveniently one block over from the resort were staying at. Right across the street from one of the Disney parking lots actually. All of sudden BAM, Larry throws a right hook and almost knocks us out. Like the salesman they hired Larry to be, he gives us the dreaded line we hate to hear.
At this resort, they offer free breakfast in the morning with a brief 45-minute presentation.
Oh Larry, you didnt just go there did you? We were laughing and having such a good time at Moe's and Curly's expense. Why did you have to go and ruin it?
There is nothing brief to these 45-minute presentations. 45 minutes turns into 150 minutes and they expect you to buy something. They hold you hostage and give you the chinese water torture until you agree to buy more points. He tells us, Go to the presentation, have free breakfast, tell them youre not interested in buying at the moment and theyll give you a $100 American Express gift card just for attending the presentation." Yeah, just like the time I was supposed to get a free trip.
Still waiting on that by the way. "So which day should I put you down for? Larry asks. Tricky Larry is trying to get us to commit to a presentation by buttering us up with a gift card now.
Watch out for Tricky Larry!
We told Tricky Larry no thanks, we dont have time for a presentation. Our days are pretty booked, but if we need money later on down the line we might consider it. We dont want to spend part of our vacation learning how we can go on vacation. I think we have that down to a science pretty well by now. Weve been to one of these so called 45-minute presentations 5 years ago. How does he think we landed up staying at this resort in the first place. After about 10 minutes of not having much fun with Larry anymore (and declining his offer over and over), we finally break free of his grasp and head out to explore the grounds.
Heres a few things we saw on our exploration.
Club house and swimming pool.
Plenty of empty lungers in the early morning.
Empty tables on the top balcony of the club house.
Entertainment area inside the 2nd floor of the clubhouse.
Pagoda on the way to the swimming pool
BBQ area and DSA right below our room. Came in handy each night.
Obviously youre not here to look at resort pictures and hear about Larry. I'll post a link to more resort photos later if you really want to see more. You want to find out about our time at Disney. Were getting there. For our next stop is:
DISNEYLAND!
Disneyland Hotel that is.
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Yay! You figured out what you forgot! Congratulations!
