We need a little “Magic”, right this very moment! – Completed

[MomToPrincePhillip]

Looks like this vacation is off to a good start!

 

[dolphingirl47]

Well so far we are off to a good start. We got to the airport about 5PM after stopping by Target fir a travel iron and AAA for a Texas guidebook and Houston map. We made good time on the 405. When we pulled up at the airport, we went to American Premium. Evidently they only offer porter service if you teavel 1st class

My heart just stopped when I read this. Irons are prohibited items as far as DCL is concerned. If they spot this, they will confiscate the travel iron.

I am glad that everything went so smoothly. The food looked great. It's a shame that the soup was not very nice.

Corinna

 

[Leshaface]

Free wine is ALWAYS good wine

Hope your flight was quick and you arrived safely.

 

[franandaj]

Did you fly out of Long Beach?

Can't wait for room pics.

Can free wine be bad?

You're always jumping the gun! I guess I didn't say what airport we flew out of. All will become clear in the next post.

Looks like this vacation is off to a good start!

So far other than a late arrival (planned) everything is relaxing.

My heart just stopped when I read this. Irons are prohibited items as far as DCL is concerned. If they spot this, they will confiscate the travel iron.

I am glad that everything went so smoothly. The food looked great. It's a shame that the soup was not very nice.

Corinna

Yikes! I just told her, so we'll see what happens. I had no idea.

Free wine is ALWAYS good wine

Hope your flight was quick and you arrived safely.

Yeah, pretty much unless it is spoiled!

It was a long day, but I was anticipating that so it wasn't surprising.

I am working on only four hours of sleep so we're going to get dinner soon.

 

[PrincessInOz]

The sandwich looks decent. I have to admit that I've had soup in a few airline lounges and have never really found one that was made 'right'.

Hope you get more sleep.

 

[dgbg100106]

The soup had a weird spice in it that made it sort of inedible. The free wine was good for free wine! The sandwiches were really big. Neither of us could finish them.

Well at least there was an up side!

 

[jedijill]

Yay for free wine!

Now hurry up with the next update.

Jill in CO

 

[PizzieDuster]

I'm in! Love the pictures!!!!

(The title of your thread reminds me of my mom's favorite Christmas song, "Oh we need a little Christmas, right this very moment")

 

[franandaj]

The sandwich looks decent. I have to admit that I've had soup in a few airline lounges and have never really found one that was made 'right'.

Hope you get more sleep.

I'll keep that in mind. Yes, I did get more sleep!

Well at least there was an up side!

Yay for free wine!

Now hurry up with the next update.

Jill in CO

We'll have to see! First we have to re-pack all the suitcases and put our tags on them. However, I may have some time when Fran goes BACK to Walmart to return stuff this morning before we leave on our cruise....

I'm in! Love the pictures!!!!

(The title of your thread reminds me of my mom's favorite Christmas song, "Oh we need a little Christmas, right this very moment")

That's the idea on the title.

 

[rentayenta]

I do always get ahead of myself. Hope this morning runs smoothly for you and happy sailing! I must know what all Fran had to return to Walmart?

 

[franandaj]

When we checked into the Admiral’s Club the hostess told us that we were traveling out of the “remote gate” from gate 44. What? Remote Gate? I’ve been flying out of LAX for 30 years and I have never heard of such a thing.

Well we headed to gate 44, took the elevator down to the ground level and low and behold there was sort of a “bus depot” where we could load a bus for the remote terminal.

It’s a little blurry but you can see the next bus boarding passengers.



Here is the big picture view, you’ll see the bus in the previous picture collecting passengers for the “remote terminal” in the right side of the picture. Sort of weird to be pulling away from the terminal and not on a plane.



Next to the runway there was this whole two lane highway that we drove down. This terminal was really far away.



Of course the Airplanes have the right of way.



There were quite a few of them exercising that right.



We drove farther and farther, I realized that we traveled east of Sepulveda Blvd. (for those of you who know LAX) That’s really a long way! Finally we arrived at the “remote terminal”.



Unbeknownst to me, there was this whole other terminal out there.





They had a little food service area.



I was pretty sure that this is what our plane was going to look like.



So we just waited for our plane to arrive and preboarding to begin.



Yup! It was going to be a little tiny plane.



I was surprised when they offered us dinner. Fran took the Salmon Salad.



I had chicken with some sort of curry sauce, hummus and tabbouleh. It was actually pretty good. We both got turtle cheesecake.



The rest of the flight was uneventful.

 

[lovetotraveltx]

I did the same thing wating too long to check in!! Booked after the pay in full date and just kinda 'forgot' about excursions and checking in and by the time I did had 1:30 port time too..ugh. All Palo was already booked except brunch the first full day so I booked it, but then saw from previous cruisers on the 8 day that the first full day night was formal night, so canceled it. On our Wonder cruise we arrived at Palo in t shirts and jeans and apologized to all who would listen. We had the John Lassiter presentation that was scheduled to be 45 minutes which would give us time to change, but it went almost 2 hours (loved every minute!) and by the time we made it...late...to Palo almost missed the brunch serving time and felt awful being so poorly dressed..but it was fun all the same. Soon you will be comfy on board and all these dramas leading up to it will be forgotten

Love this thread so far! Only up to page 4

Sorry to hijack but have a Palo brunch question. Have heard they are pretty strict about dress code at Palo but see they allowed your jeans. I want to wear dress capris to Palo brunch and on another thread I got my head chopped off. Would they be ok?

 

[franandaj]

I do always get ahead of myself. Hope this morning runs smoothly for you and happy sailing! I must know what all Fran had to return to Walmart?

See you even snuck in there before I got this update proofed and posted!

All in due time grasshopper. Although I don't know if I will get to that before the cruise is over. We'll see....

 

[Pinkocto]

That remote terminal is a bit bizarre to me. I'm glad you had plenty of time to get there.

The plane dinner looks surprisingly good.

 

[franandaj]

Love this thread so far! Only up to page 4

Sorry to hijack but have a Palo brunch question. Have heard they are pretty strict about dress code at Palo but see they allowed your jeans. I want to wear dress capris to Palo brunch and on another thread I got my head chopped off. Would they be ok?

I'm not sure if you are talking about the pictures on the first page with the jeans, those were from our last WDW trip. We've never worn jeans to Palo. On our last cruise however, on our third visit to Palo, Fran broke down and wore tennis shoes as her dress shoes really hurt her feet. I've always worn a dress there. Fran has always worn khaki pants. I would think capris would be fine as long as they were dressy looking and not shabby. The main point of the dress code is so that people dining there feel special. It's hard to feel special when the guy atthe table next to you is wearing flip flops and his gut is hanging out of a tank top over his shorts!

 

[dolphingirl47]

This remote terminal really is strange. Dinner sounded nice.

Corinna

 

[franandaj]

That remote terminal is a bit bizarre to me. I'm glad you had plenty of time to get there.

The plane dinner looks surprisingly good.

Yeah I was pretty surprised it was there. It turns out that our flight was on American Eagle. Those plabes are smaller and I guess they aren't tall enough to reach the boarding hallways at the main terminal.

They had this elaborate ramp system to make boarding the plane ADA compliant. I guess normally one would climb a ladder to get on the plane.

 

[franandaj]

This remote terminal really is strange. Dinner sounded nice.

Corinna

It is! It's been literally 30 years since I started flying in and out of LAX, from my initial college auditions during my Senior year through the rest of my adult life and I never even knew it existed!

 

[ACDSNY]

Came by to see if you're on that ship yet? Have a magical time!

 

[rentayenta]

Grasshopper?

I have flown LAX a bazillion times and had no clue that weird far out terminal was there. Wonder if they use that for celebrities etc too?

The cheesecake looks good. Stacy's pita chips are good too. Trader Joe's sells this amazing chunky olive hummus. I love it with pita chips. If I can't have TJ's pita chips then I like Stacy's. Glad the food was good.

You're on the ship by now cruising away. Enjoy!