Mrs. Darling's 2010 Half Marathon Trip:Yes, it does snow at Disney World

[dismagiclover]

Originally Posted by PracPerfPatricia

Hey Jenny,

Subbing on...

Can't wait to hear all about the 1/2 marathon...You will be my inspiration as I aspire to do one someday...

I'm glad you're here! Oh there are stories to be told about the half marathon! Don't go away

[dismagiclover]

I woke up this morning in Maryland to a ringing phone. On the other end was a voice telling me the schools were to have a 2 hour delayed opening because of snow. I peeked out the window and saw about 3 inches on the ground. (It doesn’t take much snow to slow things down around here.) I should have seen the snow as a foreshadowing of what was to come, but I didn’t. The delay was good news because now DH and the kids could drive me to the airport and I wouldn’t have to mess with parking and shuttles. So we left promptly and before I knew it I was at the airport standing in line to check my luggage. Originally I had planned on just taking a carry on. (The trip was only 2 nights.) But the weather forecast kept requiring me to pack more and more clothes so I finally decided to check a bag so I wouldn’t have to worry about space. It was the coldest it had been in Florida in at least 25 years and I was pretty bummed about that. I want to escape winter when I go to Florida not take it with me. Anyway, I made it to the gate where they promptly announced our plane was still on the ground in Buffalo but would be leaving shortly. It looked like about a 30 minute delay. I called Liz and left a message to let her know I’d be late and she’d have to wait a bit longer in the airport. We were taking the Magical Express together and I had the passes so she didn’t have any choice. (Sorry again, Liz.) The plane eventually loaded and we were on our way. We landed after an uneventful flight. I called Liz and she told me she was sitting right by the food court waiting so I headed over. We happily said hello and then headed for Quiznos where we picked up sandwiches and quickly ate. We were in a bit of a hurry because we were hoping to make a DIS meet at POP by 4:00 and because of my 45 minute flight delay were running a bit behind schedule. After scarfing down our sandwiches we headed to the Magical Express. You no longer have to wait in line at the counter. You show your ticket and they send you directly to your bus line. We were in line number 4


Soon we were heading out to the bus.




Then we were on our way. And a long way it was. It didn’t take too long to see this


But unfortunately the bus was full and we were the last stop on the circuit. So we began the stops. First stop was the Polynesian and we noticed that many of the flowering plants were covered. I’m sure to protect from the freeze. Next stop was the Grand Floridian. Then came the Wilderness Lodge. At this point it looked like the entire bus disembarked.


This was definitely the most popular resort of this bus. For a moment we thought the bus was empty and that maybe we’d gotten on the wrong bus because no one else appeared to be heading to the Contemporary. Then we noticed one lone soul way in the back of the bus heading to the Contemporary as well. Here we are waiting for them to remove all the luggage at Wilderness Lodge.




Finally we saw this.




We pulled up to the Contemporary entrance, jumped out and headed to check in. Would we get a good room location? What kind of view would we have?

[dismagiclover]

Liz, there is a new cute picture of you in the first post

[pjstevens]

Jenny, can't wait to hear all about it. I thought our 'weekend' was short, I can't imagine your's just two night, ouch.

[disneylovin24]

Can't wait for more!!! I want to see the snow in disney

[Happy Elf]

I'm here! Can't wait to hear about your adventure!

[dismagiclover]

Originally Posted by pjstevens

Jenny, can't wait to hear all about it. I thought our 'weekend' was short, I can't imagine your's just two night, ouch.

Hi Patricia! It was a quick weekend, but you'll see me drag it waaaaay out on this trip report It will be fun to compare notes on our trips!

Originally Posted by disneylovin24

Can't wait for more!!! I want to see the snow in disney

Don't worry. I have pictures of the snow in Disney

Originally Posted by Happy Elf

I'm here! Can't wait to hear about your adventure!

Hello old friend! It's so fun to hear from all of my summer trip report friends again. This adventure was a little colder than my last one

[Dolce27]

Yay! Very happy that you started!

[Stefy]

Originally Posted by dismagiclover

Another of my summer trip report friends! It feels like a reunion to hear from you again. How is life in my favorite city?

Its great to hear from you too Life in London is good, apart from the two weeks of snow we just had, but the rain seems to be melting it away.

I'm glad you weren't delayed too long on your flight and score for the nearly empty ME after your first resort stop.

Oooh I'm excited to see what your room is like, more please

[dismagiclover]

Originally Posted by Dolce27

Yay! Very happy that you started!

I'm happy I started too! Though the really good stuff (the race itself) won't be up for a while. I hope you add in your race experience as we go along too. I want to get as much info about the marathon as I can!

Originally Posted by Stefy

Its great to hear from you too Life in London is good, apart from the two weeks of snow we just had, but the rain seems to be melting it away.

I'm glad you weren't delayed too long on your flight and score for the nearly empty ME after your first resort stop.

Oooh I'm excited to see what your room is like, more please

Two weeks of snow in London The winter I stayed there I don't think it ever even came close to freezing. I hollered (in shock) when I read your post and told DH. He said he knew all about it. They'd had to cancel some soccer games. For him that is tragedy
The rooms at Bay Lake are nice, but the studios are pretty small. You'll hear about it in the next update

[Dolce27]

Originally Posted by dismagiclover

I'm happy I started too! Though the really good stuff (the race itself) won't be up for a while. I hope you add in your race experience as we go along too. I want to get as much info about the marathon as I can!

I completely, 100%, understand!! I was like this when I first made the decision to do it last August. I couldn't ever find much on it. I wanted people's experience on the full-marathon; not the Disney website about it that Google kept pulling up.

I was already thinking about doing this, since I had so many problems finding race reports on it last year (I think I found 3 full's and 2 half's? ), but I've started a training and marathon TR:

http://www.disboards.com/showthread....7#post35034717

I'm not doing a full Disney TR. This is just running/marathon related only. It will be in two parts: Part one, my training and experience leading up to the marathon and Part two; the actual marathon.

I'm really happy that you're going for the full. Now that you've done a half and have a year to build, you're going to do great for the 2011 full-marathon!

[dismagiclover]

Dolce Thanks for the link! Still feel free to share any insight over here! The more info I get the better

[dismagiclover]

We headed to the check in line and approached the friendly cast member. She efficiently checked us in and revealed our room number. She showed us the location on the map and we were pretty excited. We hustled up to the room. We were still trying to hurry because we hadn’t yet given up on the DIS meet, but time was ticking away and hope was fading. It was close to 3:00 as we arrived at our room.



We entered and saw this:



Liz had stayed here previously, but in a 2 bedroom villa. This was the first studio stay for both of us. The modern style gave the room a feeling of sleekness yet it still was very comfortable. I noted it even still seemed to have some of that new construction smell. Sorry I don’t have too many pictures of the room, but you can check it out on allears. I do have this shot of the vanity area/kitchenette.



Now this is a very strange design. The studios are pretty small and I suppose there was no other way to fit everything in, but it seemed strange to be getting ready in the kitchen. It was fine for us because we didn’t do any food prep (remember we are on the Deluxe Plan.)

And here is a picture of some Disney art.



The art throughout the tower was really cute.

The Studio was perfect for two people. Anymore than that I think would feel a little crowded.
After dropping our things we headed out to the balcony to check out our lake view. Straight ahead was this:



The lake was beautiful and peaceful, but what really got us excited was what we saw when we turned our heads to the left



Both Liz and I couldn’t believe our luck. This was officially a lake view, but Space Mountain was right in our face! Sure seems like a Magic Kingdom view to me! We will definitely take it! Unfortunately we didn’t have much time to enjoy the view because we were late for a very important date. Before the DIS meet we needed to get to the Expo to pick up our packets for the big race tomorrow. So we quickly headed for the convention center to catch a bus to Wide World of Sports where the Expo was held. We knew we were on the right track when we saw this sign.



See that woman in the background. We chatted with her on the bus. She was a very experienced runner. She’s from Boston and has run their marathon several times which for those of you that know about marathons means she’s fast. Both Liz and I peppered her with questions while we waited and on the bus ride over. Another long bus ride it was. Once again we made multiple stops at various resorts before we finally arrived at the Expo. At this point we realized there was no way to make it to Pop for the DIS meet. With a sad heart Liz used her nifty I-phone to post on the half marathon thread that we wouldn’t make it. Would we ever make it to the Expo?

[carissanboys]

Hey Jenny and Liz! I'm here!

I'm so glad you're doing a TR, Jenny! I've been pestering Liz for photos and info.

I thought of you guys the day of the marathon. I'm so proud of you both. Maybe there will be a half marathon in my future if I can ever get my butt in gear.

[wsushocker]

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