I guess this isn't really a day, but for numbering sake, here tis.
Same cast as before.
And I'm sad to say the dreaded license rears it's ugly head again!
Due to the joys of travelling with frequent flier miles, we had to kill a day before flying home out of Tampa. The phone calls booking the flights were a joy! But anyway, given this, we weren't in a big rush to get off the ship, so we thought we'd eat with our servers one last time. Which meant an 8am breakfast at Lumiere's.
No surprise, I was up early. I went out to check the temperature, which was chilly but not cold (better than I thought it would be at 6:00 am)! The alarm went off about 7, and my kids surprised me by actually getting ready fairly quickly. I poked my head in the hallway shortly after 7 and told Jose that we would be out by 8 since we were going to our breakfast at Lumiere's instead of Topsiders. He said the only thing they needed to do quickly was turn the bedding, so I told him I'd pull that off the beds and put it out for him. By 7:30 everyone was ready to go, so we decided to go on up to Topsiders. We ate, and there were folks waiting for seats, so we headed downstairs about 7:55. We had a vague goal of stopping by Lumiere's to say goodbye to Noel and Alex, so we started down the aft stairs. We got off at deck 3, and It was absolutely JAMMED. Apparently, the doors weren't open yet, and people were line up back to Parrot Cay for disembarking. We worked our way through the crowd (A rousing chorus of MOOOO anyone?), and went in the back door of Lumiere's.
Alex and Noel insisted on us sitting down at our table. We weren't going anywhere fast anyway, so I got my 2nd cup of coffee in, and DH had a final sweet roll. I had given each of the kids 2 Wal Mart cards to give to anyone they wanted. DD had picked Megan in the lab, and DS had given one to a lab worker, but he wanted to give the other one to Alex. The last night DS had come to dinner with us, he didn't want to eat anything. Alex asked if he'd eat some kind of dessert, and DS said "Do you have any plain cheesecake?" Well it wasn't on the menu that night, and even though the screaming sugar kid at the sweatpants table had been hollering for cheesecake and his server said it wasn't available, Alex came through for DS (sweatpant family had already left!). When I asked DS who he was going to give the card to, he said Alex, since he knew that was something extra that he had done. His second choice was Joe in Scoops, since Joe saw more of DS than we did on the cruise! Anyway, back to the last morning, DS gave Alex the card and explained why he was special to DS. It was really very sweet. Alex just smiled, ruffled DS's hair and said "well, I couldn't let you go hungry now, could I?"
The ships doors opened about 8:15, and we waited for most of the rush to go past. Final goodbyes to the servers, and we merged into the herd, just in front of Herc10 and his wife (hey, were they stalking us???). As we're heading out, DH pulls out his wallet, only to say those dreaded words. "Hon, where's my license?" ARRRRRRGH! We step out of the traffic pattern, search every pocket and cranny in the wallet, and no joy. I look through the carry ons. No joy. With not much additional choice, we head out to the luggage pick up area. Find all our bags, and DS goes off to find a porter. Meanwhile, DH goes over to the customs inspector and presents the problem. He does have a US Government ID with him (both of us are federal employees), and they say that will work. Thank God, because I really didn't want to search through all our bags there for the stupid license!!!
Porter returns and loads up our 8 bags! (hey, that's only 3/4 bag per day, and that's for 4 people!) He drops us in line at the Budget shuttle, just behind AFFF (Gus) from the DIS boards. We chat for a bit, then they get on a shuttle, and we take the next one, and rejoined at the rental agency. When I had booked our cars, I was able to get a "luxury car" (Crown Vic or eq) for less than the "Full car" (century, etc.) so we had lots of space. When we left the rental agency (me driving, remember the missing license?), Gus and his wife were still working out the bags, since there were no upgrades available. But lest you think I'm laughing, we had the same problem when we got home!
We had an easy drive across the state to Tampa. Stopped at a Cracker Barrell for lunch, checked into the Tampa Airport La Quinta (I'd gotten it on hotwire). DS explored the grounds and found the outdoor pool. It was in the high 60s or low 70s, but he wanted to swim. DH took him while DD and I napped. When DH pulled out his swimsuit, guess what fell out? Yep, the dreaded license that seemed to have a mind of his own! Well, that made for one less chore when we got home. Toward late afternoon, we got a local paper for movie listings, and found the closest theater playing Lemony Snicket. Off we went. Kids liked the movie, I thought it was okay but a bit on the dark side. We had mall food court for dinner, back to the room for the night.
Our flight the next day was 7:45, and the airport recommended 2 hours of lead time, so we were up VERY early. The hotel's continental breakfast started at 4:45 though, so we were covered. It was a pretty decent spread, and I got to chat with the desk clerk about Disney Cruises. Told her to check out the DIS, so if the desk clerk is reading this, HI! We made it through the airport in reasonable time, for our first leg which was to LaGuardia. I was worried about the weather, but it was cold and clear there. We landed on time, and had a mad dash to the next terminal for our connection. Now this is the only airport I've ever been through where going from one domestic terminal to another required you to go BACK through security. We skid up to our gate, where the agent says "Oh, I've already loaded this flight." I start to lose it, saying "American airlines booked us on this connection. Our flight was on time, and we ran all the way here. It's not our fault the connection time was too short." Meanwhile the agent (hoping to get rid of me!) is saying "Maam, come right through this door and you'll be ready to go". I was mad for most of the short flight to National, but finally got over it. DH went to get our rental car (A Century. Remember that Gus had discovered that a Century doesn't like to hold luggage for 4 people on this long a trip? We MADE it fit!), and we were on our way home. 2 1/2 hours later (we stopped for lunch though), we were finally home.
It was a wonderful trip, full of ups and downs (just like life), and blessed with wonderful people, including the 120 or so DISers that were friends we just hadn't met yet.
If you're still with me, thanks for reading. I hope something we experienced either helps you with a future cruise, or at least made you laugh. Happy cruising all!
Same cast as before.
And I'm sad to say the dreaded license rears it's ugly head again!
Due to the joys of travelling with frequent flier miles, we had to kill a day before flying home out of Tampa. The phone calls booking the flights were a joy! But anyway, given this, we weren't in a big rush to get off the ship, so we thought we'd eat with our servers one last time. Which meant an 8am breakfast at Lumiere's.
No surprise, I was up early. I went out to check the temperature, which was chilly but not cold (better than I thought it would be at 6:00 am)! The alarm went off about 7, and my kids surprised me by actually getting ready fairly quickly. I poked my head in the hallway shortly after 7 and told Jose that we would be out by 8 since we were going to our breakfast at Lumiere's instead of Topsiders. He said the only thing they needed to do quickly was turn the bedding, so I told him I'd pull that off the beds and put it out for him. By 7:30 everyone was ready to go, so we decided to go on up to Topsiders. We ate, and there were folks waiting for seats, so we headed downstairs about 7:55. We had a vague goal of stopping by Lumiere's to say goodbye to Noel and Alex, so we started down the aft stairs. We got off at deck 3, and It was absolutely JAMMED. Apparently, the doors weren't open yet, and people were line up back to Parrot Cay for disembarking. We worked our way through the crowd (A rousing chorus of MOOOO anyone?), and went in the back door of Lumiere's.
Alex and Noel insisted on us sitting down at our table. We weren't going anywhere fast anyway, so I got my 2nd cup of coffee in, and DH had a final sweet roll. I had given each of the kids 2 Wal Mart cards to give to anyone they wanted. DD had picked Megan in the lab, and DS had given one to a lab worker, but he wanted to give the other one to Alex. The last night DS had come to dinner with us, he didn't want to eat anything. Alex asked if he'd eat some kind of dessert, and DS said "Do you have any plain cheesecake?" Well it wasn't on the menu that night, and even though the screaming sugar kid at the sweatpants table had been hollering for cheesecake and his server said it wasn't available, Alex came through for DS (sweatpant family had already left!). When I asked DS who he was going to give the card to, he said Alex, since he knew that was something extra that he had done. His second choice was Joe in Scoops, since Joe saw more of DS than we did on the cruise! Anyway, back to the last morning, DS gave Alex the card and explained why he was special to DS. It was really very sweet. Alex just smiled, ruffled DS's hair and said "well, I couldn't let you go hungry now, could I?"
The ships doors opened about 8:15, and we waited for most of the rush to go past. Final goodbyes to the servers, and we merged into the herd, just in front of Herc10 and his wife (hey, were they stalking us???). As we're heading out, DH pulls out his wallet, only to say those dreaded words. "Hon, where's my license?" ARRRRRRGH! We step out of the traffic pattern, search every pocket and cranny in the wallet, and no joy. I look through the carry ons. No joy. With not much additional choice, we head out to the luggage pick up area. Find all our bags, and DS goes off to find a porter. Meanwhile, DH goes over to the customs inspector and presents the problem. He does have a US Government ID with him (both of us are federal employees), and they say that will work. Thank God, because I really didn't want to search through all our bags there for the stupid license!!!
Porter returns and loads up our 8 bags! (hey, that's only 3/4 bag per day, and that's for 4 people!) He drops us in line at the Budget shuttle, just behind AFFF (Gus) from the DIS boards. We chat for a bit, then they get on a shuttle, and we take the next one, and rejoined at the rental agency. When I had booked our cars, I was able to get a "luxury car" (Crown Vic or eq) for less than the "Full car" (century, etc.) so we had lots of space. When we left the rental agency (me driving, remember the missing license?), Gus and his wife were still working out the bags, since there were no upgrades available. But lest you think I'm laughing, we had the same problem when we got home!
We had an easy drive across the state to Tampa. Stopped at a Cracker Barrell for lunch, checked into the Tampa Airport La Quinta (I'd gotten it on hotwire). DS explored the grounds and found the outdoor pool. It was in the high 60s or low 70s, but he wanted to swim. DH took him while DD and I napped. When DH pulled out his swimsuit, guess what fell out? Yep, the dreaded license that seemed to have a mind of his own! Well, that made for one less chore when we got home. Toward late afternoon, we got a local paper for movie listings, and found the closest theater playing Lemony Snicket. Off we went. Kids liked the movie, I thought it was okay but a bit on the dark side. We had mall food court for dinner, back to the room for the night.
Our flight the next day was 7:45, and the airport recommended 2 hours of lead time, so we were up VERY early. The hotel's continental breakfast started at 4:45 though, so we were covered. It was a pretty decent spread, and I got to chat with the desk clerk about Disney Cruises. Told her to check out the DIS, so if the desk clerk is reading this, HI! We made it through the airport in reasonable time, for our first leg which was to LaGuardia. I was worried about the weather, but it was cold and clear there. We landed on time, and had a mad dash to the next terminal for our connection. Now this is the only airport I've ever been through where going from one domestic terminal to another required you to go BACK through security. We skid up to our gate, where the agent says "Oh, I've already loaded this flight." I start to lose it, saying "American airlines booked us on this connection. Our flight was on time, and we ran all the way here. It's not our fault the connection time was too short." Meanwhile the agent (hoping to get rid of me!) is saying "Maam, come right through this door and you'll be ready to go". I was mad for most of the short flight to National, but finally got over it. DH went to get our rental car (A Century. Remember that Gus had discovered that a Century doesn't like to hold luggage for 4 people on this long a trip? We MADE it fit!), and we were on our way home. 2 1/2 hours later (we stopped for lunch though), we were finally home.
It was a wonderful trip, full of ups and downs (just like life), and blessed with wonderful people, including the 120 or so DISers that were friends we just hadn't met yet.
If you're still with me, thanks for reading. I hope something we experienced either helps you with a future cruise, or at least made you laugh. Happy cruising all!
