A trip for Mommy and Daddy... ONLY! With more PICS (Okay.. I'm DONE finally! #124)

Hubby and I are also planning a trip alone. I am enjoying reading your trip report so much...can't wait to hear the rest of the story..:dance3:
 
Oohhh . . . . I gotta know! How did he wake up? I have my fingers crossed that he doesn't have some kinda tummy bug. . . of course, that's just because I'm thinking that

1) You are either both teachers/work in schools (can't remember for sure)

2) You have small children

3) IT'S COLD AND FLU SEASON PEOPLE!

4) You seem to be having waaayyy to much fun already!

Can't wait for your next installment! :)
 
I am really enjoying your report. Me and my DH will be leaving in 8 days for our 7 day adult only vacation to Disney.... :banana: :banana:

Kids are not to happy about staying home in the cold Ohio weather :cold:
 

Note to self: Next time you sleep at SSR, take the huge, thick, heavy, hot comforter OFF the bed before sleeping.:idea:

I’d love to tell you that my husband woke up to something fun, interesting, or unique… but he didn’t. He woke up to a good ol-fashioned SWEAT!! I roll over and feel he is gone. I wake up enough to realize he is sitting on the couch. I’m also awake enough to realize we have another half hour before the alarm goes off… and that’s pretty darned early!

Me: What are you doing?
DH: sitting
Me: What’s wrong?
DH: I’m sweating my b@!!s off.
Me: Oh. Well, I hope they stay on for the race. ((rolls over and goes back to sleep))

Ah… yes.. the race. The wonderful 5K Family Fun Run at Disney’s MGM Studios. :cheer2: We were very excited to see what this was all about. So we got up, threw on some clothes, and went to our bus stop, The Carousel. Remember last night, when we were told that the busses would be stopping by each bus stop starting at 5am? Remember that? Yeah.. so did we. So at 5:45, we were there… waiting. We happened to see a black cat walk by on the street.:eek:

Me: I have a bad feeling about this. That CM checking us in didn’t really seem to know what was going on today.
DH: Me too. I haven’t seen any busses all morning.
Me: Oh look, a phone (they have these little black phones at each bus stop)
DH: Can you reach the front desk and ask about the busses?

I try the phone. Surely it will work.. this place is brand-spankin’ new. Nope. Nothing. No dial tone, no response when I dial the posted numbers.:confused3

We decide to wait until 6:15. Then I send DH back to the room to get his cell phone. I will run to the front desk (which is no short trip, mind you) to see what’s going on. If I’m gone in the meantime, and the bus comes, he can get on it and I would meet up with him at MGM later.

So I jog to the main building. As soon as I get in and ask, the CM quickly tells me, “Oh. The 5K busses only pick up at Congress Park.” :sad2: Gee, thanks. I’m so glad it seemed like such common knowledge when no one last night seemed to know anything about it. But.. pause… we are at Disney. No griping or complaining. :rolleyes1 I call DH, and he meets me at the Congress Park bus stop, where loads of other runners are waiting. Boy, we felt like idiots. We had been watching DCL busses drive by us for almost an hour. We didn’t even think that they were the ones shuttling the runners around.

While we were waiting, we heard something interesting from the Meares guy that was at the stop monitoring the shuttles. He was talking about how ME got connected with Meares. The story went something like this:

“Disney walked into the Meares’ offices and said, ‘We want to start a free shuttle from the airport and we’d like to use Meares as a partner.’ Meares replies that they don’t think they are interested in offering anything free. Disney rephrases, ‘We are GOING to start a free shuttle from the airport and we ARE using Meares as a partner. If not, Meares busses will no longer be welcome on our property.’” Don’t know if it’s true or not, but it’s a great story about the power of Disney, eh?:earboy2:

Bus arrives, we get on board with a bunch of families. I’m proud to see so many parents and so many KIDS running in the race. What a great family thing to do together. As we pull away, I see another black cat! :eek: (Or maybe it was the same one who had made his way to Congress Park as well). Hope that doesn’t haunt us today!

The MGM parking lot is PACKED with people when we get there. They had set up a Pirate ship-themed stage with fun performers up there getting everyone excited about the race. pirate: DH got his number, I pinned it on, then he was off on his way to try to get as close to the start line as he could.

I saw a group of people with LIME GREEN shirts on that said they were from Plainfield, IN. That is 3 miles from my home… so of course I approached them to find out more about them. And of course, I had to wait until DH left me, so that I wouldn’t embarrass him with my abilities to have fun conversations with complete strangers! Turns out they were a whole family running together from grandma/pa to grandchildren. :rainbow: Also turns out that the grandparents used to be music teachers in Avon (which is what my DH does!!) many many years ago. ((Insert “It’s a Small World” music here)). I did ask them about their LIME GREEN shirts, but it had nothing to do with the DIS. Just something bright they picked out so they could find each other.

Here are a few pics from the race.

The Pirate performers:

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The START:

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The Send-Off Crew:

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DH at the Finish:

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DH with his medal:

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The first runners past the finish line ran that race in under 17 minutes. :worship: I can’t even imagine running that fast. DH ran it in the time he wanted. I think he wanted to beat 30 minutes, which he barely did. He gave the race itself a B- score. He said it was great running through the park, especially since it wasn’t open yet. But the starting of the race was rough. There were SO many people, it took a long time to be able to spread out and find a pace. :crowded: Definitely something we will look into, though. Especially as our kids get old enough to participate!

We returned to the hotel for a shower and change of clothes. Hopped on a bus to MGM again. This time, we didn’t have to wait at all. And the bus came right to the Carousel!
We used our DDP for the first time at the ABC Commissary. When the CM at the register handed me my receipt, there was no mention of the DDP on it. I thought it was supposed to tell you how many credits you had left or something. I mention this to said-CM. She tells me it’s fine. The DDP was used. Ok… I’m such a rookie, or am I?:rolleyes1

We enjoy a lovely but really greasy breakfast in a virtually vacant MGM!

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Little did we know, the crowds were coming… and coming… and coming… and coming…:crowded: :crowded: :crowded: :crowded: :crowded:


Note to self: When planning next Disney vacation, try to avoid the Marathon Weekend unless you are participating!

Please stay tuned. Did the black cat bring any bad luck? …
 
We happened to be in MGM on the same day! How cool is that? We wasn't there for any of the marathon activities...but I agree with you. Try to avoid Marathon weekend!
 
I am REALLY enjoying your trip report so far. Congratulations to your DH for the run. I have heard Marathon weekend is CRAZY, can't wait to read more about the crowds. TOO funny about the sweating at night comments :rotfl: sounds exactly what my DH would do.
Lesley
 
Folks, I have the next installment ready to go.. but I am having trouble accessing my pics. :confused3 I uploaded them to the pics area on this site, via the photography section. Now I can't seem to get to them. And with my next installment, it is necessary to add pics! You'll see why when I get this going!

Don't leave. I'll be back as soon as I find them!!:surfweb:
 
Good luck with the pics, can't wait to read more popcorn::

Lesley
 
Wow! I have never even heard of that run. How fun! Congrats to DH for running it. I wouldn't ever do it, but props to him for doing it! I have this thing about running .. called I CANT RUN! :rotfl: Oh well! Cant wait to hear more about your trip!! :)
 
Enjoying your trip report. I would love to take a mommy/daddy trip. The wheels are in motion. We were also there the weekend/week after the marathon and the parks were very crowded, IMO, all week.
Cant wait for another installment. Melissa.
 
Well, I'm so over it with the pics on the DIS site... I'm going to investigate photobucket this weekend and will hopefully get back into this TR as soon as humanly possible. I miss updating it!! Don't leave, folks. I'll be back. I promise!!!!
 
I am loving your TR!!! I am planning a surprise WDW/Cruise Vacation for our 20th anniversary (It's a few years away, but a girl can dream, can't she!!) :banana: Meanwhile we will settle for another fun family vacation next March! :grouphug: Anyway, I can't wait to hear about the rest of your trip!!
 
Ladies and Gentlemen, allow me to introduce the next character to join our trip. His name is Logan. He's the one in green on the left. You know, the one with arms the size of my legs!

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Everyone say, “Hi Logan.” What’s that? You can’t? His hotness is just too much for you to handle? Well, I agree! :love: Folks, this is the reason why I missed most of the Lights, Motors, Action show. Do you blame me?:confused3

Yes, the LMA show was our first stop after breakfast. One of our major missions this trip was to see as many shows as possible. Even though we’ve seen this one several times, we love it, and were happy to see it again. Even more so when Logan came on the set. :flower3: YUMMY!!!

A few fun things that happened:

They selected a family out of the crowed to introduce the show. I’m sure part of the YOAMD. They were supposed to say “LIGHTS” “MOTOR” “ACTION”.. in sequence from one child to the next. But, they saved the last word for the poor, shy little girl in the front. And boy, did she BLOW IT! I felt bad. She was young enough to screw it up, but old enough to realize she did. So much for that dream!:sad2:

We also witnessed a fender-bender in the opening sequence. It was the very first “ballet” scene, and the red car bumped a black one. It was hard enough to send parts of the car flying. Do you think it was the black cat?! :scared:

And finally, Logan spoke into the mic.. and they had a close-up of him on the big screen. I was too much in awe to grab the camera for a closer shot. But this was the ending of his conversation with the “director”

L: I’m gonna go jump on this…
ME: You can jump on me!!:thumbsup2
:rotfl2: :rotfl2: :rotfl2: :rotfl2:

See, things you could never say with kids in earshot! My DH got a kick out of my little obsession. We vowed to try to find him a hottie during the trip, too. I think Pocohontas was as close as we got!

Next stop was :tinker: Walt Disney, One Man’s Dream. What a wonderful collection of all things Walt. And we were able to take our time and actually read about everything. When we got to the movie part I was tempted to skip out. I thought I’d seen everything about Walt on all of the different cable specials there are out there. But I was wrong. Almost the entire movie was made up of footage I had never seen. I highly recommend it to all Disney fans out there!

We spent a few moments in the Animator’s Gift Shop.. or as I like to call it, “Cruel and Unusual Punishment Store”. Would I just LOVE to slap down $1600 for a piece of artwork? But… ummmm… not gonna happen. It’s hard for me to imagine having enough money to buy things like that. But a nice dream anyway.:rolleyes:

As one of the biggest Little Mermaid fans, I have always felt a bit guilty that I had never taken the time to see VOTLM. Well, we did this time. We grabbed a fast pass so we could spend some time in the Animator’s shop looking at things we could never afford!

Once in the queue, I had a thought about standing in large groups.

Don’t you hate when people push past you when you’re just standing there? Oh, I’m sorry I was only standing 5 inches behind the person I front of me instead of ½ an inch and you thought you needed to fill that space!!:crowded:

VOTLM was okay. The best part was the black light section. Ariel had a great voice. Ursula was frightening!! I was a little disturbed by the lack of audience etiquette. People were talking LOUDLY all over the place. What ever happened to teaching your kids to be quiet during a show? If you want them to be loud during a show, go see Playhouse Disney!!popcorn::

We meandered over to TOT, and I gave a salute to RNR… I was so sad it was closed the entire time we were there. :sad1: The wait time was almost an hour for TOT. HUH? It’s VALUE season for crying out loud. We passed. We were getting exhausted from the long morning and needed to get back to SSR to freshen up for our ADRs at Rose and Crown. We snuck a little nap, too… hit the pillows and both of us were out!!

We are finally figuring out the layout of SSR. It’s monstrously huge.

See you later for dinner and fun and EPCOT!
 
The night before we are leaving has finally arrived. One more night in our own Mickey bed.

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I love , love , love this bedding... Where did you find it.. and did they have King?

Love the report also!!!:thumbsup2
 
Sooze, I don't know what happened - your TR disappeared from my subscritpions list for a while, then just reappeared.:confused3 But I'm caught up now! (And planning a little trip to see Logan, er... LAM next trip!;) )

Good stuff!:thumbsup2
 












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