Another live trip report...

Groucho

Why a duck?
Joined
Jan 16, 2006
Messages
5,903
Well, it's that time again... we're headed to WDW tomorrow and I've got my photo gear pretty much all packed and ready to go, and will be checking in every day or two and maybe posting a few unprocessed photos along the way.

I try to have us do something new and different each trip... Last January included a Richard Petty ride-along... June was Star Wars Weekends... and this time, after having watched the runners do their thing in previous years, we'll be part of marathon weekend. Well, "we" means everyone in the family except me. :) My wife will be running the 5k, my 5-year-old will be running the 200m, and my 1-year-old will be running the 100m. They even have a class for under-one-year-olds called the "diaper dash" - that's Disney for you!

For those who haven't read my trip reports before, a quick background - the family consists of me, Mrs Groucho, Jack (5), and Leila (1).

We've had a lot of years where one or more of us has gotten sick during the trip - and unfortunately, this year it's started before we've left. Jack's had a bad sore throat all day and it's really impacted his usual level of excitement. On the other hand, it's probably helped him get to sleep tonight without being quivering with excitement about the trip!

I often post a shot of the gear I'm bringing along. This is for my own reference, to know what's there in case anything goes missing, to compare to previous trips, and to make DSLR shooters who use "walk-around" lenses feel better about their choice! (Who wants to carry all this?!?)



The gear is essentially the same as last January, with only a few changes... the big one being the K-5, but I'll probably throw the K-7 in the luggage somewhere as a backup. The lenses are all almost the same, though I decided to bring the Nikkor 105mm F2.5 instead of the Super Takumar 105mm F2.8, just to do it a little different this time.

Now, I do not carry all of those lenses every day! Not even close. What I do carry fits into my usual 20-year-old Tamrac case, bulging a little bit here. I might have to pull off a couple pins to cut down on weight...



Now, I need to get to bed so I'll be all ready to hit Hollywood Studios tomorrow evening! Here's hoping Jack feels better in the morning...
 
Looking forward to reading/seeing the report, have a great time.:thumbsup2
 
Have a great time! We will be awaiting some great photos. I hope Jack gets better and everyone stays well!!
 

As always I am impressed with your planning and even more impressed with your pins! What is that Mickey Ears gauge one? I love it!

Is it all really just 20 pounds? I've never had the nerve to weigh mine and I carry so so much less......

Anyway, I too can't wait to travel to WDW through your reports!

Here's to a great 2011 trip!
 
As always I am impressed with your planning and even more impressed with your pins! What is that Mickey Ears gauge one? I love it!

Is it all really just 20 pounds? I've never had the nerve to weigh mine and I carry so so much less......

Anyway, I too can't wait to travel to WDW through your reports!

Here's to a great 2011 trip!
My wife found the gauge one a few years ago. That was the first pin on my bag. I don't have many, mainly the ones on the bag plus a few freebies - DVC, Magical Express, etc. I think she found it at the Downtown Disney pin store. I don't know if it's still available. It's a good one since cars are one of my main obsessions. :)

Well, so far, the trip has had an ignominious beginning. Jack woke us up at 3:50am because he was feeling so bad. Fortunately nothing too sinister, just overheated, but he had a rough night. In the morning, he still felt lousy. The good news is that he felt a lot better after taking some medicine, and feels fine now and claims to not feel sick. We'll see.............

The great news (sarcasm on!) is that our flight, which was supposed to leave at 1:14pm, is still in Atlanta. And it's 2:14pm. We'll be lucky to leave here by 4:30pm and estimated arrival is 7:22pm. :( The funny thing is, I was very happy to get this flight - we were booked on JetBlue originally, then they stopped offering nonstops from Rochester. They put us on a flight that left at 7am or so, with a layover at JFK. Ugh! I switched to a flight leaving around 11. I used "Yapta" (a flight price checking site) to track the Airtran nonstop, and it dropped to $100 a couple weeks ago. I got a refund for JetBlue and bought the Airtran tickets.............. and here we sit. :(

The estimated time for leaving Rochester just changed to 6:03pm. Sigh.................... good thing that there's a pretty nice little kids play area here. And a slow, flaky wireless internet. Yeehah!

The big bummer is that we'll only have 2 or 3 nights to see the Christmas stuff. Tonight was supposed to Osborne Lights and tomorrow was Magic Kingdom... we'll see what happpens.
 
Can't wait to ride along!

I hope Jack is much better. Maybe the flight is late enough he'll crash on the way there????

And I sure hope you find a way to still see all the Christmas stuff.

Don't you have some really creative airport shots to post already? Geez....don't you know we're all waiting???????? :lmao:
 
Can't wait to ride along!

I hope Jack is much better. Maybe the flight is late enough he'll crash on the way there????

And I sure hope you find a way to still see all the Christmas stuff.

Don't you have some really creative airport shots to post already? Geez....don't you know we're all waiting???????? :lmao:
Jack is fine on the plane - it's Leila that gets us worried! She's been pretty good so far but hasn't taken her nap yet. Hopefully she'll do that on the plane... she should be exhausted by now! Of course, they'll be ready for dinner by the time we get going... our plane is finally on our way here now and should be here at 4:44. They estimate 5:30 to leave but hopefully it'll be before then!

As for pictures... well, if you're going to be pushy about it... :rotfl2:

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Jack's throat started to hurt again, fortunately we picked up some more medicine on the way to the airport.

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There, happy now? You won't get pictures posted so quickly for the rest of the trip. :teeth:
 
Is it all really just 20 pounds? I've never had the nerve to weigh mine and I carry so so much less......
I forgot about this question. I don't know what it all weighs; I've not given it much thought. The laptop bag gets filled with the lenses I think I'll use first; the rest goes in checked luggage. I think that right now (I'm a little bit away charging my laptop battery ;) ) I've got the 16-50mm, 50-135mm, LensBaby, 50mm F1.2, Nikkor 105mm, and maybe one other. At this point, I'll be lucky to go anywhere tonight to use them... it'll probably be too late for Hollywood Studios, but maybe Magic Kingdom for an hour or so. Not sure. I won't have a tripod either way, which kills some of the point of going at night...
 
Hope the flight is going smoothly & ya'll get checked in with no snags. OR hitches. Whichever. Hope the sickness is on its way out the door as well! Can't wait for more!
 
It's been a pretty good flight so far, with Leila sleeping at the beginning and being pretty well-behaved since then. We're currently watching Mickey cartoons on the laptop and beginning our descent. Can't wait to actually get there! :)
 
Happy landings and good luck on the trip!
:grouphug:

Marlton Mom
 
Subscribing to this thread .... I don't want to miss any of it .. I love following your live trip reports Groucho!!
 
Have fun! It looks like your weather is going to be better than it has been down here the past few weeks. It has been abnormally cold!
 
Thanks everyone!

Have fun! It looks like your weather is going to be better than it has been down here the past few weeks. It has been abnormally cold!
Yeah, I've been watching the weather a little bit, and see in some of the WDW news updates about the freezing weather. We've been here before when it's gotten below freezing but I think we missed it - the first week or so should be beautiful!

Our bad travel luck continued after we landed... due to the delays, there were no free gates, and we sat on the tarmac for 45 minutes. Finally we disembarked and got over to Magical Express and hopped on a waiting bus, empty but for us and another family going to Kidani (the DVC portion of Animal Kingdom Lodge.) Then came the Pop Century folks and the CBR folks... and naturally, of the four stops, Kidani was last! We finally got checked it at around 10:30 and our room is a decent length walk from the main lobby. Sigh...

Still, it's a beautiful hotel and I will have to spend some time with the tripod at night. I'm currently staying up waiting for our luggage to be delivered, so no tripod yet. Nor any pajamas for anyone or anything else like that. Hopefully it'll arrive soon; we have a reservation for Chef Mickey's in the morning!

Speaking of food, it was too late to walk over to Jambo House (the main AKL building) to hit the food court before it closed, and I just barely got into the little gift shop here and grabbed a loaf of bread (white only? ugh!) and peanut butter and jelly. I also grabbed a Mickey's Premium bar for dessert but our freezer didn't keep it all that cold so it was a bit melted when I ate it. Oh well!

This is behind the check-in desk...

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It's pretty hard to grumpy when this is the first thing you see when looking out on the balcony...

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I'm looking forward to your trip report. I just dropped DD and her boyfriend off at the airport. They'll be at Pop Century for a week. It would be cool to see them in some of your pictures!
 
I hope everyone was feeling better today and able to wear their slightly wrinkled suit case clothes as you marched around the parks!

popcorn:: :thumbsup2 popcorn:: :thumbsup2

Marlton Mom
 


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