Dawgfan's secret short trip to the Magic

[dawgfan]

We are a family of four, with Me (Walter), my wife Lisa, oldest daughter Kaleigh ( 15 yoa) and youngest daughter Ashley (12 yoa). We go to WDW about every other year. Last July I talked my wife into purchasing Annual Passes . As a result we did Disney in July 2010, Spring Break 2011, and a class trip with my oldest daughter in May 2011 (just dad and oldest daughter along with her class). When my daughter and I returned from the class trip in May, I described our trip to my wife. She must have been horribly jealous that she was not able to go. She immediately said that she really wanted to go back to Disney before our AP’s went out. So, we hatched a top secret plan to take our girls back to the World in June without their knowledge. We began to lay out a plan where we could get out of town with the girls but they would not know where they were going. We had to have a cover story. My wife fretted over this as she was sure that she would mess up and let the cat out of the bag. I told her that we just had to have a good story to cover the reason for going out of town. We were stumped on that. I came up with several ideas but they all seemed to have too many holes in them . Eventually we settled on a plan to just tell the girls that mom and dad needed some time off and we were going to get away. We would go out of town to Valdosta Georgia to do some shopping and possibly go to a theme park that they have there. Valdosta was far enough down I-75 that my kids would likely not spark up any suspicion. My wife immediately became concerned about the possibility that the kids would be somewhat “let down” that they would not be going to the theme park in Valdosta. She felt that they may really want to go. I told her she was crazy. Any kid that would choose a small theme park with few rides over Walt Disney World would have to be off their rocker. This was not going to be an issue and I was sure of it. The kids have been to Wild Adventures theme park in Valdosta a couple of times and immediately said that they were not interested. “The rides are always broken down and there is not much to do or see there”, said my youngest. She is not much of a ride enthusiast anyway. The oldest daughter said less verbally, but made her feelings known by facial expressions only common to teenage girls when they are displeased. This was our first hang up in the plan. If they did not want to go to the theme park would they now buy the plan that we were going all the way to Valdosta Georgia just to shop? We quickly just threw in the idea that “getting away from it all” was the real point to all this and we would shop or do whatever. They had no problem with this, though my wife wondered if they were buying the storyline. I had a few conversations and became amazed at just how “unplugged” teenage girls on summer break can be. They had no plans and no desires for anything to do in particular this summer. We had a vacation planned for later in the summer and they were content with that on the horizon. The fact that mom and dad may have been acting a little strange or had come up with one of the stupidest ideas in the world to go shopping out of town for a few days was no shock to their systems. As long as the I-pods and cell phones worked, life was good. My wife packed the kids stuff in a separate bag for an extended stay and the kids packed things in their bags as if they were going away for a couple of days. So, on Wednesday 6-1-2011, we woke bright and early and headed out.
The plan was to stop at a drive thru and get breakfast. After eating in the truck I believed the kids would fall fast asleep as they usually do on long trips and I would make some time on the interstate. I was shooting for them being asleep until we crossed the Florida line. After that the landscape is so general that they would not likely pick up on anything for some time. I would eventually have to tell them where we were going and I left that to chance. I had hoped for one of those Disney commercial moments. You know the type, where the kids hear those magic words and gleefully scream “we’re going to Disney World”. I do not know what I was thinking. I seem to have forgotten that my kids were no longer 3 and 6 years old and had been replaced by robots. All went according to plan at first. They fell fast asleep and I sped my way toward the Florida line. As we approached Valdosta I began to feel that we would pull off the first hurdle of the trip in getting across the state line with no fanfare. About 3 miles from exit 5 on I-75 South I heard a rustling from the back seat . Suddenly my oldest daughter awoke and pronounced that she had to go to the bathroom and by the way, I have started my period. Everything slammed into slow motion as I subliminally said “Oh NOOOOOOOOOO” in that slow motion sound effect. Actually I said a few curse words under my breath, but I digress. I pulled off onto exit 5. This is the exit that we normally stay at when we go to Wild Adventures theme park in Valdosta, the very place that the kids had been told we were initially going to. I prepared myself for the inevitable discovery that we “were here!” as they would surely think that we were staying at the Hampton Inn as usual. I pulled into the McDonalds there on the exit. My daughter and I went inside and both used the bathroom. We came back out. The kid got back into the truck. I spoke briefly with my wife in reference to our conspiracy at the hood of the truck trying to anticipate our next move. Completely at a loss for what might happen next we both got back in the truck and blindly headed out of the parking lot toward the ramp to I-75. I crossed my fingers hoping to get by the gauntlet of clues that would pop up over the next 10 miles. In every direction there were signs or clues that we were in fact in Valdosta. I was sure that at any moment I would hear one of the kids proclaim that we had arrived at our destination. I picked up the pace toward the state line. I knew the next problem would be the “Welcome to Florida” sign and the Welcome Center just inside Florida. I thought this would be the end of the secrecy and prepared to tell the kids where we were really going. I caught a break and noticed three large trucks just at the state line. I pulled up to them and then slowed my pace to block the view of any signage on the passenger side of the truck. This worked…at least for a moment. Suddenly as I cleared the Welcome Center, the truck on my right slowed and a third Welcome to Florida sign appeared into view. My 12 year old daughter spotted this and I watched her in the rearview mirror as she seemed to process this bit of information. She then quietly asked if Valdosta was in Georgia. Sadly, geography may not be her strongpoint it seems . My oldest daughter quickly snapped, “Yes it is in Georgia!” and glared at my youngest daughter with a mean girl look. No more was said. My oldest daughter continued to look out of the window apparently clueless to the thousands of highway signs with the state of Florida emblazoned upon them. They both fell back into a slumber in short order after asking how much further we would be driving. I assured them that we had at least another hour and fifteen minutes left. Blissful silence was the only reply.
Okay, I had answered two questions. How acute are the senses and how in tune to the surroundings is the average teenage girl? The answer was a resounding, “not so much”. How much time do I have to figure out the next step in the plan should they wake back up? I had bought myself another hour or so I guessed. I picked the pace back up and hoped to get to the Florida Turnpike before they woke back up. As luck would have it, about 3 miles from the Turnpike, I hear another rustle from the back seat. My oldest daughter who is sadly still on her period ,remember, has to go to the bathroom again. @#!%^$^^!! I said to myself! The exit before the Turnpike is the Wildwood Florida exit. It is also one that we generally stop at as we head down to WDW. I was assuming again that the kids would recognize this place and so sought to bypass it. It started to rain seemingly reflecting the mood of all of this. However, the heavy rain covered the fact that I continued on past this exit. I successfully merged onto the Turnpike. As we went underneath the unmistakable Ron Jon Surf Shop sign on the turnpike I prepared to be “cold busted” by the girls. Not a peep was to be heard from the back seat. I pulled off on the insistence of my wife after pretending that I had forgotten that a bathroom break had been requested. We stopped at a small gas station and all exited the truck. Directly across the road was a souvenir stand proclaiming to sell every Floridian type trinket and citrus known to man. The kids went to the bathroom and came out. They asked two simple questions. “What is for lunch because we’re hungry “ and “how much further”. I answered with, “I don’t know and I don’t know.” My wife felt that this had gone on too long. She was just ready to get the truth out. I was not going to be so quick to let the surprise be known. After all, I was looking for this big reaction. I decided that I would make them work for it a bit. I knew my youngest daughter had a new phone (her pride and joy) and that she had just downloaded a GPS application. She wanted to eat at Subway. I told her to pull up the GPS and seek for a Subway in the area. I told her to first find out where we were . I supposed that when she found out where we actually were the obvious questions would lead into a good moment of surprise all to be caught on the now filming camera. Of course the fact that dad had pulled out the camera was a bit odd, but again, teenagers believe parents have all been kidnapped by aliens. They did not think too long on that oddity. What I caught on tape for the next several minutes was my youngest daughter unsuccessfully fumbling with her new phone application in a vain attempt to determine her location, while her older sister looked on with disdain. She finally answered that “we were in Wildwood”. My wife asked, “where is Wildwood?”. She continued to fumble with the computer chip driven device that was slowly but surely ruining my Disney moment. This had simply gone on too long. The look on my wife’s face said that clearly. I just went ahead and told them “we had a change in plans and decided to take you guys to Disney World”. I braced for that spectacular moment for later digital playback. All I got was “what?…okay”. I am thinking, “you are kidding me”. All that build… up for that? It was then that I realized the damage that we had done to our kids in spoiling them with many things to include TOO MANY DISNEY TRIPS! Oh well, off we went toward Orlando laughing about the whole secrecy thing. My oldest is an honor student. I had felt certain that she would have picked up on the fact that we were in Florida for the past 2 hours and I told her so. She really had no clue. She advised that she trusted me and never questioned where we were going. She was just okay with going somewhere. I gave them a short speech on their particular perils should they ever be kidnapped, as they would be of no help in their own rescue. They would also have failed miserably as boy scouts. This of course had no meaningful or lasting effect. Oh well, we are going to Disney World…or did I forget to mention that?

I got back on the Turnpike and sped to our destination. We were staying at Port Orleans Riverside this time. We had always stayed at Port Orleans French Quarter in the past. That is our favorite resort. It was not available and booked solid. I was not able to reserve early enough to get POFQ. We arrived in Orlando in a rain storm and went to a quick lunch at Joe’s Crab Shack. We checked into POR at about 1:45pm and immediately noticed how busy the resort seemed to be. I waited in line for a pretty good bit of time. This is when WDW staff cuts are really apparent. There were tons of people checking in and out of the resort but they had only two people at the front desk. There were two other people at the concierge desk and they were evidently trying to fill in the gaps with check in’s when they could. We were told that POR and POFQ were both booked to 100% capacity that week. This made it seem all the more silly that they would be so apparently short staffed. Our room was not ready so I gave our cell number for contact and we went shopping. Ahhhhhh, shopping!! Did I mention that I have a wife and two daughters? Shopping is an Olympic event in my family and I seem to be the only one who has not stood on the podium to receive a medal for it. My wife and kids are darn good at it. I have to say that I am really good at dragging myself along and looking as if I am somewhat interested. We shopped and toured the resort killing about an hour and a half, which was a great stretch to do, and then we got a call that our room was ready. We could have gone to the parks or Downtown Disney but my oldest was feeling pretty run down by now and everyone was in need of some rest. We elected to go to our room as soon as it was available.
The room was clean and nice. We stayed in Magnolia House, one of the mansions. The rooms are very similar if not exactly the same as the rooms at French Quarter. We had the misfortune of staying next to two rooms where two large families had packed in. They appeared to be “camping” almost. There were lots of kids in each room. The parents had toys strewn about the walkway and into the grass courtyard directly in front of their rooms. They had drug two chairs out of the rooms to sit in and mostly to smoke in. It is not a designated smoking area. They would spend hours and hours hanging around the room smoking and watching the kids play in the courtyard. They kept their doors open a great deal despite the heat. They really did not bother us with noise too much but the camping and smoking was weird. They would set up the chairs all over the place and move from one location to another. One night we returned from a late night at the parks to encounter a person right outside the door of our room smoking and talking on a cell phone. She just looked at us and smiled while she took a deep drag on her cigarette and continued to talk for an hour more after we went inside. This was just strange.
Our first day nearly over and a brief rest at the room done, we decided to go to Magic Kingdom. The rain had stopped and so we headed out. We went to the bus stop, east depot, which was conveniently located right behind our room area. This is when we would get our first clue into the bus situation that would be with us all week long. The bus to MK took a good while to get there. Once one arrived it was already packed so full that you could not get everyone on it. We debated about just driving our own vehicle to the park. We decided to wait on the next bus. It arrived and was again packed, but we were able to squeeze in for an uncomfortable ride to the park. We left the bus and headed to the park. The crowd did not seem to be that bad. We were able to get around and do a few rides. We took a decidedly slower pace than we usually take. This was one of many trips taken already this year on AP’s and we were really anti-park commando this go around. We wanted a leisurely pace. This worked out okay but we just did not ride much. I am a commando style WDW patron. I want to ride as much as I can and try to do as much as can be done in a day. The girls just were not up to it. So, you guessed it, we shopped. We did hit the Haunted Mansion which was great. The new line que and the ending changes are great. We rode Big Thunder Railroad. We did Buzz Lightyear once. We walked and took our time and noticed things that we usually don’t. The weather by now was fantastic. The rain had ended and the air had cooled. We gathered at the hub for the new show about memories that they display on the castle front. This was my wife’s and youngest daughters first time to see this show. It is awesome to say the least. This show is not to be missed and really something special. We then watched Wishes. After that, of course as all WDW veterans are well aware, the “meat grinder” was turned on. One Gazillion people all turned toward the end of Mainstreet, ducked their head, and began the Batan Deathmarch…err uh… they began to exit the park. I feel sorry for the kid that gets caught under the throng. Knowing that if you tripped you would die, we opted for a short walk in advance of the crowd and then we scooted into the mainstreet Bakery for a quick bite. We held up there waiting for the crowd to dissipate. After eating, we moved to the bus stop for POR. We exited the park and headed left toward the buses minding our own business. We went directly up to the que area for POR and we were told quickly that the end of the line was “thatta way” as a woman gestured with her finger back toward whence we came. All I could say was “wow”! I have never seen nor do I ever hope to see a line for a bus stop at the parks like that one. We walked back to the end of the line which now curled all the way around the walkway toward the Contemporary. We would eventually board a bus that was way too crowded. The bus driver would not even let us elect to go on another bus that had pulled in behind the one we were made to board. He simply stated that they would not allow anyone on that bus until this one was full. Well, When I boarded I was last person on. My feet would not go behind the yellow line of the bus as there was no room. The bus driver was changing shifts to make matters worse so there was a delay in getting started. The new driver got on and promptly directed me to have my feet behind the yellow line. She then loudly proclaimed that there was plenty of room in the back of the bus and that we should all begin moving back. At this command I almost moved my feet in a direction that she most assuredly would not have wanted to move. Someone must have picked up a child toward the back of the bus just then and that allowed me to move about 90% of my flip flop clad 9 and ½ inch clodhoppers back from the yellow line. This was enough to make Helga happy and so she sat in the drivers seat. We then pulled out and took the slowest bus ride I have ever made back to the resort. Did I mention that we were the last stop on the route. Oh yeah! I got on and off the bus several times to allow others to get off at their stops. Each time I think Helga the bus driver attempted to leave me. Each time I would get back on she would look at me as if I was just boarding anew. She would always have a “hey buddy, the parks are closed” look on her face. She would then quickly close the doors almost hitting me. Then she would do the obligatory “back of the yellow line” order. What a night. Oh well, we still had fun. That pretty much concludes day one.