BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP!!!!
Yes that is the sound of our alarm clock going off at 4:30am on Saturday August 17th. We are ready to hit the road as scheduled at 5am. The kids are a little disoriented as we load them into the minivan that we packed the night before - the minivan now retitled 'the Magic bus'. The twins are in the captains chairs, facing forward for the first time and they seem to like it! Emily has the middle seat of the rear bench and she is in charge of the cooler to her right and the box of videos on the floor. Up front Mom and Dad have the tv-vcr unit perched on the step stool in between us, strapped down seemingly safely with about half a dozen bunjee cords thanks to Dad's efforts. We've got enough CDs to drive to FLA back and forth three times and never hear the same song twice - again thanks to Dad's paranoid preparation efforts on Friday. We are rolling.....and the kids lull back to sleep and we enjoy 3 hours of light traffic and relative peace. Then everyone freaked out so our first stop was at around 3 1/2 hours. Then two hours later a stop in VA at a KFC for lunch. Thank God or whomever invented this tv-vcr thing - armed with Disney movies and Baby Einstein and Sesame Street for the little ones - things rarely got out of hand, although there were some tense moments but eventually everyone quieted back down. We arrived at the Fairfield Inn in Florence, SC, did some quick shopping at Target for one or two forgotten items, and had dinner at the Seafood buffet at the Shoney's next door to the hotel. Not bad, it had vegetables for the kids and there was something for everyone. Emily (our 6 yr old) managed to order the first of many many burgers and fries she would not eat. Luckily we have Caitlyn and Ryan to clean up the leftovers...LOL. They may be eating alot of french fries this trip
.
At the hotel, Caity fell asleep after only a little bit of crawling around, but Ryan had ALOT of energy and was climbing and crawling and bouncing about until 10pm. Emily also was having trouble falling asleep. Mom and Dad were nearly in a coma but we managed to stay up long enought to get everyone down. Planning a 7am departure in the morning.
Day 2 - mom involuntarily wakes up at 4:30 am. I gently wake Dad and ask if he wants to leave early. He bounces up, we shower and are on the road at 5:30am with a cup of coffee and a free danish from the breakfast bar. Plan is to drive until we get hungry and stop for breakfast somewhere else. We get to GA and have a YUMMY warm breakfast at Cracker Barrel around 9am or so. Hitting the road again, Dad is driving in the right lane in the flow of traffic when we see the flashing lights in the rear window. Dad says "Is he pulling me over? What did I do?". I said "Were you speeding?". He said "I was just following the flow of traffic, I wasn't even in the passing lane." The kind officer told us we were driving 75mph in a 55 mph work zone. WORK ZONE?? Hello? It's a Sunday morning - there's no work going on here, just big orange cones. How convenient. Then he tells us after he writes the ticket that he didn't put down that we were in a work zone so the fine isn't doubled, like he's cutting us a break. Yea, right dude....thats because there are no workers there so it's NOT a work zone. I guess that's how they keep the taxes low in Woodbine Co, GA - nail someone from NJ with luggage on the roof rack who won't be around for the court date in October and will just pay by mail. Well, no reason to let it ruin the vacation...we put the ticket away and keep driving - of course staying at only 74 mph in the dreaded work zones.
We arrive in Orlando around 2:30pm at our resort - Marriott Cypress Harbour resort. It is beautiful!! We got a room just as we requested, in Cedar Key on the first floor - room 5214. It is SO nice and we proceed to bungee the kitchen cabinets shut to keep the little ones out and we unpack. The babies are fascinated by the glass table!! It's see through!! We rest for a while, eat some Pizza Hut deep dish supreme by the pool, and go food shopping at the new Publix on I-Drive South. We found it to be fairly expensive compared to many supermarkets at home, especially for cold cuts, but we bought breakfast and lunch foods for the villa, and milk, snacks and bottled water. We still feel refreshed from our break, and we head to meet mom's brother and fiancee at the Beach Club for dinner at the Cape May Cafe.
Even though we had a PS there was still a 30 minute wait for dinner. We were ok with it but there were alot of very angry people....the 'entitlement' crew was out in full force! The hotel lobby was VERY crowded. We went out to check out the view of Boardwalk while we waited and looked at the pirate ship pool. Overall I'm not as impressed with Beach club as I was last time. It looks like it could stand a little sprucing up. The dinner however was WONDERFUL. I shared the last piece of chocolate mousse cake on the buffet with a little girl (heck, neither of us had room for a whole piece) and I ate - basically - like a pig. We really enjoyed it. Clams, wonderful salmon, yummy ribs...and OH MY GOD those Oreo Mousse desserts.....can I get the recipe for that?? The twins had had enough and were not the best behaved during dinner....we had to hold them alot but they just wanted to run around. Short sighted on our part, we should have given them some time to shake their sillies out before dinner. Live and learn. Luckily we were way over in the corner so they didn't disturb anyone's dinner too much with their fussing. DH apologized to the table next to us when we left for all the fuss, but they said "Don't be silly, we have kids too! They weren't so bad!!". Thank goodness. Emily ate two buckets of clams herself! The waitress joked with her that she would have to charge her for a grown up dinner since she ate as much as a grown up would! She was in her glories!
We hit Downtown Disney for a little shopping. Big mistake, that was mobbed too. You could barely walk at World of Disney and it was very hard finding a parking spot. We headed out after getting the penny press book and a our DTD pressed pennies.
Now to bed as we have a big day tomorrow at Disney MGM Studios.
Yes that is the sound of our alarm clock going off at 4:30am on Saturday August 17th. We are ready to hit the road as scheduled at 5am. The kids are a little disoriented as we load them into the minivan that we packed the night before - the minivan now retitled 'the Magic bus'. The twins are in the captains chairs, facing forward for the first time and they seem to like it! Emily has the middle seat of the rear bench and she is in charge of the cooler to her right and the box of videos on the floor. Up front Mom and Dad have the tv-vcr unit perched on the step stool in between us, strapped down seemingly safely with about half a dozen bunjee cords thanks to Dad's efforts. We've got enough CDs to drive to FLA back and forth three times and never hear the same song twice - again thanks to Dad's paranoid preparation efforts on Friday. We are rolling.....and the kids lull back to sleep and we enjoy 3 hours of light traffic and relative peace. Then everyone freaked out so our first stop was at around 3 1/2 hours. Then two hours later a stop in VA at a KFC for lunch. Thank God or whomever invented this tv-vcr thing - armed with Disney movies and Baby Einstein and Sesame Street for the little ones - things rarely got out of hand, although there were some tense moments but eventually everyone quieted back down. We arrived at the Fairfield Inn in Florence, SC, did some quick shopping at Target for one or two forgotten items, and had dinner at the Seafood buffet at the Shoney's next door to the hotel. Not bad, it had vegetables for the kids and there was something for everyone. Emily (our 6 yr old) managed to order the first of many many burgers and fries she would not eat. Luckily we have Caitlyn and Ryan to clean up the leftovers...LOL. They may be eating alot of french fries this trip
.At the hotel, Caity fell asleep after only a little bit of crawling around, but Ryan had ALOT of energy and was climbing and crawling and bouncing about until 10pm. Emily also was having trouble falling asleep. Mom and Dad were nearly in a coma but we managed to stay up long enought to get everyone down. Planning a 7am departure in the morning.
Day 2 - mom involuntarily wakes up at 4:30 am. I gently wake Dad and ask if he wants to leave early. He bounces up, we shower and are on the road at 5:30am with a cup of coffee and a free danish from the breakfast bar. Plan is to drive until we get hungry and stop for breakfast somewhere else. We get to GA and have a YUMMY warm breakfast at Cracker Barrel around 9am or so. Hitting the road again, Dad is driving in the right lane in the flow of traffic when we see the flashing lights in the rear window. Dad says "Is he pulling me over? What did I do?". I said "Were you speeding?". He said "I was just following the flow of traffic, I wasn't even in the passing lane." The kind officer told us we were driving 75mph in a 55 mph work zone. WORK ZONE?? Hello? It's a Sunday morning - there's no work going on here, just big orange cones. How convenient. Then he tells us after he writes the ticket that he didn't put down that we were in a work zone so the fine isn't doubled, like he's cutting us a break. Yea, right dude....thats because there are no workers there so it's NOT a work zone. I guess that's how they keep the taxes low in Woodbine Co, GA - nail someone from NJ with luggage on the roof rack who won't be around for the court date in October and will just pay by mail. Well, no reason to let it ruin the vacation...we put the ticket away and keep driving - of course staying at only 74 mph in the dreaded work zones.
We arrive in Orlando around 2:30pm at our resort - Marriott Cypress Harbour resort. It is beautiful!! We got a room just as we requested, in Cedar Key on the first floor - room 5214. It is SO nice and we proceed to bungee the kitchen cabinets shut to keep the little ones out and we unpack. The babies are fascinated by the glass table!! It's see through!! We rest for a while, eat some Pizza Hut deep dish supreme by the pool, and go food shopping at the new Publix on I-Drive South. We found it to be fairly expensive compared to many supermarkets at home, especially for cold cuts, but we bought breakfast and lunch foods for the villa, and milk, snacks and bottled water. We still feel refreshed from our break, and we head to meet mom's brother and fiancee at the Beach Club for dinner at the Cape May Cafe.
Even though we had a PS there was still a 30 minute wait for dinner. We were ok with it but there were alot of very angry people....the 'entitlement' crew was out in full force! The hotel lobby was VERY crowded. We went out to check out the view of Boardwalk while we waited and looked at the pirate ship pool. Overall I'm not as impressed with Beach club as I was last time. It looks like it could stand a little sprucing up. The dinner however was WONDERFUL. I shared the last piece of chocolate mousse cake on the buffet with a little girl (heck, neither of us had room for a whole piece) and I ate - basically - like a pig. We really enjoyed it. Clams, wonderful salmon, yummy ribs...and OH MY GOD those Oreo Mousse desserts.....can I get the recipe for that?? The twins had had enough and were not the best behaved during dinner....we had to hold them alot but they just wanted to run around. Short sighted on our part, we should have given them some time to shake their sillies out before dinner. Live and learn. Luckily we were way over in the corner so they didn't disturb anyone's dinner too much with their fussing. DH apologized to the table next to us when we left for all the fuss, but they said "Don't be silly, we have kids too! They weren't so bad!!". Thank goodness. Emily ate two buckets of clams herself! The waitress joked with her that she would have to charge her for a grown up dinner since she ate as much as a grown up would! She was in her glories!
We hit Downtown Disney for a little shopping. Big mistake, that was mobbed too. You could barely walk at World of Disney and it was very hard finding a parking spot. We headed out after getting the penny press book and a our DTD pressed pennies.
Now to bed as we have a big day tomorrow at Disney MGM Studios.
I am enjoying your report! It sounds like your drive went well, except for that ticket. We drove down in May from CT and your report is bringing back some memories.
)!
