Finally- on our way to Orlando
Time to get us actually traveling in this review.
In the days leading up to Jan 25th, we checked the weather a bunch more times and decided we could safely cancel that first hotel night in TO. Happily, that didn't backfire on us.
The night before we left
I arrived home on Jan 24th after work (which included doing the happy dance when I stuck my "out of office" message on my email), to find out that Conor had a great day at school, dumped his milk on his pants, and ... we couldn't get them back at the end of the day due to the classroom being locked. (Don't worry - he had on his back-up pants!) Great - those will be in AWESOME shape after 10 days.
After a quick supper, and getting Conor to bed, we spent the evening at our usual last minute rituals, which includes the comforting aspect of constantly asking one another - "did you pack X? where is Y? What did you do with Z?"
I engaged in the final great suitcase shuffle, which goes like this:
- Open all 3 suitcases and 3 carry-ons on the living room floor.
- Remove at least 2 full outfits of clothing per person from each suitcase.
- Redistribute these to the other suitcases.
If you're wondering why I do this - clearly, you've never been on the lucky receiving end of having a bag go missing for a few days. (Guess who has? Yes, yes, lucky me.) This way, no one person is without underwear for 2 days -essential to happy traveling.
I then did the checked bag/carry on reshuffle, where I change my mind 3 times about what needs to go in the carry on - this is based on 2 key principles a) what do I need on the flight to keep the kid happy? and b) what do the rest of us need to survive for 2 days if our luggage is lost? (Again, voice of experience here.)
Frequent use of the luggage scale is essential in this shuffling - beware! Love our luggage scale. Best invention ever, I think, for my peace of mind.
Finally, we pack one extra bag... the "leave in Toronto" bag, which is the the bag of stuff you need to miraculously transform back into someone who is ready for winter weather.
And then, I went to bed.
True confession: At no point in this did I have any trouble sleeping - the non-Disney in me, I guess? Or sheer exhaustion?
We hit the road
In my world, if I think we need to be leaving the house at 10:00 a.m., I proclaim to my family we need to leave at 9:00 a.m.
I am not faultless in this, but my husband, the king of the "triple check" always underestimates how much time that last bit of running around takes.
So, with a 9:00 a.m. plan firmly in place, and a 4.5 year old determined to help us pack, we did leave the house at 10:00 a.m. (after triple checking that all bags were IN the car).
Here he is, and do NOT ask me why he put both his stuffies on his head - it took him 5 minutes to pose for this pic.
Note the one and only Disney shirt - purchased on mega-sale at Old Navy, when I was on-line to get him new underwear and socks (it's all glamour, all the time around here.)
First stop - you guessed it - Starbucks, then hello 401. It was an easy drive mostly - the weather was good both in and out of the car (4.5 year old had new TV to watch and new games on his "phone" (my old i-pod touch). Toco Robot rocks, by the way, if you need a new app for your 4 year old. We made one short pit-stop to have our usual conversation.
"Conor - come on bud, we all need to go in to pee."
"I don't need to pee."
"Yep, bud, we should all pee. We have another hour and a half to drive and we need to all make sure we have peed."
"I don't have any pee."
"Buddy- remember, every time we talk about this, you say you don't need to pee. Every time we go in, you try, and you find out you have sneaky pee, that's hiding."
"No - I don't have any. My p**** is empty" (Yep - my kid is inventive.)
(At this point, you want to avoid precipitating a meltdown - you're in public, you have to get another long drive in, and you've just started vacation, so you resort to creativity as opposed to "mom says...")
"Well, bud, why don't you come in and help me pick out a donut?"
Yep - Tim Hortons to the rescue. How Canadian are we anyway?
Needless to say, once in the building, suddenly someone decides that maybe he should check for "sneaky pee" (his term) and voila, it's there. (Sorry for TMI!)
Back on the road - in the throes of the ugliness that is the 401 across Toronto, snow squalls start, which just adds that extra je-ne-sais-quoi as one is trying to get to YYZ in one piece. Happily - we made it fine, and found a good parking place "indoors", so to speak, near the hotel. Then, realize we don't want to be trucking our luggage up one level in the parking garage, so we get BACK in the car, and Conor and I and all the luggage get dropped off at the hotel, while Brian hopes the spot is still there. (It was.)
YYZ tips
In the end it was just after 1:00 p.m. when we got to the Sheraton - it's in Terminal 3, if you've not been there before. Our flight was leaving, of course, from Terminal 1.
(If you didn't know, one of the perks of staying at the Sheraton Gateway is that you can leave a bag there for the duration of your trip - so we leave that "winter transformation" bag - complete with everything we'll need the night we return.)
The only downside of the Sheraton Gateway (other than the cost) is that there are no luggage carts there (officially speaking) so you have to truck your stuff down to the monorail to terminal 1. This was not awful, but interesting with me corralling the over-excited 4.5 year old, so I couldn't take as much as I normally would.
Fortunately, not far into Terminal 1, we located carts, and we were on the way.
We found our check-in line. (Cue the Air Canada complaints.) For some reason that NO ONE has ever been able to explain, most of the time, we can't check in an advance. I am the person who LOVES doing these things in advance - be it on-line or at a little booth thingie. Nope - we are rejected. We don't know why, so we have to stand in the check-in line.
This was a typical line -we were there for about 20 minutes. (Happily - the aforementioned new rocket app on the i-pod touch was good for all that.)
Rant here - why were we in line this long? Not, I will say, because of Air Canada (this time, anyway). The line was slow due to the 2 families who apparently don't read the rules so they had bags that were, oh, 60 lbs, and they didn't want to pay for overweight. So, the rest of us sit there watching them argue and move things around in bags. (No, ma'am, I do not think that you moving your kid's diapers out of that bag is going to get you down 10 lbs. - try moving the men's shoes!) ARGH! Then, they didn't know they had to pay for their bags even if they weren't overweight (yes, it's annoying, but it's well advertized), so they argued about that, then spent seemingly forever finding their credit cards. ARGH again!
By the time we checked in, it was about 1:45 - we were organized, and our bags were underweight (thank you luggage scale) and our documents were in order, so we were done in 5 minutes. We were directed to, I think, the "f-gates" (?) which is where we got ready to clear American customs or whatever that is called. You fill out that form, and then you stand in line some more. This line was moving pretty quickly (it wasn't too busy that day) so we were through in about 15 minutes.
We then get in the next line (don't you love traveling?) to go through security. Since the great luggage reshuffling process also includes prepping for going through security, we were ready. We did have a stroller (don't judge) which kept the 4.5 year old happy (it's a rare event for him) so this got us in the special line. The only glitch here was the usual last minute negotiation about the fact that Sockie would have to go through the scanner. Fortunately, that day, Sockie was keen, so long as he could stay with Teddy, so we got through that OK.
All in all - we emerged on the other side of security, intact, and after our customary "Don't you have the passports?" moment of panic, we headed straight for lunch, as it was way late - 3:00 p.m.
Yes - tactical error- so tip for all - it took 2 hours to get through all of the lines at the airport - so our plan to get lunch right after we checked in fell apart - so we were all hungry and grumpy.
Air Canada - my metaphor - skip this if you don't care what I think about them!
4 years ago was the last time we traveled to the US and we decided we didn't want to take Air Canada for once. We had taken AC for years not so much due to choice, but rather due to the fact that they are the only airline that fly out of our local airport, and with an infant, it was just easier. (Also - they have a near-monopoly on places we go often to visit family.)
We flew on an American airline, and, to be blunt, it was awful. They were not even polite when we explained we couldn't do the advanced check-in - they made us try again (with a 9 month old) at the kiosks, then they patronized us and tried to help us use the kiosk, only to proclaim with great astonishment "Oh, it's not letting you check in!"
After various experiences like this, we had our last leg of the flight on Air Canada. It occurred to me that while AC frequently loses my bags, runs late, has near-monopolies on certain destinations, and changes their rules with great frequency, they are, to us, like a co-worker you don't really like, but with whom you still have a very productive working relationship. You're never going to go for drinks after work, but you understand each other's weaknesses, and you know how to deal with them.
We've tried West Jet - very fun, but their flights rarely work out for us, and what's the deal with the no milk on board? We've tried to book Porter - once again - the flight times never work out.
So, even though we can now drive to one of 4 other airports within 3 hours of our home, we end up on AC more often than not. So, yes, we appear to keep working together. Since this trip was on points, I really shouldn't complain... much.
And, I will leave you here, as we were eating overpriced lunch in Terminal 1, before heading to our gate.
Later!