acebatonfan
VMKer at heart
- Joined
- Jul 14, 2011
- Messages
- 520
Welcome to my first trip report! I was very recently down there with my high school orchestra from March 28th to the 1st for Festival Disney competitions. Yes, there were a lot of stressful moments, some of them being really eye-opening, but I'm glad I was able to spend a few days with the mouse.
For privacy reasons, I am using letters for names, though I will try to not make the letters really confusing.
To begin, meet me
. I am your normal violist: have a few other close friends, though I made the mistake and decided to spend most of the time with my close friend since the sixth grade, C.
C has been a decent friend
. We both went to the same elementary school, been in the district orchestra together since the third grade, and spent many hours in middle school PE "running" together. The main issue, though, is that she has an even closer friend than me, A.
A has been alright to me, though she really is a snob
. The only reason why I put up with A is because C has been Best Friends with her since Kindergarten. A is really athletic, being part of the swimming team. Because of her status on the team, she is best friends with a lot of the swimmers, one of them being my crush, and a lot of the others being people who I really want to strangle.
For most of the trip, I ended up hanging out with C, A, and A's swimmer buddies (now being called the swimmers). If there really was one thing I could have changed about this trip, it would have been not choosing these 7-10 people for my group.
Wednesday March 28th
Arrival Day:
We, C, A, the swimmers, and me ended up driving from my high school to Cleveland, roughly a three hour drive, because our orchestra director believed we would save a few dollars by doing it that way instead of flying from our local airport, though 2/3 of the flights had a layover in Chicago at some point during the trip. For the little group I naturally got into, we departed from Cleveland to Baltimore at around 7, the same plane then going down to Orlando from Baltimore. C, A, and I ended up sitting together, though I spent a lot of my time studying for a few exams awaiting me after my trip. At around 10 AM, all ten of us in the group arrived in Orlando. We got onto the bus going to Islands of Adventure, and relaxed until we got there.
Islands of Adventure:
Islands of Adventure was alright. I am a complete ride wimp, though, so I ended up skipping out on The Hulk and Dragon Racers. When I did tell C that I was not going to ride, she made a big deal out of it, and I had to lie and tell her I was expecting a call from my mom at any moment (and that I could not miss the call) in order for C to shut up and stop making a big deal about me not riding, though she also refused to ride a few rides.
I also had a bit of a horror moment during Islands of Adventure. Ladies, we all have had that time where our curses might cause us to leak into our jeans? Lucky for me, my curse decided that it would be perfect for it to happen while in Harry Potter World. When I noticed this, I separated myself from the group to go buy a jacket or a long-sleeved shirt to cover the huge stain on my capris. I did, though, send a text to C explaining the situation so that the group would not go off to another area without me knowing.
Thinking about it now and how she tells A everything, I'm starting to wonder whether she might have told A, A then telling the swimmers of my little horrors.
Eight of us ended up having dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe. And, while in line for Jurassic Park, my crush ended up showing me a photo of him shirtless in a pool.
At the Room:
Let me get this straight right now. Because I was out sick during the time room arrangements were made, I was unable to pick who I got to room with. I did, though, get to room with a girl I knew from last year's geometry class, K.
The orchestra was staying at the Coco Key resort, though I would have preferred to stay on Disney property. To be completely honest, the resort was simply one step above from a motel, and what I experienced the first night really did not make me feel happy and safe in the "hotel."
To begin, my school has a few safety precautions to use while we are traveling. One of these is the “tape method.” When the chaperone checks in with us at the end of the day, after he/she leaves our room, he/she then places a small piece of tape on the door and the wall the door is connected to. The school also has a private security guard on duty while we’re in the room, and he would mark us down and notify our director if he sees us leave the room and/or notice the tape not on the door.
K and I got into the room at around 10:00 PM. We talked to the two other girls sharing our room and unpacked for the night. At around 11:00, our chaperone came in, the air conditioning letting out a loud screech, something we assumed was normal. She said that it wasn’t normal for the air conditioning to be going off like that, and she phoned maintenance. The air conditioning guy didn’t arrive in our room until 12:30 in the morning. We let him in, and he checked the air conditioning and told us that we needed to move rooms as soon as possible. Within a half hour, we had everything packed, our chaperone finally came into the room to make sure the new room was alright, and we were leaving the room.
It was a simple two doors down move, though we did notice a lot of small issues that really stood out to me. Once our chaperone came into our room to get us re-situated, she noticed that we had a lot more accessories in the room than any of the rooms we booked had, like the ball pillows advertised on the website’s room photos and pamphlets advertising Orlando; this minor detail, though not really important, really showed me how the hotel really “tries” to have quality in the rooms, and that they could have easily skimped out on the AC work just to make it easier for themselves. After the chaperone told us about what will be happening tomorrow, she told us that she forgot to bring the tape with her, and that she “trusted” us to not go out of the room. Well, the security guard must have written down that we were told to leave the room. We didn’t get in any sort of trouble for leaving our original room and not having tape on the new door.
It was 2:00 in the morning, and I finally fell asleep....
For privacy reasons, I am using letters for names, though I will try to not make the letters really confusing.
To begin, meet me
. I am your normal violist: have a few other close friends, though I made the mistake and decided to spend most of the time with my close friend since the sixth grade, C.C has been a decent friend
. We both went to the same elementary school, been in the district orchestra together since the third grade, and spent many hours in middle school PE "running" together. The main issue, though, is that she has an even closer friend than me, A.A has been alright to me, though she really is a snob
. The only reason why I put up with A is because C has been Best Friends with her since Kindergarten. A is really athletic, being part of the swimming team. Because of her status on the team, she is best friends with a lot of the swimmers, one of them being my crush, and a lot of the others being people who I really want to strangle. For most of the trip, I ended up hanging out with C, A, and A's swimmer buddies (now being called the swimmers). If there really was one thing I could have changed about this trip, it would have been not choosing these 7-10 people for my group.
Wednesday March 28th
Arrival Day:
We, C, A, the swimmers, and me ended up driving from my high school to Cleveland, roughly a three hour drive, because our orchestra director believed we would save a few dollars by doing it that way instead of flying from our local airport, though 2/3 of the flights had a layover in Chicago at some point during the trip. For the little group I naturally got into, we departed from Cleveland to Baltimore at around 7, the same plane then going down to Orlando from Baltimore. C, A, and I ended up sitting together, though I spent a lot of my time studying for a few exams awaiting me after my trip. At around 10 AM, all ten of us in the group arrived in Orlando. We got onto the bus going to Islands of Adventure, and relaxed until we got there.
Islands of Adventure:
Islands of Adventure was alright. I am a complete ride wimp, though, so I ended up skipping out on The Hulk and Dragon Racers. When I did tell C that I was not going to ride, she made a big deal out of it, and I had to lie and tell her I was expecting a call from my mom at any moment (and that I could not miss the call) in order for C to shut up and stop making a big deal about me not riding, though she also refused to ride a few rides.
I also had a bit of a horror moment during Islands of Adventure. Ladies, we all have had that time where our curses might cause us to leak into our jeans? Lucky for me, my curse decided that it would be perfect for it to happen while in Harry Potter World. When I noticed this, I separated myself from the group to go buy a jacket or a long-sleeved shirt to cover the huge stain on my capris. I did, though, send a text to C explaining the situation so that the group would not go off to another area without me knowing.
Thinking about it now and how she tells A everything, I'm starting to wonder whether she might have told A, A then telling the swimmers of my little horrors.
Eight of us ended up having dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe. And, while in line for Jurassic Park, my crush ended up showing me a photo of him shirtless in a pool.
At the Room:
Let me get this straight right now. Because I was out sick during the time room arrangements were made, I was unable to pick who I got to room with. I did, though, get to room with a girl I knew from last year's geometry class, K.
The orchestra was staying at the Coco Key resort, though I would have preferred to stay on Disney property. To be completely honest, the resort was simply one step above from a motel, and what I experienced the first night really did not make me feel happy and safe in the "hotel."
To begin, my school has a few safety precautions to use while we are traveling. One of these is the “tape method.” When the chaperone checks in with us at the end of the day, after he/she leaves our room, he/she then places a small piece of tape on the door and the wall the door is connected to. The school also has a private security guard on duty while we’re in the room, and he would mark us down and notify our director if he sees us leave the room and/or notice the tape not on the door.
K and I got into the room at around 10:00 PM. We talked to the two other girls sharing our room and unpacked for the night. At around 11:00, our chaperone came in, the air conditioning letting out a loud screech, something we assumed was normal. She said that it wasn’t normal for the air conditioning to be going off like that, and she phoned maintenance. The air conditioning guy didn’t arrive in our room until 12:30 in the morning. We let him in, and he checked the air conditioning and told us that we needed to move rooms as soon as possible. Within a half hour, we had everything packed, our chaperone finally came into the room to make sure the new room was alright, and we were leaving the room.
It was a simple two doors down move, though we did notice a lot of small issues that really stood out to me. Once our chaperone came into our room to get us re-situated, she noticed that we had a lot more accessories in the room than any of the rooms we booked had, like the ball pillows advertised on the website’s room photos and pamphlets advertising Orlando; this minor detail, though not really important, really showed me how the hotel really “tries” to have quality in the rooms, and that they could have easily skimped out on the AC work just to make it easier for themselves. After the chaperone told us about what will be happening tomorrow, she told us that she forgot to bring the tape with her, and that she “trusted” us to not go out of the room. Well, the security guard must have written down that we were told to leave the room. We didn’t get in any sort of trouble for leaving our original room and not having tape on the new door.
It was 2:00 in the morning, and I finally fell asleep....
