BethEJo
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- May 27, 2008
We then boarded the flight. See, that's Emma and I sitting on a plane. Gotta have those compulsory plane shots!
Despite boarding on time, we took off late as we waited for a connection to come in from Amsterdam. At the gate, we were told that it was a completely full flight yet Emma and I really lucked out and had an empty seat next to us. We managed to spread out and have more of a comfortable flight than we expected The flight seemed to pass quite quickly; I did some uni/research work to start and by the time I had finished, food was being served - bangers 'n' mash with a pesto pasta salad. It really wasn't bad!
I spent the remainder of the flight watching the 'comedy' section of the available TV programmes. This included The Middle, Miranda, Nurse Jackie and Community. My favourite however, was the Disneyland episode of Modern Family. If you've never watched Modern Family, then please give it a go It's aired on ABC in the US and on Sky 1 here in the UK. It's hilarious! I have seen the Disneyland episode so many times now, but I never get bored of it. If you only ever watch one episode, make sure it's that one!
After landing, the Captain made the announcement that due to recent problems with Immigration at Orlando, it was currently too busy in the hall and were going to have to be held on the plane for the time being. After around 30 minutes, we disembarked to find that the Immigration hall was still absolutely heaving with people. We knew we had a long wait ahead of us, but at least Orlando was the other side of that wait! We started to worry about Jo and Tanya; we had no way to contact them whilst in Immigration and had no idea where they would be waiting or how to let them know that we were going to be late. It also didn't help that they didn't have each other's numbers!
After finally clearing Immigration and the monorail, I managed to switch on my phone. A barrage of messages came through from Jo checking if we were OK since we were three hours later than planned! We wandered around the shopping area and found Jo outside Starbucks - should've guessed really, as that girl is ADDICTED to iced coffees! After hugs, we headed down to the Magical Express area where Tanya had also been waiting for a couple of hours. None of us had seen her since we finished our College Program in 2011, but seeing each other again now, it felt like we had never been apart!!
We checked onto the bus, loaded our bags and then settled down. OKW was to be the first stop. We half watched the welcome video (which I loved) and half excitedly discussed our plans and itinerary (which I had made and colour coded - expect nothing else )!
Before we knew it, we were at the resort and at first looks, we loved it. Check-in was quick and we were shown our room on the map. We were also given a lovely green balloon poodle as the room pet - we named him Patrice!
We loaded our bags onto a golf cart and were whisked away to our room; we were staying in room 5514 - a bit of a trek from Hospitality House - but super close to one of the little swimming pools and the South Point bus stop. Our Bell person was Dave from England; we chatted about how he had been living and working out there for a while now. We also entertained him with our practising of our American accents. Our favourite phrase to say: "Turtle Pond"!
We unpacked, showered, and the consensus for dinner that evening was Captain Cook's at the Polynesian - we were just craving those pork sandwiches!
Of course I had the Aloha Pork Sandwich with a Macadamia nut cookie for dessert; it did not disappoint! We had a slight hiccup with our first meal on the DDP however; we ordered the meals and I gave the cashier my room card. The touch pads are already set up for the new Magic Bands/RFID cards, so i touched my room key to the Mickey head as instructed and the cashier told me to enter my PIN... errrrrrrrrrmmmmmmmm... I told him we'd just arrived and that I didn't have one. He was pretty darn annoyed at that! I explained to him that no one had mentioned it to us - I guessed a number that I might have used, but of course it didn't work. He went off on one, saying how did he know that this was actually my room card, it could have been anyone's and we could just be saying that we didn't know the PIN so that we could use it! I almost told him to forget the food, but he eventually just put it through after a massive fuss! The end result was worth it
We enjoyed our sandwiches, the Disney fries and of course the American orange Fanta! After finishing up, we had a quick explore around the beach of the Poly - we love watching Wishes from there, and that was the original plan for tonight, but on stepping outside it was actually quite cold! Especially the sand!! That combined with the tiredness didn't make for a good combination and we decided we'd just do it another night and head back to the room! Lightweights I know!
Considering the plan was to go straight to bed, we didn't end up settling down until around 11:30! It had been a long day but after almost two years, we were back, and it felt gurrrrrrrd! We were so excited to hit up Magic Kingdom tomorrow!!!
Despite boarding on time, we took off late as we waited for a connection to come in from Amsterdam. At the gate, we were told that it was a completely full flight yet Emma and I really lucked out and had an empty seat next to us. We managed to spread out and have more of a comfortable flight than we expected The flight seemed to pass quite quickly; I did some uni/research work to start and by the time I had finished, food was being served - bangers 'n' mash with a pesto pasta salad. It really wasn't bad!
I spent the remainder of the flight watching the 'comedy' section of the available TV programmes. This included The Middle, Miranda, Nurse Jackie and Community. My favourite however, was the Disneyland episode of Modern Family. If you've never watched Modern Family, then please give it a go It's aired on ABC in the US and on Sky 1 here in the UK. It's hilarious! I have seen the Disneyland episode so many times now, but I never get bored of it. If you only ever watch one episode, make sure it's that one!
After landing, the Captain made the announcement that due to recent problems with Immigration at Orlando, it was currently too busy in the hall and were going to have to be held on the plane for the time being. After around 30 minutes, we disembarked to find that the Immigration hall was still absolutely heaving with people. We knew we had a long wait ahead of us, but at least Orlando was the other side of that wait! We started to worry about Jo and Tanya; we had no way to contact them whilst in Immigration and had no idea where they would be waiting or how to let them know that we were going to be late. It also didn't help that they didn't have each other's numbers!
After finally clearing Immigration and the monorail, I managed to switch on my phone. A barrage of messages came through from Jo checking if we were OK since we were three hours later than planned! We wandered around the shopping area and found Jo outside Starbucks - should've guessed really, as that girl is ADDICTED to iced coffees! After hugs, we headed down to the Magical Express area where Tanya had also been waiting for a couple of hours. None of us had seen her since we finished our College Program in 2011, but seeing each other again now, it felt like we had never been apart!!
We checked onto the bus, loaded our bags and then settled down. OKW was to be the first stop. We half watched the welcome video (which I loved) and half excitedly discussed our plans and itinerary (which I had made and colour coded - expect nothing else )!
Before we knew it, we were at the resort and at first looks, we loved it. Check-in was quick and we were shown our room on the map. We were also given a lovely green balloon poodle as the room pet - we named him Patrice!
We loaded our bags onto a golf cart and were whisked away to our room; we were staying in room 5514 - a bit of a trek from Hospitality House - but super close to one of the little swimming pools and the South Point bus stop. Our Bell person was Dave from England; we chatted about how he had been living and working out there for a while now. We also entertained him with our practising of our American accents. Our favourite phrase to say: "Turtle Pond"!
We unpacked, showered, and the consensus for dinner that evening was Captain Cook's at the Polynesian - we were just craving those pork sandwiches!
Of course I had the Aloha Pork Sandwich with a Macadamia nut cookie for dessert; it did not disappoint! We had a slight hiccup with our first meal on the DDP however; we ordered the meals and I gave the cashier my room card. The touch pads are already set up for the new Magic Bands/RFID cards, so i touched my room key to the Mickey head as instructed and the cashier told me to enter my PIN... errrrrrrrrrmmmmmmmm... I told him we'd just arrived and that I didn't have one. He was pretty darn annoyed at that! I explained to him that no one had mentioned it to us - I guessed a number that I might have used, but of course it didn't work. He went off on one, saying how did he know that this was actually my room card, it could have been anyone's and we could just be saying that we didn't know the PIN so that we could use it! I almost told him to forget the food, but he eventually just put it through after a massive fuss! The end result was worth it
We enjoyed our sandwiches, the Disney fries and of course the American orange Fanta! After finishing up, we had a quick explore around the beach of the Poly - we love watching Wishes from there, and that was the original plan for tonight, but on stepping outside it was actually quite cold! Especially the sand!! That combined with the tiredness didn't make for a good combination and we decided we'd just do it another night and head back to the room! Lightweights I know!
Considering the plan was to go straight to bed, we didn't end up settling down until around 11:30! It had been a long day but after almost two years, we were back, and it felt gurrrrrrrd! We were so excited to hit up Magic Kingdom tomorrow!!!