Heather and Brandon Do Disney

[mcdee1980]

WE'RE BACK! In just a few short days all of you fun readers will have the opportunity to race around the World with us . . . okay you can read about how Brandon and Heather managed to be in 3 different parks and see 4 different hotels all in one day . . . our trip was a manageable 6 days long and a blast. Brandon, my roommate and first time Disney visitor, is already hooked. He has started planning next year's trip already!
For those of you who missed my sordid pre-trip report and haven't started reading my dining report . . . This is who we are . . . For starters we're from New Orleans dun dun dun . . . and we are both single and don't have any children . . . dun dun dun . . . do you see where this is going? OK:
Heather (me): 27, acts 10 in WDW, obsessed with my camera, single, straight, female, bartender . . .
Brandon: 22, first timer, single, gay, chef . . .

I'm working on a dining report as well . . . you can head on over if you want to read exclusively about food and service . . . which is a big deal to us because we are both in the hotel business . . . if you want to read about our trip, pull up a chair and take a deep breath because its going to take awhile. I'll try and get the first real installment up after work today. You can probably expect Brandon to pop in every once in awhile, but he's not as dedicated as I am!

 

[TigerKat]

Subscribing........

 

[disneediva]

 

[zipuzee]

Welcome back Heather!! Can't wait to read your report!

 

[mcdee1980]

Picture it . . . New Orleans September 9, 2007. Its 10pm in the evening and two Disney bound New Orleanians are still hard at work . . . no really we're both still at work. Their flight leaves at 8:30 in the morning and neither one has packed. In fact, Brandon still hasn't done his laundry. Brandon, fortunately, get out of work a wee bit earlier than me and heads over to Check Point Charlie's. I'm not sure, but I think New Orleans might be the only city that has bars with grills, live music, and laundromats . . . that are open 24hrs a day . . . gotta love Igor!

I leave work about 11:30 and get home at about midnight . . . I must have been walking slowly . . . it doesn't usually take that long to walk my 18 blocks. I grab my suitcases and my myriad of different sized ziplock bags and my packing list . . . a little (yes just a little--humor me) neurotic, no? It takes me about an hour to get mostly packed. Mostly because some of my things are in the car, which is at the bar/laundry with Brandon or in with Brandon's laundry.

At about 1 am I call Brandon, who has finished his laundry, but had now had too many beers to drive home with his laundry. I put real clothing back on, I think I was already in my Pjs and walk over to Check Point's to collect him . . . yeah right . . . Miller Light please? Okay, two hours later we finally get home. Brandon throws all of his clean clothes in his suitcase and promptly passes out. I finish my packing and lay down, but don't actually get any sleep.

6am rolls around and the alarm goes off. I roll over. Then I realize the alarm is going off because I have a plane to catch to the happiest place on earth!
"Brandon . . . wake up"
"uhg"
"B, come on wake up"
"SPLAT" . . . Brandon rolls over onto innocent girl just trying to get him out of bed to go to Disney World.
After about 5 minutes of wrestling I manage to get out from under 6'4" and 250lbs and sit up.
"Well I'm going to Disney World, even if you're not." Magic Words aren't they? Brandon sits up in bed and rubs his eyes. Both of us shower kiss our kids, the cats: Cain, Abel, and Jezebel good bye and we're off. And we're hungry . . . hmmm what is open this early. Oooh there's a Sonic . . . oopps missed the drive way . . . detour . . . five minutes later: sausage, egg and cheese on Texas toast and a Southwest breakfast burrito . . . yummy, but won't actually get eaten until we get to the airport because we are running a little bit late and still have to check luggage. I had checked in and printed boarding passes at work the night before. I wanted to make sure we had seats together.
At 8:57am we take off from Louis Armstrong International Airport and at 11:20am, now in Eastern time . . . we land in Atlanta. Fortunately for us, the last time Brandon was at the Atlanta airport he taught the bartender at the Last Call Bar how to properly make a bloody mary, even more fortunately the same bartender was there, recognized Brandon and made my bloody the right way. Brandon opted for Sam Adams Octoberfest. Several hours and some sugar free Ben and Jerry's later, we get on the plane to Orlando and touch down at about 3:15 in the afternoon.
Coming up next: One night at the Pop, bad bus karma, and dinner at Earl's. Going to start my dining reviews . . . have a 50 hour work week this week--may not see too much of me except in the mornings.

 

[AshClan]

Oooh, this one's gonna be fun!! Can't wait to hear the rest. In the meantime....I'm off to check out your dining report. Because, really, who wants to do WORK on a Monday?!

 

[mcdee1980]

Alrighty folks we've made it all the way to Orlando . . . now how do we get out of this airport? Okay . . . sign says this way . . . sign says get on train . . . okay . . Oh look there's a lady in DISNEY clothing . . . she says go down to the elevator across from baggage claim 25 and go down to the first level. The line for Disney's Magical Express is literally the longest line we will wait in all week. We wait to get checked in and then we wait to get put on a bus and then we wait to have our carry on luggage put under the bus and then we get on the bus and wait to leave--you get the idea.

So we finally make it to the Pop Century and thank god we were the first stop to be dropped off. I thought Brandon was going to lose it--he's not the most patient person. We check in and get exactly the room I asked for -- in the 70s, away from the pool and on the 4th floor.

We are STARVING! So we go down to the bus stop and here's where the bad bus karma starts. One of must have killed or maimed a bus in a former life because we waited forever for a bus to Downtown Disney. We watched three of each park bus come and go while the line for Downtown got steadily longer and longer and longer. When the bus finally arrived they couldn't fit everyone who was waiting on the bus and a couple of families got left behind to wait for the next bus. They are probably still there. Once we got dropped off everything was wonderful. We made a beeline for the Earl of Sandwich because neither of us had eaten anything since the Atlanta airport and I'm not sure that ice cream really counts as food. More later--Brandon is screaming about not having any clean clothes.

 

[m11dolphin]

GREAT REPORT SO FAR, I AM ON BOARD

 

[Jill in Chicago]

Can't wait to hear more!

 

[LMO429]

looking forward to hearing more

 

[kokotg]

I'm in!

 

[WDW Poly Princess]

Welcome back!