Of course, the night before we left I didn't sleep well. How could I?! It was Disney Eve! We were shooting to leave our house between 6 and 6:30AM. Our flight was departing at 9:30, but I have this thing about getting where I am going in case anything awful happens on the way. I want plenty of time for disasters. I blame my Dad. He is like that too, this is the man who was famous for cutting our yearly vacation at the lake short by leaving the day before we were scheduled to leave. EVERY YEAR. Anyhoo...
We woke up, showered, said goodbye to the kitties and were out the door at 6:25AM.
DH show the camera your excitement!
You call that excitement? I want to see DISNEY excitement!
LL's excitement.
It was DH's job to get directions and to drive to Park, Shuttle and Fly. DH doesn't do well with driving in Boston and I have found that it's easier on my nerves if I have no idea where I am going and just let him drive. I found this out when I drove to the cruise terminal, not a fun way to start a honeymoon let me tell you. If we get lost, it's all on him. Less fighting that way. DH got us to Park, Shuttle and Fly with no incidents. Snaps for DH!
We left our car, hopped on the shuttle and there was a cute little family on there with us. A Mom, Dad and their little girl. Her first trip to Disney. They were staying at All Star Movies, they saw our Pop luggage tags and were jealous as they had wanted to stay there. I told them I had heard good things about the Movies and they would have a great time no matter where they stayed!
We were at the airport and through security by 7:40AM. Yep. We had about two hours to wait. Oh well. We had the breakfast of champions while we waited. DH had an Orange Mango Vitamin water with BBQ kettle chips and I had a Diet Pepsi with Honey Mustard kettle chips. Yep, I had fallen off the soda bandwagon a few days before we left. Let me tell you, I drank lots while we were in Disney.
I listened to my Disney music on my Ipod and read my book. Oh and people watched. I love to people watch. Of course there were a lot of families around heading to the Mouse's House. There was this annoying squinty lady who talked very loudly to everyone. Kept telling her children to not stare at people, LOUDLY. Who does that?
We get on the plane and we see the seats and groan. DH and I are not small people. We wedge ourselves into the seats, DH gets the inside and I get the outside. 5 minutes sitting and I can't feel my knee caps. It was not pleasant. Luckily the middle seat handle came up so DH was more comfortable, alas I was not. I took one for the team though and was squished beyond belief. There was a family of three across the aisle, the little girl was super cute, she was watching Finding Nemo which was enjoyable for me. I think the Mom caught me looking and angled it more towards me. Thanks Mom!
Diagonal from us was the weirdest guy. Ever. First off, he's complaining to his wife about being squished. Dude, deal. DH and I were squished beyond belief but you grin and bear it, you know? He makes her get up, she's in the middle seat, get him something to use as a pillow and then complains because she is trampling over him. Sigh. People. So then as the plane takes off, he gets out Crest Whitening strips and puts them in. Does anyone else find this odd? Why would you do that in public? On a plane? Gross. So I had the joy of seeing him apply and remove them. Blech. Then the drink cart comes out, you know you move your leg when they get near. Not this guy. He tripped one of the flight attendants! Then they kept having to ask him to move his leg whenever they were near. I was flabbergasted. Then to top it all off. His head shaking. I have problems with my ears popping on the decent, I am sure I look funny as I try to get them to pop. This guy was going all out head banging away. I was worried he was going to get whiplash! DH and I had quite a few giggles about this guy on the way down. Kept our flight amusing.
We finally land and we are on our way...but not before the lady behind me slams my head with the overhead compartment. Ouch. Let me tell you, that really hurt. It brought tears to my eyes. I was standing in the aisle waiting to go out and she just opened it. THUD. Ow. I took some ibruprofen as soon as we got off the plane, I wasn't risking a headache from it. So we head to the Orlando Airport Monorail thing. I don't remember exactly where I am going but I know the vicinity. I hadn't done Magical Express before but last time I flew to Orlando, my transportation was right near there. So I am leading the way and squinty lady from Boston asks me where to go. I say, you get on the monorail thing and there will be signs. She doubts me. I said, well that's what I think and smile. She starts to be annoying and wondering out loud if I am right. Either take my advice or don't. She walks away muttering to herself about whether I am right. I hop on, DH follows, so does squinty lady and her brood. We get to the other side of the airport and head to Magical Express, all the way squinty lady and brood follow wondering if we are going the right way. I was so annoyed at this point, I don't tune out annoying people well.
Lo and behold, Magical Express is right there. No thanks from Squinty Lady, nothing, no acknowledgement. Jerk. I get in line, no wait thank you very much, get my papers stamped and head into the Pop Century line. Luckily squinty lady got into the All Stars Line. Thank goodness for small miracles. We waited about 15 minutes for our ME bus. DH had a good chuckle at my expense while in line. I had red ink all over my chest area...it was from the stamp they used on our ME documents. I had held them with my chin when I was fidgeting with our bags. DH made sure that I wrote it down in my TR notebook. Men.
As you can see, my bangs were flying all over the place. I had severe hair battles all week.
I was very relieved to get a "real" Magical Express bus as I really wanted to watch the video. It was great, I got a bit teary eyed. It was the excitement I tell you!
I was not happy to see these.
My attempt at a picture of the Walt Disney World Sign. As you can see, it was pouring by this time.
Sigh. I started to freak out about the rain and hurricanes. It took me a bit to calm down. I was starting to worry that all my plans would get ruined. I put everything in perspective while on the bus and calmed myself down. Channeled my inner TK, if you will. Pirate! I believe our bus was also going to Animal Kingdom Lodge but I can't remember. I do remember that we were the first stop. DH is sleeping or I would ask him, it's back to work for him tonight. Boo. I told DH that I would hop off the bus, he would get our carry on's and I would go check us in before the hordes of people made the line too long.
Will our room be ready?
What section will we be in?
Will the rain stop?