Just Slap a Band-Aid on it and Everything Will be Fine! 2025 Food and Wine Trip Report! (Updated 9/26!)

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Welcome everyone to my annual Food and Wine Trip Report! I hope you enjoy following along on our adventure from this year’s festival.

This year we had a bit of a shorter trip, coming down (barely…we’ll get to that in a second) on September 20th and flying home on September 25th. Even though it was a shorter trip, we packed a lot of Food and Wine fun in, and of course some other stuff too.

Per usual, this was our mother daughter trip, and was kinda our 10 year anniversary at Food and Wine! Kinda because the skipped 2020 festival, but it has been 10 years since we started going. So I guess we get to celebrate a decade of the fest next year as well.

Now for introductions!

First up is my mom, Carol.



She is the best travel buddy, we tend to enjoy the same things, and both of us love Disney, so we take a lot of Disney trips together. She is a semi-retired teacher, so our trips have to coincide with her school schedule, but fortunately being semi-retired she doesn’t teach every day of the week so it’s a bit easier to fit trips in, especially shorter ones.

Next up is me, Debbie!



(having a bit too much fun with the photopass lenses )

I’ll be your narrator for this hopefully amazing trip report! I was lucky enough to grow up on Disney and going to Disney World yearly, and clearly became hooked. I love visiting Disney World, and especially love visiting with my mom, it’s amazing having these opportunities to make these memories with her.

Now for details. Even though this was a short trip, we did do a split stay. Crazy I know, but originally we had planned to come down on the 21st instead, but then decided to book a bouceback for Saturday night to make the trip just a bit longer. So the first night we were at the Beach Club, and then on Sunday we moved over the Yacht Club for the rest of the trip.

Alright, I think that’s enough for introductions, let’s get into the show!​

 

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TOC

Day 1 - Saturday September 20th, 2025
Day 1, Part 1: Off to Orlando...Maybe!

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[Dis_Yoda]

Hope you had a fabulous vacation!

 

[2xcited2sleep]

Can't wait to hear all about it!

 

[Paulaparm]

I’m in!

 

[HappyGal]

Let’s light this candle!

 

[StarWarsMomofGirls!]

I'm here to read all about your trip. I always love hearing about your trips with your mom!

 

[buzzrelly]

You can't go wrong with a BC/YC split! Sounds fun!

 

[nascargirl]

Hoping on over from your other trip report. Looking forward to hearing all about this trip!

 

[Wood Nymph]

I'm looking forward to your trip report. We were at the BC for a very short two days, Tuesday and Wednesday this week and loved it.
But it was really hot!

 

[VAtink]

Hope you had a fabulous vacation!

Thanks! It was a great vacation, just a tad too short!

 

[VAtink]

Can't wait to hear all about it!

, thanks for joining in!

 

[VAtink]

I’m in!

, thanks for following along!

 

[VAtink]

Let’s light this candle!

, thanks for joining in!

 

[VAtink]

I'm here to read all about your trip. I always love hearing about your trips with your mom!

Aw, thank you! Thanks for following along!

 

[VAtink]

You can't go wrong with a BC/YC split! Sounds fun!

Right? Love those resorts!

 

[VAtink]

Hoping on over from your other trip report. Looking forward to hearing all about this trip!

, thanks for joining in on this one!

 

[VAtink]

I'm looking forward to your trip report. We were at the BC for a very short two days, Tuesday and Wednesday this week and loved it.
But it was really hot!

Thanks! Yeah, it was super hot this week! It was really nice on Saturday and Sunday, but the heat and humidity came back in force on Monday!

 

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Day 1, Part 1: Off to Orlando…Maybe​

It was finally here, travel day!

Both my mom and I were taking early flights that were schedule to arrive in Orlando around 9am, perfect timing to get to Epcot right around when the food booths opened!

My flight was scheduled to take off at 7, so I was up around 4:30 to get ready and feed my cats. I had hired my usual driver to get me this morning because ever since the pandemic Ubers are hard to come by early in the morning, so it’s nice having the peace of mind knowing I have a ride lined up.

My driver arrived right on time at 5:20, and by 5:30 I was at the airport. It is really nice living so close to the airport, especially for these early morning flights!

Unfortunately, once I arrived at the airport I saw that my flight was delayed two hours! NOOOOOO!

I mean, it’s pretty common for my flights to be delayed so I shouldn’t be surprised, but it was still upsetting, especially since I could have slept in instead of getting up before 5!

Oh well, nothing I could do about it. So I got my bag checked and make my way through security. Once through I went to find my gate…gotta make sure it really exists, then headed to the store to pick up some water for the flight.

Water in hand I found a nice window seat to watch planes take off while waiting for my flight to board.



I also called my mom to let her know to go to the hotel without me when she arrived. We had booked a Minnie Van and given them her flight number since she was supposed to get in a bit after me originally, and obviously I didn’t want her nor the driver to wait for me.

Even with the two hour delay, time passed pretty quickly, and soon it was 8am, so only about 20 minutes before we were to board.

Sadly, boarding did not happen because shortly after 8, the flight was delayed another two hours! NOOOOOOOO!

Now the flight was scheduled to be at 11am. Ugh. Apparently, there was a mechanical issue with the plane that they were working on.

Ok, not the early arrival I had anticipated, but at least the flight wasn’t cancelled.

You would think that a four hour delay would be the end of it, but oh no, we were just getting started!

At 10 I got notice that once again the departure time was pushed back, this time to noon. So at least the delays were dropping from 2 hour increments to 1 hour….that had to be good right?

It was around this time my mom called, she had landed in Orlando and had already found the Minnie Van driver. We chatted a bit, and she explained to the driver what was going on. He told her that it was possible that they could come back to get me whenever I arrived, but I would have to call to see. He did send them a message though to let them know I would be calling so they would hopefully be willing to come back and get me too. I fully didn’t expect them to, but would be happy if they could. I did however not want to call them while in the airport since I would have to give my credit card number to book the new ride, and saying it out loud in a busy airport didn’t seem like the smartest idea. So my mom offered to call once she got to the Beach Club and was in the room. Perfect!

It was also around this point I started to look at other airlines to see if they had any flights that were leaving shortly, with a 5 hour delay and counting I was starting to worry that my flight might be outright cancelled.

There were a few flights around noon, but since I had checked a bag, I didn’t know how to deal with getting it back and rechecked on a new flight, so I went up to ask the gate agent. She was awesome and told me that the problem was almost fixed, they had just been waiting for a part that was flown in and that flight had just arrived. Phew, that’s the news I wanted to hear!

So I settled back in to wait. Well, my joy was short lived because at 12:20 I got another notification that once again the flight departure was being pushed back, this time to 2:37!

This time our pilot actually came on the intercom to give us the update, apparently the parts they had flown in did not fix the problem with our plane. NOOOOO! BUT, I guess they figured we had waited long enough and finally decided to just put us on a different plane. The gate agent was funny, after the announcement she saw me and pointed and yelled “We’re getting you to Florida!”

Unfortunately, that plane had to fly to us still. So more waiting, yay. They also moved us to a different gate, so we all trudged over there to wait some more.

Our new plane arrived around 1:40, but they had to get everyone off and clean, so not time to leave yet!

Finally, a bit after 2:00 they started boarding! YAY!!!!!!

It was a super fast boarding process, I think we were all anxious to finally get on the plane! At the end of the boarding process when the gate agent comes on the plane for a second, she spotted me and goes “we did it! I told you we’d get you to Florida!”

Once the doors were closed, the pilot came on the intercom and goes “well, first of all, sorry!”
HA!!!!

We ended up pushing back from the gate at 2:28, finally! We ended up passing our original plane as we taxied out and they were still working on it!



Thank goodness they put us on a different plane!

We taxied out, but instead of going to the runway, we went to a holding area and just parked. Uh oh. Now what!?!?

Well it turns out they couldn’t get a clearance to take off from air traffic control. Not sure what the issue was, but the pilot assured us everything was fine on our end, they just were waiting for the go-ahead to actually take off.

Now I don’t know if the ATC just forgot about us or what, but we just sat there for more than 30 minutes!

Finally at 3:03 we were given clearance to take off! So just a nice 8 hour delay.

The flight down, once actually flying, we nice and smooth. They even offered free drinks to everyone due to the delay. I got a glass of red wine, and the flight attendant filled the cup almost to the brim!



We landed in Orlando at 4:55, it was so nice to finally be there!

Once landed I got texts from my mom, she was able to get the Minnie Van to come get me too! Yay! And bonus, they weren’t going to charge us for this trip! Double yay!

Since I was in the second row, I got off the plane fast, and quickly made my way to the APM to get to the main terminal.

As I was going down the escalator to the baggage claim, I spotting my Minnie Van driver, Brandon!

Turns out it was the same driver who drove my mom! We got to chatting while waiting for my bag to come out, and it turns out that he felt so bad about my 8 hour delay, he offered to stay late just to come get me! How amazing is that!?!?

Since I had flown first class, my bag had the priority tag, so was one of the first to show up. Bag in hand we made our way to the Minnie Van and soon were on our way to the Beach Club!



Next up: Bourbon Steak!​

 

[13littledogs]

So glad you finally made it!!