May Trip

[himandher818]

First off let me say this is probably not going to be an exciting trip report full of grand adventures. At the time of this post we have no ADRs, nor any park reservations. Most of our time (May 1st-14th) will be spent at the Fort. You see this trip has some specific goals.

First off, we had gotten annual passes for a Feb of 2020 trip just before you know what and used those passes for the Feb trip and later that year for the Oct DisMeet. After The parks were closed for a while in early 2020, this pushed our AP renewal date to June 2021, and since there were no new APs being sold, only renewals, we renewed. Well this is our first and only trip on this renewal. So that beings me to one goal of the trip... is is worth renewing the APs again?

Another goal is about traveling and working. For most of 2020 and the first part of 2021 most of my work was done remote from home. I had a few trips during this time frame was did a few hours of work on those trips, but not much. It looks like there may be more remote work opportunities in the future, so the second goal is ... how much work I can do while traveling and still enjoy the trip?

Also there is the question about Disney itself. We are all familiar with with changes around Disney, be it "premium meadow" loops, Genie+, resort parking fees, demand pricing, after hours events, park reservations, the list goes on. It seems a Disney vacation is becoming more money for a lesser experience. We do have a trip in the planning stages for sometime around February - March 2023, and are considering a Food and Wine trip this September. Our experience this trip will determine if move forward on F&W trip. So the goal here is to determine ... Is Disney now a once every few years, or does it stay a few times every year?

All of these tie into each other, we will see how this turns out.

Next Post: The trip down.

 

[garneska]

all good points @himandher818 . I will say working at the fort is something i generally loved when the internet is good, though hotspot works fine too. I enjoyed working and then heading anywhere. Of course that is now par for the course i like taking the RV for a few weeks but only use a handful of vacation days.

 

[himandher818]

There is something about sitting outside under the awning working, that almost makes it not feel like working. Being at the Fort makes it even more so.

Internet was so-so. I made it through a Teams meeting today without issue, but at other times it was dropping on and off.


On to the trip…

I started getting ready for the trip about mid-March, then late March a lot of work came in and I was taking care that more than prepping for the trip. I paid the price on leaving day, the day was rushed and hectic.

I have the camper at RV park a little over an hour away from home. I had gotten the camper mostly ready the week before the trip and came home to get packed on Thursday and Friday night and load the truck with everything I was willing to leaving in the truck overnight.

The fun started on Thursday morning. I took the truck to get the tires rotated and balanced, and while they had the tires off, I looked at the brakes on the truck because they may need replacing. I had checked them a while back, and they were worn but fine, and thought by now they would be pretty well worn. I was right. One pad had only about 1/16" left. So, I stopped on my way home and got some brakes.

That night I went to replace the brakes, and I couldn't get the wrench on the lug nuts. So, I run back out get some replacement lug nuts and then I'll take it back to the tire place and have them put the new lug nuts on Friday morning since I knew they had the tools that could remove the lug nuts.

Friday morning, I get to the tire place, and they start telling me the problem is my lug nuts are "swelling" and that's why I can't get my wrench on them. First time I have ever heard of that, but it seems to be a real thing on Ford factory lugs. They did not charge me to put the lug nuts on.

I got back home to do the breaks, and realize my breaker bar, and torque wrench are at the camper. So off I go to get a new breaker bar and then I replaced the brakes. I just cranked the lugs down good, I’ll torque them properly later.


Saturday came and it was time to hit road. The plan was to leave the house at 9:00am, be at the RV park where the camper is at 10:30, be at the tire store to get new tires at 12:30 and to be on the road to Eagle Roost by 1:30 and hit eagle roost by 7:30. Them leave the Eagle Roost about 9:00 the next morning and hit the Fort at 1:00. The actual was ...

We got the truck loaded Saturday morning and hit road a little after 9:00, not bad. But we had to make few stops, such as trash drop off, Dunkin, and gas (3.329/gal) so we got out town about 9:45. About hour later we realized we forgot all the food DW had made for trip (about 8 meals).

We got to the RV park at 11:00 and we finished packing it up, unhooking the water, sewer, electric, and adding some water to the fresh tank. Then I realized in my haste to leave the house I had tossed the sway bars for the hitch in the bed of the truck. Apparently, the clip for pins that hold it to the WD hitch had come out. Only one was in still in the bed. So, I found an "S" hook for hanging lights in the awing track that would fit in the hole on the pin. I figured this would work since the clip is only to hold the pin in place and not under a lot of stress. I hooked it in, and duct taped the heck out it to help keep the hook and pin in place. Now to get new tires for camper (all 4 plus the spare).

We got to tire shop at about 12:45, a little bit late for my appointment but not too bad. Got checked in and the camper moved into position. This went pretty smooth and while waiting I was able to raise the soft top camper shell on the truck in case it rained on us. We got out of there a little after 2:00 and made a quick stop at Walmart to see if they had a clip that would fit the sway bar pin. They didn't. I guess I'll have to order one. That put us on the road at about 2:45 on an Atlanta Saturday afternoon. I don’t think I need to more about that.

We stopped for gas at the Buc-ee’s off I-75 Exit 144 (3.299/gal). Pretty easy getting in and out. It’s BIG and seems nice. We didn’t go in this time, maybe next time. We then hit road again and the next stop was the Flying J at exit 2 for a gas stop (3.65ish/gal, didn’t get receipt) and Subway sandwiches (since we forgot our food).

The next morning, we were on the road about 9:30 expecting a fort arrival of about 1:30. I did the online check-in for 1:00. We did have a gas stop just south of Ocala at a Pilot (4.15ish/gal). Do NOT stop there. It was very crowded and tight. From there it was easy ride to the Fort.

We got the text for our site while on 429. We arrived a little after 2:00. We had requested the upper number half of loop 700. We got site 723.

We arrived at our destination safe, and no harm to us, the truck, or the camper. It was a good trip.

 

[garneska]

Wow Atlanta on Saturday late afternoon. That is bad. I am sorry for you.

 

[Teamubr]

Sounds like a great recovery on day 2 and nearly hit your Fort arrival time. Nice!

Your prep sounds like many of my trips. Rush, rush, rush.... I've vowed to do better, but life gets in the way.

There is something about sitting outside under the awning working, that almost makes it not feel like working. Being at the Fort makes it even more so.

Internet was so-so. I made it through a Teams meeting today without issue, but at other times it was dropping on and off.

Completely agree with working from a campground. DW worked from the Fort for about half of the 2 weeks we were there in January. She tried the Fort wifi with intermittent results. Hot spotting off her work phone (Sprint) was stable enough.

j

 

[himandher818]

Your prep sounds like many of my trips. Rush, rush, rush.... I've vowed to do better, but life gets in the way.

I plan to do better each time, but I seem to spend my time moving onto the next urgent task once the last urgent task is done or at least mitigated 'to not as urgent as the next urgent task'. Which why I was getting tires on the truck rotated and doing the brakes the day before the trip, it finally became the most urgent thing I could work on at the time.

Now at the Fort....

Once I rolled into the fort, got to the site and and parked I finally started to relax. Dinner that night was our standard Fort arrive dinner ... P&J's chicken and Ribs. They used to have a Full rack and 8 pc chicken combo that we used to get, and then have left overs. Now they only have a half rack with 4 pc chicken. So I got two. After the fact I realized that it made no sense to buy two meal only to plan on one them being leftovers. Another thing they have dropped from the menu is the cowboy beans. They only have slaw, mashed potatoes, and mac & cheese sides. That wraps up the trip down here. I plan now to have a boring and restful trip.

Monday morning started with a breakfast from P&J's and some 50th anniversary refillable mugs. Then time to pickup the cart from Kenny. After getting the cart I started doing some work and realized I had left the external hard drives I keep most of my work on at home. They are probably on my desk. So instead of getting anything done on that project, I was downloading files over the super speedy and reliable Disney Wifi. Fortunately I had another project I could work on while those files downloaded. After getting some work done picked up some groceries (since we forgot a lot of food) at Walmart. I also forgot to bring a fan to setup while working outside, so that was added to the shopping list as well. I really found the meaning of being in hurry often means being in hurry to do things twice. Monday night dinner was the "leftovers".

Tuesday was was pretty calm. Got some work done, got some relaxing done. We were planning on have cooked out hamburgers for dinner, then realized it was a food truck night so we decided we would give that try. Well the only two trucks there were a cupcake truck and an ice cream truck. Not much for dinner, so P&J's pulled pork sandwiches. After dinner we went to the campfire for movie, Big Hero 6. DW and I both like that movie. We planning on going to movie again Wednesday night for Jungle Cruise. DW hasn't seen it.

I have a few pictures to post tomorrow.

 

[himandher818]

I promised some pictures...

Our sign and owl. when we got the owl we wanted to give it a Disney name. So it was either "Owl" from Winnie the Pooh, or "Archimedes" from Sword and the Stone. We went with "Owl-chimedes". DW actually came up with that one.




My "cube" while here





Today was another just hanging out day, but I did do the Crockett's Crafting project...



We also saw the Jungle Cruise movie. DW enjoyed it. And that sums up our day.

 

[himandher818]

A quick update.
The last few days just full of hanging out, walking around the Fort. We do go to the beach for the MK fireworks and the water parade.

Sunday we went to Epcot. We got the see the GREAT WALL of Epcot. Seriously, most of Future World is a wall. Wee toko the Mission Space side of Spaceship Earth, going in and going out and I don't even know if the Land side even exists. We spent the day walking up to World Showcase and seeing the topiary characters, and the the new night show.

Oh and the Garden Rock concert was the Commodores. How much of the original members were there I can't say, but the were still pretty good, and made you want to dance as you walked.

 

[cruising spud]

When our kids were younger, we did a lot of Disney, and I planned the heck out of each and every trip. As, the kids got older/flew the coop, we did other trips besides Disney and only hit Disney every few years. I still planned each and every trip. And, then we planned a HUGE, everyone is coming Disney trip, and Hurricane Irma destroyed all of our plans. A HUGE mess canceling everything. So, our last trip, right before COVID, my husband and I reserved a campsite at the Fort and went down with no tickets and no reservations. Picked up tickets when we arrived at the Fort and had not a bit of trouble reserving rides. Have not been back to Disney since, and with all of the new planning involved, I really have no inclination to go back right now. Time will no doubt change my mind, but for now my husband and I are content to visit other places. So, I really want to read your trip report. Thank you.

 

[himandher818]

Well we are back now. The last few days were hanging out at fort and a MK day on Thursday, half day actually.

The food trucks were better this week. There were some with food and not just dessert/snacks. We had empanadas and quesadillas from Apps. It was very good for a food truck.

I was planning on getting a video of the water parade on Friday, but just a storm came in and it was canceled, so I missed my last chance to video it. I wonder if it had anything to do with the fact that Thursday was the 12th. We only had rain two days. The day we arrived as we were unpacking, and the day before we left as we were packing up.

It was good relaxing trip, as for the questions I was going to try to figure out...

Annual Passes. We decided we probably won't go to Food and Wine this year, so out next trip will be Feb 2023. Still I am thinking right now I am going to renew the passes at least one more time.

Traveling and Working. I didn't get as much done as I had hoped, but I think with more practice I might be able to get it worked out. I only had about 35 hours billable during the two weeks I was hoping for about 60, but part of that was my fault since I left some of work at home, and had to download it again, and rework some of what I had done before the trip. I did get some non-billable work done.

As for "is it worth it still" ... The Fort is worth it to me, even at the current rates. We didn't experience much else so I am going to leave this question open for February, and maybe later, since I will be renewing the passes in June.

 

[himandher818]

A few pictures

Arriving at the Magic Kingdom



Leaving the Magic Kingdom


On our last day the turkeys finally visited our site.

 

[himandher818]

One more that I think we have all been waiting for ...



It don't get more offical than this. (until june 23 gets here)