Sleepy and Grumpy visit Tatooine–A SWW TR! - The End - All done and Link to new TR

[Misskitty3]

Your pictures are so great! Looks like a REALLY fun time! I showed my son the Chewie and Ewok photos and he loved them!

Is Star Wars weekend just once a year and is it always at WDW? I know Disneyland has the Star Wars run coming up in January but that isn't the same thing as this event, is it?

 

[eandesmom]

what a fun morning, low key, good characters, fun shopping (love the name badges) and some fun treats. It's VACATION, a morning drink is just fine!

We ate at Rosie's the last trip, a first for us as well and actually quite liked it!

You needed that "nap"! Question is....were you able to go back to sleep?

I'm not surprised, you guys had been going at it pretty hard, had to be worn out.

 

[Luvchefmic]

Love the Maury " You are the Father" t-shirt very unique

What was Fran telling the Ewok.?.hmm, first thing I thought of when I saw the picture " You sure you don't want to come home with us ? We have a beautiful new house and you can have your own room "

 

[Paula Sedley-Burke]

Great update and photos! I love the idea of the Golden Spoon Birdsofprey is great!

Those name badges were such fun weren't they! How nice you got to ride the RnRc twice! Even though you left slightly later than planned you still got it all done so nice rest and activities scored! You have to listen to your body don't you. No point saying oh this is what our schedule says when the body says...no way!

The drinks look good at Darth Mall. It's always 5 o'clock some place!

 

[franandaj]

Looks like another fun day! Love the pics with Chewie and the Ewok.

Glad you didn't make the ADR....you guys needed the sleep!

Jill in CO

I'm glad we waited for that one! There's a reason for the title of this report. Spoiler alert: This might not be the only time something like that happens.

Is that also your secret hangover cure?

There could be something to that. Although I didn't wake up with a hangover. Drinks are good on vacation!

I really like those mugs too.


I love it!

I have them on display in my kitchen! Yes the shirt was pretty funny.

Wow... looks like you were tired. Oh well, a much needed nap isn't a bad thing. At least you should be well rested the next morning!

Yeah, in hindsight it was good that we rested. I'm pretty sure we needed it!

Another great day at DHS and during Star Wars Weekend. I really like your pictures with the characters and the one with Chewie and the Ewok is a very nice.

Very nice updates.

Thanks! SWW were really fun!

That heat and humidity takes all the stuffin out of you so when you get back in the AC all you want is sleep. Great pics with the characters.

I know, I mean it gets hot here, but we always say it's a dry heat, but that's sooooo true. Florida heat just kills me.

There should not be any such time as 6:00 AM when you are on vacation unless you have to travel somewhere. The character photos are really nice. I think Olaf will make a very handsome Jedi. Your photos from The Great Movie Ride came out really well. You must have been really tired to "nap" until midnight.

Corinna

I know, especially after the day before when we were out the door at 6AM. I think that day did us in, well that and not getting any sleep on the travel day. That could have had something to do with it.

I can't wait to see Olaf in his Jedi outfit. We saw someone with him dressed like that at the parks and that's where she got the idea.

I've really been working on trying to figure out light settings with the camera. It's been fun.

WOW! You went down for a nap and didn't wake up til midnight? You must have been tired out.

Great picture with Chewie. The wait was worth it.

Love that you're getting pictures inside dark rides. You're doing great!

Yeah, I don't remember going "out" like that in a long long time. I'm glad we waited for it. How often do you get your picture taken with Chewbacca?

Thanks for the compliments on the pictures. I now want a new lens.

 

[franandaj]

Your pictures are so great! Looks like a REALLY fun time! I showed my son the Chewie and Ewok photos and he loved them!

Is Star Wars weekend just once a year and is it always at WDW? I know Disneyland has the Star Wars run coming up in January but that isn't the same thing as this event, is it?

It was a fun time! SWW is only at WDW, it's usually from the third weekend in May to the 1st or second weekend in June. Disney is great with coming up with things to draw people in the slower times so that there are no slower times. I don't think the Star Wars run will spur SWW at Disney, they have enough So Cal AP holders to keep the park busy year round. In fact they no longer sell the So Cal passes, there are so many out there.

what a fun morning, low key, good characters, fun shopping (love the name badges) and some fun treats. It's VACATION, a morning drink is just fine!

We ate at Rosie's the last trip, a first for us as well and actually quite liked it!

You needed that "nap"! Question is....were you able to go back to sleep?

I'm not surprised, you guys had been going at it pretty hard, had to be worn out.

It was a fairly relaxed day, we didn't "run" anywhere and got done just enough. Oh yeah, I'm sure I went back to sleep. A nice warm bath and I was back in bed in la la land.

We were going at it pretty hard before the trip too. This was only 16 days after we came back from the road trip and I have a short update that I'm going to post over there, that also was pushing it while we were home.

Love the Maury " You are the Father" t-shirt very unique

What was Fran telling the Ewok.?.hmm, first thing I thought of when I saw the picture " You sure you don't want to come home with us ? We have a beautiful new house and you can have your own room "

Yeah, ya think? She is always trying to lure woodland creatures to come to live with us!

Great update and photos! I love the idea of the Golden Spoon Birdsofprey is great!

Those name badges were such fun weren't they! How nice you got to ride the RnRc twice! Even though you left slightly later than planned you still got it all done so nice rest and activities scored! You have to listen to your body don't you. No point saying oh this is what our schedule says when the body says...no way!

The drinks look good at Darth Mall. It's always 5 o'clock some place!

I have learned that if you don't listen to your body, it will force you to do what it needs and sometimes that is not pretty!

 

[franandaj]

So we have had a few days to breathe in between our busy July days and I've been able to pull together some updates. We leave again in five days for the Star Trek Convention in Las Vegas, and then after two nights at home, it's off to Ohio and Indiana for some more fun. I'll post a short update on the Disneyana Convention last week, but here's an off topic one post TR on our trip to the Car Show two weeks ago.

Every time that I think I have a plan when it comes to a road trip, nothing works out. I wanted everything that we were taking in a neat pile waiting to be loaded before bed Tuesday night. Wednesday morning Fran is still picking out clothes. The car is at the shop and it’s 10:00AM, there is still stuff at the old house to be picked up. Clearly my day is not going as planned.

Since everyone likes some pictures, I’ll throw in a few. Here is the little beauty we are taking to the meet. It’s called “It’s a West, West, West, West Coast Meet” sort of like “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad Mad World”. Since that film was set in 1962, we decided to bring a car that was around in 1962.



Somewhere around 1:00PM we are starting to load the car and finally by 3:00 we are ready to leave. I am clearly not making the 5:30PM Happy Hour today. A stop at AAA for maps and we are on the road. Everything was going pretty well until we reached Solvang (about an hour south of San Luis Obispo) when the Generator light comes on. Now we had been having problems with the Generator on and off for several months and know that this light being on will not cause the car to catch fire, or send a timing belt through the engine. It just means that the generator isn’t charging the battery, and we run the risk of the car eventually not starting.

It was about 7PM and we decided to just forge ahead for that hour and we arrived safely. We got the car unloaded and luckily there were lots of choices for dinner in the same parking lot as the hotel. We settled on a steakhouse chain that was new to us, and it turned out to be a rather nice meal. Steak sandwich for Fran, Shrimp Scampi for me, washed down with a Margarita and a Martini respectively. After a good night’s sleep, Google was our friend to help us find a classic car mechanic who happened to be less than a mile away. We left the car before 9AM and they kindly gave us a ride back to the hotel.

We entertained ourselves by visiting big box stores in the parking lot like Bed, Bath and Beyond, the Dollar Store, Ralph’s for some groceries, Kohl’s and lunch at the Hometown Buffet. After returning to the hotel and checking in for the event, we waited in the room for word on the car. Friday morning there would be a “cruise” and if the car wasn’t going to be ready, we were prepared to rent a car so we could still participate.

Around 4PM we got the call that the car was ready and Fran went to pick it up and find a car wash. I stayed back at the room to write up the first part of this report and take a nap. I walked to most of those stores mentioned above and needed a break. Plus the complimentary Happy Hour that Embassy Suites offers nightly started at 5:30PM and I didn’t want to miss that!

So all our plans for Thursday went down the tubes. We were going to get up early, find a car wash, wax the car, have lunch at Hometown Buffet (well that worked out) and then check out the town. Good thing I’m used to being spontaneous! We ate our leftovers from the previous night, which worked out just perfect since Hometown Buffet is one of those places that fills you up for the whole day.

Thursday night late around 9PM they had Drag Bingo, which pretty much meant that the games were called by a Drag Queen. It was fun, but we didn’t win anything. Both of us were playing 3-4 cards per game and everyone seemed impressed that we could keep up. Heck on the Disney Cruises, we play like 20 cards per game, but they are electronic.





Then we were off to sleep as we had a long day the next day!

Friday we were up and down to breakfast by around 8:30AM and out to the car by 9:15. We needed gas and returned to the parking lot in plenty of time to line up for the drive trip. We were to drive from the hotel to a park via the Interstate. This was too bad. There were plenty of Country roads that we could have taken to get to the same place without having to drive 65mph and hustle. Part of driving these older cars is taking your time and enjoying the drive.







Once we arrived we still had about an hour and a half to “kick tires” and compare cars. And then the food delivery was another half an hour late. The natives started to get restless!











Lunch was eventually served and then we headed back to the hotel. We still had a few things to wrap up for the car show the next day.





We had a couple things that we needed from Home Depot to help us put together our car display for the following day. Plus we needed to get the car washed. It had been too late the night before and by the time Fran had picked up the car, the wash place was closed. As we drove up to the wash, we tried to turn the car off and even though the ignition switch was in the “off” position, the car continued to run!

We took it directly back to the shop and he looked at it for about 20 minutes. He couldn’t figure out what was going on, but showed us how we could turn it off ourselves if this ever happened again. We were back to the car wash, this time with no incident.

When we returned to the hotel, they had been in full swing of decorating for the meet. If you have seen the movie, you know that they are looking for a “W”. It turns out that the W is made up from Palm Trees. Evidently they really existed in Long Beach until the 70s or early 80s when the trees all died. Much of the end of the movie was filmed in Long Beach. Fran recognized the buildings. Anyways they had the lobby of the hotel decorated with facets of the movie.





That night there was an optional dinner after the hotel’s complimentary Happy Hour. And we had signed up for it. They served a weed salad and some pretty decent steak that we took home for the kids. We had some fun tablemates to share the evening with.



After that they played “Match Game” which seems to be quite popular these days. There were drag queens and other impersonators on the panel and it was all quite hilarious. I can’t relate any of the questions to you because none were DIS friendly. They were all car related and many used the answer “dipstick” or “tool” and other tawdry answers. The most tame question I can reveal is that “Dolly Parton test drove a car. When she finished, she said to the dealer, ‘I can’t buy this the {blanks} are too small.’”



We definitely had a good time this night.

Saturday morning was the car show. We had plans to be up early and over at the show location by 7:00AM when the open loading occurred. However, when reality set in and Fran had to really get up, we made it in the 8:00-8:30 window for our car class (barely). There were folks who showed up as much as an hour late and wanted space to be made for them. Here we are before I have polished the car and set up the details.



And then here she is with her staging.



I really wish that I had more pictures from the car show, but I screwed up my settings on the camera and never changed them from indoor lighting to outdoor. Every single one of my pictures was overexposed to the point that they were not salvageable. I have relied on the kindness of friends for the few pictures that I can show you.

We were fed a pretty good lunch of pulled pork sandwiches, slaw, and cake. Fran and I also brought some Doritos mix to quell our hunger during the day. Around 1-2 PM we took down our camp and headed back over to the hotel to relax and wait for Happy Hour and the Awards Banquet.

You gotta love the free drinks at the Embassy Suites, evidently the bartender got to know me enough and liked my tips that by the end of the happy hour, he poured me a glass of wine that set me up for the rest of evening. He warned me how large of a glass he had poured, but I was aware. I nursed that puppy for the rest of the evening!

Once dinner was over, they kicked off the awards show with a drag number. I think they sang, “There’s no Business Like Show Business” but substituting car lyrics for the Show Business stuff.





As they handed out the awards, I believe this is the car that beat out ours.



But we did win second place, so I had an award to pick up.



Even if we didn’t win, it was still a fun evening. As the token dykes of the event, it seemed all the guys knew we were the “girls from Long Beach” and everyone was very welcoming and nice to us. What is funny is that the other lesbian couple that are usually the token dykes are also from Long Beach. It will be funny when we are both there again, hopefully next year.

The next morning it was time to pack the car back up and hit the road home. Since we had an open bed, packing was quite an art. Here is the car all packed up and ready to go.



And here is our award.



Now with the generator repaired we thought we were home free. However while refueling at Costco, the car wouldn’t shut off again. Luckily we knew what to do and I was able to remove the little cap that shut the car off. Then we disabled the power system and rebooted it so the car would start again.

However, about 100 miles out of SLO near Ventura, the Generator light came on again. We kept driving and almost made it home. We were on the offramp to our house and car died. Some nice people helped us push it to the side and then we started calling friends. Of all the folks we knew, Leshaface and her DH from the DIS who were supposed to meet us at the new house were the ones to come to the rescue. Talk about a lack of 3D friends!

And how’s this for weirdness? I texted Alicia about our location, they lived in Long Beach so they could find us. Well moments later a pick up truck pulls up and it looks like Alicia and her DH. So I run over to the truck asking if they have jumper cables, they don’t, can you fit me in there? They can’t. Then I think, wait I thought Alicia lost the weight from the baby…when did her DH grow a goatee? Ewww cigarette smoke. Then it hit me, this isn’t Alicia and her DH. It’s two people from alternate universe, the one where Spock has a beard! I realized that I needed to get out of there and luckily they took off because I’m not sure what else I would have done!

Anyways, I got a cab back home, it was only a mile or two, picked up the modern car, and came back, we unloaded the Ranchero to the modern car and left the Ranchero at parked on the street by the mechanic. Thankfully Alicia’s real life DH had one of those things that you hook up to the battery and it will start the car. We got it to the mechanic so that Monday morning he could take a look at it.

Now that it has been a week, we had to take it to an electrical shop as the regular mechanic couldn’t figure it out. Turns out the problem is that we put an after market A/C unit on there, and a hidden audio system and those modifications would blow out the generator after 100 miles of use. So they put an alternator on the car and while it’s not period, it will keep the battery recharging even with the A/C. That way we can enjoy our A/C and stereo and not worry if the car will start.

As far as the rest of the night, we enjoyed some good down home BBQ once Leshaface and her DH took a tour of the house. Then we had a blast a DLR the next day. Back to your regularly scheduled programming.

 

[wdrl]

I'm not much of a "car guy" but I liked seeing photos of your car. Makes me wish I had kept my 1973 Gremlin. Gremlins never get any love. Even in Cars 2, Pixar cast the AMC Gremlins and Pacers as the 'bad' cars.

As always, thanks for sharing your adventures!

 

[mvf-m11c]

Your Ford Ranchero looks very nice. I have watched a lot of Counting Cars on the History Channel and it made me appreciate classic cars. That was very neat to see all those other cars. That was great that your car was able to win the second place award.

I always enjoy reading your adventures from Disney parks, car shows, etc.

 

[dolphingirl47]

Congratulations on coming second. Looks like you had a few nice days despite various "road blocks".

Completely off topic: Have you seen the new Haunted Mansion merchandise, which is coming out in fall. I so want the shoes and the Dooney and Bourke Tote. I am now rather glad that I never managed to get the original Haunted Mansion purse. I love the design, but never loved the shape of the purse. The totes are my favourites and the Haunted Mansion design works so well on this. Good job that I will get 20% discount on merchandise when I get to Disneyland. Even better job that our Christmas bonus will be paid while I am still at Disneyland.

Corinna

 

[rentayenta]

Weed salad? Do tell........

Nice ride. Really, what a beautiful car.

Looks like a fun morning at WDW. Love those cute mugs. And the cute pics with the Ewoks.

You're having a crazy busy summer.

 

[PrincessInOz]

Love the car meets. There are some real nice cars there and I'd love to kick the tyres someday.

Despite the fun-ness of it all, I think it sounds like a harrowing time with the Ranchero. Glad it's all sorted out now.

 

[Pinkocto]

What a fun event. Love the car, so sorry you had all that trouble.

I'm glad you got away from the alternate universe folks!

Wonderful that Alicia and DH were able to help

 

[jedijill]

Gotta life in a classic car. My starter went out at the gas station pump one time.

Congrats on the award....the car is beautiful!

I'm dropping off all the parts for the '66 today to get the interior finished? Hopefully I can start driving her in a couple of weeks!

Jill in CO

 

[Misskitty3]

How fun to see your car show pictures!! I love how you added the fun accessories and I was wondering if you had a/c.


My FIL loves cars and restored a '32 Ford several years back and he is working on a '40 now. Once the '32 was completed, he and my MIL drove it from Seattle to Pleasanton in August. My Mil said never again without a/c ....

 

[heaven2dc]

What a fun car meet! Weed salad?! I see that you didn't include any explanation haha

Love your car! My DS21 is a car enthusiast and he said you def should have won 1st prize I used to love working on cars with my late hubby - he had a 59 Ford Fairlane 500. So much fun driving around in - it was his first car he bought in 1977. Always love reading about your adventures!

 

[Paula Sedley-Burke]

Oh my goodness love the car! I adore open bed cars like that what a beauty and well done for winning a prize! Sorry she caused you trouble just like a female lol. For a moment when the engine would not shut off I am thinking this is Christine from Stephen King!

Looks like a fun event and love the idea of drag bingo and I didn't know they had bingo on DCL I love bingo! I must look out for that

The complementary cocktail hour I could def get use to how nice!

Glad you made it back and thanks for photos how I love those cars and being American we don't get to see them much over here. Star Trek convention in Vegas? Oh my you lucky ducks!

 

[Shazzasmd]

Beautiful car! And, going back a post, the photo of Fran whispering to the Ewok is the cutest ever.

 

[cj9200]

Nice ride and what a fun event. My dream car is a '66 Mustang. One of these days, maybe.

 

[Leshaface]

LOVE THE STORMTROOPER MUGS!

Okay, that sand person is a little creepy but I get it.

Fabulous pics with Chip n Dale!

I really enjoyed Rosies when we went in 2012. Good, solid hamburger.

Brilliant Maury shirt and ET shirt!

Speaking of Chewie, I was looking at the Disney Store online and found the coolest Chewie mug that i'm totally ordering.



i'm shocked that you took a nap!! You must have been exhausted.

Your car is more gorgeous in person, it's so beautiful! I'm so happy that we were there to help you guys out. Too funny about the 'other' Alicia and DH!

We had such a fun time hanging out with you guys (once we were back at the house!) DH and I later as we were driving to our hotel were thinking, "I hope we didn't inconvenience you guys!" I mean, you just got home from a long trip ride and i'm sure the last thing you guys wanted to do is to entertain guests. But it was so fun touring your home and getting to meet your kitties!