Surviving Solo - My first solo trip to the World and first Trip Report!

[PhoenixStrength]

First of all, thanks for reading my trip report! This is my first attempt at one of these, so please be patient with me. A little about me: My name is Stephanie, I'm 26 years old and I live in Pasadena, MD. This is a bad pic of me, but the most recent I have. I don't really like pictures of myself. I've actually lost 10 pounds since this pic was taken, and am working on losing more!

In my real life, I'm an office manager for a small pet sitting company based out of Annapolis, MD. I LOVE animals of all types, and, of course, Disney. This trip is my fourth trip to the World, but my first Solo trip! My first two trips were as a teenager, 13 and 17, with my family and we stayed off site. My third trip was as an adult with my two younger sisters, and we stayed at Pop Century. This time is just me, and I am staying off site (for money reasons) at Comfort Inn and Suites in Davenport. I am actually starting this TR while I am here in Florida.

Please feel free to comment or ask questions, I will certainly reply to everyone along the way!

 

[longing2Batdisney]

Hi! Stephanie
followed you over from Lisa's TR
this should be a fun and interactive TR can't wait to hear about all the fun you are having; while you are there and later when you make it back home
Have a magical time!
Connie

 

[PhoenixStrength]

So, I drove down. I mainly did it to save money, as the price of gas for the round trip is less than a round trip plane ticket and rental car (which I would need since I am staying off site), but I also really like driving. I left at 12:40am on Wednesday, November 3rd and arrived at my hotel at 2:57pm on the same day. So, even with 2 stops for gas, two stops for bathroom breaks and to stretch my legs, and breakfast and lunch stops it only took me just over 14 hours to get there. Not too bad, considering my GPS said it would take over 15 hours.

As I said, I left at 12:40am from MD, and it was dark and 34 degrees. I didn't get any pictures until I hit South Carolina due to how dark it was. Not much happened until then too. I was hoping to avoid running into any roadwork overnight, and for the most part did. There was a little just over the MD/Virginia line that had one lane closed, but since there was very little traffic it didn't slow me down at all. It was mostly just me and lots of truckers out. I did see a few other drivers from further north than me, mostly New York and Quebec. Some of them I saw off and on all the way to Florida!

From 5am to 6am in North and South Carolina it was drizzling on and off. Even after the rain stopped it was very cloudy and looked like it could rain again at any minute, though it didn't. The first picture I took was in South Carolina, just before the Georgia line.

Being from the Northeast, I don't see Palm Trees unless I head south. This is the third time I have driven to Florida, and the first time I see Palm Trees on the drive I start to feel like I am getting close. I soon crossed into Georgia:

And then Florida:

Here is a picture of Jacksonville, FL as I drove past. You can kinda see how cloudy it was still even in Florida!

I stopped for lunch and a second fill up of gas right after passing Jacksonville. At about St. Augustine the clouds finally started to break up and I could finally see peaks of blue sky!

Ironically, just after I took this picture it rained again, though only for about a minute and then the rain was gone for the day! I ran into more and more traffic as I drove, but I never had to go under the speed limit and quickly passed Daytona Beach and then merged onto 4.

I was on Route 95 South all the way from about 10 miles from my house until I exited onto 4 in Florida. I spent about 13 hours on Route 95, and as soon as I merged onto 4 I started getting really excited. I don't know about anyone else, but once I know I am only about an hour away, even knowing I was just going to my hotel, it feels like that hour is taking as long as the 13 hours before it! I was lucky to be getting through Orlando just before rush hour so I did not hit any of the traffic jams, just heavy but moving traffic. Soon I saw the first sign I was getting close to Disney:

Not the best pic, I know. But seeing the first sign letting you know about the Disney exits was such a relief! But my hotel was past Disney, so I had to drive past them all, knowing I would be using them soon! Right after passing Exit 62, the Celebration exit, is my favorite sight on 4, the Mickey Mouse Head Electric Pole I have tried to get a picture the last two times I have been in Florida, but never could. I finally got a great pic this time!

After about 6 more minutes I made it to my hotel, the Comfort Inn and Suites, on Route 27 in Davenport. My hotel is right next to 4, but thankfully I don't hear any of the traffic noises from my room. Here is a pic of the exterior of the hotel:

It is a great hotel, and I will be posting on the Orlando Hotels thread about it. It is pretty new, just opened in February of this year, and is priced very cheaply for all the amenities. When I say it is right off 4, I'm not kidding. There is a single row of parking to the left of the hotel, then an 8' tall chain link fence, then 4! I quickly checked in and got all my things into my room. It took me a bit to unpack and get settled. I ordered delivery from Domino's and after dinner I went to bed early, since I had been up for 36 hours by then!

Tomorrow: Horseback Riding at Fort Wilderness and then shopping at Downtown Disney!

 

[PhoenixStrength]

Hi! Stephanie
followed you over from Lisa's TR
this should be a fun and interactive TR can't wait to hear about all the fun you are having; while you are there and later when you make it back home
Have a magical time!
Connie

Hi Connie, welcome to my TR! I am so glad you followed the link here. I hope I do a good job on this TR and everyone has at least half as good as a time reading this as I do reading Lisa's TRs. It will certainly be interactive, and I hope I can make it as fun as possible. I do like writing, I just hope I'm actually good at it!

Feel free to chime in anytime

 

[DizFan101]

I am looking forward to reading the rest of your solo trip report.
I can not imagine going to WDW w/o my mom. She's like my bff.

 

[PhoenixStrength]

I am looking forward to reading the rest of your solo trip report.
I can not imagine going to WDW w/o my mom. She's like my bff.

Hi, and thanks! I hope you enjoy it.

I am very close to my Mom too, but this will be my second trip in a row without her. She and my Dad love Disney too, but they tend to make trips for themselves now that myself and my younger sisters are all adults. Due to some family issues no one else could go with me. My youngest sister just recently moved out on her own and couldn't really afford it. My parents just replaced the siding and roof on their house and that took most of their savings so they are skipping vacation this year. My other sister was in a severe car accident in January (she was hit New Years day by a girl running a red light) and she is still recovering physically. So, I decided to make a solo trip! I had already been thinking about taking one before I knew that no one else would be coming, so I don't mind at all. It is nice to know that I can do what I want, when I want, without having to discuss it with everyone else!

I see that you will be here soon! I'm sure you are excited for your trip! You will be coming the day after I leave. Hope you will let us all know how your trip goes.

 

[johnsonmatt3]

Im here from Lisa's TR, I don't think I would ever do a TR while in WDW, theres just too much excitement going on during the stay.

 

[mickeystoontown]

I'm here! Glad to hear that you've made it safely and there wasn't too much rain on your way there. I know what you mean about the last hour to WDW seems like the longest hour of your entire life!

 

[LutheranChick82]

I'm in - great TR so far. I hope your having a great time. How long will you be at Disney? My DF and I will be there in just over a week and I can hardly wait!!!

 

[jenseib]

I'm joining too. I hope you are having a fantastic time right now!

 

[PhoenixStrength]

Im here from Lisa's TR, I don't think I would ever do a TR while in WDW, theres just too much excitement going on during the stay.

Hi and thanks for coming over! I won't be doing but maybe one more entry before I get home. I just had an early day yesterday and figured I'd get it started!

I'm here! Glad to hear that you've made it safely and there wasn't too much rain on your way there. I know what you mean about the last hour to WDW seems like the longest hour of your entire life!

Hi Lisa!!! Thanks for coming over here I wish there was not much rain yesterday, but it rained almost the entire time I was at DTD. I'll be doing that entry in the next few days. And I'm sure you understand, our drives take about the same amount of time!

I'm in - great TR so far. I hope your having a great time. How long will you be at Disney? My DF and I will be there in just over a week and I can hardly wait!!!

Thanks and welcome to my TR!!!! I am leaving the morning of the 13th, next Saturday. Congrats on your upcoming trip, I know you will have a blast!

I'm joining too. I hope you are having a fantastic time right now!

Hi and thanks! I had a great day today at MK, and looking forward to Epcot tomorrow.

 

[norybell]

Hi Stephanie,

I'm in! After 2 solo trips of my own, I think I'm becoming addicted to them, so I'm curious to see how yours goes!

 

[PhoenixStrength]

So, Thursday morning I slept in a bit since I had been up for 36 hours before that. I got up around 8:30am, took a shower, ate breakfast in my room (healthy Pop-Tarts ) and then left the hotel for Ft. Wilderness for my 11:30am Horseback Trail ride. This was my first day driving into Disney! I was on World Drive in about 8 minutes and got my first look at this:

My favorite sight at the beginning of a WDW vacation! Now I truly felt I was at Disney. I followed the helpful signs past Magic Kingdom to:

Fort Wilderness! I spoke to the wonderful man at the gate who told me where to park so I would be closest to the Outpost, where the Horseback Trail rides take place. I appreciated the info, since it was forecast to rain on and off all day and I didn't want to have to walk far back to my car if it was raining when I got done the trail. Just an FYI from anyone looking to do the Trail ride in the future, the trail rides do not leave from the Tri-Circle D Ranch, where the pony rides, carriage rides and sleigh rides are. Those are on the other side of Fort Wilderness, by Bay Lake. The Trail rides leave from right beside the Check-in building. I parked and walked the 100 feet to the check-in building, then went around the corner to wait for my trail ride to start. I was a little early, so I took some pictures while I waited for the current trail ride to get back.

The miniature ponies are used for the pony rides on the other side of the Campground. The Clydesdale is one of the ones used for the carriage rides and parades. They were at that section to be looked at by the farrier, since she only comes to that section to look at the horses.

Thankfully it was not raining right then, it had stopped about half an hour beforehand and wasn't supposed to start raining again for a few hours. However, it was rather cloudy and humid. It was already about 80 degrees and the humidity made it quite sticky out. I only had to wait about 10 minutes until the Trail ride came back. I took a couple of pictures of their horses while they were dismounting.

After this group was dismounting and had left I was told to hang out for another 5 minutes while they got the next group of horses ready for my ride. While I was waiting the other two people in my Trail ride arrived. They were a couple who were camping at Fort Wilderness, celebrating the man's return from Afghanistan, where he had been serving for a year. He had just returned 3 weeks ago. He and his girlfriend had done the trail ride two years ago when they were at Disney too. She was super excited, as she loves horses, and told us all this many times. They were probably about my age, mid to upper 20s.

Soon our guides, Christian and Gayle, came and told us the safety instructions, gave us our helmets and we mounted up. I was given a gorgeous gelding named Ditto. He was very well behaved the entire ride. I don't have any pictures from the trail, as we were not allowed to take them. They wanted us to keep our hands on the reins in case the horses got spooked by the wildlife. The trail had a lot of large puddles due to the rain earlier, but the horses were able to walk around them all, so we stayed dry! We saw quite a few deer along the way. There were 3, a mom and two babies, that were only laying about 10 feet back from the trail that were not afraid of us at all. The ride took about an hour and was very enjoyable. When we got back the trail guides took our pictures for us on our horses. Here I am on Ditto.

That is Christian in the background. He was our front guide, meaning he led the ride. Gayle was our side guide, meaning she rode up and down our left side answering questions, pointing things out and just talking to us. She was super nice, answered a lot of questions and was very friendly. I learned a lot about Ditto. In addition to being a Trail horse, he is also used in weddings, usually as the horse that the groom rides in on. He has also been in several parades as one of Cinderella's carriage horses. Gayle told me that he was used for many purposes since he is very level headed and is not fazed by anything. Of course, about 5 minutes after saying that he got spooked by a large leaf blowing across the trail.

Christian was nice too, but his main focus was leading the way and watching ahead on the trail for problems so he didn't talk much. I rode behind the couple, and then there was a trainee riding behind me. She has worked at Tri-Circle D for a year, but was training to be a Trail guide. Her horse was gorgeous, but kind of a pain. He kept hitting his head into Ditto's hind end, which Ditto did not appreciate but put up with. I cannot remember the trainee's name, but she really was trying very hard to keep him under control. He was not her normal horse, but her horse had an abscess on one hoof and was being looked at by the vet, so she had to take him.

Once my ride was over I knew I wanted to go to Downtown Disney to do Christmas shopping for my family. I left Fort Wilderness and headed there.

Downtown Disney entry will be in my next post!

 

[PhoenixStrength]

So, as I said, I headed to Downtown Disney from Fort Wilderness to do some shopping. Pretty much everyone in my family loves Disney so I can get my Christmas shopping done there and everyone will be happy!

It only took a few minutes to get there from Fort Wilderness and I made my way to the Marketplace side.

After driving around for a while I finally found a parking spot by TRex. I walked over to the Marketplace side and right into World of Disney, my main stop.

This is my favorite store, since it has some of everything there! It started to rain shortly after I went in the store, so it quickly became crowded. Everyone came in the stores to get out of the rain, and I had to struggle to get through some areas of the store. Despite the crowds, I walked around for over an hour gathering things, and was able to find stuff for my father, one of my sisters and all my cousins. When I was done shopping I walked out to find it was only a very light drizzle. I took some pics of the outside decorations at World of Disney as I walked over to the other stores to keep shopping.

I know I took pictures of the other stores I went in, but for some reason they are no longer on my camera. I know I went in Pooh's Corner and was able to buy my mother's gifts. I got the last of the gifts, those for my other sister, at Art of Disney and Once Upon a Toy. It was still lightly drizzling, but it didn't bother me so I walked around the Marketplace taking a few more pictures. Here are the Macaws and Cockatoo that are outside Rainforest Cafe:

I also took pictures of the wonderful Lego creations outside the Lego store. These two are my favorites.

It took forever to get that picture of the Lego dogs and walkers. There was a family with three kids trying to get pictures taken with them. One of the kids was very well behaved, but the other two girls were climbing on the dogs and trying to knock stuff over. All the while the mother let them, even with a large line behind them of others trying to get pictures. She obviously could not read the sign that is visible in my picture saying not to climb on the figures! I love that Lego Chessie in Bay Lake. It goes on much further, but with all the people around this was the best picture I could get!

I didn't feel like heading back to the hotel yet so I walked over through the old Pleasure Island and into the West Side a bit for a few more pictures.

The last picture is of the Characters in Flight balloon. It was closed for the day due to the rain and wind. I hope to be able to get on it later this week. It goes up 400 feet and you can see up to 10 miles in all directions. The balloon itself is over 100 feet tall and is covered in Disney characters that fly, including Peter Pan and Tinkerbell in addition to the ones in my pic. You can apparently see all four parks from the top and get some great views and pictures. If I do get to do it I will certainly take lots of pictures for my TR!

By this time it was dinner time so I stopped at the Wetzel's Pretzels and got a Pretzel Dog and a drink. After walking around for a bit longer I headed back to my car. I needed to stop at Target before heading back to my hotel room for the night for a few things. Luckily there is a Target about 1/4 mile away from my hotel in Davenport. I quickly got the things I needed and was back to my hotel for the night!

Next Time: Magic Kingdom!

 

[longing2Batdisney]

Looks like you are having a wonderful time, so far! the horse riding seems like fun and something different to do while in Disney. Sounds like you were able to really do a good job with your Christmas list, great hunting!
Have a magical time!
Connie

 

[dmwang9]

Kudos from a fellow solo traveler! I found your TR this morning and really enjoyed reading what you've posted so far. Can't wait for the rest!

-- Dave

 

[PhoenixStrength]

Hi Stephanie,

I'm in! After 2 solo trips of my own, I think I'm becoming addicted to them, so I'm curious to see how yours goes!

to my TR! It's great to have someone reading who has done solo trips as well. So far my first solo trip has been great!

Looks like you are having a wonderful time, so far! the horse riding seems like fun and something different to do while in Disney. Sounds like you were able to really do a good job with your Christmas list, great hunting!
Have a magical time!
Connie

I am having a wonderful time The horseback riding is definitely something different and not exactly Disney-like, but was a wonderful thing to do. The thing about it that is definitely Disney-like though is how wonderful the Guides were!

I actually had some ideas of what to get everyone coming in so that helped. I knew what characters to theme for each person and what kinds of things they would like/need so I just went from there.

Kudos from a fellow solo traveler! I found your TR this morning and really enjoyed reading what you've posted so far. Can't wait for the rest!

-- Dave

Hi Dave, welcome to my TR! I'm very glad to hear you are enjoying my report. I'm really having a great time on my first solo trip. It's nice to be able to do what you want to do without worrying that someone else is not enjoying themselves as much as you are.

 

[Dina Monster]

I'm one can't wait to read the rest. I don't think I could do a solo trip, I can't even go to the movies by myself!

 

[mickeystoontown]

Thank you, thank you, thank you for posting the horseback riding pictures. Horseback riding is on our list of "maybe we will do that" during our next trip. It certainly sounds like something we would like to do.

Sounds like you had a good time shopping even though it rained on and off.

Looking forward to more!

 

[PhoenixStrength]

I'm one can't wait to read the rest. I don't think I could do a solo trip, I can't even go to the movies by myself!

Thanks! I am pretty independent, and while I certainly like doing things with friends and/or family, I'm not bothered by doing things alone. This is my second solo vacation, so I knew I could do it. My last solo vacation was actually in April of this year to the beach.

Disney is the perfect place to try a solo vacation first. You feel so safe there that I have not been worried about my safety at all so far. In fact, last night while eating dinner in Epcot I realized I had accidentally grabbed a spoon instead of a fork, so I walked across the dining hall to get a fork and left all my things at the table. No one even looked at it, let alone tried to steal anything. Now, I wouldn't advocate doing that. To be honest I didn't even think about it when I did it, and probably won't do that again but I wasn't concerned once I realized it.

Thank you, thank you, thank you for posting the horseback riding pictures. Horseback riding is on our list of "maybe we will do that" during our next trip. It certainly sounds like something we would like to do.

Sounds like you had a good time shopping even though it rained on and off.

Looking forward to more!

You are very welcome!!! It really was an enjoyable experience. It is nothing fancy or exciting, but was relaxing and fun. The trail is beautiful and there is a lot of wildlife to see while out. I spoke to 6 different CMs at Tri-Circle D all together and there were all just as friendly as the CMs everywhere else. I definitely think you should try it! If you have any questions about it, just ask and hopefully I can help.

It was a nice time shopping. I like knowing my Christmas shopping is already done, and shopping at Disney is always fun! I was lucky too that the only hard rain happened while I was in World of Disney. The only rain that I experienced was very light.

Glad you are enjoying my TR, I'm looking forward to reading more of yours!