Upon returning from Fantasmic! , The Envelope that Must Not Be Named was waiting for us on our door. This hammered some of the joy right out of us. That and the sight of the monkey pen that was our villa. We had a lot to do to get checked out of here. Not only that and that, but also our Magical Express pickup time was 3:40. Our flight wasnt until 8 PM! On purpose. So that we could have some fun on our last day before heading home to reality.
My plan for our last day, was this:
- Do all laundry and pack the night before
- Check out by 8 AM
- Be at Magic Kingdom by 8:30 AM.
- Have breakfast at the Main Street Bakery
- Have a heapload of fun and take more pictures
- Have lunch somewhere and enjoy it immensely
- Return to resort by 4 PM ish
- Catch bus to airport
How it actually turned out was this:
- Do some laundry and some packing the night before
- Do the rest of the laundry and packing until approximately 10 AM.
- Check out.
- Realize that we must be back for our ME bus at 3:20.
- Realize that we can't necessarily rely on Disney transportation to get us back here on time unless we leave much earlier than that
- Realize that we aren't going to make it to a park today
- Go to the pool.
- Get everybody showered and dressed while trying not to get their clean clothes wet in the process.
- Have lunch at Olivia's.
- Don't so much enjoy the lunch.
- Walk around resort
- Go back to wait for ME bus.
- Wait
- Wait
- Wait
I realize that judging by the length of each of these lists (for those of you just skimming) it appears that we actually did a lot more than we had planned on our last day.
We didn't, really.
I was pretty ticked at the time, but given that 17 months have passed since that day, I'm over it. Mostly. Writing this now is bound to stir up some unresolved emotions.
I realize that it's partly my fault. For insisting on bring home clean clothes. I didn't HAVE to do laundry. Could've packed very quickly, I'm sure. But it's a thing I have. Helps make the vacation last a little longer if I don't have to set about doing chores the moment I get home. Ironic, huh? (Not that I iron. Ever. Ironic has nothing to do with ironing, TFI.)
The upside was that the day was pretty relaxing, up until the part with the flippy fit. Just wait.
We walked around, enjoying the mellow cheerfulness of this beautiful resort. We swam some more, splashed some more, slid some more. We then proceeded to the changing rooms.
In theory, the idea of swimming and then getting showered and dressed in the changing rooms by the pool is spot-on. What could be simpler?
I think it could be a lot simpler if not for the 4 year old and the 2 year old. Myself, I could've been in and out of there in 10 minutes flat. But trying to keep the girls occupied while I showered and dressed (read: prevent them from flinging the clean dry clothes onto the wet floor) and then getting them both dressed and maintaining a semblance of dryness was a bit trickier. Meanwhile the boys were done and sipping margaritas at Goods to Go before we emerged from the shower room.
Since we had plenty of time to kill (just not enough to get to a park and back without stress!) we decided to try Olivia's, which we hadn't gotten around to yet. The service was a bit spotty, as the entire staff was preparing for a retirement party for one of the waitresses who had been there for many years. I can't remember her name now (17 months later) so I'll just call her Betsy, but I do recall seeing mention of her retirement on the DVC boards. She apparently was very much someone special to a lot of guests, especially those who returned to OKW year after year.
So for that, I'm glad we had spotty service. I'm glad that Betsy was getting to retire, and glad that so many of her coworkers and guests were giving her a nice sendoff. I'm glad that Disney hires the kind of people who stay, and who are clearly exemplary enough that they warrant a party. Not many people stay in the same job long enough to make a retirement party a big deal any more.
The food was fine, nothing grand but nothing wrong with it either. We finished our lunch and commenced to strolling the grounds of the resort again. Went to the arcade for a while, chilled in the lobby watching old Mickey cartoons for a while. You get the picture.
After a fashion, we were content to hang out in the porte-cochere waiting for 3:20 to arrive. It does.
No bus.
3:30. No bus.
3:40. The actual time the bus is supposed to be leaving again. And yet ...
No bus.
3:45. You guessed it, no bus.
Dum dum dum dummmmmmmmmmmm....