We Spent Halloween with the Mouse (and Donald too!!!)

[heatherlizz602]

Have a safe, magical, trip. I will patiently be waiting for your TR.

 

[bawsmom]

you are so lucky!! i want to be leaving for WDW have a great time and be safe!! can't wait to hear all about it and see all the pictures when you return

 

[Chelley00]

We're leaving in an hour and a half Have a safe trip, and if you see the Pirate Mickey family, say hi to us!

 

[izzyzoeybear]

We have just a few days left.....so hopefully we might see ya down there.....Have a great trip and can't wait to hear all about it....

 

[julezdisney]

Awww! She's gone! I've been so sick today I missed you! Have fun- I can't wait to hear about it!

 

[llurgy]

Have lots of fun and a magical time

Mandy

 

[julezdisney]

Happy Halloween! Keep safe & have fun!

 

[AshleyMWC]

We are currently sitting in the Orlando airport awaiting our flight- one more hour in Orlando. We had a WONDERFUL trip and were sad to leave as usual. The weather was great, the food was awesome, the Poly was perfect, and we can't wait to be back in Disney in 346 days for our Honeymoon!!! I will start a TR as soon as I can settle back into regular life again, but I will try and upload a few sneak preview photos in the next day or two. Thanks for following along everyone!!

 

[llurgy]

Welcome back!!!!

On the same hand sad to see you back as that means your Dis Vacation is over

Stoked that you had such a great time and everything was so good for you and cant wait to hear about it all in your trip report after you have gotten settled into normalcy again

Mandy

 

[ndziob]

where did you get the fantasia and cinderella shirts?

 

[izzyzoeybear]

Welcome Back!!! I know what ya mean about getting back in the swing of things. I am hoping by next week to start my TR....but right now I am still up to my waist in laundry....

 

[kaysmommie]

Welcome back, glad you had a great time in Disney! looking forward to your trippie when you get settled in.

 

[kathleen27]

Welcome Back!!!
Sounds like a great trip!!!

 

[Figment's Friend]

I'm so glad you had an awesome time and I can't wait to read (and see) all about it!

 

[Chelley00]

Welcome home!

 

[Camster0307]

Welcome back! I hope you guys had a magical time!

I look forward to reading your TR when we get back -- we leave on Saturday!!!!

 

[heatherlizz602]

WELCOME BACK!!!

Cant wait for the TR. Take your time and get adjusted to the "real world". Hope you had a magical time..

 

[JaxJags08]

Hi! Have you started your TR? Just wanted to make sure I wasn't missing it!

 

[llurgy]

Hi! Have you started your TR? Just wanted to make sure I wasn't missing it!

I am still eating my way through too
Waiting.............

Mandy

 

[AshleyMWC]

Well everyone, I know that we have been back for over 2 months now, and I can’t believe I haven’t started a report yet! Between the holidays, totally gutting and remodeling our 2 bathrooms, and planning the wedding, the Dis has sadly fallen by the wayside a little bit. I know, SHOCK, HORROR!!! But now I am back in the game and determined to start, AND FINISH this TR!!! This first installment will have few to no pictures, because well, it was just a crazy day/night, and there were simply no good times for picture taking. I will try and sneak in a few teaser pictures though, in hopes of snagging at least a couple of readers. And in all honesty, as you read about our “travel day,” you probably wouldn’t want to see many pictures of me anyway- I can’t imagine that I was looking too pretty that day.

So, I guess it’s finally time to begin!! For anyone just climbing aboard or who needs a refresher (which is probably everyone since I have been MIA forever!!), I shall begin with our small, yet fabulous cast.

First, there is me, Ashley!

I am 28 (ok, I was 27 on the trip) and I love Disney! I have loved Disney since the first time my parents took me back in elementary school. I have probably been to the World close to 10 times, and luckily I have a DF who loves the place just as much as I do. We go every year, despite people telling us to “go somewhere else for once.” We just look at them like they have 10 heads. Some of my favs include the Carousel of Progress, Hall of Presidents, Soarin’, World Showcase, the AK trails, the Grand Floridian, Boardwalk, and Donald!! Ok, I have a wide variety of favs, and the list could truly go on and on and on and on. I am a planner by nature, but DF isn’t so much, so I try to strike a balance somewhere in the middle of planned and spontaneous. I think we really achieved that balance this trip, as it was one of our best ever!

Next, we have my DF, Sam, age 29.

We got engaged about 3 weeks before this trip, and he is already pumped about our 2 week Disneymoon!! How did I get so lucky to find this guy?!?!? Sam is a banker by day, and a musician and Disney by night. Sam’s first trip to the World was with his high school band back in the day, but he didn’t FULLY experience it until he went with my family in 2003- my college graduation present. From that trip on, he was totally hooked- I mean totally! Some of his favs around the World include Tower of Terror (his #1 fav), Carousel of Progress, Everest, BTMRR, Soarin’, Boardwalk, the monorail, and Goofy. He is clearly more of a thrill seeker than myself.

So, that’s who we are, and that’s our whole travel party. Our travel dates were Oct 23-Nov 1. We spent the first night at Pop, and then transferred to the Poly for the next 8 nights (thank you Mr. 40% off discount code!!!)- it was like a little slice of heaven- or how I imagine heaven to be, at least.

So, that’s enough background info I think- now onto the report!!

So, we begin on October 23- Travel Day. We had originally planned on flying out early the morning of the 24th, but thanks to AirTran and all their stupid cutbacks, they cancelled that flight about 3 months prior. They put us on a flight that got into Orlando at 3:30 the afternoon of the 24th instead. To that I said, no way Jose. That would mean basically cutting out a whole vacation day by the time we got to the resort. So, we switched to an evening flight on the 23rd, and a stay at Pop for the one night. In hindsight we would have gladly paid the extra $$$ to spend that first night at the Poly- but we’ll get to that later. So, back to the 23rd- sorry for the ramblings thus far! Since our flight didn’t leave until almost 7 that night, Sam and I both worked that day. I worked until noon I think, and Sam called it a day around 1. It was actually not as painful as I thought to go to work that morning, and it was worth it to get a few last minute things done and off my mind. Sam’s parents had driven into town that day to pick up our dog, Disney, to watch while we were away. So, after we both left work, we met up with them for lunch. It was the first time we had seen them since Sam popped the question, so it was nice. We chatted and lunched for a bit, and then parted all different ways to finish packing and pick up last minute items and such. And that’s when it started to hit me- the dreaded sore throat and cold symptoms! Noooo, this couldn’t be happening now! I actually cried in the car driving to Target! It wasn’t bad, but I could only imagine how bad it could be hopping on a plane all stuffed up and such. So, I did what any good Diser would do- I loaded up on about a million Halls Defense cough drops, and had some hot tea. Now armed with cough drops, cold drugs, and tea, I headed back home to watch TV and kill time before we left (I was of course totally packed, unlike some other people who shall remain nameless). I think I may have briefly dozed off on the couch, but I soon woke up to realize that our ride to the airport was here!! Yay, it’s go time. So, we grabbed our bags, and headed out the door. Unfortunately, so did the dogs- Disney and Sam’s parents’ dog!!!! We don’t have a fenced yard, so they took off running, and FAST!! So, here we were running, literally full speed, down the street trying to catch the dogs. We finally wrangled Disney in the neighbor’s backyard, but Zoe was still on the loose, and definitely not stopping. You see I know they would come back, but the problem is, would they get hit by a car first?!!! They are miniature schnauzers and crazy fast runners. Plus, they’re not like big dogs you can catch and grab around the neck- no, they are small and you literally have to dive to catch them. So, I am now the only one running and screaming around the neighborhood trying to catch Zoe. All the while I literally feel like my throat is closing up from all this. Finally that stupid dog stopped to pee, and I grabbed her- yes, mid-stream and all. Bad girl Zoe! Ugh!!!!!!! Here is the Disney, one of the culprits.

What a banner start to the evening- Iooking back, this was definitely a sign of things to come! So, dogs returned to the house, we climbed in our buddy’s truck and headed to the airport. It literally took me half the trip there to recover from the dog chase. You know when you are running full steam and it’s cold out, and the pain that subsequently settles in your chest? Well, that was me. It felt like an elephant was doing the polka on my chest!

Anyway, I got over it, and we arrived at the airport safe and sound. I had already checked us in online, so all we had to do was throw our bags at the clerk (not literally, although looking back, I wish I had). So, bags thrown, we headed off to security. It was painless and pretty quick, and we now have about 1.5 hours or so before we could board. We decided to get some dinner at the oh so classy airport Applebees. It was actually pretty good in all honesty. We both had the chicken fingers basket, and a Corona. Corona is our “vacation drink.” I mean we drink them at home too, but they always remind us of vacation- more specifically Misner’s Lounge at the GF where we have consumed many a Corona. We paid our bill and headed to our gate to hang out for the little while we had before boarding. Ok, now this was funny, and I don’t have a picture (which probably makes it less funny to you guys). But we sit down, and sitting across from us this girl who I kid you not was an exact clone of this girl from Breakfast Club. I mean they literally could have been twins! And it make it all the better, she was all fidgety and kind of squirrely like the girl in the movie. She was from then on known to us as Breakfast Club. We tried to get a picture, but we couldn’t think of a way to do it that didn’t make us seem like freaks taking a picture of a stranger. So, a few minutes later, we were still sitting. There was no plane at the gate to speak of. We were shortly informed that the plane was “on the way” and that we would have to board at warp speed once it arrived. So, arrive it finally did, and board at warp speed we did. That was the fastest loading and taxi I have ever seen. Now let it be known that I do not love to fly by any means- and I certainly do not love to fly while we are heading into horrendous storms! Well, let’s just say I didn’t like this flight at all. Take off was fine, the flight was ok, albeit super bumpy. The descent, however, darn near did me in. I think the captain was about to miss Atlanta and did a nose dive straight down. At that moment I thought I was going to be sick- like for real sick. By the grace of God I was able to not embarrass myself on that plane, but I was definitely not feeling great- and we still had another leg of the flight to go. We slowly made our way off the plane and headed to our next gate- a mere 4 gates down, per the nice flight attendant who announced all 145,987 connections during our descent. Our connection was already tight before our delay in RIC, but now it was down to about 20 minutes. So, we slowly stroll over to the gate, only to find that no no, they had moved our flight! They had not only moved it to another gate, but another terminal all together. Now anyone who has ever flown through Atlanta knows that that place is no picnic to navigate- much less if you have to do it quickly. So, we literally took off running up the super super super long escalator, and along the people mover things, and finally arrived 3 terminals later! We ran onto the plane (no, we seriously did run) and found our seats. We were dripping in sweat and of course the air was not working on the plane! People were fanning themselves and taking off anything appropriate they could. Great- so now I was still feeling sick, and I was crazy hot. The only thing that improved my mood was when Breakfast Club ran in and sat in the seat next to Sam. We both looked at each other and tried not to laugh- it was just too funny!! What are the odds?!? Anyway, about 30 seconds later the plane pushed away from the gate and we were on our way. I was ok the second leg, sickness-wise, but my throat was just plain raw by this point and I just wanted to go to sleep!

So, we get the heck off that plane and head to the luggage carousel. We were using Magical Express, but since it was so late and we were transferring hotels the next morning, we just wanted to move our own bags on the ME. So, back to the luggage carousel. The bags started coming out pretty quickly, and Sam’s was one of the first ones out. Then came my big bag. Yay!!! We only had one more bag to go. You see we booked our tickets back when you got 2 free pieces of checked baggage, so we checked a semi-empty one to bring back any souvenirs and such. That semi-empty bag, however, contained my makeup, raincoat, umbrella, and crocs. So, luggage came and went, but my little orange suitcase never came and went!! And then it was just us and no more bags. Oh you have GOT to be kidding me!! By this time is it close to midnight and I am headed to the lost luggage office- home of the least friendly people in the universe (sorry if anyone works in these offices- I assume you are the exception to the rule). So I walked in- the only one mid you- and inform this woman that my bag is missing. She asks my name and says “OHHHH, we got a call about your bag!” Um, what?!?! It was a tiny little suitcase with nothing weird or dangerous in it, why would you have gotten a call about it???? She so kindly informs me that it is my fault that my bag is lost because I missed flight out of ROCHESTER! Um, ma’am, I am coming from Richmond, nowhere near Rochester. She says, “Yes, you’re not coming from Rochester now obviously, because you missed THAT flight.” What is heaven’s name was this woman talking about?!?! Thankfully a nicer guy appears and takes over and takes pity on me and my bag. He figures out that my bag was routed to Rochester from Richmond on “accident.” Accident my bootie- that mean man from the AirTran counter probably did it! He was NOT friendly as I previously mentioned, and I still blame him!! Anyway, Juan tells me that my bag will be on a plane leaving Rochester tomorrow morning and that it should be at my hotel around 2PM. Ok, no biggie- no makeup for a day. It won’t be pretty but whatever. So, we FINALLY board the ME and have an uneventful ride to Pop. Check-in was uneventful and we eventually found our room and crashed while watching the Golden Girls. Oh and did I mention that it was pouring rain that night- and of course AirTran was holding my rain gear hostage! Wow, what a day- but I promise the vacation gets better after this day!!!

Sorry for the lack of pictures this day, but again, you wouldn’t have wanted to see them anyway- trust me, I saw myself in the flesh, it wasn’t good! Up next, checking into the Poly, and we hit the first park!! I will try and ramble less, I promise!!