What Is This, A Haunted Ride? May '18 TR UPDT 6/24

[iheartbelle87]

Welcome to my May '18 TR!

If you followed me over here from my PTR, you know that planning this trip had plenty of ups/downs!

Usually I travel to WDW with DH or my Mom but this time I was joined by both of my parents and my 14 year old nephew!

We stayed at Disney's Beach Club Resort 5/13-5/17 and for the first time ever, we had the deluxe dining plan

Get ready to hear all about why I was awake at 4am every day, how we got evacuated from our hotel (and didn't even know it!), a few panic attacks, LOTS of dining reviews (3 TS per day!), and how I used 19 snack credits on our last day Oh, and some rain. Actually, A LOT of rain.

 

[iheartbelle87]

Chapters

Introductions

Pre Travel Day

Travel Day

Beaches & Cream

Magic Kingdom

Yachtsman Steakhouse

Cape May Cafe Breakfast/Swimming At Epcot​

 

[ariane37]

Wow, I logged on at the right time because I'm FIRST I heard about the rain, so sorry I hope you were able to have a good time anyway and I'm looking forward to reading all about it!

 

[iheartbelle87]

Introductions


From left to right...

Me - Ashlee, age 30, Disney lover since forever. I am the planner of all trips! I work as a nurse practitioner by day, but really I'm just an aspiring stay at home dog mom I live in a suburb north of Boston with DH and our fur baby.

Adam- 14 years old, 8th grade. My oldest brother's youngest son, lives in Northern NH. He enjoys rice krispie treats, snapchat and filet mignon

Mom- in her 50s, works as a biller at a local hospital, has allergies to dairy + shrimp, loves the Haunted Mansion, responsible for my love of Disney, also lives in Northern NH.

Dad- in his 60s, works for an excavating company, loves his small town life and would be completely okay with never leaving this town ever again, loves beer. ​

 

[iheartbelle87]

Wow, I logged on at the right time because I'm FIRST I heard about the rain, so sorry I hope you were able to have a good time anyway and I'm looking forward to reading all about it!

AHH Welcome!! Yay for being first! SO. MUCH. RAIN! I have several rain selfies I'll be posting... lol

 

[bluejasmine]

YAy Im here too!

 

[Lifelong_Dreamer]

Joining in!

 

[hardyb]

Ready

 

[verleniahall]

Joining in!!

 

[SweetSerenity]

Joining in

 

[Raeven]

Following along!

 

[iheartbelle87]

YAy Im here too!

Yes! So happy to have you!

Joining in!

Ready

Joining in!!

Welcome!

Joining in

Yay!

Following along!

Yay!!

 

[iheartbelle87]

Pre Travel Day

Any good DIS-er knows that a Disney vacation starts the day before you leave, AKA 'pre travel day'. Pre travel day for this trip fell on a Saturday. This was both good and bad. Good because I didn't feel 'rushed' but bad because I felt like it was a wasted day and I just wanted to BE THERE!

Since my parents/nephew live 4 hours away from me, they were going to be driving to my house the day before we left for Florida as we had an early flight to catch on Sunday morning. The day before pre travel day (pre pre travel day? No, thats not right...) I spoke with my Dad on the phone and he asked, 'will you have beer ready for me when I get to your house?'. Sure, no problem.

Well, it actually was kind of a problem. I woke up with fur baby pouncing on me at 5:30am pre travel day and decided to just stay awake to get some last minute cleaning/packing done. It turns out that the liquor stores didn't open until 9am, and DH was going into the office for 8am and wouldn't be back in time with beer before my parents got here. I really didn't want to leave fur baby home alone for a few minutes as this requires us to close all doors, pick up an area rug, etc... aka: too much work for me. DH had a good idea and reminded me that the local Stop & Shop sells beer and they opened at 7am. YES! I ran out to the store in all of my glory (aka: leggings, sweatshirt and a baseball hat...) only to find the beer aisle to be locked/gated.

I asked the cashier what time they started selling beer and she said, '8am'. Great, it was 8:03am... but then there was a big to do about finding a manager to open the aisle, etc. I'll spare you the details... but I was finally out of the store with a 6 pack of bud light by 8:17am. When I got home DH left for his office, and I finished cleaning, showered, etc.

At 11:12am I got a text from my Mom that they were 'here!'. I looked out my window into my driveway and they were not, in fact, not 'here' . HMM. Then I got another text, 'oops wrong house.'

Two minutes later my parents/nephew were in my driveway! Phew. DH arrived home from his office about 20 min after everyone arrived and we ended up ordering delivery for lunch. My parents didn't want to leave my house or go do anything so we just kinda stared at each other for an hour or so until we moved into the living room and tried to find a movie to watch. My house is not that big, so me/DH/furbaby/nephew were crammed on our couch and my parents were on our chair and a half. We decided on some weird Jim Carey movie which I napped on/off during. We also watched a few episodes of 'North Woods Law' which is kind of cool because its filmed in my parents town.

Eventually we ordered take out from Cheesecake Factory for dinner, and then it was time to get ready for bed by 8pm. No shame in going to bed so early. This is when we learned that my Dad's CPAP was not joining us on this trip. Apparently my mom insisted that my Dad carry on his CPAP because it would break if he packed this in his checked bag but Dad did not want to do this. UGH. This meant he'd be snoring allll throughout the trip. Adam slept on our pull out couch, Dad slept on our chair and a half and Mom slept in our spare bedroom. I guess Mom didn't want Dad keeping her up all night with his snoring...

Mom set her alarm for 1:30am. Yes, 1:30AM! We were being picked up at 3:30am, and I was kind of annoyed she was waking up so early because once our dog hears her he'll be awake and start whining until I let him out of the bedroom... but she didn't seem to care. So we were waking up at 1:30am.

Next up... less words, more pictures for Travel day/day one! ​

 

[LeiaIsAPrincess2]

1:30?! Why even bother going to bed?

 

[Raeven]

Any good DIS-er knows that a Disney vacation starts the day before you leave, AKA 'pre travel day'. Pre travel day for this trip fell on a Saturday. This was both good and bad. Good because I didn't feel 'rushed' but bad because I felt like it was a wasted day and I just wanted to BE THERE!

Definitely!

so we just kinda stared at each other for an hour or so until we moved into the living room

I laughed so hard at this

 

[Lifelong_Dreamer]

Awww man, sharing a room with snoring relatives, sounds familiar. Hope you had a good pair of ear plugs!

 

[SuperNEMOfan]

I’m here!!

Sorry about all the rain!! I hope it didn’t hinder too much on your trip.

1:30?!! I wouldn’t even bother going to bed at that point

 

[iheartbelle87]

1:30?! Why even bother going to bed?

RIGHT?! And what the HECK is there to do for 2 hrs?!

Awww man, sharing a room with snoring relatives, sounds familiar. Hope you had a good pair of ear plugs!

hahaha oh just wait...

I’m here!!

Sorry about all the rain!! I hope it didn’t hinder too much on your trip.

1:30?!! I wouldn’t even bother going to bed at that point

Yay! So happy to have you!! Yeah that rain... I've NEVER had that much rain on any of our trips hahaha...

 

[iheartbelle87]

Travel Day!

Hey everyone - so happy to have you all here! It feels like time has been going by so quick since being back from this trip- which is good because DH and I leave in 30 days (!!) for our first stay at the GF thanks to a conference I'm attending

I did not sleep well the night before our trip, waking up every 1-2 hours. Which now that I think of it was probably only 2-3 times because of the 1:30am alarm situation Right on queue fur baby woke me up when he heard my Mom walking around. Once I heard her turn on the shower I decided to get out of bed and just embrace being awake. After I brought fur baby out to pee fur baby and I joined Adam on the pull out couch in the living room in hopes of getting a few more minutes of sleep. Dad got in the shower next, and then it was my turn. Adam showered the night before so he was the last up. Our car service was scheduled to pick us up at 3:30am but at 3:15am they pulled into the driveway- I gave DH and fur baby a quick kiss before I was out the door!

Our driver left a lot to desired... he missed the turn to get on the highway so I had to direct him a different way. THEN as we were approaching the exit for the airport he started trying to pass a truck that was towing a boat. It was really strange we were the only two vehicles on the road... and we almost missed the exit. ALMOST.

Finally we made into the airport, checked our bags and then proceeded to the LLOONNG security line. It was only 4:10am. Turns out security wasn't open yet. And still no coffee. This girl runs on A LOT of coffee. There was only one line but then we got confused because people were saying it was 'pre check' so I left the line and asked a worker who said its all one line - regular people and pre checkers mixed in. Phew. Then I realized we all got 'upgraded' to pre check so in the end it din't matter. Once security opened it was quick except Dad got randomly chosen for extra security. We were at our gate by 4:30.

We all took turns trying to find food/bathroom trip. Dad was very nervous about flying so he refused to eat or have coffee before the flight Mom took Adam to find some breakfast and they came back with an orange soda and blueberry muffin for him. Hmmm. I thought selling soda to kids was almost illegal at this point? And at 5am? Maybe its the 30yo no kids nurse in me? hahah! Anyway not my problem, bring on the orange soda! I enjoyed a nice hot blonde roast from Starbucks. Finally we were boarding at 5:45am!



Dad and Adam

Dad paid for him and Adam to sit in the front of the plane and Mom and I were sitting in row 12. Unfortunately too much coffee meant I was using the plane bathroom every 40min haha! On the way back from the bathroom once I got 'blocked' by the snack carts and couldn't get back to my seat right away but luckily the seat next to Dad and Adam was empty as was were two seats in the aisle across from them. I asked the flight attendant if Mom and I could move up to these seats and he said sure! I watched "I, Tonya" (free on Jetblue! woot!) and before I knew it we were landing at only 9:30am!

We met our driver at luggage, collected and our bags and finally at 10:15am this was our view:




LOVE!


Then 5 minutes later...




Next up... was our room ready? Were our room requests met? Plus, our first TS! ​

 

[Lifelong_Dreamer]

That driver would have stressed out!

The soda and kids thing reminds me of a rant I often have about hospitals here is Canada. The patient kitchenette in the hospital is stocked with diet coke and ginger ale. I can kinda sorta understand the ginger ale but no reason to be supplying diet coke. It is a hospital, are we not meant to be promoting health? Drives me crazy. If the family wants to bring in pop/soda that is their own choice but I don't think it is something that the hospital (tax payers thanks to free health care) should be providing.