Disney Day 1: Magic Kingdom All The Way

When I left off last time, we had just arrived in Orlando and had glimpses of the Disney road signs. Shortly thereafter, we arrived at our hotel, Disney's Pop Century Resort, which was Miss Thang's choice because she wanted a "fun" hotel. 

It was definitely lots of fun because it highlights different pop icons throughout the years. They have buildings for the '50s through the '90s and in each courtyard are giant statues of popular items from that decade. 

We stayed in the '70s building, which was in close proximity to Goofy's water fountains and the '60s pool, which was in the shape of a groovy flower. It was awesome and I have lots of pics in the days to come of the various statues...

Back to the story at hand, we got to the hotel and I headed inside to check in. We had already checked in online so our information packet was ready when we got there and it took all of 10 seconds.

Can you tell someone was a wee bit excited? By the way, that's her outback hat that she bought at church camp the week before Disney. It was perfect for this trip.

We checked out our room and quickly opted not to lug our luggage at that point but to hop on the bus to the Magic Kingdom instead. I mean, really, was there any other option? We had been waiting and planning for a really long time for this adventure and we were ready to get moving.

My man on the bus...

Us on the bus...

And then this happened...

You see, my man forgot to take his pocket knife out of his pocket before hitting the parks. One of the people searching bags came over and said "Sir, I'm going to have to see what is attached to that clip on your pants." It was all very official.

So this began a very official incident (and our only one of the trip, I am happy to report) of a security guard coming over and escorting Dave to pay for a very special type of locker that opened only to the outside of the park where he could store his weapon of mass destruction. It cost all of 50 cents but, let me tell you, it was major. Taylor and I were told which tree to stand under while they took care of this business as we were not allowed to come along.

How many people can say their husband was detained by the Magic Kingdom police? 

Once Dave was allowed to rejoin our group, we walked in and caught our first glimpse...

Magical, huh? And then we carefully selected our first ride after walking around a bit to get our bearings. We thought this one would be a perfect start....

Waiting for our very first Disney ride to begin...

Then we hit the Tomorrowland Speedway, which is an oxymoron because there was nothing speedy about this ride. You couldn't steer well either but it was fun either way. And when we were waiting to get off, Dave kept running into my car (I was ahead of them), which caused me to run into others. Numerous times. They were not amused. But we were!

And then it was time to get in line for one of the events I'd been anticipating the most - the parade down Main Street U.S.A. At this point, we had realized that Texas heat and Florida heat are very different. We were under a heat advisory the first two days and it was rather miserable. We hadn't eaten for a while and my little one was melting down and didn't even want to watch the parade. Oh, the horror!

I was beginning to wonder if we'd made a mistake taking this very long vacation in the middle of June...so I sent her to look at the ducks before we got into a major argument...

And then this happened...and she was mesmerized...and all was well with our family unit again...

After the parade, which was absolutely wonderful, it was time for our first Disney dining experience. We had purchased the Disney Dining plan, which I highly recommend, and it included one counter service meal per day along with a snack and a table service meal. We had strategically planned all of our choices in February and March so there had been a wee bit of anticipation.

Our first dinner was at The Crystal Palace where Pooh, Eeyore, Piglet and Tigger come to your table, sign autographs and take pictures. It was awesome. The food was great (and even included prime rib) and Taylor loved meeting the characters.

They had a parade every 15-20 minutes and everyone was to waive their napkin around. Dave really enjoyed this part!

Those are topiaries of the characters behind Dave and Tay. Aren't they awesome? The other cool thing was that it took so long for all of the characters to visit with us (we weren't complaining a bit because we were enjoying the AC) that our waiter gave us a ticket to go to the front of the line for any ride at the Magic Kingdom. Score!

Main Street U.S.A.

I have no idea why I was slouching. My tummy really doesn't stick out that far usually...

Then we walked through the Robinson Family Treehouse

Fulfilled Dave's childhood dream of riding the Jungle Cruise...poor guy used to watch commercials for this ride when he was a little kid...he'd obviously been wanting to do this for a long time!
Then we hit Pirates of the Caribbean boat ride (fun and modern day robots looked so REAL), Splash Mountain (awesome - we rode it three times that week) and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad (roller coaster that got two thumbs up). Pics weren't really a good idea at that point :-)...

Then we visited the Haunted Mansion. Outside they had tombstones for ambience and one was for 'Brother Dave'....btw, Taylor hated this ride. It was too scary for her...but she hung in there and was brave...

Then I relived my first experience with Disney by convincing the two of them to ride It's a Small World with me. I loved it. They weren't all that impressed...

Then the castle lights came on and it started changing colors...you'll get more and better pics from Day 6 but here's a preview...

Our next stop was the Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin ride. You have a little gun and shoot at the 'Z' targets except that they don't tell you that and I didn't figure it out (Tay and Dave did in the car ahead of me) until halfway through the ride. It wasn't very good at it but we all enjoyed it a lot.

Then we hopped over to the Astro Orbiter. The line here moved at an incredibly slow pace and it wasn't that great. Think the Dumbo ride but with little spaceships. It did give us a great view of the park, though. Here's Tay waiting to ride it. Can you say exhausted but deliriously happy?

And then it happened, y'all. We hit the wall. All of us. We were worn out so we headed back to the bus stop except now it was almost time for the fireworks so there was a major crowd issue. We were shown an alternate exit that took us through some back lots and then we finally made it to the bus. While we were waiting, we were able to see glimpses of the fireworks...more about those later...

Once we made it back to the hotel, we took all of our many pieces of luggage upstairs and crashed for the night after unpacking. We also learned at this time that we'd been chose as the Family of the Day by housekeeping. This meant we got two - count them, two - towel creations. We got a purse and a Mickey. I have pics of them but they go along with something that happened later in the week so you'll have to wait with anticipation...

Next up - Animal Kingdom, Yak & Yeti and Epcot... 

Journey to Disney

Howdy, hello and good to see ya!

I know, I know, it's been much too long since I last posted; however, it took me this long to get unpacked, laundry done, attend Pop's funeral, help my parents get his home ready for an estate sale, get Tay back from Louisiana, celebrate the Fourth of July and get back into our weekly routine.

To say we had an absolutely wonderful trip would be the understatement of the year, my friends. It was magical. It was amusing. It was tiring. Best of all, it was full of memories our little family will carry forever. Pure awesomeness.

As I stated previously, I took 742 pictures of said trip so I'm going to have to break this up by days. Let's start with the very long journey to the Land of the Mouse. It's 18-20 hours from our house so we set out really early - out the door before 5am - with hopes of making to Tallahassee for the night.

It was so dark when we left that I didn't take any pictures. Well, that, and I took a bit of a nap. But I did wake up around Houston (we made it there is 2.5 hours...Dave has a bit of a heavy foot apparently) so we had breakfast at Whataburger. Apparently my man was afraid they didn't have this fine establishment outside of the Lone Star State so he wanted a last meal.

We ate quickly and got back on the road. Before you knew it, we were in my home state of Louisiana and things were still looking mighty familiar to me since I have driven/ridden this route more times than I can count since we moved to Texas when I was 8.

We passed over the LONG bridge over the Atchafalaya River, which is also the spillway, and they'd obviously just released the water because it was higher than I've ever seen it. And it's been 22 years. So that's saying somethin'.

Ahhh - the swamps...I was right back at home...and, even inside of the vehicle, I could already feel the humidity rising. Fabulous. We got gas somewhere about this time, I believe.

We went through New Orleans and, because of historical significance, I took this picture of the Superdome. We drove straight through town (thanks, Google Maps, for taking us the long way around) so we had a birds eye view of the canal where the levees were breeched during Hurricane Katrina. 

Let me just tell you that they are not exaggerating when they say much of the destruction is exactly the way it was the day Katrina rolled through. It's incredibly sad.

We then drove through Mississippi. Now I'm absolutely certain there are many beautiful spots in this state that would warrant a photograph; however, they are not located along I-10. All I can tell you about this state is that it doesn't take long to cross, we ate at a McAlister's in Gulfport (where they actually served everything on real dishes with real silverware) and Dave quickly decided those who worked there were "more interested in getting their own tea than the customers." 

Thing is, he was right. So we ate quickly and got back on the road after a quick fuel stop.

While we were in Alabama, both Tay and Dave experienced their first experience driving through a tunnel. They both loved it. So we documented it for posterity's sake...

Then Dave saw the USS Alabama and asked that I take a picture of it. Because I'm a loving wife who always does what he asks, I rushed to do so and you find evidence of that right here, my friends.

About this time, the trip was beginning to wear on us so I just took random pictures...isn't he cute? He drove the entire way. Apparently I don't drive fast enough.

And after hitting the highway for what seemed like a couple of days, it finally happened. Y'all, we saw this and were immediately rejuvenated!

Yes, friends, we had made it to Florida. Being the tourists we were, we stopped at the official visitors center to get a little taste of all the Sunshine State has to offer...which is a lot. 

After picking up a Florida road map and a hotel guide for Tallahassee, we hit the road again with our eyes set to making it to the capitol.

We got a great deal on our hotel for the evening through the hotel guide we'd picked up. It was a charming bed and breakfast, Cabot Lodge. It usually has a $149/night rate but we had a coupon and got it for only $49. Gotta love a good bargain. Especially when it includes breakfast!


The next morning we were up and at 'em really early again. Even earlier once you realize the time zone just changed...

We hit the road and got to Orlando in just under 6 hours. Tay had her first toll road experience, which was funny because she just couldn't figure out how those roads were any more special than others you don't have to pay to drive on. 

Out of the mouths of babes, right?

With anticipation building continuously... 

we finally saw this sign and knew the fun was just beginning. 

I'll leave off with the story here and pick up tomorrow with hotel check-in and my man being detained by the Magic Kingdom police. 

How many people do you know who can say that?

We're Back...

We're back from Disney, all is well and I am downloading pictures as I type. All 742 of them although you'll be happy to know I won't share ALL of them with you...just half, probably... :-)

My grandfather passed away as we were heading back home so things have been rather hectic around here. Once they calm down, I'll be sure to fill you in on all of our magic goodness. It truly was a fabulous vacation :-)