Up at 3:00am, to catch a 6:14 flight
to Orlando. BIG Yawn! Kristen woke up Madison (who was
feeling terrible the previous day) and said, "Time to wake up, we're going
to Disney!" Madison's reply was quite cheerful, and she asked, "Will
I see Cinderella's Castle?" Wife replied, "You sure will!" Madison
answered, "I'm so LUCKY!" It was very cute, and set the mood for
the whole morning. We were just very glad she was feeling better!
Brinn woke up pretty groggy and looked out the window. "It's still
dark, I'm going back to sleep!" But she woke up quick enough! Her
first comment about going to WDW was, "I can't wait to see our beautiful
hotel room!" Everyone was up, ready and in the car by 4:05.
Arrived at airport a bit early (there is VERY little traffic at four in
the morning!) Very nice uneventful flight to Philly, and the kids loved
the shuttle ride over to the main terminal. (They have a thing for
busses!) :-)
OK, time to pack it up and get ready for our second flight...
And what are the chances? Another great flight. Ontime, good
seats, and the girls fell asleep for over half the flight! :-) I
was seated across the aisle from Kristen and the girls, right next to a
dad and his 8 year old daughter on their way to Disney World too. They
were a great pair and looking forward to their first WDW trip. Dad
was NOT a Disney planning nut (and we know who we are!). So we spent
the flight talking WDW things to do, what not to miss, and some of the major
touring details (i.e. Fastpass is GOOD, Fantasmic fills up early and many
others). We may even run into them in Magic Kingdom tomorrow since
that is their plan as well. Landed on time, zipped to terminal and got
the bags in record time, and zipped out to a nicely stocked Emerald Aisle
(no VANs - durn it). A quick checkout with the car and we were on our
way! I LOVE Emerald Aisle! Took 417 to WDW and paid $3.25 in
tolls. Drove directly to AKL, and were wonderfully 'wowed' when we saw
the resort for the first time. Beautiful is an understatement. Checked
in with Rosa as the appointed CM. NOT the most friendly CM I've ever
met, and pretty close to the 'sternest'. I truly believe a smile would
crack this woman's face. I just can't stand it when they make you feel
like they are doing you a favor when they check you in. Room was not
ready, (as we expected), so we headed to Mara's for a fairly pricy bite.
$23 for one adult and two kids meals. Maddy had since announced
that her throat was hurting again, and she wasn't too interested in food.
I had the African Stew in a bread bowl ($6.99), Kristen the kids Mac
and Chz ($4.59) and Brinn the kids Chicken strips ($4.59) Add a few
drinks and a bag of crackers for Maddy and you're at the $23 total. Everything
was very tasty. I liked the stew, and it had a lot of 'mystery' meat
(as Kristen named it!) She and Brinn liked theirs as well. Now time
for the pool.
Nice big bathroom to change in, and we headed to pool. Very nice,
and very empty... what's up? Not really sure what it was, but it was
closed for another 20 minutes. No prob, lets go look at animals. Saw
a few Pink Flamingos, birds and giraffes from a distance. Very nicely
themed. Back to pool and had a blast swimming and using the slide.
Maddy was still a bit moody, but doing OK. I ran around taking
a ton of pictures.
We finally got into the room just before 3 (you could call to check on
room status from any phone) and headed up to get a bit settled and let the
girls rest. The room was beautiful and I sent everyone out to look
at the animals while I snapped a bunch of pictures. There weren't
too many animals running around, but we saw several cattle, and a few Zebras.
Thought about going to MK for a bit, but a kiddie meltdown meant a
short nap before heading to Chef Mickey's. I ran out to take some
resort shots while the girls napped.
We got ready to go and had used Valet parking upon arrival so they quickly
retrieved our car. Then we used valet again at the Contemporary. This
is very nice when you don't want to haul the kids around in the heat.
Speaking of the heat, it was amazingly pleasant today. Almost chilly
at times in the pool! I don't know the temperature, but we really
enjoyed it. Running around in the evening was especially pleasant.
I could only hope a tenth of our trip sees weather like this. We
only saw very light showers for a few minutes around 5pm. Nice.
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