Three Ladies at WDW-Preamble and Day 1
Cast: Me, a.k.a. Natalie, 28 year old mother of 2 boys, on a trip with "the Girls" a.k.a. Cynthia (my younger sister), celebrating the big 2-6 on February 16, and Andrea, my friend since 4th grade, 29 years old.
Reason for Trip: Do you need a reason for a vacation when you have two kids under 3? My reason was a sanity break, as well as giving DH a rare opportunity to be the solo caregiver for our boys for more than a few hours at a time. For "the Girls", this trip was a much needed break from "the grind" of working for over 2 years without a vacation. For us all, it was a very rare opportunity to spend some quality time together. We first traveled to WDW together in March 2003, while my DH was deployed to Iraq. Since our last trip together, I've had 2 kids, Andrea has made a major life change moving to Chicago from NJ (where she had lived her whole life) and Cynthia had graduated from Art School and landed a wonderful job as a graphic designer for Pottery Barn. It's amazing what can happen in just 4 years. This trip was born last September, when we all realized it had been WAY too long since we had seen each other and we agreed that we just HAD to go to WDW again together.
Our trip was set for 5 nights, Feb 12-17. We used Magical Journeys (thanks Debbie!) and got a MYW package including the dining plan. Cynthia and I, traveling from California, booked red eye flights for Feb 11, and Andrea booked an early morning flight out of Chicago on the 12th.
I made all our ADR's and booked a Keys to the Kingdom tour for us on Thursday, as a birthday present to Cynthia. I figured the tour would be a fun thing to do, as we had all been to WDW so many times, it would be fun to learn something for once. :)
Day 1: Monday, Feb 12
I will spare you the details of the red eye flight from LAX to Orlando. Suffice it to say, I did not sleep a wink, as usual for me. I cannot sleep sitting up, no matter how tired I am. :( I arrived in Orlando first, at 6:30 a.m. Cynthia was flying from San Francisco to Miami, then on to Orlando, and would arrive around 8:30am. Andrea was due in at 10:10 am from Chicago. I grabbed my luggage and proceeded down to the ME desk. After a loooooong walk down a deserted hallway, I found the ME desk and was greeted by a very wide awake team of CM's, who let me know I was their first guest of the day. I checked in quickly and was led to a bus to the WL. There was a couple on the bus, and as soon as I boarded, we were on our way. I enjoyed the video (last time, they were showing A Bug's Life on the ME bus :confused: ). We pulled up to the WL around 7:20 and I noticed some scaffolding which really detracted from the ambiance of pulling up to the "Grand" lodge. It was overcast, cold, and drizzling when we got off the bus. I quickly made my way to the warm lobby, and walked right up to the front desk. A very nice young man from Brazil greeted me and I tried my best to get a room that was ready (I was EXHAUSTED at this point). Bless him, he was so nice, but the hotel was just completely booked! There were no rooms ready at that time, except for junior suites, which I really could not afford to upgrade to. ;) He gave me the card and told me to call after about 12:30pm. Slightly dejected, I turned my bags into the bell services desk and made my way over to Roaring Fork to get some coffee. It was going to be a long day. I grabbed a refillable mug (I knew I would never get $12 use out of it, but I really needed a new mug for home). I got the yucky coffee and took a seat in the lounge to choke it down in peace. At this point, it was POURING rain outside, and it was about 8am. My cell phone rang and I was surprised to see it was Cynthia! She should be on a plane right now, I thought. Turns out, her plane was broken (her words), and they were sitting on it, waiting for the mechanic to fix it. 30 minutes later, she called again, to let me know they were getting off the plane and on a different one, that would hopefully take off around 9am. I told her to try and call Andrea once she arrived at MCO. Maybe they would arrive at the same time and be able to catch the ME bus together.
After I got off the phone, I walked over to the Villas, to the Iron Spike room, per some suggestions here. It was indeed a nice quiet room, but I was buzzing from the coffee and no longer wanted to rest. Instead, I took some pictures of the train stuff for my older DS who is recently fascinated by trains. After that, I returned to the lobby and pulled up a SUPER comfy chair and watched a few episodes of The Office on my portable DVD player. Around 10am, I got up to stretch and decided to freshen up and change my clothes in the bathroom in the lobby. That was fun. :rolleyes:
At that point, I decided, on a whim, to call to see about our room. I actually said to the CM who took my call "I am calling to see if, by some miracle, there is a room ready for me yet". She replied "well, it's a miracle...your room is ready! You're in 6056." I thanked her profusely (she was probably really confused) and headed straight up to my room. Before I even got there, I got a little flutter of excitement. I knew we were on the 6th floor, and we booked a standard view, so did that mean...
...I opened the door to the room, and straight ahead of me, right smack out the sliding glass door, was THE MAGIC KINGDOM!!!! :joy: I beelined over to the balcony, stepped out, and smiled as I took in the view of the Contemporary to the right, Space Mountain and the Astro Orbiter tower right in the middle, and the Castle to the left. I heard the train whistle and immediately, I was IN Disney World. You know that feeling ;) We were at the top of the (very thin) treeline, so all this was clear as day. I looked forward to seeing some fireworks later in the week.
I quickly surveyed the rest of the room and it was spotless and I very much liked the new decor. There was a towel Mickey head on our bed and a bow made out of towels on the bathtub. I was highly impressed at how clean the room was, and so quickly too, since just 3 hours ago, the room was occupied. This trend of impeccable housekeeping was maintained throughout our stay, and I actually plan to write a letter to the management praising our housekeeper, because she did an EXCELLENT job all week!
I quickly claimed a drawer and some closet space as my own and unpacked my stuff. Along the way, I talked to Andrea and Cynthia and found out they met up at the airport and were heading to the ME bus and would be here around 11:30. I called my DH and all was well at home, so I decided to use the time to relax and just wait for my companions to arrive.
(Part 2 coming soon)
