Monday, May 11, 2009

Disney Trip - Day 1

Thursday, May 7th

Tom: "So we'll leave tomorrow at about 11:00 AM?"
Me: "What? No! I told Jyoti we would pick her up at 9:30 AM."
Tom: "Not going to happen. I can't get away before eleven."
Me: "I thought you took the day off."
Tom: "I did, but I have to go in until eleven. It can't be helped. I have stuff to do."
Me: "Well, I'll call Jyoti and tell her."
Tom: "No, don't call her. You told her 9:30 AM. By the time you mess around the house getting packed it will be 10:00 before you pick her up. Then the two of you will mess around her house packing up the car, and by the time you leave there, it will be 10:30, and that will put you at my work at 11:00 AM. Perfect!"

Friday, May 8th

6:15 AM - I am awake. Probably because I didn't pack last night, and now I'm worried I won't get it done in time. Tom is in the shower getting ready for his day. He hasn't packed either, but he isn't concerned.

7:20 AM - Tom has thrown some clothes and other things in a backpack and is off to work. The last thing he said to me was, "See you at 11:30?" This, of course, irritated me, and I reminded him that we would see him at 11:00 sharp. I am out of bed and enjoying the silence of the morning. I'm taking the Tom approach and am not concerned about my packing.

10:00 AM - I am running around like a chicken with its head cut off trying to finish my packing. The girls have their lists but apparently are not reading them because they keep forgetting things like underwear.

10:40 AM - I have arrived to pick up Jyoti and Sarina. We are now ten minutes behind schedule. Somewhere Tom is snickering.

11:00 AM - We are on the road toward Tom's work. We are now thirty minutes behind schedule, just like Tom predicted. After picking up Jyoti and Sarina we had to head back home because Madison forgot her bathing suit.

12:45 PM - We are now heading toward Orlando. We didn't get to Tom's work until 11:32 AM as I took the wrong exit because I was talking. When we got to his work I called him. His comment was, "Right on time." He loaded his belongings and took over in the driver's seat. As we headed down the road he decided we should eat. We all agreed that we were hungry so we stopped and had lunch. We are now finished and heading off on our vacation.....one hour and 45 minutes behind schedule.

Tom: "We aren't in any hurry are we? What time is check-in?"
Me: "2:00 PM, but I thought we would get there at that time, check-in, swim a bit, eat and then go to one of the Disney parks for the fireworks."
Tom: "We can still do that. We aren't in a hurry. We're about an hour behind. We're fine."

4:00 PM - We have arrived at our destination. We ran into traffic about thirty minutes into our drive. Getting out his trusty iPhone, Tom took a detour to avoid whatever the blockage was up ahead. The detour was quite long and seemed to go on and on and on through Florida countryside I didn't even know existed. I have now been to downtown Brandon and seen quite a bit of downtown Lakeland. Eventually we got onto 27 near Clermont and eventually, we made it to our resort.

We are staying at one of Connie's Wyndham resorts (use to be Fairfield). This resort is Bonnet Creek and is on Disney property. I have never been here, but have heard good things. It is nice to be so close to the parks, and despite the property not being owned by Disney, there was plenty of signs leading us to the site.

Jyoti and I went inside to check-in. We received our keys from the front desk and were directed to the Welcome desk for our parking pass. This is the desk where they sign you up for the "talk". The one where they try to sell you more points and put you into the poor house. Susan was our welcome woman, and despite me telling her that I owned a million points in Wyndham and couldn't possibly own anymore, she signed my husband and me up for the next day at 8:00 AM. The reel was $75 Disney money. Listen to our spiel and we pay you $75. I knew Tom would jump all over that. I did receive a nice welcome bag, and she gave Jyoti one too. We felt like an Oscar presenter. The bag contained the following:
  • A razor
  • Two pocket-sized packets of Pepto Bismal
  • A Harlequin 60th Anniversary book, Crime Scene by BJ Daniels
  • Two Goody StayPut elastic hairbands
  • A Quaker True Delights bar
  • A packet of eyebrow wax
  • Biore restore skin-boosting night serum
The resort has separate buildings much like Disney's Coronado Springs. We are in the building closest to the main building. There are two pools. One pool has an enclosed slide and the other pool has a lazy river. We are within walking distance to the one with the lazy river. The resort is in the process of building pools at each building so outside our building is a construction zone that is roped off.

7:15 PM - We are now at an Indian restaurant for dinner, fifteen minutes past our reservation time. After arriving at the resort Tom and the girls put on suits and went swimming at the pool and the lazy river. The resort has two pools, but they are in the process of building several other pools at each building.





We are on the 9th floor. Our room is quite spacious with a kitchen (left), living area, dining area, balcony, two bedrooms, and two bathrooms. The younger girls immediately claimed their bed and changed into their swim suits. Tom took the girls swimming in the lazy river while Jyoti and I left and went to the grocery store to stock up on essentials like beer, limes, milk, beer, cereal and beer.
We arrived back at the room at the same time. The wet ones showered and changed while Jyoti and I enjoyed a beer on the balcony. The view from the balcony is quite amazing.


Tom wanted Indian food so Jyoti found a restaurant and a coupon for a free entree in a book she had picked up in the lobby. We headed out with Tom in the driver's seat and Jyoti riding shotgun. Smartly I was in the back. Tom punched in the address into his trusty iPhone and followed the directions (sound familiar Susan M?) which of course led us on a roundabout journey.

We found the restaurant by accident and not by help from Apple. We are all quite hungry. It doesn't look like we will make a park tonight as we are all very tired. The girls want to swim again so after dinner we will head back down to the pool, with our beer and limes, to end our first day of vacation.



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