Day two, Part three
So I had my luggage, I breathed a huge sigh of relief as we went to find our Coach that would be taking us to WDW
Now I hadn't told my mom this as I didn't want to stress her out but there had been two seperate coaches booked. My mom would be leaving WDW after 1 week so her coach transfer was going to be with Mears and our transfer was to be with Coach USA. I had only found this out about 4 weeks before we were due to leave and I tried to fix it, but we were told we would be charged $50 for my mom to be on the same Coach as us. I figured it would be fine for us to go seperately as it was going to drop her right there.
Anyway it took a little time to find where we were supposed to go. I know Sanford airport is small but the directions weren't that clear. I went up to the Airtours desk and I asked if I was in the right place. I gave her my name and she handed me my Welcome Pack, or at least that's what it said on the envelope. She told me to go out and take a left where I would see our Coach transfers. So, we gathered our luggage again and I went to see them, telling my mom and Steven to hang back. I told them we were here for our Coach transfers. I gave them mom's name first and they said they had her and confirmed that she was going to CBR, that was correct, they would also be picking her up from CBR in a weeks time, not correct, I explained to them that we would be moving to POFQ after 3 nights so she would need to be picked up from there. She seemed a bit confused but changed the paperwork to reflect our move. She then went on to us and said we are taking you to Crowne Plaza, not correct, we were going to CBR with my mom! So she said we were getting picked up from POFQ, not correct again, we were getting picked up from Crowne Plaza. I shown her my most recent paperwork which detailed my transfers, she sighed and said that the agency had not notified them of these changes but she would change all the documentation for me. Strike one for our travel agency!:angry:
She advised me that we would all be travelling in the same coach. Really? I informed her that I had been advised otherwise but she said that if we are all going to the same place then we would be travelling in the same coach. Okay, it worked better for us so I didn't complain.
After all that we moved round the corner to catch our coach. I couldn't see any driver there anywhere, so we saw our coach and started loading our luggage. A few minutes later the driver came up to us and said we couldn't load it ourselves as all the bags are in order of drop off, oops, we didn't know that. So he unloaded and reloaded our luggage, oh well!
Here is a pic of our coach:
We gave him our transfer tickets and boarded. The welcome agent came on the coach along with several other passengers, she picked up her mike and started going on about the welcome meeting etc, I never go to these things, I lose too much precious time when we have a schedule to work from
Anyway she wishes us all a great trip and leaves the coach, then we're on our way
I decide to look at my welcome pack and open it to find one sheet of paper with telephone numbers to call if we have any problems or emergencies. Okay where were my tickets? Where were my other welcoming things? My travel agancy did not explain the 'key to the world' cards. I had never stayed on Disney property before so was unaware that my theme park tickets would be on my room key. I paniced, where were my tickets?, I needed them for that night, I knew I didn't have the energy to discuss all this with my ground agent. All I wanted to do was get to the hotel and relax.
I started getting agitated, the coach driver comes over the mic telling us that CBR would be his 4th stop, ETA, 5.30pm. WHAT? I had 'Ohana reservations at 7pm, there is no way we could make it, not if I had another crisis on my hands with tickets. I wanted a shower, to change, I wanted a nap god dammit! How is that possible? We arrived at 2.05 pm, I thought I had made my reservation in plenty of time, great, everything is falling apart.
My mini meltdown became apparent and Steven started saying we would never make it to 'Ohanas for 7pm. WHAT? Don't be silly of course we will, even though I knew he was right, I didn't want to admit it. I tell them 'Ohanas is just a bus journey away from the hotel. My mom looks at me and says "but I thought you booked a restaurant at the hotel"
"No, when did I ever say that, I have told you all for months where we are eating"
"Oh but I'm too tired to go out of the hotel, I thought you would have booked one there, what posessed you to book one far away"?
My good manner was about to falter, I was tired and annoyed and my mom was acting like I hadn't told her squat. I had made sure everyone was well aware of the plans I had made and now all I could see was them getting flushed down the toilet. I wanted to scream
Calmly I said "It is not far away, it is one bus ride away, I have had this reservation for 180 days, I don't want to eat at the hotel as I've read that the restaurant there sux, okay?"
As an afterthought I said "Why don't you stay home then and Steven and I will go out to eat?"
I didn't mean to sound annoyed or say anything like that, but I felt like I was going to explode. All I could hear were all the conversations of the past four months or so circling in my head, all the conversations where I told my mom what we were doing, when we were doing it, and she looked at me as if I had roaches crawling out of my ears when I mentioned the restaurant.
I really wanted to go to 'Ohanas but I knew deep down that we wouldn't make it. I asked Steven if he thought I should try and call and we could make it for 8pm, he said I could if I really wanted too.
My mom said she was too tired to go anywhere and wanted to go back and sleep, so I relented and agreed that we wouldn't go to 'Ohanas. I said if we were hungry later on we would just grab something at CBR.
I went quiet, something I always do when I am fuming, I looked out the window at the scenery and houses passing by. We stopped off at AKL first, then All Star Sports then Pop Century. I was already disappointed and started to worry about what was to come when I arrived at CBR...