♫Our 14 days of Christmas ♫- The journey and arrival!

[Guest]

The Journey-

Cast...
Vicky(moi)- aged 35, loves Disney & being away on vacation with my family .
Chris (dh)- aged 42, secret Disney lover, loves sunshine, hates spending money!
Megan(dd)- aged 14, outgoing friendly teen, absolute coater & ride fanatic, loves spending OUR $$$!
Toby(ds)- aged 8- bubbley little boy, loves LEGO,Little Big Planet & HP, nerf gun addict!

Now between me booking our holiday & actually going away the kids and I had a vacation in the UK also planned in July and we also had our house on the market to sell.

So , planning and booking WDW meals and tickets were at the back of my mind, which isn’t like me at all!

Fast forward to late September , finally in our new home and then finishing the house renovations some 6 week later I could start to think about our xmas vacation.

We were also VERY lucky to have won in a competition a one day/2 park pass for US and IOA!
How exciting as we were planning on going to WWOHP anyways but this just made it seem more real!
I purchased a 3 day MYW park-hopper ticket with the 4th & 5th days free.
We also purchased 4 day US/IOA park-swap tickets, as we thought we would need more than one day to explore WWOHP.
For the first time we were going to see ICE at Gaylord Palms as well.
And MVMCP!

Now as I had left it a wee bit late to do ADR’s there was no way we would be having xmas breakfast/dinner with Mickey so I just did a random search and one restaurant could fit us in at a reasonable hour on xmas day and that was Whispering Canyon Cafe at Wilderness Lodge.
We had been there once before and really enjoyed so I booked us in at 1-20pm.
Enough of my ramblings...


Dec 14th-

The alarm went off at 2-45 am , the taxi was booked for 3-15am!

I hate waking the kids up when they are sleeping , especially Megan! Anyone with a teen daughter will know what I mean.
Tobes is like ‘Mr.Happy’ when he wakes up, don’t know where he gets that from, lol.

It was pitch black and freezing when we left the house and at that hour of the morning you have to be extra careful driving on the motorways due to wandering moose! Luckily we didn’t see any and arrived at the airport in good time.
Now, we had done on-line check-in but Chris insisted we be at the airport way earlier than what we needed to be.
As you can imagine at that hour of the morning the airport wasn’t very busy and we were soon free of our luggage and through security into departures.

This hour of the morning called for some Tim Hortons, just a coffee for Chris & I , the kids had milk and bagels.

The kids played on their nintendo ds’s/itouch and I just sat and people watched.
I was exhausted, having had about 2 hours sleep at the max!

Soon enough it was time to board our flight to Toronto which was on time and as soon as we took off I went to sleep. Tobes fell asleep as well.

Three hours later we landed in Toronto.

I love the fact that we go through US immigration in Toronto, not half as long as when landing in the US from the UK.

We had a 3 hour wait in Toronto before our next flight.But Toronto is a nice airport and we had a nice meal , stretched our legs and then went through to departures, again!
Whilst we were sat there it started to snow outside and I had images of us being stuck in Toronto but they did actually board us on time.
However, once we had boarded the plane it really, really started snowing and they decided to spray the wings with anti-freeze.It took 90 mins, and we couldn’t watch the movies or anything .I really started getting restless but I guess it was better than being delayed even more.

Again on this flight I slept, as did Tobes. Megan & her dad watched movies. It was only 2 hours and 40 mins long and we should of arrived in Orlando at 1-15pm but instead we got off the plane at 3pm.
We were all tired , abit hungry and fed-up at this point and just wanted to be out of the airport asap.

Baggage collected we headed to Dollar to get our car. We usually geta big car as DH does all the driving and he is used to driving his 4x4 at home. Also we had to fit in four suitcases plus hand luggage.
When we went through the exit doors to go to the Dollar parking lot we were hit by that lovely COLD Florida air! What, where was the gorgeous humidity we are used to. Ah well, at least there was blue skies and sunshine!

Chris chose a Ford Escape (I think), similiar to this-


For the first time we were staying at Bahama Bay. Chris seemed to spend forever sorting the sat-nav on his iphone and with quarters in hand(ready for tolls) we left the airport. YAY!

It was beautiful and sunny but still very chilly but seeing some landmarks such as Disney road signs etc just made me smile!
We found our way to Bahama Bay with no problems. I LOVED the area its in because as yet it isn’t built up and there is a beautiful new school just down the road as well. All looks very nice, as did some of the big houses down the road.

Bahama Bay reception building.



Anyways we went to check-in and were immediately impressed with what we saw.The receptionist was a lovely lady and gave us a map and directions to our condo.

So back in the car we drive to our building and we are in a third floor apartment. Now on my itinary from the travel agancy it said 2 bed condo but we actually had a 3 bed superior condo! RESULT!
It was HUGE, very spacious and airy.
We had a master b/room with en-suite & balcony, Megan had a double bedroom and Tobes had a twin bedroom and they shared another bathroom.The kitchen was fully equipped, with everything and very big, not a kitchenette. We had a dining area and a large lounge with everything you could need, this also had a balcony.
There was also a cupboard which contained a washer/dryer as well. We liked it alot.

First thing we do is unpack, well I do anyways and Megan & Tobes sorted out their bedrooms.
We all showered & changed cloths and as we usually do as its tradition we headed to DTD to have a date with the Earl!

Hmmm, well it seemed us and half of Orlando were at DTD that night! Parking lot 1 was showing as full but that doesn’t always mean it is, someone is always going to be leaving! And as luck would have it we found a space and headed into the Marketplace.
By this time it was REALLY cold! I thought I was used to the cold, with living in Newfoundland etc but it was bitter. Luckily we had out winter coats with us .We walked over to The Earl and only had a little wait.
We certainly didn’t want to sit outside so I sent Megan on table duty. I told her not to hover as I find that annoying myself but just to keep her eyes open.
Luckily by the time we had ordered and paid for everything she was waving at us from a table in the corner,.

Chris & I- Holiday Sandwich
Meg- pizza sandwich& fruit cup.
Tobes- cheese grill & fruit cup

I had been dreaming of a Holiday Sandwich for weeks and it didn’t disappoint, om nom nom.

We left the Earl, very full-up and had a wander around. Tobes made some purchases in the pin store and the Lego store, whilst I had to visit the christmas store for a mini-tree I had seen.We also did various other shops. The shops were crazy busy already, I had thought it would still be quiet.



A 'tradional' pic.


We took ourselves off to Goofys for some fudge for later and then we headed to Ghiradelli’s for some hot chocolate as we were frozen.

Tobes and his 'small' cookie



YUM!



Our hot chocolate was delicious and once we finished we made our way back to the car , very cold and tired but also with a warm fuzzy glow as we were finally here and here for xmas as well!

Once back at BB we were out like a light!




Tomorrow its WWOHP!


Much more pics for tomorrow!

thanks for reading. x

[Cannavar]

Great report! The cookie looks amazing!

[Guest]

Great report Vicky

[Tartan Tigger]

Great report. Looking forward to more.

[FLAFantastic]

Mmm, could just eat that cookie!

Good report, looking forward to reading the rest!

AnnMarie

[Juliemack]

...apart from the slight delay, a decent travel day - looking forward to more

[scottishmum]

Great read, I remember Toby,s smile from the last trippie you did lookin forward to more.

[Guest]

Great Day 0 - looking forward to the rest - Love the piccie of the cookie!

[scotsprincess]

great start

[summersun]

great start