What a great day!
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I’m so glad DD seems ok! Falls like that are very scary.
Thanks for sharing your trip with us! Looks like such a special time together.
How much time would you say to budget for a round of mini golf at Fantasia Gardens?
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Thanks, she seems 99% better. As for the golf I’d say about 90 minutes to play all 18 holes. It wasn’t very busy at that time but the 2 of us where behind 2 larger groups of 5. If nobody in front of us we could have done it in an hour.
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I’m obsessed with this post. My dad and I rarely spent father/daughter time.
I’m glad your daughter isn’t seriously injured.
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Super nice job on the convention tickets / EPCOT pivot!
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Final day (supposedly) was quite an event. Original plans were wake up late, pack and check bags with BS @ YC, head to SAB for a few hours, then hop a bus to DS for some shopping, sushi and bowling at Splitsville before bussing back to YC to grab bags and an Uber to MCO for an 8pm flight!! Sounds pretty laid back right?? Yeah not so much.
Everything went smoothly until it was time to catch the bus to DS from YC. We spent a little extra time at SAB (I mean, can you blame us??) We had a 2:15pm Splitsville ADR and I figured it would be quicker to hail an Uber. So we walked out to the front of YC and for some strange reason I handed my baggage claim ticket to BS. (Why did I do that?? It wasn’t part of the plan. Just a plain old brain fart) I ordered the Uber and it showed up in 1 minute, threw the bags in the trunk, and about half way there I’m thinking to myself…" Why the hell did I grab the bags?? Now I’m gonna being lugging these bags all around DS".
(Since the subject is brought up… Why the heck doesn’t DS have a place you can check bags?? ) Seems like it could be lucrative. Maybe a future business venture?? Who wants in??
Anyway, I tell driver I’m gonna switch the DS dropoff to SSR. Figure I’ll check the bags there, walk over to DS, walk back to DS and grab the Uber to MCO from there.
Thinking on the fly in true liner fashion.
Get to SSR and BS is asking me about reservation. I tell him no reservations, just checking the bags. Says we need a reservation. I say nicely, since when?? He says to check bags you need to be a resort guest. I said, listen I just checked out of YC, we are going over to the golf pro shop to grab some souvenirs, maybe have a bight to eat at the QS, and possible a stroll over to DS. I’m just looking to check the bags for a few hours and I reach into my pocket and pull out a $10 bill. His demeanor changed and gladly accepted the bags and my $10. It’s about 1:50 and we’ve got 25 minutes til our Splitsville ADR, I could walk through Congress Park and enter DS in the East Side then haul it over to the West Side or… I could take the path directly over to the West Side. “2nd mistake”… We walk all the way to the treehouse villas, over the bridge and take the path over to the Strawberry parking lot. Along the path I noticed the other bridge near the golf pro shop was open and that would of saved us about 10 minutes. WHATEVER!!! It’s now about 2:10 and as we approach DS I notice a security guard standing by the entrance near the entrance. We can see Splitsville about 100’ away. The guard says “you can’t enter here you have to around”. I say “you gotta be kidding me”. I show him the ADR, I point to Splitsville, which is right there. I offer to have him check the small backpack I’m carrying with only water bottles in it. No dice!!! He reroutes us around the Cirqu de Soleil building, all the way through the orange garage so we can walk through a metal detector. Anyway, 15 minutes late for the Splitsville ADR but it was dead and it wasn’t an issue. DD decided not to bowl because of her back so we just opted to dine. Sushi was great. I had the yum yum tempora shrimp and DD had the same but with a couple pieces of filet.
As I’m waiting on the sandwiches, it’s about 4:30-5:00. Flight leaves at 8:00. We are at the East Side of DS and a short 2alk over to SSR to grab our bags and snag an Uber. Plenty of time to relax at the airport and enjoy my sandwich('s). So I check the Southwest app and notice the flight is delayed about 20 minutes. “Now departing 8:40” . No big deal, check it one more time as we are leaving EoS and now it says " Departing 8:54"… Hmmmm. So we have a seat as we have some time to kill and I’m constantly updating and it keeps changing. 9:06, 9:30, 10:00, 10:30, when it gets to 11:15pm all in the matter of a half hour or so I’m looking at arrival times. “2:30am” now I’m thinking, this flight is gonna get cancelled. We are gonna be stuck at the airport, next flight out is 7:15am with a 10:15am arrival and thats if they can get us on it. I gotta be at work at noon. No calling out, I just got the last 4 days off getting people to cover for me. Brought back memories of one of the last trips DD17 and I took last year when the same thing happened with a last minute cancelled Frontier flight.
So I went into Liner mode. I called SW to see if we could be rebooked on the 7am flight. Got the automated message saying “all lines are full but we can call you back in appx. 20 minutes” Sure why not?? I mean this is how my days going anyway. So as I’m waiting for the call we are walking over to SSR to grab our bags and I jump on the Hotwire site to see what’s available. “Perfect!!! PoP at $76 is there so I start the process” halfway through I get the callback from SW. No problem Mr Jones. we can reschedule your flight but not the A35-36 Early Bird BG you got. No problem, just do it. Get it switched, hop onto the SW app to check in and we get C-34,35. Oh well. Now back to the Hotwire App. WTF!! Pop no longer available??? So I back out and search again… Ah, there it is!!! Booked. Check my emails for the confirmation #, now hop on the MDE app to link the room. Almost at SSR bell services to pick up bags. MDE doesn’t recognize the confirmation #. No worries it’s still early. Just booked it 5 minutes ago. Grabbed our bags and hopped onto the Uber app to grab a ride over to Pop. Still trying to link the room to DME while waiting for Uber. No dice. So I try the website, no dice. Got me thinking I was going to have to call HW and have them call Disney to get it all straightened out. Read a post or 2 in chat where this happened to a couple of Liners. On the way to Pop I figured out the problem. Earlier, I read off the confirmation to DD17 to write down so I could enter it when it was time to link it. I asked her again to read me the confirmation# and I checked it to the email. 1 digit off. Bingo!!! Room linked, Online check-in competed, hopped on the TP room finder link to see where room was, (view of parking lot) who cares, Lol. Had the Uber driver drop us off right at our door.
All said and done at appx 5pm we were at DS with a delayed flight. Appx an hour later we had rescheduled the flight, booked a room, linked the room, grabbed the bags, ubered to the resort, and we’re in our room. Not too shabby. Hectic as hell, but not too shabby.
Anyway, we hit the bowling pin pool at the 50’s building we were staying at, headed over to the food court 5o fill up our mugs one last time and headed back to the room, showered, ate our EoS sandwiches and called it a night. I scheduled a 5am Uber pickup to MCO. ($37 btw) tip additional. Arrived around 4:55, made it to the airport with plenty of time to spare, no lines at security but TSA pre check line had about 20 people in it. Upgraded our boarding group to A15-16 for $40 each (ouch). Smooth flight, Landed in PVD by 10am, home by 10:45, off to work by 11:15 and arrived right on time at 12 noon for my 10 hour shift. Adrenaline kept me going all night haha.
That’s a wrap of our trip. A little hectic the last day (also you’ll notice not too many pictures the last day either. The hecticness and lack of photos goes hand in hand) but overall a fun adventure. Lots of firsts for us. CBR, YC, after 5 tix, refillable mugs yay!!!, Mini golf, SAB, F&W, A&C, B&C, Croque Madame (yummy), Someone other than us snagging our RotR BG (thanks Tink), Sushi @ Splitsville, Gideon’s Cookies, and super low crowds with walk ons for just about everything. Ironically enough one of the things that was NOT a first for us was a cancelled flight home, an extra night and rebooking on the fly. Been there done that.
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You’re pretty awesome at thinking on the fly. Thanks for sharing your trip with us.
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ANXIETY!!! So glad you were able to get everything worked out and have a nice end to your trip.
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Awesome report! I love hearing how you finagle everything.
I was thinking of checking my bags into BS at a monorail resort on my departure day over marathon weekend to get in last minute MK time. Now I’m wondering if this will be a problem? I’m staying at POFQ.
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I’ve never heard of it being a problem before.
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Yeah that has NEVER been an issue. I know someone who had their stuff at Contemporary Bell Services for a couple of days once and they were staying at OKW; stored at Contemporary for convenience as related to plans.
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Yup, I think it was a “one off”. Wouldnt deter me from doing it again. And I wouldn’t let it deter you either. I’ve done it plenty of times without issue. Wasn’t an issue this time either, just a CM who needed a little persuasion and education.
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Oh, my gah, are you sure you aren’t UOR? Because that was a rollercoaster!!! LOL!!! Thank you for sharing the very excellent trip report! I enjoyed it, and I hope you did, too!
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LoL, we’ve come to expect the drama on our Daddy/daughter trips. We loved every minute of it.
Funny side story about our last 2 trips together. Last year Frontier cancelled our flight a few hours before leaving. We searched for an on-site hotel but everything was booked. We bounced from resort to resort and ended up at DS. We walked around for a couple hours before I gave up on onsite accommodations and booked us a room across the street at the Wyndham Garden Lake. Unbeknownst to me, DD had a major “bimple issue” going on during the day that I didn’t find out about until after we got home. She was too embarrassed to tell me. For those who aren’t familiar with the term “bimple” it’s a butt pimple and from what I gather it’s quite uncomfortable. Anyway it was the “butt” of a few jokes within the family afterwards… Fast forward a year and this trip also involved a a last minute flight cancellation, and extra night, and DD’s unfortunate butt issue when she slipped and fell on her tailbone @ SAB. We’ve come to the conclusion when we do another Daddy/Daughter trip we are gonna get some extra padding for DD’s backside.
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