Therefore, we decided to go on VRBO.com and rent a condo at the Wyndham Bonnet Creek Resort. It's nicely located among all of the Disney resorts. There are no free Disney buses or ferries that service the Wyndham, but we already had transportation with our rental car. We would have to pay $20 to park each day at the Disney parks. But, that price was well worth it as our condo was only about $250 per day.
We could only schedule our fastpasses+ a month in advance since we would not be staying on a Disney property. Therefore, The Wife bought a copy of the Unofficial Guide to Disney World and used touringplans.com to help us create an efficient itinerary for visiting the parks.
With no further plans to visit Universal Studios, we were finally able to sleep in late for the first time on our vacation. We checked out from the Loews Royal Pacific Resort mid-morning and drove a few minutes to the Orlando International Premium Outlets. Although we did find some good deals there, the Orlando Vineland Premium Outlets that we had visited a few days before is definitely the better of the two malls.
Afterwards, we checked into the Wyndham Bonnet Creek Resort. The guest relations person offered us a free breakfast in exchange for listening to their time share spiel. We didn't bite.
The condo was spacious with a full kitchen, two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a washer and dryer, and plenty of room for each one of us to spread out. The only negative was that we were given a room facing the parking lot instead of the pool.
The Kids and I spent some time at the resort's pool and lazy river. Although the water was heated, it was still chilly because of the cool afternoon air and overcast sky. The Kids weren't impressed by the lazy river because there were "too many old people in there." There were indeed many elderly retirees inhabiting the resort during our time there. I'd rather have them than a bunch of screaming kids.
Despite my protests, The Wife and The Kids insisted on dining at Chef Mickey's at Disney's Contemporary Resort. The restaurant is a classic experience recommended for visitors to Disney World. It's a chance for kids to interact with and take pictures with Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, Pluto, and Goofy. However, we had already visited this buffet-style restaurant back in 2008 when The Kids were toddlers. I really didn't see why we had to do it all again--especially at a price tag of $60 per adult.
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| The Kids enjoyed their visit with Pluto and the gang. |
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| As far back as 2008, The Girl has never been... |
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| ...a big fan of Minnie Mouse. |
The food was pretty good, especially taking into consideration that it is buffet-style. We urged The Kids to eat more and more to get their money's worth for the high cost of dining there.
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| We did make sure that we saved enough room for the many dessert options. |
*****
Tuesday, March 8, 2016
We had to wake up early once again as we had planned a full, busy day at the Magic Kingdom. Although the park wouldn't open until 9 AM, we had reservations for breakfast an hour earlier at Cinderella's Royal Table which is located inside her castle. We drove to the Disney Transportation and Ticket Center where we parked our car. Then we hustled onto a ferry that took us to the gates of the Magic Kingdom.
Even though it wasn't even 8 AM yet, there were several queues of people already lining up to get into the park. Since we had advance dining reservations, we were allowed through. It was nice to be able to go inside before the huge throngs overwhelmed the park.
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| We took a picture in front of the restaurant. |
Scenes from the Cinderella tale adorn the walls of the passageway that cuts through the castle.
But, the main reason we were eating at Cinderella's Royal Table was that The Wife wanted to see what it looked like inside.
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| Upon entering the eatery, diners must first queue up for photos with the owner of the restaurant. |
Since Cinderella is now a princess, I presumed that she would be too uppity to do any more cleaning. I was concerned whether the restaurant would meet all of the health code regulations.
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| My fears were confirmed as I spotted two rodents audaciously perched on a wall for all the diners to see. |
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| Who knows what horrors lurked in a bathroom that Cinderella is no longer cleaning! |
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| The dining room of the restaurant was spacious and befitting of a despot. |
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| Our server brought over some dangerous weapons for The Kids. In Cinderella's medieval world that is nasty, brutish, and short, it is important to train people at an early age in self-defense. |
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| Each table was given orange juice and a heaping blast of carbohydrates. |
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| The management must have sensed our concerns regarding their rodent infestation. They mocked us by giving us a rat-shaped muffin. |
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| Kids menu frittata with fruit yogurt. |
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| Caramel apple-stuffed French toast with bacon. |
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| Shrimp and grits with a poached egg. |
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| Beef tenderloin served on a potato and cheese frittata. |
While we tried to enjoy our breakfast, a couple of homeless princesses went table-to-table interrupting all the guests. I believe these down-on-their-luck royals were pan-handling.
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| This one was eyeing The Girl's gold necklace. I suspect that she would have grabbed it if there weren't so many people around. |
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| Even The Girl couldn't help but stare at Jasmine's incredible abs. Did Genie give her an ab roller? |
Luckily, none of us got food poisoning from our trip to Cinderella's Royal Table. The food was actually pretty good and was worth the early wake up call. It was almost 9 AM when we left the restaurant. We could see throngs of people in the distance heading our way as the gates to Disney World were opened.
Neither of The Kids really cared too much about meeting any of the Disney characters. That was a relief for us as the wait times to meet them could really eat up most of our day. One of the longest queues in the past two years has been at the Princess Fairytale Hall, specifically the side containing Anna and Elsa from Frozen. We planned on skipping that area when we did our touring plan.
However, we found ourselves right outside the Fairytale Hall at opening time without a line. Why the heck not. We got in line and did the meet and greet, all of which took less than 15 minutes. It would have been a little faster if The Boy could stop stepping on Elsa's dress. In his defense, she does need a new tailor as her current one has overestimated the length of her legs.
I was a little curious why Anna, who is obviously Scandinavian, reads books in German and saluted us in such a peculiar manner.
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| As we left the Fairytale Hall, the line didn't look too bad outside. But, the wait time now showed 60 minutes. |
Our visit to see the Frozen characters had us starting our touring plan a few minutes late, but we were soon off to the races. We blitzed through a plethora of rides and shows--Winnie the Pooh, Mickey's Philharmonic, The little Mermaid, etc. The Peter Pan ride was so lame, that I felt silly using a fastpass on it (recommended by touringplans.com). However, I changed my tune later in the day when I saw the wait times were over 60 minutes for it. Using a fastpass on the Enchanted Tales of Belle was worth it as The Girl had fun participating. The Boy didn't as he was too cool for school.
We worked our way through the rides from Fantasyland down to Tomorrowland (Clooney wasn't there). Although a lot of the rides were pretty cheesy, they did bring back memories from when The Kids were much smaller (and we were both skinnier) back in 2008. I think they were better able to appreciate the rides this time around.
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| Mad Tea Party 2008. |
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| Mad Tea Party 2016. |
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| Dumbo the Flying Elephant 2008. |
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| Dumbo the Flying Elephant 2016. |
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| The Magic Carpets of Aladdin 2008. |
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| The Magic Carpets of Aladdin 2016 |
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| Goofy's Barnstormer 2008. |
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| Goofy's Barnstormer 2016. |
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| The Sword in the Stone 2008. |
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| Still not strong enough in 2016. |
Judging by those pictures, you would think that The Kids spent half of their lives crying. That assessment would be absolutely correct. As we neared Space Mountain, The Girl started getting teary-eyed because we insisted that she had to ride it. It has been the signature roller-coaster at the Magic Kingdom for decades. Albeit, it has changed significantly since I last rode it over 30 years ago. We reassured her that, unlike Universal Studios, there are no scary rides at Disney. How bad can a rollercoaster be if you don't have to check your bags in a locker. Sure enough, she and the rest of the family survived Space Mountain. Nobody was lost in one of the infinite corners of the galaxy.
Since that was our third fastpass. We used the fastpass machines in Tomorrowland to register for more and more fastpasses. This allowed us to bypass the long lines that were forming midday. This allowed us to ride the Tomorrowland Speedway, Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Carribean, and It's A Small World with very little wait. Altogether, we plowed through 13 fastpasses by the end of the day.
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| It was finally nice to get to relax in the passenger seat instead of having to do all the driving. |
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| We took a short break to see a parade travel through the streets of Frontierland. |
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| We enjoyed some refreshing Dole Whip while we watched. |
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| Just like the Deep South, the animal world is also plagued by poverty, incest, and illiteracy. |
We had advanced dining reservations for dinner at the Be Our Guest restaurant. Apparently it is a popular place as there was a long line of people trying to get last minute seats. We even overheard one guy ask if there was a fastpass option for the restaurant.
The interior of the restaurant is supposed to mimic the castle in "Beauty and the Beast."
The Wife was excited to see all the allusions to the movie. She was then appalled to find out that I have never seen "Beauty and the Beast," so I didn't know what all the fuss was about.
The food is French-inspired and tasty. The Wife was excited to try one of their desserts known as the "gray stuff." Apparently it is an allusion to one of the songs in the film. I think it's just cookies and cream mousse.
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| French onion soup. |
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| Potato and leek soup. |
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| Mickey meatloaf from the kid's menu. |
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| Layered ratatouille. |
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| Spiced-rubbed pork chop. |
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| Roasted rack of lamb. |
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| Their signature drink is an all-natural lemonade with wildberry foam. |
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| For dessert we picked the lemon-meringue cupcake, triple chocolate cupcake, and the "grey stuff." |
After we finished dinner, we were told that we could meet "The Beast" before we left. I was hoping for Dr. Hank McCoy, but all we got was some random dude named Adam.
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| Supposedly, these suits of armor will talk. They must not have liked me because all I heard was crickets. |
We stuck around in the park to see the Main Street Electrical Parade followed by the Wishes Nighttime Spectacular. The parade was forgettable. But I did enjoy the latter show as images of various Disney movies were projected on the walls of Cinderella's castle. Plus, there was plenty of fireworks afterwards, and everybody likes explosions.
Once the shows were over, we fought the massive herd of people leaving the park. It took us another thirty minutes to get on the monorail to take us back to the Transportation and Ticket Center and our parked car. It turned out to be a very long day for us and we were exhausted. According to my phone, we ended up walking over 27,000 steps equivalent to 11 miles.
*****
Wednesday, March 9, 2016
We were planning to take a much more leisurely pace visiting Epcot. When we had last visited in 2008, I wasn't really impressed with this park. I was hoping that I would like it better this time around. The disappointment started before we had even made it to the park. Soarin', one of their premier rides, was closed for routine maintenance. This meant that all of the few remaining attractions would be that much more crowded.
We arrived around the time of park opening at 9 AM. Once inside, we headed straight for Test Track. There was almost no line there that early in the morning. The Kids had fun designing their own vehicles. The Boy and I teamed up against The Wife and The Girl. The specifications didn't affect the ride at all, which wasn't really thrilling at all. However, we still had fun. Our rocket-fast race car destroyed their fuel-economic family wagon.
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| As Jeremy Clarkson would often say: "POWER!!" |
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| This futuristic soccer-mom vehicle with butterfly decals is a best-seller in Loserville. |
We did a couple more rides like Spaceship Earth. Who knew that the history of mankind could be so boring. Then, we used our fastpasses to ride Mission Space, a space shuttle simulator hosted by Gary Sinise (Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon, and Bill Paxton must not have been available). Our only job was to push a few buttons when they lit. I intentionally didn't punch mine on time. But, try as I might, I still couldn't crash our spaceship. We chose the "Orange" side over the "Green" because we didn't really think that the extra centrifugal motion would be a big deal. Boy were we wrong. The Wife and I were really dizzy afterwards. Surprisingly, neither of The Kids were affected, given that they are more prone to motion-sickness.
Feeling a bit nauseous from the ride, we decided to visit Ellen's Energy Adventure. We figured that a 45 minute ride where we had to do nothing would be great for our headaches. Another bad idea. The audio and sound-effects were so loud that it made my head pound even more. It took a couple of hours more before both of us felt well again.
We stopped at Agent P's World Showcase Adventure and were given a smartphone that led The Kids on a "secret mission." Based on the Phineas and Ferb cartoon, the missions instructed users to perform various tasks at the Mexico, China, Germany, France, and U.K. pavilions. I guess the game was a good way to keep smaller children occupied while their parents perused the shops and restaurants.
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| We were able to thwart Dr. Doofenshmirtz at every country he could be found. |
Frankly, I wasn't too impressed by the different showcases. There's nothing very exotic or revealing about the countries that are on display. Is Canadian culture that much different from the U.S. eh?
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| These giant trolls in the Norway area are some of the few interesting aspects of Epcot. |
I was hoping that the food would be more exciting. But with the exception of a few items, most of the offerings can be found within any decent-sized American town.
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| Cronut--the fad pastry of 2013. |
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| School bread from the Norway showcase. |
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| Currywurst from Germany. |
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| The French take on an ice-cream sandwich--the croque glaces. |
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| The croque glaces is made by scooping ice cream into a brioche bun... |
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| ...and then smashing it together panini-style. |
In my opinion, the most impressive things at Epcot are their topiaries. However, they may be there just temporarily for the annual International Flower and Garden show. There were ornate characters from Disney Lore covered in colorful vegetation. Indeed, the groundskeepers at Disney keep the flowerbeds and lawns beautiful.
A relaxing day at Epcot it was not. We actually exceeded the previous day by walking over 31,000 steps or 12.5 miles. We decided to skip the nighttime Illuminations show, and left the park in the late afternoon. In retrospect, my opinion of Epcot has remained unchanged. It is still my least favorite Disney park.
We decided to head over to Disney Springs (formerly known as Downtown Disney) to do some shopping and have dinner. This impromptu decision was probably ill-advised. Many of the restaurants there were either fully reserved or had waits of over an hour. We settled on the T-Rex Cafe, a Landry's-owned theme restaurant with only two locations. I was infatuated with dinosaurs when I was much younger, but even I was skeptical over this kitschy theme.
The wait was still 45 minutes, so we visited the adjacent LEGO store. The place was absolutely packed and bustling. We noticed that the large outdoor displays built out of these miniature blocks were different and even better than in 2008 when we last visited.
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| Why doesn't anybody ever make a LEGO Bruce Banner? |
Eventually our number was called for the T-Rex Cafe. We were instructed to stand in another line until a server came to seat us. Inside, the restaurant was huge and chaotic. It was decorated with noisy animatronic dinosaurs, large fish tanks, and funky-colored lighting. Perhaps the over-stimulation was compensating for something lacking. It would have been really cool if any of us were 5 years old. But we were all older and way more tired from our long day.
The food was meh and overpriced. The menu was pretty busy with many options consisting of standard chain-restaurant American fare.
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| Rocksy's pasta with alfredo sauce from the kid's menu. |
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| Cosmo's cheesy macaroni from the kid's menu. |
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| Penne with shrimp. |
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| Steak, shrump, and baked scallops. |
Overall, none of us, not even The Kids, were impressed by our dining experience. It was a lot of show but very little substance. Just like its namesake, the T-Rex Cafe should probably go extinct.
*****
Thursday, March 10, 2016
We found ourselves back at the Magic Kingdom to do all the rides that we had missed two days before. On that day, we had noticed that the standby waiting line for the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train was consistently 90 minutes or longer. Luckily we procured early fastpasses for this morning and breezed through the line. The Girl was afraid yet again of the roller coaster so we had to coax her into going on it. How scary can a pack of single, subterranean-dwelling humanoids wielding sharp pickaxes be? I think the picture below speaks for itself.
I'll be the first to admit that I have a severe allergy to forking over $15 dollars to a wealthy corporation just to get a measly picture. However, the expressions of terror on The Wife and The Girl's faces are priceless.
They both skipped Splash Mountain which was five seconds of fun surrounded by 15 minutes of utter boredom. In fairness, they did ride Big Thunder Mountain which is probably one of the best rides at Magic Kingdom.
We finished seeing pretty much everything at Magic Kingdom, and it wasn't even noon. We decided to leave the park and just spend the afternoon back at the Wyndham resort. I was able to make lunch and dinner using our kitchen. It would be our most relaxing and most inexpensive day of our vacation.
*****
Friday, March 11, 2016
The day started out hot, and it just kept getting hotter. We had plans to see the Animal Kingdom park. Unlike the other Disney sites, this one would close much earlier at 7 PM. Additionally, many of the attractions featuring animals stopped running as early as 5:30 PM. However, we weren't going to stay the whole time as we had advanced dining reservations at 6:30 PM. Using our touring plans app, I realized that we would have to hustle to make all the shows and rides.
Our first stop was to pick up a Wilderness Explorers manual for The Kids. Throughout the park, there are brief activities and simple tasks that can be accomplished to get stickers for the book. The Kids were at the appropriate age where it would help them learn a few things. The only downside is that some of the stations were poorly marked causing us to miss them in the crowded park. This led to some backtracking and wasted time.
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| A Wilderness Explorer instructor rewards The Kids with a sticker for completing an activity. |
Our first attraction of the day was Dinosaur. The prehistoric statues and skeletons that adorned the area were better than the ride itself. Essentially, we were seated in a car that had no shock absorbers. For the entire ride, we were just jostled around while loud animatronic dinosaur bodies popped out from the dark walls. It was really lame.
A much better ride was the nearby Primeval Whirl. This mild version of a roller coaster dropped our car and spun it around in a non-terrifying fashion.
We had to hustle all the way to the other end of the park to catch the hourly showing of the Festival of the Lion King. The Girl knew all of the words to the songs since she recently played young Nala in her school's rendition of this musical.
We used one of our fastpasses on the very popular Kilimanjaro Safaris. We were herded on a bus that drove us past several African animals. It was just like our prior journey to Tanzania sans the blood, gore, and countless hours looking for something to see. It was a perfect safari adventure for folks with ADHD.
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| Giraffes are cool. |
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| Zebras...not so much. |
We hiked through the Pangani Forest Exploration Trail and the Maharajah Jungle Trek, taking in the different wildlife while The Kids filled up their Wilderness Explorers manual full of stickers. We traveled on the Wildlife Express Train to the Conservation Station. Besides a petting zoo and several more displays, some staffers tried conning The Kids into joining the honorary "Lion Guard." Prospective inductees would have to travel the park looking for animal characters that represent the inspirational traits of this organization. It sounded like another wild goose chase, so we blew off that task. Besides, I learned a long time ago to never volunteer for anything that had even the smallest hint of work or danger.
The only premier ride open at the Animal Kingdom that day was Expedition Everest. The Wife and The Girl refused to go on this roller coaster. It was their loss as the ride was actually thrilling and fun. Unfortunately, the only other good ride, the Kali River Rapids, was inexplicably closed for the week. It was a big loss, because we all would have loved to cool down from the sweltering afternoon sun.
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| The Boy had to resort to alternative means to get respite from the heat. |
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| This hippopotamus was much luckier, staying cool in a tank full of African cichlids. |
By the end of our visit, The Kids had collected all 30+ Wilderness Explorers stickers. They were sworn in to take the WE oath. Then they were given their reward for this arduous accomplishment:
Drum roll...wait for it...wait for it...wait for it...ANOTHER STICKER!
Our next stop was the Animal Kingdom Lodge where we had reservations for dinner at Jiko - The Cooking Place. This restaurant is considered by many to be one of the best Disney dining options, and the price reflects it. The Wife and I were curious to see how the folks at Disney would be able to elevate African cuisine. Pretty much all the native Tanzanian food that we had eaten a few years back was as simplistic and rustic as it gets.
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| The ceiling decor is supposed to represent a flock of birds. |
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| A medley of African-inspired dips with khobz, lavash, and naan breads. |
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| Inguday tibs and brik (mushrooms, spinach and cheese in a filo dough). |
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| Pan-seared scallops with ancient grains from the kids menu. |
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| Grilled steak with ancient grains from the kids menu. |
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| Botswana-style Seswaa beef short ribs. |
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| West African-style spiced lamb shank |
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| Puff puff dippers (Nigerian-style donuts with caramel, chocolate mousse, and strawberry dipping sauces). |
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| Tanzanian chocolate brownie with a paintbrush to apply assorted fruit-flavored "paint" to the chocolate. |
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| Complimentary coconut and passion fruit macaroons. |
Both the food and the service at Jiko were excellent. Although the meal was expensive, it was on par with Chef Mickey's and Be Our Guest. The only difference is that we were paying for good food instead of random people in costumes.
*****
Saturday, March 12, 2016
After a week of constant theme parks, we were definitely getting weary of the experience. However, we still had one last day of Disney left. We would be spending the day at Hollywood Studios. As is our modus operandi, we arrived at the park just as it opened. The Boy and I made a beeline over to the Rock 'n' Roller Coaster. This Aerosmith themed ride started out with a rush as the ride went from 0 to 57 miles per hour in under three seconds. The remainder of the ride wasn't too bad, but it still wouldn't be fun for those who don't enjoy roller coasters.
Since we were in the neighborhood already, The Boy and I rode the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror. It's a longer ride compared to Dr. Doom's Fearfall at nearby Universal Studios, but it is nowhere close to being as gut-wrenching.
The best ride of them all was Toy Story Mania, a shooting game, fun for all ages. It's a good thing that we had fastpasses as the standby wait time was already an hour. I thought I was pretty hot stuff scoring over 100,000 points and edging The Wife out by a mere 1,000. However, I was shocked to see that the highest score posted in the last hour alone was well over 200,000 points.
The wait for the Great Movie Ride, an homage to the golden age of cinema, was surprisingly long. The Kids had never heard about the majority of the movies that they profiled. Afterwards, The Girl enjoyed the Beauty and the Beast-Live On Stage show and the Frozen Sing-Along Celebration. The Boy thought that the Lights, Motors, Action! Extreme Stunt Show and the Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular! were pretty cool. Although those attractions have been around forever, the difficulty of those stunts keep them entertaining and fresh. I myself enjoyed MuppetVision 3D because I was able to take a much-needed nap in the comfortable theater seats.
We had reservations for dinner at the Brown Derby restaurant as part of the Fantasmic! dinner package. The Wife really liked the food when we last ate there in 2008, so she wanted to go back again. The food and service did not disappoint. Our server was an older, gregarious lady from Taiwan who was great with The Kids. With this package, we all had an appetizer, main course, and dessert for a set price.
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| Chicken noodle soup from the kids menu. |
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| The Cobb salad, invented by the original Borwn Derby restaurant. |
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| Cripsy jumbo lump crab cakes. |
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| Togarashi-pumpkin seed encrusted Ahi tuna. |
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| Charred filet of beef with mashed potatoes. |
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| Pan-seared grouper with half a lobster tail. |
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| Mini dessert trio: grapefruit cake, vanilla creme brulee, and chocolate mascarpone sphere. |
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| Hidden Treasures (vanilla ice cream, oreo cookie crumbles, chocolate chip cookie, and gummy worms). |
After we finished our meal, we had plenty of time to visit the Star Wars Launch Bay, a new exhibit that opened just a few months before. I tried in vain to convince the rest of the family to wait in a 20 minute line to meet either Kylo Ren or Chewbacca. They were okay meeting a bunch of lame "princesses," but they couldn't wait a couple of minutes to meet a wookiee! It's not like we're going to be anywhere close to Kashyyyk anytime soon.
We did spend ample time looking over the displays of Star Wars memorabilia. A nerdy Disney employee was on hand answering all of the guests' questions. I urged The Wife to ask him where they keep all the Klingon or Minbari gear, but she refused to stoop to my level of stupidity.
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| There's no way that this heap of junk made the Kessel Run in less than 12 parsecs. |
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| Why do the bad guys always look so good? |
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| The gun that was fired first. |
Outside the Star Wars Docking Bay were a couple of Stormtroopers on patrol. They randomly stopped and harassed the occasional tourist. Too bad that they wouldn't stop for pictures as they were all business.
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| These are not the kids you're looking for. |
It was finally time for us to go see the Fantasmic! show. There was a special section set off for those who purchased the dinner package. We conveniently found a spot four rows from the front.
The plot was a little nebulous, but I think it revolved around Mickey taking Chantix, the anti-smoking medication that can cause weird dreams. Mickey's thoughts are initially nice and happy, but he soon starts tripping out. Villains from several Disney movies began appearing in his nightmare.
This is all depicted using jets of water as a projection screen. We were so close that we could feel the spray of the water and the drop in the air temperature. When Mickey battles Maleficent in the form of a dragon, we were hit with a blast of intense heat from the flames.
Eventually Mickey prevails, and a random steamboat full of Disney characters arrive. This is followed by a barrage of fireworks. This dream sequence was pretty surreal. Mickey must have had a little bit of whiskey with his Chantix.
After the Fantasmic! show ended, we walked back to the Chinese Theater at the center of the park to watch Star Wars: A Galactic Spectacular. This was a lengthy fireworks display that was set to the music of Star Wars. I guess it's a little like interpretive dance. I really don't understand how a bunch of explosions can convey the plot of a movie. Either way, fireworks are always fun to watch, and it was a good way to conclude our experience at Disney World.
*****
Sunday, March 13, 2016
Our journey was not yet over. We still had to fly from Orlando back to Tennessee...on our old nemesis United Airlines. For only $160 per person, we would be flying through Houston on our way home. This one-stop itinerary would save us $500 compared to a direct flight with Southwest Airlines. The first leg would leave at 1 PM so we had plenty of time to sleep in and check out of the Wyndham Bonnet Creek Resort. The management tried one last time to get us to listen to their time share spiel, but we declined.
We drove our rental car to a gas station close to the airport. I swiped my credit card and was about to start pumping gas, when I saw the price. It was over $5 per gallon for regular gas. I had to do a double-take to believe what I was seeing. It was an awful case of price-gouging. Sadly, this was not a new phenomenon for this gas station. I cancelled the transaction and drove a couple more blocks to another establishment where the price was less than $2 per gallon.
On the way to the airport, we received text updates from United Airlines informing us that our flight to Houston was delayed. We had a three hour layover there, so we were certain that everything would be fine. We dropped our rental car off at the airport. But those texts kept informing us that the delay was getting longer and longer.
We were starting to get worried about our flights, so we tried speaking with a real, live person at the United Airlines counter. We noticed that there was an earlier flight to Houston, so we wanted to see if we could get on that one instead. It didn't leave for another hour. We waited and waited in the customer assistance line for the next 25 minutes as there was only one representative to actually handle customers. There were other United employees milling around, but nobody else directly helping customers. When it was finally our turn, the lady at the counter confirmed that there was indeed enough seats for all four of us on the earlier flight to Houston, but she couldn't put us on it because there was no way we could get through security in time. She said that it would take us about an hour to get through the long TSA line and ride the tram to our gate. I was pissed because we would have had plenty of time to go through security if United just had enough representatives available to assist customers. Nevertheless, I implored her to let us try, but she steadfastly refused my request. Instead, she made us check our bags onto our original flight which kept getting delayed more and more.
Twenty minutes later, not only were we already through security, we were also standing outside the gate for the earlier flight to Houston. I asked the man at the desk if he could get the four of us on the flight. He said, "Sure, as long as you didn't check any bags in already." Sigh. We sure did. For security reasons, we couldn't board this flight while our bags were on a different one. A few minutes later, we watched despondently as that earlier flight left the gate.
It finally became official. Our flight was delayed so long that we had no way of making our connection. After considering our options, The Wife found a rental car on Alamo for only $25 dollars. We planned on driving the 12 hours back home. However, we still had to get our luggage. We had to wait once again in the customer service line for the next 30 minutes as another single representative serviced a 15 person queue.
Instead of requesting our luggage, I insisted that they find any other routes to get us home sometime that evening. Luckily there was a flight on Delta going through Atlanta that would arrive at 10:30 PM. Sold. Since it was United's fault (mechanical problems), each of us was given a whopping $10 food voucher for our trouble. I normally would say "Don't spend it all on one place." But in reality, the voucher could only be used at a single location, and no change would be given.
We had to leave the terminal, check in at the Delta counter, and then reenter through security. We had several hours to kill before our next flight, but we finally made it to Atlanta. We transferred from there to our flight home without any problems.
As we made our final approach, the plane had to circle several times as there was inclement weather causing tornado warnings. After what seemed like an eternity, the plane was diverted to Huntsville, Alabama to land and refill. We sat on the tarmac for another 2 hours waiting to see if the weather would clear up so that we could make it to our final destination. The airplane's crew were able to procure some snacks from the airport and started distributing it. Finally, the pilot gave us the good news that we were cleared for take-off. It was almost 2 AM when the plane finally landed.
Our misery wasn't over yet. It was close to impossible to find a taxi that early in the morning. All the cabs had left the airport by then. The Wife called every taxi company available before some cabs started slowly trickling in. Eventually, it was our turn and we finally made it to our house.
As I collapsed in my bed that night after such a long ordeal, I realized that we had indeed made it to the Happiest Place on Earth--our home.
