Let the adventure begin!

Finally the time had come! It was time for us to go and see Mickey again!

The weather had been rough the days before our trip started, so we were eager to get away from all the ice, snow and cold and experience a bit of fun at the sunshine state. Since our flight out of Linz only left at 11am I had lots of time to pick up some breakfast goodies from our favourite bakery and drive to Tom’s to leave my car there and have breakfast together.

Once we had finished our breakfast we got all our things together, checked all our paper work once again and then set off for the airport. As always we were running late, and when we arrived at the airport we first had to stop at the short term spaces opposite the departure building and checked in our bags. Tom and I had checked in the day before, so everything was set and the bags were on their way in no time. We then took the car to the carpark and walked back to the airport. Once inside we found out that our flight to Frankfurt was already delayed, but only for about 20 minutes, hopefully! We went through security and checked out the Duty Free Store before it was time to get in line to board our plane to Frankfurt. Our seats were towards the back of the plane so we were able to use the back entrance and quickly found our seats. Our snack was already waiting for us on our seats – a Nussini chocolate bar. We did not encounter any more delays and were on our way to Frankfurt only 20 minutes late.

During the short, 55 minute flight we were served some drinks. I had a Coke and Tom had some coffee. We were surprised to find that we landed without any more delays and the bus picked us up at the plane to take us to the airport. It is a long hike all across the airport from the arrival terminal to the long distance flight terminal. Once we had found our gate we had the leftover breakfast rolls we had brought as a snack before finally boarding our plane.

Our seats were towards the back of the plane again and once we were seated we realized that they had a lot of unhappy people who had not checked in the day before and now whole families were seated all over the plane. The flight attendants did their best and I guess solved most of the problems. The plane departed Frankfurt a little late, but the pilot promised to make up for it. Once we had reached cruising altitude we were served some snacks and drinks.

About two hours into the flight they started to serve lunch. Our meal started out with some salad with shrimp and Thousand Island dressing. We also had some rolls with butter and Camembert with it. Tom’s main course was the Beef Stew with Herb Polenta, Broccoli and Carrots and he liked it very much. I had the Pasta with three different sauces, Pesto, Mushroom and Tomato Sauce. It was surprisingly good. For dessert we had the Chocolate Cherry Cake which was moist and nice. After we had finished our lunch we each took two sleeping aids and then dozed off while watching TV. When we both woke up we were about 2 ˝ hours away from Orlando.

Before we landed we were served a light dinner, consisting of Ravioli in a Tomato and Pepper Sauce, which was actually a very nice dish. For dessert we had ricecream. Tom had cherry flavour and mine was chocolate, but we both don’t like the texture, so we tried it and gave up after a few spoonfuls. Our plane landed about 50 minutes early and once we had been assigned a parking position we were allowed to leave the plane and head towards immigration.

We were so surprised to find only a handful of people in line ahead of us. It took about half an hour to go through immigration, then we picked up our luggage and headed through customs and out into the airport. Since this was a holiday weekend we were sure there would be huge line at the rental car desk, but ……… Surprise! ……….. there were about 4 other people in line and getting to the counter took about 15 minutes. We had prepaid for our car and there was nothing left to sell to us, so the process actually went fast. We were told to pick any car in a certain row and off we went. To our huge surprise the only cars available in our row were vans with 7 seats and they were massive. We both were not too happy about the cars and their size, so we asked to downgrade and pick a regular sedan. In the end we decided on a Jeep and it was a nice “little” car to drive. Once we had stowed all our belongings in the car we put the GPS in the car and off we went. About half an hour later we arrived at our retreat for the night, the Comfort Inn Lake Buena Vista. The girl at the reception desk could not find our name in the computer, so she went to check on our reservation number and we were super surprised to find out that they had cancelled our reservation.

 Well, since it had been their fault they offered to find us a room in one of their sister resorts. So after some time, they came up with a reservation at the Shingle Creek Resort. We had never heard of it, but punched in the information about the resort into the GPS and off we went again. Another 20 minute drive! Once we arrived Tom waited in the car until I had checked us in and then we went to the parking lot and finally found a space to park the car.

 We unloaded the car and hauled everything up into our room, which was really very nice, much nicer than any room at the Comfort Inn. It was spacious with a huge bathroom, flat screen TV and a lovely view of the golf course. We got settled in, then began the trek back to the car to pick up some food. There was still time to go to Downtown Disney and have some dinner at Wolfgang Puck’s Express. The hike to self parking was long from our room but we finally made it, got into the car and off we went again.

Once at Downtown Disney we tried to find a spot right by Wolfgang Puck’s Express as it ws getting late. The door was still open, there were people ahead of us, so we got in line. We ordered the Pressed Bistro Sandwich, Sopressata, Mortadella, Toscana Salami, Parmesan and Arugula, with herbed French Fries and the Pesto Chicken Salad Sandwich, Romaine and Plum Tomatoes, which came with homemade chips. Only after we had placed our order did we noticed that they had locked the doors behind us and we were the last customers for the night. Nevertheless we were asked to take a seat while waiting for our takeaway food and had a nice chat with some visitors from New York who had made their first trip to Disney and were amazed on how much they could learn about Disney from some Austrian Tourists. After about 5 minutes our food came out and we were shown a side exit to leave.

We headed back to the car, then went to Gooding to pick up some drinks and snacks. It looked like they were going out of business as half their shelves were empty. But we found what we needed and went back to Shingle Creek. Once back in our room we set the table and had our late, late dinner before we finally gave in and went to bed.