Weekend In Orlando: Part 4

Disney Springs & Going Home

Welcome to the 4th and last entry in this series. I'm going to cover what I did while on my own, during on the middle day of our time in Orlando, At the end I'm going to mention a few things we did on our way home. So let me start by going back to the morning of Saturday, August 17th.  

After my wife left the hotel room at 8AM that morning I slept in a  bit, trying to get over my long night at the Magic Kingdom. Once I woke up, got ready and headed over to Disney Springs. 

There were a lot of new places that had opened, most of them restaurants, and other changes since I was there last in March 2016. I wanted to see all of them especially, The Edison. 

Unfortunately, after the night before, my spirit was willing but my flesh was weak. I was still worn out. But I needed to get another version of a souvenir I'd gotten the last 3 times I'd been to WDW. To do that I needed to go to the Marketplace area of Disney Springs. 

As anyone who has been to Disney Springs knows, it's a very big place with lots of walkways and areas to visit. You can't just take a straight path from one end to the other and see everything. 

Because of this, and for reasons I will explain and repeat during this post, I didn't get to see most of what I went there to see. 

Since I got to the Orange parking garage shortly after the area opened, there were plenty of spaces open. 

After getting to the bottom of the escalator the first thing I saw was the "Characters In Flight" balloon ascending into the air. 

I'd always wanted to go up in this tethered balloon just for the view. 

I made a mental note that if I had time I would ride it later in the day. Unfor-tunately, I never got to do that.  

I walked from behind the AMC theater, through the West Side, past Splitsville to the House Of Blues. 

Once there, I had to stop and rest. I was already worn out. Perhaps I should have realized then that I just needed to go back to the hotel and rest. But I kept on going. I had a couple of things I wanted to do. 

As I sat down at the tables in front of the House of Blues. I was joined by this guy sitting under the table next to me. 

Of course he shied away from me when I tried to pet. But that didn't matter, My cat tally at WDW was up to two. 

During our visit to Disney Springs back in 2015, Paula and I took the boat across Lake Buena Vista to get to the Market Place. This was my best option to get to where I wanted to go. 

The boat launch dock was to the left of the House of Blues. Here's a link to a short You Tube video of part of my trip. 

Boat Ride Across Lake Buena Vista

After I got off the boat and walked up the dock to the entrance of the Marketplace I had to sit down and rest again.

While sitting there I took this slow motion video of the fountain. It's nothing really but I like it. 

Once I was ready to get going again, I didn't have far to go. I was right in front of the store I was looking for.  

There was only one problem. The last time I was here it was this store. 

But the t-shirt store had changed to this. 

In each of 3 past visits to this shop I've gotten my favorite type of Walt Disney World souvenir. 

They are custom t-shirts with Goofy on them. Each of them had an original caption I made up, a picture of Goofy, and the date. I created them using the computer in the Design A "T" shop. 

I was looking forward to adding a 4th on this visit. As I walked inside my heart fell as the kiosks that I'd used to make my shirts were nowhere to be found. 

According to a cast member working in the store the kiosks had been gone since the middle of 2017. Mickey ears had replaced the t-shirts as the item you can customize. 

So very disappointed I left the store and on to the next item on my Disney Springs agenda. 

I moved across the walkway to the Disney Days of Christmas shop. Anything Christmas themed that Disney offered you'll find here.

I had offered to find a snow globe for my friend, Jackie, and bring it back to her. The only problem was, I couldn't find any Christmas themed snow globes. 

(I was a bit perplexed as to why I couldn't find any. Later, after I returned home, I heard an explanation on a the Disney Dish podcast. 

From the time the TSA put a limit on amount of liquid allowed on planes in the US,  sales of snow globes at Walt Disney World decreased significantly. Even the smallest ones weren't allowed through the safety check. So with such a small demand, Disney cut the supply and only offers a few smaller ones in select gift shops throughout the resort.) 

I did find one or two later when I was in the World of Disney store. This was the best one. 

I was "0 for 2" in my merchandise quests. By this time it was getting close to noon and turning into a very warm Florida summer day. 

I was having to stop and rest more often for a longer and longer time as the day went on. 

I really wasn't having a good time. I knew I wasn't going to stay anywhere near as long as I had planned.  But there were still some of the Disney Springs stores I wanted to visit. 

I got some fudge and something to drink at Goofy's candy company. 

I headed toward "Once Upon A Toy" and browsed through it. Next was the Lego store. I was hoping to find something exclusive to this store but I didn't. 

I was a bit hungry and it was lunch time. I walked over to the BB Wolf's Sausage Company, a quick service restaurant, to get a foot long hot dog. It was $10. 

I sat on a wall outside the Lego store enjoying my lunch while looking at one of my favorite things in this part of the Marketplace: Brickley the Lego dragon. 

 The one thing I still had on my agenda was to find something to take home to each of our grandchildren.

I was pretty sure I'd find something in the "World Of Disney" store. It's the largest merchandise location in Walt Disney World outside of the theme parks. 

At this point it began to rain, but not much more than a shower. It didn't last very long. A lot of people, like me, went into the World Of Disney to stay dry. 

This made moving around the store, difficult. I slowly made my way around the store looking for just the right gifts. 

But then I saw the line that was queued up at the registers. There was no way I was going to stand in line for 10-15 minutes to pay for whatever I picked out. I was done. I realized it was time to throw in the towel and limp my way back to my car.

I went out the store's back door heading  toward the Orange parking garage walking past a row of shops that were new since my last visit. Soon I was in back of the Coca Cola store walking past the Disney bus drop off area.

I finally made it back to the garage about 2 o'clock. What a relief it was to finally be in my car. I know I've mentioned it to excess in this post, but I can't tell you how physically exhausted I was. 

I drove back to our hotel and got there with enough time to take a nap before the Saturday night conference events. 

I was really disappointed that I hadn't had the ability to see all the places I wanted to during my visit to Disney Springs. But I must admit, I shouldn't have even gone. 

After the exhausting night at the Halloween party, I should have just stayed at the hotel and relaxed or gone to a movie. But I was in Orlando, I HAD to go do something at Disney. 

The day was a real wake up call for me in regard to my health. I realized that when I got home it was time to get do something about my physical condition. 

Let's jump forward from Saturday to Sunday and the first leg of our trip home. 

We left Orlando a little after noon and drove to Macon, GA where we spent Sunday night. 

We had a little bit of trouble finding it, due to an issue with my Kia's outdated GPS, but we stayed at a brand new very nice, Holiday Inn Express. If you ever have to stay in Macon, GA I highly recommend it. 

Btw, on the way out of Macon on Monday morning. We stopped at a WalMart so Paula could pick up a tray to put over her lap to make a small work area for her as we drove home. She had a lot of work to do and was focused on her Color Street group. 

So there you have the recap of our mid-August trip to Florida so Paula could attend her first Color Street conference. 

Although it wasn't the best Florida/ Disney experience I've ever had, for Paula, it was a very beneficial trip. She would end up having a very busy and successful last half of August for her business. I am so proud of how much success she has had. 

Thanks for taking the time to read this post series. I do apologize if this last post was a little whiny but I had to convey to you what I went through. I'm sure as time goes by, I will remember mostly the positive memories of the trip. 

Of course, the most exciting thing to come out of it all is that, it looks like next year we're going to Vegas AND Disneyland. Yeah!!!!