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Trip Report Another Princess Weekend, Another Running Dress for Brifraz, Another Trip Report

Hello Intrepid Disney Travelers! It's time for another Brifraz Trip Report. Nothing live this time - it's already been three weeks since the trip. But the Brifraz clan just did another Princess Weekend and I'm here to share the adventure with everyone!

I suspect that most of you have followed along on one of my 36 trip reports over the past 16 years (holy carp, I've been doing trip reports for 16 years!), but in case you have not... our travel crew is a trio. Myself, my lovely wife, and our daughter. Back when I started trip reporting she was pretty young, but now she's a full fledged adult, with a nice full time job (pays more than triple my first teaching job back in the 1990s) and her own apartment about an hour from where we live. Here's us from back in 2016 on our first Princess weekend!
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Also a chance to sneak in a comment about how much I miss the old Luau at Poly.

Here's us a bit more recently, just to make sure you recognize us.
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Yes, the girls look almost the same, except some height changes and different glasses. Why am I the only one who has aged???

Anyway, back to the point. Princess Weekend 2026! Some background on this trip. I retired from teaching music in public high schools for 31 years this past summer only to take a position at a small local college for a couple days a week and to begin teaching private music lessons one day a week. My wife is still teaching English in high school (and still enjoying it) and also working part time at the Hippodrome Theatre in downtown Baltimore. As I mentioned, our daughter is now adulting full time, having graduated from college right around the same time I was retiring! As is our usual at Princess Weekend, I was running the 10k and the girls were doing the Challenge (10k and Half Marathon). For the first time ever, I was the one who had actually trained for the races - since I now have a little more free time - and the girls had not done nearly as much training as they usually do (this is what those in the business call foreshadowing).

In addition to the races, we had some other somewhat important plans. We were going to get a final ride on Rockin' Roller Coaster on its last day and bought Lightning Lanes to make sure we got to ride without hours in line (this is also foreshadowing). We also had plans to have fun with a new game that we have heard about - some Bus Roulette coming your way soon.

And it starts with a big change from normal for us (this is what those in the business call a tease).
 

brifraz

Marching along...
Premium Member
Original Poster
Still letting that tease hang out there about the big change, I do feel the need to explain the title of the Trip Report. Way back in 2016 on that first Princess Half weekend, my daughter and I did matching costumes for the 5k.
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We had a blast and perhaps the finest moment was much later in the day in Epcot, no longer in costume, when a random person yelled to me "You were the best Anna this morning." Since then I've dressed as Mickey, Terrence (from Pixie Hollow), and just worn a themed Up shirt. So, this year it was time to get back into a running dress! But, more on that a bunch later when we get to the race days.
 

brifraz

Marching along...
Premium Member
Original Poster
Sounds fun! Following along.

This sounds like an interesting trip!! Looking forward to it!!



Running to join others in the first row, to read about brifraz's Princess Weekend! :happy:

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following!

I Will Follow!

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Following! In full disclosure this will mean intermittent like bombs. I’m terrible about following TRs as they are posted.

Thanks to everybody who has joined in the fun already! And, to @Ellen Ripley - as a huge fan of early 80s music and specifically early 80s British bands, that is by far my favorite U2 song.
 

brifraz

Marching along...
Premium Member
Original Poster
So, I teased that this trip had something very different from normal. Well, your incredibly long and arduous wait is over because the different thing starts right here at the beginning. The travel. For the first time since I'm not sure when, we did not all travel together. Due to work commitments, my wife and daughter had to work on Wednesday, 2/25 and Thursday, 2/26, whereas I was totally free those two days. Couple that with the high prices for air fare and our desire to have a car for the weekend and rather than buy a plane ticket for me and rent a car...
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This happened. Who has two thumbs and spent 15 hours driving (20 total hours in the car) 940 miles to WDW? This guy! In the end, I'll spend about 30 hours driving 1900 miles (the drive back had some extra miles) but we're only on day 1 right now. The last time I drove solo to Disney was in the late 1990s so it wasn't a totally new experience, just one that hasn't happened for quite some time. And, I have to say that driving 15 hours in your mid-20s is very different from driving 15 hours in your mid-50s!

Back then, I did the drive all in one shot with just bathroom and fast food breaks. Not so much now. My plan was to leave home around 7am on Wednesday, take extended breaks (hour plus) for lunch and dinner along the route, sleep somewhere in Georgia or northern Florida, and then get to Disney by 8am on Thursday. However, as is always the case when driving on I95 down the East Coast, the plan and the reality did not match up - which you could have surmised by the 20 hours total from above. And that, my fine friends, is another tease because this morning I just had a few minutes to give you the reveal from yesterday's tease. See you tomorrow!

PS - now that you've all seen the inside of my garage and the trees across the street, it's only a matter of time before you track down my location...
 

brifraz

Marching along...
Premium Member
Original Poster
Away we go! It was Wednesday, Feb 25 and I was up at 5:30am (normal wake up time). Got my wife off to school and then got the car packed up and ready to go. I was out the door at almost exactly 7:00am.

For those who, like us, drive down I95 to Disney from the northeast on a regular basis, the traffic is something that is a unique and strange animal. In my experiences, getting around/through DC and NoVa (northern Virginia) is at best an hour and at worst 3 hours. Generally it only takes an hour when you drive it between 9pm and 5am. The rest of the time you are dealing with at least an hour and a half to two hours. Rush hour is when you are stuck with a 3 hour drive. I was going to hit the DC Beltway around 8am... prime rush hour.

As I left, Google Maps was suggesting that I take what we call the 'back way' which avoids the Baltimore Beltway, but requires a good hour on back roads toward DC. During rush hour it is usually the best way, but can sometimes still be painful. Our house to the Virginia line via that route is usually about an hour and a half and it took about 1:45 on that drizzly morning. However, the traffic around DC and the rest of Northern Virginia was surprisingly light. I took a 20 minute breakfast break a bit south of DC and was on target for hitting North Carolina around 12pm. Pretty much the average time, so I got VERY lucky with the rush hour traffic.

I'm sure many of you experience this - sometimes you just get into a groove with driving and absent the need to a bathroom break, you just keep rolling. That was happening for me, so I did almost a 5 hour chunk before my next break at the finest stop along I95.

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Yup. South of the Border. If you know, you know. And if you are older like me and remember when they had hundreds of billboards along the road starting 2 states away, it's iconic. However, I'm not insane. I just stopped for gas. I don't really trust SotB to have decent bathrooms or food, so it was a fill up and then back on the road.

However, the next break was only maybe half an hour later. I needed those two things that I want to be decent. And if you are on the highway and need decent bathrooms, there's really only one option.
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BUC-EE'S!! Cleanest and nicest bathrooms along the interstate. Heck, pretty much anywhere in the realm of public bathrooms. And a Buc-ee's pick up truck, driven by Buc-ee himself loaded up with Buc-ee plushies and in front of the wall of jerky. Now THAT'S iconic! So, I rested for a bit and got myself a wrap and some chips to eat. Then it was back on the road. So, the initial plan of long breaks for lunch and dinner was kinda out the window at this point. And without those breaks, I was already in Georgia by 6pm. But I was pretty tired, so I stopped at the welcome center and took a little hour long nap in the car. Then back on the road until about 9:30pm, just a bit past Jacksonville, where I stopped for the night.

This is a time to make a note of the fact that I usually sleep from 11pm-5:30am. So, getting to sleep before 10pm and not in my own bed meant that I was up at 3am and ready to roll. So, I did! Around Daytona, I needed to fill up on gas. Hmmmm... where to get gas near Daytona at 4:15am?
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Yup. Two Buc-ee's visits on one drive. I know how to live!! The other nice thing about driving that early in the morning is that I4 is not yet the horror and chaos that it is most of the day. Which meant, arrival at the World at 5:30am.
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Old Key West is pretty darn quiet before 6am.
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If you are an OKW regular, you will agree with me that those walls look much cleaner now, but it definitely hurts the personality of the place not to have all those pictures of DVC owners up on the walls.

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A bit too early in the morning to grab a drink at the Gurgling Suitcase so I just relaxed for a little bit and stretched everything out in the lobby area, which I had all to myself until about 6am.
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Once a CM was actually at the desk (no, I wasn't going to ring the bell - I knew my room wouldn't be ready, I had done mobile check in) I did go up and inquire about the room or even just the building so I could park at the right building, but she could not share that information, yet. So, I headed out to the main bus top to begin my solo day adventure. Bus Roulette!
 

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