Trip Report Two broke guys & a dog (for the last time.) (Once more, with feelings. 1/13/25.)

No, I’m not mad at Disney. We’ll be back (in fact, it can’t be soon enough.) But this turned out to be our last trip together as a family.

Who: Brian (R) Tony (L) and Kylie.

When: May, 2023.

Can’t tease this, so I’ll just come out with it.

We’ve posted TRs over the years under the “Two broke guys & a dog” banner (and other titles.) Our May trip was short, and we had already booked August for my birthday (complete with a planned meet up with @Tuvalu) so I thought I’d make one double TR after August.

I ended up with Covid mid-month and we had to postpone to December for Brian’s birthday.

In the meantime, Kylie, our 14 year old German Shepherd/Chow Chow was diagnosed with heart failure. That “heads up” turned out to be a gift and a blessing that allowed us to spend so much extra quality time with her.

Kylie’s 14th bday on Halloween:

She stayed with us through the holidays, rubbing on the Christmas tree when she walked past it, per usual (like a cat lol) and was really doing well - eating, going for walks, snuggling. I expected more of a slow, gradual decline…but she passed yesterday. Now my heart is failing.

I don’t know how far I’ll get with this today. It might actually be too soon. But I thought it could be therapeutic, and a nice tribute.

For some reason, since my 30s, if I cry even a little, my eyelids swell up and it’s hard to undo. Ice helps only temporarily. I fear typing all this out will continue the waterworks (it already has) and prolong that condition. OTOH, they’re already swollen, so WTH? I’ll play it by ear, if that’s ok.

This is my love letter to my pup.

 

[Tony the Tigger]

After the boat dropped some passengers off at the grand Floridian, it brought us to the Polynesian. We don’t get here very often. I would love to stay here at some point, but the coin has not stacked up high enough thus far.

In addition to completing our bar crawl, (we are finishing what we started on this trip!) I specifically wanted to visit the new Wailulu bar & grill. I had heard about a certain drink that sounded good.

We got off the boat and started walking, not sure where it was, looking for signs. As we walked, someone walking towards us from the other direction pointed at us and said, “I know you - Tune In last night!” It was Kate from the night before! What are the freaking chances?

I mentioned what we were looking for, and we had been, in fact, heading in the wrong direction. Our destination was not far from theirs, so they offered to play tour guide. Then apparently their destination was no longer a thing, so they joined us at the Wailulu. Fun! Good thing we ran into them or we’d still be walking in the wrong direction.

A true banana old fashioned!

This was much better than the one from Citricos on Christmas which, in fairness, was not advertised as a banana old fashioned. It just had banana stuff in the ingredients.

This was delicious.

Our server was fantastic. What a personality. Unfortunately, his days off are the same as Brian’s new days off, so we may not see him again.

We also split a short rib. It was good, we’ve had better.

Knowing we may not be back soon, I took another banana old fashioned to go!

We thanked our new tour guide friends, and listened carefully to their instructions to get us where we needed to go to catch a Lyft to JulieWorld.

 

[Tony the Tigger]

Random pics on our way to the Lyft, which reminded me we stopped at the room first to add more layers!

Like I said, I knew this was a long shot.

Too late. Too cold, anyway!