Hello, Everyone! Welcome to our 2012 Walt Disney World Trip Report. For those of you who haven't followed along in one of our trip reports before, here is the link to the one I wrote from our last vacation in March of 2011.
This year our vacation was from Thursday, May 10th through Friday, May 18th and we stayed at Pop Century. It was just me (Lesley) and my husband (Andrew-aka Andy) on this trip. Also along for this trip was my new NIKON D3100 DSLR camera and two lenses I got as a graduation gift from my dad. We have "named" several of our gadgets (for example, the GPS we used on this trip is named Cornelia) so I thought it would be fitting to name my new camera Walter.
I started going on Disney vacations when I was a child in the early '90s, and have gone to the parks about 10 times now. Andy's first trip was with my family in September of 2008 and he has now gone a total of 4 times with me.
After returning from our vacation last year, we immediately began talking about going in 2012, but this time we wanted the trip to just be the two of us-sort of a 2nd Honeymoon for us. We've always gone with other family members to Disney, and although we've been married for almost 6 years and dated 5 years before that, we've never been on a vacation just the two of us. Even on our honeymoon we stayed with family in Mexico to save money.
I also went back to college in August of 2011 and I realized I would graduate in May of 2012, so we decided we'd take our vacation immediately following my graduation, as a celebration.
I graduated Tuesday, May 8th with a degree in Early Childcare and Education. Wednesday night we dropped our son, Connor (5) off with my mom for the night. While we were away he was going to spend the night with her, a few nights with Andy's parents and then about a week with my dad at the mountains in Tennessee. Before dropping Connor off we went out to dinner with my sister and her boyfriend, then Andy and I went home, threw some last minute things in our suitcase and went to bed early.
At 2:30 a.m. our alarm went off. When we drive to WDW (we live in S.C. so the drive is about 8 hours) we like to leave in the very early morning hours, that way we get to our hotel early and we prefer it to driving late at night. We brushed our teeth, got dressed and loaded up the truck. My dad loaned us his truck to use during our vacation because it is new and under warranty whereas Andy's car and my Jeep are less dependable.
Too early
We pulled out of our driveway at 3:03 a.m. We filled up the tank the night before-bless you, Bi-Lo Fuel Perks, you lowered our gas to $2.90 a gallon! Believe it or not, we got great milage using my dad's truck and we didn't have to spend too much on gas throughout the trip. We rolled out of the neighborhood blasting "Good Life" by One Republic in the stereo. We do have a good life and we were on our way to make it even better!
On the road
Around 5:20 a.m. we made our way onto I-95. At 6:00 we stopped for gas at a BP near Beaufort. As a graduation gift my dad's girlfriend gave me a BP gas card knowing I'd need it for our vacation-it was an excellent gift that went to great use! I was getting hungry but because of the strange hours we had been awake I wasn't sure what I wanted. I settled on Pringles and a Pepsi while Andy got a Red Bull. Probably not the best meal to have at 6 in the morning.
Around 6:30 we made it into Georgia. We drove into some serious fog that lasted for a good distance. We didn't realize quite how foggy it was until after looking at the picture.
Horrible fog
I kept busy writing thank you notes to my friends and family for their generous graduation gifts or either napping.
Keeping busy
Around 8 a.m. we finally crossed the state line into Florida. We walked around the Welcome Center to use the restroom, stretch our legs and to try some good old Florida orange juice.
Welcome Center
Yummy!
Stretching our legs
I dozed for a bit and soon after I woke up we were in Jacksonville.
Jacksonville
A bit later we saw this sign…
So close
This year our vacation was from Thursday, May 10th through Friday, May 18th and we stayed at Pop Century. It was just me (Lesley) and my husband (Andrew-aka Andy) on this trip. Also along for this trip was my new NIKON D3100 DSLR camera and two lenses I got as a graduation gift from my dad. We have "named" several of our gadgets (for example, the GPS we used on this trip is named Cornelia) so I thought it would be fitting to name my new camera Walter.
I started going on Disney vacations when I was a child in the early '90s, and have gone to the parks about 10 times now. Andy's first trip was with my family in September of 2008 and he has now gone a total of 4 times with me.
After returning from our vacation last year, we immediately began talking about going in 2012, but this time we wanted the trip to just be the two of us-sort of a 2nd Honeymoon for us. We've always gone with other family members to Disney, and although we've been married for almost 6 years and dated 5 years before that, we've never been on a vacation just the two of us. Even on our honeymoon we stayed with family in Mexico to save money.
I also went back to college in August of 2011 and I realized I would graduate in May of 2012, so we decided we'd take our vacation immediately following my graduation, as a celebration.
I graduated Tuesday, May 8th with a degree in Early Childcare and Education. Wednesday night we dropped our son, Connor (5) off with my mom for the night. While we were away he was going to spend the night with her, a few nights with Andy's parents and then about a week with my dad at the mountains in Tennessee. Before dropping Connor off we went out to dinner with my sister and her boyfriend, then Andy and I went home, threw some last minute things in our suitcase and went to bed early.
At 2:30 a.m. our alarm went off. When we drive to WDW (we live in S.C. so the drive is about 8 hours) we like to leave in the very early morning hours, that way we get to our hotel early and we prefer it to driving late at night. We brushed our teeth, got dressed and loaded up the truck. My dad loaned us his truck to use during our vacation because it is new and under warranty whereas Andy's car and my Jeep are less dependable.
Too early
We pulled out of our driveway at 3:03 a.m. We filled up the tank the night before-bless you, Bi-Lo Fuel Perks, you lowered our gas to $2.90 a gallon! Believe it or not, we got great milage using my dad's truck and we didn't have to spend too much on gas throughout the trip. We rolled out of the neighborhood blasting "Good Life" by One Republic in the stereo. We do have a good life and we were on our way to make it even better!
On the road
Around 5:20 a.m. we made our way onto I-95. At 6:00 we stopped for gas at a BP near Beaufort. As a graduation gift my dad's girlfriend gave me a BP gas card knowing I'd need it for our vacation-it was an excellent gift that went to great use! I was getting hungry but because of the strange hours we had been awake I wasn't sure what I wanted. I settled on Pringles and a Pepsi while Andy got a Red Bull. Probably not the best meal to have at 6 in the morning.
Around 6:30 we made it into Georgia. We drove into some serious fog that lasted for a good distance. We didn't realize quite how foggy it was until after looking at the picture.
Horrible fog
I kept busy writing thank you notes to my friends and family for their generous graduation gifts or either napping.
Keeping busy
Around 8 a.m. we finally crossed the state line into Florida. We walked around the Welcome Center to use the restroom, stretch our legs and to try some good old Florida orange juice.
Welcome Center
Yummy!
Stretching our legs
I dozed for a bit and soon after I woke up we were in Jacksonville.
Jacksonville
A bit later we saw this sign…
So close
:sohappy:
