In the "before times" pre-Covid-19, RDB and I would plan a week long vacation cruising out of Galveston and down to the Caribbean, but with the cruise industry heavily regulating health and safety measures, we needed to switch vacation plans. No big deal, we'll just go camping for a week. But where?
A high school friend of mine, Heather, has been a vacation planner specializing in Disney for a long time now, and when I mentioned that we were looking for a 'replacement' trip for my birthday, she naturally suggested Disney.... and then asked me if I knew that Disney had a resort campground?
Well. Down the rabbit hole I went!
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| Artwork: Mary Blaire |
Fort Wilderness isn't just a campground. It is a way of life! I know, that sounds cheesy, but after 10 days on property, enjoying all the fun and friends, I really can see where there are so many FaceBook pages devoted to this type of camping vacation.
We used the digital check-in via the My Disney Experience App (trust me, you'll want to download this!), notifying the Fort that we'd arrive early - about 11am - and received a text with our campsite number well before that (yeah!). We drove onto property and stopped at the guard shack (where the attendant referred to me, with a bow, as "Your Highness!" *giggle*) We had the option to bypass the main check-in area and go straight to our site, or stop to chat with someone. We opted to stop and chat since we've never been on property before and could use a map!
Carl checked us in, gave us a map, took down Mr. Polo's name (a friend who was staying with us for a few nights). Like I've done for our camping hosts in state parks, I handed him a small gift of chocolates with a thank you note. In turn, he grabbed a roll of Mickey stickers, said "How many do you want!?" and handed us several. Let the fun begin!
We settled into our premium site, number 539 in Buffalo Bend loop. First thing we noticed was how close together all of the campers in this loop are - but with the way that the park has built up the landscaping between each site, once you're settled in, you really don't notice how close you are. And for us, we have 7 days in the parks, so we're not planning to hang out outside the camper much.
We hit the ground running from the moment we arrived - off to grab lunch at a local spot (with great food, but poor service) and then back to the campground to pick up the golf cart we reserved and get settled into our site.
So, the eternal debate at Fort Wilderness: to rent a golf cart or not. Ask out on the Facebook groups and you'll get people who are "definitely yes" and others who are "never needed it." FOMO got the best of me, so a few short weeks before the trip I asked Heather to see if we could rent one from the campground, knowing that we may not be able to. Great news - we were able to get a cart for a portion of the trip, and even better news, when we picked it up and asked if we could extend the reservation thru the full trip, they were able to accommodate!
RDB drove it back to our site and I immediately started putting decorations on it! (They all look the same in the golf cart parking lots, this would make it easier to find after a long park day.... and to be honest, y'all know me - I like to have fun!)
It was in the middle of decorating the golf cart that I got a call from a local Florida number; I picked it up and it was one of the cast members at the front desk asking if we were in our site right now, they had a gift to drop by!
And what a gift it was!! Carl, who had checked us in earlier in the morning, came by in a golf cart and handed us a goodie bag filled with everything we'd need to make s'mores at the community campfire, along with a beautiful Fort Wilderness photo frame, a Disney Pin, and a note from the campground GM, Bill Thompson, welcoming us to the resort and wishing me a happy birthday!
In the world of Disney-speak: I got Pixie Dusted!!
This was the beginning of what would become an incredibly memorable week, exhausting ourselves at the parks, enjoying Disney dining at its finest, resting at the campground, "looping" and hiding things for the Scavenger Hunt, visiting some off-property sites on our non-park days. I mean, even doing laundry at Fort Wilderness is an experience!
I'll write up more about staying at Fort Wilderness, but right now, as Robin Hood once sang, all I can think is: “Oh-de-lolly, oh-de-lolly, golly what a day!”
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Be sure to check out our other posts from Tent On Wheels at DISNEY!
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