*Tent on Wheels at DISNEY* M-I-C (See You Next Time!) K-E-Y (Why? Because we LOVED it!)

It's always a sad day when you have to pack up and head home from a great camping trip, but I think post-Disney vacation blues is a serious condition!  We struck camp from Disney Sunday morning, dropping the golf cart off, hooking up, and starting our 995 mile, 14 hour and 34 minute trip back home. 

On the way across, we spent the road time listening to the Spotify playlists my team had made for my birthday - an eclectic mix of rock, rap, country, easy listening, Latino, and Disney songs.  I arrived home and they had even sent me a lighted plaque with a QR code at the bottom that lead to one of the playlist songs!

On our way home, we fired up the Audible app and listened to David Grohl narrate his book, The Storyteller.

We really enjoyed listening to his book while supplementing the stories he told with Google searches of the concert where he broke his leg, the Fresh Pots coffee promo, the harmonica surprise from Huey Lewis and the Foos, and his performance of BlackBird at the Oscars. Getting to listen to the author of a book read their own story is such a cool thing (Matthew McConaughey reading his book Greenlights is another one we loved to listen to on road trips).

We stopped every hundred miles or so to fuel up the truck and take a stretch break. We appreciate the set up at LOVE's because they're really designed for tractor/trailers, which makes navigating the gas station easier.  We were prepared for the fuel costs for this 2400 mile trip, but it certainly hurt our budget a bit as fuel prices rose subsequent to the Russia/Ukraine conflict.   

We stopped over the KOA in Milton, FL.  We pulled in after dark, and noticed quite a bit of road noise, but the stop was super convenient right off the highway.  

We were in site BN1, which was really easy to get into and pull out of the next morning.  The campground was well kept and had a cute hay bale decoration right up front as we left.

RDB was up _early_ that next morning and we were on the road by 8am.  I must not have had a good nights sleep, or maybe all the running around at Disney finally caught up with me, but I dragged a pillow into the truck with me and zonked out for the first several hours of the drive on Monday.  We were making really good time, as we had our next stop at the KOA in Lafayette, LA which would only leave about 3.5 hours to home Tuesday; we had it to the KOA by noon and decided to go ahead and stop, have. good meal, and rest for the evening. 

This KOA was larger than most we've stopped at.  The sites surrounded a lake with paddle boats to rent. There was a putt-putt course amongst the large old, moss-draped oak trees.  In the office, there was a detailed and beautiful quilt in the front office and we were impressed but the incredibly friendly front desk wishing us "safe travels." 

We dropped the camper in Site 309 and then took off for a little afternoon adventure.  Food first - we relied on Yelp to help us find a spot and once again, Yelp didn't disappoint.  We had lunch at Bon Temps, and as the name implies, it was GOOD.  The jalapeno cheese grits would be worth driving back to Louisiana for! 

And if there's something that Louisiana is known for, it's good food.  Good and spicy food. So it's no surprise that it's also the home of Avery Island and the Tabasco Brand Manufacturing Plant and Museum.  

I had the chance to drop in for a tour back in my road warrior days, and since then have really wanted to take RDB over to see how our favorite flavor-enhancer is made.  It was a total spur of the moment detour for the day, but was 100% worth it!

I'm a little sweet, and a little spicy! 

The viewing area into the manufacturing plant was the only thing that was on the 'tour' the last time I was there, so it was neat to see how they expanded out to include the people-sized bottles and other various props and historical objects.  You have the opportunity to walk a self-guided tour around the property, pretty much seeing the process from seed to sauce.

In addition to the little red peppers that Tabasco is known for planted there on the island, there's also a significant grove (or several, actually!) of bamboo. 

During WWII the Tabasco 'family' worked with the USDA to plant over 60 species of bamboo on the island, and nearly 35 of those still exist. (No surprise there - bamboo is sooo invasive!)  We stopped by the gift shop before we left, and I'm pretty sure we spent more on souvenirs from Tabasco than we did at Disney World!  (Also - those cinnamon Tabasco suckers were over the top delicious!)

We packed up the next morning and finished out the last leg of the trip home.  The great thing about Lafayette, LA is that it's less than 4 hours from home - not any longer than a normal weekend camping trip.  We were home in plenty of time to get a little laundry done and set up the camper as our "guest house" for WLTR, in town for the weekend and hanging out at our place!

We had bought a bottle of scotch before we left, with the thought that we might share Walt Disney's preferred drink (Scotch Mists) with others at the campground, but with all the fun we had in the parks and everything else, we never had a chance.  It turned out to be the perfect night cap of this dream of a vacation trip we had!

_____°o°_____

Be sure to check out our other posts from Tent On Wheels at DISNEY!  

*Tent on Wheels at DISNEY* Park n' Drive: Fort Wilderness Campground

 Know before you go - a park drive thru video

(Breaking this one into multiple videos, based on the site types)

_____°o°_____

Preferred: Loops 100, 200, 300

_____°o°_____

Premium: Loops 400, 500, 600, 700, 800, 900, 1000, 1100, 1200, 1300, 1400

Loops 400, 500, 1400

Loops 1200, 1300

Loops 1100, 1000, 900

Loop 800, 700, 600

_____°o°_____

Full Hook-ups: Loops 1600, 1700, 1800, 1900

_____°o°_____

Tent/Pop-ups: Loops 1500, 2000, 2100 (RV)

_____°o°_____

Cabins: Loops 2200, 2300, 2400, 2500, 2600, 2700, 2800

Loops 2200, 2400, 2600

Loops 2300, 2500

Loops 2700, 2800

_____°o°_____

We were in Premium Loop 500, site #539: easy enough to back into (as long as the campers across the way don't have their golf carts in the way).  The pad was cut short side-to-side at the front because of an electrical junction box, and because of that the picnic table was at the back of our side, almost un-usable due to our slide outs.  The foliage around the site makes it incredibly private, even though you're so close to your neighbors - it really felt very 'jungle-like' from the views out our back window and was a very quiet site thanks to all that landscaping. We had two days with torrential rain and our side flooded, but that (the massive rain) is really uncommon, and the park _is_ built on a swamp after all.  The site has great morning and afternoon shade, but gets the full brunt of the mid-day sun.

I notified the park about the flooding situation and they immediately remedied it by having us move a few sites down, same loop, to #544. This one was easy to back into as well, and had the full width paved (since there was no electrical box in the way). It backs up to one of the main roads on the right side of the park, so your back windows will give you a view of the traffic driving by (and that means there's a fair bit of intermittent road noise during the day). Across that road is the dog park and a playground, so plenty of people watching - and a great spot if you're brought your furry friend along.  This site is much larger than 539 - there's more space between you and your neighbors, too. 

Premium loop 500, Buffalo Bend, was a great location close to the internal bus stop and a short distance from the marina with the option for dining, shopping, or catching a boat to the Magic Kingdom.  You're also not far from the Meadows recreation area with the swimming pool, arcade, Chuck Wagon, campfire sing-a-long, and nightly outdoor movies. The loop shares a comfort station (bathhouse/laundry) with loop 400, and these two sites are on the opposite side of that are, so it's a bit of a walk if you're planning to use those facilities, but the tradeoff is that you're closer to the entrance of the loop so the bus stop, playground, and dog park are a much shorter walk. 

_____°o°_____

Curious about what we did on our Disney trip? Be sure to check out Tent on Wheels at DISNEY! 

*Tent on Wheels at DISNEY* Camping at Fort Wilderness: In Between the Parks

There is so much that we did at Fort Wilderness Campground between our days having fun in the parks, I want to share that here for our blog, too! 

One of the 'must do' items I had on our list for this trip to the campground was the Electric Water Pageant.  It's unique that it's only seen from the shoreline of three resorts (Contemporary, Wilderness Lodge, and Fort Wilderness) and it's just a once a day event.  Really a neat way to cap off the night with a little extra fun!

It's also unique that the Fort is home to Tri-Circle-D Ranch where all the Disney horses are stabled.  Though we didn't sign up for a trail ride (or pony ride if you're a little kiddo), it was still amazing to stop in and see the giant horses (clydesdales, percherons, and Belgians) and gawk at the tack room, the organ carriage, and the incredibly clean stables.  I stopped over to visit on our mid-day break from Animal Kingdom thinking it was kind of fitting to stay with the animal theme for the day!

There are a few shopping and dining opportunities on the campground.  One right in the middle called the Meadows and another down by the marina called the Settlement and Pioneer dining Hall.  Though there wasn't really anything we needed, I still visited both do pin trade (the registers have pin boards out all the time, including a 'mystery' board!).  We also noticed signs around that they was a food truck round up on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings at the Settlement.  

You could get a poncho there, which I can promise you, at some point on your trip, you'll need! We knew it would rain - it being Florida in the spring and all - but I'm not sure anyone was really prepared for the downpours we'd have two days in a row.  RDB and I were nestled comfortably in the camper the night of the first gusher, but we were caught in the middle of a quest for DoleWhip (on a boat heading towards Magic Kingdom, to take the monorail to the Polynesian, to take a bus to Disney Springs for dinner afterwards.... like I said: a quest!)

Needless to say, when we stepped off the boat and had to walk thru ankle deep standing water, we pretty much turned right back around to go back to the camper and change clothes and shoes.... only, when we got to the camper, the situation wasn't much better:

That was about two inches of standing water on the concrete pad in front of our steps (site 539).  At least our shoes were already wet, right?  Ugh.  We had plans to meet up with my friend DJ-Hot-T, and so we changed clothes and shoes, made stepping stones out of our leveling blocks, and drove our truck over to Disney Springs for the evening.  (Though we loved the Disney transportation for the majority of our trip, we wanted a bit more control after the downpour-debacle that was our boat trip.)

Disney Springs was a LOT of fun, and I wrote up a post just about our time over there. 

When RDB and I arrived back at the campsite, our 'front yard' was still flooded, though thankfully we were able to get into the camper again without wading thru water.  (Thank goodness we both had extra pairs of shoes, because the ones we originally were wearing took all night to dry out!).  I had the campground GM's business card from the sweet gift we had received when we first got into the campground, and thought, ya know? You can't fix a problem if you don't know it exists!  So I wrote a quick email around 10pm letting him know about the dire drainage situation in hopes that no other camper would experience what we did.  Sent it off with a few pictures, and off to bed we went.

Bright and early the next morning, *knock*knock*knock*!!  One of the campground managers was at our front door! Well, actually standing back a bit b/c it was still all wet out there, Luis apologized for waking us up (ha!), and for the flooding situation, that this is not what they would want anyone to experience camping with Disney, and asked what our plans were for the day (Epcot).   He said he would be in touch via text with some solutions for us (I had put my phone number in my email to Bill) and sure enough, in the next hour, I heard back from him:

There's a reason Disney teaches classes on it's world class customer service! The Mouse moves FAST to fix things AND goes above and beyond!  RDB and I went over to Epcot for our lunch reservation at Le Cellier (Yes, a second time! Yes, it is that good!  and Yes! My vacation planner Heather is amazing b/c she was able to secure this for us with just two days' notice!) and then we came back to the campground to try and beat the next wave of rain to move our camper.  Well, we didn't beat the rain, but we did at least get moved to a great site (544) - higher ground, indeed!

We spent an afternoon at Hollywood Studios and came back to the campground for the evening, so I jumped on the golf cart to head down to the Meadows Trading Post of postcard stamps and to pin trade.  If you're not aware of pin trading, it's another great kind of side-gig within the Disney parks and resorts. There are boards at the Meadows and Settlement Trading posts, and you'll also find campers on the FaceBook pages who'll post that they're trading as well.

On my way back from dropping off postcards and letters to my team that evening, I drove past a dad and his two kids.  "Hitch Height!" he yelled at me as I passed.  Hitch height? I said to myself.  Why would he say hitch height? I'm not towing anything, I'm on a golf cart! Hitch height. Hitch height.  Hitch HIKE!  OMG, he was looking for a ride back to his site with the kids!!!  I pulled a quick U-turn to come back to where he was and said: "I had to think on that for a moment, you were saying hitch HIKE!  Let me give y'all a ride!"  They gladly jumped on the back of the golf cart and I drove them towards their site.  Went to drop off mail, ended up making a special delivery! I love this campground!

Though our first week at Disney was picture perfect weather, the second week continued to be plagued by bouts of rain and storms; you saw above how crazy flooded it got in our site at one point.  Our last park day, we woke to yet another large storm coming thru - this time with severe weather warnings to boot!  I'm glad we have a comfortable camper with plenty of space when rainy days like this happen, and being able to watch a Disney movie while we waited out the rain still kept us in the "bubble." 

Just like any camping trip, it was over too soon. But the memories we made along this trip, and the fun we had, will be a highlight of our camping stories for years to come!

_____°o°_____

Be sure to check out our other posts from Tent On Wheels at DISNEY!  

*Tent on Wheels at DISNEY* Magic Kingdom Day 2

Disney has figured out a lot of stuff to make your visit magical.  The transit system (bus, boat, monorail, skyliner) get you to and from the parks. The incredible customer service from cast members who great you from the moment you enter to the moment you leave (I've lost count how many "happy birthdays" I've received).  And the food, oh, yum, the food in the parks has been world class!  All that said though, there's just one thing Disney can't control:

The weather.

RDB and I were planning to drive the campground this morning for our park n' drive series, but the rain definitely put a damper on that project.  Good news though, we're set up in the camper to enjoy even the rainiest of days!  And it's only appropriate that our movie selection this morning was based on the preview we saw yesterday at Hollywood Studios - Turning Red!  ./`./`./` Never met nobody like you! ./`./`./`

So glad we were moved to this other site, as this was another downpour of a storm.  Also glad we hadn't planned to be in the parks early; we have a dinner reservation over at the Wilderness Lodge around 5pm, and the Magic Kingdom has late hours tonight till 11pm, so we'll go over to the park after dinner and watch fireworks, maybe ride a few rides if the crowds have thinned out.  

Once the storm passed thru, we left the Disney bubble to go back over to the local Mexican joint we found when we first arrived and had lunch again (those chips, y'all! I wish I could take them back home with me!  The service? Still lacking.)

A trip over to the Target to resupply on a few items and then back to the campground to drive around and video the loops.  I figured it would take around and hour and a half - 28 loops, the main drag being a mile and half long - and, it was near check in time, which meant we got stopped several times behind campers backing into their sites.

It took longer than we thought - and we ended up no-showing to our dinner reservations, but in the end, we know it's worth it; RDB's YouTube channel of park n' drives has been a great addition to our blog and people really find it helpful to have a little insight before you go.  

We caught a bus and made our way over to the Magic Kingdom for our last day in the park. We had already done so many of the rides that I wanted to on our first day, but wanted to save the fireworks for our lat night on this trip - and I'm so glad we did.

Coming back into the park at night is a completely different experience!  The crowds were certainly more concentrated down Main Street - everyone jockeying for their perfect position to watch the show.  I was still on my search for a pair of souvenir earrings - which I was able to find there in the shops of main street while we made our way towards the castle to find our own space to watch the show.

A perfect pair of Minnie hoops with a simple ruby stone.  They'll be a unique addition to my collection of other earrings that remind me of such sweet and memorable trips.  That, and they'll go nicely with the tiara I saved for tonight.

RDB and I bundled up for the evening - dragging out our hooded sweatshirts as the temp had dropped dramatically after the rainstorm from the morning had cleared out.  We huddled together to the right of the castle, near the entrance to Tomorrowland, with a fence and large concrete post to the front and side of us.  (I'm not a huge fan of crowds, perhaps even a bit fearful, and so finding a place where I could step over the short fence to safety if the crowd crushed made me feel comfortable). 

But there was no need to fear this crowd - we were all there to celebrate the magic that is Enchantment at Disney's Magic Kingdom! With a swirl of music, dancing projections on the castle face, and the BOOM of the first firework, we were in for a great show!

Fifteen minutes of pure magic later, I had tears in my eyes; much like watching the rocket launch at the start of our trip was a life long bucket-list item, I realized that standing here, in front of Cinderella's Castle, watching the fireworks at the end of an epic birthday trip, was a childhood dream come true.  

Once they opened the tunnel under the castle up after fireworks (and the vast majority of the crowd had cleared out) RDB and I left the safety of our spot and walked thru the castle to the back of the park.  I could have spent hours in that hallway looking at the incredible mosaics there, telling the story of Cinderella in beautiful pieces of shattered glass.

Greeting us on the other side was Prince Charming's Carousel....

...and I was suddenly taken back to my childhood trips to Six Flags Over Texas - where the first ride, and often times the last ride, of the day was the carousel centered as a showpiece at the front of the park.  A Six Flag day pales in comparison to the Disney experience, but the carousel is universal. A classic.  And with no wait, RDB and I ran around the fences and jumped onto our trusty steeds, ready for the magic to begin as the music started and up-and-down and round-and-round we went. 

It was like I was a kid again.  *sigh*  The joke I'd made of going to Disney World to pretend I was 4 again for my 4x10th birthday suddenly wasn't a joke anymore.  Being here was was a chance to step away from all the stress of work, the difficulties of "adulting" and look at the world thru eyes glossy with tears from so much fun and so many dreams come true - and it was all too soon that this dream of a vacation was coming to an end.

We went on one last ride - Peter Pan's Flight, so cute, and so worth the little bit of a wait, and then slowly made our way back towards Main Street and beyond that, the waiting buses to take us back to the camp ground, stopping at a few PhotoPass photographers along the way for just... one... more... 

Walt Disney had an incredible dream, that he pursued into an amazing experience, which we had the absolute pleasure to enjoy, and to think:

It all started with a mouse.

_____°o°_____

Be sure to check out our other posts from Tent On Wheels at DISNEY!