The flight to MCO was uneventful and Disney's Magical Express brought us to Animal Kingdom Lodge - Jambo House without incident. The Magical Express ride is where I really start to decompress and feel like I am truly on vacation, and this one was no exception.
You may wonder why I chose the Animal Kingdom Lodge from among the many fabulous Resort choices at Walt Disney World. The answer is simple: for the safety (and sanity) of the animals, there are no fireworks within earshot. Why is this important to me? Well, the day before the 2010 Walt Disney World Marathon when we had stayed at Disney's Old Key West Resort, I awoke to give my husband moral support before he ran the Half Marathon on Saturday. As I fell back asleep in the wee hours of the morning, I heard the fireworks in the distance and knew his race was about to start. I went to bed around 8:30 Saturday night before the marathon -- my first full marathon ever -- convinced I would never fall asleep. What seemed like hours later, I awoke with a start to the sound of, you guessed it, fireworks. Heart racing, I leaped out of bed, certain I was about to miss the start of the marathon and calculating just how quickly I could throw on clothes and get to the starting line. All I could think about was the months of training going down the drain. Only when I looked at the clock did I realize it was only 9:00 PM and those "race start fireworks" were actually the Epcot nighttime spectacular, IllumiNations. It took forever for my heart to stop pounding, and as I struggled to get back to sleep, I vowed to stay only at Animal Kingdom Lodge for future Marathon Weekend trips. We stayed at the Kidani Village section with Chuck's parents in 2011, and I slept as well as could be expected for my first Goofy Challenge. I was looking forward to a similar experience at Jambo House for this year's Goofy.
We had an Advance Dining Reservation (ADR) at the Crystal
Palace shortly after our arrival, so we pretty much threw our stuff in
the room, greeted Chuck, grabbed the race packets he had picked up for my friends, and all rushed out the door for the bus to take
us to the Magic Kingdom. We arrived at the podium more than 15 minutes
late, and I was a little worried we would be charged the recently-implemented "no-show" fee of
$10 per person, but the Cast Members got it all straightened out for us.
We had to wait a little while to be seated, but since the "Cinderella's Castle Dream Lights" holiday icicle decorations were still on display I took a moment to snap a photo. I just love Christmas at the Magic Kingdom, and this put me back in a holiday mood (even though it was January 5).
Chuck's birthday had been noted on our reservation and he was wearing the "Happy Birthday" button provided by the front desk, which resulted in the Cast Members bringing him a special birthday cupcake for dessert. I love those special magical moments Disney Cast Members are so good at providing. It truly sets their theme parks apart from the Six Flags and local amusement parks and makes each visit feel like a homecoming.
We kept a close eye on the time and my phone, because I was planning to meet my friend to give her and her husband their race packets. They were running the 5K in the morning (in addition to the Goofy Challenge), and needed their bibs. As we wrapped up the meal and headed out to meet them, "The Magic, The Memories and You!" show started. Chuck hadn't yet seen the show, so I left him and the kids to enjoy it while I went to meet my friends. Race packet hand-off went smoothly and we were busy talking when Chuck and the kids got out of the park. We all spent a few moments chatting, but realized we couldn't talk long. They had a race to get to, and I had an early morning date with Jeff Galloway and 39 of our mutual friends!
I've decided it is time to start blogging about my fabulous Disney vacations and my marathons... and especially about those wonderful times where the two coincide. As usual, I am a bit behind schedule, so please bear with me as I recap my 2012 experiences to date.
This January, I ran the 2012 Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend Goofy's Race and a Half Challenge. This is an aptly named event because participants complete the half marathon on Saturday and then come back for twice as much fun and complete the full marathon the very next day. I can't think of a better mascot than Goofy for this type of behavior.
I was a little nervous heading in to race weekend, but only because I WASN'T nervous. An odd feeling for me. You see, I'd been terrified before my first half marathon, panic-stricken before my first full marathon, and full of self-doubt before my first Goofy Challenge. This was my very first Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend where I wasn't experiencing a new race distance, so I felt a little "been there, done that" about the whole thing -- and then I worried that this attitude would somehow diminish my chances of success. Long-distance running is such a head trip!
The marathon was my third in my quest to level-up in Marathon Maniacs. I will earn another star if I complete six marathons in 6 months. These Maniacs are as appropriately named as the Goofy Challenge compet
My best running friend decided to join me in my Goofy quest immediately after hearing I had completed the Rocket City Marathon with a personal record (PR). I think I was more excited about having her to run with for race weekend than I was about my PR! It was to be her third Goofy Challenge, so she definitely knew what she was signing on for. We continued to run with our respective groups -- me with the Birmingham Galloway Training Program and her with Team in Training -- each Saturday with a nice chat over coffee afterward and then we would meet again on Sunday for about half the mileage (and more coffee!) with my husband, Chuck. Speaking of Chuck, he was registered for the "nameless challenge": the Walt Disney World Half Marathon on Saturday followed by the Chip and Dale Relay on Sunday, where he was to run the second half of the marathon course. To cement his ranking as Best Husband Ever, he agreed to do this even though he doesn't love running and despite the fact that the marathon was being run on his birthday. What a great guy!
So training progressed and race weekend was fast approaching when I spotted an alert in my Twitter feed: RunDisney was hosting a meet-up with Jeff Galloway and the first 40 people to register via email would get to join him for an exclusive run-walk-run. As a Galloway program director, this was right up my alley. I clicked Refresh on the Disney Parks Blog like a madwoman and sent my email off as close to "immediately" as possible. I sent a second email to register Chuck just moments later (the rules stated only one name could be registered per email message) and discovered that those few seconds were enough time to allow those 39 additional people to be selected. Amazing how on-the-ball we obsessive RunDisney fans can be!
So now to compare notes with my "virtual friends" who had been training with me all throughout the country. I saw that several had been selected, and when the list of the lucky 40 was posted, I was sad about Chuck not making the cut but amazed to find I knew almost half of the names from one forum or another. How exciting! One of them was going to be staying at The Animal Kingdom Lodge's Kidani Village and I was staying at Jambo House, so I asked if we could share a cab to the meet, which was to be held at Disney's Hollywood Studios long before park opening. Score! She had a rental car and didn't mind my coming along for the ride.
Logistics pretty much figured out, we then proceeded to pack our suitcases. Utilizing the Divide and Conquer strategy that works so well for our family, Chuck would fly out Thursday morning in order to hit the expo early, and the kids and I would travel later in the day so we could get at least a half day of work/school and keep the unexcused absences to a reasonable level. In true "amphibious landing" fashion, our travel plans were pretty complicated. We all got up early to take Chuck to the airport so we wouldn't have to park both cars there while we were away. Even though he had the first flight out, the school buses hit our neighborhood so early there would be no way to get the kids to school in their usual fashion. We managed to drop him off on time, grab some drive-thru breakfast (Note: this is NOT a blog about healthy eating), and get to both the middle school and the intermediate school before first bell. Whew!
Next was the struggle to get the dog to the kennel. This is usually a job for Chuck, and it's obvious I'm no good at it. Our dog, Kinja, is 60+ pounds and 13 years of age. She has spinal spondylosis and has trouble with the stairs from time to time. Since I'm only 5'3" I can't exactly carry her. Needless to say, that was a "bad back" day for the pup. It took forever to coax her out the door and down the back porch steps. Then she didn't want to get into the car. Once we reached the parking lot, she simply refused to get out of the car. Lucky for us, another car pulled up when I was just about to beg for help from a vet tech. Kinja took one look at the dog who got out of that car and decided that maybe it would be nice to go visit, and hopped out. So thank you, Kind Stranger Dog, for being the inspiration she needed and allowing me to get on with my day.
With that hurdle out of the way, I was finally on my way to the office for my half day of work. Of course, just one mile past the vet's office, I had to wait for a train. This was not shaping up to be a very good start to my race weekend. Work complete, I dashed back to the schools to pick up my darlings. This was a more time-consuming process than I had imagined. We rushed to the airport, checked in, my daughter tried to talk the desk agent into buying Girl Scout cookies, and we hurried to security. Somehow in our rush to get Chuck off earlier in the morning, the three of us had ended up with all of the carry-ons. So we did the shoe-and-laptop-removal dance and somehow I found my youngest had gone through the metal detector while my oldest was still struggling to push the bags through the conveyor. I went through the metal detector and then tried to help her with the bags from the other side. BIG no-no, I discovered. The TSA agents were nice about it and just made me go back through the metal detector again, but that could have gotten ugly. So there's your travel tip of the day. Once you go through the metal detector, you are not permitted touch your bags!
All of that out of the way, we had just enough time to hit the rest room and get to the gate. They were already boarding (naturally), and had already called our numbers in the A boarding group. The agent was nice enough to let us go right to the jetway and we were able to get three seats together. Whew!
Tune in to my next post for details about our time in Florida.
