A New Ship: The Journey Begins

After enjoying several cruises on the Disney Magic and the Disney Wonder departing from Galveston (which is just down the road a spell), this cruise involved a bit more planning and vacation time as we needed to make our way from Texas all the way over to Florida. So we loaded up the car and hit the road!

Please forgive the goofy expressions and sunlight washout, we were more excited than the kiddos to be hitting the road!

Getting everyone packed into the car and hitting the road always inspires that "what did I forget" nagging feeling, but with visions of pixie dust dancing in our heads we pressed onwards. Besides, I double checked paperwork and medications, so whatever I forgot would be decidedly non-essential.

The drive to Port Canaveral is a little over fifteen and a half hours from our home.

Without potty breaks or meals.

Yay!!! We're going to be in the car for two days!!!
(Said no five year old. Ever.)

Thankfully, less than an hour after leaving our home we found ourselves at the George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH) circling the parking garage seeking the few and far between parking spaces left on the day after Thanksgiving.

Ben found us a convenient spot not too far from the elevators. It's not so essential to find good parking on the way to vacation, but on the way back, it's really nice to just get in the car and go.

We each took a snapshot of the pillar nearest our car (to make it easier to remember where we parked.) Then we let the kids run amok with their suitcases.

There weren't many crowds early on Thanksgiving Friday.

We try to let them run as much as possible before we get onto planes. It's just easier to deal with less fidgety kids in confined spaces.

One parent ahead and one behind to assist with getting on and off of escalators.

Besides, it's fun to be "in charge" of the luggage, it's one less thing for the adults to carry and it slows them down a little bit.

Security was fairly rapid. Since we'd planned for holiday traffic levels, that meant that we could relax a bit and kill time once we reached our gate.

Chris settled into reading in a seat next to Ben at the gate while Kylee and I explored our terminal from end to end under the guise of window shopping. I scouted high and low for likely looking carry on lunches and snacks. We found several varieties of Elsa Jellybeans, so we got those. Then we found some shelf stable lunch boxes called "gopicnic" which looked likeable enough.
I grabbed the hummus and crackers meal for me, the black bean dip with plantain chip for Kylee and went to fetch Chris and see if he would like one as well.

Don't leave home without your favorite travel companion!
Chris always brings Osito (the bear) when he goes on vacation and has been known to use him as a pillow in a pinch.

Kylee and I went back to show the fruits of our foraging to the guys. Ben seemed intrigued at the idea of "gourmet lunchables" as he dubbed them. Ben spent his free time updating his Facebook profile photo to match the hipster attitude of his t-shirt.

Ben's "Cruise of the Hipster" Profile Photo

I took Chris for a nice walk to pick out his own meal and we returned with two salami and cheese meals for the guys. The girls and guys took the moment for a quick last stop in the restroom, hoping to forestall the inevitable "trying to squeeze an adult and a child into an airplane restroom" issue.

Restroom Selfie while waiting on Kylee.
#BecauseReasons

We returned just before they called for United 1230W boarding group 2. Kylee forgot that there is a lot of hurry up and wait between queuing, boarding, departure and taxiing.

Backpacks- check
Children- check
Husband - check

Chris found the seatback emergency card fascinating and spent the better part of an hour reviewing it. Kylee played with her window shade, chewed gum and spent the better part of the flight playing I Spy with the "SkyMall" magazine.

The lunch boxes were 90% awesome, but the kids found some of the included sides "too spicy." I'd totally get them again and just swap with whatever side they don't like. Portable, easy, yummy and cheap? I'd say that's a score. We landed at  MCO (Mickey and Company!) in Orlando around 2:15 PM and went to retrieve our suitcases from the bag claim.

Then we had to drag our bags and find transportation to our hotel.

Which was super easy! We ended up staying in the Hyatt Regency which despite being inside the airport was surprisingly quiet.

View of the mall from the top floor hotel landing

We set out for a midafternoon snack at (where else) Starbucks and to let the kids stretch their legs after being cooped in a plane we walked around the (very large) mall connecting the two terminal wings.

Strawberries

Everyone was pretty tired and it was an effort to get the kids to wait until 4:30 EST for dinner. They really just wanted to crash and go to bed. We headed over to Macaroni Grill for a *hopefully* quick dinner at a familiar chain restaurant.

Waiting for our pasta.

We had a surprisingly awesome time! Our waitress was sweet and very attentive. In a welcome change from our previous attempts at other sit down airport restaurants, our food was fast, hot, correct and tasted really yummy. We dragged the kids back upstairs, helped the very tired travelers into their jammies and then spent the better part of two hours waiting for them to fall asleep.

Somehow in traveling past Disney's EarPort for the fourth time, the kids really got it. We were in Orlando on vacation and our cruise was tomorrow! I didn't blame them, I was almost too excited to sleep as well!

This is Part 2 of an Ongoing Trip Report "A New Ship." Additional sections will be found on the Trip Reports page after they are posted!