Chapter 1: Our Arrival - Jan 7th and 8th.

January 7th was a Saturday. It was full of last minute shopping, packing and visiting with the worlds cutest kitty, Mable. Mable knew something was up because the luggage was out and I kept kissing her head. She knew we were leaving and she wasn't going to like it but she didn't want to miss out on the extra attention so she sat behind me all day, slapping me in the face with her tail so I would KNOW she wasn't pleased.

Here is Mable, looking annoyed at me.

Finally 8pm rolled around and Steevin's sister, Erika, came to pick us up. We handed over the keys to the apartment to her as she would also be house sitting and kitty-sitting while we were away. Erika decided she needed a poptart before she could go any further (I stocked all the cupboards and the fridge for her) so she ate that and then we were on our way.

Erika dropped us off at the San Diego airport and we gave our hugs and "see you soons". Check in was a breeze and the only issue we had was when all the cards in Steevin's "wallet" (if you can call two flimsy pieces of leather and thats all, a wallet) fell out while going through the xray machine. We found them all quickly so crisis averted.

The flight itself was a red eye flight (leaving at 1030pm). It was fairly full and the guy across from me put his teeny tiny garment bag in the overhead compartment on MY side and left poor Steev to fight his way back further in the plane to put my luggage some where and then fight his way back up stream like a salmon to get back to his seat. Mr. Garment Bag apologized but didn't move his bag to his side even though there was room for it.  (Everyone BOO Mr. Garment Bag! Boooooo!) I tried to sleep on the flight but was too excited so I ordered a gin and tonic to see if that would help. It didn't but it tasted good at least.

We arrived in Charlotte, NC about 6am. I discovered that people in North Carolina are not interested in restroom hygiene. I assume this to be true because not one stall had sanitary seat covers. And its not like they were out. They didn't even have the dispensers. At all. How is that even possible?! This is just a heads up to anyone ever wanting to visit North Carolina... bring your own seat covers! That concludes my public service announcement.

We had Bojangles Famous Chicken and Biscuits for breakfast. It was fairly tasty for a fast food breakfast. Though it was literally a Cajun spiced chicken fillet on a biscuit so I'm not entirely sure what made it a "breakfast" biscuit but it hit the spot at the time. We also had some "Ozone Water". We thought that perhaps with global warming and whatnot, perhaps drinking our Ozone was not the best idea but it was the only water they had so we at least did our duty and recycled the bottle. And soon enough we were boarding our flight to Orlando and I was able to get a few hours of sleep on the plane.

Ozone Water?

The plane finally landed in Orlando at 9am. It was a beautiful day, the sun was out and the sky was blue. We headed towards the monorail, shuttled on over to the main terminal and then lugged our luggage down to Disney's Magical Express. We showed our paper work and were guided into line by a friendly Cast Member. The family in front of us had a little girl that had a carrier for her doll, but we couldn't stop laughing because it looked like a baby doll coffin and it looked so morbid.

Doll Coffin... now portable!

Our Magical Bus arrived and we boarded it. Steevin laughed at me because I insisted on watching the little video they play while they're driving you to the resort. I don't care. It was cute and I was excited! It made the time pass quickly and soon we were pulling up to The Boardwalk.

Looking a little sleepy on the Magical Express

It was beautiful! Our driver got our luggage for us and as we walked up to the doors to the lobby a Cast Member walked up to me with a clip board in his hand. "Ms. Clarke?" he asked. I nodded. "Welcome to the Boardwalk! Are you ready to check in?"

And I said "Yes, thank you!" cool as a cucumber as though random Cast Members are greeting me by name every day. And then as he led us in I whirled around to Steevin with big, excited eyes because that does NOT happen to me every day. Steevin told me later that at that moment he got a little teary eyed and he knew he could never go back to staying in a Value Resort and that is when he felt like his vacation started.

The Cast Member led us to the front desk and introduced us to the other Cast Member who would be checking us in. She had great news for us... our room was ready! She gave us all our info and sent us on our way.  Steevin and I fell in love with this hotel right away. And we would keep falling in love with it through out the week as we discovered more and more things we liked about it and compared it to other resorts we would visit. I loved all the details in the lobby and the sitting areas on each floor. Our room was 4311, in the main building, at the end of a hallway. It was nice and quiet. The room itself was very spacious. We had a balcony overlooking the entrance to the hotel and a view of the Tower of Terror in Disney Hollywood Studios.

This is the worlds comfiest bed EVER.

Our personal sitting area

We decided to take a nap as we were tired and had gotten very little sleep on the plane. We fell asleep for several hours until our tummies woke us up and told us it was lunch time.

My view when I woke up

Creepiest chair ever

We took the quick walk to the bus stop and found a new friend we named Skippy. He really liked goldfish crackers.

Skippy!

We hopped a bus to Downtown Disney to get Earl of Sandwich, Steevin's favorite. However when we got there the line was WAY long. I think it was full of runners who needed to refuel after their races as this was the last day of the Disney World Marathon. We decided that we would get something else to eat since we can make a trip to Las Vegas for Earl's if we get desperate. We opted instead for Pollo Campero. I had the grilled chicken and Steevin had the fried. We both enjoyed what we had. Though myself and another lady had trouble figuring out how to make the "fork machine" work. I finally figured out to push the button and the lady was very excited not to have to eat her beans with her hands. I aim to please!

My grilled chicken and beans

We shopped at Downtown Disney for a while and we each got a new shirt to wear and spoke to some nice Cast Members. We headed back to our hotel and stopped to get drinks. I don't remember what Steevin had but I had some sort of caramel apple drink and it was delicious. They had a photo booth there so Steevin and I wanted to try it. However we realized we had already paid after that the buttons you could use to select your pose or the background you wanted was broken so we ended up being stuck with the worst picture possible when we weren't ready for the camera at all. We had a good laugh and then we took a stroll to the beach over at the Beach Club.

BEth <3 STeev

The view from the Boardwalk

Enjoying the View!

Enjoying his drink!

I'm thinking this is going to be the best vacation ever.

We dropped our new purchased off at the room (or "Home" as Steevin was already calling it) and then headed right down the stairs to Kouzzina, which is Iron Chef Cat Cora's place. It was so great having this almost literally at our doorstep! Kouzzina was busy and we had to wait a little for our reservation but not too bad. We were there at 7pm and they were telling walk ups that they wouldn't be able to seat them until 930pm. Glad I made reservations! Once we were seated, it was loud with shouts of "Opa!" just like a Greek place should be.

We started with drinks. Steev had the Ouzo-tini and I have the Greek Island Iced Tea. We tried three different spreads as an appetizer... olive tappanade, whipped feta and peppers and skordalia (which is an almost tangy potato spread. It was really tasty.) And then for dinner Steevin had the Kouzzina Trio which included Greek-style Lasagna, a spicy Lamb Burger, and Cinnamon-stewed Chicken with Orzo. I had the Oak Fired Port Tenderloin with Feta Gremolata, a tasty Cucumber Salad, and Zucchini Corn Pie. We had a lot of good food on this trip but I'd say this meal was probably ONE of our favorites.

Steevin's Kouzzina Trio

My Oak Fired Pork Tenderloin

After dinner we felt like a walk might be a good idea. We walked over to the Dolphin to check it out. It was fine, but it felt just like any nice hotel in Vegas. As we exited the building, Illuminations was just beginning. It was so awesome to be able to watch the fireworks in the sky and reflect off the water as we walked around the bay. It was a great end to the day and a wonderful start to the trip!

Illuminations!

<3