How Many Days In A Row Will We Wear Tie Dye (or Disney 2009 review): Part 4featured
I’m going to split this part up into two parts (both should be posted within a day…unless the 23 hour Michael Jordan tribute marathon takes me away) because I have too many pictures of the Gaylord Palms to just inundate one post with.
And, again, please don’t take my pictures or post them directly on other sites without my permission and a link back to this site.
We awoke at the Gaylord Palms around 8:00 am. We were all still pretty exhausted (well, not grandma since she takes marathon naps) and with us checking into Disney the next day, it wasn’t going to get much better. Alas, sleep is for the weak when you’re in Disney and with that, we dragged ourselves out of bed.
Grandma had breakfast while Stephanie and I called Disney to check into whether or not there was availability for tea at the Grand Floridian that afternoon (nay…again) or for the Wishes Fireworks Dessert Party during the week (another negatory). Our plans for the day were for grandma to rest up so she’d be ready to go once we got to the parks and for Stephanie, Mom and I to go resort hopping for a few hours.
Being our first full day in Florida, we had no idea how hot it was. Maybe it’s because we had an unseasonably cold summer in Chicago. Maybe it’s because Florida was having an unseasonably warm summer. Maybe it was both. But it was insanely hot. Like step outside and drip with sweat 7.2 seconds later. This would prove draining later in the day, but at the beginning, it was just plain uncomfortable.
We left the Gaylord Palms around 10:00 am and headed to Downtown Disney to grab a quick breakfast at Earl of Sandwich, look around and then hop on a bus to a resort (and continue hopping for the afternoon). We quickly found parking at the Downtown Disney Marketplace and headed towards the Earl of Sandwich.
Here’s the thing about Earl of Sandwich: Mom, Stephanie and grandma LOVE it. I’m convinced they’d eat here everyday if I’d add my consent. I don’t think it’s anything special anymore. They used to have a grown-up grilled cheese sandwich with swiss, brie and blue cheeses, bacon and roma tomatoes. It was fantastically delicious. A cheese sandwich for the cheese lover. But they took it off the menu. An unforgivable offense to me. They won’t even make it special for you even though they house all the ingredients necessary. Oh well. I’m not really a big sandwich person to begin with, anyways.
Alas, Mom *really* wanted to go there, and their breakfast menu is innocuous (though pretty limited in choices), so off to Earl of Sandwich we went.
As much as I don’t care for the food, I do like the ambiance of the Earl of Sandwich. If you’re not there late on a busy night standing 32 people deep to order a sandwich or waiting for a table for 20 minutes, you’ll notice the dark woods, the soft lighting, the cozy feel and the fresh flowers on every table. If they had a bigger space to alleviate the issues of crowding, it would be a lovely place to sit down with a book (or in my case, my MacBook) and some earl grey lemonade.
Lucky for us, it was not crowded at all. We entered at the tail end of breakfast, so I presume they get really busy around lunch time. Because their breakfast menu is so limited, they offer their full menu, as well (or maybe they just do this towards the end of breakfast time…I don’t know if they’ll make you a tuna melt at 8:00 am, but they’ll do it at 10:15 am).
Stephanie had the Ham, Egg ‘n’ Cheddar sandwich, served on “the Earl’s Mini Artesian Loaf,” which was just a fancy way of saying a smaller version of the roll they serve their lunch/dinner sandwiches on topped with a few ham slices, scrambled eggs (which was really just kind of like an egg patty) and a slice of cheddar cheese and toasted to perfection. No big review on taste here- she just plain old enjoyed it.
Heading in to the restaurant, Mom had eyes for one sandwich and one sandwich only: the Caprese. If they weren’t willing to serve it to her during breakfast, she was willing to wait because she loves it that much. In fact, she’s never tried any other sandwich here (I can boast that I’ve also tried the cobb salad wrap in addition to my beloved and now defunct adult grilled cheese) because she doesn’t think any of them will live up to it. Luckily for her (and us- I didn’t want to spend an hour waiting in Earl of Sandwich for lunch when I could be discovering resorts), they served their full menu. The Caprese is a full Earl’s Artesian Loaf (which, again, is a fancy term for a sandwich roll…don’t expect a six-inch sandwich a la Subway) filled with roma tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, basil and drizzled with balsamic vinegar before heading to the toaster. It didn’t disappoint. Everyone has a Disney food that they take one bite, sigh, close their eyes and know they’re in Disney. For me, it’s a Dole Whip float. For Mom? It’s this sandwich. It was very fresh (almost bright tasting, if I can use that term). The mozzarella wasn’t the finest, but was soft and flavorful and the tomatoes and basil were as fresh as could be without going out to the farm and picking them ourselves. The balsamic added a nice bite and tang to the sweetness of the tomatoes and the toasting really added a nice crust to the bread.
I contemplated oatmeal and a Bacon, Egg ‘n’ Cheddar sandwich, and I ultimately decided on the sandwich because I tend to crave protein in the mornings and, well, it had bacon and bacon makes anything taste good. I ordered my sandwich sans the cheddar since I don’t like toasted cheese on my sandwiches (unless they ARE toasted cheese sandwiches) because if you don’t consume them quickly enough, the cheese gelatinizes and the texture becomes unsavory and I’m a very slow eater (ask anyone who’s ever eaten a meal with me…I literally eat at a snails pace. It annoys the hell out of my family). They took no cheese to mean extra bacon, so instead of a layer of bacon, a layer of eggs and a layer of cheese in between the layers of that delicious bread, it was bacon, egg and more bacon. Mmmm bacon! The bacon was smoky and slightly sweet, but could have been a lot crispier and the bread was fantastic. The egg is where the sandwich fell apart. It wasn’t fresh scrambled eggs, but rather a rubbery patty of them. I’m a big texture person and between the limp (albeit tasty) bacon and the rubbery eggs, I just couldn’t take it anymore. About halfway through the sandwich, I took it off the sandwich and just ate the bacon with the bread, and the crunch of the bread made up for the texture the bacon lacked. Nothing could have helped those eggs.
I had some milk and Mom and Stephanie both had diet Cokes and we planned our day while we ate our breakfasts. We were in Disney twice the year before (once for a few days before and a few days after a cruise and once for six days) and we began the tradition of having breakfast at Downtown Disney and then resort hopping to the hotels we’ve never stayed in (which is basically all of them except the Grand Floridian and the Contemporary) to look around, take pictures of the theming and evaluate whether or not we’d like to stay there in the future. I’ve done this twice, but Mom and Stephanie have only done this once each (Stephanie hurt her leg before the cruise and spent all day in bed at the Gaylord Palms on pain meds the first time when I went with Mom and Mom wanted to go around the Gaylord Palms the second time with grandma so I went with Stephanie). The plan was to head over to the Coronado Resort and then just go where the wind took us since we’ve visited most of the Disney resorts (I think the only ones we haven’t visited are the All Stars, the Caribbean Beach, Fort Wilderness, the DVC resorts and the Swan/Dolphin, which aren’t really Disney resorts anyways). I really wanted to hit the Boardwalk, maybe the Animal Kingdom Lodge and Port Orleans but the weather and intense heat had other plans for us.
After breakfast, we decided to check out the Hanes Design A Tee shop since it was new since our last visit and I knew if we wanted to do anything, it would be best to do it early in the day so we could pick it up later. The shop was a few paces away from the Earl of Sandwich so we quickly made our way over.
The interior of the store is kind of cool, with tubes running around and plenty of examples to show what’s available, but very few stations so there was a wait to see a machine to see what was available. I can’t imagine how busy this place gets after lunch.
The interface was easy to use, but we were inundated with options. The first? What you actually want (with plenty of options ranging from tee-shirts to sweatshirts to various long-sleeved styles), then there’s a million color options and sizing and then dozens of graphics. Then, you have to decide what you want the shirt to say or choose from dozens of prewritten sayings. It’s a LOT of decisions to make and can be very time consuming. This isn’t an activity for those with time constraints or on a tight schedule.
We spent about 20 minutes going through the machine and looking around the store but when it came time to order, I just couldn’t let us do it. Mom wanted to get us all matching shirts, but at, at least, $25 a shirt, you’re talking $100 for four tee-shirts that we could have designed and ordered at home for less than $30. And, it’s unlikely we’d wear them again until the next trip since we aren’t really tee-shirt people. I’d read online that the quality of the printing was lacking and that it was flaking off after the first wash (sometimes even before), so I told Mom to really think about it and if she really really wanted us to having matching shirts, we’d go back later and make them.
With that, we exited the store and headed over to the Downtown Disney Marketplace bus stop and saw the Coronado bus leaving the terminal. We just missed it and had to wait about 15 minutes for the next one.
The reason we wanted to start with the Coronado is because when we were little, though we never went to Disney, we had a Disney vacation planning VHS tape and when they showed the resorts, they showed a family biking through what looked like an indoor corridor and Stephanie and I thought it was super cool. We never had aspirations of staying at places like the Grand Floridian (which is where we would stay for our first few on-site stays) and the Coronado was our dream resort. Stephanie and I visited it last year and I loved the theming and architecture (and I wanted to take pictures with my SLR camera since last year, I was shooting with a point-and-shoot) and we wanted to show it to Mom since we thought she’d love the southwestern theming, too.
It was getting hotter by the second and we were sweating buckets by the time we saw our rescue- in the form of an air conditioned (and empty!) bus to the Coronado.
It was a quick trip to the Coronado (after stops at the Downtown Disney West Side bus depot and Typhoon Lagoon) and we got off the bus at the stop near El Centro, or the main part of the Coronado Resort.
Like the rest of the moderate resorts, the restaurants and shopping are centered in one building (El Centro, in this case). El Centro housed the check-in area, the shop (which had both merchandise and food and beverage), a small quick-service area along with the expansive Pepper Market area, the Rix Lounge (which seems like a super cool lounge to enjoy some music and a drink, with shades of dark red and black) and the sit-down restaurant of the resort, Maya Grill. There’s a lovely fountain in the center of El Centro, a few statues and a gorgeous domed ceiling. Many people describe this resort as a bit more upscale and buttoned up due to the convention center inside the resort and we felt this was true, as we saw many people in suits and dresses walking around while we were there. This might be a down point for some, but I’ll always choose a more upscale environment over a more laid-back one.
The lobby area
Panchito’s, the Coronado’s store
Towards the Pepper Market, Rix Lounge and Maya Grill
We first went into Panchito’s to take a look around and give Mom an idea of the shopping at the moderate resorts (she visited Port Orleans with me but we didn’t go into the shops and she only knows of the shops at the deluxes). Stephanie went looking for people to pin trade with and I took a look at the merchandise. The theming of resort is even evident in the store, where there’s a wagon decorated with merchandise and a few reminders of the store’s namesake. Panchito’s sells everything from mugs, pins and Mickey ears to watches and food goods. It’s interesting compared to deluxe resorts, where there’s typically a few different stores (at the Contemporary, for instance, you’d go to the Fantasia Market for most food goods, BVG for clothing, jewelry, kitchen and housewares or sugary confections and Fantasia for toys and souvenirs). Stephanie found these backpacks that were collapsed and folded into a fanny pack and Mom got one for each of us (they were inexpensive, too- $8 or so each) since they’d provide us more room for whatever we needed over our purses and were relatively water resistant.
When we finished at Panchito’s, we went to check out the Pepper Market and restaurant area (though didn’t go in) before heading outside to check out the sights of the resort. The Coronado is a large, sprawling resort situated around a small lake. We didn’t last very long in the intense early-afternoon sunlight and only got to see a small portion of the gorgeous surroundings (and I still haven’t gotten to see the Dig pool area since it was raining heavily the last time we visited and it was too hot to walk over this time).
We did get a look around the area in between Casitas 1, 2 and 3 before we headed for places cooler and Mom was impressed by the understated beauty of the buildings and courtyards. The Coronado has a few down points, but it has many upsides, too, and I think the beauty of the buildings and the courtyards are its biggest upside. The buildings are shades of neutral beige and bright aqua and showcase the gorgeous architecture of the southwestern United States. In between the buildings are various fountains, sculptures and flowers with lots of small places to enjoy a book or a quiet moment. The Coronado feels almost un-Disneylike in that it provides many areas for serene, peaceful moments instead of the hussle and bussle of Disney (whereas when I visited the Pop Century the year before, that was a louder and more fun environment where the loud noise of excited children wouldn’t ruin the ambiance). That said, it’s not as buttoned up as the atmosphere at the Grand Floridian (which is an environment that almost commands hushed voices with the grandeur and class of the lobby and soft piano music during the day or more lively orchestral sounds later in the evening when the live band plays). Then again, never assume anywhere in Disney is meant for quiet peace, as the entire theme park area lends itself to the loud excitement of children and adults alike.
We headed back to El Centro to grab some Vitamin Water at Panchito’s and relaxed near the fountain for a bit. Stephanie threw some coins in and made a wish (I’m assuming to come back to Disney again a la the Trevi Fountain, but she was tight-lipped about her wish) before we headed outside to wait for a bus. We’d called again to see if there were any last-minute cancellations for tea, and there weren’t, so we decided to head over to the Yacht and Beach Club for lunch at Beaches and Cream (which we’ve never been to, making it an exciting prospect) and I wanted to head over to the Boardwalk to show Stephanie around since I like it so much over there.
We headed out to the bus depot to wait for whatever bus came first and we’d transfer to a YBC bus from wherever we were. While we were there, we encountered a nice cast member and saw he went to a college that might be near us (there’s more than one school by that name so I didn’t want to ask). Stephanie asked him if he was from our area and he was! What a small world! The next bus wouldn’t be coming for awhile so we had fun chatting with him. He was early in his college program and he was enjoying it immensely (even though he missed Chicago quite a bit). I was watching the Cubs game on my phone while Mom and Stephanie chatted with him and they let him borrow their fan since he was stuck out in the heat all day. He told us of how the college program is so much fun but he hardly gets any sleep in between work, classes and going out. He was at a party until 4 am that morning, and he had to be up for work at 6 am! And after work, he was planning on going for a run before taking a nap. He must be much better on little sleep than I am. The less sleep I get, the less patience and self-censorship I have and the more nicknames Stephanie gives me to describe my sleep deprivation induced bitchiness.
The first bus that came happened to go over to Disney Hollywood Studios, where we could take a nice boat ride to the YBC. The bus was empty again and we spent our time discussing the resort. I think it’s the nicest non-deluxe hotel and it doesn’t quite fit in as a moderate and Stephanie and I still have our childhood dream of riding bikes through the hall, but I don’t know if it’s for us. It’s a very, very large resort. Though it has its own bus, if you aren’t near the first stop, you’ll likely have a long wait for a non-crowded one. Many of the buildings are far from El Centro and the Pepper Market, so if you have a refillable mug, it could be a long walk. And really, late at night when you’re tired from a long day at the parks, it would stink to have a long walk to the room. It would be even worse in the rain. I much prefer the ease of transportation at the monorail resorts, even though I’d like a change in scenery and to try something new every once in awhile.
When we got off the bus, we saw a boat approaching and a long line to get on so we ran over. The boat was crowded, but it was mid-day and many families were going back to the resort for mid-day naps and swims so we expected it. I get a kick out of the name of the boats (Friendship). It makes me think of a song we used to sing in choir (Friendshippp, friendshippp, just the perfect blendship. When other friendships have been forgot, ours will still be hot!).
The Yacht and Beach Club was, I think, the second stop after the Swan/Dolphin (the boat stops at the Swan/Dolphin, Yacht and Beach Club, the Boardwalk and then at the International Gateway at Epcot before doing a reverse back to DHS). I love the dock area. It’s got a beautiful view of the Boardwalk (which must be gorgeous all lit up late at night) and a lighthouse. It’s very scenic.
We walked along looking for Beaches and Cream, stopping in the lobby to check the map and look around quickly. Beaches and Cream doesn’t take reservations and it was after noon already so I knew we’d probably have to wait and I wanted to get there as soon as we could. We also saw the water slide, which is modeled after a wrecked pirate ship and looked very cool.
We still had no idea where to go and found ourselves at Stormalong Bay, the expansive pool/lazy river area of the YBC. Disney prohibits pool hopping (meaning you can only swim at your resort unless your a DVC member….but I think even they are prohibited from swimming at Stormalong Bay unless they’re staying at the Beach Club Villas) and there was security checking room ID and handing out wristbands to qualifying vacationers. The pool area was crowded and even though I don’t swim at the Disney resorts (I’ve seen ducks in every pool I’ve seen at Disney, including Stormalong Bay last year, and that just doesn’t seem sanitary…not to mention all of the excited kids who may be too excited to get out of the pool to go to the bathroom and the allowance of babies in swim diapers, which are really only fecal tea bags since they only hold in solids but allow water and liquids to filter in and out…chlorine can’t kill everything), I was almost jealous of people enjoying a respite from the heat in the cold water. The facilities are nice, though. Along with the aforementioned water slide (which is in a separate area), the pool is long and meandering and lends itself to long, lazy rides in an inner tube. It’s the only lazy river at a Disney resort and a large, nicely themed pool area so I can see why people would try to sneak over and why Disney needs pool police constantly patrolling making sure only paying visitors at the resort can use the facilities.
We asked for directions and got lost again before another one gave us directions and let us walk through Stormalong Bay since we clearly weren’t there to swim. After 20 minutes of losing ourselves, we finally found Beaches and Cream.
Beaches and Cream is a table-service restaurant, but is one of the few in Disney that doesn’t take advance reservations. Because of this (and it’s small area and few tables), it’s almost always crowded. Unsurprisingly, we were quoted a 30-45 minute wait. Inside Beaches and Cream there’s a short partition that separates the dining room from a small area where patrons can buy ice cream goodies and some cute “ice cream cone” tables outside.
Stephanie and Mom waited outside but I just couldn’t take the heat anymore. I was sweating bullets and dehydrating more and more by the minute. There’s an indoor arcade next to Beaches and Cream which just happens to be very air conditioned so I took shelter from the heat in there. It’s not a major arcade, but it’s quite expansive for a resort and it was actually pretty busy. I knew families go back to the hotel in the mid-afternoon, but I didn’t expect so many people to be out of the parks and back at the resort.
I took turns sitting outside with Mom and Stephanie and running back into the cool arcade. After 40 minutes or so, our beeper went off and we were taken inside and seated. I muttered to Stephanie that I hoped we had a table and we weren’t seated at the counter, and seconds later, we were sat…..at the counter. I was too tired to care and too hot to offer to wait for a table. I knew Beaches and Cream was a small restaurant, but I didn’t expect it to be this small. There were maybe 15 counter seats and less than 10 tables, most of them 4-tops. The theming, as seemingly always with Disney, was impeccable and I felt like we were transported back in time to a soda shop in the 1950s. And sitting at the counter had it’s advantages- we had the fastest service and we got to watch them prepare all of the food and sundaes.
I had told Mom so many times of the infamous Kitchen Sink that she really wanted to try it, but in this heat and more bus rides to come, a meal of the Kitchen Sink (which is eight scoops of ice cream, every topping in the house and a whole can of whipped cream) seemed more like an exercise in keeping lunch in ones stomach stomach than a meal so we opted for lunch and sharing a sundae than all but guaranteed insulin coma. Our server came by and we quickly ordered drinks- a pink lemonade for me, a diet cherry Coke for Mom and a diet Coke for Stephanie (I told them that soda dehydrates the body further and they should opt for iced tea or lemonade, but they couldn’t be swayed). By the time she came back to take our order, we were ready for more refills. We were parched.
The food at Beaches and Cream is typical grill fare. We decided to order different sides so we could all have a little of everything. Stephanie had a cheeseburger and fries. The cheeseburger was good, but it was just a regular cheeseburger (though after a week at Disney on any dining plan, anything plain and regular sounds amazing every time we do it). The fries were straight out of the frier (they fry everything up fresh- nothing sits and waits) and weren’t greasy but crunchy and perfectly salty.
Mom ordered a veggie burger with fruit. She loves the frozen Morningstar veggie burgers at home (I’m more partial to their soy chicken patties) and wasn’t expecting what she got- a fresh veggie burger with large veggie bits (most notably corn). She’s very picky with her veggie burgers but enjoyed this one immensely. The corn added a nice texture and a hint of sweetness to the sandwich and the side of fruit was large chunks of cold, sweet cantaloupe, honeydew and pineapple. Perfectly refreshing on a hot day.
I ordered a hot dog and onion rings. The hot dog was large and very good. It was steamed on the grill the old fashioned way (with a squirt of water and covered by a bowl) and while it wasn’t the Chicago dogs I enjoy at home, it was good nonetheless. It was served on a whole grain bun (Disney did away with regular buns last year and now all of the buns at the resorts and parks are whole grain) and I couldn’t taste the difference (but I like whole grain anyways). The onion rings had a reputation to live up to and boy, did they ever. They were large, perfectly crispy and fantastically delicious. The batter was slightly sweet and it worked well against the soft onion. They were just as I like ’em, too: crunchy on the outside and somewhat soft while still firm in the middle. I think, though, that Mom had more of my rings and I had more of her fruit than we each had of our own.
I’ll give away a small Beaches and Cream secret that I got a kick out of when I saw it. From our vantage point at the counter, we were right across from the grill so we’d watch them cook the food. They have a meat press that they use to press the burgers on the grill. This press has Mickey cut outs so that each burger has a hidden Mickey in it. Kind of cool, huh?
When it came time for dessert, Mom and Stephanie thought we should get two sundaes but I really thought one would suffice after a heavier lunch. We had a lengthy debate over what we should have. Stephanie wanted a banana split. Mom wanted the Strawberry Shortcake sundae. I wanted to try the much hyped No Way Jose or the Milky Way. We settled on an Old-Fashioned Sundae, with two scoops of vanilla ice cream, hot fudge and whipped cream. Stephanie and I always fight over the cherry on top (yes, even at 23 and 24 years old, we still fight over who gets the cherry) so I asked for an extra cherry and our server came through BIG. The sundae was excellent and it was the perfect size for the three of us to share after our meal.
Beaches and Cream is a table service restaurant that takes one credit from those on the Disney Dining Plans. We weren’t on the dining plan yet so we paid out of pocket ($42.21, pre-tip). I’m not sure if this is worth a table-service meal for us, but since everyone on the plan gets their own sundae, it can certainly build its worth that way.
While I still wanted to visit a few more resorts (the Boardwalk and Port Orleans, mostly, but I also wanted to go back to the Animal Kingdom Lodge, see one of the All Stars and maybe the Caribbean Beach Resort), we were hot and tired and so we decided to go back early and rest. Then, I’d have time to go around the Gaylord Palms and we could take grandma to dinner and Downtown Disney later that night. Before we left for the day, though, we took a boat ride back to DHS and hopped on a bus to the Contemporary and did one go-round on the monorail, as is tradition for our resort hopping day. The monorails had appliques on the outside for the “What Will You Celebrate?” promotion and they were annoying and made me dizzy while looking out the windows.
After our ride, we got back off at the Contemporary and took a bus back to Downtown Disney. We called grandma to see if she wanted anything and we stopped at Earl of Sandwich to get her an All American sandwich (turkey, cranberries, cheddar cheese, lettuce, tomatoes and ranch dressing- we ordered sans the ranch) before heading into the sweltering car and back to the Gaylord Palms for a rest. I don’t think any of us actually slept, but we laid in bed and watched Stacy TV for awhile. It was still pretty early in the afternoon and we’re not normally in the hotel at this time. It would have been nice to swim, but I didn’t have my swimsuit. We took grandma down to the Haagen Dazs shop for some ice cream and she, Mom and Stephanie sat and enjoyed the atrium while I went on a photo tour of the resort (I’ll do this in the next entry since it’s fairly photo intensive).
We met up back in the room a bit later and discussed dinner plans. I still wanted to go to the Colorado Fondue Company, but Mom and Stephanie didn’t want to drive into Orlando. Stephanie suggested Chili’s, Fuddrucker’s and Sweet Tomatoes again and while I didn’t want to eat somewhere where we have the same thing at home, I had something new today in Beaches and Cream and we could eat pretty inexpensively at Chili’s with their 2/$20 deal going on (one appetizer, two entrees and one dessert for two people and $20). We drove over towards Chili’s and it was packed. Macaroni Grill was next door and even though we have one at home, we’ve never been there and we wouldn’t have to wait so we went there. I saw a Giordano’s across the street, which is a Chicago pizza chain. I hear it does good business in Orlando for people who want Chicago style pizza. Try the stuffed spinach- it’s the best!
Macaroni Grill was a little more upscale than I thought. It wasn’t quite a Maggianos, but this one wasn’t as casual as a Chili’s and people were dressed a little nicer than theme park wear (We’d changed out of our sweaty clothes so we were good, but it wasn’t what we expected). It was a dark and almost romantic atmosphere, but the screaming baby at the table next to us reminded us that it was a family-friendly restaurant. They were having a special, too. I think it was $12 or so a person and included soup or a salad, an entree and a dessert (from a special menu, not anything we wanted). Our server was Jess and I remember her because she wrote her name on our table (from upside down, by the way…that takes some talent) and she saw my iPhone and “accidentally” whipped hers out and we played “What’s your favorite app” for a few minutes. We got some good ideas off each other, too. She brought out some crusty italian sourdough and a plate of dipping oil while we perused the menu.
We contemplated an appetizer, but figured the food would be sufficient and just got salads. The salad was nice, with a delicious and tangy italian vinaigrette. I’m not usually a fan of field greens, but the dressing was so good that I almost forgot I was eating leafs. Almost. I forgot to ask what was on the salad and assumed I could pick off anything I didn’t like, but I forgot to order without onions (I hate raw onions…they went to grandma) and there was small diced cucumber and I don’t like that so I picked through my salad for awhile. Everyone else liked theirs just fine as is.
For our entrees, grandma and I both had the fettuccine alfredo, which was heavy and creamy but totally delicious. Stephanie had chicken cannelloni and thought it was just okay but was way too heavy. It came with an ample portion of three cannelloni and I’m not sure if she made it through one. Mom had the spaghetti and meatballs and thought it was good, not great. None of us came close to finishing our meals and Jess offered to box it up for us, but since we had no microwave at the Gaylord Palms and we were checking into the Bay Lake Towers the next day and had the deluxe dining plan waiting for us, we wouldn’t have the room to eat them anyways.
For dessert, I had the lemon passion, which was a citrus infused cake with lemon mousse and it was delicious. Jess said she didn’t care for it, but it was light and I loved the juxtaposition of the tart lemon mousse with the sweet cake. Mom and grandma both had the smothered chocolate cake, which was heavenly but entirely too heavy. Stephanie had the sorbetto and it was the clear winner of the four of us since it was light and cool and very tasty.
Stephanie and Mom were really tired, but grandma and I wanted to go to Downtown Disney since it was unlikely we’d be there at night for the rest of the trip (and likely wouldn’t be back except to redeem snack credits a the end of the week), we went for a quick stop into a few stores.
The parking lots were packed, but Stephanie has a great eye for finding spots and it didn’t take us long to find a handicapped spot (we really need the room to get grandma into and out of her wheelchair).
We started at Basin to take a quick look around before walking over towards the World of Disney (stopping so I could take a picture with a real plastic Disney princess). Stephanie found a stuffed Thumper that she wanted, and I found a few things, too, but we decided to hold off until the end of the week before making any purchases here since most of the merchandise can be purchased at the parks or in the resort.
We didn’t get to spend as much time looking around as we wanted because it was too hard to maneuver grandma’s wheelchair in the crowded store and grandma was getting sleepy from our heavy dinner, anyways. We headed back to the Gaylord Palms and settled in around 11:00 pm. We had to repack our stuff into the suitcases but were too tired to take them out to the car so we left that for the next morning. We knew we’d have to wake up early and I was already dreading the lack of sleep I was in for over the course of the next week. The earlier we checked in, the quicker we could get into the parks.
Little did I know the debacle that was waiting for us at check in…
Up next: A Walking Tour of the Gaylord Palms
