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Going to Disney World for Christmas


Sunday December 2nd 2018, I rode with Kevin and Carolyn to Disney World. I've been to Disney World with Kevin many trips these past few years. This was the first time I've been to Disney World with Carolyn and its been about forty something years since Carolyn has been to Disney World. She says Kevin was only two years old when she went last! I never went when I was a kid. My first trip was in my late 30's, but I do love my little mid-life crisis. This next screenshot shows our route in blue. We covered 474+ miles over 7+ hours, including 2 time zones and a couple of toll booths.

We got an early start on the drive, but it was not as early as we had planned. A strong storm system blew across Pensacola before the sun came up and we waited for it to pass before we started loading up the car. The storm was actually moving to the northeast so we had to drive through some really intense rain and thunder storms east of Crestview. We also drove through the area on Interstate 10 that was hit by Hurricane Michael just a few weeks before. Trees were leveled. Billboard signs were toppled. The devastation spanned miles and miles along the interstate. This was the area northeast of Panama City Beach and west of Tallahassee.

This trip, the three of us stayed at Coronado Springs. Coronado Springs, not to be confused with Disney Springs - Disney's shopping and entertainment development, is located right in the middle of Disney's four main theme parks. It is a large resort with newly refurbished hotel rooms; plus, they are building a new hotel tower right next to their existing lobby and the new hotel tower is almost finished. They have reached the top floor and the hotel is scheduled to open in July 2019. I think it is a great resort and I'll probably stay there many more times in the future as long as the money doesn't run out and I don't die.




Here are a few pictures from Coronado Springs including the new hotel tower, the lobby Christmas tree, new lake restaurant and the resort lake and signage.

New Hotel Tower
Opening July 2019
Original Resort Lobby is to the left.

Coronado Springs Lobby Christmas Tree

Noah and Carolyn in the lobby

Coronado Springs Lake, Signage and new Restaurant in the middle of the lake.

Maureen joined us on this trip as well but she did not ride with us. She flew in on Delta via Atlanta. Lucky she did not book a Silver Airways direct flight to Orlando. Those small propeller plans would not have flown through the storm weather from this morning. She would have been delayed for sure.


After checking into our hotel room at Coronado Springs, we caught the first bus to Disney Springs for shopping, dinner, entertainment and people watching. Disney Springs is a huge place with tons of retail shops, restaurants, bars, movies, rides, live entertainment and more. It is free to get in although you'll probably leave a lot of money there before you're done.



We visited a few shops and then met with Maureen for dinner at Wolfgang Puck's Bar and Grill.

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Sunday
Page 1

Page 2
Going to Disney World for Christmas
Page 3

Page 4

Page 5

Monday
Page 6
Be Our Guest at Magic Kingdom
Tuesday
Page 7
Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party
Wednesday
Page 8
Christmas and Candlelight Processional at Epcot
Page 9






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