Updated: May 22, 2022
It’s a human sign When things go wrong
Regular readers of this blog will be aware that I am not good at goodbyes, especially on holidays. Today is the day that Graham & Jo start the second part of their holiday and drive down the coast to a ‘shack’ they booked for the next week near Fort Myers on the West Coast. The realisation that they are leaving hit me as I got up to find them already sitting by the pool as usual. I will miss that and them. They have both been great company and we have had a lot of fun with them. The fact that we have to leave the villa to start our journey home less than 24 hours later meant I was though just about coping with their impending departure.
As it was to be their last morning we had agreed to try and make the most of it by visiting the Animal Kingdom Lodge. We were in the car by 9am. Graham offered to drive in his rental car and it was lovely being driven through Disney for a change. He had been given a much newer and higher standard car than ours despite It still being the same mid-class SUV. There were many more gadgets and it had an in-built Sat Nav.
There was no problem getting parked at Animal Kingdom Lodge and we had a pleasant wander around. Disappointingly there were no animals in the first part of the ‘Savannah’ outside of the Hotel. We made our way to the second part where at least we could see a few Giraffes and Zebras in the distance.
We found the takeaway café and got some hot drinks. It was already another scorching day so we were grateful to find a table with a parasol to give us some shade. We sat for a while talking about what we had done over the past few days and how/when we could do it all again. We all agreed that whilst the Disney Hotels are lovely, they are however crowded, full of people and most do not have large private balconies to sit on. The villa we are in is lovely, and is quiet and has the most terrific outside space to relax in. Plus, it is several times cheaper per night than a Disney room.
As it was still relatively early, we decided to drive to the Grand Floridian Hotel to have a walk around. This time we were not so lucky as the car park was full unless you had a lunch reservation. We tried to blag our way around that but failed, which was a real shame.
Instead, we headed back to the villa where Graham & Jo finished their packing, cleared their room and loaded up the car. Then they were off. Inwardly I was upset but held it together until they had gone.
Karen wanted to have a last afternoon by the pool which we did, in between some packing. I started reading another John Grisham book. Karen even ventured into the quite cold pool at one point to cool down.
For our last night out, we thought we would try the Celebration Tavern. On our way there we popped into Target to return some swimming bottoms that Karen had purchased and then to Five Below to get her another strap for her Watch.
Then we headed to Celebration. This was the first time we had ever been here in an evening and we were keen to see what it was like. It was bustling in the same way as it is during the day. There was a 25 minute for a table and we waited on a bench overlooking the Lake. It seems that the early evening is the preferred time for locals to take their daily constitutional walk around the Lake as there were lots of people doing so.
The Tavern was heaving when we were seated and there was a good noisy atmosphere. I had a Blackened Mahi Mahi Sandwich which was really good. Karen had the Chicken Dinner which was also good.
It was Quiz night at the Tavern but as we had no idea of how it worked or how long it would take, we didn’t take part. It turned out to be an interesting format. There were to be 4 rounds of 5 questions. After each question you had to hand in your answer after allocating a score to the answer of 1 – 5 depending on your confidence in the answer. Each confidence number of 1 – 5 had to be used once during each round. We stayed for the first 3 questions of which the first 2 I knew the answers to. The third we didn’t as the answer was an obscure American cartoon called ‘Pinky and the Brain’ that neither of us had heard of.
We headed back to the villa which seemed quiet now without Graham & Jo. After getting the bulk of our packing done, we sat down and finished off a bottle of wine whilst watching another couple of episodes of Shark Tank.
And so that is our last full day for this holiday. Tomorrow is the dreaded travel day with us having to be out of the villa by 10am but our flight not departing until just before 8pm. Then we have the overnight flight. Still, it is a small price to pay for able to have been here.
