prologue
Wednesday, September 11,1997
I work odd hours so at 12:00 A.M when most of you were in bed I was at work. At work that night my mind turned to thoughts of "what will I do this weekend". This is a normal Thursday morning thought, because it is the last day of my work week. So, I thought to myself, why not go to WDW? This is also not too unusual a thought for me, since I am after all a disney nut ;-). Usually, at this point, I think of all the reasons I can't go (lack of money, plans with the wife, ect...). But this time I couldn't think of any. We were ok with bills and such this week, and my wife had plans to do things on her own so I didn't have to worry about her. She isn't a disney nut, but makes up for that by being my favorite person in the whole world. So I figured if it was ok with her I would go.
When I got home from work she was getting up for work, so I asked her if it would be ok to go out of town myself this weekend. She said ok. I then started doing all the things I had to do to go. I checked out my car, mowed the lawn, did dishes, laundry, bought a comfortable pair of shoes (my old pair had been shot for awhile), ran a few errands and before you knew it it was 8 P.M. I wanted to leave by 10 P.M. to make sure I had plenty of time since I couldn't sleep I ended up leaving before that even. I will never ever again drive to FL with no sleep in the past 24 hours. I made plenty of rest stops, and they helped. I even stopped for an hour one time and may have slept for a few minutes. But, I won't kid you driving by myself with no sleep was a big mistake. I also made the mistake of driving thru Jacksonville (instead of taking the bypass). I figured the construction zone wouldn't be crowded at night, and it wasn't. Normally I enjoy seeing road construction (it's a guy thing I think), but not when I am dog dead tired of driving.
At about 6:30 a.m. I exited I-4 at state route 535, and ate at the Shoneys that was near the Days Inn I stayed at on my 1996 trip. The park wasn't opening until 9 so after breakfast I waited for it to get late enough to call my wife so I could let her know I got there ok.
My parking lot ticket reads 7:30 and when I got to the
TTC the CM there (a nice fellow in a wheelchair) said the gate would
open at 8:30. This area, the new gates at the ttc, looks
much nicer than the stainless steel things they had when I was last here.
By the time I got on the ferry I was pretty happy/anxious/stoked (pick your favorite) and took lots of pics
