Florida 2025
The plan was to go to Disney World for a few days then Hollywood Beach, FL for a week. But it didn't got at all according to plan.
Crystal's parents were going on a 7-day Caribbean cruise and invited us and Crystal's brother's family to meet them in Hollywood Beach, FL for a week afterward. We would all rent a house near the ocean and just hang out as a family. Then Crystal and her brother decided we should go to Disney World for a few days before. He have two little boys; the older one (6) has been to Disney before and the younger one (3) has not. Then we would all meet up in Hollywood Beach for a week of sand, swimming, and hanging out on the boardwalk. That was the plan anyway. However, none of it went according to plan.
We flew down separately from Crystal's brother's family. With their boys being so young, they just wanted to get their earlier in the day and get settled in and we flew down in the afternoon. We didn't see them on that first day, but got a text in the evening that the older nephew wasn't feeling well. He tested positive for Flu B and they were planning on flying home in the morning.
Lily was very upset. She had a lot of misgivings about returning to Disney World since during her last visit she had what we at the time thought was an allergic reaction in one of their restaurants but later figured out was actually a panic attack. She only wanted to come to be there with the boys and wanted us to go home too. Fortunately, she woke up in a better mood the next day and agreed to try a park.
So we took the ferry from our hotel at Wilderness Lodge (What3Words) to Magic Kingdom (What3Words). I was having terrible seasonal allergies, but other than that, we had a pretty good day. Crystal worked the Lightning Lanes like a champ so where hardly waited in any lines. The weather was beautiful: sunny, cool in the morning, 80°F in the afternoon.
They challenged me to a game of Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin—a ride where you shoot laser at targets to defeat Evil Emperor Zurg and score points. They thought they had the upper hand because they had researched where all of the 100,000-point targets were and talked a big game all day as our Lightning Lane wasn't scheduled till 4:30 PM. But pride comes before the fall. I beat them 144,900 to 45,400. What happened to all those 100K targets, huh?! 😂
Then that evening, I took a turn for the worse. What we had thought was allergies clearly was not—or at least not only allergies, the tree pollen index was high that day. By bed time, I had a 102°F fever and was dead to the world. Crystal reworked all of our travel plans, got us flights home the next day, packed everything up, drove us to the airport, dragged my zombie ass through MCO, and drove us home from Buffalo. Now her parents are all alone in a house in Hollywood Beach meant for nine guests. 😬
Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on how you think about it), this wasn't Crystal's first rodeo. In 2020, just days before the pandemic started, I got a terrible stomach bug at Disney World that had me sidelined for the last three days of our trip. I slept literally the whole time; only waking to go do unspeakable things to the toilet.
After this recent episode, I have no interest in going back to Disney World. I never wanted to be "Disney people." It just worked out for us since they have an amazing food-allergy protocol and Lily could eat in their restaurants. So we bought into Disney Vacation Club thinking we would go every year or so and Crystal could have a real vacation. But with Lily's increased anxiety around food in recent years, that has been off the table. Combined with the fact that it's crowded, so expensive, often hotter than hell, and a veritable biohazard, I'd vote for selling our DVC points and vacation elsewhere. The juice just isn't worth the squeeze.