A Very Disney Honeymoon Day 9 (Plus traveling home)
December 18th Tuesday
Today was the last day of our trip and to be honest we were both ready to start heading home. After final packing, checking over our room charges and loading up the car we headed over to the Poly. Grabbed coffees and headed onto the monorail to head over to the Magic Kingdom.
I can't remember specifics but we hit several rides until we were ready for lunch. We had reservations for Via Napoli but neither of us was up for another park so we headed into Downtown Disney and instead did lunch at House of Blues. Lunch was very nice after a few days of fancier food we were both in the mood for a good burger. After lunch we did some shopping.
We still had some time to kill before returning to MCO. We drove over to Art of Animation and wow, this resort is really cool. I've never been one for the value resorts but this one seems really well done. The cars section is awesome. We took a ton of photos for my Cars obsessed nephew.
After DH wanted to check out the fire station property, being a cop and a former firefighter he's day dreamed about working here one day. They were very friendly and we chatted for a while and were shown around. One last stop before we left property was to check out the new kennel. I had used the kennels previously when they were at the front of the parks but had yet to use the new centralized one. When we saw how close it was to our resort we kicked ourselves a bit for not just driving and bringing the fur babies.
The kennel itself is very nice. The basic accommodations are much like they'd be at any vets office. But the suites are awesome and something we'd consider next time for our pooch. They also take reservations in advance which was something we couldn't do at the old kennel set ups. It was well worth the stop. After that we headed off property and back to the Orlando airport. Returned our car, grabbed something for dinner and waited only about 30 minutes for our flight.
Flight back to Newark was smooth, the landing was not. For anyone familiar with this airport we landed on the short runway, in highwinds. I hate flying to begin with and this landing had my atheist self praying to anyone who would listen. Anyway, we eventually did stop and were out of the airport within 30 minutes.
My dad was there to get us and we headed back to my parents rental home (as they are still displaced from Sandy). It was nice spending some time with them and we also spent a few days helping to laying drywall in the first floor of their house.
For anyone curious the barrier islands of NJ are still battling Sandy. The towns are still a wreck. the drainage systems are clogged with sand, making every rain storm a flooding event that brings the water up 2-3 feet. My hometown finally got natural gas service back to less damaged properties just a few days ago. Some homes, like a close friend of mine, likely wont have gas service for another 6 months. It was hard seeing the island like that but it also felt good to get our hands dirty and do something.
By the 21st we were back home safely in NC. After 2 weeks away it was nice to be home with the furbabies again. And the trip was memorable to say the very least.
