Verstehen
I break for the Nautilus
- Joined
- Jul 4, 2008
Hello, and welcome to my pre-trip report. My name is Rachel and I’ll be your chief flight author. I’m a big lurker on many of your fabulous reports (though now that I’m posting my own report I’ll try to be more active), and decided I wanted to contribute!
I’m 31 and for the past three years I’ve been lucky enough to live in Orlando. I’ve lived in Florida for 9 years and have been a passholder since I moved here from New York, but living in Orlando is of course a whole other animal.
My husband and I moved here in 2016 for work. He’s about as far from a Disney fan as you can get, though he’ll go to the resorts and Disney Springs for certain occasions. But that usually doesn’t stop me. I get a decent amount of park time in during weekday evenings and weekends. I don’t know how long we’ll live here so I’m trying to make the best of it for as long as I can!
We live in a neighborhood of Orlando called College Park, which is about 30 minutes from Disney property (assuming no or light traffic), and super convenient to downtown Orlando and Winter Park. We love living here because we have easy access to lots of awesome shops, restaurants, and bars without being too close to the touristy areas, the houses are older and have lots of charm (ours was built in the 50’s), and even though we’re close to urban living if we want it, we also have access to a lake for kayaking and other cool nature attractions. It’s also relatively affordable compared to other areas like the neighborhoods right outside of downtown, Winter Park, or Baldwin Park, while still being in a good location in terms of proximity to amenities and safety (some parts of the city are definitely super sketchy).
I am a mega Disney parks fan and have been since childhood. I’m a huge fan of anything vintage Epcot and tiki culture and am happy to report that the bartenders at Trader Sam’s are finally starting to remember me. I like being close enough to the parks that I can go pretty much whenever I want, but that doesn’t mean I don’t indulge in the occasional staycation, particularly if family or friends are in town, or if I’m running one of the Disney races (waking up at 3 is bad enough; needing to drive before and after the races is exponentially worse).
Speaking of which…
This report will cover the preparation for my upcoming Food and Wine trip, and will eventually switch over to an actual trip report. In between, I’ll also probably use this as a little blog to share some of the other things I love about living in central Florida. I think a lot of focus on living in Orlando revolves around living in the immediate proximity of the theme parks, and that’s great, but I hope I can provide you with a nice look at some parts of the area you may have never known about! Maybe it’ll inspire you to take a look on a future trip
Joining me on this trip will be my dad.
He's the guy in the middle
He lives in upstate New York where he does double duty as a dentist and a volunteer firefighter. So needless to say, he works hard, and this trip will be a well-deserved break.
Currently our plans are to stay at the Boardwalk Villas September 18-24 in a pool/garden view studio. We have tickets for Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party already booked, and we’re looking forward to booking at least a couple of Food and Wine events. Other than that our plans are basically to chill out, indulge in drinks and hot tub time, and have little to no responsibilities for a few glorious days.
Follow along as I chronicle our plans, along with anything interesting things that happen between now and our start date!
I’m 31 and for the past three years I’ve been lucky enough to live in Orlando. I’ve lived in Florida for 9 years and have been a passholder since I moved here from New York, but living in Orlando is of course a whole other animal.
My husband and I moved here in 2016 for work. He’s about as far from a Disney fan as you can get, though he’ll go to the resorts and Disney Springs for certain occasions. But that usually doesn’t stop me. I get a decent amount of park time in during weekday evenings and weekends. I don’t know how long we’ll live here so I’m trying to make the best of it for as long as I can!
We live in a neighborhood of Orlando called College Park, which is about 30 minutes from Disney property (assuming no or light traffic), and super convenient to downtown Orlando and Winter Park. We love living here because we have easy access to lots of awesome shops, restaurants, and bars without being too close to the touristy areas, the houses are older and have lots of charm (ours was built in the 50’s), and even though we’re close to urban living if we want it, we also have access to a lake for kayaking and other cool nature attractions. It’s also relatively affordable compared to other areas like the neighborhoods right outside of downtown, Winter Park, or Baldwin Park, while still being in a good location in terms of proximity to amenities and safety (some parts of the city are definitely super sketchy).
I am a mega Disney parks fan and have been since childhood. I’m a huge fan of anything vintage Epcot and tiki culture and am happy to report that the bartenders at Trader Sam’s are finally starting to remember me. I like being close enough to the parks that I can go pretty much whenever I want, but that doesn’t mean I don’t indulge in the occasional staycation, particularly if family or friends are in town, or if I’m running one of the Disney races (waking up at 3 is bad enough; needing to drive before and after the races is exponentially worse).
Speaking of which…
This report will cover the preparation for my upcoming Food and Wine trip, and will eventually switch over to an actual trip report. In between, I’ll also probably use this as a little blog to share some of the other things I love about living in central Florida. I think a lot of focus on living in Orlando revolves around living in the immediate proximity of the theme parks, and that’s great, but I hope I can provide you with a nice look at some parts of the area you may have never known about! Maybe it’ll inspire you to take a look on a future trip
Joining me on this trip will be my dad.
He's the guy in the middle
He lives in upstate New York where he does double duty as a dentist and a volunteer firefighter. So needless to say, he works hard, and this trip will be a well-deserved break.
Currently our plans are to stay at the Boardwalk Villas September 18-24 in a pool/garden view studio. We have tickets for Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party already booked, and we’re looking forward to booking at least a couple of Food and Wine events. Other than that our plans are basically to chill out, indulge in drinks and hot tub time, and have little to no responsibilities for a few glorious days.
Follow along as I chronicle our plans, along with anything interesting things that happen between now and our start date!
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The hardest one to get was definitely Sci-Fi. I had to look at a few days that were not my first choice before I found one. I’m not sure if it has to do with Galaxy’s Edge opening up. We tend to book just a couple of places and keep everything else last minute, which works for us because our choices are usually off the beaten path.
