December 6, 2001 - A Day Off - Sort of

We're all tired from yesterday's launch, so Irene and I decide to have a quiet day, after we return the rental car.  Have you ever been lost in Orlando?  We take the rental and the truck with me in the lead.  I negotiate the Disney system all right, but think I'm on the wrong road and make a U-turn.  Then it's just a matter of turning all routes into pretzels.  We finally hit a red light and Irene goes left while I go right.  I make a turn and catch her in a strip mall.  Frustrated, we call Enterprise and then ask a girl in her car.  Then it's easy.  We head back to the campground minus one car.

After a rest we decide to explore using the internal Disney transportation system.  We go to the Fort Wilderness Marina and catch a launch to the Contemporary Hotel.  The Contemporary actually looked its name when Walt Disney World opened thirty years ago.  It's a large A-frame hotel with the monorail line running right through its middle.  Inside it has a huge open space with rooms on galleries rising to the top on either side.  In the lobby are gift shops, restaurants, and other services, including the always-present kiosk selling memberships in the Disney Vacation Club.  We get on the monorail and take it on the hotel loop.  We get to sit in the nose area with the driver.  This provides a superior view forward.

We debark at the Grand Floridian Hotel and Spa, perhaps the most expensive hotel in WDW.  Designed to look like a 19th century Florida vacation palace, this hotel is white with red roof and turrets.  It has lots of lacy filigree woodwork.  As usual, Disney's attention to detail pays off.  Inside are plenty of blue-haired little old ladies.  In the lobby, a man in a tuxedo sits at the piano playing.  Tea will soon be served.  Irene buys some gifts at the hotel shop, and we head back to the monorail, which takes us to the transportation center.   From there we get on the Epcot monorail and make a round trip to Epcot Center.  We then take a launch to Disney's Wilderness Lodge.  This wonderful hotel looks like a National Park System lodge from the 1930's.  It is built of mammoth logs that rise five stories with rooms in galleries around the main lobby.  The contrast between Contemporary, Grand Floridian, and Wilderness Lodge is marked.  Each has its own character and certainly attracts its own kind of guests.  At the same time, each is unmistakably a Disney hotel.  Images of Disney characters can be found in obvious and hidden places.

We grab a launch and return to Fort Wilderness.  The kids have bought tickets to Mickey's Christmas Party in the Magic Kingdom.  We have opted out and watch TV for a while before collapsing in bed.  The Disney transportation system has proven itself to work quite well.  It consists of boats, monorails, and buses.  By using them in combination, visitors can get to any place in the World in due course.  Disney discourages guests from using cars to move about the World, but some remote spots are better reached by auto.  Nevertheless, since returning the rental van we have used the transportation system to our satisfaction