~~Flying 1000 Miles to Run 13~~A January 2012 Pre-Trip Report & Training Log~~NEW9/8

[CAStevens218]

Hi Everybody!! Welcome to my first pre-trip report!

Who:

That's me! I'm Christin, a 24 year old recent graduate with my Master's degree. I'm working part time right now and searching for a full time job in my field! I'm also planning my wedding, which will take placy on 7/22/2012 at a local aquarium! I love to read, I run regularly and, of course, I LOVE everything Disney!

Favorite Ride: Tower of Terror, closely followed by Expedition Everest!

This is Ben, my fiance. I'm sure he would choose a different photo if I let him, but he has no say in this and I love that hat, so this is what I'm using!!!!! Ben is 27, works full time, loves video games, rock climbing and....Disney World!!

Favorite Ride: Rockin' Roller Coaster

If you want to check out the trip report from the last trip Ben and I took together, you can find it here:

~*~*~Are You Sure That Snow Is Fake?!?~*~*~A December Disney Trip!

Anyway, back to the cast....

This is my Dad. The photo was taken on our annual hiking trip in 2010! We hit 4 peaks that day!!! My family went to Disney World in the 90s, and my dad still says it is the best vacation we ever took! He is excited to go back and see everything again!

Favorite Ride: I think he'll like the shows at Hollywood Studios the best!

Finally, this is my brother. This photo was taken at my Master's graduation in May! He works one part time and one full time job and pretty much likes to just hang out! He likes to go fishing, and he really reallly realllllyy loves his truck!!

Favorite Ride: I think he'll love the thrill rides!

Why:

This trip came about when I decided to run the 2012 half marathon and my dad decided to join me! Ben and my brother were more than happy to tag along!!!

The plans have evolved over the past month or so, and I'll get into the later on!

When: January 6-11 at WDW and January 11-14 at the beach!

Where: Pop Century & a yet to be determined beach resort (possibly Disney Vero Beach)



In addition to using this thread as a pre-trip report, I also plan to use it as a way to track my progress for my training! Right now I'm up to running 7 miles comfortably and 8 not so comfortably, so I've definitely got some miles to add between now and January!


So, I hope some of you will follow along and help me plan my trip and get ready to run my first half marathon!!

 

[CAStevens218]

Table of Contents​

The Evolution of the Trip

Changes and Progress

Day 1:
Day 2:
Day 3:
Day 4:
Day 5:
Day 6:
Day 7:
Day 8:
Day 9:

 

[jc040404]

LOVE your title!! & Excited to follow along until your trip!

 

[CAStevens218]

Alright, so its about time that I get going on this! A pretrip report is much harder to write because I actually have to decide what to write about instead of just following the progression of what happened on a trip!!

So anyway, here is where we stand as of right now...

This trip has evolved quite a bit since we first came up with the idea. It started out as a quick weekend trip to run the half marathon...we were going to fly down on Friday and fly home on Monday. Then my dad decided to take a whole week of from work and said that we should stay from Friday until Tuesday, giving us 1 day for each park. THEN, he decided that we should stay for a whole week!!!

The thinking behind this was that we would stay at Disney World from Friday until Wednesday morning, and then drive to the beach and stay from Wednesday until Saturday. Then we decided that it might be better to plan a few free days to head to the beach if the weather cooperates. PLUS, Disney is offering free dining that week, so we can eat for free if we stay on property!

SO, after many changes of plans, as of this moment, we are going to fly down on Friday January 6 and fly home on Saturday January 14. We will spend at least 1 day in each park, and add some relaxation time and free days into our schedule. My dad would like to rent a car and drive to the beach for a day or maybe take a trip to Kennedy Space Center. We are going to stay at Pop Century on Friday and Saturday nights and then move over to Port Orleans French Quarter from Sunday until Saturday with free dining!

Phew!! The best part of all these changes is that it all started with everyone saying "We don't care what we do, you plan everything!!!" Then, slowly, all these preferences and requests start coming out! Crazy family...

Now, as far as this whole half marathon thing goes, I think my training is going pretty well! Its been tough in the heat of the summer, but I'm up to running 8 miles comfortably! I'm going to stick with 8 for a few more weeks and then bump it up once the fall weather sets in around here! Sidenote...one of the best parts of living in New England is the fall! I can't wait for gorgeous foliage, apple picking, apple pies and pumpkin carving!!

I'm also trying to decide if I want to stick to my own training or follow the 12 week training plan posted on the Disney marathon weekend website once we hit the 12 week out mark. My own training has been working pretty well so far, and I'm not in it to set any records, just to finish, so I think I might stick with my own plan, but we'll see how I feel in the next few weeks!

That's it for now! Next time I'll start going through our plans for each day....well, my plans for each day since nobody wants to help me plan it until some crazy inspiration hits them and they throw a request at me!!! Its a good thing we can laugh at ourselves!!!!

Goodnight!

 

[m2zjj]

I saw your trip report in your signature and it caught my eye. Now I've read that and I'm joining in here. I love the title and can't wait to read more about your plans.

 

[jc040404]

Phew!! The best part of all these changes is that it all started with everyone saying "We don't care what we do, you plan everything!!!" Then, slowly, all these preferences and requests start coming out! Crazy family...

That's so my group! Leave it all up to me until I start getting things planned. Thank goodness we don't really do much of the planning thing anyway.

A PTR does seem like a lot more work, but I still can't wait to hear about your plans.. even if they get changed by moments of inspiration along the way.

 

[CAStevens218]

I saw your trip report in your signature and it caught my eye. Now I've read that and I'm joining in here. I love the title and can't wait to read more about your plans.

Thanks for reading along!! I promise that when I do a trip report for this one it will be much more interesting!! I'm definitely going to try to stick with this pre-trip report though!!

That's so my group! Leave it all up to me until I start getting things planned. Thank goodness we don't really do much of the planning thing anyway.

A PTR does seem like a lot more work, but I still can't wait to hear about your plans.. even if they get changed by moments of inspiration along the way.

Oh, the requests are flying in now!!!!! I think the trip is starting to feel more real to everyone and they are realizing that they actually have opinions!!!

So far, I found writing a trip report to be much more fun....but hopefully I'll get on a roll here! We officially booked everything last night, so I'm going to go write an update!!!!

 

[CAStevens218]

We have made progress! I've been checking the Southwest and Jetblue websites daily for about a month now looking for a reasonable airfare. We usually like to fly Southwest because they leave from Providence, Rhode Island and it is a super easy airport to get to and navigate. However, the prices were just not going my way, so I branced out and started looking at the Southwest and Jetblue fares out of Hartford, CT.

Well, last night Jetblue had reasonable prices for the flights we wanted out of Hartford, so we took the plunge and booked! This is the hardest part for me because I just know that some day I will look at the Southwest website and they will have great prices....but I couldn't stand waiting anymore, I've never waited this long to book airfare and I was getting nervous!!

Does anybody have any experience with Jetblue? The only negative I can see is that we only get 1 free checked bag as opposed to 2 with Southwest...but that won't be an issue for anyone in the group except me, and I'm sure I'll be able to throw some stuff in everyone else's suitcases!

So anyway, after booking the airfare I decided that it was time to go ahead and book our Disney package so we could make sure to get the hotel and room category we wanted!

As I mentioned before, we were planning on doing 2 nights at Pop followed by 6 at Port Orleans French Quarter. Wellllllllll, we were all talking and my dad wants to take us to Kennedy Space Center and maybe take a beach excursion or two, and its so hard to plan concrete days in January when I have no clue what the weather will be! I feel like if I plan a beach trip for, say, Monday, it will be freezing on Monday but maybe warm on Wednesday and we will have other plans! Stressfullll!!!

So, we talked about it and decided to go with staying at Pop the entire stay and taking advantage of the free Quick Service Dining Plan. This way, we will have complete flexibility and no ADRs to keep.

Ben and I talked and decided that we still wanted to take dad and Dan to a few sit down meals, so we chose to keep 'Ohana for our last night, Sci Fi for burgers and milkshakes one day, and a breakfast at Kona. Everything else will be quick service and best of all, FREE!

I'm actually pretty excited to try the Quick Service Dining Plan...there are a lot of options that I'm interested in trying, and it will definitely be different for us to have so much flexibility! We can actually pick our park for the next day the night before on some days, which will be very different!!

So, that's that for now! 8 nights at Pop Century, free QSDP and a half marathon!

The training is going well also. We are getting into some great running weather with fall approaching, so I'm excited to bump up my training a bit! I'm at a pretty comfortable 8 miles, so its time to start increasing that mileage!!!!

That's all for tonight....this turned into a long update!!!!

Goodnight!!