CKCK

Lettuce wraps have no business at 'Ohana. The end.

1500 is open for business.  Yes, there was a travel trailer, slide out and everything, I would estimate at least 28 feet long in it.  So much for the rules.  1600 is still closed however.

That's weird. 1600 was open when we drove through Saturday. There was one site that had been completely repaved and was blocked off. You could also see where they had dug up the road and repaved it as well. I had seen cement sewer type pipes sitting out in the front of 1600 earlier, so I'm guessing they had to redo a bunch of sewer lines. Guessing they opened the loop for the busy weekend then shut it down for more repairs.

Page 6.

Woo hoo

On Saturday I noticed a travel trailer (about 26' or so) set up in 1500.  Weird.

And by the way, as of Saturday ALL loops were open and FULL!  Most crowded I've seen the Fort in awhile.

It was open on Saturday.

Thanks to all for your concerns!  Once we got to the Fort I basically zoned out (aka drank a lot of beer) for the remainder of the time and didn't even get on the world wide web.  

I'll save details for the TR (hopefully we'll get that going this week, even though I do still have our Thanksgiving report to put up), but I will share this now:

bearings suck.

Actually they're really good, but I'm kind of mad at them at the moment.  

I will say that I now own an IR thermometer (coolest toy I've bought in awhile...I checked so many temperatures), our trip home from the Fort took a record LONG time (because I was paranoid and stopped every hour to check the temps), and I will be pulling off all four hubs (including the new one) and checking/repacking everything before our next trip.  

I always knew ABOUT bearings and knew to grease them (and did using a grease gun), but I now know that using a grease gun (like the video up top) is NOT the way to do it properly, and that bearings need to be inspected and REPACKED by pulling them off, not just squirting new grease in with a grease gun.

So, an expensive and scary lesson learned.  The end.

I found them!  

 

It turns out they enjoyed Cecil Bay RV Park so much, they decided just to stay and spend their vacation there.  If you want to interact with CKCK and the Reds from now on, go on over to CecilFiends.net and sign up.  

I was hoping you wouldn't find me.  I wanted it to grow like FF.net and then come back and surprise everyone here.  Oh well, my plan is ruined now, so I guess I'll just stay here.

Glad to hear things are working out you might want to invest in a temp gun to keep track of bearing temps. I keep one in the MH and shoot all the wheel hubs everytime we stop for fuel to make sure none of them are running hot.

I actually had just checked them by hand about an hour before and it was okay after driving about 2hours. Maybe a little warm but nothing alarming. I kind of had a funny feeling about that wheel before we left...should have listened to my gut I guess.

Sure hope you get fixed up ASAP in the morning and get to the Fort at a reasonable time.

 

So how is Cecil Bay?  Would you recommend it for an overnight?

Cecil Bay isn't bad. There are a few full-timers here, but other than that it's pretty quiet. The owner is real nice, but couldn't offer me much advice on finding a repairman. We haven't ventured into their restrooms, but I bet they're pretty old from the looks of the other buildings. They seem to keep the grounds in decent shape.

All in all I don't think it's a bad overnight place. I think there are a few others just spending the night. A Phaeton pulled in next to us, so that makes me feel a little better about being here!

Thanks for everyone's concerns and well wishes. The silver lining to all of this is that Jason (Katman) was able to get our reservation pushed back by a day so we won't lose tonight's Fort stay. Instead I'm paying $31 for Cecil Bay RV Park, and whatever this new hub is going to cost me (I shudder to think). But at least we don't lose money at a Disney! Thanks Jason!

Luck ran out...can't get the part until the morning. Boooooo.

Found someone and he's already been here and gone to find a new wheel/hub assembly. Fortunately the spindle is okay so we aren't looking at a full axle. With any luck we might still make it to the Fort today.

We lost an axle bearing on I-75 S headed to the Fort. Caught it before it went up in flames, but we're down for the count until I get it fixed...probably a new axle. We limped into the Cecil Bay RV Park. Anyone know any mobile repairs in this area?

Not a good start to the trip...

 

You know what's amazing?

 

The number of people who will just stop dead in the middle of a path and just stand there to discuss what they should do.

 

 

So we got in line with the rest of the suckers hoping for that 4th FP+:

 

 

 

One of my biggest pet peeves is when people stop in the middle of the walkway.  Especially when they stop SUDDENLY when I'm behind them pushing a stroller.  

I try my hardest to not be one of the obnoxious stroller pushers (and we push small strollers too).  We get out of the way if we stop.  We don't cut in front of people with strollers.  We don't tailgate people with strollers and hit their heels.  

HOWEVER, I've gotten to the point that if someone is going to stop right in front of me in moving traffic...I'm NOT going to stop suddenly.  Oops.

Maybe I can fix the world one person at a time.

And I refuse to wait in a line in to get a FP so that I can avoid a different line.  I don't care that the FP line is shorter than a standby for a big ride.  It's the principle of the matter.  

We like restaurants.  

The end.

I have a mini.... Cooper!

I have a friend named Cooper.  He is not mini.

Excellent report, we drive a minivan and love it, went from a Camaro to a Town and Country.

Ouch.  That trade hurts more than ours did.

We never went the minivan route. I had an Escort Station Wagon for a long while. I put a rubber mat in the back for the dirty baseball gear, and camping gear then moved to my first Sport Trac where all the dirty baseball gear and camping gear could go in the truck bed. The best thing about the Sport Trac was vinyl floors, no carpet to get dirty!!

I obsess with keeping carpet clean.  Vinyl floor sure would be convenient!

Short, sweet, and to the point.

Thanks for bringing us along.

Minivans rock!!!

Before DD was born we flew out to California to visit my family and the rental car company was out of the economy car we reserved so they upgrade us to a minivan. Neither of us really thought it was much of an upgrade until we got in it and drove it. After our two hour drive to my moms house we decided DW needed a minivan before DD arrived. I surprised her with her dodge caravan a few days before we were blessed with our beautiful daughter. We've had one ever since.

I never thought of a minivan being used as a surprise!

It's none of the above.... It's the MAN-VAN!!

Okay Duane, you may be getting carried away here.  I may dig it now, but it still is a minivan.  

Speaking of minivans, has everyone around here seen the swaggerwagon video from Toyota from a couple years ago?  

If not, go here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ql-N3F1FhW4

Good report CKCK.  

 

Anyone who mocks minivans either doesn't have multiple small children, or prefers their life to be more difficult than it has to be.  I think we've had 4 of them. 

Totally.  Our friends without children don't get it.

 

 Dang it!  I forgot all about this.

 

 

This TR is making me want to go back this year for the F&W.

 

 

Where was this?  Did they bring the wagon out of hiding?

 

And, they even come with central vacs now. How cool is that....

The wagon was just outside the Settlement Trading Post.  I think it has been there for awhile now.

We didn't get the vac.  We would have had to wait a couple months for the new models to get that.

I agree. I can haul so much more crap with my mini van. And while it's probably not super comfortable for them, my parents can cram in the back so we don't need 2 cars to go places. And there's still room in the back for crap.

I generally don't haul crap.  That would be messy.  

I hope you don't put your parents back where the crap was.  

Thanks for the reds tease and posing with princess red is bonus.

 

Your drawings are both good. I'm impressed.

 

About that mini van.... well, I won't make fun of you too much.

 

Beautiful sunset picture. 

 

Bring on Thanksgiving!  

Thanks thanks and thanks!

And the Thanksgiving TR will get started in a couple of days!

Man, what a great update.

 

Carrot cake cookie.  Like.

 

Animation class. Like.

 

Bowl of cheese. Like.

 

Sausage.  No comment.

 

Sunset over Bay Lake. Love.

 

TCD

woo hoo

Nice TR CK.

Food. Check

Beer. Check

Redheads. check

thanks for checking.

Thanks for the TR !   You delivered !

Doing one this short was easy to deliver!

We've had minivans since 1996. Not proud of it, but they are handy. Really good at depleting all sources of testosterone within 100 yards! Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Now, the vans back in '96 easily drained testosterone.  They are way better now!

Day 2: Sunday, Oct. 13

DHS

Since this was a non-red trip it meant we could ride some things we normally don’t get to.  

Namely R&R.

No pics, but we rode it.

It also meant we didn’t have to share any food that we got.

Like this:

Carrot cake cookie.  

One of my jams.

We sat here and ate it.  

That’s our carrot cake cookie eating place.  

In the shade.  Benches.  Squirrels frolicking.

Good times.

We had three missions at DHS today.  

Ride R&R.

Get a carrot cake cookie.

And do this:

Mine was the top one, Mrs. CK the bottom.

It was cool we got Donald, because we already had a Daisy.  

If you haven’t ever done the animation class...

do it.  

Relaxing, air conditioning, dim lights, and you get a free souvenir.  

Can’t beat it.

We accomplished our three missions and headed to Epcot for more F&W.  

After all, that’s why we were here.

Soup stuff:

I’m thinking cheese soup or something.  Probably pretty good.

Cheese stuff and other thing:

I remember the cheese stuff from last year.  Has pistachios or something on it.  

Not healthy, but good.

Other thing I have no idea.  Kinda looks like a gyro.  

Salad stuff on a tortilla and some kind of alcohol:

Can’t remember if it was mango margarita or what.  Either way it was overpriced and not enough of it.  

Like everything, but for some reason I keep spending money.

Okay, now here’s my jam:

From China, strawberry ribbon ice cream.

Crazy good.  Weird, but good.  I can’t even explain it, but I wanted more.

Also got potstickers:

Potsticker is a funny word.

Sausage:

Lots of comments to be had here.  

I’ll leave it at that.

Bowl of cheese:

It’s actually ravioli or something.  

Looks like a bowl of cheese.

It’s actually pretty good.

But so not healthy.  

Bowl of cheese.

And that’s all the food and wine.  

Sorry.

We left after our F&W lunch and hung out at the Fort for awhile. 

Here are some random campsite pics:

Let’s talk about the elephant in the room for a minute.

The minivan.

We’ve had it for a year now.

We traded in my wife’s Acura TL for that.

It was difficult.

It’s a minivan.

That was a large psychological hurdle to overcome for me.

But it’s flippin’ awesome.  

Automatic doors, no more hitting cars next to us when the reds fling open the doors.

DVD entertainment system with headphones.

Awesome.

Lots of room.

I’m over the stigma of having a minivan, because it’s flippin’ awesome.

I’m pretty sure we explored the Fort for awhile then headed over to the MK.  

I didn’t take any pics at the park, but took some around the Fort:

That’s it.  Food and Wine 2013 over.  

We headed out the next morning.  

It was a quick trip, but F&W is always good.  

Tent camping, not so much.  

The main reason?

Sand.

I hate sand.

Hate it. 

Tent camping just puts me closer to the sand, and that’s never a good thing.

Fortunately our Thanksgiving trip was in a premium, and back to normal in our camper and GC!

I’ll start that TR shortly.

Until then, thanks for catching up with me on this quick one.  

I promise the next one will have lots of redheads! 

out.

that"s a lot of red.

The people ask for reds.

I give reds.

Even if one is fake.

And half nude.

Awkward.

Here's a teaser:

I'm in!  Hey, we were there that weekend, I'll have to look for us in the background of your pictures (if you have more than just food, that is, haha).

Crazy!  It was such a quick trip for us we barely even paid attention to if anyone else was there.  Not sure I have many pics of anything other than food though...

I am in

I am glad.

I'm in.

 

Your descriptions are great.

 

Food & Wine Fest is what I want to do next.  

 

Adults only.  Maybe in a year or 2.

F&W is great.  We did it with the girls one year on a Friday night and quickly realized it was not the best of ideas!

I'm in!

Great!

I'm in also !!!!

Great also!

Top of page 2!

Well this is awkward...

I hate to tell you this, but that's page 1.

I will say that at one point you were on page 2.  Someone vanished.  Not sure who.  

Still awkward.

We missed you and your eloquent descriptions...   Bring on the reds...   ( and it is good to see you again )

Yeah, I'm here too, right?!?

Wow, CK² is back!

 

With those eloquent descriptions of the dishes you tried at the Food and Wine Festival, I think you ought to apply for a position with the Disney Dining Blog.

 

Funny stuff!

 

Bring it on!

 

TCD

See, you get me.  I'm totally in the wrong business.  

I love the food descriptions.  So much better than the wordy word stuff they put on their menus.

 

Awe man I miss those red heads.  They are going to be as well known as the TCD Twins.  I suggest you take a trademark out on them and sell t-shirts.

Who needs menus anyway?

Yeah, SOMEONE broke my cover on our Thanksgiving trip because of the reds!  We'll get to that one soon!

I'm in.  We're going for F&W for the first time this year, so I'm looking forward to hearing more.

Bam!  That means you'll be writing a TR in the fall!  

I am in. I have to disagree on the Sam Cherry Wheat though. It is one of my favorite beers. Bring on the Reds!!

Weird.  I still think it tastes like medicine.  

I'm in.

Great!

I'm in.

Great!

I love your TR style.

I love your comment style.  Kind of redundant, but effective.

I'm in too!

Loving your descriptions of the food.

I agree with you about the Cherry Wheat beer in fact that is exactly how I described it to my husband. I said it tasted like Robitussin.

I'll keep reading even though you don't have the Reds with you.

How could you do that to us?

Don't you like us anymore?

And I don't like Robitussin either.  Glad you agree.

The reds will be here soon.  

Yes I like most of you...

I'm in! Note to self, beware cherry wheat beer. (In my best Clint Eastwood imitation) Same for avoiding the blueberry flavored beers that are about to show up on shelves for summer. Just gimme a man's beer or a man's coffee; straight up without flowers. Looking forward to more, and hoping there will be more about the tent camping. Despite having a trailer with a kitchen and bathroom, I have spent more nights flat on my back in a two man tent these past three years while my son is in Boy Scouts. Lots more planning and more ibuprofen! Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Cherry and wheat.  See, that just doesn't even look appetizing.  And blueberry...that's not beer in my opinion.  

Man beer.  That's what I'm talking about.

I'm in, even if this will be redless but yeah for a no kid trip! Did the reds know where you were going? Cuz heads would roll in this house if we went to Disney without our 5 yr old.

Yes, the reds knew.  They got to spend the weekend with the grandparents, so it was all good.  Plus, we just told them that we were going down to get everything ready for our Thanksgiving trip.  

It worked.  

Better late than never! Glad you're back.

I'm in, but I need some pics of the reds.

Thanks!  

Chill on the reds, be patient!

I'm a little slow...but I'm learning that page 1 is a big deal so.. did I make it? :)

Yes.  

Congratulations.

Love the food pics, tent camping, and adult trip!!!  I mean kids are cute and all, but you were married before you had kids!!!

That's right!  Most people forget that!  

I will say a WDW trip without the girls is tough.  Everything we do we talk about if the girls were there.  I'm just a softy when it comes to them!

woo hoo.

There, I remembered.

CKCK 7.0-Food & Wine, Oct. 12-14

I know you’re all, “why is this CKCK guy just now doing a Food and Wine TR?”

I’m kind of asking the same question.

Here’s the answer:

Because that’s how I roll.

Or because I was absent for a long time, am back now, and it will bother me if I don’t do these.

But don’t expect any great literary works.  

In fact, don’t even expect it to be good at all.

We’ll return to the photos/thoughts format.  

You get pictures.  Mostly of food.  

Duh.

And thoughts.

That’s it.  And not very many of them.

Because I probably don’t remember anything else.

After all, it is called Food & WINE, right?

Oh, and team CKCK does F&W as CK...meaning no reds.

But guess what? I have a Thanksgiving TR to do after this one, and there will be lots of reds in that.  

I might throw in a couple bonus red pics in this one to keep you reading, because I know that’s why most of you read these.

I’m okay with that.  I’ll take what I can get.

I just hope I remember how to post pics...

Day 1: Saturday Oct 12

Here we go.  Mrs. CK and I had a 3 day weekend and decided to head down for F&W...one of our favorite times at DW.  

This trip would be quick, so we didn’t want to take the camper.

But we were going to stay at the Fort.  

duh.

What to do?

So we borrowed a tent, rented a Kenny Cart, and headed down.

This would be a first for team CKCK.  We are used to our walls, running water, tv, ac, etc.

I repeat, we do not tent camp.  This was my first time setting up a tent.  Hopefully my last.

Random pics of interesting signs around the Trading Post.

Then we went to Epcot for dinner.  After all, that’s why we were here.

I don’t remember what any of this was.  But I’ll tell you what I think about it now looking at the pic.

Some sort of a scallop something or other with rice:

Looks like a bunch of crap to me.

Something on black stuff:

I’m thinking this was fat.  I mean bacon.  I mean something that was meat, from a pig, and we ate it.

They put green things on it to make you think it was more healthy than it actually was.

More shrimp with what looks like weeds:

Fruit and stuff:

I don’t remember what this is...I’m thinking stuff on a steamed bun:

We must have already known it was going to be good because we got two of them.

I call this, waste of money:

I mean, we barely got anything, but they try to make you feel better about it by putting in the triple tray.  

Beer:

That was the Sam Adams flight.  I know one was the chocolate stout or whatever.  And one was Cherry Wheat, aka medicine beer.  

Really, it tastes like medicine.  

stupid.

Lobster roll:

I do remember that we didn’t order the lobster.  We ordered something cheaper, but it wasn’t ready or something was screwed up, so they gave us the lobster roll for the same price.

Win.

Bread pudding I think:

This was obviously in the American Pavilion, and there was about to be a concert across the way.

It was Manhattan Transfer.

Many of you are thinking that’s more like “Manhattan Transfer to another pavilion because they’re old.”

Except we’re dorks.

And we remember Manhattan Transfer from back in the day when our moms used to rock out to this stuff.

And therefore back in the day we rocked out to it as well.

I’m not ashamed.  

So we took our beer, lobster, and bread pudding and grabbed a bench to watch them.  

We were easily the youngest people sitting there, and I don’t really consider us all that young any more...at least relatively.  

So it was a little weird, but I didn’t care.  I had food, beer, a seat, and music to listen to.  And I was in Epcot.

All good things to me.

More dessert looking things:

Crap in a cup:

But hold on a minute.

That was the frozen smores or something like that.  

More like frozen awesome.  It rocked.

Beer:

No idea what it was, but it looks like beer to me.

Hawaiian pork something:

That’s day one.  Day two will take is to DHS for two of our favorite things at that park and back to Epcot for more F&W.

This TR is nearly over.  Which is good.  Because Thanksgiving was just a month later and the pics are way better...because they are mostly of two little redheads.  

Speaking of the reds we need some updated pics

YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We've missed the reds. 

We'll get there.  Let me ease back in first!  

I actually have a couple mini-trip reports I should probably throw together before our next one comes up...pretty soon I might add.  I might have been absent from here for awhile, but we didn't stop going to the Fort!

My wife is a fan of the HTT (hoity toity tea).  She dragged me there once.  

Just once.  

She took the reds there also (6 and 4 now).  

They liked it. 

I do not.

Must be a girl thing.  

I'm okay with that.