ependydad...Doug

As I thought of how hot it was in Florida, I read something on Facebook that said, "Hide yo kids, hide yo wife, it's going to be cold tomorrow!". Apparently back home it was a freak 50-degree day. So, I saved it for posterity.

 
We got ourselves put together and headed out for the day. Obligatory morning selfuses:


(Funny story- with my large schnoz, we'd fight over whose nose would be in the rear when doing kissing selfies.)
 
And then we took the monorail:

 
Our new Tables in Wonderland card go quite the workout this week:

 
Can you guess where we are?

Tonga Toast
 

Big Kahuna
 
Needing pictures of all modes of transportation, we're now on a boat:

(I'm trying to remember how we got from the Polynesian to the Yacht and Beachclub. I'm pretty certain we took a bus from the Poly to Hollywood Studios and then a boat to the hotel.)
 
We were curious what this Ariels location was:

 
Turns out, it's for wedding receptions:
https://www.disneyweddings.com/florida/wishes/venues/ariels/
 
I debated holding onto this one for a "Where in the World?" post, but I was afraid that it was too obscure. So, where are we?

 
While you think of that, consider how much of a rebel I am. I bite my thumb at thee:

 
If you guessed the holding cell (aka lounge) for the spa, you'd be right:

 
Because it was a slow day, I was invited to sit in one of the massaging chairs beside my wife. BUTTONS!

 
I'm smiling for the picture, not for the chair. She loved it; I hated it. But, I dislike massages in the first place where she's like, "oh yeah, get in there and bruise me."

 
We returned to Hollywood Studios by boat. We had to get our DHS time in before the Star Trek Wars freaks (fans) took over. One of us beat the other at Toy Story:

(I won't say who. It was me!)
 
Obligatory Army Guy picture. He just stood there. Might have been a fake. Either way, we selfused with him:

 
Then we walked around a bit. Which is unusual for us- as our days are usually hectically planned and we're running here, there, and everywhere.

 
She remembered that Cinderella's Coach was there. So we went and found that:

 
My princess held the glass slipper:

 
The coach was pretty neat.

 
Once Upon a Time fans will recognize this (I didn't, but she spotted it right away):

 
We were going to walk up the big hill to see the bridge better. But when I got closer, it was a LOT steeper than I was prepared for.

 
So what else was there to do? Why selfus, of course!

 
Upclose:

 
And then without having to go to a strip club, we "made it rain":


 
Next up was watching the Indiana Jones show. I haven't seen this in years. It's pretty much what I remember- but still fun to watch.


 
I did take some slow motion videos as I played with my iPhone. I also had to use Verizon's web chat to figure out why my home internet wasn't working for the kids and mother-in-law. When our internet down- we have no internet, no TV, and probably no phone. They had to have fun without all that- GASP! I KNOW!
 
Heading out from DHS, we stopped for an ice cream sandwich for her.

 
And, apparently no picture of it- but because of my birthday button- the clerk asked me what I wanted and gave me a chocolate covered Mickey Head. Though, like most things- I shared with my beautiful lady:

 
That looks like 30 pictures, which works as a good break because we left there and headed BACK to the Yacht and Beach Club for dinner. Next up will be dinner and fireworks pictures. :)

I've said it before and I'll say it again, you are a great dad. Good work.

DISCLAIMER: If you dislike selfies, this isn't the report for you. Like seriously, run, don't walk, away. The only thing missing from this selfie report is an actual selfie stick.
 
Now first, the back story- my wife and I wanted to go somewhere alone for Memorial Day weekend. We were going to leave on Thursday and come home Monday evening. Then we talked about going down and using our annual passes, so we added a day onto the front-side of that plan (leaving Wednesday afternoon). I priced up every variation that I could possibly think to figure out the cheapest way to do it (but still be convenient to the parks):
Take truck + camper and stay at Thousand Trails Take truck + camper and stay at another campground Take truck + camper and stay at the Fort All of the above, but leaving the camper in storage in Florida since we are headed back in a month Take car and stay offsite (I could use Marriott points for one of the nights) Take car and stay at a Value resort Take car and stay at a cabin offsite Fly and stay offsite Fly and stay at a Value resort Fly and stay at a cabin offsite The cheapest but least convenient to getting to the parks was truck + camper and staying at Thousand Trails. The remainder were surprisingly close in price when you accounted for the price difference in gas at 28mpg vs. diesel at 9mpg. Even flying was in the same ballpark since our drive takes us 2 days and would require a night at a campground or hotel along the way.  
The problem with Value resorts is that my wife and I aren't comfortable on a bed smaller than a queen. We weren't positive/guaranteed that we'd get a king bed at the Values. So, with Jason's help - we also priced various combinations of nights at Port Orleans, Corando Springs, and Carribean Beach. Poor guy worked for his commission!
 
We ultimately booked our stay at the Fort. It was still while you could book extra days to get the site type we wanted (Preferred) and cancel the bumper days. Jason took care of everything and we were set.
 
And then somehow we changed our reservation to flying, staying at the Contemporary, and adding a day at the end. Like seriously- I'm not sure what happened. Troll-inspired review to come later.
 
---
 
So without further adieu, the trip report- the selfie that started them all, here we are on the plane:

 
We either paid for groceries to be delivered, or we rented a town car who would make a pit stop at a grocery store. Clearly, the logic is sound. Town car won. Jason set us up with Happy Limo:

 
Riding in a town car beats the pants off of Disney's Magical Express. I don't think we saved any time with our detour to Walmart, but hey- we got groceries and a t-shirt for our Disney-bounding.

 
Before too long, we had arrived on property:

 
Just a little after that, we went through the Magic Kingdom gates on our way to the Contemporary:


 
Our ride & we took advantage of the Bell Hop:

 
We got checked-in and headed up to our room. Thanks to TCD, I knew that the numbering system for the Contemporary added the first 2 numbers together to identify your floor. An interesting point to note- to get the reservation that we wanted (a room in the main tower, with a theme park view, with a king bed, and using the annual passholders discount), we had to book extra days. Jason couldn't easily remove the extra days and had to get supervisors and superiors involved. Ultimately, they rebooked our reservation. More on that to come...
 
First, we're on our floor looking down:


 
Our assigned room (but not the one we stayed in):

(4-4 = 8th floor; regardless of what the front desk tells you)
 
Here's the view from that room:

 
And then my wife realized that the room had 2 double or queen beds. It seems that in the switching around on our reservation, the "king bed" request got lost. She called the front desk and explained that we reserved a king bed room. She was informed that a "king bed" is just a preference and not guaranteed, but they would see what was available. (Note, this is contrary to what we were told by 2 travel agents- Jason and another on Facebook and a guaranteed king bed was one of the drivers for switching up from the Value resort.) After a bunch of keyboard clacking, we were given a different room - 4636. As I mentioned before, from TCD's comments, I knew this was on the 10th floor. When my wife asked the front desk worker what floor that was on, she was told - "it's the same one you're on now, the 4th floor"; durr. Anyway, the bell hop waited while we sorted it out and took us to our room. Unfortunately, it was immediately off of the elevators.
 
Another interesting Contemporary point. If you get an odd-numbered "theme park-view" room and are sitting on the bed, you are facing Cindy's castle. If you get an even-numbered, they're facing away but there is a fairly uncomfortable couch to sit on that does face the castle. My wife was a little disappointed in our even-numbered reassignment.
 
But, our room was nice:



(Yes, 2 of us for a week required 4 bags. This is my life.)

 
And our view was still nice:



 
Panorama'd:

 
We could see the Polynesian, the Grand Floridian, and Magic Kingdom.
 
That's a good stopping point- we cancelled dinner reservations at Teppan Edo and instead went to Hollywood Studios for the night, I'll cover that in glorious selfie-form later.

I am still ticked they messed up the King bed selection. Grrr

In!!

Count me in!

Oh man- my wife and I were scheduled to be at the Fort at the same time, but have since gone nutty and made reservations for the Contemporary. We would have let you onto our site in a heartbeat.

Great explanation Doug. That should be handed out with every weight distribution hitch sold.

Fnally an explaination I understand! 
and it was not even my question!
Thanks, Doug!

Nacole -
 
(Firstly, apologies for making the gross assumption that your husband is driving and you're navigating. If it's the other way around- you go girl. :) )
 
I took the image that you posted above from the CAT Scale website and have modified it to show 2 axles and the different positions for the various weighings that you want to do.
 
First, to calculate tongue weight and camper weight, you need to do 3 total weightings. It's very important to do all 3 at one time and with no changes in passengers or gear (don't let someone run in to pee or have hubby do the second or third weighing while you're in paying). It's paramount that everything stays the same- otherwise, you'll see surprises in your numbers that don't add up.
 
The first weighing will cost you $10-$15 and subsequent weightings will cost you $2-3 each. In each case, get weighed and pull off of the scale. My wife would run in and pay for each weighing after we did one. I'm not sure if you can do multiple without going inside each time.
 
Weighing tip: take a broom handle or painter's pole or something. I'm 5' 11" and have long monkey arms - standing on the running boards of my truck is each to reach the button to call the weigh master. Standing on the ground, it's a stretch. A pole of some sort would let you push the call button if you're height challenge or don't have freakishly long arms. OR- I've read that people go inside and get the telephone number of the weigh master's desk and call from your cell phone when you are ready for the weight to be captured.
 
 
#1 - Truck and Camper together with your WDH like it normally is in travel-mode

 
- In this case, you want your truck to be split between scales 1 and 2 and both of your camper's axles on scale 3. You cannot tell tongue + camper weights by this weighing alone. You have to do more to figure this out. I'll explain what you can find from this below.
 
 
#4 - Truck and Camper - Splitting Camper's Axles on Scales (optional!)
No, I'm not actually this terrible at math and yes this says #4 between #1 and #2. :) This step is optional but good to do now because you're WDH is still engaged and your camper is still connected to the truck - both of which we'll undo in the next weightings.
 
You have 3 options here. Note, the graphics are misleading: scale #1 is significantly shorter than scales #2 and #3, so you'll have to play around and see how you can split the scales with your axles. Your goal is to have your camper's axles split between 2 scales and have nothing else on them.
 
Here's 3 configurations that may work. I did the first, but I hear your length concerns and you may need to do the second or even third:
 
#4a - Split the Camper Axles between Scales #2 and #3

 
You'll want to be outside the vehicle while he drives forward. From the driver's seat, you can't see well enough to see what is where for this weighing. My wife stood off to the side to get me lined up. She then got into the passenger seat where she normally is (remember, everything the same for every weighing).
 
#4b - Split the Camper Axles between Scales #1 and #2

 
As I said, these graphics are misleading as they imply that scale #1 is the same size as #2 and #3. That's just not the case. See if this works if #4a doesn't work for you.
 
#4c - Put the camper axles on scale #1 and weigh twice
 
First time, put both axles on scale #1:

 
Second time, pull a little forward and put just the 2nd axle on scale #1:

 
Then, to figure out the weight of each axle is just:
- Second axle is the weight shown on the 2nd weigh slip
- First axle is the weight of both axles (1st weigh slip) minus the 2nd weigh slip
 
 
#2 - Truck and Camper together but with the WDH bars/chains not connected
Basically, this is just the camper on the ball and nothing else. You typically don't travel like this, but you need it for weight calculations later. Just throw the WDH bars into the truck bed.
 

 
- Again, you're going to split the truck between scales 1 and 2 and both camper axles are on scale 3. You still can't tell any actual numbers from this, but we'll get there.
 
 
#3 - Truck only
This is the most nerve wracking as you need to park the camper in a truck spot or off to the side somewhere. I find this stressful because I'm still terrible at parking. (But truthfully- I've never had a bad interaction with a trucker- I think I just stress myself out more than they're bothered.) Some places I have to back into a truck spot and others I was able to pull off to a curb. Make sure you properly chock wheels before you unhitch!
 

 
- In this, you're still splitting the truck between scales 1 and 2.
 
 
Now You've Been Weighed - Reading the Tea Leaves (err.. numbers)
 
Each weighing will give you a "weigh slip" that looks something like this:

 
The Steer Axle is scale #1 in all of the above graphics; the Drive Axles is scale #2, and; the Trailer Axle is scale #3.
 
Basically, you're going to want to plug all of those numbers into this site:
Towing Planner - Actual Travel Trailer Weights
 
It'll break things down for you such as:
Gross combined weight = adding steer, drive, and trailer axle weights togetherYou want to compare this against your tow vehicle's "gross combined weight rating" (GCWR) Truck weight = steer + drive weights added together with the WDH engaged (e.g. weighing #1)You want to compare this against your tow vehicle's "gross vehicle weight rating" (GVWR) Truck weight without the WDH engaged = steer + drive weights added together without the WDH (e.g. weighing #2)This is used for information below. Truck only weight = steer + drive weights added together with the truck only (e.g. weighing #3)This is used for information below. This is also good to know how much actual payload you have before you add the travel trailer. You'd be surprised what this number really is when you're loaded for bear. Tongue weight = truck weight without WDH - truck only weightThis tells you the actual weight of the tongue Camper weight = tongue weight + camper axle weight without WDH (e.g. weighing #2)You want to make sure that this doesn't exceed your camper's gross vehicle weight rating (GVWR) Tongue weight percentage = tongue weight / camper weightTypically you want this to be between 10% and 15% to minimize sway From a WDH perspective, you want to see that the steer axle weights don't change much between weighing #1 and #2. Refer to your WDH or tow vehicle's owners manual to find out their instructions for what you want to see here. I have read that you want varying amounts of weight transferred back to the front axle. I have never actually pulled a travel trailer with a WDH, so I don't have my own opinion.  
 
And finally, the split axle weights. Your goal is to see that the axles are carrying similar load. This isn't required and is more of a "nice to have" weighing. If one or the other is significantly carrying more than the other- it could be indicative of an out of level towing experience or improper loading of the camper.
 
If you ever end up somewhere that one of the RV Safety sites is doing individual wheel weights. Pay the $60-70 for the report. I've heard nothing but good from them.

Final Thoughts
 
Well, we've reached the end.  
 
2 full weeks at the Fort, including Christmas and New Years.  
 
5 park days.
 
Countless enjoyable meals.  
 
Lots and lots of character interaction, including some good touchy-feely time with Princesses.  
 
AWESOME Fiend time, including a GG with new and old friends, and sharing a loop with the Dawg Fans.  
 
A DIT family reunion at the Fort.
 
A brand spankin' new motorhome.
 
A fun, special meal at Trails End.
 
We surprised the girls with New Years Eve at the HDDR.
 
Super treatment from cast members toward Anna, including some "re-rides" on the Mine Train.
 
Date night with my beautiful wife at California Grill.  
 
Yep....this trip really sucked monkey butt!   :rofl2:
 
So let's get real....we had a very good trip.  Not perfect, of course,  because what IS perfect?  But it was great.  
 
Yes, it ended on a very sour note.  One that made us truly not want to return to the parks for a while.  I do think Disney has screwed up some things terribly.  I'll address all of that separately.  I know I've dragged it all out for months now....not intentionally, it just worked out that way as it naturally would have come at the end of this report as it happened on the last evening.  And I became conflicted on whether to share it at all.  But I will.  
 
So where do I stand on the whole Disney thing now?  
 
I still love Disney.  
 
And I also hate Disney.  
 
They do so many things right.  But at the same time they are NOT the company they used to be.  Management makes SO MANY boneheaded decisions.  I seriously shake my head at some of them.  And I think some of those decisions are terribly unfortunate.  But there is still no place on the planet that compares to WDW.  There is no place that offers everything that is offered at WDW on one property.  Where you can park your car and never drive it again for 2 weeks if you don't care to, and visit different theme parks, multiple hotel resorts, water parks, countless dining and nightlife options, and shopping, all connected by transportation.  Nothing compares.  Which is why it's heartbreaking when you see the STUPID decisions that current management makes at times.  
 
So I'd say I have a love/hate relationship with the place.  
 
My family is kind of over it for a while.  We are going to spend our dollars elsewhere this year.  We'll still have lots of fun, and we'll see new places.  Nothing wrong with that.  I know we'll be back at the World someday.  I have no doubt about that.  And we are planning another Disney Cruise later this year.  But for now....as far as WDW is concerned, we are done.  
 
And so is this report.  
 
Thanks for reading!  

We saw lots of pets- they have a dog run. And yes, it is VERY expensive. For my wife, I, our kids, and my in-laws, it was right about $199/night. BUT- we had a waterfront site with our own boat dock and went swimming on Christmas Day. The sites have vegetation that keeps them private between each other. I would go back. And it was still a fraction of the price of what my wife's aunt and grandmother paid for a tiny hotel room.

Yes, boots... I was definitely thinking their BOOTs looked nice.

Ok- my wife and I are trying to sneak away for a long Memorial Day weekend. But the costs are adding up- it is making me wonder if I can squeeze a big rig (42' fifth wheel) into a full hookup site? Has anyone done it? Or am I just looking at angst and heartache getting parked?

Ok- my wife and I are trying to sneak away for a long Memorial Day weekend. But the costs are adding up- it is making me wonder if I can squeeze a big rig (42' fifth wheel) into a full hookup site? Has anyone done it? Or am I just looking at angst and heartache getting parked?

If it would give it more credibility, I'd be happy to change the title of my cinnamon roll thread to "Selfie Sticks Banned On Rides At WDW".  Then there would be two sources.  

I know the answers to all your questions. 
 
She is an asshole. 

Sounds like you squeezed in ok and I think your experience is pretty typical of many of the sites in 100, 200 & 300.  Depending on the angle to the road (some are really wacky) and the placement of trees, trash cans, utilities, etc., the Preferred loops can be a challenge for bigger rigs.

That is a beautiful rig ependydad!

This is amazing. Good for you guys. Can't wait to hear about it.

Based on subject line, I had to check that this wasn't Dave's MSB Cinnamon roll thread...

Only someone who truly loves Disney and cannot wait to get back ASAP would figure it out that quickly.

From Facebook on the Blue Angel's page:

From Facebook on the Blue Angel's page: