My Best Trip Ever! A Disney Trip 10 Years in the Making About This Page:

[Dlandmom2]

Fun day! I've learned with my kids that I need to start heading for the exit at least an hour before I really want to leave, because we always do the same thing and get sidetracked along the way!

[Cam22]

Great afternoon for you two! the pictures with princesses and the one in his new hat!

[lauriep]

What a nice afternoon! Just shows how much fun you can have without doing a single ride. LOVE all the photos of Evan. Too sweet that he learned to kiss the Princesses hands in greeting. He's adorable in the Pluto hat and scratching Pluto behind the ear. You should definitely submit the popsicle drip guard tip. You're such a mom!

[KMB733]

What wonderful character interactions!! The pictures with the princesses are just too cute

[honeybee723]

That is a great tip! Maybe you should think about marketing that idea. Evan is too cute!!! I love the interaction with the princesses. and that photo of him wearing his new hat is adorable. I like photos where they're not looking directly at the camera, almost like you're capturing that emotion or thought without them knowing it.

BTW, I definitely don't like the sound of your next update.

[PrincessSharon]

Nice afternoon. But it sounds like that's gonna change.

[chezp]

What a great time with the characters! I'm not liking the sound of the next installment...

[cubfancolleen]

Great afternoon! You had some wonderful character interaction (and I know what you mean about getting a little choked up when you saw Evan with Cinderella). Love the Popsicle tip!
Worried about what's coming next!

[mommapants]

“An unexpected afternoon turns into a horrible night”

As we were walking back from the Poly monorail to SOG, I realized this was quickly becoming one of my favorite parts of the trip. It was always quiet and allowed for some time to decompress. It was nice just to walk with Evan (or whomever) and sort of recap what we did, what we still wanted to do and just be together. Evan told me his favorite joke along the way. What kind of peas are brown? Poopies! What kind of peas are yellow? PeePees! And what kind of peas are black? Black Eyed Peas! He would laugh. I had heard all of these before so every time I guessed the answer he was like “good job Mommy you got it!”

Once back at the hotel we were met in the room by a beautiful fruit basket compliments of housekeeping. I suppose they felt bad about the mix up yesterday. I also notice for the entire week they never took our housekeeping tips – I guess that is a SOG policy. Christine got a fruit basket too but not my sister. Weird. Steve (BIL) made a comment about how they saw all the candy they had in their room and figured why bother. It was ok however because we shared ours and it was just the right amount for the week.

While at the hotel we rested, swam and Evan watched his DVD. Pretty soon it was time for dinner and the usual “what do you want to do for dinner?” ritual began. We decided to try the Italian restaurant at the hotel – It was OK nothing special to write home about.

As we were finishing up dinner we were discussing whether to take the bus to the TCC then the monorail over to watch IllumiNations or just drive. It was decided we would drive. I told my mom I’d just run back to the room and get the keys while everyone else went potty and left the restaurant. Off the cuff I said “Gee I haven’t seen the cars keys in a while”.

Now let me back up for a moment and explain something. One of my pet peeves about renting a car is the size of the key chain they give you. And this time was no different. There were 3 keys on the ring and the ID tag as well. Two of the keys were electronic not a regular metal key so they were big and then the third key was one to just open the door and the ID tag was about 3 inches long. They are all secured together by a metal ring that can’t be cut or open so you are stuck carrying this mass around all the time. It is quite a pain when you are heading to the parks and trying to down size everything. Honestly it was about the size of a softball. My sister commented how stupid it was to have them all together “if you lose one, you lose them all”.

On our first day I actually hung the keys on the inside door knob. I’d figure that would be a good place to always know where they are.

Alright resume story…as I’m heading back to the room I’m thinking …“I haven’t seen the keys on the door knob. I wonder where they are? Well I’m not going to worry. They are there somewhere. I’ll find them, probably in my bag from yesterday”.


Well I’m sure you have guessed by now what happened…..

I head into the room and look in all the obvious places, then the not so obvious places but I can not find the keys. I’m starting to get panicky. I dump out my entire suitcase – nothing. My mom calls wondering what is taking so long. Next she comes up and begins to help me look. I begin to think maybe I dropped them or locked them in the car. In all honesty I was scared I had dropped them and someone might have stolen the car. I take the ½ mile hike to the parking garage.

I was completely relieved to see the van still in the lot, but it is night and the lighting in the garage is dim and the windows are all tinted so it is hard to see. I was 99% sure that I had locked the van using the remote control on the key. I then look around the van, under the van and even on top of it. I stopped at the front desk to see it anything had been turned in then I checked with bell/valet services.

I now came back to the room and my mom and I begin to systematically rip the place apart. It was like they disappeared off the face of the earth. I figure one of two things happened; either I dropped them and they haven’t been found or the person who found them hadn’t turned them in yet. However you would not be able to drop these things without hearing them. I knew they were not lost in a theme park as we obviously used the keys to get back to the hotel so that was a plus.

I headed back to the van, now with a small flash light to see if I can find anything. I stopped and fill out a “lost” form at the front desk and they even called housekeeping to see if something turned up in the laundry.

I was really mad at myself. I DON’T lose things. I am extremely organized and careful. Walking back to the room I’m replaying in my head what we did. The last time we rode in the car was yesterday coming back from AK. Then we changed to go swimming in my sister’s room. Good they must be in there.

We start checking her room and can’t find anything. I didn’t feel she was giving me much effort but we really only changed in there, nothing more. It wasn’t like we spent all day. We did a once over in there but found nothing. I was convinced that when she packed she would find my keys.

I really didn’t know what to do. Should I wait and see if they show up? Not use the car? I called the rental company to explain what happened and to see what my options were.

Option one – do nothing and hope the keys show up before we have to return the car. That would mean we would be paying for a car we couldn’t use and if we never found the keys we would have to deal with that on our last day of the trip – no thank you.

Option two – have a locksmith come and open the van to see if the keys are inside for a mere $60.00 fee.

Option three – trade out the van (no additional cost) but pay to have new keys made for the van at a tune of $215.00. But the car would need to be towed to the airport so add on that charge.

As I had said before I was 99% sure the keys were not in the van so I didn’t know if I should skip the second step. But then if I didn’t and paid for the new keys and the old ones were there…what to do, what to do???

Either way I was going to be spending more money than I needed. I bit the bullet, said a prayer to God and paid for the locksmith, hoping against all hope that the keys would be inside. It is now heading to about 9:00pm and Mom is trying to get Evan settled. I honestly have no idea what anyone else did. I think Chris and the boys went to bed and I think Jill and fam went to see Fantasmic but missed it.

I went to the lobby to await the lock smith. He was there pretty quickly and had the van open in about 30 seconds. As anticipated – keys were not there.

Back to the room I go to call back Enterprise to proceed with option 3. Fortunately I was able to use AAA for the tow back to the airport so I only had to pay the $215.00 key replacement.

I explained to the operator on the phone where the car is “Shades of Green Hotel” she wants a street address. I don’t have that. “Trust me” I tell her “The tow truck driver will know where it is” After about 6 calls to Enterprise customer service center and AAA I realized I’m calling someone in like Indiana and not anywhere near Florida and that is why they need the street address.

So I have the call into Enterprise that we will be bringing the van back and I have all the instructions as to what to do. I have the call into AAA and was told that the driver will be there within 30 minutes. I head to the lobby to wait. As I’m walking to the lobby I get a call from AAA stating because the car is in a parking garage and “in park” and there are no keys, they will need a special driver with a special truck and that it may take hours before someone could be there. It was at this point I just wanted to break down and cry. I was so upset with myself and I was tired and emotionally drained.

I headed back to the room again to tell my mom what was going on. I had no sooner told her when I got a call the driver was here. Cure the angels singing. So back to the lobby, once more, and then into the garage. The driver was great. He was very friendly and got the van out of the spot and hooked up in about 15 minutes. He had to go all the way to the top level to turn around, thank God there were empty spots, other wise I wouldn’t know what we would have done. I hopped in the truck and we were on our way to the airport. He was afraid hotel security would give him a hard time as he said they always think the tows are there to do repos.

I know this sounds crazy but the drive back to the airport was one of the best parts of my trip. Well maybe not one of the best but it was very memorable. The driver told me a lot of inside info about the rental car places and tow truck driving.

I was commenting about how Enterprise said I could switch vans if they still had vans at the airport. Driver told me “They will never run out of vans” He showed be the overflow lot for all the rental companies at the airport and there must have been 10,000 vans in the overflow lot.

I asked him how long he had been doing this and he told me a really interesting story.
He lived in NY and was laid off. He couldn’t find a job and move to Orlando and got a part time job at a towing company. It was a small mom and pop place. The owner got sick and when he came back the driver (sorry I don’t remember his name) offered to buy him out. The owner said no. The driver left the company, the next week, bought his own truck and ended up putting the other guy out of business. He has been in Florida for 4 years and now has 15 trucks in his crew. He is the only AAA tow company with a contract for Disney. So basically if you call AAA for a tow in Disney you will get his company. He also does other theme parks and I4. He gets over 300 calls a week just from AAA not including all other regular calls he would get. He told me it gets crazy when the theme parks close. As it was now past 11pm, he got 4 calls while driving me to the airport.

It was just something I never really thought about. How many people make a living because of Disney but don’t actually work for Disney. So if you know anyone needing a job, tell them to become a tow truck driver in Orlando. I don’t know if I would want that though, working 7 nights a week. Good money I guess but not the way I’d want to live.

I got to the airport and was able to exchange vans easily enough. They even told me they would hold off of the replace key fee so if I found the keys in the next few days I could just return the keys and all would be fine. Well there is always hope of that, right?

I drove back to the hotel around midnight or so and was asleep by 1am.

Not to keep you all waiting.
I never found the keys. I was so sure when we packed to come home we’d find them somewhere. They just never showed up. Once I got home I was just so back logged and I didn’t get all my unpacking done right away. About 3 weeks after being home I was putting away my back pack, travel purse, beach bag, carry on, etc…. I picked up my beach bag to place in the closet and was like – boy this feels heavy. I looked inside it, in the little zipper pocket on the inside and you got it – found the keys! It was too late to get a refund on the charges but at least I had the satisfaction of knowing I didn’t lose them. As I replayed it all in my head I realized the day we changed in my sister’s room to go to the pool I must have placed the keys in the bag. But I realized we didn’t need the beach bag at the pool since we used the hotel towels pool-side so I just put the beach bag into my suitcase thinking I won’t need this anymore. When I ripped the room and suitcase apart looking for the keys I obviously never looked into the inside pocket. Our family joke is now anytime something is missing is…did you look in your beach bag?

What an ordeal – but thank God that it was all done and it didn’t happen on the last night of our trip as I would have been in orbit.

Coming up Next
“Boys Pirate Adventure”

Birthday pin surprise count: holding at 3, but will be increasing soon

[JKnott17]

Oh, man, what an ordeal! I'm sorry that you didn't find the keys in time to get a refund on the charges, but you were lucky that it didn't happen on your last day. Looking forward to your next update, hope it's a much better day!

[Colexis Mom]

Wow, what an ordeal! Sorry for the extra cost, but glad you found them in the end!

[lauriep]

What a fiasco! The good thing is that you got some Disney magic from a non-Disney employee and didn't let it ruin your trip.

On the subject of magic... I saw your story in the AllEars newsletter tonight!

[cubfancolleen]

So sorry about the key ordeal, and the extra expense. But I'd be like you, happy to have the satisfaction in knowing I didn't really lose them - just misplaced!

[JKnott17]

Originally Posted by lauriep

What a fiasco! The good thing is that you got some Disney magic from a non-Disney employee and didn't let it ruin your trip.

On the subject of magic... I saw your story in the AllEars newsletter tonight!

I just read it too, how cool!

[Cam22]

What a mess with the keys! I hate to lose things, too, and would have been so frustrated. Glad you were able to get it all sorted out though and even find the keys.