Chloe's Chat: Winter break at Disney

By Chloe Gregg
Editor in Chief

My boyfriend Kobe and I spent the week before Christmas visiting the magical world of Disney in Orlando, Fla.

I was fresh out of my penultimate semester at LCC and had recently taken and passed two out of the five required boards to get my Dental Hygiene License: Nitrous Oxide and Local Anesthesia. So, I was feeling pretty accomplished and ready for a vacation.

Although the trip wasn’t very long, really only three and a half days, we still had the time of our lives while visiting Florida.

We arrived in Florida at 2 a.m. on Monday due to an unexpected delay in our flight departure. The night was spent checking into our hotel, getting into our room, and immediately falling asleep until we could explore the following morning.

Our hotel was in a resort with four other hotels. They all shared multiple pools, hot tubs, bars, restaurants, and a Starbucks. There were also mini golf courses, and basically just a load of different fun things to do while at the hotel.

Unfortunately, we didn’t get to spend a ton of time doing hotel things because our schedule was so packed. Monday morning we visited Disney’s Lake Buena Vista golf course for a “quick” 18 holes (it took almost five hours.)

Around 4 p.m. we headed out to Disney Springs, where we had a delicious dinner at a popular burger joint. We then spent the night walking around, visiting shops, and stopping at the bars.

The next day we had a little more time in the morning to lounge around the hotel and its luxurious heated pools before our noon tee time. Our second day of golfing was spent at Disney’s Oak Trail Course, which was a walking golf course filled with wildlife every step of the way. While there, we rented this automated robot that walked and held our clubs for us for $15. It was so much fun watching it chase us around on the golf course.

That night we went to Player One Arcade, an arcade nightclub recommended to us by one of our Uber drivers. Player One had old-fashioned type of “insert coin” games, but guests paid a flat rate for entrance, and could play whatever game they wanted, for however long they wanted.

Player One also had TVs lining the walls behind the bar that were hooked up to different game consoles. Anyone who ordered a drink could then ask for the controllers and play.

It was a lot of fun, but we made sure to head home early to prepare for Disney in the morning.

The following morning we woke up at 6 a.m. sharp and got dressed and ready to go. We were at the park by the time it opened.

We ran to the Avatar section of Animal Kingdom to ride the Flight of Passage ride, but there was already a three-hour-plus wait time (just for reference, that’s as long as the movie.)

Instead we focused our attention on other parts of Animal Kingdom and got to visit all of my favorite stops. We even got front row seats on Expedition Everest, one of the best roller coasters at Disney!

Around noon we had basically done and seen everything we wanted to do there, so we headed over to Rainforest Café (Kobe had never been in one) for a quick drink and then hopped on the Disney bus to go to Epcot.

Epcot is the “world center” at Disney. It has 12 different country “pavilions” or stops along its two-mile perimeter. Each country hosted its own collection of drinks, and we were determined to try a drink at every country. About an hour and a half and three drinks in, we realized this probably was not going to happen if we wanted to remain conscious.

Still, we had a ton of fun exploring and drinking at the many different countries, and by the end of it, yes, we were pretty drunk.

We ended our country excursions in Mexico, the last stop, where I had scheduled us a fancy dinner in the Mexican restaurant, La Hacienda. This restaurant had floor to ceiling windows overlooking the lagoon.

After an amazing dinner, we watched the Disney fireworks show over the lagoon from our gorgeous view in the restaurant and then headed back to our hotel.

Our last day we woke up early, got all of our suitcases and bags around, and headed out for a final morning of golf at Disney’s Magnolia Golf Course. Fortunately for our flight times, this course only had 14 holes and we were done within two hours of arriving. From there, we left for the airport to go home.

Overall, I had an amazing and unforgettable trip. This is the second year in a row Kobe and I visited Disney around Christmas, and it was just as magical this time.

I hope everyone had a wonderful winter break!