Katoomba, Australia : Three sisters & Prince Henry Cliff Walk

Spent my first day in Katoomba appreciating the rock formation that is The Three Sisters, in all it’s glory (and it is pretty glorious); and, I got in a good two plus hours of mostly easy hiking between Echo point and Katoomba Falls, along the Prince Henry Cliff Walk: a paved walkway which skirts just below the top of the plateau upon which the city of Katoomba sits. In this case I think the pictures speak for themselves, while at the same time doing no real justice how it feels to be in the presence of this sort of natural beauty in real life. Really, this view IS worth the trip.

As such, there’s really not much for me to say about these photos, other than I had wonderful afternoon enjoying the views, so I’ll let them do the talking.

This is the document that the QR code on the left links too: http://www.naturetourismservices.com.au/3sisters.html

The QR code link is worth following as it loads a really well written description of the location and the available walks (better than what I could do here).

I began my visit at what is called Echo Point… I’m not sure why as I didn’t hear any echo’s when folks called out… but maybe if EVERYONE was quiet, and one person did, we might…

After enjoying the views from Echo point I took the ramp (which leads off to the right of the point — looking out towards the sisters) down to the Prince Henry Cliff walk that goes from the point to the falls

In this picture I was actually as impressed with the foreground as the background, especially the color

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A former Apple employee took this with the new phone and airdropped it to me — while it looked WAY better on his phone, I’m not sure it looks better on my computer screen… could be he airdropped a low pixel version

You’ll notice that it was windy as heck, and that the Australians were all wearing sweaters or coats… that’s because along with being windy it was 66F, which in my mind made it great weather for some serious walking…
Menapause and carrying around 30 lb of excess fat, it’s a thing

Also, before I started the walk I was very specific with the park staff about how I had bad hips and knees and needed to know if there’s be any serious amounts of stairs and or climbing along the way… suffice it to say they lied when they said no difficult stairs and that the whole thing was well paved throughout. There weren’t a LOT of spots like this, but if I were actually handicapped I’d be seriously pissed off… as it was it just slowed me down for a bit.

High tea @ Lilianfels Blue Mountains Resort & Spa: Katoomba, Australia

Lilianfels Resort & Spa is located in an historic house in the town of Katoomba, New South Wales (NSW), Australia, near the Blue Mountain‘s Three Sisters rock formation on the edge of what Australians refer to as their “grand canyon.” Among other attractions available to those NOT staying at the hotel, is their High Tea … but for me, the meal was a MAJOR let down; it was no where near as tasty as it looked, and is most definitely NOT worth the calories.

As those who follow my blog know, I have a tradition of going to High Tea with my best friend since childhood, who from time to time will join me for a few days (she loves traveling, but not alone, and her hubby doesn’t, so she’ll take a few days off and join up with me. Since she’s not here to share it with me, I am having high-tea with an oversized teddy bear I spotted on the other side of the room that looked lonely (there being no children in the room that day).

Having the bear as my partner tea partner was my idea, not theirs — they just looked at me funny when I asked if I could. But as I was one of the first people to show up, and no kids had arrived, they let me have it.

All in all the sandwiches were ok but not amazing nor worth much of a mention; to be honest I have had better at pretty much every high tea I’ve ever gone to. The hot tea and the scone were fine (nothing particularly memorable),

and in spite of having sat myself directly adjacent to the window, my only view was of a smallish garden with high hedge rows behind it.

So mostly I’m going to talk about what should have been the highlight of the Tea, especially considering how pretty they were…. the desserts,

When I fist got the tray, I was seriously impressed that the Panna-cotta has cotton candy on top of it … but here is the thing, and this was the first in a long stream of bad thinking and planning on the part of the pastry chef: When you get a high tea you don’t dive into the desserts first. Instead, you leisurely have the sandwiches and the scones… So that between arriving on my table and my finally getting to it ….the cotton candy did what cotton candy does when dampened… it shrinks and turns into a sticky glob

The yellow thing in the middle turned out to be a white chocolate spoon. At first I was like “well that’s smart” … but as soon as tried to use it as a spoon, it snapped…. and then when I tried to use that now shortened “half” spoon, it also snapped … So that finally I just gave up and grabbed my metal spoon…. only to find that the Panna-cotta was kind of tasteless and definitely not worth the calories, and I left it half eaten.

Next I had what turned out to be a beet root tart (Australians like Canadians are very into eating beets — because they’re healthy) and and love beets in general …. but this tart? Well let’s just say it’s ‘different’… nothing to write home about, and leave it at that…. but beetroot, healthy… so I ate the whole thing.

This cheesecake dropped a pineapple apricot jam on my leg as soon as picked it up … and since again, it was more pretty than tasty, I put it down after the first bite

A custard tart with fruit perched on it… the custard was good the cup that held it was not so much — you sort of had to pick the fruit off and eat it separate because the custard wasn’t firm enough to hold it in place and the whole thing was way to big to pop into your mouth whole… again, bad pastry design.

This oh so precious looking brownie ??? Again, not very tasty. In fact I once again put it down after the first bite because it just wasn’t worth the calories. And the hard candy on top did help a bit, but it was mostly just sugar.

All in all, don’t waste your time.

Katoomba, Australia: Pins On Lurline, an upscale resturant

Pins on Lurline (the latter is the name of the street it’s on) is a tasty, slightly pricey, upscale, chef driven restaurant that you will probably need to book well in advance if you want a seat. Located in New South Wales Australia, in the tourist town of Katoomba, not far from Echo Point Lookout (a favorite point for viewing the Three Sisters); this restaurant is listed as 5 stars on Yelp, and as 4.5 stars on Trip Advisor.

Upon first arriving in Katoomba I tried to find a good place to eat dinner. This restaurant was listed as one of the very best it town on multiple sites, so I called and asked if they were open and could have dinner there… suffice it to say the guy who picked up the phone almost laughed at me, and gave a clear “no, sorry, we’re fully booked.” And since, for the most part, I can’t be bothered with this sort of place (unless its a very tiny yet popular place, I rarely find the food at places that require booking ahead to be worth the hassle), I just sort of wrote it off as one of the places I wouldn’t be going to.

The next day was a bit windy, but I decided to walk down the street towards the Three Sisters, the major tourism draw for this town, which took me right by the restaurant. I decided to go up to the building and if possible try to stick my head in, and maybe to make a booking — because I had seen they had Kangaroo on the menu, and I wanted to try it.

As luck would have it, although the place was completely empty, the door was open although there was woman was inside standing near the bar, who seemed to be busy taking phone bookings for that evening. I assumed therefore that it wasn’t open yet for business, but that they were just prepping for that evening.

So I asked if I could see the menu and maybe make a booking, and she was like, “well we’re open now, would you like lunch?”
“You’re open?”
“Yes, we’ve just started doing lunch on weekends. Didn’t you see the sign?” (it was a Saturday)
“I was just walking by and I didn’t see any sign.”
“Oh, it must have blown over” (like I said, it was windy

Now here’s the thing, according to the various web sites I had looked at Pins wasn’t supposed to be open at lunch, and even the night before when I called the guy hadn’t mentioned it … and if I hadn’t been walking right by it I would I would never have known. Which sort of explains why I was the only person in the restaurant for most of my meal… towards the very end a 2nd couple also stopped by to make reservations, and ended up staying for lunch.

I ordered the pumpkin soup …. normally they put a dollop of cream on top but for me that didn’t.

It ended up being kind of overwhelmingly peppery without the added fat, but coffee is good. It surprised me a bit because in the the states pumpkin soup would normally be sweeter, and with cinnamon in it. Apparently that’s NOT how the Aussies like it, what I learned from talking to the woman is that here pumpkin soup is always savory and with lots of pepper (a fact later confirmed to me by others).

For my main I ordered the seared kangaroo with a green salad. The woman “warned” me that Kangaroo because it’s so low fat has to be eaten rare, and I told her that was fine because I actually prefer my steak “blue” … which is a bit like seared tuna, and is borderline raw.

She said that because their usual dressing are full of oil the cook did some improving. The kangaroo was not bad, but not amazing… Bison is way more flavorful and I can see why in this case the locals tended to prefer to eat lamb, mutton or beef. But apparently apparently Kangaroo is very healthy. The way it was cooked it came out tender; and the taste was more like ostrich than beef or bison… it has a very subtle flavor … I actually felt that the cook has overwhelmed it with the taste of charring/burned edges.

The Australian Egg

Firstly….Let’s hear it for countries where you don’t refrigerate eggs.

You’ve got to love the Australian sense of humor; that said, in Aussie slang words are shortened, so chickens become chooks

Most Americans don’t realize this but the rest of the world does not refrigerate their eggs (read this link to understand why we do it when the rest of the world doesn’t, if you don’t already know). While staying at Airbnb’s in the US owned by recent immigrants I have regularly had to explain to them why storing their eggs decoratively on a table (the same way as fruit), is not only NOT a good idea, it’s down right dangerous — and then explained to them why that is.

So, here in Australia, if you’re shopping for eggs, do NOT look for them in the refrigerated section…. you’ll find them stacked up in the aisles.

Shirt Bar, Sydney Australia

So I thought this was a really cool idea for a store that I’d never seen before: I’ve seen combo coffee bar bookstores many times and combo coffee bar flower stores a few times, but this is the first time I’ve seen a custom high end/trendy tailor/coffee AND whiskey bar… that also is a trendy restaurant.

I was walking around the redeveloping (it started in 2012 and isn’t expected to be completed until 2023) Barangaroo section of Sydney when the I was drawn into what I initially thought was a fabulous men’s clothing store by some really great music that was drifting into the street

According to the waitress who walked over to me as soon as I stuck my head in the door, asking, “have you ever been here before?”, the owner of the Shirt Bar is a tailor who does custom tailored suits for both men and women — but in this day and age, those skills won’t necessarily pay the rent. So he had the brilliant idea to open his business in the new and trendy Barangaroo section of Sydney (an area recently converted from a container/shipping terminal into a trendy/hipster business center and tourist haunt) … So, this store is not only a very high end custom tailer, but it is also a coffee house

………. a whiskey bar,

And a restaurant that has distinct breakfast, lunch and dinner menus

And tables are specifically designed so that at night they can crank them up to bar height, and, like I said earlier, they play really cool music

Sydney Australia has VERY clean, and free, street side public toilets

Let’s face it, knowing where the clean toilets are is a THING, and it’s especially difficult while traveling. In this regard Sydney public toilets are quite impressive…. and I’m talking STREET side toilets!!!

Now public toilets in malls, stores, or public buildings are usually pretty good, but let’s face it, street side public toilets can get pretty well… yucky/smelly/ nasty, etc., and are as a rule to be avoided

I am thrilled to say that so far, I’m finding that Sydney has VERY clean street side public toilets… McDonald’s clean, or better yet, Costco clean, which is an even higher standard (there’s a reason why while driving around the North American continent my pit stop of choice for both gas and bathrooms is Costco).

The bathroom above was the 3rd public one I have used since coming here … and I’m finding the public toilets are cleaner than some of the restaurants toilets I’ve encountered while here. As I was in the toilet shown above, a British woman (with a thick country brogue) and I were talking about it — and she noted how the Sydney were much cleaner than the British public toilets, in spite of the fact that they were all free, while in the UK toilets aren’t.

A weekend in Patonga; New South Wales, Australia

Patonga is a sleepy sea-side town without a train station, that’s located about an hour north of downtown Sydney. It is a nice place for a quiet relaxed stay (and to escape the heat of the city). It’s basically a beach, beach sides homes, one seemingly nice hotel (I never entered beyond the restaurant areas) with a bar/restaurant and cafe (with free WIFI!!!), a few art galleries representing the art of local artists, and a post box. Be warned, the place doesn’t even have a proper convenience store, and I’m not even sure there’s regular bus. And NOT all Australian cell phone companies service the place… lord knows ours didn’t — hence our excitement of it being freely available at the hotel about a block away from our beach house.

This last weekend my travel-buddy Mik took to me visit an ex-girlfriend of his, someone who is now “family” for him. She has friends who have a beach house in this small town north of Sydney and had lent it to her.

Because there was construction on the train line we needed to take there, we had to take a bus from the central train station (the main hub station for Sydney)…

which I thought was a good thing because you see more from buses than from trains

Ultimately we ended up taking the bus none stop all the way from Sydney’s central station to an external suburb called Berowra — for what seemed like good one hour ride, possibly more, at which point the we were transferred to a waiting train. Now from my perspective this was pretty unusual. In the States, they’ll usually work on one or two station’s (or bits of line) at a time and at most this sort of filler bus will takes the place of that, here they seem to prefer to do the whole line all at once.

From there, we connected to the train (which should have started at Central Station, but for the construction)

…. and took that to Woy Woy Station. Then we walked the distance from the station to the local mall which held the grocery store (ALL major brand groceries in Australia seem to be located in malls)

where we got some food, and met his friend who drove us the rest of the way.

In part I think this was because a) there was no connecting bus to the place, and b) as I mentioned before, there are no grocery stores in Patonga (not even a small one for basics like milk and eggs).

Patonga while very small is a VERY nice place…. it’s a tiny peninsula surrounded by a river which empties into the sea, and slightly protected bay

When we arrived I was amazed by how close to the beach we were

A panorama shot with our house (with it’s back porch) to the right and the beach to the left, just past the sand dunes, the panorama distorts the distances a bit, but it was very close

The path from our back-porch from our porch, sans the panorama view

As the pictures show Patonga is really nice, and the placement of the home we were staying at couldn’t have been better.

We swam in the ocean… which was great escape because the house didn’t have any air conditioning and the temps hit 110 F that week… i.e., HOT!

Just above the spot where the river meets the ocean and there is a really strong current that will carry you down towards the sea, but that runs right into a sandbank which will catch you … we road it multiple times, really relaxing

And had a few meals at the local restaurant, which we were really excited to discover had free wifi, because the house we were staying at didn’t….

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the cell phone company my friend and I had signed up for wasn’t offering up ANY bars, let alone data. (His girlfriend’s phone WAS getting signal, but she was on a much more expensive provider.)

First time there, my friend ordered an iced mocha and got this — what best can be described as a deconstructed Iced mocha

we were impressed… I on the other hand ordered an iced coffee and an avocado toast

Like I mentioned before, the temps near us had reached 110F, and as a result I was getting very dehydrated… I don’t handle heat well

I bought us drinking coconuts and 2 cold pressed watermelon juices JUST for me… cause I dehydrate faster than most people

After, my friend suggested we take the coconuts with us, and when we got back to the house he opened them up using a saw he found in the garage, and we ate the meat…

That same day I had a one on one with a praying mantis — I honestly don’t remember EVER seeing one that wasn’t in a cage before

One of the things that I learned while in Patonga is that the silk of Aussie spiders is impressively strong… like seriously….way stronger than at home. That, and apparently the ones with webs are as a rule not the poisonous ones… my travel partner threw a small stress fit when he heard I wanted to find small rocks to bring back to the states and put on my Dad’s tombstone. Under rocks is where you find the most poisonous ones. He said that I should absolutely not pick them up without gloves.

… Also, because there was no air-con where we were staying I slept with the sliding glass doors open, protected from intruders by metal gates that doubled as bug screens. As such, out-door sounds were NOT blocked, and except for no calls from Mammal predators this place sounds like the jungle. This includes magpies (which sing pretty)

and, in the place of hyenas and or monkeys, kookaburra birds which sound like an insane man laughing his head off in an insane asylum (and LOUD)…

my traveling companion, who is Australian, likes the sound — I learned later there is a popular Australian children’s song about the bird — Personally, I think the bird sounds a bit creepy, but my friend loves it …. anyway, one of those was in the back garden and between it and the heat, I woke up at 5am. I later learned another name for it is “the Bushman’s Alarm Clock” because they tend to go NUTS, and loudly, at 5am.

Flying to Australia, New Years Eve

My first trip ever to Australia! Deciding to go “down under” was rather last minute, for me. I flew one way on New years Eve on a relatively cheap $724 (with tax and fees) ticket on United that I found using Google’s Flight search engine ). Travel hints: 1) it’s cheaper to fly on major holidays when other people don’t want to; 2) try using goggle’s search engine. I find it is among the best for finding the cheapest flights available as priced directly from the airlines themselves — so while not always THE cheapest flight out there, it provides bookings that are a LOT less likely to get you bumped, or to discover upon showing up at the airport that the airline knows nothing about your reservation. And, 3) while Americans can stay in Australia for 3 months without going to the consulate to get a visa the old fashioned way, you still NEED TO GET AN ELECTRONIC VISA! They won’t let you on your flight without it, and it’s much more expensive to get it at the last minute (and can take up to 20 minutes, even in that case). And remember to PEE before landing… just saying.

[Breaking with tradition, I’m writing this from Korea (as per usual) I never got around to writing it on shortly after arrival… and I’m really looking at this in retrospect I’m posting it with a date that is three months after the fact.]

My friend (the one who had expressed interest in our becoming travel buddies) had gone home to Sydney for a few months over Xmas; while I, at this time, was doing my THIRD extended trip in a row at Disney World. Between 2015 and 2018 I’d spend 18 MONTHS in the Orlando area, doing little else than go to Disney, either daily or weekly …. depending on my mood, health and the weather. All in all, I was kind of Disney’d out (or at least Orlando’d out).

“HOW can that BE?!” you ask… (somewhat facetiously, I assume)

Well, it was mid November, right after the thanksgiving school holiday, and I was once again at Disney World, using up the remainder of the on- year-pass I had purchased in December 2016 (at the time they were offering a deal of 13 months for the price of 12) out of a sense of Jewish guilt (in this particular case, based on the laws of economy taught to me in my childhood, i.e., never wast a dollar), because the pass wasn’t due to expire till late January. I knew I was bored with it before I had even arrived, but I was saying to myself, “this will be my visit for 2018, one month and then I’ll do something else,” not yet having ANY idea of what that something else might be.

Warning: slightly depressing side bar [Initially the plan had been to then go to New Orleans and spend a few months there; but my beloved friend (in fact the guy I lost my virginity to) who I was going to see while there (he was single, I was single… neither of us had been involved with anyone for a while and we’d maintained our friendship for 30 years, so…), had up and died on me. He had dropped dead in early June while at work… IN A HOSPITAL of all places; he was a doctor, had sat down on a bench (suddenly not feeling well), and died, sitting up. Apparently he hadn’t even collapsed to the ground when they’d found him. Luckily for me, we had spoken only days before he died, talking in part about my plans to go to NOLA the following winter, and talking about me finding an Airbnb in his neighborhood, at least initially. I’d been driving towards Montreal, and the cellphone connection kept dropping while in New York State’s mountains, so we agreed I should call him back once I was settled in (so my last memories of him were recent, and very positive). The day I called him back, I loaded up my computer where Facebook is my default web page, and at the very top was a posting on his wall saying “RIP Peter” with the details of his death. So, while it was now about six months later, I still couldn’t bare the thought of going to New Orleans without him being there… which left me rather adrift.]

So here I was, back in my safe zone, Disney World (a place I now knew like the back of my hand), NOT what I had wanted for myself for this year, and simultaneously being seriously annoyed by the fact that while only a few years previously I could trust that between thanksgiving and Xmas the parks would be half empty, so that I could just jump on rides like the Pirates of the Caribbean or the Haunted Mansion ride with only a 10 minute wait, those days were now GONE. The citizen of Brazil (who had yearly been discovering the joys of a Disney vacation in increasing numbers as their economy became robust enough to allow them to afford to travel) were now there en masse, or at leasts that’s the way it felt, and as their “summer” vacation months encompassed the whole of our Winter months the lull in attendance between American School Holiday was now a thing of the past. As a result, most of my favorite rides (the low key, non roller coaster ones) were no longer rideable unless I were willing to stand in line for 20 minutes, which I was not… and a bit of the joy had gone out of the Happiest Place on Earth for me. (Disney REALLY needs to think about opening up a South American location.)

So I realized that I was not only getting a bit bored of Disney World, but that I felt like I was stuck in something of a semi depressed rut. I was doing things I no longer enjoyed because they were safe and known (never a good thing). So, I decided it was time to make a change.

I fairly spontaneously (for me) decided to, first: check if my friend in Australia was amenable to my suddenly showing up (he was), and then I canceled my reservations with Airbnb for January (ladies and gentleman, here’s an Airbnb user tip… NEVER book an airbnb that has a strict cancellation policy — flexible and moderate are your friends) and I decided to book a ticket to Australia for mid-January (again, Jewish guilt about not wasting the Disney ticket). …

HOWEVER, I discovered (using googles flight search engine) that if I flew on New Years Eve rather than mid January as originally intended, I would save about $400 (Jewish guilt issues resolved!) … explained this to my Australian friend, who a bit less enthusiastically (just being honest here) agreed that it was only reasonable that I should fly in earlier than initially planned (although he started hinting I should explore other parts of Australia without him — hence my trip to Katoomba)… so with the agreement of my friends in Georgia (where I needed to stay for about a week or so in order to reorganize my suitcase, and store what I wasn’t taking) and the ones in Orlando (who would be baby sitting my car) … I was off

[Just a bit ironically, I was initially intending to go Australia, then Shanghai (to see friends and the new Disney park), then Tokyo with my best Korean friend (where I’d again go to Disney)… then home — but I wasn’t booking the return flights till I solidified things with them. And then, before even taking off a distant female friend, so much so that FB wasn’t bothering to show her my posts, who it turned out is working in Shanghai and was intending to go to Australia for travel, was told by a closer mutual friend that I was going to be in Australia TOO and we should hook up. For a while we tried to organize our dates but she was unwilling to commit to anything in advance (in effect because there were other people she wanted to travel with more who weren’t getting back to her) and I’m unwilling to be left hanging on the beck and call of someone who can’t make up her mind because she dangle’s person on hold while hoping for “something better” because she’s too afraid to just travel alone …. so that didn’t happen, and she’s now on the “don’t even think about” list of travel partners.]

So, as you probably could guess from the tips I listed at the start of this… guess who forgot to sign up for her electronic visa? So ya, that was a glitch— but since I always like getting to the airport super early (more than two hours before the flight) I was, with the help of United’s staff, able to do it from my iPhone — and the visa came through in about 15 min after we figured out how to sign up for it — thank the powers that be for smart phones and web pages that work as intended.

Once I was checked in, I discovered that Orlando airport now has this place is near gates 30-50. It newish (I verified that wasn’t there the last time I passed through) — they have Cuban coffee as well as American — I had one called Cuban roast which was very good… it had chocolate undertones you could actually taste … They also have very tasty and BIG cubano sandwiches ready at almost an instant (which is great if your running for a plane). I ate 1/2 at the restaurant and saved half for shortly before takeoff (I remember that on the TV news once they said that medical studies have found that having freshly swallowed food in your belly at takeoff can decrease the risk of strokes during, but haven’t been able to find a link to add here).

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When I got to SF I hadn’t remembered to make a bathroom run before landing, and I ended up NOT quite making to the bathroom after disembarking… in SF!!! Right when we were starting to land, but not allowed to get up, I realized to late that I really REALLY needed to go… and by the time we unloaded my sphincter, upon just seeing the bathroom sign a few feet away, couldn’t do the job anymore… fech!!

That said, I was very amused to discover that United had me set to depart one gate away from the gate I arrived at!!! Totally saved me from the not quite enough time to make the transfer worries, so I grabbed some Japanese food from the directly adjacent eatery. Upon loading the stewardess’s were wearing these crowns… I asked if we were all going to get one, and she gave me hers…

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And, I was SUPER thrilled to discover I alone in my row, so that I actually managed to get some sleep on the way from SF to Australia.

While flying somewhere between Port Vila and Brisbane

I met and got friendly with a former Harlem globetrotter by the name of Tracy Williams who is 6’7″ so he was having to stoop a bit to make the photo happen.

…we did the photo and he gave me a signed-photo that says, “To Rebecca, Happy New Year, 2018”

… he was really hungry and they had no food so I gave him my pack of bison jerky and other high protein/low carb snacks I brought with me was but not hungry enough to eat — and all of it was verboten to bring it into Australia anyway so better it shouldn’t go to waste… I was doubly glad I’d given him the food when some very cute dogs sniffed me all over before allowing me to enter the airport. Australia is the fist country I’ve been to where they large numbers of sniffing dogs on staff and EVERY SINGLE PERSON and their bags gets a full sniff-over before being allowed to enter.

My friend picked me up at the apart and we went to a cafe near where we were going to be staying, and I had Israeli food (Sydney is FULL of Israeli restaurants — who knew?) … not the best shakshuka I’ve ever had, but no bad.

Traveling with friends, Mik

I have now been traveling around the US by myself for 2.5 years, and while I have been enjoying it a lot, and don’t want to stop, I HAVE found being a solo travel for THAT long was proving to be a bit too lonely. Back in late September I was in Stratford Ontario Canada for a 2nd season of the Shakespeare festival. While there, My buddy Mik passed through, on his way to visit relatives in Toronto, to visit me.

At that time we discussed the fact that his current job allows him to travel at will, he’s a computer coder, and would I be interested in us traveling together?

In early November we gave it a rather successful four day test run in Tennessee, after which we agreed “this might work”. He headed back to the west coast and I headed to yet another winter in DisneyWorld (my Disney pass from the previous year was good until the end of January so I figured I should make use of it).

After I had been Disney for over a month, I started to get a bit bored with it. Mik had already told me his intent was to head home to visit his mother in Australia in early December and would be there till early March… so I asked him how he felt about me joining up with him. I spent the next few weeks trying to figure out what things I absolutely would need within the limits of one 45 lb suitcase, 1 carry on bag and a small backpack, and then what to do with everything I couldn’t take. The excess clothing is now stored at my friends in Dalton, GA… and I left my car with friends in Orlando not to far from the airport. New years eve I flew (for the first time in my life to Australia), and as of yet don’t have a return ticket or any real idea of when I’m returning… other than I have to back for doctor’s appointments, and possibly jury duty.

Some suggestions on how to do a Disney World vacation and not go broke

I’ve had a one year Disney world pass now for two years now, and I’ve sort of gotten it down.

Where to stay:
Pretty much all of the areas that are just off of the DW campus, where the hotels are, are also ‘cheek to jowl’ with Airbnb rentals that are often nicer, and for less money than what the hotels have to offer. ALSO, if you’re someone who cares about a good reliable wifi connection, the reality is that I’ve NEVER found Wifi at a hotel to be anywhere as good as the wifi in a private home, particularly if it’s one where they’re renting you a room in their own home — rather than a property they rent out entirely.

When I first got to Orlando this year I was renting an Airbnb space from a perfectly nice divorced elderly guy. The “home” was actually a double wide/trailer (but from the inside you can’t REALLY tell that) located just south west of the park. I was paying about $34/night for a HUGE air conditioned bedroom with a ceiling fan, that has a walk in closet, an ensuite bathroom that has a shower and a jacuzzi tub, free parking in his driveway, full usage of the kitchen, and located in a gated development with a guard that has a pool and a weight room. My host offers up free coffee from his Keurig (most Airbnb hosts do). Now granted, I could stay at a flea bag motel for around $45 a night, but why would I want to?

For Thanksgiving I drove up to Georgia to stay with my friends up in Dalton, and then came back to Orlando a 2nd time, and am now staying at a different Airbnb in the newly developing (I remember 20 years ago when this whole area was NOTHING but orange groves) west side of campus… in a home that can’t be more than a year or so old. I have a beautiful and comfortable room in the home of a young Brazilian couple again for about $34/night.

Additionally, if wifi is important to you, my experience is the wifi at Airbnb’s where the owner is living in the same space with you are almost always way better than what is offered from the hotels. (AVOID the ones where the owner seems to have 4 or 5 spaces to rent in different locations… I want my owner living IN my house, this may mean a bit less privacy but it USUALLY, emphasis on the usually, assures a much higher standard of customer service, in my experience.)

This year, I’m going to be headed to my friend in GA for Thanksgiving holidays, and then moving to a different Airbnb that’s again just at the edge of the park, but this time a bit north west of it in an area that was all orange groves in 2002 (the first time I came to Disney for an extended stay) but is now housing developments and strip malls … again for about $34/night. And around Disney there’s very little new home building that isn’t part of a development, and all of those include pools and weight rooms, some of the more expensive ones even have golf courses — but those Airbnb’s in those, when they exist, are much pricer as a result, although still less than at a hotel resort with a golf course.

I think Disney is aware of the problem (for them) and is as such upping their hotel game. Currently the ONLY Disney hotels that call to me ‘enough’ for me to be willing to pay their rates, is 1) the infinitely long Wilderness Lodge next to animal kingdom, where every single room overlooks a sort of zoo like area, so you can look out of your bedroom window and see giraffes and wildebeests; and 2) the currently in development star wars themed hotel where apparently the “windows” will make you feel like your on a space ship, your assigned a story line upon arrival that you’re supposed to play out, and all the staff are in costume and character at all times (including some aliens) … THAT would be worth $300/night — but even then I would want to find friends to share the room with.

Shopping:
Disney is impressively expensive. As a rule, I do NOT BUY ANYTHING on campus until I have had a chance to visit the two (and you should go to both) outlet shops that sell discontinued Disney merchandise, and Disney discontinues stuff every few weeks. These shops ONLY carry things that were either available ONLY at DisneyWorld shops (not the Disney stores in malls), or are left over from various Disney Cruises. To give you an idea of the prices, T-shirts that sold for $36.99 on campus are $12.99 at these stores, stuff that was $39.99 sell for $14.99, and items that were $14.99 are marked down to $2.99…. and unless marked “as is” or “all sales final” (in which case the discounts will be steeper, because the merchandise is damaged), all items come with a full refund 30 day guarantee. SO, you can grab that Mickey Mouse jacket that they only had one size too large for you at one store, and then return it to the other one if that branch has it in your size.

While the selection is much smaller, odds are you’ll find at least a handful of items you like, and at those prices, well, the items seem to get cuter. So where allow yourself only one item, (because if you look the prices are essentially 1/3 of what they’d be in the park) here you can get three items for the same price. AND if you think about how much you’d have paid for that “reasonably priced” hotel room located equidistant from DW as your Airbnb — which would currently be between between $70 and $150 night… (although there are flea bag places going for $45 a night just a bit father off) well…

Like I said there are TWO of these stores, both are in outlet malls in shops adjacent to the food courts (so ask folks where the food court is, as to my experience the teenagers working in those places often don’t know the Disney stores are even there):

One is in the ‘Premium Outlet on Vineland Ave’, located just a bit east of DisneyWorld:

while the other is about 20 minutes north in the ‘Orlando International Premium Outlets’ that are just east of the Universal Amusement parks Campus:

Once I have “satiated” my need for cute Disney stuff…. I currently have six new really cute Disney T-shirts that I picked up last night, as well as some new luggage tags (star wars themed), that’s when I start shopping the parks in earnest…. usually finding I can’t justify their prices, especially having just purchased six new T-shirts.

Food:
Firstly, you CAN of course always bring your own snacks to the park, or eat a good breakfast at home, limit yourself to a light lunch, and then wait to get off campus to eat dinner… There’s no shortage of Denny’s, Ihops, etc., not to mention there are a few Bahama Breeze restaurants scattered just outside the edges of the park, that offer a late night happy hour from 9pm to midnight where they have really good/tasty half price appetizers, where the calorie hit is listed on the menu (I like the fresh crab, shrimp, mango and avocado stack, for about $7.50 @300 calories ).

BUT assuming you don’t want to… one of the best held food secrets of Disney world is that firstly, there are Macdonald’s scattered around the parks, but of course this means getting in your car and driving over there because none of the DW rapid transit goes there.

AND the gas station food: You know that gas station that’s one right near Magic Kingdom? Pretty much every park has one not TOO far outside the parking area, if you willing to walk it. The one next to the Magic Kingdom is the one where they have actual mechanics available to fix flat tires, or swap out dead batteries so that you can at least get home. It, and all the other ones, actually have REALLY tasty hot food for sale, not kidding. These stations on the Disney property (all of them) are NOT offering up your normal gas station food, which you’d have to be a little desperate to eat… nope, these are the same sort of fare at the same sort of prices, but at MUCH higher quality. The wings for instance, are REALLY good, and their nice big pieces of chicken like at a restaurant (my mouth is actually watering as I write this). So, don’t be surprised to see Disney staffers at these places, dressed up in the outfits they wear working for on site restaurants, all of them buying pizza, subs and wings from these places during their lunch and dinner breaks.

Kid’s portions:
While Disney’s sit down restaurants won’t let you do this, the fact of the matter is that if you approach a fast food location and as an adult ask for the child’s portion, the staff will never question you about it… they’ll just assume the child is with a different adult already seated at a table. Even at Hollywood’s canteen, where waiters bring the food to the table, no one has ever made an issue that I opted for the child’s $7 half portion of grilled salmon rather than paying $15 for the adult sized portion.