This trip was the first trip where my family took the very first flight out of Orlando to our home airport, and we will NEVER do that again.
We were trying to save some money (later flights were $30-80 more expensive per person, which really adds up when you’re a family of five) and wanted to avoid germs as much as possible. Since the planes on our airline get cleaned overnight, but not during trips during the day, we figured our best bet was to leave on that 6:00 am flight out of the most magical airport on earth.
Let me tell you now… it was not magical.
Allow me to paint you a picture of may family’s last 4 hours in Orlando.
Imagine staying up all night trying to cram all of your ears, your kids’ stuffed animals, your metric ton of clothing (including things that are still wet from you getting out of the pool at 10:00 pm), your tween’s Loki horns, and your newly-turned three-year-old’s enormous toy dinosaur from Animal Kingdom into your suitcases. You’re falling asleep while packing, face first on the table, nodding off while the toddler demands more of whatever show it was you found for him on the TV.
You send your wife off to get a $5 soda from the vending machine. You don’t even like soda, but you’re desperate for that little energy boost from the caffeine. It’s 2:00 am, and your MEARS Connect shuttle is due to leave your resort at 2:55 – you have to hurry up. Your wife is falling asleep too. The big kids have been passed out for about four hours. The toddler is getting more impatient with his demands for you to keep the Star Wars shorts playing.
You get a text from MEARS. It’s 2:20 am, and they’re on-site 35 minutes ahead of schedule. You panic, waking up everyone, including your wife as fast as you can. The big kids are stumbling around in their pajamas looking for clothes and shoes. You tell them “Forget the clothes, just get shoes on. The bus is here and we CANNOT miss it or we’ll miss our flight!”
You send your half-asleep wife to borrow a luggage cart from bell services… ten minutes go by. You try to call her only to hear the phone ring on the bed. You prop the door open and step outside to look around… no one is out there. You start loading bags onto the sidewalk outside the room. After a couple minutes, your wife comes into view stumbling in the dark carrying her resort mug. She thought you sent her for coffee, and was pretty much sleepwalking around the All-Star Movies lobby for the last fifteen minutes. You yell across the courtyard – “Hey! The bus is HERE! I need you to go get the luggage cart!”
She snaps out of it, looks to her right and sees the bus idling there, then takes off to the bell services desk. She comes back a minute later, and tells you to take the toddler and go, that bell services says that you need to talk with the bus driver if you don’t want to get left behind.
It’s 2:45 now. You’re the slowest walker in the family, and you are pushing that stroller as fast as you can from the room to bus. Your wife and kids are loading up the rest of the luggage, backpacks, and your rollator as fast as they can. You get to bell services, where the bus driver is waiting… you’re fine. You’re not late. The driver is early, and you aren’t the last people he’s waiting for at the resort.
You wait for your wife and kids, load the kids onto the bus, and every last one of you fall asleep on the ride back to MCO. At the airport, you have to somehow figure out how to get all those suitcases loaded up and back across the airport to the Southwest check-in on the other side. It takes a few minutes, but you make it work, renting a cart, and stacking things precariously on your rollator, and filling up the under-stroller basket. Your big kids are pushing the smaller carry-on size suitcases through the airport.
You make it to the Southwest Airlines check-in line. It’s halfway across the terminal, and there are NO employees there yet. You park your rollator with your wife, and you and the kids sit on the nearest bench. Since your rollator seat is full of your medical bag, diaper bag, purse, and carry on, you’re limited on options for seating. Around 20 minutes go by… it’s 4:00 am and employees are starting to arrive. They start dividing people out. If you’re just checking a bag, you can go to the first line, but if you need more assistance (I do, the Customer of Size policy is a blessing and a curse – you can’t check in for your return flight until you are physically at the airport) they send you down to the help desk.
No one is staffing the help desk, and there’s a LONG line. One of the music departments on a Music in the Parks trip is trying to get home to Denver with over 100 students. (Absolutely all the love to this program by the way. I played several instruments throughout middle and high school, and Music in the Parks was always the highlight of my year. It made me smile to know it’s still going strong and kids are still benefiting from these opportunities.) Around 4:30 they finally get three employees over to staff the help desk. You get checked in, check your NINE bags, and head for TSA.
A TSA worker thankfully informs you of the wheelchair line all the way at the far end of the security area, but it was still a much faster option for you than waiting in the regular line. Unfortunately you have to do the full-body scanner this time (on the way down, they sent you through the metal detector and swabbed your hands) and of course, because you have a big butt and thighs that ALWAYS light up on this scanner you have to get the full pat-down experience. You get uncomfortably close to this TSA agent in a matter of about 90 seconds, get your hands swabbed and then are on your way to the gate.
Or so you think, because your kids are unwilling to eat their poptarts, and your wife wants coffee, so they send you ahead to the gate while they wait in the line for McDonald’s (which you can’t eat due to your allergies) and you have to ask for them to put your preboard on your ticket, and explain to the boarding agent why you need your family to preboard with you (because your wife has to assist you with gate checking your mobility device, boarding the plane, and storing your stuff, your oldest has anxiety and doesn’t know how to board on her own, the middle kid – the one wearing ear defenders – probably should have his own preboard to be honest, and you cant have a three year old board alone.)
It all gets sorted out, the family is allowed to board together, and you’re on the plane. Everyone is so wiped out that the kids are asleep before you push off from gate. You catch about a 45 minute nap before you’re touching down, heading to baggage claim, and waiting for your ride.
On the upside, you were able to sleep the rest of the day once you got home because everyone else was exhausted too, AND you got some pretty neat photos out the plane window.
But for real…
There is zero reason for being up before sun to try to be on a plane before it’s light outside. We typically fly back on a late flight. Think “leave your gear with bell services, get one last castle photo in, catch a late lunch in the park and then head back to be on a 7:30 pm flight” kind of trip. At the very least, I won’t ever fly back before 1 pm. I want to be able to sleep in a little, enjoy a full breakfast, pack up the room having been fully rested, and then maybe even grab a to-go lunch from the food court before we leave.
Let me know in the comments, what’s your ideal return flight time when leaving Walt Disney World and why?
Access the Mouse 