What a wonderful trip! As part of our Christmas celebration, we decided to book some trips to Disney World. Two of our kids and one of their girlfriends came down to enjoy the time with us. We decided that we should split our visits to Disney up as neither I nor my wife thought we could really handle more than one day at a time. Thank goodness we did it that way! Neither one of us could move the morning after our visit!
We woke up at about 4 am, we live about 70 miles from Disney and it had been suggested that we get there by 6 am due to lines for parking and for entry. We arrived at about 7:30 as we stopped to get a bite to eat. Well, there were about a dozen vehicles there when we arrived so we were able to park very close to the park. We had to stand in line for about an hour as we waited for the early resort stayers in. So in retrospect, I will sleep a little longer next time.
This was looking like it was going to be the longest working day for Dougal that we had ever planned. We were worried that it may be a little over the top for him so had a few plans in place if it turned out to be so, just in case. However, he did very well the entire time.
The crowds for the most part were very nice about having Dougal around. We did get a lot of "What a beautiful dog" comments and a whole lot of parents quietly telling their kids about not approaching and explaining to their kids about service dogs, which really made me happy. There were very few that actually tried to break Dougal's focus, but as in every public area, there were a few, but not nearly as many as I thought there would be.
A special shout-out should go out to all the cast members there at Disney World! They were spot-on with their knowledge and were so eager to help us make sure we had everything we needed. None of the rides that we went on was service dog friendly which is what we were expecting. The process went something like this:
- Walk up to the ride (we were using the fast pass thing so would schedule the ride and show up at the scheduled time).
- The cast member would see the service dog and phone another cast member to let them know we were coming.
- A cast member would be waiting for us to guide the team to where they hid the kennel.
- Dog in a kennel, then I would head to the rest of my party.
- A cast member sat with Dougal while we do the ride.
- After the ride, I would go back and pick up Dougal.
We did see 4 or 5 other teams while we were in the park. a Dachshund, a Goldendoodle, a couple of Pitty types, and what looked to be an English Bulldog. While we did not stop to talk to them Dougal really did want to go meet them.
I have added an album for our trip HERE if anyone is interested.
