Last month, I and several of my colleagues were in Florida to staff our college president as she met with donors and presided over alumni events.  The week was going swimmingly until about Wednesday, at which time it became clear there was a major storm brewing here in New England that would likely derail our return flights. By Thursday, all of our Friday and Saturday flights home were cancelled.  Our last work event of the week was in Miami, and my boss and I originally decided to book rooms at a hotel near the Ft. Lauderdale airport as we waited out our rescheduled flights home on Sunday and Monday.  I know this is far from on par with homelessness or world hunger, but let’s just say neither of us was particularly thrilled to wait out the storm for three days at a Ft. Lauderdale airport hotel.

I admit, I was a bit sad. I am certain most people would be thrilled for a few extra days in Florida, but it had been a long week. I was ready to get home, ready to enjoy a quiet weekend in sweatpants before heading back to the office. Herself eager to get back north, our college president was able to book a flight out of Florida to a hub in the mid-Atlantic from where she hoped to catch a train or bus back to New England. Once she was safely at the airport for her flight, my boss turned to me and said “Listen. There is *no* way we can stay in Ft. Lauderdale at this hotel for three days. It’s time for a new plan.”

With only a couple hours left on our rental car reservation, we weren’t sure what to do locally – Palm Beach? Go back to Miami? Could we make it to the Keys? Could we even keep the rental car?  And then, as I searched for flights in some last-ditch attempt to get out of Florida earlier than Monday, I found one last flight out of the state. It was expensive, but I’d be home by 5pm on Sunday. It would also get my boss home earlier than the flight she currently held. The flight was departing from Tampa, though, nearly a five-hour drive from Ft. Lauderdale.  So, mostly joking, I said to my boss “You know, Disney’s on the way to Tampa. We could just spend the weekend there.”  The crazy thing…she went for it!

Fate was definitely on our side.  Although hold times to contact the airlines were averaging between one and four (seriously!) hours, we decided that since we were at the airport anyway, we’d just park, run in, and do our flight and car rental rejiggering in person. This was a brilliant plan; the Ft. Lauderdale airport wasn’t busy at all, and we walked right up to ticket agents to make our changes. We managed to get the last two tickets on the Tampa departing flight, and I easily cancelled my original ticket and got a refund while we were at the airport. It turned out to be no problem to not only extend our car rental but to return the car to a different airport, and we could do both for very minimal money. We also managed to score the last two available hotel rooms left on Disney property during a weekend that saw Mardi Gras crowds, cheer and dance competitions, and the largest number of Brazilian tour groups I have ever seen. Not only did we both get rooms at Coronado Springs – a resort I had fallen in love with earlier that week – but we managed to get rooms in the same building.  I admit it, we were nearly giddy – suddenly, this blizzard didn’t seem so bad.

My boss and I had a lovely drive to Disney, chatting and gossiping nearly the entire time.  Our check-in process at Coronado was quick and painless, and after freshening up in our rooms, we walked across the lake (we ended up in Ranchos) to the lakeside bar.  It was a bit on the chilly side, but that wasn’t going to stop us from drinking frozen margaritas and reveling in fact that our spouses and families were enduring a blizzard while we were drinking margaritas and wearing shorts.  We entertained ourselves scheming about how we might crash one of the many conventions going on at Coronado, and spent a little tipsy time walking through the convention center seeing what our options were. (Since we didn’t think we could pass as medical imagers or IT nerds, we quickly abandoned our half-joking plan.)  I fell into bed around midnight, exhausted but ridiculously happy to be at Disney in such an unexpected context.

This is the kind of thing you encounter when driving from Ft. Lauderdale to Orlando.

Checking in at CSR.

Celebratory mango frozen margarita.

The next morning, we were up early, both with huge smiles plastered on our faces. After a quick off-property jaunt to Starbucks for breakfast, we headed to the Magic Kingdom, something I’d rarely do on a crowded Saturday, but why not? We had no plans, were content to just walk and take everything in, and figured that the people watching would be pretty epic.  My boss had yet to see the new Fantasyland expansion, and so we concentrated our time there, getting a ride in on Dumbo and on the Little Mermaid ride. So yes, for those of you keeping score at home, I have now ridden Dumbo with my boss – it’s going to be an interesting performance review this year!

Ranchos 7B, our home for the night.

Couldn’t have asked for a nicer day (or place) to wait out a blizzard.

Stupid crane, still ruining otherwise beautiful shots.

Saying hello to Ariel.

Not pictured: wall-to-wall people.

I found out on this morning that my boss is, like me, something of a closeted Disney fan. She absolutely adores Tinkerbell and the Disney fairies, and so I humored her with a 40 minute wait to meet Tinkerbell. I also introduced her to her first Dole Whip, and confessed to her my love of pin trading.  The Magic Kingdom was ridiculously crowded, but I honestly couldn’t have cared any less – it was 82 and sunny with a perfect breeze, a far cry from the 20 degrees with blizzard conditions going on back home.

We were finally driven out of the Magic Kingdom by our hunger, and headed over to Epcot where we decided to get lunch and a margarita. First, though, on a whim I forced us to locate the NSync Leave a Legacy tiles, something that took far longer than it should, but hey – when I’m committed to something, I finish it. Afterwards, we walked to the Land pavilion for lunch at Sunshine Seasons.  My boss couldn’t believe the good and healthy options there, and vowed to take her family there for lunch on their next vacation. Not in any particular hurry, we lounged over our lunches and marveled at the multiple South American tour group streaming in; obviously they had all gotten Soarin’ FastPasses at the same time earlier that day, and all were coming back to use them at the same time. I pitied the poor fools in the standby line.

Found them!

Next it was margarita o’clock – it was finally time to get my long-awaited La Cava del Tequila margarita.  On the way, I told my boss the story of Duffy, and she couldn’t figure it out – she was legitimately creeped out by him. (Sorry, Duffy!) Once in Mexico, we stopped dead in our tracks when we saw the La Cava line; it had to be nearly 40 people deep.  A good margarita is worth waiting for, however, and so I reminded my boss that I had just waited 40 minutes with her to meet Tinkerbell, so she was going to wait with me for an out-of-this-world margarita. She happily complied, and after maybe 15 minutes we made our way to the bar. She ordered the pineapple margarita and I the passionfruit, and we both quickly agreed that these were the best margaritas either one of us had ever tasted.

Pineapple on the left and passionfruit on the right. Oh heavens, so delicious.

Furtive margarita drinking in one of the only places free of people.

Best tasting and also one of the strongest, folks. By the time we walked the World Showcase to Japan, we were both a little tipsy, which might be the perfect condition in which to browse the Mitsukoshi store. She bought some souvenirs for her family and I bought some for CP, and then we were off to France for a snack to soak up the tequila. What goes well with a margarita, you might ask? A frangipane pastry, of course!

A tipsy Totoro picture from Japan.

So there we were, a bit tipsy and eating French pastries in the United Kingdom pavilion. (Only in Epcot can you say this.) We had a bit too much fun watching geeky kids playing the Phineas and Ferb game, and then we finished our walk around the lagoon before stopping in Club Cool and Mouse Gears. I did some pin trading (my freak flag flying proudly in the open now) before we left, and then we headed back to the rental car and to the Hilton Garden Inn, since there was literally no room on Disney property that night.

Up next? Well, earlier that morning I decided to see if our spontaneous good fortune would continue, and called the dining reservation line to see if by some chance there might be a Victoria & Albert’s reservation available for that evening. My boss and I are both food fans (I can’t bring myself to use the word “foodies”), and so I thought this would just be the perfect way to cap off our impromptu vacation. Amazingly, there was, and we got the last available one. I’ve written up a review of our dinner here, but let’s just rehash this for a moment to say that it was the Best Meal of My Life(tm). Perfect service, amazing food, impeccably timed courses that allowed you to digest and not get too full. I always thought V&A would be a bucket list item I wouldn’t cross off for years and years, but I’m so glad it worked out to get this meal in now.  It was also great to share a wonderful evening of good conversation and fun with my boss, since it’s something we don’t often get to do in our busy work lives.

Still dreaming about this fish.

After seven courses and six wine pairings, we poured ourselves into bed around 1am, and met up again on Sunday morning around 9am. Bleary-eyed, we made our way to Starbucks once more for breakfast, and then made the hour-plus drive to Tampa for our flight home. The airport was a madhouse and our flight home ridiculously turbulent, but I didn’t care – I was home, happy, and in possession of some terrific memories of a potentially bad situation that turned out to be one of the best ever. Carpe diem, indeed.