First Day in Orlando!

  My day started off painfully early: 4 AM, to be exact. Not the best way to start a long day of travel, especially after only falling asleep at 11 or so. I showered, packed my last-minute stuff, and was on my way! Dad drove me to the airport, where we checked the boards and found out my first flight (Phoenix to Charlotte, NC) was delayed by an hour! Cue panic mode. My second flight (Charlotte to Orlando) was originally supposed to take off only an hour after my first flight had landed, and now I'd be arriving in Charlotte about forty minutes later than originally planned, not to mention that I was flying standby and my seat wasn't guaranteed

 I tried the phone number Jay gave me for US Airways' employee help line, and after being put on hold and calling back a few times, I finally just decided to get on my first flight and hope that I'd be able to make the second. The first flight was uneventful; there were plenty of seats open for standby, so I got on without a problem. Once we started our descent into Charlotte, it was almost 2:00, and my flight to Orlando was supposed to start boarding at 2:10, and this flight had only a few standby seats open. I rushed straight off my first flight and to the connecting one, and to my relief, was informed my name had just been called for a standby seat. I got on my second flight with no problem, and though the landing was a little delayed over Orlando because of a rainstorm, I met up with two of my roommates and got my luggage.

Kelsea (one of my roommates) and her friend had driven down from Virginia, and they offered to pick Bernice and I up from the airport and drop us off at our hotel. We had a little trouble finding the car, and I realized just how exhausted humidity makes you! Weirdly enough, Orlando's parking garage has a ton of palm trees, ferns, and little waterfalls intersected throughout the cement structure, so that combined with the humidity made me think we had stumbled onto an unused set from Jurassic Park. Pretty weird looking; I wish I had got a picture!

We got to the hotel after a little circling, and settled in. After a slew of Facebook updates and video chatting, Bernice and I decided to explore the area a little bit.  We had wanted to go to Downtown Disney, but the hotel doesn't provide a shuttle there (just to the parks) so we  decided to save that for tomorrow.

We finally decided to walk down to the apartment complex where we'll be checking in on Wednesday, as it's just a couple of minutes from the hotel, then wandered over to Wendy's for dinner. We've been watching the Olympics for about 3 hours now....I don't feel too tired (darn time difference!).

Tomorrow I'll be meeting the rest of my roommates, and hanging out in Downtown Disney!