Unexpected Exeriences

Sometimes, things just don't go as planned.

This past weekend was the Walt Disney World Wine & Dine Half Marathon Weekend.  I had this lovely vision of how the weekend was going to play out.  But, as you can guess from the title, it most certainly didn't go as planned.

It started the night before we left, when I realized that hubby had forgotten to pick up dog food and the store was now closed.  So, in the morning, on the way to NY to drop off the dog and kids, we had to make a detour to buy dog food.  That added about 1/2 hour on to our morning.  No big deal.

Then, we got stuck in traffic.  When we eventually pulled over at a rest stop, we fell asleep for a lot longer than planned.  We finally got back on the road, only to be caught in a standstill less than 2 hours from our destination.  We arrived about 4 hours after we had planned.  At that point, we still needed to make the expo and make it to our dinner reservations.  We didn't think we would make it in time.

After checking into our room, we showered and caught the bus to the expo.  I had some mixed emotions coming into this race--  I knew I wasn't as trained as I wanted to be, but I was fairly certain I could finish.  But, stepping up to the Start line in the same place you last failed creates some tension.  For me, it was the Expo that put me over the edge.  As I walked through the WWOS complex, the flood of emotion just hit me.  The last time I came through here, I could barely walk--and that was *before* the race.  I looked around and remembered all the feelings.  I had tears welling up in my eyes and knew I couldn't talk, so just tried to smile (which probably looked pretty crazy) and just handed the volunteers my info and nodded my head.  With only a few tears leaking out, I made it up the stairs on the way out.  Then, I saw it:  The table with the RunDisney medals.  I stopped to look and saw the marathon medal for 2016 and Completely.Lost.It.  Sobbing.  I will be back in January to make that mine.

It was not busy at all and we had been able to get our stuff fairly quickly.  We didn't spend any time shopping, but the expo's are all generally the same every race anyway.  We knew taking the bus would be iffy, so we hopped in a cab and make it to our dinner reservations on time!

We had an enjoyable dinner and walked around Disney Springs for a bit before headed back to our hotel.  The 5K race was in the morning so we got our stuff ready and headed to bed.  In the morning, we were on the first bus and arrived at the race with plenty of time.  It was such a fun atmosphere with so many amazing costumes.  They even made it "snow".  Lots of fun!  Hubby and I run at very different paces, so we usually don't run together.  However, since this trip was supposed to be our 10th anniversary trip, we decided that we would do the 5K together.  As it turns out, it was a lot of fun.  We ran intervals, walked a lot and I even got him to stop for a couple of pictures.  If you know my husband at all, you know that there are very few pictures that exist of him as an adult.  And, he hates stopping for any reason during a race.  Not that he's fast or going to win, but his drive to do his best is so strong, he forgets to stop and smell the roses sometimes.  So, the fact that he's IN pictures with a character DURING a race---  mind blowing! 

When we finished, we got our medals and  got on the bus back to our hotel.  After getting cleaned up, we went down to the boardwalk and grabbed lunch at ESPN before heading back to our room for a nap.

When evening rolled around, we were once again on the first bus out of our hotel headed to the race.  We got there and grabbed a few pics, checked our bags and wandered around until we found a good spot to sit and relax until race time.  We were watching the weather because there was rain approaching.  I was trying to meet up with a group of people from online, but it just wasn't in the cards.  I never ended up finding them--  text/FB wasn't very reliable and without a planned meeting spot, it just didn't happen.  I was pretty bummed about that since hubby and I were not planning on running together.  I was hoping to run with a couple of people and was not looking forward to the trek alone.

It started to get very windy and everyone was moving in the direction of the corrals.  I had been watching posts on FB and there were some people saying they had been sitting on buses for almost an hour and it seemed like transportation from the resorts was on hold.  As we moved in the direction of the corrals, a volunteer said that this was an evacuation.  Everyone was being moved inside.  Now, as you can imagine, moving 18,000 people takes some time.  We had to go up stairs and into the complex.  Once there, no one was giving direction as to where to go, so everyone just stopped--which made it worse for the people still trying to get in.  As it turns out, it never rained where we were.  However, I did later hear reports that Animal Kingdom got hit very hard with limbs and debris all over the park and volunteers reporting that there were unsafe running conditions.

Because of the delayed start and unsafe conditions, runDisney made the decision to let the race begin on a shortened course.  This meant that instead of the half marathon we were supposed to run, we only ended up running less than 7 miles.  I had been fighting a headache all day and the delayed start messed with my hydrating/fueling plan--  I was starving before the race even began!  So, while not what I had planned, in some ways it was good that we weren't running 13.1 miles.  Hubby and I saw a group of volunteers headed out, so we (along with thousands of others) followed.  They were letting us head back to the corrals.  We had to funnel back through the pre-race area before being released to get in our places.  However, they did not wait for everyone to be in place and people were still trying to get to the corrals when they started the race.  That caused a huge back up in the last few corrals because people were just jumping in wherever they could.  The corral I was in was so packed you couldn't move.  I was still hoping to find the people I was supposed to run with, but that never happened.  As we stood there squished together, I asked hubby if we could run together since it was a shortened course anyway.  He agreed, even though I'm not sure he really wanted to. 

When we finally got on our way, we quickly realized it was going to be slow going.  The course is fairly narrow and having that many runners on a course less that 7 miles, it just doesn't ever space out.  And, so, we shuffled along, running a few seconds when we could, walking the rest.  The one thing I was most excited about during this race was getting to see the Osborne Lights.  This is the last year of the display and I am so thankful that I got to see it.  It was so amazing!

While I didn't get to run with new friends, I got to run with my best friend.  And, I did get some shout-outs along the way:  One woman recognized my outfit from an online post.  A guy ran up from behind and yelled out to me because he recognized my shirt (we're part of the same running club here at home!) and I did get passed by a friend on the course who yelled out as well.  Most definitely NOT the race I had planned, but not a bad night.  We headed into Epcot for a little food and wine, rode Spaceship Earth and walked back to our hotel around 4am.

We got our medals but didn't wear them.  I didn't feel right wearing it since I didn't run 13.1.  I don't mind if other people wore it, and I think the debates that popped up online are ridiculous.  They gave out the medals because we finished the race that they set before us.  I personally, just don't want to wear it.  I have it and I will display it with my others.  I just couldn't put it around my neck.

On Sunday, we ended up waking up early, after only 4 hours of sleep.  So, we got a last minute reservation at Captain's Grille for breakfast.  We ended up taking another nap before heading to Magic Kingdom at 4pm.  We did a few rides, and much to my surprise, hubby was still allowing me to take pictures of him!  He wore a light up Christmas necklace too.  Seriously...who is this man??  We saw the castle lighting, the fireworks and the parade, and got lots of cookies and hot cocoa.  Lots of fun!

On Monday, we headed to the Epcot Food and Wine festival.  We sampled so many delicious things and ended up having a wonderful day exploring Epcot more than we ever have before.  It was so relaxed and enjoyable.  But, sadly, our trip had come to an end and we had to pack up and come home.

All in all, it was a great time and I'm glad we went.  I'm not sure I would do the race again (I feel like running at night disrupts the trip a bit too much), but who knows.  It is Disney after all.