I left for the Dopey challenge on Wednesday afternoon.  I got my kids off to school, went to see my chiropractor to get everything “lined up” and then my husband drove me to the airport.  We had a nice talk on the way up there and I knew that once he left I was going to be anxious for the rest of the family to get down to Florida to join me.  But I was also looking forward to a little time alone as well.  My flight was delayed about an hour; but I still had plenty of time once I would land to get the car and head to the expo so I wasn’t worried.

Just before we took off it was snowing heavy at the airport and the plane needed to be de-iced.

I landed around 5:30, picked up the minivan and drove straight to the expo.  At that time of night, the lines are very short.  The merchandise I sort of picked through, but there was still quite a bit of stuff on the racks.  I spent about an hour at the expo exploring and purchasing what I needed for my races, checked out the runDisney merchandise, said hi to Jeff Galloway, and then drove over to Target to get what I needed for the hotel room for the week.

I was starving and wasn’t quite sure what I was going to do about dinner.  I figured I’d have something that I picked up from the groceries at Target.  I got to the hotel around 8:00, unloaded the car and was determined that I was going to take ONE trip from the car to the room with my luggage and the groceries.  Thank goodness there was a luggage cart near the elevator!

Once in the room, I put the food away, sorted out my gear for the 5K race and had a delicious dinner of Raisin Bran!  To be honest, it really hit the spot!  However, I will find out after the 10K that it’s not a good idea to eat that for dinner prior to the races.  More on that later.  My intention was to be asleep by 9 or 10 p.m. so I could get 5-6 hours of sleep.  Since it was a travel day and I had to rush around to the expo and Target, I was still pretty revved up when it was time to get to bed.  I did some work for my job on my laptop and then settled down for sleep by 11 p.m.  I set my alarm for 3:00 a.m. and was feeling good about my first morning wake up call.  I knew that I could spend time resting after the 5K if I was feeling tired from the first early morning wake up.

I enjoyed my time alone in the hotel room, getting things ready for the family and having some quiet time to myself.  I was also getting excited to surprise the kids on Friday and almost slipped a few times when talking to them on FaceTime.  I had to be careful not to say anything about their own rooms at the hotel or the minivan that they would be riding in.  I am so happy to report that with the new medication my doctor gave me, I did not suffer from a migraine from flying.  That was HUGE for me!  I had the ability to function once I landed and wasn’t sick in the bathroom the night before the race!

I booked a 3 bedroom suite at the WorldQuest Orlando Resort.  My friend Amanda Tinney stayed there during Tower of Terror in 2013 and I went to see her in her room.  I was so impressed by the size, the cleanliness and the cost of the location that I knew I would have to stay there for a race sometime.  It seems very isolated from everything, but it is really just 2 minutes outside of the gates to Walt Disney World and less than a 10 minute drive from the room to a parking space at Epcot for the early race mornings.  I will write a separate blog post with my overview of the room and accommodations there.

Stay tuned for my 5K recap in the next blog post.