Paula Deen and her boat captain husband are headed to Disney World for a whole week, y'all! They'll go during the Food and Wine Festival so Paula can hang with her chef peeps.
My thoughts:
It's the perfect combo - Paula and Disney - dontcha think? There's no merchandise left that either Paula or Disney hasn't put their name on. The only thing left is a collab of the two. Oh, the possibilities. Mickey-shaped butter? Minnies with Paula eyelashes? Heart-diseased Donald who exists solely on Paula recipes?
Ok, it's time to get into this thing. It's a whole week so this could take awhile.
Let's kick this trip off by taking your own bus from Savannah to Lake Buena Vista on
Friday, October 29. Have your bus drop you off at the Beach Club by 9 a.m. or so where you'll get checked into your Club Level Newport Presidential Suite. The idea here is to maximize views and food options and this suite has 2 different balconies so you can see both the EPCOT area and the Boardwalk area plus the typical club level amenities (food!). Score!
Your suite probably won't be ready yet so have them hold your bags and take the short walk over to EPCOT. You'll enter in the World Showcase area which is awesome because you'll be spending a lot of time there this week. Head toward the Future World section and find the Festival Welcome Center that's in between Future World and the World Showcase. From 10-12, your old friend Cat Cora will be here! She'll be doing a Family & Friends thing and will make lunch. A wine rep will be there to help you figure out what works with the food. Yum!
It's good that this lunch thing with Cat Cora is over at noon because you've got some event crashing to do. In the same area, there's a thing called Authors without Borders going on at 12:15 where food and wine authors speak for 30 minutes.
Are you an author? Yep. Have you written about food? Yep. Can you speak? Yes, you might speak exaggerated Southernese but it still qualifies.
Get right up and start talkin', girl. Everybody enjoys an Authors without Borders crasher.
Since your husband is with you, perhaps the audience won't mind your husband reading (or should I say readin'?) to them from his book about you.
Probably two weeks later, I was out smokin in my yard again and Paula shows up chasin the dogs again! And naturally the dogs and I had already said our hellos were buddies by this time. Paula ran up, same thing. Well, Im sorry my dogs are poopin in your backyard again, she said. If you have a bag or somethin, I can clean it up. Please let me.
Its okay, I said.
Awww.
After all that readin' and eatin' and walkin' it's probably a good idea to head back to your room which is hopefully ready by now. Take some time this afternoon to chill - grab an ice cream from Beaches and Cream, take a dip in Stormalong Bay, take a bath in butter...or all 3!
Time to indulge your love of buses! By about 6:00 or 6:15, head for the bus stop and get on the bus headed for the TTC where you'll take
another bus to Fort Wilderness.
If you aren't feeling the bus love as much, you could also take a bus from the hotel to Magic Kingdom and then travel by boat over the Ft. Wilderness.
You are here for the 7:15 Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Revue show! Fun and Food are the goals here so it's just perfect. Cornbread, fried chicken, ribs and strawberry shortcake! Can you imagine it? This funny show will you have in
stitches, girl. Get back to your room afterward and call it a day.
Saturday, walk to the International Gateway by the time EPCOT is set to open. Although the World Showcase isn't open yet, you can still enter here and walk to the Future World section. Make sure you spend a little time here since most of your attention will be in the World Showcase this week.
Take a break mid-day if you'd like but head back to the World Showcase in the evening for Party for the Senses beginning at 5:45 with seats to watch the Eat to the Beat series performer for the night which happens to be Starship/Jefferson Airplane/Jefferson Starship/Thomas Jefferson/whatever-they-call-themselves-now.
From 6:30-9, you'll enjoy tasting various food and wines. I'm sure they'll have at turkey leg if you look real hard.
The following day is
Sunday. Not just any ol' Sunday but it's Halloween today. Take it slow this morning but head to Downtown Disney via bus. You're going to cleanse yourself of the evils of Halloween at the Gospel Brunch at the House of Blues which is half food and half gospel entertainment. At this time, the entertainer is TBD. I hear they're good!
Hang out in DTD, do a bit of shopping and walking and maybe even have your husband rent a boat. Y'all have a thing for boats so this oughta be a hit.
In the afternoon, head back to your hotel for a bit before heading to the Magic Kingdom for Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party which starts at 7.
The best part? You get to go as yourself.
To be continued...