Camping At Disney World 2018 - Days 1-3

How this trip came about:

1. We agreed to go to Walt Disney World in 2019 with our friends Holly and Brian and their three kids (see posts from our 2013 Disney trip with them starting here).
2. Todd and I have had a lot a fun camping recently and decided that the two of us would camp at Disney World and on the drives there and back.
3. Being not sure what camping and theme-parking at the same time would be like, and not wanting to combine that first-time experience/stress with traveling with another family, we decided to do a test run in 2018.
4. We invited my mom to come along.

On our first day we got an early start for our 8.5 hour drive and picked Mom up at her house.  We already had most of her gear and had packed it in the car the night before.  We got on the road and had an pleasant enough / uneventful drive to Buccaneer State Park in Waveland, Mississippi - our camp site for the night.

A drizzle around Baton Rouge

Buccaneer State Park sits on the Gulf of Mexico.  Almost completely destroyed by hurricane Katrina in 2005, it underwent an extensive 8-year renovation.

Based on a recommendation from the park attendant, after setting up camp we drove into Bay St. Louis and ate dinner at Cuz's Old Town Oyster Bar & Grill.  Delicious!

While the weather in Orlando was in the mid-80's/low 90's, here it was in the low 40's with high winds and rain overnight.  The multiple blankets we brought were not enough, so we slept in all the clothes we had.  We got up in the middle of the night to re-secure all the guy lines when the side of Mom's tent collapsed due to the wind.

In the morning we packed up camp and got back on the road, stopping at a McDonald's for some much needed coffee and breakfast

Our next camping destination was about 7 hours away at O'Leno State Park in northern Florida near High Springs.

Welcome to Florida

A great campground

Location is everything.  Our campsite was across from the restroom.

Good morning

Not breakfast

Packed up and ready to go...

...almost

We had planned our drives and campsites so that on the 3rd day we would only have a 2-3 hour drive in to Orlando and the Fort Wilderness campground.

We made it!  The campground is really nice, with large packed sand pads, clean bathroom and showers, laundry facilities, paved paths, bus service, golf cart rentals, horseback riding, carriage rides, restaurants, stores, water vehicle rentals, bicycle rentals, on and on and on.

Todd running the power cord to the tent.

After setting up camp we hopped on a campground bus to the stables, then rode horses over to Hollywood Studios waited for a Disney parks bus to take us to Hollywood Studios.
The bus drop-off and pick-up area had been moved back to a different part of the parking lot while construction was going on near the entrance of the park.  Here you can see one of the towers for the new Skyliner gondola transportation system which will open later this year.

It was overcast, but didn't rain

Just Star Tours, not Galaxy's Edge

Merry really early Christmas

Dinosaur Gertie's is all decked out for the holiday

A cute holiday projection show overplayed the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror.  There were also lasers over the streets and snow falling.

Next stop:  The Twilight Zone

Buzz Lightyear in the new Toy Story Land.  We rode the Alien Swirling Saucers which is just like Mater's  Junkyard Jamboree in Disney's California Adventure at Disneyland in Anaheim.  The line for the new coaster, Slinky Dog Dash, was too long.

We closed the park and rode our horses buses back to camp.  The next day was the last day of the Food & Wine Festival, so Epcot would be next on our agenda.