"RoseGarden" - - - - - - - from

Monday, February 14, 2011

On The Move Southern Florida

As expected, our journey is filled with stories and observations, mostly good, some unexpected.

11 Feb 11
Departed Panama City Beach at 0900 with intentions of arriving in Kissimmee, Florida near Orlando sometime in the afternoon. That part of the trip was good with little traffic, arriving Kissimmee around 3 p.m., which was 4 p.m. due to a change in time zone.

Find Baymont
We had arranged reservations for a room through Expedia.com at Baymont Inn and Suites, listed as being at 7601 Black Lake Road, Kissimmee. The GPS took us to some barren non-populated patch of Florida bushes. With some excellent help from a local UPS employee we found Baymont at Sherberth Road, not Black Lake Road.

Mentioning our strange directions at check in did little good as they were ignored with a smile. They did have our reservation on file and we were given a room.

Sales Pitch
The person booking you in does the major paper work and then directs you to a nearby desk to get a “parking permit.” I was obligated to stand in line for about 15 to 20 k
min. while the customer ahead of me bought Seaworld tickets. With apologizes it was suggested I could put the stuff in the room and come back, which I elected not to do. The reason you are directed to the second desk is because that is a high pressure sales pitch to get you to purchase tickets to local entertainment venues such as Disney Land.

When I said we were just passing through and on to Fort Lauderdale the following day, offers switched to wonderful deals at Fort Lauderdale which would get you $100. free gas. With insistence that I was not purchasing anything extra, I was given a cartoon type parking permit for the night.

Occupied
Off we go to our room 1115. Much to my surprise our electronic key allowed me to barge in on a couple from England. The room was already occupied. With apology and embarrassment I retreated back to the reception desk in a not so good mood.

Standing in line again, for another fifteen minutes I finally got to tell the same gentleman behind the counter - “You gave me a room that is already occupied.” I voiced my opinion that this wasn't a pleasant experience. With an apology and a promise to check out what went wrong I was given another room, 1117, which turned out to be unoccupied.

A Room At Last
Actually the room turned out to be quite nice. The furnishings and appliances included were fairly new and very similar to the pictures show on Expedia. A wide screen TV was a pleasant bonus, along with the large fridge, microwave and the coffee pot. The washroom was reasonably clean and tidy.

Internet? Well it was there, and I have to say they have several open connections for guests use. However the process of connecting requires patience, and the speed of it was only slightly faster than dial up. Dropped connections were high on the menu.

The Big M
So after getting the room set up, we decided to go to the nearby MacDonald's for a quick snack. MacDonald's was chosen because it was just across the street. Quick it wasn't. There weren't many customers, but getting a burger and a crispy chicken sandwich with fries took ages. Many customers got their orders while we waited because “crispy” was taking a long time.
On our way out we asked for a couple coffee's and three cookies to take out for later consumption in the room. That too took several people to put the order together while we waited another ten minutes.

So much for the “fast food “ name. It doesn't exist in that establishment.

Returning to the Inn for the night, we settled down in anticipation of what tomorrow may bring.

February 12, 2011
Rise and shine to a new day. The night was anything but peaceful with the heater/air conditioner unit cycling on and off every few minutes. Usually that is good because it keeps you warm (or cool), but in this case the thing sounded like a diesel truck starting up and shutting off. And it vibrated the floor the same way.

The supplied continental breakfast was good. Overall the premises was neat and clean. Despite the mix up in occupied rooms, we would likely stay there again.

Cruise
The original purpose of the entire trip was to participate in a Bahamas Celebration Cruise, booked by telephone last summer. Talking to a couple at Kissimmee who had experience with cruises, it was suggested we should check certain things about the cruise we were intending to take. Through online research the advice turned out to be correct, so we cancelled the cruise. It would appear if we had continued, we would risk spending much more money than we had originally anticipated.

Florida Keys
So the plan became to continue on to the Florida Keys. The trip by turnpike from Kissimmee to the keys was uneventful and traffic was relatively light most of the way.

Next: the fantastic keys, with pictures. Publication will depend on our internet connections.