It is 12:23 am on Thursday morning. The school bell rings at 8 am. I got home to Lethbridge Tuesday morning at 12:15 am. I was in Disney World for my shortest trip ever (approximately 72 hours) this weekend. And I am still wired on how wonderful life is. So I have decided to start recapping my past weekend. And I am doing you all a favour by breaking it into two parts—–before race…..and then the race itself. So here is the lead up….

I participated in my first ever RunDisney event on Saturday night, the Wine & Dine Half Marathon. This event was an after-thought registration after signing up for Dopey Challenge, as I had a friend who I used to work with at Badgerette Pom Pon express interest in doing a half. And she is a total Disney freak. So we convinced each other and were signed up.

I arrived in Disney on Friday afternoon, after flying in on a red-eye from Calgary, Alberta. Teresa and I met in the airport and were able to take Magical Express to our hotel, Yacht Club. Holy shit….this will be for an additional blog….but I haven’t stayed at anything except Pop Century while visiting Disney since I was 18. And I’m never going back.

Anyways, after getting checked in and getting our MagicBands (which I was pleased we could individualized credit credit cards to!) we head to the Expo, it was very easy to access with the provided transportation, and once we arrived, it’s as very easy to maneuver. Now….I don’t know what it was like in the morning, but at 3:30 pm on Friday it was great…..and if we missed must-see merchandise that morning we didn’t even know, since we didn’t know what we missed and the crowds were very manageable!

I participated in a breakfast on Saturday morning put on by Megan and Krista from “The Runner’s Guide to Walt Disney World”. I had found out about this event via social media (Twitter!) and got to experience Toy Story Mania first thing in the morning (first riders!) and a private breakfast in the “Prop Shop” at Hollywood Studios. As a true Disney parks fan, this was awesome!

There was only about 40 of us there, so it was a very semi-private function. I enjoyed the buffet breakfast, and got to know some great people at our table! Heather and her mom were fantastic! And the men from Georgia and Tennessee were a hoot (they were there waiting for their wives and one other guy friend to get back from the Jingle Jungle 5 km held that morning.). They were hysterical because while one of the guys already there had done the Dumbo Double Dare, he had no clue how his friend found out about this meet up. As a side note, I ran in to them at the after party that night at Epcot, and the following day (also while at EPCOT) and both times they yelled to me saying “CANADA!!!”

I got to meet Christine and Pam (daughter and mother) of We Run Disney while at the breakfast on Saturday, and that was great! I have been following them on Twitter the last months since I got set up on Twitter. It was great to meet up with them at such an awesome event! I loved that such fans of Disney (like Megan and Krista) had the capacity and energy to put on such an event….as a true Disney parks fan, and a fan of running, this event was the perfect way for me to start my day as I lead into the Wine & Dine Half Marathon!

More to come…Always knew I loved Disney, so it is natural I would love to RunDisney!!…..