Episode 2 (September, 2023)
Whelp, what can I say, we went again.
As soon as I got back from my whirlwind trips on the Halcyon, at Batuu West, and then Batuu East, I wanted to dive into everything and really truly understand how the Halcyon fits into the grand world of the canon of Star Wars. So, I hit google first and really tried to understand the story of the Halcyon. There is a great reddit group and some discord groups that specialize in the Halcyon and Galaxies Edge.
While I was learning, I also saw bits and pieces of what was currently happening as people were booking and experiencing the ship. In December of 2022, I started talking with my travel buddies about wanting to do the Halcyon again and that I had been hearing rumors of folks getting on “cancelled cruises” which gave them a 50% discount if they had to reschedule. In January, we decided to roll the dice and booked a trip for early October, looking at the pattern of cancellations and hoping that our cruise would be cancelled. In early February, my sister, the extreme Disney nerd got a notification of steep and stacking discounts for the trip. She called the booking line and found a discounted sailing on September 16th, 2023. Because of all of the discounts, our trip was $4,168.03 – a significant reduction from total price. We all agreed that that price was basically like getting 50% off and we decided to go.
In May, Disney announced the closure of the Starcruiser, with the last sailing being September 20th, 2023. So, we had managed to make it onto one of the last sailings at a steeply discounted rate.
Preparation
Okay, so here is the thing, this time, I was going in with as much knowledge and optimization as I possibly could. I had previously consumed all of the Canon video media and vowed to watch all of the canon media up to the timeline location prior to our departure in September. I also setup a book club with my travel companions to read Phasma, Galaxy’s Edge: Black Spire, The Princess and the Scoundrel, Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge Comic, and the Tales of the Halcyon Comic. At the same time when I was learning the Canon of GE/BSO and the Halcyon, I was deep into the communities online.
I was able to see the story arcs for each story, a total set of Play Disney achievements, and of course start talking with other enthusiasts about the best parts of each story and experience. We are also able to piece together a set of recommended times for trainings and dinner to let the story play out and have time for all of the events that we wanted to see. Manda was able to handle all of our bookings when they opened, and a month out from our sailing, we got our first notes from Disney about our voyage. I say that we went into our first trip blind. Our second trip was planned to a T in order to maximize the last sailing on the ship.
I am immensely grateful that we had an opportunity to do it again and that we were able to experience the wonder of a trip with no spoilers, but also that we were able to do a trip that let us experience the entire halcyon story.
In our planning, we all talked about which stories we wanted to experience. None of us had any interest in joining the first order, but we were much more interested in seeing the heist/romance story lines and being more active with the Saja and Resistance. For the fun of it, here is a link to our Itinerary, Booking Notes, and Planning notes. You can see they are full of specific times to request specific things: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1z1_BwyoNV4EqIvVEGl2XVrgrbtHIJr9h2mqjkgVd5NU/edit?usp=sharing
We used that document to plan Episode 2: The Halcyon Strikes Back…
Episode 2: Day 1 – The Saga Begins (Travel, Hollywood Studios, and a long day)
We left the house at 5am after a long night of little sleep with the kiddos. I packed the weekend before so that I was ready and did not need to take a lot of time to prep the night before. When my shauffers arrived, I slowly crept out the back of the house and met them. We loaded all of our bags into the car – which was a tight fit – and headed for the airport. At the airport, we breezed through security and went to our gate – after grabbing a McMuffin on the way 🙂 (I am a sucker for a McDonald’s Breakfast). Our flight out was at 7:30am and boarding was smooth and on time. We got on the plane, which was packed and settled in for a long flight.
During the flight, I read. It was really uneventful. That is, until we landed. They could not get the jet bridge aligned with the plane so we sat at the gate for 25min waiting for engineers to try and bring it together. Eventually they just gave up and had us walk across the little gap. Then we were in the terminal.
We got to Orlando and made our way to Hertz to pickup our rental car (an EV Chevy Volt). While we were getting the car, we got a phone call from Instacart, who dropped our food off at baggage services at the Boardwalk. We stopped at a simple gas station on the way to pick up things like Milk and headed to the resort. Our room was nice, but nothing to write home about :-). It had three beds and I ended up on the pull out.
We took about 30min to drop stuff and repack and headed out to Hollywood Studios for the day. The Boardwalk has a nice boat to studios, which we used. The boat was uneventful and got us to studios around 2:30pm. We use Military tickets, so we had to go to guest relations when we arrived so that we could activate our tickets. It took about 30min for us to do that process and then enter the park. Luckily, we were able to get Lightning Lane Passes for Slinky Dog Dash and Rise of the Resistance and as soon as we got in the park, we took off for Slinky Dog. it was great, I think the kids would love it, the theming with the toys and characters was great and the ride was a nice, low key, roller coaster.
Then we entered Batuu. We entered from the west gate, and were right in front of Mubo’s Droid Depot – so we stopped in :-). I managed to snag the last Utensil set from the store and pick up a Spira.
We moseyed a bit through the outpost and made our way past the Eschelon and into the queue for Smugglers Run. I joined the OTS (Onaka Transport Solutions) team as a gunner on the Falcon. Manda was also a gunner and mom was a flight engineer. We did well – except that we had really young pilots. After smuggling two units of Coaxium for Hondo, we walked through the spire, I stopped and paid homage to the ancients and paid my respects to Zabka while walking to the resistance outpost at the ruins. The ruins are gorgeous and we had a wonderful time walking past the cenote and into the briefing with Rey. Rise was amazing, as usual. I was briefly held by the first order but managed to escape with the help of R5 and the resistance. Lt. Beck finally greeted us on planet and took our leave of Batuu and returned to Ear’th and enjoyed Mickeys Railway and Prime Time Cafe for dinner. I loved the meatloaf, as I usually do, and the Long Island was strong and surprisingly good. Manda had pot roast and mom had the fried Chicken. We were the sampler :-). Our waitress was snarky and kept tearing into me for having my elbows on the table, hiding things, and generally being snarky.
We then went back to Batuu. We had an appointment to meet Kimbe and find our own scrap. Manda and I both did a build with the Gatherers, I chose Peace and Justice and Manda went for Power and Control. After building, we went to a late night reservation at Oga’s. On the way, I happened to spot Rey and was able to grab a quick selfie with her. Hollywood Studios closes at 9pm and our reservation was at 9:40pm. We sat down and had a couple of drinks. I really enjoyed the Slug Slinger (from Dagoba) and the Margarita. After our reservation, we walked out to a deserted park. The Cast Members were all waiting to escort us out. We walked slowly, taking pictures of the Falcon and the night time sights of Batuu. Eventually, we made it out of the park at about 10:55pm.
At that point, all transit was shut down. We ended up walking from Studios back to the boardwalk, which was a bit of a longer walk than Manda and Mom were really up for (it was about 20min). Then we all got ready for bed and tucked in.
Episode 2: Day 2 – Animal Kingdom and EPCOT
We woke up early to go out to Animal Kingdom, booking lightning lanes when they opened and then heading to the park for opening. We drove over and got to the park right as it was opening at 9am. We went straight to Everest, because it is so good :-). I was able to record the whole ride for the kids and call them right after (which was before they went to school). I have always loved that ride! The theming of the area and the ride itself is engaging. After our quick run from the Yeti, we started to make our way over to Kilimanjaro Safari. We rode in the trucks and were able to see a bunch of animals. After the safari, we took the train out to Doc’s Hospital – and we got to see some of the petting zoo. I truly believe that Animal Kingdom is one of the best parks for kids. Their integration of the badges program on top of the wonderful things to do and learn is super engaging.
After making it back out to the main park, and finishing Rafiki’s path, we made our way over to Pandora – and yes, this means we went through the park counterclockwise and the longest walks possible. They definately learned a lot about theming the “other worlds” with Galaxies Edge and walking into Pandora is a transformation. We had lightning lanes for all of the rides, and we went through the ritual banshee flight with the Na’vi (flight of passage – which is the next generation of Soarin) and then went over to have a snack before journeying through the Na’vi river cruise. For snack, I had an awesome Cheeseburger that was in a steam bun – perfect for any of the kiddos I know. We also shared a mousse that was very Halcyon esq. Then we made our way out of the park.
It was so hot. We felt like we were melting walking across the parking lot and when we got back to the car, the thermometer was reading 124 degrees. We sat in the car for a bit and cooled off – then we made our way over to Epcot. At Epcot, we first went into the shops, because it was way hot. We managed to pick up a couple of Pins that mom wanted then we headed over to Reef Restaurant where we had a reservation for Lunch. Lunch was awesome. We tried the salmon filet, the Mahi-Mahi, and some amazing Cajun Shrimp (with fried grits). When we had finished our lunch, we grabbed a fast pass for Soarin – which was right next door.
For the 50th Anniversary of the park, they had created a Play Disney Park game that integrated with our MagicBand+’s. Basically, they hid 50 iconic statues around the parks and when you walked up to them and waved at the statues, they play a song and then you unlock that character in the app. Since we were planning on visiting every park, we basically said, “challenge: accepted.” We got all of them at Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios yesterday while we were there and started to do them at Epcot. They were a fun little distraction when we had some down time.
After finding a couple of them, we walked over to Guardians to learn about Xandar and help the Guardians keep the timeline intact. After Guardians, we needed to get out of the heat for a bit and went back to the hotel. We took a little break while we waited for our dinner reservation. That down time was pretty chill. I was able to call the kiddos and just chat for a bit. After about an hour we went back to Epcot to do some shopping in the tea shop and have dinner. We had wonderful food at the Rose and Crown – and two pints of Guinness – which was great because the second pint kept us in the pub for a few extra minutes and it started to downpour. Since we had a table, we were able to sit in the relatively spacious covered area and watch the show as everyone outside got soaked :-).
After the rain, we were able to journey over to the entrance to the world showcase and get our last four statues at Epcot. At the same time, the fireworks show started, and we were able to enjoy the end of the show (which also does colors and vibrations on the MagicBand+). That was officially the end of the day. As soon as the fireworks ended, the park closed, and we started to walk back to the Boardwalk. It took about 20min to walk but we made it back. Then we went to bed, so we were ready to start again.
Episode 2: Day 3 – Studios and Boarding the Halcyon
As day three dawned, we were headed back to Studios. We snagged some fast passes for Rise and Tower and made it into Batuu to have an early Ronto Wrap. They unfortunately, do not have meiloorun Juice at Batuu East – Uber disappointing. Because it was the morning, I just ordered the drink without thinking and the staff was super confused. While shopping I ran into a Mandalorian with a small green child. We had a quick chat as they went through the market. Otherwise, we ate and then did a quick run on Smugglers before sitting down with that notorious gangster, Oga Gara. It was super early so we ended up getting some non-alcoholic drinks and generally having a good time and ending things with a Blue Bantha. We rode Rise and then did a few bounties (the others did not finish last trip) before heading back to the Boardwalk for our 11am checkout. We boarded transit back (boats) at about 10:40 and had no way of communicating that we would be late – Disney does not give you any way to contact your resort, just the general guest relations phone number. So, I jumped off the boat at the first resort and huffed it over to the hotel to get into the room and prop the door open for us. I arrived 2minutes to 11am and they arrived ~10min later and we packed up, got the car, and headed to the Galactic Starcruiser Terminal.
We arrived at the terminal at 11:29am and did not make the first boarding group. There was a queue of people already lined up to depart. We were in the start of boarding group two. They got us some waters, took some pictures for us, and gave us our CSL Magic Bands. And shortly after we arrived (maybe 30min) they took us into the building where we could wait in AC – which was nice.
Oh man, how do you describe the Starcruiser. This was our second voyage so we knew what to expect, but you still cannot expect everything. While waiting in the departure hall, we got to know some of our fellow cruisers – who were all dressed in their in-universe wears. The group in front of us was from North Carolina, they met on a previous cruise. The ones behind us were on their first voyage. We arrived as Gaya super fans, wearing our Ryloth Rebels baseball jerseys – and my Gaya shirt underneath. We had been using our Star Wars bags the whole time and had gotten tons of compliments – and everyone was really happy about them when we arrived. I actually got into a who is gaya’s biggest fan contest with a cast member.
Then we waited, and waited, and waited. They started taking us back right at 1pm and we were in the second departure group.
When you arrive at the Galactic Starcruiser Resort, you are briefly outside as you talk to cast members and get your bags checked in. Then you go through TSA level security and enter a departure hall. It is a long concrete walkway that ends in a glowing Chandrilla Star Line (CSL) Logo – which is about the same size as a person. When you get up to the logo, you enter a briefing room.
You are shown a quick video about the Halcyon and some safety tips (including both in world emergency procedures and Ear’th procedures). After the video, they board your entire group in a shuttle. The shuttle launches under the control of D3-O9.
It is a quick and smooth ride through the atmosphere and to the Halcyon – and you are treated to some great views of the ship. Then the door to the pod opens…
…And you are treated to a fantastic view of the atrium. Passenger Services is lined up and attaches to each party to personally walk you to your room. Our cast member was great and walked us down to the bottom level of the ship where we were room 4-102. That room is right next to the elevator bank, and on the same level as engineering, the brig, cargo storage, the climate simulator, lightsaber training, the excursion terminal, and the dining room. Suffice it to say, our room was right next to most of the action.
Right after we finished with our crew member, we went on our starting “missions.” We had assigned oursleves things we needed to do and take care of for the group. One of us went right to passenger services (for two reasons, our MBands were not working, and to sign us all up for Cantina Chronicles – the non-alcoholic drink tour). I ran into the Sublight Lounge to sign up for Spirits of Adventure, the Alcoholic version of Cantina Chronicles, and our other travel partner ran into the store.
We all met in the store and did our first round of shopping – for the things we were afraid would sell out quickly. We picked up some cards, some pins, and a couple of clothing items. After that quick shopping excursion, we did a couple of story points. I knew the terminal code for admin access – and was able to immediately unlock engineering (Raithe messaged me to do the story to get the code, but I already had it CSLA 🙂 ). We walked around engineering a bit and then went over to lunch in the Dining Room. It was super good. I ended up eating a double portion of TipYip and Cheese Noodles and a double portion of PBJ Bites – so good. I washed everything down with a Blue Milk and some coffee.
After lunch we took off to explore the ship. During this time, almost nothing else is going on – until muster at 4pm. So I hacked a console which immediately got me in with Raithe Kole the smuggler. He sent me some messages and needed me to do something things in engineering. We went in and took care of them, also making a stop to take a picture of the HS + LO markings that Han carved. We walked around talking pictures of the mostly empty ship and then took some time to change and have a drink in the sublight. We all played a couple of rounds of Sabacc at the holo table and enjoyed a few rounds of Corusant Shift – which is a fun variant only played on the ship. I had the Mustafarian, which was good and manda had the Hoth Ice Breaker – which is also delicious. Mom ended up just getting a balieys :-). Ooani made her way over and said hi, she loved our outfits and immediately recognized the Gaya patches.
Then we made our way out to the atrium to people watch and get ready for muster. We were in station Aurek. Which was led by Saja Kyr. Right after muster there is a flurry of activity to get to know the characters. We said hi to Leenka as she walked through our group and briefly chatted with Captain Keevan. I made a point to help with Gaya’s luggage, scan in with SK, and spend some time talking with the Saja. As muster started to slow down, we found ourselves in a group sitting with Sandro. He decided to start jamming to some tunes and asked us to make a Gaya fan club with him – he asked what we should be called and I said “Go Gaya” which was her fan club which he referenced for the entire voyage. He taught us a little dance to one of Gaya’s songs and then we decided to try and get the two recent stormtroopers to dance with us, which was a lot of fun. Sandro taught us all the Ryloth Shuffle – it was awesome.
Then Gaya arrived. We got to meet her briefly and show her our fandom – then we went down to do lightsaber training. Lightsaber training was a super fun experience with Saja Fen Rua. She walked us through the forms and how to proceed. I saw the “sparkles” of the force and she was super impressed that I felt/saw anything. Right afterwards I cornered her to ask about “force training” and she said that I should approach her later in our voyage.
After our sweaty lightsaber training, we took the time to change and get dressed for dinner. I changed quickly so that I could go and keep questing. I ran up to the atrium and happen into a story sequence where Raithe showed Gaya the Hananeya in the CSL compass. After that, he asked us to help him figure out a way to steal it. He had us tap a hidden MBand port in the Sublight Lounge. I was tasked with watching the silent alarm on the display case, and I was almost arrested by two stormtroopers who arrived a few minutes after. Then we made our way down to the first night dinner.
Dinner starts with an amazing spread of three dumplings. One is Sweet/Sour, one is Teriyaki and the other is a spicy Tip Yip. They were all so good. I really enjoyed them and probably ate too much of them. Then the second course comes out. It is Bantha short ribs, Felucian spicy shrimp curry with rice, and roasted vegetables. It was all so amazing, but that Bantha has a special place in my heart. The last course is dessert, which is a chocolate blue milk whip, that is so good. I topped all of this off with a Bespin Fizz (which has blue milk gelato on top of a lemon bubbly). Then Gaya made her appearance.
She does an amazing set of her songs: Gaya, Rockstar Queen, Coaxium, Hananeya, and Oola Shooka. We all danced with her and Croy, until the show was interrupted by Chewie and Sammie. Sammie turned in our furry friend to Croy, who took him to the brig. At the end of dinner, we were provided with a note to piece together. We got part 3 and eventually read that we needed to help the Captain and SK free Chewie at 9:40pm in the Atrium.
We headed up to see where the action was and found Raithe, who signaled me over to pick up the coaxium coordinates to deliver to Hondo (so Raithe is the one who gives the back story for Smugglers Run). I picked up the coordinates with a scan of my MBand and then wandered around the ship. We saw SK get bolted, and had to work on our quests to get a quest to free him. We had to enter SKSK on a “Droid Control” program which unlocked him. Then we took a minute to go and have a drink in the Sublight. I had a Trandosian Ale and Manda had a Blue Chardonnay. We had a really great discussion with Crystal and Ranger, our Bartenders – who were both such a joy. Crystal has been so highly spoken of, I let her know that, and we ended up giving her a “rebel” bracelet. She said that she had never been a rebel and this was new. Our friend Krystale came out and said “Who is lying to Crystal?” We had been in trouble with Krys earlier for hiding some coasters and lying about it so she really tore into us about lying and threw a napkin at me. Then she went and did rounds around the bar and on the way back, I threw a napkin at her :-). Then it was on. There were all kinds of napkins flying.
After that, we turned in. It was a long and fun day and we went straight back to sleep. I got the bottom bunk of the bunk beds, yay!
Episode 2: Day 4 – Halcyon Excursion Day
Day two began as most days do, with breakfast. We went down to the dining room and had some wonderful waffles, eggs, and of course blue milk and coffee. They also had some wonderful sweet buns, blue yogurt with granola and fruit, and vegetarian tofu and mushroom gravy (which was ugly but surprisingly delicious).
After our breakfast, we were scheduled to have a photo shoot at 9:30am. We walked upstairs and let them know we were ready about 30min early. We grabbed a drink (non alcoholic) in the Sublight Lounge and walked around and took advantage of the ship being empty to get some pictures.
The photos are really quite good. After the photo session, we dropped a couple of things in the room (aka lightsabers) and went over on our excursion to Batuu.
Our first thing was an early morning stop in Oga’s. We all got non-alcoholic drinks and stayed there for just a couple minutes because we had a lot to do. After Oga’s we did all of our quests: Giving Coaxium Coordinates to Hondo, Smuggling Coaxium for Leenka, finding the code to save SK, turning off the pod racer grill, helping the resistance, and of course helping the Saja acquire artifacts. It was a lot, and we were back on the shuttle back to the ship at 11:50am (for our noon cantina chronicles course).
Cantina chronicles was fun! They start off with a three-drink flight. The first is a bespin fizz (lemon bubble water with a blue milk gelato). Then you move on to a more pomegranate drink and then a “poison” that requires an antidote. They were all really fun.
Next was more food! We got to the sublight a bit late – say 12:30pm for a 12:00pm class and our next class was Spirits of Adventure at 2:30pm. So we had some time. We went down to the sublight and had more food – the deserts this time were amazing. Then we did some exploring, I walked through the cargo hold and did some work on a terminal to help SK/Leenka.
Then it was time for Spirits. We sat down at the bar with Chris as he began his tale. We learned about the silver oceans of Nar Shadda, the lemon clouds of Bespin, the bounty hunters liquid courage in the huntress, and lastly the chief engineers favorite drink. Honestly, the drinks were disappointing, over priced and mostly disgusting. Manda and Mom really did not like them so I ended up drinking 2+ flights because I did not want to waste anything. The tasting was also ~150 for us, which was spendy.
After the tasting, we had another alarm test to check at 3:45 so I ran out to do that. And then we had our 3:30 bridge training. During our training, SK and Lenka came in to help us bring in some coaxium from Chewie. It was fun.
When bridge training ended, we walked out to the Heist occurring in the Atrium. I went with the Saja/Raithe to help distract the troopers, we were teaching them the power stances. I also joined Saja Tycer to help smuggle the green suitcase for Rey. We got it downstairs and into the right place for Rey to find. Then we debriefed the heist with Gaya and Raithe and had some really great moments with both of them. While running between things, I saw Rey corner some stormtroopers and mind trick them.
Then we started getting into finale’s. I was tasked with helping Rey uncover an artifact. It was a holocron with a message from yoda – so cool! And mom and manda helped in engineering. Manda also helped break the Halcyon out of a first order blockade on the bridge.
After that, Manda and I ran to the bridge to help Raithe and Hondo smuggle some Coaxium onto the ship.
Wow, what a day, and it was not over. Right after that smuggling run, we went out into the atrium to the Acoustically Gaya concert, her final singing event. She distracted the guards while we all got her luggage off of the ship. Along the way, she had some great singing with Sandro.
Then the dinner bell rang, and we had to line up. We managed to snag a picture with Tall Paul as he was just with us in line.
Dinner was great. We had a set family style three course meal. The first course was the famous Felucian Blue shrimp. They were delicious.
Then we had rice with fish, which was good and some amazing Bantha short ribs with mashed potatoes. Dessert was a CSL Logo cake with some great Mousse. At the end of the night they brought us some cookies – just in case we needed some additional sweet.
Dinner ends with an alarm for all of us to muster in the atrium. We went to our assigned muster stations and found Lt Croy was celebrating his takeover of the ship and how he did it. He named his co-conspirators. And reflected that Kylo was arriving shortly and we were in trouble. Rey arrives and they dual. Eventually Rey uses the holocron to distract Kylo and is able to escape. Kylo orders Croy to eliminate the passengers but before he can do that, Chewie and Sammie return to capture Croy and the stormtroopers.
Thus ends the story of the halcyon. We hung out and took a bunch of pictures then since we were all exhausted, we went to sleep.
Episode 2: Day 5 – Goodbye Halcyon! (more Batuu and Magic Kingdom)
Oh, it is the last day. And it is very bittersweet. We had to have our bags packed to be picked up at 8am. So we woke up around 7am and booked our experiences for the day at the parks and got our bags out. Once that was done, we wandered over to breakfast. We were not in a hurry. We ate and then headed up to the atrium to slowly make our way off of the ship.
After the Starcruiser, we decided to go back to studios to have lunch. We walked in and rode rise, we ate at DB7 and we rode tower of terror on our way out (we did that because, the Starcruiser would give you meal credit on Batuu, but we did not use it on our excursion day, and we didn’t want to lose it). We had a magic band break on our way out of Studios, so we stopped at guest relations, and they helped get her a new one. Then we loaded up in the car and headed for the Grand Floridian. It was really cool.
One of us, had a job interview at 5pm so we hung out at the hotel, and I FaceTimed the kiddos. Then we went over to the Magic Kingdom. We wanted to finish collecting the statues and ride Tron, pirates, and the haunted mansion – we were successful in all things :-).
For dinner, we ate at a great little quick service place that had breaded chicken and fish and chips. Pretty low key and great conversation.
We closed the park and then took off back to the hotel. I walked while my companions took the monorail. I beat them to the hotel and started getting ready for bed. Then when they got there, we all went to bed quick because it was late.
Episode 2: Day 6 – Exhaustion, Depression, Departure – oh and Magic Kingdom
Departure day! Man, I was tired! We woke up and moved a bit slower, leaving the room around 9am. We dropped our bags with luggage and kept the car with the valet. We went to Magic Kingdom first. We powered through Lightcycle run 2x once with ILL and once with Virtual Queue. Both were fairly fast. We did a mixture of Lightcars and Lightcycles, both were fun.
Then we walked over to space mountain – because we were right there. It was so rickety. After that we slowly moseyed over to Be Our Guest for Lunch. We took our time. All of us had the steak, it was so good. I had a wonderful grapefruit Hefe. When we left there, we decided to stop and do Haunted Mansion one more time on the way out of the park.
After that, we were pooped. We headed over to Disney Springs to look around and charge the car before going to the airport. We found a working charger and took in the M&M, Lego, and Star Wars Stores at springs before heading to the airport.
We dropped our rental, dropped our bags, and got to our gate about 2hrs before boarding. We all had fast food for dinner and just relaxed for a few hours until our flight. The flight was uneventful. I had an exit row entirely to myself and spent the time watching Ahsoka and sleeping. It was a long day and a great trip.
Starcruiser Bonus Images
I took a couple of thousand photos. The ones in the story above are the ones that reference specific moments in the narrative. The ones below are things that I found interesting (hopefully in chronological order).
