Is the Magic gone... Why this could be our last WDW trip....

[Blackrose]

**** Is the Magic Gone? ****

Cast of Characters :

DW : Princess Dee
Me : Capt. Al

Trip Dates Sept 7th - 15th

Now that is out of the way lets begin the tale that will tell all.....

It was a chilly March night, when DW came to me excited :yay: about a surprise trip back to the wonderful land we call Walt Disney World! I had been raving about this magical kingdom since we went a couple of years ago, and wanted to plan a trip in September. When I brought this up to my wife, she explained that we could not afford it :sad2: , so this surprise months later made me very happy:banana: ! The planning begins!

Now, last time we went, we ran around crazy and wore ourselves out! So this time I told her we would plan, plan, plan! We bought the planning books, we downloaded the calendars, we scheduled ADR's, we rented a car. I finally felt like we were ready to conquer and enjoy the Mouse this time! Boy was I wrong :sad2:! Stay tuned.....

[I heart the mouse]

Go on....!!! I can't wait to hear the rest!

[lynn71092]

Oh, this should be interesting....popcorn::

[Blackrose]

Chapter 1 : Pre-Flight - Flight - Landing:scared1: !

I have to start off by saying that I am a very fearful flyer. I hate, hate, hate, flying, but let me reiterate the HATE:mad: :scared1: I have for flying. So that is out in the open lets continue...

I had a very restless night, and our plane does not leave until 1 pm that afternoon, so it is a day of fear and loathing in Oregon! My palms are sweaty, my pulse is racing as the images of a fire, smoke and the impact of metal against ground fill my head. I mean we all know that planes crash everyday right? I have every right to imagine horrible things... My wife feels otherwise as she assures me things are ok. Besides, she says, we are going to Disney World:banana: ! So this makes me happy for about a minute or so...

Its off to the airport we go. Now we are from Medford, Oregon, and our airport is listed as an international airport, but it is very small, and only about a mile from our house. So we get to the airport, and anticipation is killing me, but we have about 2 hours before the plane leaves. So we wait...and wait...finally we see this small 50 seater touch down. I think to myself, I dont remember jets being this small, this cant be our plane :scared1: ! Sure enough we get to ride on the tiny tube with wings, and as we board I notice that it is even smaller inside :eek: ! Did I mention I hate planes...? On we go the worst part is the take off so I quietly screem as pictures of flames and other nasty occurences bounce around inside my head. These little planes dont like turbulence as much as the bigger ones do. So we head to Salt Lake City which is surrounded by mountains, and wheres theres mountains, there is turbulence... So we land uneventfully, and have about an hour till the next flight. The next flight is the long one... We board a much bigger plane and the flight into Orlando is smooth. With the time differential we arrive in Orlando at Midnight, so we rush to get to Pop Century so that we can get a good nights sleep for tomorrows first day in the World! We took our luggage with us, so they would not wake us up 4 hours later to magically express it to us :) . We show up at POP with glee in our eyes! We stayed here a couple of years ago, and things do not look like they have changed much! We ask for an 80's room, but those rooms are not preffered, and we end up in the 60's 4th floor overlooking the pool. We are not to upset, and decide that it is different, but it is close to the Hippy Dippy Pool and Bar! We get to our room, and after a few minutes, it is lights out!

Tomorrow : Resort Hopping Day![/COLOR]

[happyindisney]

Can't wait to read more!

[SereneOne]

Signing up!popcorn::

[disneykibbes5]

I'm intrigued. ready to hear morepopcorn::

[mla1977]

I want to know how this turns out...

[iluvdizknee]

your leaving us hanging......:surfweb:

[tinawv]

Very catch title. Can't wait to read more, so don't keep us in suspense to long. ;)

[sandybobandy]

Alright, I'll bite. :) Looking forward to more!

[Blackrose]

Thanks all, my next installment will be soon... probably tonight.

[tinawv]

Yea. :banana:

[luvmyboys]

Allright. You got me with the title! Can't wait for more...:surfweb:

[Blackrose]

Resort Hopping!

After a night of tossing and turning, (some drunks were in the pool until early in the morning). We arose to start our day. This was resort day. Last time we were in WDW we spent so much time at the parks and such that we never looked at any other resorts but our own, and even then we didnt get to see much of ours. So from this moment on, the trip started going downhill...

We decided on breakfast at the POP food court. We did this last time and it was pretty good, but this time the food made us sick. The bacon was not cooked, and things were just not good! So off we went, we rode to Epcot to transfer busses and ended up at Coronado Springs. We walked around the resort and got caught in a thunderstorm at the pool... which makes a little bit of a walk back to the shopping area. We loved this resort, and if we ever go back, this is where we are staying. The theming was great, the pool was great everything was great. Keep in mind we are from Oregon, where the rain is misty, and cold. So we relish the rain in Florida, because it helps with the humidity, and it is warm. We head off to downtown disney to catch a boat to Port Orleans. As we were going down the river, we noticed some sort of housing on the river, we never found out what those were, anyone know? They were nice to look at. We get off at Riverside I think or whicherver was the first stop of the two. We thought this resort was ok, but it was pretty much dead no people shops dead... The great thing was that it was very quiet and peaceful. This resort was very beautiful to walk around, and we walked over to the other resort I think it was POFQ. This was nice as well. We had forgotten how much time it took to get anywhere at Disney with the busses, and our Resort day turned into only seeing a couple... It was getting onto our time for dinner at Cape May Cafe:banana: We loved this place so much last time that we went 2 times and had one breakfast there! So we showed up at our ressie time, and in a few minutes were seated. We noticed something right away. The waitress came over all happy and full of glee until she asked the one question that haunted us this trip. Are you on the Dining Plan? At that very moment the glee turned around. We got one drink, no refills, she had like 2 tables but we hardly ever saw her, we had to put our dirty dishes on another table, because noone would clean them, and then when they finally did come to clean, they moaned about how they had to have everything cleaned and setup in like 6 minutes or something similar. We were like :eek: . The food on the buffet was nothing better than a hometown buffet. Last time the meat was tender, the clams tender the wait staff great, but this time the best food on the buffet was the tomato soup... They also changed the deserts. We were very disapointed. We did not complain, and figured that maybe she was having a bad day. We headed out to walk around the Beach Club, which was very nice, then off to the boardwalk. Is it me, or does the boardwalk seem to be a dead place to hang out? We went to Jellyrolls, but they wanted 10 bucks cover! Bah! We walked the boardwalk, had a couple of drinks, and decided to head back to the room. When we got back to the room it was drink time and swim. We enjoyed the swim after a day of walking. Another restless night, because of the late night swimmers. We contemplated asking for another room, but hung on... Some of the things that we noticed during this day were that the bus drivers were not their jovial selves, boat captains as well as some restaurant employees. There was construction going on all over the place, which takes away from the magic as well... to be continued...

Tomorrow : Animal Kingdom and bird poop!

[thinktink99]

I feel so bad for you folks...sounds like your vacation was getting off to a bad start. You were asking about the housing along the river...If I remember correctly they're two level, octagonal shape (or something like that) and are in the woods...those are called the Treehouses. I think Disney use to rent them like villas but now they are used to house people working there (i.e. like international folks etc)...at least this is what I have been told....

[Blackrose]

Animal Kingdom and a day with the birds!

We are excited and a little tired this morning, (another night of partying in the pool), so we get up and prepare for Animal Kingdom! Originally we had planned MK today, but thought since AK was only open until 5 we would go there, then to MK. It is pretty hot today which it has been most of the trip so far, but it is starting to drive us crazy, until AK. The temp is lower at this park, so that helped! We unloaded and headed to the park. We decided to make a beeline for Dinosaur since it is our favorite :banana: , but along the way we saw a bugs life, and then somehow got into the line for Kulamanjari Sufari. Again, CM issues. The CM that pulled into port in the truck in front of us was alive and happy, but our CM was dull and boring, and did not put any feeling into it. Oh well... We go to Dinosaur and ride it 3 times in a row! There were no waits for anything at this park! We walked a few trails and then decided it was lunch time. About this same time I started noticing pain in my right foot. I look down and my new Red/Black (which we couldnt find in any park!) pirate crocs were rubbing my foot raw on the top part. This would be crucial later in the trip! So off to lunch at Flaming tree, because our favorite restaurant, Tusker House, was being remodeled. (Alot of stuff at WDW was being remodeled on our trip). I got the ribs, DW the chicken. We sat down in the tables behind the restaurant. We saw a bunch of birds flying around and begging for food, when all of a sudden plop ( Now keep in mind, I love ribs, but I never ordered them with horseradish!) This happened several times and mother nature thought it would be nice to spice up my meal a bit. We decide to move to another spot. So I pass on the ribs and concentrate on the desert Chocolate cake! It was very yummy, but wait a minute, since when does this cake have a creamy filling! Argh! Lunch is ruined, but no worries because we have adrs at Ohanas! Woot! So we notice the time and decide to go back to the room for a bit. We did the bus routine, and headed over to Ohanas! Now I am pretty sure I met a Dis member while waiting for the table, but I didnt have the nerve to ask. She was a nice lady with a dog. If you read this, we were the couple at the table in front of you in the waiting area. Anyways, we get seated at a table for 2 out in the middle of the room, which kind of sucked. We were right by the cooks area, and could feel the warmth on an already warm day.... So the waiter comes over, and the proverbial are you on the dining plan comes out... So lets stop just for a second, I have allergies to onions, and the last time we were at WDW I would mention that, and the chefs always came to talk to me and we would figure out what I could eat. At Boma the chef made me just about everything on the buffet without onions! Keep this in mind throught this story, because from what I understand, at WDW the chef is supposed to come out and talk to you about your allergies. So the waiter told me that I couldnt eat some of the stuff they were going to bring out, and then didnt bring it out. I was ok with that, but my wife is not allergic. Side step again... They did that at every restaurant. I had to tell them over and over that my wife is not allergic, and even then they would not bring stuff out... So, we sat and waited, waited, waited. They brought out some shrimp and chicken wings that were awesome! Then that was the last time we saw our waiter until check time. The food was the best out of all places until our last day, but I will get there later. So we get our check, and another theme that we soon realized at WDW. So lets side step again. I have an opinion of the ddp. I think Disney muscled restaurants into this plan, because the prices on the menu, and what you pay for the plan are way off! Then, they include the tip in it, and this is why I think we were having terrible service. Get my drift? We always tip no matter what, plus the plan was free this time, but when the waiters dont help us and fill our drinks (we had one drink and an alcoholic drink no refills!) they dont get tips! So here is the theme, we get our check and there are 2 drinks on it with tax, but wait a minute in fine print they added a 18% tip to it! I didnt give a tip and we left. Oh yeah, the bananas foster was to die for! So we head out to MK forgetting about what happened. We get into the park as people are lining up for the fireworks. We take the opportunity to check on HM which was still closed :sad1: . So we ride jungle cruise and head to BTMR. We are heading up the big hill when the fireworks start going off! That was awesome! The park was fun and we head back to the room to get ready for tomorrow. We cancel an ADR for Capn Jacks and get a table at Jiko! We are excited...

Tomorrow : MGM and the terrible Jiko meal, plus the woes of my feet!

[Blackrose]

MGM : Jiko and my feet!
Ok here we are on day 3 and things are not that bad, a few things here and there, the heat so on... This morning I woke up and my feet were throbbing! I looked and noticed that my left foot had a terrible blister on it and was cracked between the big toe and the next toe, and my right foot had the rubbing skin against the crocs. I decided today to wear my hikers :sad1: I love my crocs! Today is MGM day and we fenagled a meal at Jiko! We are excited. This was also going to be Typhoon lagoon day. So we get up and for some reason we decide to go to the contemporary. So we do the bus tour to the contemporary and noticed they are doing work over there as well. We wanted to do lunch as well, but did not like the counter service they had there. We decided that since MK was close we would go there and eat. We had an early dinner at 4:50 at Jiko, so we had to eat fast. It was approaching noon. We head to MK and pass on Caseys, then I remembered a Mexican place by POTC. I enter, and it is closed! :eek: We are running out of time still, so we look at the park map, and what do we see? Pecos bills! Right next door! So we head there. The thing is the lines were terribly long and we did not get to eat till a bit after 1. We both had the taco salads! They were pretty good, but we didnt eat it all, because of dinner. At this point our day is pretty much hashed, because of the time we wont be able to make TL, so we head to MGM for about an hour lol. We head to the great movie ride and get the gangster. They were running both shows at this time, but we just missed that car. We had never been on this ride before, so we really enjoyed it. When we were done, we walked about a bit, then decided it was dinner time. We head back to the room, dress up a bit, then head to Jiko! We get to Jiko, and check in. There is practically noone in the place, and they tell us to wait.... no problem. We sit in the bar and have a couple of drinks. We waited about 20 minutes... We thought, this is the great Jiko so it will be worth it. We get seated and get what seemed to be a nice oriental fellow as our waiter. He asked the proverbial Are you on the dining plan? (see a pattern here?) We say yes and he says ok what do you want to drink, what do you want for an appetizer? We said coke or something, and had not looked at the menu yet. He left... forever... still only 2 other parties in the whole place (this would change shortly) I tell him my allergies, and he says dont order this, this or this, so DW orders the taste of africa, and I order the lamb. He brings out the order, I start to eat, but quickly notice the lamb has onion in it, I bring this up to the waiter, and he says let me go check. Sure enough there is onion, so he then brings me the sweet potatoe in corn husks, which was just ok... So far he has been pretty good ( I get onions in all sorts of stuff back home so nothing new, except I was expecting a bit more being WDW and all :) ). At this point we order the meal, I had the Scallops without the chaka laka, and DW has the chicken, both were great and went off without a hitch! Meanwhile, we start noticing the same sort of behavior, the lack of service... Argh! Things seemed fine up until the main course, then we couldnt get a refill to save our lives! Finally, he came back to ask about desert we both get the Pistachio Creme Brule OMG this was good! Wow! So we eat up and wait for the ticket, and this is where it gets good. Now we had 2 drinks at like 7-8 bucks each so we figure with tax and all maybe 20 bucks. Well our bill for the drinks was 28 dollars! So we paid it, then later examined the evidence. This happened to us 2 times on this trip this way and eveytime the other way. Ill explain. With the ddp the check shows what you ate and totals all 0's. Then you get another check with the alcohol, or whatever you had that was not on the ddp. Well they got sneaky here, they put the prices of the meal on the ticket which came to a bit over 100 dollars, then taxed it, then added 18% tip, then rolled this onto the drink tab. So if you look at the dinner ticket, it showed the 100 dollars then no change due, but showed the taxed and gratuity, which they just added onto the drink tab. Wow! That was very sneaky. So we put it away, and just waited. The thing is, we could have complained, but disney would have offered free this and that blah blah, but that is not what we want, so at that point, we decided that the day we leave we will tell Disney about this sort of thing, just so they know. We didnt want anything free or extras, and if we did it on the day we leave there would be no freebies they could give us, because we are leaving. Right? Right! So we laugh this off, and head to MGM we are determined to watch Fantasmic, but when we get there it is pouring rain, and lightning. This was our MGM day both times we came to watch, we would be rained out.... Oh well, the show is canceled, and we head back to the room! Again, more refurbs the rockin rollercoaster was down. There were a lot of refurbs at WDW hrm.... We get back to the room and hit the sheets for another long day. By this time my feet are killing me! The blister popped, but is now red and swollen. I am limping now... Time for sleep!

Tomorrow : Epcot, Weak Margaritas, and Coral Reef!

[Luv2Scrap]

more! more!

[Mickey'sMainMami]

We just returned on Friday, and we experienced awful dining too! I can't wait to hear more!

[happyindisney]

Wow! I'm sorry your dining esperience sucked! We have had problems occasionally with service and we dion't have the DDP. SOme times I just think it is the luck of the draw...and I think you had horrible luck this time!! I am hoping it only gets better from here!

[dizneydonna]

I have a feeling that this is exactly why gratuity it no longer included with the Dining Plan, beginning in 2008. I know that it sort of "stinks" in some ways.......but in other ways, I believe that it could bring back new "life" to some of the wait-staff (if you know what I mean). ;)

By the way.......if you ever do decide to go back to Cape May Cafe, ask for Durland's section.........exceptional waiter. :thumbsup2

[Blackrose]

I have been out of town on business, but will continue next week. It gets way better. Our rental car experience was like none other...

[hannymom]

anxiously awaiting for more.............................

[Blackrose]

Epcot, Weak Margaritas, and Coral Reef!

It has been a few days, but I can post a bit more... This day was not to bad actually. We had adrs early at Coral Reef. 4:30, but that is ok. The first thing we do is check out Leave a Legacy picture, which was very cool, then head into the park. Today seemed a bit hotter than most days on the trip, there was blistering sun, with no clouds in site. We missed a ton of things in Epcot the last time we came here, so we took our time! We noticed spaceship earth was being renovated.... constant theme this time lol! Last time the soda taster place was being renovated, but open this time, so we tried out the different sodas. I liked the one with Ginger the best, cant remember the name of the country though. Then we head to Ellen. We had no idea this part of Epcot existed until this trip we enjoyed the nice air conditioning, and the ride was nice! We exited here and went to FT for a ride, but the standby was over an hour... so we passed. We are not ones for FP, not sure why... so we head into the world showcase to begin the drink around the world. I wanted to do this in a couple of parts, because of dinner and such. So we head to Mexico for Margaritas. I do not like blended Margaritas (headache freeze!), but that is all they have. I grab one and notice that they are premixed and very weak! Bah! Over priced and under alcoholled :sad2: <--- is that even a word...:) So we head to the next country Norway, I stop in the bakery there and get the beer, which was not half bad, and this is where the fun started to begin. We saw a couple of women with Drink around the world t-shirts on, so I struck up conversations, and it turns out, that is what they are doing! So we discussed the various drinks and I told them we had to go eat dinner, but will look for them stumbling around... So off we went to Coral Reef. We went off that way early so we could check out the finding nemo aquarium. We love to go in aquariums. So we watch the fish for a bit, then its off to dinner. Now we thought, since it was early, that it would not be bad people wise, boy were we wrong! I requested a aquarium seat, and they said it would be a little wait. I figured that it was for my wifes benefit so we can wait! It was worth it! We got to sit in the second table right next to the tank. We had a sea turtle sit right next to us the whole time, and when I get the pictures downloaded, I will post a ton of them for you all! The only issues we had were that they messed up our dishes because of my onion allergy! They took everything off of the food that had any hint of onion, which is fine for me, but my wife got her food without the good stuff on it lol. My wife had the Mahi and I think I had the Catfish, but am unsure, I forgot....:eek: The website menu on allears.net does not look up to date, but anyways, my wifes food had no soy or couscous, it was comical and the waitress was amazing! We gave here a 20 dollar tip, because she kept taking the food back and bringing out more. They brought out like 3 appetizers, then kept taking my wifes back and bringing me onions and such forth, till finally everything worked out. The cool thing was that we met a lady and her grandson from Massachussettes. They were the nicest people. We met another like this at le cellier later this week. I finished off with the Wave, which was very yummy! Yum, Yum, Yum! So now we are stuffed and need a wheelbarrow to take us out... we head into the park again. We head to Soarin' the wait was bearable with the game on the wall being interesting... We have been on the one in California, and the 2 seem similar, except for the cue. In Cal, there is only one line and cinema. Also, in WDW the cue and entrance were like in a tunnel-hallway situation that seemed weird. Just me...So we get out of there and check out that pavilion, then decide its time to head into the showcase! This time we start in Canada for a drink and check some stuff out. We see a band playing and decide to have a beer while listening. We stroll through the shops not really noticing anything spectacular. Time to head to the UK for some Dooleys. Now a quick story, back home in Oregon, we found Dooleys at a small N. Cal town called Crescent City. We cannot find this drink anywhere else, so we come to the world, and those 2 women we ran into mentioned this drink, and we were shocked! We thought it was an obscure drink, but it is popular at WDW! Anyways, we order a drink there and head on out. Yum, Yum! If you havent had it, Dooleys and Coke is awesome! Its fantabulous! :banana: Off to France! As we are heading to find a drink we run into the 2 women we saw earlier, except now they are sloshy! :lmao: So they offer to buy us drinks in France, but I cant remember the name of that drink bah! It was pretty yummy though. Then, our plans get put on hold as we are dragged to Jellyrolls. I did not know you could walk there from here, so that was awesome. These nice women paid for us to get in and bought our drinks, so if they read this THANK YOU! And where were you Thursday night! Anyways, this was pretty fun, but the one woman left early, she was not feeling well. So we enjoyed these dueling pianos and they even play November Rain! We exchanged a few laughs with them, then headed back to the resort. It was a long day topped with some liquer and time for beddy bye! This was probably the best day we had, tomorrow is off site day.

Rental Car : $101.00 lobster feast joke!