Hillary12.8.07
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2007
December of Dreams!!! Our DISNEYmoon at Wilderness Lodge!
Table of Contents
Introduction and Day 1
Day 2 Part 1-MK morning
Day 2 Part 2-Some pixiedust and FANTASMIC!
Day 3 Part 1-Epcot!
Day 3 Part 2-Magic Kingdom!
Day 3 Part 3-Dinner with Pooh and WISHES!
Day 4 Part 1-A few firsts at Animal Kingdom!
Day 4 AK cont.
Day 4-A most romantic evening out at the Grand Floridian!
Day 5-A relaxing day at the pool!
Day 5 Part 2-KONA! and MORE romance!
Day 6-Epcot and Coral Reef!!
Epcot Part 2-Spaceship Earth andIlluminations!
Epcot Part 3-Our final walk around World Showcase continues...
Last Disney day part 1-Magic Kingdom/Ohana
Last day part 2-Ohana, and our last night at Disney
St. Augustine Part 1!!!
St. Augustine Part 2!!!
St. Augustine Part 3!!!
I have never done one of these, so please, be nice. I have grown ADDICTED to these boards, and couldn't wait to do my OWN trip report, amongst all the great writers and picture takers here!
This is also a honeymoon trip report, and I also have a wedding planning journal with all that stuff here...
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1510931
in case anyones interested.
For those of you who don't know the story, let me introduce ourselves..
Me, Hillary-age 25, graduate student in School Counseling. We live in Augusta, GA, home of the Masters golf tournament, and James Brown.
I have been going to Disney since I was about 3. We had annual passes for 2 years in a row when I was in middle school, and I've been obsessed just like my parents raised me. I love everything about it. I've stayed many places, although Ft. Wilderness will always have a special place in my heart. It's the first place I really remember staying, and my parents love it. The first place I ever stayed was the Buena Vista Palace though, way back in 1985, and I hardly remember it. My dream though, has always been Wilderness Lodge, as long as I can remember. So, this was the only place I could imagine spending my honeymoon
DH, Andy-age 24, works as a Network Administrator. Had never been to Disney, and was super excited to be going for our honeymoon. Well, back in May, we were planning to go to St. Augustine with my parents for Mother's Day. But after hearing us go on and on about going to Disney, my mom's love got the better of her, and she decided we'd be going there instead of St. Augustine, as long as that was ok with us. And it was, of course. We stayed at Ft. Wilderness, Saturday to Wednesday. We only went to MK, MGM and Epcot, and it was very rushed. So DH's first trip came early, but I was glad. Even though it wasn't our honeymoon, it was good, because he got to see alot, which let us relax more on our honeymoon w/out having to worry about missing alot.
SO, that brings us to the trip. We left Monday, December 10th, 2 days after our wedding. And stayed until the next Monday, December 17th. We drove straight there on the way down, and then the following week we stayed overnight in St. Augustine on the way back. Just to break up the trip of course. It was my first real trip w/out my parents at Disney, and my first trip alone with my DH. Year of a Million Dreams indeed.
And it begins....
Saturday night after the wedding we spent the night at the B&B where our reception was held. My parents had paid for the room for us to get ready in before the wedding, and so we'd all have a place to leave our stuff. AND we did some bridal portraits and pictures there before the wedding as well. Anyway, as much as we didn't really want to stay there all night, we decided heck, free room, might as well. Then Sunday morning we got up and got ready, they brought us breakfast in bed, which was super nice. Then headed over to my parent's house that afternoon to open the rest of our wedding gifts. All of my family was still there, and DH's parents and brother came over as well. We had a great time, just relaxing and spending time with everyone before we left. We were both so full of excitement, from the wedding and knowing we had the whole week at Disney ahead of us! We left around 5 or so, and rushed home to finish packing and get ready to get to bed. We wanted to leave EARLY the next morning. It's about an 8 hour drive from here, and I wanted to be there already! We were like the kids in the commercial, too excited to sleep, but finally around 10 or so we both drifted off to sleep, full of anticipation for the week ahead.
The alarm went off around 4:45 am, and for the first time probably ever, I jumped out of bed and hit the shower. I was READY TO GO!!! I got myself ready, and got DH up, and he showered and finished loading up the car. We were pulling out of our driveway at 6 am on the dot! One stop at the gas station for lots of soda and we were off!!
We were making great time, we made it to I-95 in record time less than 2 hours, at Yemassee, SC. We stopped for the first time there, right before we got on the interstate. From there it seemed like we were time traveling. I got an XM radio for my car for my birthday in November, and boy was it nice! I played with it pretty much the whole way, and it kept us very well entertained. I forgot to mention what my car looked like on the way down...thanks to my bridesmaids, they did it while I was getting my hair done Saturday.
We got lots of honks, and thumbs up from passing cars. Very fun. We were in such good spirits, and in the best moods. It was a beautiful day, and we were on the way to Disney. Nothing can beat that. We got to the Florida line in what seemed like NO time. We stopped again near Daytona, at one of those little roadside stands that sells fruit and tacky souvenirs. I really just wanted DH to experience that. We also filled up on gas again, and were on our way! Before we knew it, we were going through downtown Orlando. We had made awesome time, just a little over 7 hours and we were there. And soon coming up on DISNEY! I admit, this was mean, but I was so excited, and had to take a picture and send it to my mom, to make her jealous. She's as big a Disney nut as I am, so I took this on my camera phone, so thus the bad quality.
I started bouncing up and down in my seat as we went under the sign, and I started seeing Disney buses and signs for everything. Seriously, nothing can beat that feeling, just getting there, and wanting to just get out and do everything at once. I LIVE for that feeling. I can remember how ecstatic I was.
Soon we were pulling into the Wilderness Lodge. I was seriously, about to burst out of my seat. I took another picture to send to my mom, just to be nice, of course.
We pulled up under the big awning, and I was just more excited than words can say. The sky was blue and sunny, and I had not a care in the world. The valet guy unload our car, and then DH decided to save the money and just park the car himself. I went in and checked in, pretty much dancing the whole way there.
Check in was a breeze, and the lady helping me immediately gave me 2 of the Just Married pins. I think it really started sinking in then, that I was married, and on my honeymoon at Disney. She told me our room was ready, and handed over our keys and the Disney folder with all our stuff in it. DH still hadn't come in yet, so I just walked around a few minutes, in awe of how BEAUTIFUL the lobby was. The tree, the carvings, all those little details, EVERYTHING. Finally I saw Andy come in, and we took the elevator up to the fifth floor. We found our room, RIGHT off the lobby, on the left side. I was SO excited, mistakenly thinking that not only did we have courtyard view, but also a room off the lobby??! We slid the key in, but nothing happened. 2, 3 more tries, and nothing. DARNIT! Should have known it shouldnt have been that easy. So we went back down to check in, luckily there had been no line since we'd been there. Another girl helped us, said they had given us the wrong room, and told us our new one. I said that I'd really liked that one, off the lobby. Well this girl didn't speak English very well, and seemed very confused. Another girl came over and said that we'd paid for courtyard view, which was more, but she'd see if they could get us another room off the lobby, which was less. I was confused, thought that was what it was. Then she explained to me that the only rooms that were both lobby and courtyard are the ones directly facing the lake, and of course they were all booked. AGH. So, we decided to just stick with what we'd wanted initially, so they gave us another room, again on the fifth floor...
Room 5119, our home away from home for the week...
This was waiting for us on the bed...
I immediately went to the balcony and pulled back the drapes and went outside to check out the view...
DH had other plans...
We sat around for a few minutes, about that time our parents called to check on us. Ah, it never stops. We tried calling bell services to bring up our luggage, but our phone was not working. The little buttons would not do anything. So we went downstairs, decided to go ahead and get lunch, and just stop by the bell services counter. It was now about 2:30 pm or so. We headed down to Roaring Fork, and both just got cheeseburgers and fries and just paid out of pocket. And here is my stolen food porn picture...
We also got the refillable mug, and filled up on coke. We sat outside and watched the ducks, and kids swimming, and just relaxed.
After eating, we stopped by bell services and asked for our luggage to be brought up. They got there just a few minutes after we did. After receiving everything, we decided to wait to unpack that night, and head on out for some fun!
It's a family tradition to go to Downtown Disney our first day, since we don't usually waste a park ticket that day. DH is not a fan of the buses, and LOVES water and boats, so we decided to make it more fun. We rode the boat to the Contemporary, which was very fun. Then walked around there for awhile, and decided to then ride the monorail, MY favorite. We got off at the Polynesian. We didn't stay too long, knowing we'd be back later in the week twice. We then rode a bus to DTD. Time consuming? Yes, but fun. We walked around most of the stores, but waited to buy anything. When we went back in May, we never went to the Westside so we walked from DTD over to Pleasure Island and the Westside. By this time we were both starting to get tired, it was probably around 7 or so, and it seemed very crowded. It was pretty hot too. So we agreed to get out of there, and go back the WL for some swimming.
What a GREAT idea. The pool was virtually empty when we got there. DH was disappointed that the slide was closed, but we would be back later in the week. We just floated around, and enjoyed the evening. This was the first time we'd ever been swimming in a pool together, strange as that sounds. My parents have a lakehouse and we have boats and jetskis, and we've been to the beach together a lot, but never a pool. Strange much? Anyway. We also waited around until people got out of the jacuzzi...I'm weird about being in there with strangers. Somewhere in there we decided to split some chicken fingers and an ice cream from Roaring Forks using our first CS credit. “The Fork”, as it became known as throughout the week. And filled the mug up with our first hot chocolate of many. We sat near the pool at a table and ate, and talked about everything we wanted to do that week.
After an hour or two we headed back to the room and showered, and started unpacking. I also decorated, and got our room in the Christmas spirit. Again, dorky, yes...
During this time, I had the door to the balcony open slightly so we could hear the boat horns on the lake. I heard a familiar tune, and got all excited. It was the Electrical Water Pageant, which Andy LOVED in May. LOVED.
We ran out there and watched it from our balcony, and soon after went to bed, exhausted, but ready to get up and see the World!