Ten Sleeps in Disney World!! - An Aug Trip Report *5/9 Departure Day & Final Thoughts

[mickeysmyboy]

I'm so sorry about your wait for the boys!I would have been fuming mad! Especially after trying to get cell phones to communicate with! Men!!

ICK! What a jerk that CM was! The person who made the design had to know that once it went to one person via the internet it was going to be all over the universe in 5 seconds flat! UGH!

Sound like you had a pretty good time the rest of the day though! I love the Push video! We've never seen him!!

Can't wait to read more!

 

[Mickey_Mom]

I'm so sorry about your wait for the boys!I would have been fuming mad! Especially after trying to get cell phones to communicate with! Men!!

He saved forty-five bucks by not buying US texting minutes ahead of time. Whoopeee.

ICK! What a jerk that CM was! The person who made the design had to know that once it went to one person via the internet it was going to be all over the universe in 5 seconds flat! UGH!

Sound like you had a pretty good time the rest of the day though! I love the Push video! We've never seen him!!

Can't wait to read more!

I hope that CMs day got better and he was nicer to people. We were really not expecting attitude over a tee shirt.

Push was fun, but the crowd filled in quickly after he spoke with us. He doesn't have a CM to stop the kids from mauling him!

 

[JPFamilyMom]

My DH is frugal too.... but I think he would go for the cell phone thing thank goodness, and if not and he were that late, I wouldn't have been so nice to my DH

Wow about the CM, sorry you had to experience that that is awful

LOVE the trash can video, I have to find that trash can, must add it to my MK list

 

[momtoleasawav]

I am really enjoying reading your trip report. Can't wait to read more!!

 

[wdwgirl03]

Cool you guys got the I'm Celebrating buttons!

Love the video of Push.

 

[Mickey_Mom]

My DH is frugal too.... but I think he would go for the cell phone thing thank goodness, and if not and he were that late, I wouldn't have been so nice to my DH

Wow about the CM, sorry you had to experience that that is awful

LOVE the trash can video, I have to find that trash can, must add it to my MK list

Don't forget to look for the guy "who looks like he knows what's going on" with the schedule in his back pocket. There's no Push on the Times Guide!

I am really enjoying reading your trip report. Can't wait to read more!!

Hi there! Thanks! I'm having a great time writing it!

Cool you guys got the I'm Celebrating buttons!

Love the video of Push.

Oh man, we must have come home with ten of those I'm Celebrating buttons. We got them at check in, we got them from bitter CM guy.... There was a CM handing out random buttons at the bus area when we were leaving DHS. Alex got the Incredibles on a button that said Family Reunion but Ariana snagged a black and white one with the Prince putting the glass slipper on Cinderella's foot that says Happily Ever After. Score!

 

[MinnieNurse]

Great updates. I love the Snow White ride. We skipped it in August and now I need to go back and ride it.

Man I have that princess design saved on my computer and almost used it. After LL and your experience I think I wont. Crabby CM's need to be reported though. Questioning a child like that should not be tolerated.

 

[jordanyosh]

Some form of communication is a must at WDW.....did your DH know that you were a bit upset even though you put on the happy face? Oh wait, he's a man like me....never mind.

 

[PracPerfPatricia]

What a wierd, creepy CM...

The whole thing with the phones...reminds me of something Dh would do......He can be sooooo generous and that get wierdly frugal with certain things...maybe it comes with the Y chromosome?

I think its cute that you "plastered" on the smile-I've done that-sometimes you just have to pick your battles...

We love Philharmagic too...sooo good...

You got to see the White Rabbit... Lucky you!

Never seen Push...just another reason to add to the list...

 

[DisneyFairy66]

Hi Hi!
I love your TR! Its great!! Cant wait to read more!

Question though where did you find that photo scavenger hunt? Id love to find one for my upcoming trip!!!!

 

[Mickey_Mom]

Great updates. I love the Snow White ride. We skipped it in August and now I need to go back and ride it.

If you leave now, I'll meet you there...

Man I have that princess design saved on my computer and almost used it. After LL and your experience I think I wont. Crabby CM's need to be reported though. Questioning a child like that should not be tolerated.

I wish I knew the true story behind the design. What makes them so touchy about it?

Some form of communication is a must at WDW.....did your DH know that you were a bit upset even though you put on the happy face? Oh wait, he's a man like me....never mind.

Yeah, he knew. He went into his "whatever you want honey" mode.

What a wierd, creepy CM...

The whole thing with the phones...reminds me of something Dh would do......He can be sooooo generous and that get wierdly frugal with certain things...maybe it comes with the Y chromosome?

I think its cute that you "plastered" on the smile-I've done that-sometimes you just have to pick your battles...

Exactly!

We love Philharmagic too...sooo good...

You got to see the White Rabbit... Lucky you!

We got to see the back of him anyway! He seemed to be waiting there quite a long time so we lost the photo-op.

Never seen Push...just another reason to add to the list...

Ah lists. I love keeping WDW lists!

Hi Hi!
I love your TR! Its great!! Cant wait to read more!

Question though where did you find that photo scavenger hunt? Id love to find one for my upcoming trip!!!!

Hello! Here's the one we pulled our items from: http://www.disboards.com/showpost.php?p=31367456&postcount=2264 Good luck!

 

[Nicole786]

I just read through your TR to catch up! I'm really enjoying it. I know all too well what comes from no cell phones in WDW, but being from Canada im sure it would have been ridiculously expensive with the service!

 

[Mickey_Mom]

I just read through your TR to catch up! I'm really enjoying it. I know all too well what comes from no cell phones in WDW, but being from Canada im sure it would have been ridiculously expensive with the service!

Hello and We'd priced it out before leaving and yes, calling is ridiculously expensive.

But texting was more reasonable at seventy-five cents per text (no roaming charges) and we had a $15 credit on our account because of a small snafoo when we'd been set up. George was convinced however that times and places to meet was a much better way of doing things.

 

[TinyDancer]

Loving your TR so far.

AWESOME pics!!

 

[Mickey_Mom]

Loving your TR so far.

AWESOME pics!!

Thank you! I'll be updating later today but life has gotten in the way so far and we're working in the backyard. I've snuck in for a few minutes

 

[Mickey_Mom]

Push was soooo much fun! It started to get a little crowded around him and we’d had our turn so off we went for more adventures. We decided to help out in the battle against Zurg and in no time we were right in the thick of it.

George went with Ariana, Demetri went with Alex and I was on my own. I’d remembered a hint I’d read that if you turned around in the first room you exit and shoot the targets there, you’d get mucho points. So I turned and fired but I don’t think it helped me any. Either that or I missed them completely because I had a deplorable final score.

I really enjoyed this ride and I really hadn’t expected to. Since Toy Story Mania came out I think the draw for this ride has gone down somewhat, but we had a fun, fun time and at several points George and I were aiming at one another and laughing maniacally as we turned our cars toward each other!

We took the customary ‘Curse you Buzz Lightyear!’ picture with Zurg behind bars (I have no idea what they were doing in this picture!)

..... and found a picture of mischievous Stitch fighting his own battle! Wonder how he scored?

Continuing our fun, we headed towards the Monsters Inc Laugh Floor and waited for our turn to help power Monstropolous.

When we were in our seats awaiting the show to start, the camera found George and he was up on the big screen but I can’t remember what message was written for him! Something that made him laugh and shake his head back and forth in quick denial anyway!

It was a cute show, but I feel like I’ve heard it before so I hope they add a bit more variety to it. Maybe its just me..?

Anyway, no one had any desire to go on Stitch’s Great Escape (such a shame because we really love Stitch but the ride is just so blah) so we let a gleefully happy Demetri know we were heading towards Splash Mountain and did a few twirls crossing the bridge out of Tomorrowland.

There was a show going on in front of the Castle but it was halfway thru so we planned to come back for a later one.

A quick hello to another ducky

And it was time for our traditional family bongo dance over the bridge into Adventureland! Let me explain. One of the several trip planning DVDs we have is the one with the four people talking about what different experiences you could get in each park. One lady talked about toddlers and little ones, one guy talked about all the relaxing things you could do, the young teenish guy talked about all the thrill rides and the main lady just talked about the parks in general. It was our favorite planning DVD because it just made everything look so FUN! Anyways, the main lady was a bit quirky and she did a little bongo dance to the music when she crossed the bridge. Well on our first trip, the bridge was coming up and I reminded the kids about the bongo dance. To our surprise, the music from the DVD was actually coming from the bridge and so we bongo danced over it! Every single time we cross that bridge – we bongo dance!

Our first stop (after passing right by Aloha Isle) was the Jungle Cruise!

George was parking the stroller and I was wandering a bit with Alex when I noticed for the very first time this area in front of the Jungle Cruise. I can’t believe I’d never seen it before! Slowing down sure lets you see new things.

The ride itself was cheesy fun, as always, but this particular ride was extra fun for Demetri. He happened to be the first of our group onto the boat and so he got to sit on the special magic square beside the driver. Ariana was beside him, then followed by me, then Alex then George. I was a little nervous Demetri sitting up there without me being next to him. He’d be the kid that dips his fingers into the water or reaches for the hippos and splash! As it turns out, our seating arrangements worked out fantastic for him because he was laughing at absolutely everything she said and felt it was completely natural to have a conversation with her every step of the way. So Demetri essentially became part of the ride and even scooted over at her beckoning to steer our boat.

He got a rousing round of applause when the cruise was over and had an absolute blast!

Hee hee – There is NO random dancing at Disney!

Next, we were off to a whole new world in Agrabah. Watch out for the camel – it spits!

It was still pretty hot and we used our misting fans regularly. Sprit, sprit, fan….ahhhhhhhh.

We played a game of chicken up in the air with the camel and I managed to take this picture. If you look closely, you can see the water coming out, and a second later I lost the game of chicken.

The next thing we decided to do was the Enchanted Tiki Room. Before our first trip, we’d heard to skip this one so we’d never done it before. This time around however, I thought what the heck and we waited in line.

We’d just missed a show and were the first in line for the next, so when the doors opened in the fountain, we missed it. It seemed we waited a very long time and I remember remarking it must be a long show. Pictures while we waited.

It was finally our turn and in we went, grabbed a seat and watched the show. Sigh. I wanted to like this show, but unfortunately I just couldn’t. While Zazu has always been a favorite, I’ve always really disliked Iago. His voice just grates on my nerves and I quickly find myself wincing listening to him. And so it was that I was glad to have finally gone to see the show, but alas, not my thing.

Demetri was getting ever so excited to be closer to Splash Mountain, but first we needed to finish up Adventureland. Anyone know what we haven’t done yet?

Love the canon holes thru the flag!

Yay! One of our favorites. We got to see the new stage for Captain Jack’s Pirate Tutorial but unfortunately we’d missed the shows for the day. A hazard of not even glancing at the Times Guide! Alex gave me a stern look when they mentioned no flash photography was allowed on the ride, so I put my lens cap on and just sat and enjoyed our sail through the Spanish Main. The first time I saw this ride with the addition of Jack Sparrow, I kept waiting for Johnny Depp to stand up and wave. So life like!

Love it!

I love the dump shop for the Pirates ride. It has tons of really cool stuff in there and Alex picked up a few souveniers for his friends. Demetri picked a sword fight.....

.... and would have stayed there all evening if we didn’t remind him a certain ride was coming up next……

CONTINUED IN NEXT POST

 

[Mickey_Mom]

Yep! We’d finally made it to Frontierland and the ride he’d been waiting for from the moment we’d started our day.

This ride is just too fun. Everyone has a laughing place and this ride is it for Demetri. He loves the first climb and being up high outside where you can look out over the park, he bops and dances to the music, he loves all the little dips and the characters. He loves the bees and when the bear gets stuck, and most of all he loves the long climb up, up, up and that ever so slight moment of hesitation at the top when he gets the biggest smile on his face that turns into a deep breath that becomes a woooo-hooooo as he holds on tight and hopes to get soaking wet!

We’re in the three back rows. Alex was running to the picture place after this ride because he wanted to make sure he caught what he referred to as the “best ride picture ever”. I found the one that was us and I said, “where are you?” and he said “Exactly!” Oooookaaaay. Unfortunately Demetri’s face is partially hidden by the boy in front of him, but you can make out his smile!

With Splash Mountain finally conquered, we decided before trying to tame a runaway train that we’d ride a much smoother rail, the WDW Railroad. We kept the stroller parked outside Splash and hopped aboard.

We headed towards Mickey’s Toontown Fair and I realized as much as we’d gotten done today, there really was a whole lot we hadn’t yet done. We hadn’t even been on Dumbo yet! Off our train continued towards Tomorrowland and I was struck again how no one uses that super secret path behind the Speedway. Mental note to self, take the super secret path that leads to Space Mountain. Speaking of Space Mountain, are they re-doing it completely or what? It’s been closed for so long for refurb they must be doing a complete overhaul? It was a little odd passing it on the train and I was still bummed that we hadn’t been able to go on the Transit Authority. Off towards Main Street USA we went and noticed a black monorail gliding by. Very cool. Then we slowly made our way back towards Adventureland and rolled to a stop where we’d started in Frontierland. It was the perfect little break and we were doing a stupendous job in keeping with our no rushing, taking it easy theme.

Thanks goodness because we needed all our energy to get that runaway train!

Another favorite of Demetri’s, he calls it the crazy train ride. Just when you think this ride is over, it goes on and on. It slows and speeds up and whips you around and then slows and speeds up again. We love this ride at night and we made another mental note to do this again for sure on our second MK night.

Another casualty of not reading the Times Guide was missing the last raft over to Tom Sawyer’s Island. We’ve never been and I was looking forward to exploring unknown territory, especially with Demetri. I think he would have had such fun, but not this time. Another mental note.

We were starting to get a little peckish and it was still pretty hot so we decided it was time for a snack break. We found the nearest ice cream stand and I don’t remember what George and Demetri got, but Alex got Dibbs and Ariana got her much desired Mickey Head ice cream. I tried a frozen banana….. It looked so yummy…. banana, chocolate and nuts ….. it should be good!

Not so much. I was ready to toss it after three bites. I ate the chocolate and nuts around the banana, content that I’d at least tried it early on and knew never to get it again. Ever.

The next few pictures of the next ride we went on turned out a little creepy. Check this out…

Looks like its evening time and the sun is almost gone …. right? Except that 20 minutes later with this picture, its clearly still day time with a bright sun.

Weird huh?

I was so excited to ride this and was reminding everyone to be the last ones out of the stretching room so we could listen. One teensy problem however. With Ariana’s GAC, we were led into a different entrance than what everyone else uses.

It’s a smaller hallway that we’ve used before, but when we were allowed thru to join the main line before boarding our doom buggies, we had completely bypassed the stretching room! Man! First time they’d done that and I’d been soooo looking forward to it! I tried a few pictures with no flash but they didn’t turn out so I just sat and enjoyed the ride and made funny faces at the ghosts that tried hitching rides with us.

We’d now come almost full circle back to where we’d started our day – Fantasyland. Actually just before entering Fantasyland we were met by the most glorious of smells for our fast growing hungry tummies. Columbia Harbour House. George thought it was a table service and we were out of luck to get anything, but when I told him it was counter service and I wanted to try it for dinner, he was all gung-ho. But then he chickened out and said he didn’t want to try anything new and just wanted to stick with what he knew was good. Grrrrrrrr. Yet another thing for another time.

Another favorite ride is Peter Pan’s Flight. While we were standing in this longish line, I told the kids to make funny poses for me. The boys were standard silly poses.

And Ariana gave me something that made her look like an opera singer!

I’ve often tried to take pictures on this ride, but just as it seems I’m about to snap a great picture, I’m propelled forward and the shot is lost. So this time, I had a ship to myself and I decided to just take it all in. I even spread my arms throughout the start of the ride and pretended to have been sprinkled with pixie dust! So much fun, I highly recommend it! As it happened, when I had my arms out I glanced down at my shirt and noticed little gold sprinkles everywhere. And then I noticed it was on my arms, short, legs…everywhere! I tried brushing it off there was soooo much of it, but it wouldn’t come off. I really had been sprinkled with pixie dust!! I’d never noticed it before!! I was the last to come off in our group and I asked the kids if they’d noticed the pixie dust. Nope, I was the only one. So another note went into the file to watch for the pixie dust when we rode it next.

Next of course was It’s a Small World.

It was almost a new ride for us this time because we were riding a pretty cool boat. The GAC card took us to the alternate entrance area and the CM put us on a boat by ourselves that was meant to have a wheelchair wheeled onto it. Very cool that wheelchairs can go on this ride, I’d never considered it before how they’d do it. For us, it was essentially single seats that you could lounge on and put your feet in the middle. Very different.

With the boat to ourselves and no one to disturb, we were very silly and talked to the dolls and I told the boys to point out something small they’d never seen before in each of the rooms. Alex marveled the entire trip at all the money that was in the water. A quick blurry shot of the kiddos running up the aisle.

It was time for our late dinner and there was no Spectro Magic scheduled for this night, so we headed back to Cosmic Ray’s. We had a little under an hour before Wishes was to start, so we took our time before going to find a spot. The boys went up to get the food while Ariana and I danced to the music Sonny Eclipse was playing. Our late dinner was fairly close to what our late lunch had been.

Time to head out and we hadn’t gotten very far when my mouth dropped open in horror. If you remember, we hadn’t bothered to look at the Times Guide all day long and while that had provided us with a wonderfully spontaneous go-on-whatever-ride-we-want kind of day, we’d also missed out on a few things that were on, or wrapped up at scheduled times. I’d known before we left however that Spectro Magic wasn’t scheduled for this first day here, and because of that, we’d scheduled our second MK day when Spectro was scheduled. So imagine my shock when we came out to this.

CONTINUED IN THE NEXT POST

 

[Mickey_Mom]

Crap! But oh well, we did have another MK day coming up, so this failed planning could be redeemed then.

It was about twenty minutes until Wishes was due to start and we found a spot to settle in. A quick shot of the castle…

….and our family getting ready to watch.

And then Jiminy came on to introduce the show. I love, love, love Wishes. I sing, I cry, I ooh, I ahh. I love it. Tinkerbell flies down from the castle. I love it. My favorite songs have fireworks timed to it. I love it. Sigh. We realized too late we were too close to the castle, but oh well. I tried the fireworks setting on my camera and set it to continuous, six photos with one click of the button. These are my favorite two.

It was extra magic hours at MK this day so we knew we didn’t have to sardine our way out of the park once Wishes was over. We’d gotten most of the park done however and with our second MK day all set to take care of what we’d missed, we asked the kids what one ride they wanted to go on before we called it a night.

Can you guess?




I’ll give you a hint. Demetri had a major say.




Have you figured it out?




Oh yeah. You know it.

George passed this second time around, poor thing didn’t want to get wet.

I took a few Main Street night shots….

…. and we headed for the Pop bus area. We’d missed a good chunk of the crowds with the extra Splash ride but it was still early enough that we got onto a bus fairly quickly and had an uneventful ride back to the Pop.

We came back to cute little towel basket in our room and everyone got ready for bed while I downloaded the days pictures.

Lastly, we went over our favorites and not-so-favorites of the day. Here are the answers I got:

ALEX
: Jungle Cruise
: Turkey wraps and the Tiki Room

ARIANA
: CRT and Splash Mountain
: Nothing!

DEMETRI
: Splash Mountain two times and driving the Jungle Cruise
: too close to the castle for fireworks

Next Update: Where's Demetri?!? Where's Ariana?!?

 

[mickeysmyboy]

Sounds like you had a great day at MK!! Demetri is too cute!! He must have in heaven driving the Jungle Cruise!!

I love you Wishes pictures!!! I've found, with my camera at least, to use the fireworks setting the camera has to be absolutely still. It's kinda a pain in butt. But, I did get some good pictures in regular automatic mode with the camera rested on my knees. I'll have to try the continuous mode! I've never thought of that! I bet that would be good for rides too!

 

[Angies1274]

Wow!! Great Update!!

Yay!! for Demetri being able to steer the boat in the Jungle Cruise. DS was chosen to do that in April. Did he get a little Jr. Skipper card?

We learned last year to avoid the frozen banana. Yuck. (sorry, I should have warned you!!)

Love your Splash Mountain pics!!! It's such a fun ride!! How cool that your were able to ride it again after Wishes.

Beautiful pictures of the Castle during Wishes

It sounds like you had a great day and you got so much accomplished!!!-even with it being a relaxing day