3 Families doin' a Surf & Turf Trip! AKL CL & Dream...Good-Byes

:rolleyes1 waiting to hear about AKL CL :goodvibes:listen:


:lmao: You're killin' me! You'll get a little info in the next installment, and by the first of next week you'll have it all:thumbsup2...plenty of pictures and details....I promise!



Sounds like a blast. I'm in!

It was a blast for sure!!!:thumbsup2 Glad to have you!



Hi :wave: I really enjoyed reading your last trip report and I'm sure this one will be great too.

:welcome: back! Good to 'see' you again! I'm hoping this TR will be up to par...I'm in grad school and having to split my time:upsidedow It might take me a little longer to get installments done...we'll see.




Hi! I was so happy to see you had started your TR. We are doing very well! I can't wait for our trip to get here! :yay:

Are y'all running one of the Disney races??:woohoo:




Signing on! We love AKL and we are planning our 1st cruise ever on the Dream next April!

The Dream is awesome!!!! Y'all have so much to look forward to. Are you doing the 3, 4, or 5 night? Our friends did the 3 night Dream this past April during our Spring Break, and they are planning on doing it again next April...you may see them;)
 
Found It! :-D

Can't wait to hear all about your trip! Your family is gorgeous. Is that you and dh on the ship balcony? You guys look stunning!
 


So excited to follow along on another trip with you and your fun family! :) AKL club level and the Dream sound like a good combo to me!! :thumbsup2 And happy 45th to your folks! :goodvibes
 
Happy 4th of July to everyone!!!

Just got back from a small get together at the river...now back to the DisBoards;)



Found It! :-D

Can't wait to hear all about your trip! Your family is gorgeous. Is that you and dh on the ship balcony? You guys look stunning!

Yay! You found me over here! Thanks for the nice comments, and yes that's the hubby and me on our balcony getting ready for dinner at Remy.



popcorn::

OOooh, signin' up! :woohoo:

(Thanks for posting that link over in the thread, my sigs don't work either!)

Hi there:wave2: You must be using an iPad, too. Why don't the signatures show up on those things? Do all the smilies and all pictures appear? Can you tell I'm iPad illiterate:upsidedow



Great start-- LOVE the pictures so far :thumbsup2 Can't wait to read the rest.....

:wave: Glad to have you join in!!


So excited to follow along on another trip with you and your fun family! :) AKL club level and the Dream sound like a good combo to me!! :thumbsup2 And happy 45th to your folks! :goodvibes

:welcome: back, Christine!! Hope all is well in CT (you are in CT, right?:laughing:) That's nice of you to wish my parents a Happy Anniversary!


Hopefully I'll have another installment done by tonight...
Heather
 


Day 1
Checking In


Some of you already know that we’re early risers (or at least I am). I wanted to make sure we were on the road by 7am, but we didn’t leave until 7:30ish…already behind schedule! Dad’s making the picture…do you notice who is missing??? Poor Bill…he couldn’t get off work, bless his heart. Of course he’s probably thinking… “3 days without screaming kids!!”


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We stopped for breakfast…and made it quick! :drive: Hit the road once again….headed to the World! Ignore the speed on the GPS….I’m quite sure it’s inaccurate. :rolleyes1


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Finally…Disney World is in our sights! The weather isn’t looking good, but any rainy day at the World is better than a sunny day at home.

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And what true Disney Fan doesn’t get the obligatory shot of the infamous marker?? There’s just something about driving under “Walt Disney World” that makes the trip come alive! To this day, I still get excited when I see it!


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Now we’re really close because we all spot….(can you hear the loud screams of excited children....and perhaps an adult or two?!)

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When we drove into the Animal Kingdom Lodge area, we immediately felt like we were in another country….it soooooo did not look like Florida! The architecture and foliage were perfectly laid out to resemble Africa.


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We pulled up to the guard shack and were instantly greeted with “Welcome Home!” When we gave the security guard our names, he immediately called the lodge and stated that he had 2 parties of Club Level guest that would be arriving within minutes. He kindly told us to drive up to the Lodge and a Concierge Cast Member would be greeting us and taking us directly to the lounge for check-in.


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He was correct! Before I could even open the door of the van, there was someone there waiting. They loaded our luggage onto a cart and swept it away. The very friendly cast member then told us a little about the Lodge, and we followed her into the resort.



Beautiful fresh flowers welcomed us in…the arrangements throughout the resort were just stunning.


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Our Concierge hostess spoke a bit more about the lodge while we stood inside, then she took us to the elevator to go check-in on the 6th floor.

Sorry this isn’t a better picture…we were in a hurry:upsidedow. But, you can see our hostess over to the side kindly escorting us the entire way. I’m sure I’ll say this time and time again, but every cast member we met at AKL were extremely friendly!! We are still talking about the hospitality shown throughout our stay…probably some of the best we’ve encountered at WDW….seriously.


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Would you believe that I didn’t get any pictures while checking in:confused3….or should I say, MOM didn’t get any pictures while dad and I were checking in. Of course she was running after 3 very excited children...so I’ll let her off the hook. I believe she was prying their little hands off the chocolate chip cookies while we chatted with concierge staff.

Dad did manage to get this shot from the 6th floor…basically this is the view from the lounge. The lobby area is quite impressive.


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They told us that we would be staying on the 4th floor on the ….


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This is an old aerial view…(notice that the Villas aren’t over to the left of the picture)…but will give you a visual of where our room was located. We had a great view of the Savannah (more on that later...with lots of pictures:thumbsup2)


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Our rooms were not ready, but no big deal. We kinda expected that since it was noon when we checked in. We had lunch ressies at TRex so it worked out perfectly. The concierge staff said they would text me with the room number when the room was ready.


We looked around briefly, but then decided to go ahead and drive over to DTD and eat lunch.​




Up next popcorn::….lunch at TRex with a dining review!
 
An early riser?? You???? LOL. :rolleyes1

Wow! It was like the red carpet was laid out for you, how nice!!! Can't wait to see pics of your room!! :yay:

And, no....I have not started packing yet...we just got back from MD yesterday and are packing up for a weekend wedding that we leave for tomorrow...and then on Sunday...when we are back...I will start packing for Disney :woohoo:
 
Great check-in, great so far!!! I love the feeling that you are far far away that you get from AKL :cloud9: Can't wait to see the pics from your balcony :yay:
 
Yay! Y'all made it to Disney! :woohoo:

I had to laugh about the speed on the GPS. Ed said he is going to put a piece of duct tape over that part of the GPS when we drive in September. :rotfl:

The photos (as always) are gorgeous! I really like the effects you did to them, too! :thumbsup2

I really want to see the AKL lobby in person one day. It just looks beautiful.

Can't wait to hear more! popcorn::

Are y'all running one of the Disney races??:woohoo:

We sure are! :woohoo: We were supposed to be doing our trip during the 2nd week of December but when Ed saw the Tower of Terror 10 mile race, he asked for us to change our trip dates. So, he will be running the 10 mile race. He has convinced me to start the Couch 2 5K program and I'm about 2 weeks away from finishing it. :yay: So, I am going to try the 5K race. We'll see how that goes for me.
 
:cheer2: yay!! Great pics! :surfweb: More please!

Question-is it better to be on Kudu or Zebra for CL access. I had requested Zebra to be on same side as pool, and 1st room, our 1st 6 nights are a pool view, then next 6 nights are CL.
Our last stay (non CL) we were on Sunset Savanna - Kudu trail. :confused3 Do they have CL rooms on both trails?
 
An early riser?? You???? LOL. :rolleyes1

I know you were totally shocked, right?:rolleyes: Check out the time stamp on this post:rotfl:


Wow! It was like the red carpet was laid out for you, how nice!!! Can't wait to see pics of your room!! :yay:

They'll be doing the same for you very soon at the WL!!!!!

And, no....I have not started packing yet...we just got back from MD yesterday and are packing up for a weekend wedding that we leave for tomorrow...and then on Sunday...when we are back...I will start packing for Disney :woohoo:

Good grief! Y'all have been super busy....slow down....breath....and START PACKING!



Great check-in, great so far!!! I love the feeling that you are far far away that you get from AKL :cloud9: Can't wait to see the pics from your balcony :yay:

Yes...I will say, we did feel very far...far...far...far away from everything. Can you sense a twinge of sarcasm in my voice;)




Yay! Y'all made it to Disney! :woohoo:

I had to laugh about the speed on the GPS. Ed said he is going to put a piece of duct tape over that part of the GPS when we drive in September. :rotfl:

:rotfl: Good idea, Ed!


The photos (as always) are gorgeous! I really like the effects you did to them, too! :thumbsup2

I really want to see the AKL lobby in person one day. It just looks beautiful.

Can't wait to hear more! popcorn::

Thanks, but I'm not quite sure that I like the new Photobucket. They took some things away that I really liked.



We sure are! :woohoo: We were supposed to be doing our trip during the 2nd week of December but when Ed saw the Tower of Terror 10 mile race, he asked for us to change our trip dates. So, he will be running the 10 mile race. He has convinced me to start the Couch 2 5K program and I'm about 2 weeks away from finishing it. :yay: So, I am going to try the 5K race. We'll see how that goes for me.

Good for yall!! You'll be able to do a 5K with no problem at all:thumbsup2 Next thing you know...you'll be running the Princess Half!!!

:cheer2: yay!! Great pics! :surfweb: More please!

Your wish is my command!!!pixiedust:Will later this afternoon work??;)


Question-is it better to be on Kudu or Zebra for CL access. I had requested Zebra to be on same side as pool, and 1st room, our 1st 6 nights are a pool view, then next 6 nights are CL.
Our last stay (non CL) we were on Sunset Savanna - Kudu trail. :confused3 Do they have CL rooms on both trails?

CL rooms are on both sides if I'm not mistaken...it's kinda weird how they do it. It appeared that some of the rooms on the Kudu Trail were not CL rooms (the rooms on the opposite side) and if they were, the Savannah view would have been terrible. I can't answer your question about Kudu or Zebra...sorry...guess it's just personel preference. I'll post a picture of the AKL map and try to label a couple of things....that might help you decide. You're smart to request a room closer to the main lobby! It would be a heck of a walk if you were at the very end:crazy2:



Joining in!

:dance3: Welcome! Welcome!

Hope everyone has a great day!! Off to catch up on some other TRs:goodvibes

Heather
 
I'm jealous of you hopping in your Ferrari-like van:car: and magically arriving about 4.5 hours later at WDW - I'd be there all the time - how do you show such restraint?!

Your arrival is shaping-up to be a near perfect landing! A TEN for sure!

popcorn::
 
Far, far away, eh.....:scratchin
We had a suite on the second floor ALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL the way down the hall at the very,very end. It was a super duper hike to the lounge....but it sure is a nice walk :goodvibes
 
Looks like the trip is off to a smooth start - other than the rain. But you are right, a rainy day in Disney is better than a day anywhere else! :thumbsup2

Sorry your hubby couldn't get the time off... although I have a hard time believing those angels do any yelling & screaming... ;)

Totally agree AKL feels like it's in another world and you forget you're in Orlando. Looking forward to hearing more about staying CL.

Faith looks so cute in the arrival picture with her doll. They are ready to go!

As always love the borders and other effects you add to the pictures!

Oh, and good memory... I am in CT! All is well here. Nice and sunny & hot for the holiday weekend! :beach:

Looking forward to more! popcorn::
 
Hi! :wave2: All caught up and anxiously awaiting the next installment! We have never stayed at the AKL so it is great to hear (and see) all about it!

You have a beautiful family :grouphug:
 

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