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A Very Merry Un-21st-Birthday to Me! May 2015 Trip - Updated 10/27**

California Grill looks fantastic! Kristin and I have noticed that we end up eating far more asparagus and creme brulee in Disney than we do outside of it.

We noticed a CM from Bethlehem a few years back in Epcot. When we told him we were from there, too, he asked if we had brought him any A-Treat soda or Tastykakes :)

Your updates are REALLY making me miss F&G. Walking around World Showcase, sampling from the food kiosks was so much fun. Tasted great, too!

Another great update! This TR makes me really look forward to when we can visit WDW without the kids ;)
 
Coming out of longtime lurkdom to write my first post on the dis. Where are you from in central PA? I live in Dillsburg and drive down Rt 15 to work at Mount St Mary's so know exactly what you mean about construction outside of Gettysburg!

Enjoying your TR!

Rachel
 
California Grill looks fantastic! Kristin and I have noticed that we end up eating far more asparagus and creme brulee in Disney than we do outside of it.
I love this place! I eat a lot of asparagus at home anyways, I'm actually a fan of green veggies! :rotfl:
Creme brulee seems to be all over Disney. I don't remember the last time I had creme brulee outside of Disney.

We noticed a CM from Bethlehem a few years back in Epcot. When we told him we were from there, too, he asked if we had brought him any A-Treat soda or Tastykakes :)
Once I told my mom about meeting these people, she said she met some people from Bethlehem when we went when I was younger.

Your updates are REALLY making me miss F&G. Walking around World Showcase, sampling from the food kiosks was so much fun. Tasted great, too!
Tastes amazing! Next to that rita from the Mexico kiosks. I'd rather chug Nyquil than that stuff again. :crazy2:

Another great update! This TR makes me really look forward to when we can visit WDW without the kids ;)
I mean, the neighbors across the street are going on a cruise and leaving their son for a week with his grandmother... :rolleyes:





Coming out of longtime lurkdom to write my first post on the dis. Where are you from in central PA? I live in Dillsburg and drive down Rt 15 to work at Mount St Mary's so know exactly what you mean about construction outside of Gettysburg!

Enjoying your TR!

First of all, :welcome:!

So glad you decided to come out of lurkdom!

My hometown is Boiling Springs, right outside of Carlisle where I live in the summer. But I go to Millersville University. That Rt 15 work is SO ANNOYING. What are they even doing? It looks exactly the same every time I drive past! :sad2:

I'm actually looking at Mount St. Mary's for grad school! What do you do there? I'm looking into their biotech program.
 
First of all, :welcome:!

So glad you decided to come out of lurkdom!

My hometown is Boiling Springs, right outside of Carlisle where I live in the summer. But I go to Millersville University. That Rt 15 work is SO ANNOYING. What are they even doing? It looks exactly the same every time I drive past! :sad2:

I'm actually looking at Mount St. Mary's for grad school! What do you do there? I'm looking into their biotech program.

I love Boiling Springs - it's so pretty! I love taking my girls to the duck pond there; it's so beautiful and picturesque. I'm also a fellow PA State System grad - graduated from Shippensburg.

I work in the development office at the Mount, which means I'm a fundraiser. I actually work with the deans so have heard a lot about the biotech program which is interdisciplinary between the science school and the business school. The director of that program has a lot of great experience and really cares about helping students be successful. The Mount as a whole is a great place - good luck with your decision!

And I have NO idea what they are doing on Rt 15. It seems like general repair/repaving but it is taking forever!
 
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All in all, GREAT meal! We love the California Grill. I might have been a LITTLE tispy because I decided to try and take the confetti they placed on the table for my birthday and put some of it in my wristlet… which I am now sitting here thinking… why did I do that? But, we got an Uber to take us back to AKL, and I must have been tispy because I was OUT.

Your pictures of California Grill brought back great memories - we ate there for the 1st time last year and loved it. And, they also got me excited for our trip this month (it's August - I can saw "this month"! Yeah!) since we are eating there again. It was so neat to go out on the observation decks and get the bird's eye view of Disney property. We are eating early - 5:25pm - so we won't see the fireworks which is a bummer.

I also took the Mickey confetti that they put on our table!
 
I love Boiling Springs - it's so pretty! I love taking my girls to the duck pond there; it's so beautiful and picturesque. I'm also a fellow PA State System grad - graduated from Shippensburg.

I work in the development office at the Mount, which means I'm a fundraiser. I actually work with the deans so have heard a lot about the biotech program which is interdisciplinary between the science school and the business school. The director of that program has a lot of great experience and really cares about helping students be successful. The Mount as a whole is a great place - good luck with your decision!

And I have NO idea what they are doing on Rt 15. It seems like general repair/repaving but it is taking forever!

My dog also loves the duck pond. But for different reasons, lol. :laughing:
My grandfather (a VERY long time ago - he passed away a year before I was born) was the dean of admissions at Ship. My dad and one of his brothers went there too.

I'm glad to hear good things about that program! I think the business aspect of it is really interesting.

Forever and a half for those road repairs. They even opened up that lane in November for a couple weeks - and then shut it back down! :sad2:


Your pictures of California Grill brought back great memories - we ate there for the 1st time last year and loved it. And, they also got me excited for our trip this month (it's August - I can saw "this month"! Yeah!) since we are eating there again. It was so neat to go out on the observation decks and get the bird's eye view of Disney property. We are eating early - 5:25pm - so we won't see the fireworks which is a bummer.

I also took the Mickey confetti that they put on our table!

If you keep your receipt and are in the area around the time of the fireworks, they should let you go back up and watch from the observation deck! But it is a great view even without the fireworks. But California Grill has become one of our favorites. For our next trip we were looking at some of the signatures at the GF, but I think we'll stick with CG! :)

And I hope you have a great time on your trip!
 
If you keep your receipt and are in the area around the time of the fireworks, they should let you go back up and watch from the observation deck! But it is a great view even without the fireworks.

Oh, yeah! Thanks for the reminder. After dinner we are going to head over to the GF so DH can get a martini & a cigar (PU!) at Mizner's Lounge and take them out to the balcony off the 2nd floor of the main building. Maybe we'll head back to the Contemporary to watch Wishes afterwards. This would be something new for us and I like to try and throw in little surprises for DH & DD every trip. This would a nice one!
 


the Sundae Sampler,

OMG that looked amazing. Your whole dinner did lol...but I'm a sucker for ice cream or sundaes of any kind! Looks like a fun day. I love that you kept running out to see the animals while getting ready...how often does THAT happen lol And I love those "small world" stories. What are the odds.
 
OMG that looked amazing. Your whole dinner did lol...but I'm a sucker for ice cream or sundaes of any kind! Looks like a fun day. I love that you kept running out to see the animals while getting ready...how often does THAT happen lol And I love those "small world" stories. What are the odds.

Ice cream is a big weakness of mine. Sweets in general. lol. That dinner left us so full, but it was so good!
Meeting people from where you're from is kind of odd. Like, you should probably expect it, but it just feels weird!
 
Day 6 – Magic Kingdom: Our last full day! – Part 1

It was VERY early morning for us, because we had 7:40am ‘Ohana breakfast reservation. We took a cab from AKL to be on time, and we ended up being about 20 minutes early. I can’t say we thought of this breakfast as anything special. Not that the service wasn’t good; it was the food I think. The eggs were a little too soft for me, and everything else was kind of bland! Was kind of disappointed.

On top of that, Kenny wasn’t feeling well, and actually got sick in the bathroom while we were there. So I ended up not getting pictures with Pluto or Mickey, but both spent a lot of time with me when he wasn’t there! Pluto was actually great, and put on a show for everyone.

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By the end of breakfast, Kenny and I were both actually REALLY tired… and dare I say… sick of walking around all day! :rotfl:

A break day should have definitely been planned. We walked through the gift shops at the Poly and sat in the lobby for a while before taking a boat over to MK. Originally, I told Kenny that we can just go back to the room if he still didn't feel well, and not to feel bad about it. We could always come back to MK after he rested some, but he said he felt fine.

Our first stop: meeting Tiana! And while she was pleasant, the photo we got was not…

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I mean, the shadows are BAD. I would think they would notice this and push back her meeting time, or rearrange where we stand!

After our meeting with Tiana, we road Jungle Cruise, which was pretty much a walk-on, followed by the magic carpets of Aladdin. Then we walked through some gift shops, and headed towards BTMRR for our first FP! We ended up getting towards the end of our time, but we were still on schedule. We skipped a lot of stuff we had planned for this day, just because we were tired…

Next up was meeting Anna and Elsa, however, we had about 20 minutes to burn, so we took the train over to Storybook Circus and got pictures with Goofy and Donald….

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And then headed over to the princesses!


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We seemed to be VERY rushed at this meet and great. First of all, there was a family who was large who I don’t think actually had FP for them, but pretend to act like they couldn't understand the CMs… so… that probably took 20 minutes to short out. We actually waited a long time in the FP line!
 
Stomach problems in Disney are horrible! Glad to see Kenny got through it and was able to make the later meet and greets.
 
Stomach problems in Disney are horrible! Glad to see Kenny got through it and was able to make the later meet and greets.
I know! I was actually pretty worried, because he had health problems a monthish before Disney.. thankfully, if they did continue it was our last day.
 
Looks like you're having a great trip. That's too bad about Kenny's stomach issues; nothing is worse than feeling sick on vacation.
 
Looks like you're having a great trip. That's too bad about Kenny's stomach issues; nothing is worse than feeling sick on vacation.
I agree. Once when we were at the beach I got a STAF infection from a bug bite on my face. My lymph nodes swelled up, and I was put on antibiotics and told to stay out of the sun... THAT was probably one of the worst vacations! :guilty:
 
All caught up!!!!!

Yeah for booking for next year!!! :woohoo:Exciting!!!

Also we had the same exact meals at Akershus and also loved hen both!

I love how you see so many characters!!! Great interactions over all too!

Sorry I was soooo behind!
 
All caught up!!!!!

Yeah for booking for next year!!! :woohoo:Exciting!!!

Also we had the same exact meals at Akershus and also loved hen both!

I love how you see so many characters!!! Great interactions over all too!

Sorry I was soooo behind!

Characters are so much fun to see! Don't worry about being behind; I'm starting to fall into being into a trend of being behind too! :rotfl:
 
Day 6: Magic Kingdom – Part 2

After our very long wait with Ana and Elsa, we decided to do some of the Tomorrowland rides we skipped earlier before our FP for Splash. We ended up going on Stitch’s Great Escape, which I didn’t think it was terrible… I mean, if we miss it I don’t think I would mind, but I wouldn’t care if we went on it again or not. Then we headed over to Laugh Floor, which is one of my all time favorites. I love the Monsters, Inc. movies.

We still had a decent amount of time left before our Splash fastpass, so we decided to go do some shopping on Main Street. On our way out of Tomorrowland we caught a little bit of the Move it! Shake it! And whatever else it’s called, Parade.

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I ended up getting a purple mickey t-shirt… and Kenny got a pair of boxers? I don’t remember what we bought. Maybe I only bought something. But it was finally time for our fastpass! So we made our way over to Frontierland…


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We didn’t get a chance to ride Splash last year, we just didn’t have time, so I was pretty pumped about it this year. I loved it.

After Splash, our original plan was to head back to the resort and take a break, but first we were going to make some FPs… we decided on Haunted Mansion, but since there were some available coming up in the next 10 minutes, we deiced to wait it out, go through the new shop before our FP time.

After Haunted Mansion, we made another FP to meet Tinkerbell, and we headed back to AKL.

Now our original plan was to nap, swim, and head to the GF for dinner and then go over to MK. However, our plans didn’t quite work out like that. More on that another time!


Life update: So sorry for not updating for so long! Moved back into my Apartment, and life has just been crazy! First week of classes is almost over… and I can tell it will be a stressful semester. Just another reason to looking forward to graduating and going back to Disney! :thumbsup2
 
Hollywood Studios - Day 2 - Part 1 :sunny:
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Our original plan was to not get to HS until 9:45am, because, we didn’t really have anything we wanted to do before then. However, my body decided to still be too excited to sleep past 6:30am… so there I was, at 6:30am, wide awake, ready to start to get ready.

By 7:30am we were at club level eating breakfast, thankfully, I ate more this time and was able to hold myself over until popcorn in the afternoon. And then by 8:20am, we were at the bus stop. We made it to HS by 9:00am. 45 minutes early. So we walked around the shops, I found a nightshirt I really liked, which I ended up buying on our way out.

However, we did end up getting to meet Minnie! It wasn’t originally in our plans, but we did get to meet her with little or no wait. We even had a conversation with her about her favorite type of cheese! (She had just gone on a break to nibble on some – and they gave her Swiss – not cheddar! :scared1:)

She had also pointed out my ring. It’s my birthstone from my grandmother, it was actually a gift from my grandfather to her. We also had a mini conversation about how Mickey hasn’t given her a ring yet, and we'd try to put some pressure on him.
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Next was time to stand in line for Mickey! We sat on the floor for a while. We were third in line. Once we were up, we talked to Mickey about how Minnie wants her ring. His answers were pretty adult like, about being a bachelor and wanting to ride that out as long as possible. :rotfl:
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Then off to meet Mike and Sully! I’ve also always loved Monster’s Inc.
I thought this sign at their meet and greet was pretty cute:

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Fun fact: Sully's paw accidently touched my butt when we were arranging for our picture. He didn't mean to, but it was still surprising! :laughing:
We then had nothing to do until our Toy Story FP+, we walked around and met Dale.
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Look at him lookin' all snazy in his tie and hat.
And we sat down and waited. Then it was time for the FP! I liked the ride, however, I don’t necessarily see all the hype for it, unless you don’t like thrill rides. Then it was time for more waiting! We met Donald Duck, and ended up getting a souvenir popcorn bucket and water bottles. I don't actually know why we bought the bucket, but its pretty cute. I think its because it came we a lid and so we could put it in the backpack without it spilling.
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Then we thought, why not go look at RnR, as we walked up to it there was a 30 minute wait, and right before we got into line BANG! 70 minute wait. No thanks. Got icecream instead, and decided to not see the Beauty and the Beast show because we’ve seen it before. We finally had an idea to ride Star Tours before our FP, and then ride it again with our FP. We still had about an hour. But while we passed the Indiana Stunt show, we saw there wasn’t much longer until the 12:30pm show, and thought: why not?

I’m glad we did! We loved it! I didn’t think we would, but we did! And then once it let out, our FP+ was up, and we decided to go straight to Star Tours. I think if we weren’t so tired after lunch, we would have gone on Star Tours again, we like it so much.

It was only about 1:30pm by the time we checked into Sci-fi for our 2:00pm reservation, however, we only had to wait for about 5 minutes.

Part two of Sci-fi and our night coming up next!


Quick question for you all! :thumbsup2

For anyone who has stayed at POR, POFQ, or Coronado, what did you like about them, and why? And if you’ve stayed at the other resorts, why you would pick one over the other?

I’m going back and forth for our next trip, and I know it’s going to be our last trip for at least two years since I’ll be going into grad school. I’ve decided to drop the GF, and go with a moderate (Because Kenny also said he'd take me back to the GF someday once he gets this new job :laughing:). I’m currently leaning towards Coronado.
 
Your meal at California Grill looks delicious! I am not usually a fan of game meats, but I've had bison before and it does taste like beef. It looks really good served that way though!
BTW, I have a dress that looks almost exactly like the b and w one you wore to dinner! You look great!

Sorry your breakfast at Ohana was not up to par. I enjoyed it last year, but we also stayed at the Poly so we were also really happy that we did not have to stroll far for breakfast. The Mickey waffles were the best part!

Your day at MK looked like it turned out fine in the end! Looking forward to see how it ended!
 
Your meal at California Grill looks delicious! I am not usually a fan of game meats, but I've had bison before and it does taste like beef. It looks really good served that way though!
BTW, I have a dress that looks almost exactly like the b and w one you wore to dinner! You look great!

Sorry your breakfast at Ohana was not up to par. I enjoyed it last year, but we also stayed at the Poly so we were also really happy that we did not have to stroll far for breakfast. The Mickey waffles were the best part!

Your day at MK looked like it turned out fine in the end! Looking forward to see how it ended!

I was kind of unsure about ordering the bison. But I really do like to try new things, and I am so glad I did!
I got that dress at OBX about 3 years ago, and I love it! I can wear it to so many things.
I think the Ohana breakfast might have just been an off day for us. I would definitely give it another try another time. With Kenny being sick that morning, and I was exhausted we might have just been focused on other things!
 

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