February quick POR PTR! 2/24: just a few more hours

[JustCor]

@JustCor if blanco Nieves is a powder formula, you can get some of those sachets from hobby lobby (look in jewelry making section) and put some in it and stash in in your dresser drawers or hang off a hanger to freshen up the clothes (and keep out moths and mice).

If you really want cape may, get you a searcher going for the reservation on touringplans.com it got me all of mine for the December trip.

Ps. I feel like I'm stalking you when it's actually just a slow day on the dis and home doing laundry.

It is a powder, and I think I might go take a look at those sachets. That would be a nice scent to have in my clothes and closets. I'd like to go to Cape May, but I taking this as a sign to try something new. I keep getting stuck in the same handful of restaurants and then I don't get to try new things. There are so many places I haven't tried yet that may become another favorite place to go. I think I need to make food plans when I'm not either starving or stuffed. My decisions are just terrible when I'm either of those. I either want to eat at a place that I can stuff myself to bursting, or want nothing to do with food at all.

Slow days are good for pouring over the boards! Hardly a stalking thing at all!

 

[Trixie15]

Another week gone by and your trip is getting closer. Have you narrowed down the dining options yet?

 

[JustCor]

Another week gone by and your trip is getting closer. Have you narrowed down the dining options yet?

I haven't. I've spent the last week or so moving out of my apartment and moving in with a friend while I work on getting a home. Now that things are settled, I'm back in planning mode!

 

[JustCor]

Four actual weeks

Now that life stuff has calmed down a little, it's back to looking at Disney stuff. It's been a little bit since I've looked at anything Disney related and I'm curious if the break will change what I want to do. Unfortunately, MDE is not cooperating. I can't get to restaurant pages or menus without being greeted by the face of Stitch, showing me that the page I'm looking for is missing, or eaten. Convenient. I've kept the Liberty Tree Tavern ADR so far. So far I haven't been able to find anything that sounds any better than Liberty Tree, but that's hardly a bad thing. At some point soon (hopefully) my MagicBand should ship. I have my fingers crossed that it will be the new MagicBand. I think I've got more than enough of the old bands (14!! how did that happen?), but there's a definite intrigue that comes along with getting something new and different. I look forward to them adding more designs to the newer bands. I've become very fond of my blue band with the sketch style Mickey designs on it.

So, back to waiting for MDE to work again. I'd like to peek at a few more restaurants before settling on any kind of plans. Maybe I'll even add another to this list. We'll see.​

 

[Disney_traveler]

Congrats on the partial move before the big move. I'm living Disney vicariously through you and downloading my photopass pictures. With work and life being and overall hellhole, I'd even take my substandard Christmas Disney trip right now! Looking forward to more of your meal planning!

 

[JustCor]

Congrats on the partial move before the big move. I'm living Disney vicariously through you and downloading my photopass pictures. With work and life being and overall hellhole, I'd even take my substandard Christmas Disney trip right now! Looking forward to more of your meal planning!

Thank you! We've had some stressful times at work lately and this trip couldn't come soon enough! It feels a lot farther away than it really is.

 

[JustCor]

The fun's in the mail

As expected, my MagicBand has shipped out. It's coming from Davenport, FL, so in theory it should reach here in a day or two since it's traveling from about four hours away from here, but I've seen how these bands like to take the scenic route. Perhaps it'll be here by the end of the week after taking a detour to Illinois and Pennsylvania. We shall see.

I've made a small change to my ADRs and added Cape May on the Saturday I arrive. The only time available was a late 8:15pm slot. Usually I'm not big on late dinners, but I really did want to go back to Cape May, so I grabbed the time. The nice thing about the later time is that I can still keep my fast passes in place at MK and still make it to Cape May with little problem (I hope). I'd still like to do Liberty Tree Tavern, but I think that might be better for a longer trip in the not too distant future. With this later dinner and being at a resort instead of a park, I think I might take the bus over to Disney Springs to walk off the food for a bit and maybe pick up something sweet to snack on back at the room before hopping on the boat back to POR. It's shaping up to be a nice day once all of the plans are in place. I'm hoping the weather stays a little towards to cooler side of things for my trip, though I'll take whatever I can get.

So, one step closer to being set for this trip. I'm weighing whether or not I would like to do anything on the Monday departure day. It's definitely tempting to get back into the habit of doing a nice breakfast before heading out (I'm always down for The Wave), but I may put off that bit of planning until closer to the trip. The one nice thing about The Wave that I appreciate is that the relative obscurity of the place has made it fairly easy to get a last minute ADR. I hope that my luck holds out on this trip.​

 

[Disney_traveler]

You're only a little over a month away!

I found the MB 2.0 to be more comfortable than either 1.0 (the bulky one) and 1.5 (a little thinner). When we were there at Christmas we got the 1.5s but I bought the It's A Small World 45th Anniversary one.

 

[Trixie15]

I thought I've read several different times that Fort Wilderness has a good breakfast buffet. Have you ever eaten there?

 

[Disney_traveler]

I forgot to ask....what color magic band did you pick?

Also, it may not be Disney....but I do have a week in Ruidoso planned, Alamo Drafthouse tix to Beauty &a the Beast with collectible glass and bought season passes to Sea World/Aquatica in SA.

 

[JustCor]

I thought I've read several different times that Fort Wilderness has a good breakfast buffet. Have you ever eaten there?

I haven't. I've heard the same thing and read some pretty good reviews regarding the breakfast. It's definitely tempting!

I forgot to ask....what color magic band did you pick?

Also, it may not be Disney....but I do have a week in Ruidoso planned, Alamo Drafthouse tix to Beauty &a the Beast with collectible glass and bought season passes to Sea World/Aquatica in SA.

I think I went with the red band. Or was it blue? I don't remember. I'm pretty sure it was the red band.

I miss Alamo Drafthouse. I really enjoyed going to those when I lived in Austin. They have the best setup for movies, and they did a Saturday morning cartoon thing where they'd play older cartoons and serve cereal and do fun stuff. I really wanted to go to that but never got around to it. One day in the future maybe!

 

[JustCor]

Stuck in oblivion

This was the notification that I received on Sunday evening. It's now Wednesday and it hasn't changed. I'm not sure what the delay is, but my MagicBand just isn't budging right now. Bummer. I'm not quite at the point where I'm counting down the days yet, but it is finally starting to feel like a Disney vacation is just over the horizon. I'm starting to get excited. Even though it's on the slow train from Slowsville, I think the MagicBand shipping contributed to the vacation feel. It's finally something that's tangible to say "Hey, Disney vacation is coming up quick!", even though it's not quite in my hands yet. I have a feeling that when it arrives, coupled with the start of a new month, things will finally feel real for this trip.

Speaking of trips, I've started to get things in order for something bigger and more proper later in the year. Last year's stay at the Grand Floridian was one of the best overall Disney Trips I had, and I wouldn't be opposed to repeating that trip again. While that would be for another trip report in the future (likely after this trip is over), I'm weighing all of the Deluxe options to see exactly where I'd like to stay and for how long. But again, another trip for another trip report.

Back to this trip.

I thought by now I'd start to get a little gunshy about the big, expensive brunch, but that's been a pretty solid plan so far that I'm absolutely pumped about. I've kept reading reviews and they mostly tend to gush about how great it is. I'm still kind of confused if they'll let you try different dishes, if the mimosas are bottomless, or if they'll bring you another entree until you're full. I'll have my answers eventually, but the reviews almost seem conflicting. I'll keep pouring over things until the day arrives, I'm sure.

So that's the update for the moment. Nothing really big to update on. The band is in the mail, my food selections are starting to look pretty solid, and I'm starting to feel the vacation vibe. Things are looking good!​

 

[JustCor]

How is this efficient?

This is the current information on the MagicBand tracking. My package, which started in Florida and will end in Florida, has been sitting in Illinois for three days. Tomorrow will be one week since the Florida to Florida package was shipped, and it's currently in another state and time zone (I think). Seems odd that this would somehow be the cheapest way to send something three hours away.

Honestly, I've done very little Disney anything in the past few days. I'd like to do a little more planning, but I'm not sure what would be left to do. I could switch up food places again, or juggle my fast passes, but they're feeling pretty settled as of now. These super short trips are fairly simple to plan out. I gave a fleeting thought to renting a car for the sake of making it feel more vacation-y, but that just feels like throwing money away on a car that'll just sit in the parking lot for the majority of the trip. So, things are at a standstill as we hit the 21 day mark. Exciting?​

 

[JustCor]

It's starting to feel real

After a long adventure in Illinois and who knows where else, my MagicBand finally arrived. While the camera makes it look a little pink, it's a nice bright red. I like the look of the band so far, though I haven't tried it on. It does make me wish for more decorative bands in this MagicBand 2 style. Maybe they'll have a couple in the stores that I can check out and maybe buy.

With the band finally here, it's starting to feel like a true vacation. I was starting to worry, as it hadn't really sunk in yet. It just seemed like a planning thing with no actual payoff. That's a bit of an odd feeling with a little over two weeks to go. I've made no more plans. I think I'm kind of set at the moment and might end up rearranging some of my fast passes. I'm trying to figure out a way to squeeze in a few more things, but the limited time of this trip is making it a little difficult.
Did I mention how pumped I am for this brunch? I've been all over the reviews and it just makes me want to be there now. I'm absolutely looking forward to eating a bunch of deviled eggs, sushi, and countless other things. Just 17 more days remaining.​

 

[Disney_traveler]

Magic band looks great! It looks like it is a neon orangeish red color.

 

[JustCor]

Magic band looks great! It looks like it is a neon orangeish red color.

It's a neat design. I'm looking forward to seeing what kind of accessory type things they release for them and if they put out any more designs. I think I prefer the fit of this one to the previous bands, as it seems to sit more true on my wrist, but we'll see how it holds up long term. The red looks to be the same red color as the regular MagicBand, but my phone kind of butchered the color a little bit.

 

[JustCor]

Planning the plans of other plans

Well, it's been a little too quiet in my updating, but I've been busy with other things. So where are we at in this journey so far?

Lucky 13. Two more weeks of work and then a nice vacation from things for a brief period of time. I think I can probably handle that. Nothing much has actually changed on this little Disney trip. My two ADRs still look pretty good, and my fast pass selections are still holding up. I've looked at some things in Disney Springs that I'll try to check out while I'm there, but nothing is really concrete at the moment. I think I've just managed to get what I want and have stuck pretty close to those plans.

So, with not much else to plan for this trip, I fell into the spiral of trying to figure out what's next and how I want to do things. I've been half heartedly looking at Disney Cruises. I think I'd really like to do one, but the price is kind of putting the breaks on things. One of the big things holding me back has been that I've never actually gone on a cruise before. This is one of those things that I'll probably look back on in the future and say "I should have just started with a Disney Cruise" or something like that. Still, I haven't mentally prepped myself to paying Disney Cruise prices yet. So how do I remedy that?

Book a 7-day regular cruise for next year. Seems logical enough. I mean, I might as well get this whole cruise thing going somehow. Maybe a nice sale on a Disney Cruise will pop up before then and I'll be able to make a proper comparison. Who knows. I'll have a little over a year to contemplate that whole thing. Until then, I'll need to fill the Disney hole with another, more proper trip. Something a little longer than an extended weekend would be nice.

Something like a five day stay at the Yacht Club, for example. I think this is the first Disney trip I've done where I've actually set it up before the ADR windows open. I've been pretty good about being about two months out. This will be the first of the Epcot resorts that I stay at. I'm looking forward to it! I tend to spend a fair bit of time at Epcot anyhow.

So, the plans are still coming, but they're on other vacations. For now, my immediate trip is looking pretty nice. I'm happy with everything in place at the moment. Some kind of updates will follow, no doubt, but I'm almost down to two hands for counting. I'm pumped!​

 

[Disney_traveler]

It's a neat design. I'm looking forward to seeing what kind of accessory type things they release for them and if they put out any more designs. I think I prefer the fit of this one to the previous bands, as it seems to sit more true on my wrist, but we'll see how it holds up long term. The red looks to be the same red color as the regular MagicBand, but my phone kind of butchered the color a little bit.

They just release/are about to release a 45th anniversary Haumted Mansion 2.0 band. If it would have been the wallpaper or the hitchhiking ghosts, I would have been all over that, but it is just purple with a cartoony Madame Leota head. Meh.

 

[JustCor]

They just release/are about to release a 45th anniversary Haumted Mansion 2.0 band. If it would have been the wallpaper or the hitchhiking ghosts, I would have been all over that, but it is just purple with a cartoony Madame Leota head. Meh.

Yeah, I saw that. I wasn't very impressed. It looks kind of lame. I'm holding out until something good gets released. I've been kind of disappointed in all of the designs that have come out so far for MagicBand 2. They just look either boring or cheap.

 

[Disney_traveler]

Yeah, I saw that. I wasn't very impressed. It looks kind of lame. I'm holding out until something good gets released. I've been kind of disappointed in all of the designs that have come out so far for MagicBand 2. They just look either boring or cheap.

I actually like this 2017 one, it I know it is too girly for a guy to wear. It reminds me of something you might see on a Dooney purse.