khertz
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Aug 10, 2008
The second star to the right
Shines in the night for you
To tell you that the dreams you plan
Really can come true
Buongiorno! Welcome, DIS Family, old & new to my latest TR. While I am no stranger to WDW and DL trip reports (as you can see from my signature), this is my very first foray into an Adventures By Disney TR that will include a little bonus of Disneyland Paris at the end. I hope you're ready for an immense number of photos because DH took about nearly 6000 on our 12 day journey! Of course, I won't be posting all of them, but this TR will definitely be jam packed with photos, so if that's your thing, you have come to the right place.Shines in the night for you
To tell you that the dreams you plan
Really can come true
First up, I thought I'd do a quick introduction to the two of us and then a recap of how this trip came to fruition.
Pic by Mike 01 by disneymom1024, on Flickr
My illustrious titles include mom to an adorable nearly-4-year-old, wife, and pediatric oncology RN. I am a huge Disney nut, particularly when it comes to the movies and the parks. I have been to WDW a total of 12 times and to DL twice with a third stay to come next year.
DH is an amazing husband and father, and works as a radiation safety officer in the oil field. He loves our Disney trips as much as I do, though he doesn't relish in the year of planning that comes before them the way that I do. He is a big fan of all things Donald Duck and in the past couple of years has taken up an interest in photography, so you will have him to thank for the photos you see in this TR. I started out taking a few photos on my point & shoot camera, then quickly realized I was totally wasting my time as DH was photographing EVERYTHING!
Now that you have the "Who," let's discuss the "Why" of how this trip came to be. Visiting Italy is something I have wanted to do since high school, but my parents don't fly so it was completely out of the question for a family vacation. I didn't ever think I'd actually make it there, but then a couple of things happened: Adventures By Disney and the DIS Unplugged podcast! Every time I listened to shows recapping their Viva Italia adventures, I decided I just HAD to get to Italy myself! After a little convincing, DH was on board, but not completely sold on the ABD aspect because it's so expensive. I tried to plan the trip on my own for about 5 minutes before realizing how complicated it would be to make sure we saw everything we wanted to see, got ourselves from city to city, figure out where to stay, etc. Eventually I convinced him that ABD would be worth the premium price to have all of those things taken care of for us. Then it just became a question of when.
About a year and a half ago, we decided that fall 2014 would be the ideal time for us. DS would be a little older and I figured it'd be easier to leave him for a long trip
rotfl: yeah, right). Plus, because of how his birthday falls, he wouldn't have started Pre-K yet, which is good because I didn't want him missing 2 weeks of school so we could go on vacation since we don't have family nearby that could stay with him while we were gone. We figured sometime around our anniversary in September would be good, but we did discuss that if there happened to be a DIS Exclusive trip at another time, we'd change our dates to go if we could.Fast forward to May 2013 when ABD was just about to release the dates for 2014. We knew we would be booking through Dreams Unlimited, so I told DH he should email Kevin to start an email rapport before the dates were released in preparation for when we were ready to book. Kevin emailed back and said they were tentatively planning a DIS Exclusive Viva Italia departure, and lucky for us, it was exactly the time of year we wanted to go! We had to wait awhile for the departure details to be finalized with ABD, but then we went ahead and booked. We could have saved some money by taking a regular Viva trip, but we trusted that Kevin & John were making changes that could only enhance the trip, despite the extra cost. Boy, are we ever glad we made that decision!
We decided to add on a pre-night in Rome to get adjusted before the ABD trip officially started. We thought about adding a post-night in Venice, but ultimately didn't. Instead, DH wanted to check something off of his bucket list and visit Disneyland Paris! Since it seemed like we would end up passing through Charles de Gaulle on our way home, after convincing me to add onto our trip, we decided to extend our layover so to speak and add 2 nights in Paris with a day in the DL Paris parks.
Our trip dates were September 14th-26th. I can't say it was an easy decision for me to leave DS for such a long time, but now that we have done it, we definitely made the right decision. He had some good quality time with both sets of grandparents, and DH and I had an amazing trip that was honestly a dream come true for both of us.
I hope you will join me as I recap our adventure, because in addition to all of the pictures, we also had some amazing experiences, so much good food, a lot of laughs, and gelato...oh so much gelato!!
So I think that's enough yapping about the trip, let's go, shall we? Or should I say...Andiamo!!
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Looking forward to hearing about this trip! I've traveled with several folks that you traveled with, so I've seen & heard bits and pieces on facebook. It will be great to hear about the entire thing!
and that number does include videos taken as well. 
