Sometimes.....you just gotta stop & smell the Sharpie! Sept./Oct. 2015 at AKL ~ Updated 9/25 pg 10

[punkin413]

So happy you are doing a TR... I remember you from the Memom/Jill trip reports!! Seth is adorable.

Oh cool! Glad you found me, and thanks for reading and for your sweet comments!

Did you pretty much see animals quite a bit from your room? I've read reports and threads here where certain savanna view rooms don't get many animals. Like I mentioned before, I am choosing between AKL Savanna view, BCV and BWV for June 2017. So I'm not sure I want to risk not seeing animals, as that would be one of the main reasons to choose AKV.

Thanks, in advance, for your experiences!

As for the update: Men can definitely be stubborn! Though I find most of them big ole babies when sick. So its refreshing to see a man who isn't....

Yum for Earl of Sandwich. I'm fairly certain we ate their in 2012. Yay for People Mover and meeting Buzz! I hope we get the opportunity in June. My boys would love him! Love the GF photos!

Great update! Enjoyed it!

Yes, I'd say we saw animals 90% of the time both in our room and when we'd walk by the windows down the hallways. Not every single time, but most definitely most of the time. The one major complaint I have with AKL is the location....so if it weren't for seeing animals from the room I really wouldn't stay there. We loved the resort - it's beautiful and clean and the staff was great, and it even smelled good! But next time if we stay at a deluxe we will definitely get a different location. I just thought Seth was the perfect age to get a kick out of the animals and I have always wanted to stay there, so I'm glad we did!

Just my 2 cents....on my PTR, I don't have many people keeping up with it but I guess I'm more doing it for me. And it will be the same for my TR. I mean, I live on these boards these days and I still don't have many people reading. I just think there is so much to read here on the boards that I'm just a drop in the bucket. But, I do understand that it can be a little disappointing to not have much of an audience. So, I say do what makes you happy. But I'm definitely enjoying it and looking forward to it, if you decide to continue!

ETA: I'm actually currently re-reading your previous TR, too.

I'll probably continue it just my own benefit, like you said. But it's just a little disappointing....it takes awhile to upload the pictures to photobucket and then go in and remember and write down what happened. Then looks like not many people are reading it anyway!

 

[MickeyReeds]

I'm really enjoying reading your trip report! Were you in a DVC room? If so, did you miss the housekeeping? We're staying in June and I wonder how that will go. Maybe we can pick up some extra towels--that's kind of weird thing that my DH loves on a vacation--a clean towel everyday.

 

[ariane37]

Wow.....wondering if I should continue with this. Thank you to those who've posted since the last update. But this is kind of sad!

I do not think it's sad at all! In late Jan. I had 2 TR's going - my first(s). I was SO excited to do them! One got a pretty decent amount of comments on a regular basis; the other one, for my Nov. 2015 trip which I actually am still working on, eh. Comes and goes. Certainly didn't take off the way I though and hoped lol. I've tried to figure out why some TR's/PTR's get TONS of comments days after they're started, while others have like 20 comments a month after they're started; no idea. I do know lots of people read but don't necessarily comment. Yeah it bothers me at times but you know what? I keep going! I love reliving our trips through writing the TR's plus, I'm a stay at home mom whose kids are in school all day so I have no excuse for not finishing a project I start

I even started a PTR for our upcoming Nov. trip and that one isn't getting a lot of action but who the hell cares?? Keep on writing; many will read and some of us will keep commenting I'm enjoying following along

And yes uploading to photobucket is a pain in the butt

 

[heatherrrrz]

The savanna pictures are so cute, those rain clouds look awesome over the resort. Loved seeing the Cinderella coach, I could only dream of having that for my wedding.

 

[Miss Whimsy]

Loving your report!

Sorry Ray got sick. Men can be so stubborn, huh?

 

[KittyKitty]

Just wanted you to know, I am reading your report, and enjoying it!

 

[ArielSRL]

And yes uploading to photobucket is a pain in the butt

I just upload my photos straight to my post...I don't use photobucket. I know that the option wasn't always available, but is there an advantage to still doing it that way?

 

[ariane37]

I just upload my photos straight to my post...I don't use photobucket. I know that the option wasn't always available, but is there an advantage to still doing it that way?

I am really, REALLY bad with computers and all things tech, but I don't think there's any advantage at all to using photobucket over just uploading right to your post. I use photobucket because all my pictures are too big to upload to my posts, and while I've figured out how to shrink them on my phone I haven't figured out how to do it on my computer yet. Yeah, I know I'm a moron. I've been on the boards since 2012 and just figured out how to give myself an avatar 2 months ago so.......yup. I'm clueless

 

[ArielSRL]

I am really, REALLY bad with computers and all things tech, but I don't think there's any advantage at all to using photobucket over just uploading right to your post. I use photobucket because all my pictures are too big to upload to my posts, and while I've figured out how to shrink them on my phone I haven't figured out how to do it on my computer yet. Yeah, I know I'm a moron. I've been on the boards since 2012 and just figured out how to give myself an avatar 2 months ago so.......yup. I'm clueless

Don't be so rough on yourself! Though sometimes I feel the same way! I do hope my photos I take from our trip will be small enough. I'll take them on my phone but then I'll probably have to upload them to my computer because its so much easier to post from the computer, especially if it's an actual update to a PTR or TR. I will probably have some videos though and for that I have no idea how to post them!

 

[ariane37]

Don't be so rough on yourself! Though sometimes I feel the same way! I do hope my photos I take from our trip will be small enough. I'll take them on my phone but then I'll probably have to upload them to my computer because its so much easier to post from the computer, especially if it's an actual update to a PTR or TR. I will probably have some videos though and for that I have no idea how to post them!

Thank you Good luck with your pictures AND your videos, of which I have no clue lol. I'll have to hop over and check out your PTR!

 

[ArielSRL]

Thank you Good luck with your pictures AND your videos, of which I have no clue lol. I'll have to hop over and check out your PTR!

I just added your most recent TR to my list!

 

[stitchfan75]

Oh how cool! Where was your room? We were at the pool that Monday afternoon and that Wednesday afternoon. Stayed pretty much near the slide b/c Seth loved it. Go back up and read the end again - I forgot to include the panoramic picture I took and it's pretty cool!

We were over by the animal care center, it was a standard that had a view of the people pen but every morning the worker would ring a bell and all the animals would make their way over to it to be let in. We were at the pool on Wednesday, I'm betting my girls saw your son because they wee on that slide constantly! How funny!

 

[punkin413]

I'm really enjoying reading your trip report! Were you in a DVC room? If so, did you miss the housekeeping? We're staying in June and I wonder how that will go. Maybe we can pick up some extra towels--that's kind of weird thing that my DH loves on a vacation--a clean towel everyday.

Thanks! Yes, we were in a DVC room. I personally don't miss housekeeping. If I needed an extra towel or two I would just ask the maid when I saw her in the hallway. I think I had to do that maybe once. And I just threw a few Kroger bags in my suitcase to use when our trash got full, which only happened once or twice too.

I do not think it's sad at all! In late Jan. I had 2 TR's going - my first(s). I was SO excited to do them! One got a pretty decent amount of comments on a regular basis; the other one, for my Nov. 2015 trip which I actually am still working on, eh. Comes and goes. Certainly didn't take off the way I though and hoped lol. I've tried to figure out why some TR's/PTR's get TONS of comments days after they're started, while others have like 20 comments a month after they're started; no idea. I do know lots of people read but don't necessarily comment. Yeah it bothers me at times but you know what? I keep going! I love reliving our trips through writing the TR's plus, I'm a stay at home mom whose kids are in school all day so I have no excuse for not finishing a project I start

I even started a PTR for our upcoming Nov. trip and that one isn't getting a lot of action but who the hell cares?? Keep on writing; many will read and some of us will keep commenting I'm enjoying following along

And yes uploading to photobucket is a pain in the butt

I'll go check out your report when I get a chance! Thanks for your words of encouragement. You're sweet! And I appreciate it.

The savanna pictures are so cute, those rain clouds look awesome over the resort. Loved seeing the Cinderella coach, I could only dream of having that for my wedding.

Thanks! It was really cool seeing the Cinderella coach up close! No bridge or groom in there but I'm sure there probably was later that evening!

Loving your report!

Sorry Ray got sick. Men can be so stubborn, huh?

Thanks! Stubborn is an understatement! He was killing me!

Just wanted you to know, I am reading your report, and enjoying it!

Thank you so much!

I just upload my photos straight to my post...I don't use photobucket. I know that the option wasn't always available, but is there an advantage to still doing it that way?

I don't think there's an advantage but the few times I've tried to upload the pictures directly I get an error message that some of them are too big. So I just upload them all to photobucket and that way I don't have to sort out which ones were too big. By the way, I saw you said something about videos. I upload mine to photobucket and it works great. If they're longer than like 1 minute I have to split them up.

We were over by the animal care center, it was a standard that had a view of the people pen but every morning the worker would ring a bell and all the animals would make their way over to it to be let in. We were at the pool on Wednesday, I'm betting my girls saw your son because they wee on that slide constantly! How funny!

Cool! I've heard neat things about that area. I sent you a PM with pictures of our pool day. Seth was on that slide the entire time other than maybe 10 minutes of jumping off the side of the pool so I'm sure our kids probably ran into each other!

 

[punkin413]

Hey guys! Thought I'd do a quick update tonight.

So we are on to Day 3! This was Monday, September 28th and today our plan was the following:

Get up and head to Hollywood Studios bright and early
Sign Seth up for the Jedi Academy
Ride a few things and then eat lunch at 11:30 at Sci-Fi
Head to Epcot for the afternoon (which is where our FPs were)
Free evening to swim

Ray was still feeling bad. He was running a slight fever and just felt weird. He treated it with Ibuprofen and just kept going over my insisting that he rest. The good news is his stomach was now okay...he just had this weird low-grade fever.

We got down to the bus stop around 8:20 or so. I didn't have to get there before 9:00 park opening, but I wanted to get there by like 9:15. This was the first of 2 times that the bus system at AKL was a problem. We waited SO LONG for a HS bus. It was beyond ridiculous. We thought about just taking the car after we had been waiting for like 30 minutes, but the keys were in the room and by the time we had gone back up there, a bus probably would have came.

So finally we make it to HS. I want to say it was around 9:30 when we got there. I knew I needed to book it over to the Jedi Academy sign-up if we were gonna get a decent time (or any time at all). I really wanted a time that was like before 2:00 and that way we could head to Epcot for the afternoon. To save time Ray stood in the bag check line while Seth and I hurried through with no bags and headed into the park to sign up. Then Ray met us there. The line was pretty long already but I was hopeful we had made it in time. Seth was already tired from speed walking! I don't think The Force was with him.



If you ever do this, please remember that you must have your child with you because they have to ask them a few simple questions to make sure they can understand directions. We went through that process and, unfortunately, the earliest time available was for the 4:10 show that afternoon, and according to the cast member that meant we had to be back at HS by around 3:40. So there goes our Epcot afternoon. But doing the Jedi Academy was more important to Seth, so we just adjusted our plans accordingly.

After that we headed over to Star Tours to catch a ride. This was a first for Seth!

Who can tell me who lives in one of these in the new movie??



Hi, R2-D2!





They look natural on him.



We got the adventure where that big creature's tongue comes out and goes all over the glass and Seth loved that!

We looked around the Tattoine Traders store a few minutes (Ray's favorite store). After that he caught a ride on a speeder bike. And I think his daddy loves these pictures more than I do!









At that point it was about 10:25. We had an 11:30 ADR at Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater. So what to do for an hour? We had no FPs at this park - I had chosen our FPs that day for Epcot and I didn't want to give them up b/c I knew we wouldn't have long there and couldn't wait on Test Track, for example. So we decided to head over to my very favorite ride in all of Disney World, Tower of Terror!!!!



This was a big deal to me, because this was something I'd been waiting 5 years for. In prior trips Seth was too short to ride. And this is one of those rides that it really just depends on the kid as to whether or not they will want to do it. But I was crossing my fingers and toes that he'd love it as much as I do!

The posted wait in the standby line was 40 minutes. But I know from experience that this attraction's posted wait times are usually higher than they really are. I don't think I've ever waited as long as the time said. It was 10:38. Exactly 52 minutes until our lunch reservation. Let's do it!

Here he is, calm as a cucumber in line.



He didn't seem worried at all. He had seen youtube videos of this ride so he knew what it was. I was honestly more worried about the video in the pre-show but he did fine with that too.

Some pictures from my favorite ride....







I was getting a bit antsy about the time before we got into the pre-show. That last picture was taken at 11:06 and our ADR was at 11:30.... The one time the posted standby time was accurate!!!!

So how did Seth do???




HE DID AWESOME!!!! I was so proud of him. He was so brave!!! It was not his favorite ride and he said he didn't like when his hiney came off the seat. But I was so proud of him for doing it!

Here are some photopass pictures....




In case you're wondering, Ray was holding his cell phone under Seth's face in order to get a video.

I always like to get the entire picture too, just to see what everyone else was doing on the crazy elevator with us.




Here is our photopass video, which I love..... (click to play)



And here is the video Ray took with his phone, which I love even more. Watch until the end. The look on his little face the last time the light hits it is both pitiful and hilarious. Is it bad that I'm laughing at my kid?? (Click to play.)




So I will leave you there for now. So proud of my brave boy! Next update....running here, there and yonder!

 

[ArielSRL]

Oh....I know this one! It's Rey!!

Great update. I'm so worried about getting the time we want for JTA but we are going for the last show so we can see the light sabers light up, so I hope we will be ok. Though I plan to take AJ over on the bus to arrive at like 8:15 while the rest of the crew drives.

I hope AJ does okay on ToT. I need to show him some videos. I tried to get yours to play but my internet is being funky. It always seems to do this at night after the kids go to bed, when its prime video viewing time (I'm totally addicted to several WDW vlogs now). I'll watch tomorrow at work. Internet is better there.

Not going to comment too much because I'm falling asleep as I try to read and respond. I just can't hack late night anymore. I'm feeling so old lately....

 

[ArielSRL]

Ok, watched the videos. Good stuff! And the photos too. ToT is probably my favorite thrill ride, if not favorite of all time, at Disney. Its just awesome. Hopefully AJ will be ok on it. We have a FP for it for both Monday and Friday so the MK stuff will be first and should be a good indicator of what he can handle....I hope.

Personally, I can't do most simulator type rides (like Star Tours and the now closed Body Wars) but I think AJ is going to try it with my dad. I hope he enjoys it, as well.

Looking forward to more!

 

[DisneyJo]

Yay well done Seth on riding TOT, I still can't get Ellie on it and she's 18 next month

 

[hokieinpa]

Sounds like you had a great afternoon in Disney Springs/Downtown Disney. I don't think I'll ever get used to calling it Disney Springs either!!

Love the savanna pictures! We'll be there in 10 days! So did you miss having trash service? That's the only thing I'm a little worried about. Did you just bag it and leave in in your room? The hall?

Sorry the buses were running slow that morning! Glad you got a JTA that at least semi-worked out! Can't wait to read about that!

Yay Seth! So brave! Surprisingly, my just turned 4-year old love TOT. My 6-year old refuses to ride!

And I'm still reading - keep up the TR! I want to hear more about AKL!! And I switched my pictures over to Flickr versus Photobucket. I like the uploader better and the storage limit is 1TB...pretty much unreachable!

 

[MickeyReeds]

Seth was far braver than I was on my first ride. I'm holding on to my dh for dear life. I will go again, but it's not something I'm really looking forward to!

 

[swim mom 29]

Seth is so cute and all your pictures have been great. We're doing Park Fare for breakfast in a few weeks and my 10yo DD can't wait for the Mad Hatter.
Just thought you should know, the savanna pictures from your room have caused me to convince my husband we can squeeze a night in at AKL when we are in Florida in September for a wedding (he's always wanted to stay there, so it didn't take much arm twisting). I have become a person who is planning two Disney trips out... I'm pretty sure it is a significant red flag for a Disney addiction!