The 2006 "Mommy & Daddy Want To Drink Alone" WDW Vacation Trip Report

[PRWPMP]

2006 Mommy & Daddy Only WDW Vacation Trip Report (PRE-TRIP & BACKGROUND INFO)

CAST:

Me (Total Disney Freak since way back yonder or a coon’s age…whichever you prefer):
Paul
37 years old
IT Project Manager for Thrivent Financial
Something you didn’t know: Anything illegal I might do within 60 days of a WDW vacation should technically be dismissed due to temporary insanity
Favorite drinks: Rum and just about anything and/or Jack Daniels and something clear and/or Canadian whiskey and something clear and/or…okay, so I pretty much enjoy any type of liquid libation EXCEPT tequila, gin and Southern Comfort (all high on the ‘icky’ meter [SHUDDER])

DW (She’s called a dame because she is too classy to be a broad):
Michelle
35 years old
Physical Therapist Assistant for Oneida Tribe of Nations
Something you didn’t know: Has learned to tolerate (or ignore?) my Disney OCD and love of Rat Pack music
Favorite drinks: Tanqueray and Tonic and/or Bombay Sapphire and Tonic (notice the top shelf requirements…again, more credence to the Dame vs. Broad debate)

DD (Dame-in-Training):
Allyson
11 years old
An astoundingly good student and daughter
Something you didn’t know: SHE’S NOT COMING ON THIS TRIP
Favorite drinks: Orange juice and/or Code Red Mountain Dew

PREVIOUS WDW TRIPS:

1995 = Dixie Landings
1998 = Caribbean Beach Resort
2000 = Disney Institute (for business…ha, ha, ha, ha)
2001 = All Star Movies – with DD
2002 = All Star Movies – with DD
2003 = Offsite Rental House
2004 = Offsite Rental House in Feb.
Offsite Rental House in Dec. – with DD


BACKGROUND:

Not that anyone really needs a reason to go to WDW….

Okay, so it was sometime in July, 2005 and the odds of us getting back to WDW in 2005 or 2006 were not looking good. During the past few years, we have taken our annual sans-daughter trip with a group of friends for drinking, tanning, drinking, relaxation and drinking. These past trips had revolved around a rental house that our friends owned in Kissimmee. Without checking with us first to see if it was okay, these “friends” up and sold the house to cash in on the insane upsurge in real estate values in Florida. The selfish *******s!!!

So, plans were circulating amongst our group for a replacement trip to Cancun or other Mexican location. However, in October, 2005, Hurricane Wilma ripped through the Cancun/Cozumel area and the group trip started falling apart. Living by the motto of “Seize The Future,” Michelle and I immediately began to scheme a way to do something we haven’t done in 5 years…go to WDW by ourselves.

Faster than the launch mechanism of the Rock and Roller Coaster, I blocked a week in my calendar at work for January 6th through the 13th, called Midwest Airlines to book 2 tickets from Milwaukee to Orlando (had enough FreqFlyer miles for a free companion seat for Michelle..woo-hoo!!), logged onto the WDW website to secure a Pop Century Resort room with 5 day MYW-Hopper Option tickets, and signed up for DME. All that was left was to deliver the bad news to our group of friends. Well…bad for them…good for us.

I think our friends are still a little disappointed in our withdrawal from the annual “Escape the cold and drink!!!” festivities for 2006, but they more than understood when we reminded them of our 5 year drought of alone time at WDW. There’s always next year!!!

THE PLAN:

It is now January 2nd, 2006 and after surviving the coldest and wettest Wisconsin December in recent memory, all of the snow is gone, replaced by an annoying freezing drizzle and fog. Ahh…Wisconsin weather…its craptastic!!!

The Disney OCD has REALLY kicked in now. I’ve got about 4 different lists working, the bags have been packed for the past 3 days, I bought little bottles of booze for the room, put them in the already packed carry-on, and I can’t seem to fall asleep real well lately.

You don’t really care about all this do you? Alright, I guess I don’t blame you…so here’s the pre-trip daily plan:

Thursday, January 5th, 2006:
- Try to look busy at work whilst staring at the clock…tick, tick, tick, tick….
- Kiss and hug Ally to near death before dropping her off at Michelle’s parents and drop off the sweetest Golden Retriever that ever lived at the kennel
- Drive to Milwaukee and check-in at Four Points Sheraton (Sleep, Park ‘n Fly Package)
- Have a relaxing drink to end the day at: TBD

Friday, January 6th, 2006:
- Wake up at 5am to get ready, catch the shuttle to the airport, check-in with Midwest, and wait until our 7:30am departure
- Arrive in Orlando at 11:05am and proceed to the DME for check-in
- DME to Pop Century
- Check-in at Pop Century and hopefully get our room
- Head to Downtown Disney for walking around, shopping, people watching and drinks
- Have a relaxing drink to end the day at: TBD

Saturday, January 7th, 2006:
- Magic Kingdom Day
- Have a relaxing drink to end the day at: TBD

Sunday, January 8th, 2006:
- EPCOT Day (I know it’s Marathon day but we gotta catch TT before it goes into rehab on Monday)
- Lunch at Beaches & Cream
- Have a relaxing drink to end the day at: TBD

Monday, January 9th, 2006:
- Disney Studios Day
- PS/ADR at SciFi for lunch
- Take advantage of EMH evening???
- Have a relaxing drink to end the day at: TBD

Tuesday, January 10th, 2006:
- Relaxation Day
- Blizzard Beach if the weather is nice, otherwise resort hopping and lounging
- PS/ADR at Yachtsman’s Steakhouse for dinner
- Have a relaxing drink to end the day at: TBD

Wednesday, January 11th, 2006:
- Animal Kingdom Day
- Take advantage of EMH evening???
- Have a relaxing drink to end the day at: TBD

Thursday, January 12th, 2006:
- Park “Clean-Up” Day starting with Magic Kingdom EMH morning
- Park hop and ride our favorites
- Downtown Disney for shopping
- PS/ADR at Planet Hollywood for dinner (free meal voucher...love the free stuff)
- Pack everything up
- Have a relaxing drink to end the day at: TBD

Friday, January 13th, 2006:
- DME to airport for 11:45am departure
- Arrive in Milwaukee at 1:30pm
- Drive to Green Bay

FINAL PRE-TRIP THOUGHTS/GOALS:

So we are only 3 days out at this point. The weather in Orlando is looking pretty chilly for the first couple of days. Okay, so that’s all relative. 58 degrees with sun in Orlando is still a whole lot better than 24 degrees with snow in Green Bay. I’ll probably have to pack jeans and some sweatshirts for the first couple of days, but once it hits 65 degrees, the shorts are on. Don’t worry, I’ve been fake baking so the bloated white carcass that is my body will not shock small children into years of psychiatric treatment.

Also, we have the following overall goals for this trip:
1. Relax
2. Take a leisurely pace through the parks
3. Take time to sit and people watch more
4. Find a new bar every night to sip a few adult beverages before retiring for the evening

Let’s hope it all works out as planned, or in the alternative, that we can let the little annoyances melt away.

 

[PRWPMP]

Friday, January 6th, 2006:

Travel Day or “THE WHITE DEATH COMETH…”

So we are up and at ‘em by 5am to get ready and catch the hotel shuttle to General Mitchell Airport by 5:45am. Midwest has a very smooth self-check in so we take advantage of that and cruise through security by 6:30am. Some life-giving coffee’s and general quivering with excitement follow and we are wheels-up out of Milwaukee right on schedule at 7:30am. Somehow, we got the VERY last row of seats on the plane with no window…weird experience, let me tell you.

We arrive in sunny Orlando at 11am and proceed directly to Airside A-Level 1 to participate in our first line of the trip. Holy crap…are you freakin’ serious that we have to stand in that line? It was huge but moved surprisingly fast and found ourselves in the Pop Century/Coronado Springs/AKL line by 12noon. After a pretty quick half-hour trip to WDW, we were the first stop and checked in. Our room was ready…woo-hoo!!! We purchased our refillable mugs and went to find room 2434 in the 50s section.

Okay, so its probably the furthest walk from anything, but its place to have a cocktail before crashing, so it works for us. The weather was a little cool, but was a far cry from what we just left so we put on the shorts and grabbed a sweatshirt from the carry-on and we were off to Downtown Disney. This is typically our first-day plan when we arrive mid-day. No sense burning a MYW day, so we head to DD to “pre-shop”, which basically means that we start tagging the items we are going to wind up buying sometime during the trip.

Our first item on the plan, however, was to get something to eat and, since we fell in love with the Earl of Sandwich last time, we stuffed ourselves. It was a nice afternoon just taking a leisurely pace through all of the shops and soon found ourselves, shockingly, at Raglin Road for a cocktail. Okay, so the place is cool, but $7 for a thimble of Captain and Coke? I am more than used to Disney pricing but this was outrageous. An absolute outrage I tell you. Yep…I had one anyway. Gotta love Cappy & Coke.

After that, we went back to POP and had dinner in the food court, filled up the mugs with mixer…err Coke…and retired to our room. The local news was absolutely hilarious. “Don’t let your pets outside for longer than 5 minutes…Keep a slow trickle of water flowing…develop an emergency plan in case the power goes out…keep your shades open during the day and sealed tight at night…” You would think that the White Death was coming. Are you people serious? The forecasted low is supposed to be 35 degrees. That wasn’t even the high temperature in Milwaukee that day. Real cold isn’t until the snot in your nose freezes. I know…not a regular occurrence for Floridians, but come on…

Oh, one final note for today…if you stay at the POP, prepare for really low flow water in the bathroom sink. I counted exactly 8 little streams of water that wouldn’t knock a fruit fly out of the air. I thought about fixing that little problem, “Hey honey, where’s my Leatherman?” “It’s at home dear.” “Damn it….”

 

[PRWPMP]

Saturday, January 7th, 2006:

Magic Kingdom Day or “TWO TICKETS TO THE GUN SHOW”

Okay, it’s a little chilly this morning. Its not light yourself on fire to stay warm cold…for the love of all that is holy…but its chilly.

We are up at 7am to get showered, get breakfast and get in line for the MK bus by 8:15am. With a 9am opening, we should get there in plenty of time. The bus driver said it might take an extra 5 minutes getting to MK as they have to re-route around the half-marathon by taking that pretty drive past Fort Wilderness. Okay, no problem, we’ll still make rope drop.

Yep, you guessed it. Traffic jam!!! Practically every bus that WDW owns was in this line of traffic trying to get to the TTC because the half-marathoners were on the road that takes you to the Contemporary and the MK bus stops. After about 15 minutes of heavy sighing and confirming with my Mickey watch that we weren’t going to make rope drop, we finally started moving. The bus driver said that the half-marathoners were finally clear and we could proceed directly to the MK bus stops. YAY!!!

10 minutes after rope drop, we are walking down Main Street USA and there is absolutely NO ONE here!!! This was really weird. Seriously, we cut through where Frontierland meets up with Liberty Square and headed back to Splash and we were the ONLY ones on the street. We started with Splash and had the entire boat to ourselves. We could have stayed on, but being wet and chilly isn’t a good combination. BTMRR was next and again, the entire train to ourselves. Okay, so let’s try all the mountain ranges then. We walked right on Space Mountain and had to share the rocket with another couple. So that’s all 3 mountains in the time it takes to walk between them and ride them. Sweet!!!

People finally started filling up the park after our “mountaineering” and we decided to start in Tomorrowland and make a counter-clockwise tour around the Magic Kingdom. The crowds were minimal and we even did some things we usually skip, like Stitch. It was a very relaxing tour.

Can I interject something here? Of course I can…its my damned trip report. We saw the funniest thing today. So, its chilly right? And, to the locals its damned cold. Well, we saw two guys who must be from Ketch-A-Moose, Canada or something because here it is…chilly by our own admission…and they are wearing their tank top shirts, showing off their “guns.” Reminded me of the movie Anchorman, when Will Ferrell’s character was offering “two tickets to the gun show.” Freakin’ hilarious.

After doing everything we wanted to do at MK, we took the resort monorail to check out the bar situation at the Poly. Not sure what was happening there, but the bars and lounge areas were packed with people. We skipped it and headed back to POP for dinner and some relaxing cocktails in our room. Thank GOD for the refillable mug program. It was only day one and we had our money’s worth.

Oh, one final note for today…if your kid freaks out when Mickey pats his precious little head, what makes you think that the intense experience of total darkness, Stitch’s chili dog breath and canned screaming will be a good idea? I thought about fixing that little problem, “Hey honey, where’s my Leatherman?” “It’s at home dear.” “Damn it….”

 

[THE HAT]

love pop...love a cocktail......and am loving your trip report too!!!

 

[VanniGirl]

Looking forward to the rest.

 

[OhMari]

It's not cold till the snot freezes in your nose


What is a Leatherman? Is it something you keep your tools in?

 

[Grammyof2]

Great report. Keep em coming!

 

[cjsmith]

Oh my God, these have got to be some of the best reports that I've ever read! You and your dame sound like a lot of fun, too bad we weren't there to join you in some cocktails!!!!

 

[hentob]

Subscribing...this is gonna be fun

 

[PRWPMP]

Hoping to get a few more days of the trip done today. Work, as usual, is getting in the way.

OhMari...a Leatherman is a multi-tool...like a Swiss Army Knife on steroids.

Thanks everyone for the comments...more soon.

 

[PRWPMP]

Sunday, January 8th, 2006:

EPCOT Day or “NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL A CAPPY & COKE”

It’s annoying to keep saying we got up, had breakfast, yadda, yadda, yadda every single day isn’t it? So no more!!!

Today was EPCOT day and we arrived at the park about 5 minutes after rope drop. You do realize that, for someone with Disney OCD, these little things eat away at you until you are left sitting on a bench with your head between your knees right? I mean, you plan and you plan and then everything goes to hell and you lose 5 minutes of valuable park time. I’ll be okay…whew…after a cocktail.

Things were a bit crowded when we arrived but it was really just due to the people cheering on the marathoners. You really do need to give these people credit. I can barely stand driving for 26 miles much less the thought of running it. I would say that these people are dedicated and self-disciplined, but that would take away from accurate descriptions like insane, stupid, crazy, and bizarre.

Sorry about the side-track there, we followed all of the other lemmings to Soarin’ to make sure we caught this before the FPs were all gone. This is new for us since we last came in December 2004 and I have to tell you, it was absolutely awesome!!! It definitely gets added to the “Favorites” list. Just be sure to remember to breathe during the attraction or you will miss some of the best details. I’m sorry? Oh, right. You probably didn’t need a reminder to breathe did you?

We were going to proceed directly to TT but decided to just start at The Living Seas and work our way around Future World in a counter-clockwise fashion. We were originally going to do Disney Studios today but a few weeks before the trip, Disney announced that TT was going to go into rehab on Monday the 9th. I adjusted the trip plan accordingly (see, I can adapt in the face of change) and here we are.

We actually did every pavilion, every attraction in Future World. I can’t ever remember doing that before. We even did JIYI and found it different from the last time. Of course, we the “last time” was over 6 years ago, so you might expect that. It used to be REALLY lame, now its just regular old lame. Lines were pretty minimal for everything. I think TT was the longest at 20 minutes. Had to do the singles line for Mission:Space since Michelle is not good at things that spin and move erratically. Weird how she is able to live with me. But I digress.

You know what? No, you probably don’t. Well, you could try to guess but it really would waste a lot of time. Okay, so anyway, we really got screwed on ride audio this trip. Our TT car didn’t have any audio at all…just static. At Disney Studios (wait...thats in the future) we didn’t have audio on the RNRC. At MK, we didn’t have audio on the Haunted Mansion. I suppose one explanation is that the Captain and Cokes are making me deaf, but the odds on that are pretty slim. The real explanation likely has something to do with attractions that aren’t being refurb’d often enough.

We lunched at the Electric Umbrella and headed back to the World Showcase. We started with Mexico and took a clockwise tour around. You know, when you don’t have kids along, you actually discover there are shops and places to eat and places to just sit and even a ride or two here and there. Cool. By the time we got to the UK, the fine balance of rum symbiosis I had managed to keep well maintained was beginning to get out of balance. We limped into Rose and Crown and ordered a pint of Stella Artois for the lady and hinted strongly to the nice bartender that a Cappy & Coke in a pint glass would equal a large tip. He just shrugged and said…”Okay, so you want a double?” Honest to God!!! Someone who finally understands me and my needs. Now that’s what I call a Cappy!!! You know what is really obscene? That double Cappy in a pint glass cost the exact same as the thimble of Cappy at Raglin Road. I guess it pays to shop around.

After living the dream that is (E)very (P)erson (C)omes (O)ut (T)ired, we made our way back to Pop for dinner and a sleepy time cocktail.

Oh, and one final note for today…if I ever catch you running down the hallway outside my room with your loud wheeled luggage, followed by at least 52 members of your family, each with a loud piece of wheeled luggage, I WILL get out of bed and beat you with a sock full of pennies. What they need along the room hallways at Pop are little wheeled luggage speed bumps. I thought about fixing that little problem, “Hey honey, where’s my Leatherman?” “It’s at home dear.” “Damn it….”

 

[horsegirl]

Oh, and one final note for today…if I ever catch you running down the hallway outside my room with your loud wheeled luggage, followed by at least 52 members of your family, each with a loud piece of wheeled luggage, I WILL get out of bed and beat you with a sock full of pennies.

Ah, Ha, Ha , Ha!!!!!!!!! Too funny!

 

[PRWPMP]

Monday, January 9th, 2006:

Disney Studios Day or “HEY…THAT @#*&^#ING BIRD JUST ‘SHEET’ UPON ME”

YAY!!!! We finally made a rope drop today. Of course, standing over Michelle with my foot tapping as she made a valiant attempt to inhale her breakfast may have helped, but who’s to say? I’m a firm believer in forcing people to adopt my strict schedule adherence. Anywho…we are at the Studios 10 minutes BEFORE rope drop and get to listen to the opening ceremonies. After the musical interlude, we are WALKed back to the RNRC/TOT area despite a whole family RUNning past the CMs and who are ignoring the CMs plea to WALK. We WALK through the turnstiles at RNRC and WALK into the pre-show only to stand right next the family who RAN. Oh…hello…losers…how was the run?

I have to admit that anything that launches you from 0 to 60mph in 2 seconds is perhaps mankind’s greatest achievement. So we walked on the moon…who cares. I just went from 0 to 60mph in 2 freakin’ seconds!!! We did the RNRC twice in a row, then did TOT, then sat down with an ice cold water for about 20 minutes. That’s a lot of G’s for two people, this early in the morning, without a fresh cocktail. Whew…

We really took a lazy trip around the Studios today, making sure we hit our favorites before our PS/ADR at SciFi for lunch. The crowds again were not too bad because we were able to do RNRC twice, TOT, The Animation tour (this sucks since they removed the ability to gawk at animators who are trying to work whilst being gawked at), the One Man’s Dream exhibit, and the Great Movie Ride before lunch.

SciFi has been one of our favorites for a long, long time. We were seated in the back seat, presumably because we had that look like we were gonna do the nasty at any second. In the front two seats was a very nice family from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan which is only a stone’s throw from Green Bay, as the crow flies. Yummy lunch. Somehow, the regular old chocolate malt sounded better than the Space Monkey, but we managed to survive the 40 minutes without alcohol.

After lunch we just walked, and talked, and did an attraction here and there. I couldn’t find “A Net Full of Jello” this time at the Muppets movie, and became terribly distraught. So distraught, in fact, that we left the Studios. No…really its only because the Studios is still just a half-day park for us because we don’t really get into shows and parades. Rather than waste half of a MYW ticket day, we hopped a bus to the TTC with the goal of strolling through the MK for the rest of the afternoon.

Whoa…holy sea of humanity!!!!! There were people in MY theme park. How dare they show up en masse when I want to take a trip to my Laughing Place!!! We took a walk to each land, hoping it was just one big Brazilian tour group, but quickly found out that it was just about every attendee of the massive International Builders Association conference and their spouses/kids. Okay, this required a quick change of plans. Let’s see, what can two people do with the rest of their afternoon at Walt Disney World?

I know the suspense is killing you, but we simply hopped on a boat to the Poly and sat down at the Barefoot Pool Bar. The boat ride was awesome. Gliding across water that is not rock hard in January is always a treat. A reasonably sized Cappy later, we walked into the Poly to have a look around. You’ll never guess what they have up on the second floor. Nope, you’ll never guess. Okay, so if you guessed the Tambu Lounge, you guessed correctly. Another reasonably sized Cappy later, we walked back down to the dock to catch a boat back to MK.

And this is where the day turned from blissful heaven to a freakish nightmare. Here I am, sitting on a little wooden bench. Allowing the rum to work its magic through my bloodstream. Minding my own business. Contemplating the reason I had never before considered starting my day with a Cappy instead of finishing it with one. And then it happened…a damned seagull shat upon me. Since the moddy’s will likely put the little dots over the word $H!T, let’s just call it “sheet.” Yepper, I had been the helpless victim of bird sheet. Right on the top of the hand. Michelle was somewhere between freaking out and laughing hysterically as I tried to find something, anything to wipe off the sheet from my hand. There was a brief discussion that she was never again going to allow me to touch her with that hand when I reminded her of the lengthy process it would take to re-learn doing certain things with my elbow or feet that I had come close to perfecting in the last 12 years or so. Ahem….so I find a paper bag, some sandpaper, an SOS pad and lots and lots of soap and we are off to the MK to catch the bus back to POP.

After more hand washing, we ate at the POP food court, played some games in the game room, and retired for the evening with some cocktails and learning how to use my left hand to…ahem…never mind.

Oh, and one final note for today…thanks to the Imagineers who were able to create such a life-like animatronic seagull that actually flew right over my hand and was able to duplicate the realism of a “flying rat.” It truly was a magical Disney moment. As such “realism” landed on my hand, I had to only wonder what the Imagineers would be up to next. Perhaps they could build little bird sheet protective screens to sit under? I thought about fixing that little problem myself, “Hey honey, where’s my Leatherman?” “It’s at home dear.” “Damn it….”

 

[scotthart]

Really enjoying your report. My wife and I truly enjoy WDW without the (six) kids, something our friends just cannot understand. To those people I say "bars everywhere and buses to drag my happy butt home" . How could anything be better than that? Please keep the installments coming!

 

[momofdbsdc]

Your trip report is AWESOME!!!I am enjoying every moment!!! Here's to ya!

 

[BionicEar]

This is fabulous so far! Yesterday, I managed to talk DH into a "no-kids-weekend" to WDW for the Epcot F&W. Yay!

I may not have a great trip report like Vettechick's but I'll certainly do my best.

Like you, we want to drink alone too!

 

[mommyintn]

Love the reports! Can't wait to hear the rest.

 

[fizz13]

Had to subscribe, fantastic reports,

Claire xx

 

[Alicnwondrln]

great trip report

 

[liamsaunt]

So very very funny! Thank you. I am printing this one out for the DH to read. You sound like our type of people!