The Trip That Put a Diser to Shame - AKA That's the Way the Cookie Crumbles

[Heffielump]

This is the trip that put a Diser to shame! The Diser being me.

I'm a 29 year old Marketing & Communications Manager for a large multinational company based in Toronto, Canada. I have a few loves:

1. My job because it allows me to travel all around the world, including around WDW.

2. Disney and all its wonderful characters. My favorite Disney character is Pooh (and all his lovely friends) and my favorite Disney princess is Ariel.

3. Food. I work for food, travel for food, live for food. I've even spent time working in my favorite restaurant in Toronto just to get closer to food. In another lifetime I think I would have been a pastry chef.

How this trip came to be...

Part of my job is to travel...a lot. I'm usually traveling at least once every two weeks for up to three weeks at a time. This trip came about because of a conference at the Hilton Bonnet Creek Resort. The original plan was to fly from Toronto (YYZ) to Orlando (MCO) on 3/26 and leave on 4/1 with work from 3/28 - 3/30, but I needed to be at our corporate offices in New Jersey from 3/22 to 3/26. This was going to be one of those extended trips which was fine except for the packing issue. Going from a cold climate to a warm/hot climate in one trip. Either way, I was going down the street from WDW!

The Original Plan
The original plan changed a few times, with the potential for added cast members, but you'll have to wait and see who really showed up!

With only two full free days in Orlando (3/27 and 3/31), the plan was to attack Magic Kingdom and Epcot on a two-day park hopper. I had it all worked out, spreadsheets and all! You'll see this isn't exactly how the cookie ended up crumbling...

This is really my first TR, so if you're out there, I could use some encouragement!!!

 

[francis6306]

Oh darn... your job MADE you go to Orlando? And stay so close to Disney?? What a shame... can't wait to hear more!

 

[jpmandan]

 

[camsmomE]

Sending encouragement your way

Sounds like it's going to be a great report!

 

[clandrum]

Looking forward to more!

 

[Heffielump]

Oh darn... your job MADE you go to Orlando? And stay so close to Disney?? What a shame... can't wait to hear more!

I tried to get them to NOT send me, but they wouldn't

Sending encouragement your way

Sounds like it's going to be a great report!

YAY! Thanks for joining in! This was not your typical WDW trip!

Looking forward to more!

Thanks for reading!

 

[Heffielump]

Departure Day

My departure day on March 26th started from my hotel in Morristown, New Jersey. After arriving in NJ on the 21st and spending four full days in meetings and seeing eight inches of snow, I was ready for some sun and some Disney. I had scheduled my flight to MCO at 3:45pm because of some previously scheduled meetings. As the cookie crumbles, the meetings got cancelled, and all the earlier Continental flights to Orlando were full. That should have been clue #1 that Spring Break was still going on... full flights to Orlando!

After a morning of e-mails and catching up on some work from my hotel, I departed for Newark airport. If anyone has ever flown from Newark, you'll know it is one of the worst airports...ever! Despite the fact that I was in the new Continental terminal (I normally fly out of Terminal C back to Toronto, which is overdue for renovations by about 20 years!), there was no guarantee that the flight would take off on time.

Thankfully check-in was a breeze, they didn't charge me for my overweight suitcase and I had time for a late lunch at the Oyster Bar. I also managed to avoid Crumbs bakery which has some of the biggest and best cupcakes in the world...there was a Mickey rice krispie calling my name instead.

The flight was uneventful and before I knew it I was riding the fake monorail to baggage claim and hopping in a taxi towards my hotel. By this time it was already 7:00pm and my hopes of making it to DTD were quickly fading, as was I!

Up next - would I make it to DTD?!?

 

[Mrs. Sojourner]

Can't wait to hear more about your trip!

 

[Heffielump]

At long last I arrived at the Waldorf Astoria Orlando. The cab driver was super nice and warned me to stay away from MK on a Saturday in the middle of Spring Break... oops

Check in was a breeze and my request for a king bed, on a high floor with a Disney view was made. If I wasn't going to make it to the parks, I could at least enjoy the fireworks from the comfort of my own room . For those that know me, I'm a HUGE fireworks nut. There is just something magical about fireworks and Disney does them best!

By the time I got to my room it was almost 8pm, DTD was out, but I wanted to check out the property before the conference began.

Background info:
Part of my job is to plan an international conference, I have an amazing event planner that works with me (aka Snow White, who was also in Orlando! ), but we also hire vendors to help us out. Earlier this year, we had our conference where I met our event vendors. I'll call them Lily Pad and Bashful They're some of the nicest and sweetest people ever. All of us are usually flying around the world so when I found out they were going to be in Orlando working the conference I got super excited!

Wandering around the property, I have to say the Waldorf/Hilton property is really beautiful and well done. It almost has the GF feel to it, without being on Disney property.

After wandering around, I literally ran into my Lily Pad and Bashful , call it a little pixie dust Lily Pad and I had one of those girly moments where we saw each other and just screamed and started jumping up and down. I missed seeing Snow White, but I was just happy to see Lily Pad and Bashful!

After a little reunion, I headed back upstairs to my room just in time to catch Illuminations. Ahhhhh Disney

As the cookie crumbled, I didn't make it to DTD that night. But I still saw my fireworks and sometimes Disney magic happens outside the parks too!

 

[francis6306]

That's good that you still had a little disney magic your first night therer!

 

[Heffielump]

That's good that you still had a little disney magic your first night therer!

Thanks! Lots more Disney magic to come. Thanks for reading! It keeps me motivated to write

 

[Heffielump]

Today was supposed to be my MK day, but the taxi driver and plane full of kids scared me a bit. I had this whole plan to sleep in a bit, register for the conference and head over to MK for a late lunch at Columbia Harbor House before catching the Make a Wish Come True Parade and staying all the way until Wishes. I also had some rides and of course a Pineapple Whip worked into the schedule.

I’m not a huge fan of crowds and the prospect of waiting in line for rides by myself wasn’t exactly appealing. I don’t mind waiting when I have someone with me, but today was a solo day. Out the window went my carefully crafted plans. I took my time getting ready this AM and headed downstairs to register for my conference around 10:30. Note: The Waldorf serves Illy coffee and Tea Forte tea in the lobby every morning – FREE! They usually start around 6:30am and end around 10:30am. I made it down just as they were starting to clear the coffee/tea so I grabbed an English Breakfast Tea Forte tea (not a fan of coffee in the AM, even if it is Illy!) and slipped a Jasmine Green Tea into my bag for later . Headed over to registration where I saw Lily Pad again (YAY!), who was sweet enough to walk me down to pick up my conference “uniform” – not so flattering long-sleeved shirts (since it was a work conference, all employees had to wear special shirts so that everyone could ID us). Picking up my uniform, I saw Snow White – not the real one, but just as exciting for me! Snow White is preggers and is due in late June. I haven’t seen her since late January, and she was barely showing then. But she is now! Snow White made a VERY cute soon-to-be mommy! They showed me the Harry Potter glasses we were going to be giving away for the Harry Potter night (stay tuned!), and I managed to snap a pic of Bashful wearing them - distorted to protect the innocent! (blackmail for the future!)

Saying bye to Snow White and her dwarves (yes there were others, but they don’t really play a role in this TR…) as well as Lily Pad, I dumped my uniform and registration stuff in my room and headed out… to DTD!

If I wasn’t going to a park today, I figured I might as well spend the afternoon at DTD…

Hilton/Waldorf has a free shuttle that goes to all the Disney parks as well as DTD, but the schedule to DTD was a bit sporadic. Wanting to maximize my time there, I opted instead for a $12 MEARS cab ride. The cab driver dropped me off on the West Side, close to Pleasure Island. Not super ideal considering everything I wanted was in the Marketplace. I still had a nice stroll over in the Florida sun – it was still cold and snowy when I left Toronto and New Jersey, so the fact that I was able to walk around in a tank top, skirt and flip flops made my day

I passed Raglan Road, which curiously enough I had never bothered to notice during my October 2009 trip. I also stopped to look at the Irish merchandise to see if I could find a leprechaun hat for Bashful. Off Topic: Bashful is Irish and speaks with a pretty heavy Irish accent and I’m convinced he would make a very good leprechaun (much to his dismay!). Whenever I see Lucky Charms cereal at the grocery store, I think of him! LOL! And if my international conference ends up in Ireland next year, he’s going to HAVE to dress up like a leprechaun
Back on Topic: No leprechaun hat to be found for Bashful – lucky him! But lots of flags! For some reason I didn’t take any pictures here, I think I was just enjoying being back in Disney… sorry I’m a bad Diser

I was starting to get a bit hungry now, so I headed to the one place I had planned to have dinner the night before – Earl of Sandwich! I’ve had Earl of Sandwich in airports before (remember I spend my life in airports…), but never at Disney, so I was super excited! The line wasn’t too bad as it was probably after peak lunch hours. I was debating between the Original and the Hawaiian. The CM at the cash said the Hawaiian was better, so I went with it since I love pineapple. I also picked up a potato salad and a bottle of water – no dessert for me here, I had other plans! I hunted down a table close to the area where you pick up your sandwiches and before long my buzzer was going off. I have to say I was a bit disappointed with the Hawaiian, maybe it’s because I’m not a huge ham fan. I much prefer chicken, turkey or roast beef. The pineapple was delish, but it just didn’t do the trick and I felt like I should have just stuck with the Original.

Disappointed with lunch, I headed out to do some souvenir shopping. I had a list! I headed to the Lego store, which was under renovations and relocated to a giant yellow tent close to Earl. With the yellow tent and the sun shining in, the whole place had a really uncomfortable yellow glare. I did a quick walk through, but the light was really hurting my eyes, even with sunglasses. I saw a couple of sets that I wanted including the London Bridge, but I was really looking for the Carousel. I decided to think about the London Bridge because I wasn’t sure if I wanted to lug the giant box back on the plane with me.

Leaving the Lego Store, I strolled through Tren-D to look at some sun dresses. Everything in there was super cute, but I couldn’t really see myself wearing any of it. I have problems with buying clothes that I can’t wear to work, just the little part of me that is practical!

My second last stop – the one I had been waiting to go to for eons… World of Disney! This place is part of what I picture heaven to look like (except in heaven it would all be free!!! Hehehe). I knew I needed a few pairs of ears, so I went to the hat section first. A pair of Minnie ears for me, a pair of Minnie ears for a friend’s niece back home, and a pair of Mickey ears for my friend that wasn’t able to come down to Disney. I found a Minnie ears headband that had black sparkles on the ears for me and I hunted down a pair of kids Minnie ears for my friend’s niece. The Mickey ears were more difficult. I originally wanted a Mickey ears headband, but after asking three different CMs, they told me Mickey ears don’t come in headband form because Mickey is for boys?!?! Who knew! I had to settle instead for the standard issue Mickey ears hat. Oh yes, I also needed to get a Bride ears for BFF back home! She’s getting married in September!

Also on my list was a Mickey plush… so I headed to the Plush section. If you read my unfinished PTR, you’ll know that I am addicted to plushies. My one goal was to not bring home every single plushie at WofD. I DID need to find a Mickey plush for a friend’s niece who had visited Disney late last year and gone home with a Minnie plush. This time I was out to find the matching Mickey. This was not as easy as you think. First of all, I had no idea which size Minnie she already had. I knew it wasn’t the giant one (the one that wanted to come home with me…), but there were three smaller sizes. So I spent an hour on the phone and emailing back and forth with my friend trying to figure out which size. It was a matter of “This one is too big”, “This one is too small”. I even ended up asking a cast member for a measuring tape, because they don’t have the sizes of the Mickeys on the tag. The cast member laughed at me and told me to just get one of each! In the end, I picked up Small Mickey and Medium Mickey. Extra Small Mickey and Large Mickey stayed. I resisted Large Mickey, even though he was calling my name. Sorry Minnie! You’ll have to wait until next time to be reunited! I also contemplated getting Piglet for myself. Piglet is the one Pooh character missing from my collection, though I’m not sure what has made me neglect him after all these years.

By the way, did you know Piglet is a BOY?!? I found that out recently, who woulda thunk? He’s PINK! My rationale being – if it’s pink, it’s a girl, instead of Piglet is a pig and pigs are pink, therefore Piglet is Pink.

I walked out of WofD without doing too much damage. Two Mickeys and four pairs of ears. I won’t mention the stuff I put in my basket, but ended up having to put back…

Shopping done, I needed a bit of relaxing time AND a bit of dessert. Ghiradelli here I come!

Normally I’m all about the chocolate, but today I wanted something a little less chocolatey. I opened for the Paradisio – vanilla ice cream, strawberries, hot fudge and topped with a chocolate dipped strawberry. Can you say delish?!?

I took a seat outside on the patio to soak up the sun while waiting for my sundae. I took these pics while waiting - crowds weren’t too bad today so I’m guessing everyone was at the parks!

My sundae arrived and the CM was sweet enough to put down a napkin to catch all the overflowing melting ice cream Yummers!

There was no way I could finish the entire thing, but I sure tried! The couple next to me each ordered a giant peanut butter and chocolate sundae and polished them off easily… not sure how they did it, but they’re clearly better at this ice cream thing than I am!

Coming up next! What happens when they shut down Harry Potter land just for us! And my afternoon at MK!

 

[tony609]

Can't wait for the next installment! The Ice Cream looked really good, I can't recall if I have ever had one there or not. If I did it didn't look that good.

 

[ksl5f123]

I am enjoying your TR. You are really good at adjusting your plans to go with the flow. Your sundae looks really yummy!

 

[Heffielump]

Can't wait for the next installment! The Ice Cream looked really good, I can't recall if I have ever had one there or not. If I did it didn't look that good.

It was very good! I think the fact that it wasn't super hot extended the longevity of the ice cream

I am enjoying your TR. You are really good at adjusting your plans to go with the flow. Your sundae looks really yummy!

Thank you! And thanks for reading! Work trips mean adjusting to the unknown, but I'll take all the Disney I can get!

 

[peterpanlover96]

I love your TR so far!! You seem very upbeat and happy, and I just love it when people are as optimistic as possible in Disney! I will be reading on about your trip/conference until the end

 

[Heffielump]

I love your TR so far!! You seem very upbeat and happy, and I just love it when people are as optimistic as possible in Disney! I will be reading on about your trip/conference until the end

Awww Thanks! I saw that you have a ticker on your signature! Another trip soon for you!

 

[Heffielump]

I’m doing Day Three and Four together because the majority of these days have nothing to do with Disney, but some cool stuff happened anyways! I’ll skip along to the fun parts!

Day Three was set-up day for the conference – nothing terribly exciting except for the chance to have lunch by the pool and then wade into the pool – but only up to the knees. There’s just something wrong about wearing a bathing suit when there are work people around!

Day Four was Harry Potter Night! That’s right, they were shutting down Harry Potter World just for us! The only downside to this day was the rain storms that were coming in from Atlanta. Apparently it had not rained in Orlando for eight months and it decided to rain like cats and dogs all day long. Snow White was NOT happy, but the show must go on!

Dinner was held in one of Hilton’s ballrooms where Snow White transformed the room to resemble the dining hall at Hogwarts. All day long I was trying to peak, but Snow White wouldn’t let me… when I went down for dinner, Bashful walked me in and I think I literally stood there for about 10 minutes with my jaw dropped. The entire room was absolutely STUNNING! Twinkle lights, a huge ball in the center that changed to represent the ceiling changing, long tables. If anyone needs a wedding planner, Snow White is your gal!

It was still raining outside after dinner (hence no camera). So we donned our ponchos and boarded the bus for Harry Potter land. All us uniformed people had to go ahead to welcome our guests, so we were standing in line in the pouring rain for a good hour, but we still had lots of fun! And it was great to see everyone get in the spirit of things. I of course had to wear the Harry Potter glasses they were giving out to everyone

After everyone was in the park, one of my colleagues (hereafter known as Cinderella) headed through the gates into Hogsmeade. We were kind of drenched at that point, but we were getting into things and the whole rainy, misty thing was kind of appropriate for Hogsmeade. Call it a bit of pixie dust in HP world We stopped at the Butterbeer cart to try a non-frozen variety. We actually tried to only get them to fill it half way because we only really wanted to try it, but apparently they are legally obligated to fill it the whole way because it’s a trademarked product. Who knew?!?! It tasted kind of like a super-sweet root beer with caramel melted inside. It was good for the first few sips, but we quickly abandoned it after a few sips each. We didn’t need our tummies rumbling around before Forbidden Journey!

I call Forbidden Journey “The Castle Ride”, because I could never remember what it was called. I was super excited to ride this because I had heard about all the amazing detail that goes into the line and the ride itself. Note: I’m not a roller coaster person, I don’t do well with spinning and tossing around. I’m even hesitant to ride Mission: SPACE on the green side at Epcot! That’s how bad it is… We walked up to Hogwarts, can I say how amazing the theming of this park is? As an avid reader (I read the entire HP series in seven days ), it’s pretty difficult to translate what I see in my head when reading into real life, and they did a pretty darn good job doing it! Outside Hogwarts there are all sorts of warnings about motion sickness and a list about 6 feet long of the different medical conditions that should not get on the ride. I got a bit nervous at this point, but onwards! I didn’t come here to chicken out! I was actually looking for Bashful at this point because he had promised to ride this with me, but I figured I could always go on again with him afterwards right?!?!

The wait time was 5 minutes for this ride! Yes that’s right! 5 minutes! I wish I had taken a picture because based on the stories I’ve heard about, this ride has never had a wait time of 5 minutes! Cinderella and I wandered through the amazing queue, and while we didn’t get the hours upon hours of waiting that allows you to take in every single detail, we were still pretty amazed at the details. My favourite was seeing Dumbledore’s study!

Before we knew it we were ready to board. I was really starting to get nervous at this point so I had to get Cinderella to psyche me up a bit! We sat down in our pods (4 seats each). I made sure to get a middle seat because I didn’t want to go flying off the side. At this point they stopped the ride because apparently someone had gotten sick as they were getting off the ride . This did NOT inspire any confidence in my ability to survive the ride. We sat there for about 5 minutes while they cleaned up (I was actually wondering what was happening to those people in the middle of the ride…were they stuck?). Meanwhile I was starting to chicken out when I saw a couple of our executives in line. Cinderella and I started shouting at them a bit, it must have been the Butterbeer and I was convinced that if THEY could do it, I could do it!

At the beginning of the ride, they kind of swing you up and away. I think my words to Cinderella were “Ohhh my Godddddd!!!”. The ride itself is amazing, the first scene you really feel like your flying! I wish I could tell you more about what you see, but I spent the rest of the ride with my eyes closed, holding on for dear life and praying that I wouldn’t be another one of Voldemort’s victims! I think I opened my eyes for one other part, but that was it! Soon, but not soon enough we were arriving back at the loading dock. And I stumbled off the ride! I survived!!! Cinderella said I was spewing a few phrases throughout the ride, but I really don’t remember saying anything, and if I did they probably wouldn’t be DIS appropriate!

We stumbled into the gift shop to see our ride photos, but the area was too crowded to see anything. I did find Bashful though, who rode the ride without me! *sniff* That’s okay, I was not about to go on that ride again, so I’m glad he went on with the other dwarfs (This might be ammunition for the Leprechaun hat though! ) While we walked out, the Seven Dwarfs were trying to convince me to ride the Dueling Dragons roller coaster… not a chance! I was staying on solid ground after that ride! I managed to “lose” them in the crowd and Cinderella and I went into Hogs Head for much needed drinks!

We hung out in Hogs Head for a bit with my old boss (Donald Duck). They have a pretty good selection of alcoholic beverages in there which made for interesting conversation... I was itching to go explore Hogsmeade a bit so Cinderella, Donald and I wandered out and over to Ollivander’s wand shop. There was a very diligent student outside studying and kept us company while we were waiting to go in. We waited about 5 minutes (another record time!), before going in to see the show. I didn’t get picked (which was disappointing, but fine because tonight was not about me), but it was still amazing and really exciting to see the show.

After the wand show, they deposited us into the gift shop where I picked up a few wands, one for myself and another two for my brother and his GF (who is a HUGE HP fan!). Note the wand that I bought for my Dbro has since broken in half. I told him it was because he was being evil to his DGF and Dumbledore was punishing him Donald picked up a Slytherin T-shirt for his wife. I asked him if he know that Slytherin was the evil house, and he said that's why he picked the Slytherin one . Donld also purchased a wand for his SIL. Cinderella bought a t-shirt for herself and we wandered over to Honeydukes for a bit. We were a bit OD’d on sugar from the few sips of Butterbeer so we passed on more sugar before boarding a bus back to the hotel.

Coming up next - how long would I last at a very crowded MK? Oh and the Mad Hatter's Tea Party!