08 Graduation Trip!

[jenakate]

It's taken me almost all summer to convince myself to write this. I came up with one excuse after another, including not having time. Well, I really don't have time...in fact I leave for college in about 3 weeks. Which brings me to my explanation of what this trip report will be. I'm going to do highlights of my trip since, when I leave for school, I'll be taking my Disney-pictureless lap top.

So....here I go!

This trip is in celebration of my high school graduation!

Dates: May 26-June 12
Resort: Fort Wilderness (We always camp at Ft. Wilderness to save money and stay longer!)

Cast of Characters...

Jena: Me! I've been to Disney World 5 times, including the trip when I was five (and I don't really remember it). My favorite park is EPCOT. I love to watch all the performances at Disney World. This fall, I'll be a freshman in college and double majoring in Vocal Performance and International Studies with a minor in Spanish.

Carole (Mom): Although she doesn't have much time for trip planning since she is the president of a credit union, my mom taught me how to travel and enjoy Disney. She is my best friend

John (Dad): My dad is definitely the time manager of our trips. He's all about maxmizing time. Unlike lots of Dad's I read about on the boards, my dad LOVES Disney World and isn't afraid to admit it.

Joelle (15): My little sister. She loves Disney as well...but not as much as me Joelle really likes to take pictures at Disney World and, like the rest of the family, her favorite park is EPCOT.

Jordan (26): My big brother. Jordan lives in Colorado and flew to Orlando to meet us. He only got to stay for about four days...one of which was his birthday!

I have three other siblings (we are a blended family) who couldn't come along because of work etc. They're all in their twenties and one of them is Jordan's twin.

I guess I could put a paragraph here about how much I love Disney...but honestly, I don't think my words would do my feelings justice...so I'll just leave that part out and let you see for yourself through my pictures and experiences.

On the Road Again...Page 1 #8
And So It Begins...Page 1 #10
The Calm Before the Storm...Page 1 #11
Birthday...Disney Style...Page 1 #15
A Breakfast of Royal Proportions...Page 2 #20
Inside the Seas...Page 2 #25
Can I Have Your Autograph?...Page 2 #26
Wrapping Up...Page 3 #36
Still Wrapping Up...Page 3 #37 (Final Post)

 

[reyasmommy]

First of all CONGRATS on your HS graduation. My first trip to WDW was for my HS graduation ((which was a million years ago))

Can't wait to hear more!

 

[OhMari]

My dd just graduated too.

Did you stay in the cabins at Fort Wilderness, or a tent or a travel trailer?

I'm just wondering, since we have a really big travel trailer 48 ft. My son moto-cross races, so the front half is living quarters and the back half is for his 4-wheeler race bikes. I so want to camp at WDW. My dh doesn't want to pull the trailer that far. I am really looking forward to your TR. We don't get to many people that report that stay at Fort Wilderness.

 

[FauntleroyFAN07]

all right i love FW, cant wait to read it,

and ohmari, i will do a TR when i got to FW in fall of 2010 for 2 weeks with my parents, i will have tons of pics for you..

 

[OhMari]

all right i love FW, cant wait to read it,

and ohmari, i will do a TR when i got to FW in fall of 2010 for 2 weeks with my parents, i will have tons of pics for you..

 

[jenakate]

reyasmommy: Thanks so much! It's good to finally be done with high school

OhMari: We've camped at Ft. Wilderness 3 times. The first time, we had a pop up camper that we rented in Orlando. But, we decided that we didn't really like it. So the last two trips, we've used a tent. It can get hot but if you come prepared it's totally worth it. The activities are endless...we always bring our bikes and LOVE riding around the grounds.

FauntleroyFAN07: Thanks! I love Ft. Wilderness too..can't wait to read your trip report in '10!!

 

[irky416]

Congrats on graduating!

I can't wait to hear about your trip.

 

[jenakate]

This is what I used to count down to our trip

My dad and I left the day after I graduated. Since I was a senior, I didn't have to make up snow days, but my little sister did. So my mom and sister flew down when my sister was done with school.

This is our intense trailer. My dad is a master packer...and has to be since we camp and bring sooo much in order to be comfortable.

I colored this on the way down...and then wrote "We're going to Disney World" on it and hung it in the window...lol

Like I said, this is going to be an abbreviated trip report, so things will come at you fast...

After two days of driving, we got to Ft. Wilderness at 8:40 p.m.

I thought this was cool...really, it's just my stupid camera having problems in the dark lol



We set up the tent and sleptttttt

 

[OhMari]

Thanks for telling me. I actually saw someone on here, that set a "air conditioner" into the tent. It was the funniest thing I ever saw.

 

[jenakate]

Alright...this is going to be a looonng post.

Wednesday

We woke up the next morning and ended up switching sites for a more private, shaded spot. Campsite 2042 was our home

After getting everything set up, we went to DTD for lunch. I read about everyone’s love for Earl of Sandwich on the Dis and decided I had to try it. I SCARFED down my sandwich…it was very good. I can’t remember what I got but here’s a picture…

After lunch we went to Wal*Mart to load up on groceries and then came back and unloaded. After all of that, it was already time for dinner, so we grilled some hot dogs.

Later we took a boat to the MK and rode around on the monorail It was a good inaugural ride. We sat in front on the ride to EPCOT and right as we were going past, Illuminations was starting…suuuuuch a cool view. We then got off at the MK and watched Wishes from out front. This was so cool. We had a nice bench and good not only hear the music but see the fireworks.

Thursday

On Thursday, we slept in and then went to Typhoon Lagoon.

We have tons of water park days built up on our tickets so we only stayed for a few hours. We snorkeled with the sharks- one of our favorite things to do. If you’ve never done this, I definitely recommend it. Go slow, though, so that you can really see everything.

We came back and had beef stew for dinner. Check out the cute plating that my Dad did…

(We saved that plate from the AK in like...'04)

We watched National Treasure on my Dad’s lap top later that night. It’s one of our favorite movies.


Friday

Dad and I woke up at 7:40ish and got showered. We took the bus down to the dock and got on a boat to the Contemporary. Our objective today was to walk around some of our favorite resorts And to use every form of transportation available…which we did. That wasn’t really our goal…I was kidding…

Let me share with you our day by transportation

Settlement bus to Contemporary boat launch
Monorail to Polynesian
Monorail to Floridian
Boat back to Polynesian
Straight to the Monorail for Contemporary
Boat back to Fort Wilderness
Bus back to Campsite

Holy cow. It was tiring. While at the Contemporary, we stopped for lunch at the Concourse Steakhouse. LITTLE DID I KNOW that in just a few short days, this restaurant would no longer be, well, a restaurant. So it was very cool to get to eat there before it was closed.


Before…

After...

Hahahahahaha

Later that night on our way to the settlement, I saw this…

I thought all you croc lovers would enjoy that.

We went to Chip and Dale’s Campfire that night and saw Enchanted.

At about 11:30, Dad and I headed up to the outpost to wait for Mom and Joelle’s Magical Express arrival. They didn’t come til 12:00a.m.! Obviously, after riding a bus back to camp, we went right to sleep.

 

[jenakate]

Well, um, the title of this post is a little deceiving…because there really was no “storm” after Saturday…but it was the only title I could think of.

Saturday

Saturday was another day out of the parks. We were trying to wait for Jordan so we could all go in together.

I woke up at about 9:45a.m. and had breakfast. Dad had gone to get a golf cart earlier that morning. For years we’ve wanted to get a golf cart to ride around in and have fun at the Ft with. Here’s the cart…

Here’s a picture of the pool…just for fun.

After swimming and dealing with some cart issues, we went to DTD and ate at Rainforest Café. I got my travel journal at WWoD…

This is on the bus ride home…

Mom!!

Dad!!

And Joelle…being weird.

So there’s your introduction to the family.

After going home and hanging out around the Fort (and maximizing our day w/ a golf cart!), we got our traditional Trail’s End pizza and watched Wishes from the beach.

Trail’s End

No music, but still pretty cool



Sunday, June 1

Reading back through my trip journal, this day was so fun. We were up by about 6:20a.m. and almost made rope drop…I could hear it from the boat.

I have never been to a rope drop at the Magic Kingdom. I don’t really know why…I think we pretty much always miss it by about 10 minutes.

In computer class this year, one of our projects was to make a t-shirt using only Miscrosoft Word to create the template. I decided (obviously) to make something Disney inspired. I picked a bunch of Disney pictures from over the years and combined them to make this shirt for my Dad...

He got compliments all day and one guy thought he was a CM!!! hahaha

That morning, there was a lot of smoke and ash in the air. A forest fire had broken out east of I-9. Here’s a picture of it from the day before at DTD.

Anyway, after riding Space Mountain and a few others, we made our way to Tom Sawyer’s Island. Everyone else was tired, so they took a break over by Aunt Polly’s (by the way, what’s the deal with Aunt Polly’s?! Out of our four trips in the past 6 years, it has only been opened once!). Jordan and I decided to explore, though. We went up to, I guess it’s called, the Fort and played an intense game of checkers. We also shot at the Thunder Mountain riders as they shot (no pun intended) by. Later, when we rode Thunder, we used our “finger guns” and shot up towards the fort just in case anyone was up there

Later, while Mom, Dad, and Joelle watched the parade, Jordan and I walked onto Haunted Mansion. I wasn’t too impressed by the renovations but the ride was fun like always. And yay for skipping parades and walking onto HM because when we walked by later, the line was back almost to the Riverboat cue.

After taking a break and swimming back at FW, we headed back to MK.

We watched Wishes from a very weird spot that night- the side/back of the castle. I don’t recommend it. Very weird.

By the way, I love Monter’s Inc Laugh Floor.

 

[MeMom]

Just wanted to drop in and say I am enjoying your report. It will be interesting to hear about someone who does the tent camping.

Thanks for sharing your pictures. Every trip we say we're going to try to go over and do the outdoor movie, but we haven't gotten around to it yet. We'll keep it on our list, and eventually we'll get there!

 

[FauntleroyFAN07]

wow lots of pics, and all the shots of FW are bringing back such good memories growing up there....can not wait till i am there again in a few years.


we hope to visit during our christmas trip this year

 

[jenakate]

MeMom: I'm so glad you're enjoying the report! And thanks for saying so You should definitely try the outdoor movie. You can make s'mores there too w/ the big fires that FW makes. I recommend bringing lawn chairs if you're looking for comfort!!

FauntleroyFan07: I just noticed that you're a cubs fan. ME TOO!!!! My brothers lived there for about 7 years while they were growing up so they passed the Cubby dedication on to my little sister and me. My dad is a die hard Cardinals fan so things at home are always interesting during baseball season Oh, and I'm glad I'm bringing back childhood memories for you.

 

[jenakate]

Monday, June 2

This was our MGM (Hollywood Studios) day. The most exciting thing that happened was riding the new Toy Story ride. Holy cow. If you haven’t ridden this, get pumped because when you do you will love it.

Oh, and for those of you who are LOST fans, when we ate at the Commissary for lunch, the tv’s had on a little program that was attempting to sum up the last four seasons of LOST in about 15 minutes. It was pretty funny. For those of you who don’t watch LOST, it’s pretty difficult to sum this show up in any short period of time.


Tuesday, June 3

I know I skipped a lot of Monday, but that’s because Tuesday was very exciting. It was exciting because Tuesday, June 3rd, was Jordan’s birthday!!!!

We started the day at AK with plans to head over to EPCOT. Jordan had never ridden Everest so we, of course, did that. We also watched the Lion King…this is my all-time, absolute, most favorite Disney show.

Joelle took this one...

While Jordan and Joelle rode Kali, Mom, Dad, and I went to Epcot to get FP’s for Soarin’. When the other two arrived we stopped and had lunch. We always pack sandwiches etc for lunch in the parks to save money. While we ate, Mom and Dad had Jordan decide where he wanted to eat his birthday dinner. He picked Morocco CS but Mom and Dad said that it was his birthday…he should have Marakesh! Oh em geeee. I was so stoked. But I was pretty sure that everyone in my family was going to hate the food…my mom and I are the only adventurous people when it comes to food. Anyway, we went to try and get reservations and, lucky us, there was a table available at 8pm. So after that we headed over to World Showcase. On the boat ride over to the American Pavilion (we were on our way to hear Voices of Liberty…my other favorite performing group), the entire boat sang Happy Birthday to Jordan at the prompting of a very nice cast member. I wasn’t on the boat, though. I decided I would walk…I ended up arriving before the rest of my family. My dad called and told me what the boat had done and said I should talk to a CM and see if VoL could sing to Jordan too. So I did. And they did. And it was SO cool.

After that, we headed back over to Future World to use our Soarin’ FP’s. However, earlier in the day Jordan had mentioned wanting to do the Behind the Seeds Tour, and Mom and Dad paid for the three of us kids to go. Jordan felt really bad because he didn’t know it cost anything…but it was totally worth it. It lasted about…an hour and a half I think? Here are some pictures from it…

This is a picture of the boats...get it? Because I'm not in one...

If you care at all about plants/gardening, you would love this tour. And it isn't bad for kids either! They have some cool interactive things to do...

After a few more hours of rides in Future World (including the new SE…which is fun…but I miss the old one ), we dodged a few deluges (is that the plural of deluge?) of rain and made it to our Marakesh reservation at 8:05.We had a great waiter named Hoham. He took a really cute picture with Jordan in honor of his birthday…

They switched hats

I had the beef cous cous and it was very, very good.

We finished eating at 9:11 and went outside and caught the end of Illuminations. We had EMH and didn’t get home ‘til 12:30am. I was POOPED!

 

[OhMari]

Does your mom know you posted that picture of her. My dd's are always taking crazy pictures of me too.

Really enjoying your TR. I didn't know you could get a golf cart at the camp site. Does Disney rent these or another company.

 

[jenakate]

I just told my mom...I just took off the picture...lol

Yeah-- you can rent them right through Disney! They have a little building where they rent out canoes, bikes, golf carts, sports equipt., etc etc. TONS of people at FW get the golf carts. They are very popular. But, just so you know, you have to be a licensed driver to drive one. Most people don't obey that rule, but we do...and just in case you wanted to too, I thought I'd tell you so your dd's aren't dissapointed

 

[irky416]

Great updates. I'm enjoying all your pictures.

 

[jenakate]

irky416: Glad you're enjoying it!!! Thanks for letting me know

 

[jenakate]

The 4th of June, Jordan went home. It was a sad day…but also very uneventful…so I’m skipping it.

Thursday, June 5th

This was the day I’d been waiting for my whole life. It was the day in which I would eat inside Cinderella’s Castle. When I found out at age 13 that this was possible, I knew my life would never be complete until I had experienced the Royal Table.

Hahaha. No but really. I had never had the chance to eat at Royal Table before and it was seriously one of the things I was most excited and interested in doing in all of Disney World for about six years. We’d made reservations before but things always got derailed for one reason or another. But now finally, my dream was coming true!

We made reservations for breakfast because, after hearing about it on the dis, I knew we could get in before the park opened and experience the empty streets while also snapping the coveted ‘castle with no people’ shot.

We woke up at 6 on Thursday morning and left the campsite at 7:22. We arrived at MK at about 7:50. Here’s a shot of me, Mom, and Joelle (from left to right )

We checked in and were shortly escorted to a small and fast moving line to see Cinderella. We got a family picture with her She was a very good Cinderella. Joelle and I were given wands on our way up the stairs. I knew they gave wands to little girls but I didn’t know if they’d give them to teenagers…I was, needless to say, very ecstatic to see that they did. Looking back at my trip journal, my description of CRT took up two and a half pages…hahaha. I’ll directly quote my journal for the rest…

It was beautiful upstairs! The sun was shining through the stain glass windows, the dining room was nearly empty, and it was so beautiful and “castle-like.” We got a table near the middle (not by the window, but still nice).

The food was great! There were only two choices but that was okay with me because it made deciding easier.

All the food is all-you-can-eat; French toast stuffed with cream cheese, bacon, sausage, potatoes, and eggs.

The princesses came around and visited shortly after we got our food. Joelle and I already had their autographs but we had them resign just for fun. And also because I wanted to see if their signatures were the same as a few years ago. They weren’t. Here are some pictures of us w/ the princesses…

Joelle and I thought this was HILARIOUS. It was just really funny to look over and see the little girl with her hand around Jasmine’s hair instead of her waist…

There was a wishing ceremony near the end of our meal. This is where the want comes in. The whole thing is cute…but pretty cheesy. You use your wand and the little rubber star they give you to make a wish while closing your eyes and saying the magic words. When you open your eyes there are lights flashing all over the room.

On our way out, there was a little girl (probably about 5 years old) coming up the stairs saying to her mom, “I have a wand! I have a wand! I have a wand!” And I thought, “Oh, that’s cute…she really likes the wand.” And then she says, “Why do I have a wand?” HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Too funny. That’s exactly what I thought when I got mine! Oh man…priceless.

So after breakfast we started the rides. Remember a few posts ago when I said I loved the Monster’s Inc. Laugh Floor? Well…I loved it even more after today. For those of you who haven’t been to it yet, you can text in jokes while you wait and then they use a couple in the show. On the first day, they used one of Joelle’s and I was very jealous lol. But then this time, they used TWO of my jokes and said I was the funniest girl in Missouri!!! (That’s where I’m from…you text in your home state w/ the joke.)

We headed back to camp and took naps at about 4. We ate dinner and then got back to the park about 8 and went to our favorite fireworks spot- Tomorrowland Terrace. Mom waited with the seats while Dad and Joe went shopping. I went off on my own to ride TTA and Carousel of Progress. This was seriously one of the best times of the trip. As an 18 year old traveling with her family, I don’t get much time to myself to just enjoy my surroundings…so this was really special.

After Wishes, they had an extra Spectro showing. I guess everyone else in Magic Kingdom was tired…because we went over by LTT and sat on BENCHES to watch the parade. BENCHES!!! There was NO ONE in front of us!!!

See?! Empty.

Uh-May-Zing Day. Oh and sorry that this post has a GUH-JILLION pictures.