10 Anniversary Trip to the World...with Pics! 9/23 - 9/30 at WL!

[lucky978]

Cast of Characters –

Me. Mom. 34 years old. Similar to most of you. Disney nut. This is my 7th trip to Disney World. First was with my dad for my 13th birthday. My dad passed away 3 years ago so returning to Disney always reminds me of that trip and how wonderful it was.

DH. 35 years old. Not crazy about going back to Disney “so soon”. Although it’s been 2 years for him. He had no choice, though. This was our 10th Anniversary trip.

DD1 – Twin “A”. 8 years old. She is a Princess for sure. A true “girly girl”. 8 going on 18.

DD2 – Twin “B”. Also 8 years old (obviously). She's is a little “rougher” than her sister. She can be a tomboy at times. Typically…she's is a wise guy always trying to make us laugh.

This is the girls’ 5th trip to Disney. DD2 is much more excited about going and has helped me plan out our days and activities. DD1 just “goes with the flow”. Their relationship is a love-hate relationship. One minute they can’t stand each other, the next minute they’re best friends.

Originally we had booked a Southern Caribbean cruise to celebrate our 10th Wedding Anniversary which is September 28th .

Then along came Free Dining. Lots of “pleeeeeaaaase” and batting our eyelashes at DH and he finally agreed to go back to Disney. I promised him this trip would be different and we would not be commando all week long. Let’s hope I can keep that promise. We were booked for Sunday – Sunday on Southwest Airlines staying at POFQ. We had stayed there before in 2004 and really liked the quaintness of the resort.

However, thanks to these boards I had been reading about the Wilderness Lodge. We’ve visited the lodge before to eat at WCC and always dreamed about staying there. So I looked into it and finally decided to switch my reservation and booked a Courtyard View with Free Dining for 7 nights. Hey –it’s our 10 year anniversary. With everything we’ve been through together in the last 10 years – we deserve it. DH has no idea about what this vacation is costing so what’s the harm? He never gave me a budget…

We live about 20 minutes from Manchester (NH) airport and about 35-40 minutes from Boston’s Logan airport. DH only had one request – we fly out of Manchester. A day after I booked the trip on Southwest Airlines, they released a special. I ended up moving our trip from Sun – Sun to Sat – Sat. Doing this saved me approx. $500 . Unfortunately they won’t refund my money. They just put it in as a credit to be used within the next year. I can do that. I’m sure of it.

So we’re all booked. 7 nights at WL Courtyard Bunk Bed Non-Smoking room requested.

Day 1 – 9/23 Saturday . Our flight wasn’t scheduled until 1:55pm. We left the house at around 11:15am for Manchester Airport. My mom drove us into the airport which was nice. Door to door service. Our flight wasn’t until 1:55pm. Boarded the plane around 1:40 and left about 10 minutes late. No big deal – we still arrived in Orlando on time and were on our way to the Magical Express counter when a poor woman in front of us took a fall . We felt so bad for her and her family. Airport personnel were there to help her and were calling on the proper authorities to help her out. We checked in at ME and were on our bus approx. ½ hour later. Our bus was stopping at WL, GF and Poly I think…but WL was the first stop.

There were about 3 people in front of me at check-in. I sent DH and the kids to WCC to check for availability for dinner. I had tried and tried to book it for our first night but every time I called there was nothing open. He came back and said there would be about an hour wait – which was fine with me. I checked us in – CM was very nice and helpful. All of my requests were granted!!! Courtyard view – Non-smoking – Bunk Beds! We went up to the room to check it out and the girls changed into their bathing suits.

We returned to WCC and waited about 10 min while the girls played with the Lincoln Logs and our table was ready.

The girls were getting cranky and tired. They were not behaving very well and it seemed as all they were doing was complaining and arguing with each other about everything. They wouldn’t do the pony race or participate in any of the activities that were going on.

My patience was wearing thin at this point as well.

I ordered the nacho’s as an appetizer which were pretty good. I had the chicken and pasta dish (which was very good) and DH and DD2 had the skillet. DD1 had the Roasted Chicken Drumsticks with french fries. Neither of the girls’ ate anything and the meal was a bust (although it was FREE so I can’t complain). We took our desserts to go (2 “worms in dirt”, one apple pie and a chocolate cake).

We left WCC and headed for the pool. The girls swam for about an hour which seemed to make happier. We headed to the beach and watched the Electric Light Parade which was great. We really enjoyed it.

Then we headed up to our room. When we returned there was an anniversary card signed by Mickey and Minnie and some balloons for us that read “Happy Anniversary”. Very nice touch by Disney!

Our luggage had arrived, I quickly unpacked got in our jammies, ate some of our desserts and headed to bed. The lodge was absolutely beautiful and our view is perfect.

Beds were very comfy. The girls decided on their own who would sleep on the top bunk and who would sleep on the bottom. There was no arguing about it, which I was worried about. Went to sleep dreaming of a happy day tomorrow at Epcot!

 

[jlcd]

Great start. I love the pics!

 

[pumba]

thanks so much for your report........and yup.....who is going to sleep on the top bunk saga.........we have been there and done that......hahaha
Anxious for more

 

[cyjmhill]

What a great start!

You have very cute kids!

Can't wait to read more!

 

[FatherForce]

We were there the same time as you.
Pretty hot wasn't it?

 

[lucky978]

I had planned our first day to be spent at Epcot. Not sure why, but I think it probably had something to do with tourguidemike.com or some other website recommending this as a "least busy" park for today.

We woke up around 7am to this beautiful view from our room.

The girls ate breakfast on the balcony and did some homework. We showered and got ready and were off to Epcot.

Hopped on the Epcot bus (all the busses at WL were awesome - I don't think we waited more than 5 min for any bus all week). The only problem was this weekend was the triathlon and there were runners for the race throughout the grounds of the resort. The bus was detoured a few times and it felt like it took forever just to get out of the resort. But we still made good time.

We arrived at the park as it was opening and headed to Soarin with the rest of the crowd. On the way we passed by the Character Connection building. There were about 5 CM's standing outside trying to get people to go in and everyone kept walking.

So I stopped and asked what was in the building. "Characters", the CM said. So we entered the building and everyone was yelling and cheering for us. We were the first family to arrive that day!

We had all the characters to ourselves and got some great pictures. We also received a certificate signed by all the characters for being the first family! I know it's not much, but it was certainly fun for us to have them all to ourselves! Here are some pics.

Minnie was flirting with DH and we got some really cute pics on the photopass card as well.

When we arrived at Soarin, there was a 10 min. wait posted, so we grabbed Fast Passes and headed to the Standby line. This was DH's first time on this ride. My girls and I had ridden this last May right after it first opened. I love, love, love this ride. And from the looks on DH's face during the ride, he did, too!

After Soarin we were headed to Turtle Talk when I spied no line at Living with the Land. Yah, I know. There is a reason this ride has no line, but for some reason I like this ride and I thought DH would as well...being a landscaper and all. I was right. He did like it.

Off to Turtle Talk, against the wishes of DD's. Not sure why, but they had no interest in seeing this show. I think they are starting to get to the age where they think some things are "for babies", even though it's okay for them to like it. Hey, I liked Turtle Talk. And so did DH.

Headed to Test Track and there was a 20 min. wait posted. Again, grabbed Fast Passes and rode standby. Probably waited 5 min. We all love this ride! So much fun!!! Of course we stopped in the car center on the way out and had to get in every car there. The girls (and DH) had a blast!

It was quickly approaching our 11:30am ADR at LeCellier. Of course, reading so much about this restaurant on these boards I was really looking forward to it. We arrived and were seated after a 10 min. wait. I hate to say this but we were extremely disappointed in this restaurant. Our server was very slow and I didn't find the food to be as great as I thought I would.

DD1 chose the salad as her appetizer and DD2 got the cheese soup as did I. DH got the shrimp with wasabi sauce. Which he said was very spicy.

None of us were crazy about the soup, but I really liked the pretzel bread. I had the prime rib sandwich, DH had the sirloin steak, DD1 had chicken strips and DD2 had a cheeseburger. But it was the service that was really lacking. We waited what seemed like forever for our food to arrive. I'm glad for free dining, because at least now I can say I tried it. I don't think we will be back there again, though.

Here is my DD1 in Epcot.

After lunch all anyone wanted to do was go back to the pool. What is wrong with you people? We're in Disney World!!!! We did use our Fastpass to ride Test Track again and headed back to the WL pool.

Here I did something I swore I would never allow happen again.

I let the girls get their hair wrapped.

On our Spring 2004 trip I let them get their hair wrapped. From the top. You know what I mean – from the part in their hair on the tops of their heads. Well DD1 decided that she would play helicopter with her hair wrap 10X a day for the next 2 weeks. Long story short – it ended up breaking the hair and she ended up with what we so kindly referred to as “rooster hair”. DD2 decided the next day that she didn’t want that to happen to her. So she cut hers off. At the top. Right near her scalp which resulted in…you guessed it… . “rooster hair”. So I swore that I would never ever let them do this again.

I know. I’m weak.

Here is a pic of DD1 getting hers done.

At least this time I was smart (?) and had them do it from underneath. That way there would be no helicopter to be played and if some act of scissor terrorism should happen again, at least nobody will see it.

We spent a few hours at the pool, relaxing and enjoying the hot, hot weather. We had planned on returning to Epcot that evening when I decided that we needed some magic. I decided it simply didn’t feel like we were in Disney as we hadn’t been to the Magic Kingdom.

So we all showered and headed out to the Magic Kingdom by boat (love the boat ride from WL to MK!).

It was EMH tonight so we got our wristbands upon entering. We were able to get so much done that night. We rode Splash, Space, BTMRR, Buzz, POC.

Here’s the girls on the way out of Buzz

Grabbed a bite to eat at Casey’s and got a spot right outside Casey’s to watch Wishes. Ahhhh…Now I’ve arrived. I finally am feeling the magic! Wishes is just what the doctor ordered. We rode Small World and headed out for the night. It was late and we were exhausted but enjoyed the evening so much! Here is a view of the castle that night.

And a view of Main Street on the way out. Just beautiful!

Tomorrow…more Magic Kingdom and we get to meet the most personable trash can in the World…PUSH!!!

 

[lucky978]

We were there the same time as you.
Pretty hot wasn't it?

Yes, it was hot, hot, hot!!! But I can't complain because we didn't have any rain. Except for a few hours on Tuesday afternoon!

Hope you enjoyed your trip as well!

 

[pumba]

great report......I have heard the damage from those braids before....some one in a trip report maybe.........sounds like you are having a great time..
I really do like the cheddar cheese soup and especially the pretzel bread....we do usually the dinner time food....BUT I would just go and takeout soup and bread.....YUMMY
thanks for the great photos too.....you did an awesome job

 

[lucky978]

Working on the next intallment today!

 

[jlcd]

More please!