2 Big Kids do Disney--May 5-14, 2006**Last day up 7/6**

[scrap4u]

As you can tell, I’m normally a lurker. But I’ve been inspired by so many great TRs (Zzzub, Melly, Busymom, Jamal, to name a few) that I thought I would give it a try. I hope you all will enjoy sharing our memories of this trip to Disney.

Who’s who--
DH—age 41—loves Disney though not quite as addicted as I am. Goes to work at 8am and gets off from 2nd job at 11p, Monday through Friday. Loves roller coasters, thrill rides and has recently become obsessed with carpentry and Norm from the New Yankee Workshop. He’s building a “Norm” project right now.

Me—age 46—A total Disney nut. I read booksabout Disney, watch shows about Disney, love Disney movies, haunt Disney websites, etc, etc. I’m into scrapbooking and am step-mom to DH’s 12 year old daughter. Alas, she isn’t with us this trip. So it’s just the big kids.

This will be our first trip in 2006 to the World and I am so excited! We were able to go 3 times in 2005, once in 2004, once in 1998 (our honeymoon). So we think we’re veterans. In actuality, we’re somewhere between novices and veterans. At least we don’t have to use a map at MK!

We started planning this trip in February. I have a family member (cousin) who is a cast member and he graciously got us a CM rate at the Animal Kingdom Lodge. Great! Saved tons of money that we will for sure spend while in the World. We could only get 7 nights at AKL so we’re spending our first night with CM cousin on May 5 and then heading to AKL on May 6.

We bought our tickets on AirTran. Big mistake, but we didn’t know that yet. We would normally fly Delta but the strike seemed to be a very real possibility.

Ordered our 8 day park hopper passes from Disney and booked a rental car.

Now we just need to get some new clothes. As another poster mentioned, a trip always requires new stuff! After spending many a lunch hour at Kohls buying shorts for DH and myself and spending tons of money at Target on toiletries, we’re finally ready to start packing. Yay!

Thursday, May 4—Let the packing begin. I get my clothes and shoes packed but not the toiletries as some of them I will use the next day getting ready for work. DH gets home at 11pm and starts his packing. Neither of us is worried about finishing at this point as we we had a few hours on Friday to finish up between getting off from work and leaving for the airport. The first of many small (!) mistakes we would make this trip.

I should point out that I was not working last year when we took all 3 of our trips to Disney. So I had plenty of time to make sure things were organized and nothing forgotten. If only that had been the case this time.

Next up: Depature Day?

 

[scrap4u]

Friday, May 05.

I have to work until 1p and then go home and finish packing. DH is supposed to be done by 1pm as he has to come home and cut the grass before we leave—so it won’t look like we moved and didn’t tell anyone. I of course have to make multiple stops on my way home--last minute things we just couldn't travel without! Get home and try to finish the packing. I jump online to make sure our flight is on time. Nope! Already been delayed out of Richmond. So I get on the phone with AirTran because we’re going to miss our connection in Atlanta. They rebook us on a later flight from Atlanta to Orlando, and now our original flight from Atlanta is delayed too and should make connection with no problem. So then they have to change us back. This happened 2 or 3 times while I was on the phone with them.

In the meantime, DH has gotten home late and has to finish his packing, cut the grass, take out the trash, turn off the water to the washer and unplug that and the dryer. We have to leave at 420p to drive to the airport to check in by 5pm even though our flight has been delayed and isn’t leaving until until after 7p. I finally get off the phone with the airline and start locking the suitcases up and forget numerous things I meant to bring…like gum for the flight to help my ears pop during take off and landing. It was right there in plain sight on the dresser. Oh well. It would be the first of many things I forgot this trip. I'm a nervous nelly so we're both running around unpluggin tvs, computers, etc, in case of power surges or thunderstorms.

Then I had to progam our vcr to tape numerous shows all week long that were season finales or series finales. Thank goodness I did that correctly in my rushed stated. We go racing out the door just about on time. I didn’t forget our trip binder though! Great organizer (read annal) that I am, I have put together a blue binder with dividers for flights, car rental, hotel confirmation, a spread sheet of our ADRs and tour, one divider for each park with park hours, parade and show times and best places to view things from Tour Guide Mike. My husband laughed at me when he saw it but he would soon be worshiping the “Blue Binder”!

We rush to the airport trying to beat rush hour traffic on the interstate, pull up to the park and drive and manage to catch a shuttle over to the airport. We check in for our flight without any wait at all. Not a single person waiting to check in. We inquire about upgrading to business class. AirTran has a deal at check in where you can pay $35.00 per flight per person and upgrade to business class, if it is available. Lucky for us it is. DH is 6’1” and has been having some back problems. This will save us tons of time later in the trip. But we don’t know that yet.

Our flight has now been delayed until 8p. It’s only 5pm and neither of us had lunch. DH is getting so frustrated with the delays he’s talking about renting a car and just driving to Disney. I mean we drove two out of three trips last year so no big deal, right. Well honey, we didn’t start out driving at 5pm after working most of the day either. So we decide to wait for the flight and get something to eat.

Richmond airport is undergoing rehab right now so no open restaurants at all in the airport. There is one food cart in a hallway where we buy $12.00 chicken Caesar salads which were pretty good but not worth $12.00 each. What, are we in Disney already? We sit near the cart and eat and people watch. Always a fun thing for us to do.

We head through security where poor DH practically has to get naked! He takes off his running shoes, his belt, wallet, cell phone and I’m afraid I’m going to look over and see him in his underwear! I take off my shoes and then we’re through security with no problem. Have to wait a while for DH to get himself put back together and we make it to our gate. After an eternally long wait, we board the flight and in business class are served a drink before take off. Boy do we need it by this time! The pilot comes on and says if we pull away from the gate by 810p we can leave right away and everyone should make their connections. So everyone hurry up and sit down! I'm so excited to be on our way, I would be happy to help people stuff their belonging in the overhead and shove them into their seats! Just kidding..well, sort of! We do pull away before 810p but are then stopped on the tarmac. Pilot comes back on and says, oops! Atlanta says we have to sit on the ground until 845pm. Son of a gun! Now we have to hope our connecting flight has been delayed again too. We finally take off around 840p and we’re in the air. We were beginning to wonder if we would ever leave home!

 

[scrap4u]

We land in Atlanta and find out that our connecting flight to Orlando has just taken off. There is 1 more flight at midnight that is sold out and we can go standby on it. Oh boy. There are hundreds of people standing in line at the AirTran customer service desk. Those fools! I, being a travel agent, go right over to the Air Tran phone bank and speak to an agent in their call center. I whip out my handy dandy blue binder and have us on standby for the midnight flight. I send DH running over to the gate for the midnight flight so he can get in line and make sure they have us on the standby list. I get us a back up reservation for a 9am flight the next day. 2 business class seats confirmed.

I go the gate and DH is up near the very front of the line with about 50 people behind him. 2 gate agents are boarding people for another flight to Tampa. They never make an announcement, never look up at the long ling breathing down their necks. They just keep their heads down and pretend to count boarding passes! Finally the people in front of us start asking the 2 gate agents questions. They never look up but do answer their questions.

People are getting upset and frustrated. Personally, if I had been one of those 2 agents, I would have been very afraid the mob was going to attack! But for the most part everyone remained calm. A few people stood there and yelled at them. That always adds so much pleasure to any trip we take. Negative energy just seems to feed negative energy.

They finally call for the boarding of our flight. Not a single standby passenger gets on. They shut the doors with about 50 of us just standing around. Keep in mind—this was the flight that the airline put us on earlier in the afternoon when we were still at home. But then we were moved back to our original flight. If I only I had known or just stayed with the later flight, we would be on our way to Orlando arriving around 1:30am. I should have checked my crystal ball before leaving home!

It’s now just after midnight. I whip out the blue binder again and call the rental car company to let them know we won’t be picking up the car until the following morning. I then turn to my print out of hotels near the Atlanta airport, with their phone numbers, addresses and rates. You see, I had a sneaky feeling before I left work that we might get stuck in Atlanta on a Friday night. So I was prepared. Just call me Nelly, Nervous Nelly! The first one I call is available so I book us into the Marriott Airport hotel. They have a shuttle that will come get us.

We schlep our carry on bags down to the front of the airport. Our checked bags probably made the midnight flight that we didn’t. Having traveled for many years I know to always pack a change of clothes or 2 in my carry on along with all our prescriptions and our toiletries. So we can be clean and look half way normal the next day.

We go outside the airport to try and find the hotel shuttle but we can't find it. We don’t see it. DH is useless in an airport. He relys on me, the experienced travel agent to get him where he is going. We’re exhausted, stressed and hungry and I have no patience at this point. I see shuttles for other hotels and car companies but not the Marriott. I call the hotel on my cell phone and she says go to area 2. I tell her I see areas A, B, C, etc but no numbers. She has no idea where I am to tell me where to go. I hung up and DH and I grabbed a cab. The Taxi driver says—the hotel has a shuttle for free. Me—yes we know, please just take us to the hotel. Taxi driver-well I have to charge you $10.00. Me—fine, just take us to the hotel. I'm practically begging at this point I'm so tired. We’re there in 5 minutes and check in with no problem.

I think the room was nice. I have no idea. Too exhausted to pay attention. I call my cousin in Orlando that we were supposed to be spending the night with to let him know we’re stuck in Atlanta. We’ll see him in the AM. We brush our teeth and crash. I think we both have dreams about being able to eat somewhere besides an airport the next day!

Next up--Orlando--better late then never!

 

[Avivasmom]

WOW I sure hope the rest of the trip went much more smoothly. I cannot wait to read about it.

 

[nataliz]

What a stressful beginning to your trip!

I hope the rest is smooth sailing! Thanks for sharing!

 

[scrap4u]

Day 2—Saturday May 6

We got to bed about 1:30am on Friday night. I was up at 6:00am and DH at 6:30a so we could catch the 7:00am shuttle back to the airport. Yes, we were able to find the shuttle with no problem this time. Even without a shot of coffee for me, we found the shuttle. We’d have walked right into it if we missed it since it was right at the front door. By the time it left for the airport it was standing room only.

Shuttle let us off at the Air Tran entrance and I thought we’d walked into an Orioles baseball game before the game begins. Yes, I know, we’re from Richmond, but for years, the Orioles were the only major league team we could comfortably drive to see. Back to topic—there were hundreds, I mean hundreds of people waiting to check in at the Air Tran counters. The line came out of the winding queue and went all around the airport. They also have self serve kiosks—little atm machine looking things—where you can check yourself in and print your boarding passes. They had maybe 20 of them and the lines were maybe 30 or 40 people deep at each one.

Now I’ll tell you that I was a travel agent from 1981 to 1999. I quit to get computer certifications and went to work in the IT field for 5 years. I was laid off from that job and that’s why I wasn’t working last year. I finally went back into travel last September after being out for 6 years. So I haven’t flown much in the last 6 years. But I don’t recall ever seeing this kind of craziness in an airport. And I have been in some strange airports. While DH stands there with his mouth hanging open, wondering how we’re going to check in, I see a very short line with 4 people in it. Guess what----it’s for business class check in. And we just happen to have business class reservations. So glad we bought that upgrade in Richmond the day before!

We didn’t have luggage to check so we were checked in and given boarding passes within 5 minutes. Yeah baby! We followed the signs to security and somehow ended up in the line for check in at Air Tran again. DH kept saying “honey, all these people seem to have really big bags for carry ons”. I finally asked the man in front of me “are you in line to go through security?” and he says yes, we’re in line with Air Tran. Ok, we’re operating on very little sleep and no food. We still aren't sure we were in the right line. DH says “why don’t you go check somewhere else further down this hall and see if we’re in the right place.” So I walk a little further down the hall and see the next sign for security. Duh! We’re in the wrong line. We’re in the line we just bypassed for check in. So I run back and grab DH and we go to security. I guess the man in front of me was operating on no coffee too since he evidently didn't understand my question. Geez!

Poor DH does the whole stripping routine, I just take off my flats and boom, we’re through security. Now we must eat! Must have food! So we go to yet another airport concession stand. Atlanta Bread Company I think, and we get breakfast sandwiches, danishes and I finally get my coffee. And it was all cheaper then the salads we had at Richmond airport the night before.

The flight boards on time—miracle of miracles. We get in our roomy comfy business class seats, have some juice and the flight takes off on time. We’re already having a much better day then yesterday. Flight is uneventful. We both sleep. Flight lands and I tell DH, we will never fly Air Tran again!

We had a car reserved through Hertz but they aren’t located at the airport. So we found our luggage in the Air Tran office, where it had spent a restful night. We are able to find the Hertz shuttle—who can miss that big yellow bus—and rode to their offsite location to wait in line to get our car. We drag the luggage to the car and DH says he will drive.

Now my DH is a wonderful loving man….who has very little patience. I wait until it looks like we’re heading out of the maze that is the Hertz parking lot to call my cousin and let him know we’re on the way to his place. While talking to cousin—DH proceeds to get lost in the parking lot and is driving around in circles cursing and yelling. I proceed to point out the exit signs he missed and we finally get out on the road. YAY!

Next up—AKL we’re coming!

 

[scrap4u]

It’s day 2 but only feels like day 1 as we’re just getting on the road in Orlando. Our original plan was to spend the night at cousin’s apartment on Friday night, and then check into AKL on Saturday and hit a park. I mean we have 8 day passes so lets use them.

But cousin wanted us to come see his apartment and spend some time with him. Now I love my cousin and don't mind seeing him, but it was another small kink in the plan. We get to his apartment, visit with him a while. His fiancée had to work so she’s not there. She’s also a CM. He suggests we go get lunch and asks if we’ve ever been to Celebration. We hadn’t so he drives us over there and shows us around.

If you’ve never been to Celebration, I highly recommend it. It’s just a beautiful and well planned community. Victorian homes, Craftsman cottages, brownstones, you name it. Shops, restaurants, banks, a hospital, a college, a hotel. Wide streets with sidewalks. Just very nice. We had lunch at the Market and it was fine. Nothing spectacular, but at least it wasn't airport food!

Go back to cousins apartment and pick up our rental car and then follow him to AKL. He wants to be with us at check in to make sure we get the Savannah view room he reserved for us. The CM at check in is a little daffy. Not funny humor-wise but kind of strange. She is very nice but seems to have a hard time finding a room for us. She does finally get us a nonsmoking savannah view room and we’re off to see our home for the next 7 nights.

The room is quite nice. A little on the small side but it’s just DH and I. We all 3 rush to the balcony to see our view. It was terrific. It was overlooking Arusha Savannah on the Zebra Trail side. We could see zebra, giraffes, and some animal that sort of looks like a brown cow with really big horns—how now brown cow! Sorry.

It’s going on 3pm or so and cousin decides to leave. DH and I unpack—he is a firm believer in unpacking, not living out of a suitcase for a week—and then decide to take a nap. So we still haven’t hit a park yet.

It’s grad night at MK so no Wishes tonight, but we have 610p ADRs for the California Grill. We get up, get dressed since this is a signature restaurant and they supposedly don’t want shorts anymore—business casual only. We drive over to the Contemporary and check out the shops before checking in for our ADR as we’re pretty early. I love the shops at The Contemporary!When we check-in we’re immediately taken upstairs and given a table in the wine room. We’ve eaten here before, last year, and loved it, but we sat overlooking Cinderella Castle that time. This time, we can see Epcot in the distance, along with the Wilderness Lodge and Polynesian. It’s a beautiful view and it was all adults in this room so pretty quiet.

We bought a new digital camera 2 days before we left home and I was still learning how to use it. It has a 12x digital zoom and can go to 46x so we spent a lot of our time playing with the camera and taking pictures of everything we could see from our table. Up until the food arrived anyway.

The service here was fine but neither DH nor I were as impressed with out food as we were on our previous visit. I had a filet and DH had the pork loin. The pork loin was quite tasty but the filet was burned on one side. I like my steak medium-well not well done so it shouldn’t have been burnt. I also had the wedge of lettuce with the green goddess dressing. It was pretty good but again, not quite as good as previously. I think we would still go back again since the food was so good the first time.

When we were finished we went outside and took pictures from the two walkways on either side of CG. We went back down to the car so DH could change back into shorts and I drove us over to Downtown Disney. On a Saturday night, around 8:30pm. We couldn’t find a place to park. They had numerous parking lot entrances blocked off but you could see some empty spots in them. After driving around in circles and leaving DTD and coming back in, I finally made my way into a lot and found a spot. We parked and started walking to the shops. But then I found another spot much closer. Now normally I don’t care where we park but for some reason I felt I had to move the car this time. So DH keeps walking and I run back to the car and move to the closer space.

DH has some bad problems with nausea after eating certain pork products or when he over eats. He has had tests and the docs don’t know what is wrong. He takes medication that seems to help but not when we’re in Disney. The only thing that helps at that point is tons of peppermint. On previous trips, we’ve been unable to find any in the Disney stores. We normally bring our own with us but this was another of those things we forgot.

We stumbled across Goofy’s candy store and they had peppermint breath mints in little tins. We bought 1 and DH started eating them like candy. I wanted to go into the World of Disney store but DH was tired and nauseous and cranky. So we each had a slight meltdown, walked away from each toher, then found each other again and sat down to stop the melt and agreed to get some more tins of mints and head back to AKL. These mints were life savers (not the candy) for our trip.

We head back to AKL in Saturday night traffic—always fun around DTD just as Epcot is closing. But we get back without getting lost and hit the hay. Tomorrow is an early day. We have 8:25am ADR for The Crystal Palace at MK.

Next up—We finally get to the park!

 

[OhMari]

I think you just convinced me not to use AirTran and flying non-stop.

Thanks for sharing. My sister is determined to stay at AK Peak Season. Yikes.

 

[Minniespal]

Enjoyed reading your report ~ Thanx for sharing.

 

[zacksmammie]

Great trip report can't wait to read the rest!

 

[scrap4u]

Sunday, May 7—

DH and I are up early. The first thing we do each day is open the drapes and go out on the balcony to say hello to our animal friends. Sometimes they are very near our balcony munching on trees and what have you and other times they are way in the back of the savannah. With our terrific new camera I am able to get close up shots even when they are way in the back!

We’re both morning shower people—have a hard time getting going if we don’t take a shower before heading out. So we clean up, get dressed and hoof it through the beautiful lobby of the AKL. Get it—hoof it—Animal Kingdom Lodge! Boy I crack myself up!!!

We get down to the bus stop to try and catch a 730a bus over to MK. It’s very foggy this morning but the weather forecast says sunny and hot. It was in the mid 90’s on Saturday and they’re calling for the same today. We catch a bus with just a few minutes wait. The one thing I love about AKL is that the buses don’t stop anywhere else before getting to a park. Except for MGM. The bus stops at Blizzard Beach first. But that’s it.

We arrive at MK with no problem. I wish we could see the morning opening ceremony but then we’d miss our ADR. So we check in with the CMs out front, tell them we have an ADR for 825am and we’re in! Finally! We have arrived at the Mouse House!

Now, I know most of you are familiar with that wonderful, spine-tingling feeling when you first walk through the tunnel and enter Main St. USA! What could be better….entering Main St. when the park is closed and there’s almost no one on the street. You have it all to yourself. That sure makes one of my dreams come true.

DH is eager to find food so he’s walking ahead of me towards the Crystal Palace. Me, I’m skipping along Main St…come on, you know you would too, if no one could see you…taking pictures of everything without strangers in the pictures. Terrific pictures of what is to me the true symbol of WDW—Cinderella Castle. With practically nobody in front of it. Woo Hoo!

Now we are about to stumble across a little bit of magic. We head down Main St. make a left at Casey’s Corner and are following the sidewalk to CP. We notice two CMs (maintenance type guys) big burly manly men leaning over a storm drain/gutter type thing. We both wonder what they’re doing when we notice a peeping noise. So we stop to watch them ever so gently reach down in the drain and pick up a small duckling that had fallen or slipped down into the drain. They were so sweet, holding it and talking to it, reassuring it so it won’t be too scared. Then they walked around trying to find all the other ducks to put this little guy back with his family. It was of course a very humane thing to do, but the way they handled was just so nice, magical if you will.

We went on to CP and checked in. Waited maybe 5 minutes to get our table. We do CP on every trip because I’m a huge Tigger fan. My car license plate is I Tigger (I is roman number 1) and I have a Tigger tattoo, yes a real one, on my right upper arm. No I’m not a biker chick or anything, I mean, how can you be with Tigger on your arm. Anyway we are seated and I swear we’re seated at the same table every time. It’s ok, because it’s a good table location but I just think it’s funny.

The characters were already walking around our aread and we didn’t want to miss them so we waited before hitting the buffet. Tigger always gives me a big hug and makes funny motions when he sees my tattoo. The character handlers are very nice and take pictures of both DH and me with Tigger and Pooh. We take lots of pictures of each other with Piglet and Eeyore too. They talk about how hot the characters are inside their fur. I can attest to that. When Tigger put his arm around me for a picture, I could feel the heat just coming off him in waves. Poor thing.

CP has a terrific assortment of breakfast foods and everything we’ve ever had there was very good. Of course, since it wasn’t airport food, we would have loved it no matter how bad it might be. But it wasn’t bad at all. We saw all of the characters and managed to get out just as the park opened.

We walked over to Thunder Mountain—one of DH’s favs—and rode that and got fast passes to ride again, then did Splash Mountain twice in a row. I love Splash Mountain! We’re those weird people that ride water rides but don’t really want to get wet. We didn’t get very wet on Splash. I’ve learned to duck behind the people in front of me on the big drop and that helps. I always get splashed in the face though. Never fails! But it was already pretty warm so the yucky theme park water felt really good.

I didn’t keep notes during the trip so I’m not 100% positive which rides we did on which day as spent 2 days at MK. Pirates was closed, which broke my heart when I found out months ago it would be. We did Haunted Mansion and Hall of Presidents. We had a very nice lunch at Columbia Harbor House. I had the Lighthouse sandwich—a hummus rollup that was very good. Nice and light when you’re hot. DH had the Anchors Aweigh—Tuna sandwich along with the New England clam chowder. We first ate here while taking the Keys to the Kingdom Tour last year. We didn’t even realize it was in MK but we’ve gone back every trip since then. Try it, you’ll like it.

We skipped Cinderellabration this trip. It’s cute but I like Cinderella’s Surprise Celebration better. We walked through some of the shops. Did Mickey’s Philharmagic—what a wonderful show. We saw Merlin and the Sword in the Stone show—very cute.

We are firm believers in taking naps while at Disney since we are usually up early and out late. Remember TGM’s motto—tired guests don’t make happy guests, or something close to that! So we left the park before the parade and took the bus back to AKL. Slept for awhile and then got up to redress as we had another dinner at a signature restaurant. At least this one was in our hotel.

We had 530p ADRs for Jiko. We had never eaten at Jiko before but after reading a number of reviews we thought we’d give it a try. We checked in and were seated within 10 minutes. The atmosphere is wonderful, our server was terrific. But the menu is a bit foofy, if you know what I mean. Do you know what I mean or is that a made up word? Not to offend anyone, but I’m a more basic food kind of person. DH will try almost anything once. We started with the lamb patis for DH and the taste of Africa for me. African breads and dips was my appetizer and it was yummy. DH liked the lamb, thought it was very good. Then DH had the marinated ahi tuna and didn’t realize until it arrived that the tuna was raw. Not his favorite kind of food but he said it was pretty tasty. I had the cucumber, tomato and red onion salad. It was different. The watermelon vinaigrette was kind of strange. DH had the Wild King Salmon for his entrée. He thought it was pretty dry. I had the Tanglewood chicken. It came in a really big bowl with some weird tee-pee looking top to it. It was fine, but it was chicken. Again, nothing wrong with the food here but very pricey for food that wasn’t outstanding.

What a truly small world we live in. The family sitting at the table behind us was from our hometown and their waiter had lived there too. We called the waiter over and spoke to him about when he lived there etc. We didn’t recognize the family behind us so we didn’t bother them during their dinner.

We headed back to the room to change into shorts and headed back to the bus stop. It’s EMH at MK tonight so it’s open until 1am. Plus it is one of the few nights that SpectroMagic is being done this week.

Next up—A beautiful evening at MK

 

[scrap4u]

A big thank you to those that have posted. I really appreciate your encouragement! It helps me to keep working on this since I'm very nervous about it.

I should have another installment up later today.

 

[scrap4u]

We made it back over to the MK with no hassles. I think we rode a few rides and then decided to grab a spot for SpectroMagic. Now we have seen this parade numerous times, but I really wanted to get pictures of it with the new camera. We know from experience that watching it over near Pecos Bills is much less crowded then watching from Main St. But for some reason, on this trip, DH wanted to make decisions for us. As, I’ve mentioned, he is a great DH, but he doesn’t read a lot about Disney or the best places to watch things from. He decided we should watch from Main St. And it was 830p with the parade supposedly starting at 9p. So we manage to find a spot in between the hub and Casey’s Corner. We find a family that is sitting down on the curb and the kids are in strollers and we stand behind them. Everything is fine for awhile. Then another family, 2 older adults and a child—probably in her early 20s, come up and stand next to me. They appear to be of Asian heritage but speak what sounds like Spanish the whole time. Not that there’s anything wrong with that but it just struck me as different. I kept expecting to hear an Asian language. It’s like when you expect to have a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and instead it’s peanut butter and mayo. Nothing wrong with it, just not what you expect.

Anyway, this family evidently doesn’t understand the personal space concept. So they continue to move closer and closer to me. The daughter is talking the entire time on her cell phone and sometimes passes the phone to her mother. Daughter has her back to me and her hair keeps brushing up against my arm, shoulder, my hair, etc and this is really, really bothering me. But it is dear cousin’s fault that it is. You see, on Saturday when we were visiting with him, he got on the subject of bed bugs. Yuck! As I don’t want to offend anyone or scare anyone, I won’t go into the details. Needless to say, all I could think of was what if she has them and I get them from her. Eeew!

Dear cousin must love searching the internet for obscure factoids. I told him I had been sick with a respiratory problem 3 times in the last 6 months. He proceeds to tell me about some microscopic bug that people are breathing in and then the bugs eat holes in your lungs. Gee thanks Cuz! I could have gone the rest of my life without hearing that. Now every time I cough, I imagine the holes in my lungs.

Anyway, we kept getting pushed closer and closer together as people are trying to get up and down the sidewalk we are standing on and the CMs are telling us to make room so people can get through. So we all keep scooting closer and closer together towards the street. Then the parade was delayed. I don’t know what the problem was but it didn’t start until around 915p. So we’re standing there in the heat, all mushed together waiting for the parade. I finally made DH switch places with me. Let him get the bed bugs! He picked this spot when we could have had plenty of space over by Pecos Bills. Not that I said anything to him. But inside I was thinking--I told you so. I'm really 12 on the inside! I really was angling for a better spot to take pictures from and to get away from the pushy family. It was all for naught though. Every picture of the parade came out blurry. Oh well, that’s the chance you take with a new camera. I needed to use the flash to get clearer pictures. My old Canon digital didn’t need the flash.

Spectro is great as always. Can you tell we’re parade people? Parade ends and we decide to try and fight the crush of people who appear to be trying to leave the park. Why are you leaving—Wishes is getting ready to start! We start to head to Cinderella Castle to watch Wishes from the backside. If you’ve never seen it from behind the castle, near the carousel on the side closest to Peter Pan’s flight, try it sometime. The fireworks are going off all around you and over your head. Sometimes we’ve had ashes falling on us. Not so good when they get in your eye. You can hear the music you just can’t see the lights on the front of the castle. It’s never terribly crowded and is a very different experience from in front of the castle.

Anyway, we head towards the castle and bear to the right. I don’t know exactly which walkway we were on, but everyone else on it was going the other way! Everyone, with their strollers and wheelchairs. I must have missed that one-way only sign. After about 10 minutes of trying to scoot into small openings in the crowd, we finally get through to open space! We easily make it from here, walk by the Mad Tea Party and come up from the back side of Fantasyland.

Wishes is just beautiful. The story, the music, the fireworks. I always tear up when we watch it. But it could be the ashes in my eye…yeah, that’s it! I was enjoying the show so much, I forgot to take any pictures! I did buy the CD this trip with the music from Wishes so I can tear up at home!

We hit a few more rides and then head to the hub to see if any characters have come out. I ask around and they will be coming out in about 15 minutes. We find the line for Minnie and Mickey and we are only 4th in the line. Great! We get our picture taken with both Minnie and Mickey with Cinderella Castle in the background. It’s a great picture. We had this same picture taken last August but it didn’t show up on our photopass card when we went to buy it. So I was determined to get one this time. I even asked the photographer to take a couple of pictures just in case they were blurry or lost. They were very accommodating. We also got a picture with Pluto and then decided it was time to head back to AKL.

We didn’t have to wait too long for a bus and were soon back in our little room saying goodnight to our animal friends on the savannah.

Next Up---Tower of Terror here we come!

 

[nataliz]

Thanks for sharing!

How were the busses at AKL? Were they crowded?

 

[scrap4u]

Thanks for sharing!

How were the busses at AKL? Were they crowded?

For the most part, no. Sometimes in the evening coming back from a park right at closing, but other then that, plenty of room.

 

[scrap4u]

Day 4—Monday 5/8

We slept in a bit this morning. Got up and spoke to our furry friends outside our balcony and then headed downstairs to have the buffet breakfast at Boma. If you’ve never eaten here, it is just wonderful. It runs 16.99 per adult I believe and even though I can’t eat enough to make it cost effective, it is just yummy.

We finish stuffing ourselves and catch the bus to MGM. As I mentioned before, this is the only bus that stops before getting to it’s destination. We stopped at Blizzard Beach to drop off 1 family and then we’re on our way to MGM.

I’ve read in numerous places that this is a hard park to tour and fit in a rest in the afternoon because of the afternoon times for a lot of the shows. I agree but having stayed all day/night here in August with DD and everyone having a melt down, we’re determined to take a break in the afternoon.

We walk quickly to Tower of Terror. We start to get fast passes as the standby line shows a 20 minute wait but when we get to the fast pass machines the cms tell us it’s about a 5 minute wait. So we head in the standby line and practically walk right on. We lover ToT, it is our very favorite ride. We’ve even stopped at MGM 2 ride ToT when we were on our way to the airport for our flight home!

We exit the ride, look at our picture and then head out to ride it again. This time, I asked the cm in our lobby room, about hidden Mickey’s in the room. He waits until the preshow is over and everyone is leaving the room to head down to the ride, and shows me a hidden Mickey on the printed sheet music on the desk. He then tells me to look for a red electrical box in the hallway outside the room. So DH and I leave the room and wandering down the walkway looking for the red electrical box. We find 2 but can’t see any hidden Mickey’s. By the time we get down to the loading area for the elevator, we are the only ones there except for the cms. So I ask them about hidden Mickey’s. Well this cm didn’t know much but he grabbed another cm who has worked at ToT since it opened and he talked to us for a bit. The elevator opened up and we were still the only ones in line so the CM let us ride by ourselves! Other people were coming down the ramp but they let us go. How cool! DH picks the very back row over to the far right so I go with him. When we get off the ride we find our picture and it’s not bad so I decide to buy it. I never buy ride pictures but how many times do you have the opportunity to ride ToT in an empty elevator. I had to have proof for posterity. It was very cool but the cm selling us the picture said—why didn’t you sit up front? We were both like—I don’t know!

We made it over to Rock n Roller coaster but the standby line was too long. So we got fastpasses for that and headed to Lights, Motor, Action to get a fast pass. They weren’t giving them out but were loading the stadium for a show so we hopped in line and got good seats, up high, not in the sun. Always an exciting show. Then we headed over to Indianna Jones. I know, it’s a hokey show but still has pretty good special effects. We had lunch at the ABC Commissary where I had another hummus rollup with black bean salad. Yum. I don’t remember what DH had. I’m sure we walked through some shops as I am a champion shopper. We decide to head back to AKL for our afternoon rest. We have yet to see the Stars and Motor Cars parade as we normally have an early dinner. We have 530p ADRs at Boma for dinner tongiht. Twice in one day but that’s fine with us.

Have a lovely buffet dinner at Boma and head back over to MGM for evening and the EMH. We did the Great Movie Ride which I always enjoy. It gets me off my feet and is air conditioned! Got into see The Voyage of the Little Mermaid. Of course did ToT and Rock n roller coaster. We tried to get into the first show of Fantasmic but we were late and it was packed. So we walked around the park, did some pin shopping, rode rides and hit the late show of Fantasmic. What a wonderful show it is. I got some great pictures with the terrific zoom on my new camera. Can you tell this camera has me quite excited! After Fantasmic we decided to call it a day. My feet were really starting to hurt and I felt like I was getting a few blisters. Not good this early in the week!

I forgot to mention that back on Saturday night, after we left the Contemporary we drove over to the Wilderness Lodge to look around. Neither DH nor I had ever been there. It was very nice but I’m not sure I would want to stay there. We did get some cute pins there and a very nice CM at the pin cart gave me some ideas on how to display my pins. I used her ideas as soon as I got home so now they are all easily viewed instead of being stuffed inside a Mickey shopping bag!

Next up—The rain and our Segway tour at Epcot.

 

[roberrl187]

Great report. Thanks for sharing.

 

[TLinden16]

Wow, you are quite the little organizer! I bet you could get good money making those handy dandy blue binders for people!

The AKL is a great resort--I stayed there right after you. I'm not a big animal fan, but going out on my balcony and seeing a giraffe right outside my door was really cool.

Thanks for posting!

 

[scrap4u]

Segway tour spoiler—if you don’t want to know about this tour, please skip this chapter. There isn’t anything secret about it though.

Sorry for the delay in writing this tr. Life got in the way this weekend what with Father’s Day and all and I’ve been sick with some kind of stomach bug this week. So I’m writing this from home today.

So it’s Tuesday, May 9 and we have a 9:00am Segway Tour confirmed for this morning. We wake up to pouring rain and thunder. Not a good start to the day. Of course, wildfires have been breaking out all over Orlando and they are in the middle of a drought. So I’m happy that they are getting some rain but not happy that it’s raining on our vacation.

We had a 730am ADR for the Boma breakfast buffet. We wanted to eat a good hearty meal before our tour. We drove over to Epcot so we didn’t have to waste any time waiting for a bus. We threw on our Mickey ponchos—bought on our Jan.05 trip—and ran through the rain for the entrance to Epcot. We got in and found our way to the guest services center to check in. We are given the option to cancel our tour and get our money back, reschedule for another day but they are all sold out during the rest of our stay, or go ahead and take the tour and if it’s still raining when it’s time to go outside, they will cut the tour short and we’ll be given a partial refund. DH had checked the weather channel before we left the room and it looked like the storm was going to blow over fairly quickly so we opted to take our chances and do the tour.

The tour has a maximum capacity of 10 people and there are 3 tours a day. We were walked over to Innoventions West where we were taken inside a room to watch a short video about segways. For some reason we had 13 people and the instructors couldn’t figure out why. Well it turns out that 2 people were on the 930am tour and didn’t realize they were in the wrong tour. The 3rd extra person was a lady who had seen us walking through Innoventions and just joined in with us. When we grabbed helmets and started to put them on, she asked if she was supposed to put one on too. Finally, the instructors figured out she was just tagging along thinking this was a free tour and escorted her out. Too funny!

Next we went to our Segways and were taught how to get on, get off of, stand on them, turn them off, turn them on, etc. The instructors have you step up on to the Segways one at a time so they can assist you. DH went first and as soon as he had both feet on the segway, he started the see-saw pulling-pushing motion. Like when you’re first learning to water ski and the boat pulls you to far forward and then you yank the line back and have too much line. I thought if he was having trouble then I was really going to be in trouble as he is Mr. Athletic. DH got the hang of it pretty quickly though and was fine. Next it was my turn. I put one foot on and then stepped up with the other foot and stood there. The instructor said “You didn’t wobble at all! That’s really good.” I’m only 5’4” tall and DH is 6’1” so he may have had more trouble at first because my center of gravity is closer to the ground then his. Who knows?

Anyway, we were divided into 2 groups. Our group got to practice going uphill, making a sharp 90’ turn and then going downhill. The other group got to go in and out of cones without hitting them to get used to making tight turns. Then we switched. If you’ve never ridden a segway, it is a lot of fun but your feet and legs do all the work. You lean forward to go forward or lean back to stop or go backwards. You have one control on your handlebar and that is for turning. If you don’t lean you can turn the control and just turn in small circles until you get dizzy. If you want.

The cones took some practice. Then we all had to limbo with our segways. They held a pole up and we had to duck and go under it as if it was a tree branch. Then we got to practice stepping off the segway, reversing the direction on it, and pulling it over an obstacle, like a limb or something.

Most everyone in our group caught on very quickly except for 1 woman. She seemed a bit timid on the segway. When it was time to step off the segway to go over the obstacle, she couldn’t get off. She managed to get 1 foot on the ground but when she would try to take the other foot off the segway, she would pull the segway with her and it would run over her. I felt sorry for her but was also having trouble not laughing. I know, I’m a mean person! It looked so funny though—like the segway was alive! She did finally get off the segway and pull it over the obstacle.

1 hour of the tour over and now it was time to go outside. And lucky for us, the rain had stopped, the sun had come out and we were going to ride around World Showcase while it was closed! Too cool. No one was in World Showcase except for CMs and security. We went into a number of countries and our guide would tell us about the buildings in that country and some history. Then we would have challenges like riding in and out of the columns of a building in Italy. Or through a small tight garden in Germany. Then we had 1 area where we could do anything we wanted and we had our pictures taken with the Epcot ball in the background. This was a great tour, though our legs and feet were very tired when it was over and I would highly recommend it to anyone.

We decided to walk over to Morocco and have lunch at Restaurant Marrakesh. We had never eaten here before but we love Lebanese and Greek food so though we would enjoy this. Plus we got to sit down in the cool and rest our feet while waiting for the restaurant to open. The restaurant is quiet beautiful with lots of tile mosaics. The wait staff was very friendly and helpful with the menu. DH had the Sultan Sampler and I had the lunch special, a beef brewat roll, a chicken kabob and crepes Atlas. DH had the Bastilla for dessert. It was all wonderful and we’re eating there again in September for dinner. The belly dancer came out and danced for a few minutes while we were having dessert. She was very good and pulled a couple of little girls out of the audience to dance with her. It was a very enjoyable experience.

We went over to Soarin’ to get Fastpasses for later and then DH did Test Track and Mission Space. While he road these I went into Mouse Gear to find some other shoes to wear. My feet were killing me in my tennis shoes and I already had a couple of blisters. I managed to find some Birkenstock type Mickey sandals there. I stood under an umbrella near the Innoventions Fountains and changed shoes and just stood there enjoying the sound and view of the fountains. A female security guard came up to share my shade and we started chatting. She had worked for Disney for 6 years I believe and loved every minute of it. DH finally got done with his rides and found me at the fountain.

We managed to catch part of Off Kilter’s show in Canada on our way out. I love hearing these guys. I’m part Scots and love a bagpipe. We headed back to AKL to rest as we had to be back for a 440p ADR at Le Cellier. Another new dining experience for us.

We drove back to the hotel and boy were my feet really hurting. When we got back to the room I took off my new Mickey sandals and my socks and DH and I both just stood there in shock. Both of my feet were so swollen, you couldn’t see the bones in my feet or my ankles. It was very strange looking but it sure explained why my well worn tennis shoes had rubbed blisters so quickly. My feet were so big it was a wonder I didn’t bust my shoes open! DH went to get ice for me and I stretched out with a big bag of ice between my ankles to try and bring the swelling down. This would put a slight damper on the rest of the trip, but I trooped on!

Next up—Le Cellier and the rude family!

 

[arizonacolbys]

Great review!! Thanks for sharing!!