Home for almost a week and here is my report. We spent 3 days in the park, stayed at the Swan, and we traveled with my DH's bother and his wife, referred to as the in-laws or B-I-L or S-I-L. I'd be happy to answer any questions that you post as a reply.
DH and I were there 7/9-7/13 at the Swan on the teachers discount. We spent 3 days in 4 parks with my DHs brother & his wife. Both were 1st timers. (DB-I-L remembers a trip in the 70s.) DS-I-L is from China and so dining was a challenge.
DAY 1 Arrived in record time @ 3ish and checked in a bit early. 4th flr. No balcony. Got the NS/KING per req. View didnt care due to discount. Room was great and the bed was stacked w/ the feather stuff for Heavenly Beds. (After night 1 we asked for real pillows since the feathers made me sneeze and they were very mushy.) The housekeeper left 4 extra pillows and this was great. We had to kick off the comforter due to heat and we could not see the TV in bed! Its that thick! The AC comes on via a sensor when you come back to the room, so its a tad warm at 1st. Check in was A+. Very happy about the teacher discount. Thanks, Dreams Unlimited!
Found the family and suggested a small tour. Nowif you have an evening free before the parks, doing a tour is nice, but time consuming. We took a bus from the Dolphin to MK & got on the monorail and had to change monorails at the TTC. Did a round trip back to the TTC and changed trains to the resort monorail. Went to the Contemporary. Had dinner at the California Grill. Train trip took about an hr., & I was worried that the in-laws were not excited. We had a 7:15 PS and were seated right away. (Fireworks were @ 10PM that night.) Meal was great. S-I-L (sister-in-law) was picky about the food, but she had the corn chowder. B-I-L had the BBQ chx pizza. DH had the tile fish entrée and I had the sushi handroll & goat cheese ravioli. The tuna was kind of a puree and the ravioli was nothing to write home about. The tile fish looked great. SIL had a cheesecake dessert that looked great. I had a glass of McCrostie chardonnay that was excellent. Our server was a bit snotty. ADVICE: If you want separate checks, you should say so before you are done. We often forgot to say 2 cks before we ordered, and it was like we caused major trouble several times. We took the monorail to MK & took a bus back to the hotel. DH and I decided to go to Kimonos, a sushi restaurant in the Swan, for a snack. We LOVE this place and ate there night 1 & 4. EXCELLENT!!! The Swans Heavenly Bed is great! Mushy pillows - ask for extras.
Next day: Epcot. We opted to avoid EE to MK and take a boat to Epcot. We arrived before 9am and were NOT allowed to enter the park until 9am. I want to let everyone know the truththey are no longer letting folks through the International Gateway a MINUTE early unless you have a PS for the Princess breakfast in Norway. They ask for your name, too. So, at exactly 9AM FW opening, we were herded around the UK & Canada to FW. Epcot was not too crowded. We got on Test Track w/ a 15-min. wait or so. Fun to look for hidden Mickeys. TEST TRACK BROKE DOWN while we were in the most crucial part of the ride. The big loop the fastest part slowed down to about 10 MPH (rather than 60 MPH) and I was hanging on to the bar. Very uncomfortable, and I was trying to explain to the In-Laws that this is not how the ride really goes! We were offered to ride again. The 2nd time was perfect. Ate at the Fountainview Bakery A+. Rode SSE, UE and took the Seeds tour at the Land. ITS NOW $8 PER ADULT! Worth it! Went to Le Cellier for PS lunch and seated right away. Surprised that there were not many people in there until after 1PM. Free breadsticks and great service. I had the steak salad; DH had a good Ruben, BIL had the French dip (ok) and SIL had trout saladlooked great! I thought it was great and family was happy. Too hot for cheddar cheese soup. We explored more of EPCOT and later ended up at DH & my favorite spot the Rose & Crown Pub. Its so relaxing! We saw the films in World Showcase. SIL enjoyed the film in China but noted that a lot of the fashion was out of date. It seems they added to the film and didnt change it entirely. She did not want to eat at Nine Dragons since to her it looked like American Chinese food, not authentic. Good call. We all ate fish n chips from Rose n Crowns fast food stall outside the pub. Good value! Saw Illuminations. I miss the old, original one. Now there is a touchy-feely song at the end. Called it a night.
Next morning we took a bus from the Dolphin to early entry at Animal Kingdom. There is 1 bus that picks up folks from the Swan, Dolphin, Yacht Club, Beach Club and Boardwalk. When we arrived at the BW, there were plenty of angry people. Since they were the last on the pick up route, the previous 7:30am bus must have filled up and by-passed the entire hotel! We were on the 7:45ish bus and not all of them would fit, but I believe there was another bus right behind us to help get everyone to AK ASAP. We were in the park pretty fast and headed for the Safari. It was a fast moving line for about 20 min and we saw the usual animals. Saw Tough to be a Bug, rode Dinosaur and left. In-laws needed a rest and we met at 1:30 for tempura at Japan. The tempura was quite good and the portion was very generous. We walked right in and it was almost empty. We had some sushi, great, and some bonito? broth that was unexpected. Afterwards we saw more of Epcot and took the monorail to MK for the afternoon and E Night. We bought the e night tickets the night we checked in, so it was quick & easy to get our wrist band on Main St. and do some attractions that werent on E night. At PotC they were giving away promo. posters for the new movie that was released the same week. Since we were going to be at MK until 12:30, my DH wanted to eat at a sit down restaurant to spend time. There were long lines in FL and they didnt want to ride those rides anyway. We made our biggest dining error to date that night. We waited 20-30 min. for Tonys whatever restaurant. We paid $18.95 for Chef Boy Ardee` could have barfed up and it would have been better. The menu was small, but the portions were big. Free chewy bread with a good pesto, pine nut tomato dipping sauce. Water as no wine is available in MK. The spaghetti and meatball ONLY ONE big, wad of a meat ball, was awful. We laughed about it, but it was a disappointment. We had some ice-cream much later and it was so good! Fireworks were at 10PM and E Night started at 9:30 so this meant that the park was pretty crowded after 10PM. Although they were not letting others ride after 10, it seemed busy. It was as though we only had 2 hrs to ride! We did SP. Mtn 2x, Buzz 3X and Spalsh Mt. 2X. There was no line! No one wanted to get wet, so I exaggerated the dryness factor and DH was not happy. However he loved the drop and the night view and we rode again. E Ride was totally worth it to us! We called it a night and went back at 12:30 via bus.
DH and I took a boat to MGM for EE the next morning to ride RRC as many times as possible. We rode 2x because it broke down for a little while--? ToT was incredible! There are NO LAPBARS anymore and I will not spoil the rest. The in-laws met us later and we rode those 2 rides again and they liked it. They didnt want to ride them again. We did the Backstage Tour and Millionaire. It started raining and we left. DH and I went back to the Rose & Crown and met the in-laws for dinner at Kimonos. It was a nice end to the trip. We checked out through the tv and left early the next AM and traffic was good. Until next time!
DH and I were there 7/9-7/13 at the Swan on the teachers discount. We spent 3 days in 4 parks with my DHs brother & his wife. Both were 1st timers. (DB-I-L remembers a trip in the 70s.) DS-I-L is from China and so dining was a challenge.
DAY 1 Arrived in record time @ 3ish and checked in a bit early. 4th flr. No balcony. Got the NS/KING per req. View didnt care due to discount. Room was great and the bed was stacked w/ the feather stuff for Heavenly Beds. (After night 1 we asked for real pillows since the feathers made me sneeze and they were very mushy.) The housekeeper left 4 extra pillows and this was great. We had to kick off the comforter due to heat and we could not see the TV in bed! Its that thick! The AC comes on via a sensor when you come back to the room, so its a tad warm at 1st. Check in was A+. Very happy about the teacher discount. Thanks, Dreams Unlimited!
Found the family and suggested a small tour. Nowif you have an evening free before the parks, doing a tour is nice, but time consuming. We took a bus from the Dolphin to MK & got on the monorail and had to change monorails at the TTC. Did a round trip back to the TTC and changed trains to the resort monorail. Went to the Contemporary. Had dinner at the California Grill. Train trip took about an hr., & I was worried that the in-laws were not excited. We had a 7:15 PS and were seated right away. (Fireworks were @ 10PM that night.) Meal was great. S-I-L (sister-in-law) was picky about the food, but she had the corn chowder. B-I-L had the BBQ chx pizza. DH had the tile fish entrée and I had the sushi handroll & goat cheese ravioli. The tuna was kind of a puree and the ravioli was nothing to write home about. The tile fish looked great. SIL had a cheesecake dessert that looked great. I had a glass of McCrostie chardonnay that was excellent. Our server was a bit snotty. ADVICE: If you want separate checks, you should say so before you are done. We often forgot to say 2 cks before we ordered, and it was like we caused major trouble several times. We took the monorail to MK & took a bus back to the hotel. DH and I decided to go to Kimonos, a sushi restaurant in the Swan, for a snack. We LOVE this place and ate there night 1 & 4. EXCELLENT!!! The Swans Heavenly Bed is great! Mushy pillows - ask for extras.
Next day: Epcot. We opted to avoid EE to MK and take a boat to Epcot. We arrived before 9am and were NOT allowed to enter the park until 9am. I want to let everyone know the truththey are no longer letting folks through the International Gateway a MINUTE early unless you have a PS for the Princess breakfast in Norway. They ask for your name, too. So, at exactly 9AM FW opening, we were herded around the UK & Canada to FW. Epcot was not too crowded. We got on Test Track w/ a 15-min. wait or so. Fun to look for hidden Mickeys. TEST TRACK BROKE DOWN while we were in the most crucial part of the ride. The big loop the fastest part slowed down to about 10 MPH (rather than 60 MPH) and I was hanging on to the bar. Very uncomfortable, and I was trying to explain to the In-Laws that this is not how the ride really goes! We were offered to ride again. The 2nd time was perfect. Ate at the Fountainview Bakery A+. Rode SSE, UE and took the Seeds tour at the Land. ITS NOW $8 PER ADULT! Worth it! Went to Le Cellier for PS lunch and seated right away. Surprised that there were not many people in there until after 1PM. Free breadsticks and great service. I had the steak salad; DH had a good Ruben, BIL had the French dip (ok) and SIL had trout saladlooked great! I thought it was great and family was happy. Too hot for cheddar cheese soup. We explored more of EPCOT and later ended up at DH & my favorite spot the Rose & Crown Pub. Its so relaxing! We saw the films in World Showcase. SIL enjoyed the film in China but noted that a lot of the fashion was out of date. It seems they added to the film and didnt change it entirely. She did not want to eat at Nine Dragons since to her it looked like American Chinese food, not authentic. Good call. We all ate fish n chips from Rose n Crowns fast food stall outside the pub. Good value! Saw Illuminations. I miss the old, original one. Now there is a touchy-feely song at the end. Called it a night.
Next morning we took a bus from the Dolphin to early entry at Animal Kingdom. There is 1 bus that picks up folks from the Swan, Dolphin, Yacht Club, Beach Club and Boardwalk. When we arrived at the BW, there were plenty of angry people. Since they were the last on the pick up route, the previous 7:30am bus must have filled up and by-passed the entire hotel! We were on the 7:45ish bus and not all of them would fit, but I believe there was another bus right behind us to help get everyone to AK ASAP. We were in the park pretty fast and headed for the Safari. It was a fast moving line for about 20 min and we saw the usual animals. Saw Tough to be a Bug, rode Dinosaur and left. In-laws needed a rest and we met at 1:30 for tempura at Japan. The tempura was quite good and the portion was very generous. We walked right in and it was almost empty. We had some sushi, great, and some bonito? broth that was unexpected. Afterwards we saw more of Epcot and took the monorail to MK for the afternoon and E Night. We bought the e night tickets the night we checked in, so it was quick & easy to get our wrist band on Main St. and do some attractions that werent on E night. At PotC they were giving away promo. posters for the new movie that was released the same week. Since we were going to be at MK until 12:30, my DH wanted to eat at a sit down restaurant to spend time. There were long lines in FL and they didnt want to ride those rides anyway. We made our biggest dining error to date that night. We waited 20-30 min. for Tonys whatever restaurant. We paid $18.95 for Chef Boy Ardee` could have barfed up and it would have been better. The menu was small, but the portions were big. Free chewy bread with a good pesto, pine nut tomato dipping sauce. Water as no wine is available in MK. The spaghetti and meatball ONLY ONE big, wad of a meat ball, was awful. We laughed about it, but it was a disappointment. We had some ice-cream much later and it was so good! Fireworks were at 10PM and E Night started at 9:30 so this meant that the park was pretty crowded after 10PM. Although they were not letting others ride after 10, it seemed busy. It was as though we only had 2 hrs to ride! We did SP. Mtn 2x, Buzz 3X and Spalsh Mt. 2X. There was no line! No one wanted to get wet, so I exaggerated the dryness factor and DH was not happy. However he loved the drop and the night view and we rode again. E Ride was totally worth it to us! We called it a night and went back at 12:30 via bus.
DH and I took a boat to MGM for EE the next morning to ride RRC as many times as possible. We rode 2x because it broke down for a little while--? ToT was incredible! There are NO LAPBARS anymore and I will not spoil the rest. The in-laws met us later and we rode those 2 rides again and they liked it. They didnt want to ride them again. We did the Backstage Tour and Millionaire. It started raining and we left. DH and I went back to the Rose & Crown and met the in-laws for dinner at Kimonos. It was a nice end to the trip. We checked out through the tv and left early the next AM and traffic was good. Until next time!
