3 Kids, 2 Adults and 24 Hours In The Car...Off To Celebrate Halloween With The Mouse!

[shellywalker]

This trip report is a little bit late, but better late than never right? I haven't done one in a little while, so you'll have to be patient with me!

Our trip started at 3 AM on Wednesday October 19th. When we left, we had no idea if we'd be stopping half way, or pushing all the way through. Basically we didn't know if the kids would last 23 hours or 5 minutes together in the car. We packed up the van the night before, we had borrowed a car top carrier from a friend, so we were able to fit almost everything in there that we wouldn't need for the next 24 hours! We woke the kids, took a potty break and hit the road!

The Cast:

Myself: I'm Shelly, 28 years old, a stay at home mom, a photographer on the side and currently going to school for my bachelor’s in photography. I have a busy life, but try to make time for Disney at least once a year! I'm the planner, the obsessor and the executor!

DH: He is Alex, and 29 years old, he's a Firefighter. He loves working on our house; we recently remodeled our bathroom and added a small addition to the front of the house. He once was not so much a fan of Disney World. I know, I know BUT, he has come a long way, he now will even make recommendations to his friends, and he loves to have fun with his kids. This was by far his favorite trip!

DD: She is Maddie, she was 8 during this trip, and has since turned 9. She's in 3rd grade and LOVES Disney as much as me. Her favorite park is Magic Kingdom, her favorite ride is Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin, and her favorite character is Donald Duck. She loves eating at Chef Mickey's! Outside of Disney she loves to ride her bike, play her video games, and read!

DS: He goes by Jackson, and he was 3 during this trip, and has since turned 4. He was my biggest concern during this drive to Disney, as nothing about his personality is calm or quiet. He's a busy body. His favorite park is Epcot (that's what he says, but he's crazy!), his favorite ride is Splash Mountain. He doesn't have a favorite character, he loves them all! Outside of Disney World, he also loves his bike (just got that for Christmas), playing outside, going to the lake and fishing, playing at the park and playing with his Star Wars and Super Hero toys!

DS: He goes by Cooper, and he was 1.5 during this trip. He just turned 2. He was a pretty big concern on the drive as well, you just never know. He LOVES Disney, and watching Mickey and Jake every single morning. The first thing he says to me in the morning is "yo ho"! It's always a little nerve wrecking to take a small child to see characters; you always have that fear that they'll be afraid. Not him! He was high fiving and hugging everyone! His favorite character is Stitch, he was belly laughing at him so hard when he first met him, and he hasn't let go since!

We had reservations at All Star Movies from Saturday the 22nd to Thursday the 27th. We knew we had wanted to drive to the beach one day, so when we left, we were assuming we'd get into Florida early on Friday morning, and we'd head straight to the beach and get a hotel room there for Friday night and then head back to Orlando Saturday. That's not even close to what happened

I hope you tag along and check out our first ON SITE family vacation to Disney World!

 

[shellywalker]

Day 1

As I previously said, we had the van packed up and ready to go, we only needed to toss in the coolers and small things that we needed to use that morning. We woke up the kids, hit the bathroom and then hit the road. I was convinced that since it was so early in the morning and still pitch black out, the kids would go back to sleep. Not so much. Jackson stayed awake until after dinner that night. We stopped at the Oasis in Chicago and grabbed McDonald’s breakfast, and got right back on the road. It was a very boring drive through Indiana, and uneventful! When we got into Southern Indiana, we stopped for lunch at The Cracker Barrel so the kids could get out and stretch. Lunch was a disaster. Jackson was a mess, wouldn’t eat his food and ended up sitting in the car with Alex, while I tried to finish my lunch and feed and keep Cooper under control. I ended up just leaving the food and being annoyed and leaving. We got back in the car and headed on our way. When we arrived at the welcome center in Tennessee, we got out to use the bathroom and stretch. Now it was my turn to drive! The drive was fairly uneventful, except we hit horrible traffic in Chattanooga. We spent about 2 hours in traffic there, and then it was smooth sailing again. I drove until we were south of Atlanta, and then we switched again. I fell asleep, and the next thing I remember is being in Florida! We stopped for gas about 3 hours north of Orlando, and we switched drivers again. I was so happy to be the one driving us into Orlando. We had decided that we weren’t going to continue driving on to the beach; we were SO tired and just needed a bed. We called All Star Movies, and booked ourselves a room that night (or early morning) and then for Friday night as well. We decided we’d do the beach, but it would just be a day trip! I woke the kids up when we got close, so that they could see us pulling in. They’ve never stayed on site before and they were SO excited. I dropped Alex and Maddie off at the lobby to check in, while I stayed in the car with the boys. We were off to our room in the Love Bug section for the next two nights! We brought a few things in and crawled right into bed! We made it to Disney in almost exactly 24 hours! I can’t believe I hardly took any pictures on our road trip down. When we hit the hills in Tennessee, I took pictures, but that’s about it! Don’t worry; I made up for it the rest of the trip!!

They are just lots of pictures like that!

 

[ohboyx3]

Can't wait to hear about your trip. We are going in october this year and I like reading about everyone's experiences!

 

[loveysbydesign]

Jumping onboard! We are actually leaving this Oct. 19 to drive to WDW so I am very eager to hear how your tip was weather and crowd-wise! my 3 kids will be older than yours though!

 

[shellywalker]

Can't wait to hear about your trip. We are going in october this year and I like reading about everyone's experiences!

Have you been this time of year? It's my absolute favorite! We've gone every October for the last 4 years, and it's always SO amazing! Thanks for joining along!!!

Jumping onboard! We are actually leaving this Oct. 19 to drive to WDW so I am very eager to hear how your tip was weather and crowd-wise! my 3 kids will be older than yours though!

Welcome! Where are you driving from? How old will your kids be?? Thanks for joining along!

 

[loveysbydesign]

Have you been this time of year? It's my absolute favorite! We've gone every October for the last 4 years, and it's always SO amazing! Thanks for joining along!!!


Welcome! Where are you driving from? How old will your kids be?? Thanks for joining along!

We're driving from PA and the kiddos will be 13, 10 and 5. This will be our 3rd time driving and we always stop for the night. Hoping to take the Autotrain home this time!

 

[shellywalker]

Day 2
The kids decided they didn’t want to sleep in at all…I suppose after that long drive, they were finally ready for some action! The room we were in was just a standard room, and SMALL! I will never understand why a family of 5 can't stay in a regular room at The Contemporary, but can at All Star Movies. I had my fingers crossed that the next room we'd be in would be a little larger! It made for very long mornings of getting ready, while stepping over children and toys and stuffed animals. We were hungry, so we decided to head over towards the food court and sort of scope out the resort at the same time. Now, the kids have never stayed on property before, and I’ve only stayed at The Contemporary…so this place had some high expectations for me, and no expectations for them! They LOVED all the oversized movie stuff and were climbing all over it!

We grabbed breakfast from the food court, I can’t remember what DH and I ate, but the kids had Mickey Waffles of course! We grabbed a table outside by the pool, and enjoyed our first breakfast in the gorgeous Florida sunshine! There is just something about waking up to that smell of Florida and being able to sit outside and eat breakfast! The food court that morning was fairly busy, but nothing compared to what we’d see later in the week! The food was mediocre, at best. We only ate here when we had to. We were on the Dining Plan, so we tried to avoid the food court as much as possible! However, this first day, we weren’t on a plan yet…technically our Disney vacation wasn’t starting until Saturday! We finished up breakfast, and headed back to the room to get ready to head to Cocoa Beach for the day!

 

[shellywalker]

We're driving from PA and the kiddos will be 13, 10 and 5. This will be our 3rd time driving and we always stop for the night. Hoping to take the Autotrain home this time!

At least your kids will be prepared then for that drive! Although, I was pleasantly surprised at how smooth it went. I hadn't driven to Florida since I was in High School!

 

[aLLpInK]

You have some beautiful kids!!! I.m enjoying the report!!
Did you get their name designes from a disser? (Love them!) If so What kind of transfers did you use? Thanks!

 

[shellywalker]

You have some beautiful kids!!! I.m enjoying the report!!
Did you get their name designes from a disser? (Love them!) If so What kind of transfers did you use? Thanks!

Awww, thank you I did get them from a disser! I just bought a package of iron on transfers from Walmart and printed them on my printer! Really simple, and the kids LOVED them! They still wear them all the time!

 

[shellywalker]

Day 2 Continued…
We plugged the info to the beach into the GPS and we hit the road! What should have been a fairly short drive, turned into hours of stand still traffic on the highway. There was apparently a rollover accident and the road was completely shut down! I kicked myself, because I originally wanted to go to the Gulf Coast and go to Clearwater/St. Petersburg. I spent a lot of time there while I was growing up, and I wanted so badly to share that with my babies. However, Cocoa Beach was closer and since it went from being an overnight visit to just a day visit, we chose the closer destination. Who would have known that the trip to Clearwater would have been shorter? Ugh. We stopped at my favorite Ron Jon Surf Shop while we are out there. I have not been there in YEARS! The kids loved it, and it was amazing for me to watch them experience what I too experienced at that age! We got a few souvenirs, and headed over to the beach! This was their very first experience with the Ocean. Jackson was questioning everything, and wondered about sharks, Cooper loved playing in the sand and Maddie was like a fish! They had a blast spending the entire day playing in the ocean and the waves!

I remember this pier as a kid! I remember standing out there fishing with my Grandpa when I was maybe 6 years old. It’s amazing how literally nothing has changed!

After a long day in the sun and water, we decided we were going to pack up and head out to grab dinner. We went up the road a few miles to where the Ron Jon Hotel is, and grabbed dinner inside at the grill. We had a beautiful table out on the patio, overlooking the beach and the ocean. The food was good, but we were all ready to head back to the hotel! It was early to bed, because the next morning we had to check out and re-check in to the room we’d be staying in the remainder of the stay….and then our first Disney day!

 

[DWGal210]

Joining in! What a gorgeous family!!

You're a trooper doing that drive straight through - good for you!

It looks like they had a great time at the beach - very fun!!

 

[shellywalker]

Joining in! What a gorgeous family!!

You're a trooper doing that drive straight through - good for you!

It looks like they had a great time at the beach - very fun!!

Welcome! Thanks for joining me!!! The drive surprisingly went very well!! And the sooner we can get to Disney, the better, right? They loved the beach! We go a lot in the summers to the lakes around here, but it's nothing like the ocean!

 

[shellywalker]

We woke up this morning, and packed everything up and got ready for the day. We needed to check out, and re check in to our “preferred” room, get our dining cards and so on! I always go to Disney with good intentions of writing everything down, right down to who helped us at check in, and of course, that has yet to happen! A very nice younger guy helped us! He asked if we had a preference of the building and I asked him what the best one was, he told us Toy Story, but there weren’t any available until the afternoon! No biggie, we had already gotten ready for the day and were heading to breakfast. He offered us a text message when the room was ready, so we jumped on that! We packed everything up and headed out to breakfast. We had no ADR’s, so we headed off property to find something to eat before we headed to Animal Kingdom for the day! In fact, this day was kind of a free for all when it comes to eating; we had no ADR’s at all! We ended up at Perkins, which is DD’s favorite, and I have no idea why! I’ve never left Perkins without feeling sick! But alas, I wasn’t about to waste any more time looking for somewhere to eat! I couldn’t tell you what any of us ate, the only thing I can tell you as that there was this woman walking around making balloon animals, and I mean some SERIOUS balloon animals. Like nothing I’ve ever seen before. I apparently only took pictures of those on my phone, but Jackson had a very intricate alien, Cooper had a dog or something not as fancy, and Maddie had a unicorn hat! The kids loved it and started out there day just right! We finished up breakfast and hit the road! We were to spend the day here….

We walked in and of course headed straight for the Tree of Life, where we needed to have pictures taken! Turns out that this is one of my favorite family photo’s that we’ve ever taken!

The first year we went to Disney with the kids, Maddie asked to have her picture taken with EVERYTHING. To the point that when we went to Downtown Disney towards the end of the trip, I left my camera behind! Jackson was the same way this trip! While at first, funny and cute, it gets old!

Last time we were at Animal Kingdom with the kids, we went with some friends, who had been there before. We were first timers, so we just followed their lead…their lead that guided us through ¼ of the park! I had NO idea the things that Animal Kingdom had until DH and I went back that following summer by ourselves. We were bound and determined to get to see everything at Animal Kingdom this time around! We walked the trails that go to the left of the tree, and ended up over by Africa, where we quickly grabbed fast passes for the Safari!

Now, the kids had been on that before, and were very excited to be doing that again. We have an amazing zoo here in Milwaukee, and we visit it frequently, so they are very avid animal lovers! After we grabbed our fast passes, we hopped on the train and headed back to Rafiki’s Planet Watch (I think that’s what it’s called!)

DH and I had been back here, but not the kids! They were excited to be encountering their first set of characters!! This would be Cooper’s first time able to actually interact. He was only 6 months old the first time he went! He did a lot of high fiving!!

We explored the building a little, went out to the petting area, and then started heading out. It was getting close to our FP time for the Safari and we would NOT be missing that!
The fast pass line was pretty much nonexistent, so in no time at all, we were cruising our way through Africa! At one point during our Safari, we were stopped, for quite a lengthy time, because of a herd of Rhinos! I think it’s so special for the kids to be able to experience those animals in as close to their habitat as they can be in this country, and to see that the cast members and their caretakers do their best to not interrupt their lives.

To Be Continued...

 

[shellywalker]

Last year we took the kids to Sea World while we were down there, and the week before we got there a Killer Whale calf was born! This year, a few days before we arrived at Animal Kingdom an Elephant was born! If you look closely, it is rolling around on the ground on the far right side of the pictures!

Here we are in a traffic jam, in the middle of Africa! Who knew!!!

And here is the guilty party…

As always, our trip to Africa ended with a scary chase for poachers! Elephants are my favorite, so risking my life to catch those poachers is no big deal! Where to after the Safari? That’s right…Kali River Rapids! I stayed off with Cooper, because he’s too little and DH took Maddie and Jackson. Everyone was walking off soaking wet and we told Maddie, nah that won’t happen to you hahahahaha, sometimes a little white lie is worth it…ish.
This first picture was just on the walk over to the Kali River Rapids, but it’s so pretty I had to toss it in there!

Now really, I knew Maddie would probably not enjoy this ride…although part of me was hoping once she went on it she’d be okay. Not the case. She was real mad when she got off! She is definitely not even related to me! I could sit on these rides all day long! Jackson on the other hand, I thought would love it! Not so much…not that he was crying or making a big deal about it, but he just was eh, that wasn’t fun and now I’m all wet! I took Maddie into the bathroom to attempt to get her shorts dry at least. Since Disney is so eco-friendly and invested in the super blast air dryers, that didn’t happen. I would have had to stand there all day with her shorts. So, moving on…we headed through some more trails and saw some more animals!

We attempted to see the Nemo show, none of us had seen it before. We walked in shortly before it started, got pretty decent seats, saw most of the show and then there was some sort of technical issues. The show paused. We waited a few minutes and decided to just head out…the kids were getting hungry and we needed to see the Dino’s before we left!
Now, Jackson has in the last year become obsessed with Dinosaurs! So were really anxious to show him this part of the park. Again, something we never saw the first time! We headed first to…

After we got off the ride, we saw these guys…

We walked around some more, the kids dug for bones, I grabbed a chicken nugget meal for them…and then we headed out of the park!

We had a big day planned the next day, so it was an early night for us!!!

 

[shellywalker]

I’m not sure what we did when we got back to the hotel, we may have went swimming for a while, but I do know that we ended up at Magic Kingdom later that night. It was PACKED, like nothing I had ever seen before. We could hardly navigate our way down Main Street, and before long, the boys were both asleep in the stroller, which meant we weren’t going to be doing any rides. We hung around and waited for Wishes to start! I thought it was packed before; trying to get out of the park was like a mob scene. I was afraid I was going to lose a kid! It took us over an hour to walk from the hub to the front gate!!! I didn’t take a single picture that night!

Day 4

The next morning we had our very first character meal! We had 8:05 Reservations at Hollywood & Vine! The boys were really looking forward to this meal, as Playhouse Disney is their absolute favorite! It was great to be able to get into the park before it opened, there is always something so magical about the calm, and quietness of a park before anyone gets there. There was a lovely gentleman outside of the turnstiles checking in families who had reservations. We stood in a line that was a few people deep, and then made our way into the park. We headed in and straight over to our reservation! When our table was ready the cast member announced something like “Now Showing, The Walker Family”…these kinds of details totally make the vacation! The kids love that! The characters we were able to see were June and Leo, Handy Manny and Special Agent Oso! The kids ate Mickey Waffles, again, and Ice Cream! The food was good, and the atmosphere was great! The characters put on a dance show, and the kids get up there and dance with them, it was very special!

These moments are so special…it’s like just as I think she’s outgrowing my happy place, she gets SO excited to see a character that once was her favorite, that she hasn’t ever seen in person!

Here is Jackson up there dancing with June! Daddy and Cooper were dancing in the back! What a great time!!

This was my plate starting at the left: Pancake, Grapes, Cheesy Potatoes, Tator Tots, Biscuit and a Mickey Waffle.

This was DH’s plate starting at the left: Cheesy Potatoes, Tator Tots, Ham, Sausage, Scrambled Eggs and Bacon!

Jackson’s plate had Mickey Waffles, Cinnamon Raisin Toast and Bacon! He ate the same thing at every single meal!

We would go back here for breakfast again! The kids loved it! We stopped by the photo op spot on the way out and took a few pictures with our new friend, Jake!

Up next: Would we FINALLY get to ride TSM for the FIRST time????

 

[Stasieki]

Following along. 24 hours in the car

We live in TN (your picture is exactly what I see every day) and drive 11 hours. That is our max.

 

[shellywalker]

Following along. 24 hours in the car

We live in TN (your picture is exactly what I see every day) and drive 11 hours. That is our max.

I think my checkbook would be in a lot more trouble if I lived that close It actually wasn't that bad at all! I imagined it to be FAR worse than it was!!! TN is gorgeous! We are going to Nashville in the fall for a wedding and I can not wait!!!

Welcome along!!!

 

[Stasieki]

I think my checkbook would be in a lot more trouble if I lived that close It actually wasn't that bad at all! I imagined it to be FAR worse than it was!!! TN is gorgeous! We are going to Nashville in the fall for a wedding and I can not wait!!!

Welcome along!!!

I work in Nashville and live just outside the city, in Murfreesboro. Let me know if you have any questions.

 

[catherines_mama]

Just read your intro and am glad I found your TR. We are going OCT 2012 about the same time. We only have a 10 hour drive, so I'm looking forward to your adventure down!

...OKAY - caught up! What fun! Your family is beautiful and you can see how happy they are. Do they always get along well or is it the Disney magic? I am glad your trip went so well down! Sometimes the kids just suprise you!

Please tell me you went back to AK and saw more (like LION KING and BUGS LIFE).

Also, a MK at night tip - there is a bathroom to the LEFT of Plaza Restaurant, next to it is a back exit. After WISHES! CMs will let you exit through there and it saves a LOT of time. ALSO, cut through the Emporium stores, just go to the back wall and cut through, it really helps when you are afraid you'll lose a kid. I know the feeling, mine are older so we truly have to form a human chain. if it gets bad, DH will take 2 and I take 1 and we meet @ the popcorn stand by the exit (b/c mama needs her popcorn) LOL

Question: how did you find the preferred room? Was it a better fit or just a better location? I never noticed the difference.

EXCITED FOR MORE!!