8 Days with 8 People in 2008... I'm seeing a theme here!

[Melora]

As you might have noticed this trip report is a little on the tardy side.

But better late than never I always say!!

So here we go!


We have as our adventurers:

Me (big surprise)
Jeff (Hubby and fellow Disney lover)
(We're the ones on the right...)

Emily (20, My daughter who no longer lives with us but loves Disney as much as I do)
Bri (20, Emily's girlfriend, partner, room mate and good family friend.. never been to WDW)
Erin (16, Jeff's daughter, lives with her mom, and has been to the World once for one day a couple of years ago before a cruise)
Alex (13, my son, but calls Jeff dad, who lives with us... easy going and a genuine pleasure to be around)
Katherine (just turned 9, our little princess we brought home from Russia 3 years before)
Jeffrey Jr (7, our youngest and funniest one of the group)

(There will be plenty of pictures of all of the above so no need to post extras)


We live about 5 hours via airplane from Florida and 45 minutes from our airport so I always try to book the earliest possible flight out so we can get to Florida at a reasonable hour. This usually means that we have to get up while it's still dark and not everyone is happy about that even if we are on our way to the World. It also means that I don't have even a second in the morning to do any last minute packing. According to Jeff everything has to be in the suitcase, zipped up and waiting in the hallway to be dragged out to the car the minute he wakes up.

This usually means I am up far too late the night before, refining my packing, worrying about what I forgot (despite the detailed list) and falling asleep standing at the kitchen counter trying to remember what I had come in there for in the first place.

Everyone who didn't live with us stayed overnight so there was no panic in the morning if someone didn't show up on time.

Luckily our van holds 8 people and after we stuffed everyone and their 1/4 ton of luggage into it, there was barely room to move.
Suitcases in the rear and everyone's carry on's at their feet.

As expected, the freeways were empty and we made it without incident to Wally Park (which I like to call Wally World) where we park our car for the duration.

Here we are taking the shuttle to the terminal. As you can see not everyone is awake yet.

Alex, Katherine, Erin & Jeffrey

As per usual, our flight was delayed an hour, so instead of grabbing a quick meal at one fast food places,
we ate a leisurely breakfast at Ruby's Diner which was at the far end of our airport terminal.

We got done fairly quickly and still had time to kill so Emily took pictures of herself:

and the back of Jeffrey's head.

Our plane finally arrived, everyone got off and we got called to board. As we were getting on the plane, Jeffrey said hello to the flight attendant who was directing people to their seats.
She thought he was so cute and polite that she invited him to sit in the pilots chair with the captains hat on. Katherine got to try the hat on too. They loved it!

(I had to stop Jeff from making comments reminiscent of the Airplane movie " Joey, do you like movies about gladiators?")

The flight was relatively uneventful and we had our own video screens so Erin and I played trivia most of the flight.
Jeff and Alex played a couple of times too. It was fun.
I won 4 times and got the highest score on the whole flight... woo hoo!
Of course I'm not sure that many people were playing.

This is what I saw every time I turned around.

Emily, Jeffrey & Bri

Finally we made it Florida!
I really like the Orlando airport. Its full of Disney stuff before you even get to the parks!
I always call this our first ride of the trip.... the airport monorail.
I try to get this seat every time we get on so I can take a picture.

And this is our second ride of the trip.... the Magical Express:

Jeffrey was so excited he could barely sit still. Hence the following picture.

Careful kid, you wouldn't want to your face to get stuck like that:

We got lucky and Old Key West was the first stop on bus route.
Welcome Home!!!!
I checked us in while the kids watched some TV in the lobby.
Already I was so excited. All the sights and smells just dripped of magical good times!

We had booked a 2 bedroom villa which works out very nicely for our group. Us in the master bedroom, Em, Bri, Erin and Katherine on two the queen beds in the second bedroom and Alex and Jeffrey on the pull out couch. We love the space. The room also has 3 TVs which works out well when there are 8 people who all want to relax in the evening and all want to watch something different. We love the large balcony too. Although this trip, even though we had a prime location (meaning we could see some of the EPCOT fireworks), there were tall bushes and trees that blocked most of our view. I just so happy to be there I didn't care!

We had decided to let the Magical Express deliver our luggage again, even though last time we were here they lost 2 of our bags (well they technically belonged to Chris and his wife who were staying at a different resort) and they didn't find them again until mid morning after the night we arrived. We hoped it was a one time thing. Since we didn't have anything to unpack and we were all starving we dropped off our carry-ons, we walked up to the hospitality house and took the boat to Downtown Disney to get something to eat.

We ate at Earl of Sandwich which is such a wonderful value for what you get. I adore the tomato soup!!!

Part way through our meal Katherine was squirming around and asking if she could take off her shoes. (No not in a restaurant!)
She continued to fidget until I asked her what was going on.

"My shoes hurt." I reached down and gave them the toe squeeze and discovered that her toes were jammed all the way into the front of the shoe and they were at least 1/2 a size too small.

"Why did you wear these?"
(In my mind I was really asking "why didn't I check their foot wear more carefully?").
She shrugged her shoulders and got tears in her eyes. "I can't walk very well."

"Don't worry we'll figure something out."

As soon as we finished eating we started searching Downtown Disney for someplace that I could buy her something that would stand up to all the walking we were going to have to do.

We found a store called Team Mickey Athletic Club that sold name brand shoes with good support. We found her a pair of Nikes for a lot less than I thought and her vacation was saved.

We caught the bus back to the resort and just as we were going into the room the sky opened up and it started pouring like crazy. It was actually pretty cool since we don't get that kind of downpour in California. Our luggage had arrived so we spent timing unpacking while we watched the Olympics (gymnastics and swimming) and went to bed at midnight.

 

[Melora]

It's always hard for those of us on the west coast to get up and running early in the east coast morning time. Every year we try to force ourselves out of bed to get to the parks as close to opening as possible but it just doesn't happen. Especially with the little kids. If you wake them too early you'll just end up with a bunch of grumpy bunnies.

This morning we got up at 8 AM Florida which is 5 AM our time. We got out the door and to the bus but not all of us were awake and happy about it.

Smile Katherine!

I guess not.....

The running theme of the trip began right away when it started to pour rain as soon as we got off the bus.
Thankfully I brought ponchos for everyone.
Ponchos in general are a mixed blessing because although they keep you dry, you feel like you are in a sauna while you have them on.
As it turned out, the dollar store ponchos everyone tells you to buy to save money felt like we were wearing saran warp and they ripped and tore and never lasted more than one wearing (if that).
I definitely will NOT use these again.
I bit the bullet and purchased Disney ponchos for everyone since there was heavy rain forecast for the entire week due to Tropical Storm Faye.
The one perk of Disney ponchos is that if the kids tore them (which they did several times, usually at the neck) any place that sold them would replace them for free.

Here are Bri & Alex modeling the cheapo ponchos:

A least the rain kept the temperatures down which was very nice.

Our first ride in the park was Dinosaur which was a great way to stay dry. Then everyone except me and Jeffrey (he was too short) rode Primeval Whirl.
He and I shopped in the stores and I got him a caramel apple that he ate while we sat on bench out of the rain. It was nice to just be here and taking in the all the sights, sounds and tastes.

Our first sit down lunch was at the Tusker House for an African themed buffet. We arrived 20 minutes early and didn't have to wait very long before we were seated.
I cannot tell you how much I love this place.

Here Jeffrey gets a little love from Bri as we wait to be called:

Here are Erin & Alex before we ate:

And a couple of pictures of the buffet area.
Not very crowded!

After we stuffed ourselves we headed towards Expedition Everest and our first Fastpass ride of the trip. I had been dreading this moment for months. I kept telling myself I was going to go and not be scared (who was I kidding?) The closer we got the more my stomach hurt. Without warning my eyes were welling up and I started to slow down and I was trying to tell everyone I didn't know whether or not I wanted to go after all.

Everyone completely ignored me and just forged ahead. Mom? Mom who?

Before I knew it they were heading down the fastpass lane and dragging me with them. I literally had tears dripping down my cheeks. Finally Emily noticed me, but all she did was give me a hug, tell me it was going to be OK and kept herding me along. There was no line at all and I was caught up in the middle of the family parade and suddenly found myself pushed into a seat and buckled into the ride. I somehow ended up next to Jeffrey. I don't think anyone else wanted to ride with me.

My heart was beating out of my chest but I was trying to keep it together so Jeffrey didn't freak out. Em and Bri were in front of me and kept turning around to check that I wasn't trying to escape. As soon as we left the station Jeffrey said "It's OK mommy, this will be fun." I guess I realized at this point there was no turning back so I took a deep breath and tried to relax.

Overall the ride was not as bad as I thought it was going to be, but it still gave my stomach a good lurch during the backwards part. The huge drop was not too bad either because it was over before you realized you were dropping.

Here's the picture of us as we about to drop. The front row is ecstatic, Jeffrey looks stunned, and back row is lovin' every minute. Erin and Katherine were in the car behind us.

I was SO incredibly happy that I survived.

Next we went on the safari and because it was so cool and overcast there were lots of animals out.

Here is an artsy picture I took of Katherine reflected in the drivers rear view mirror:

We walked the Pangini trail next and that was pleasantly cool and beautiful.

This first picture is in the building that you have to go through with all the small caged animals:

Em's favorite animal is the hippo, so of course we had to take a picture of her here:

NO Bri No!!

Even the gorillas thought it was cool enough to be out and about:

By now Jeffrey's legs were giving out so we headed back to the room for a rest.

Its had been a fun first day so far.

 

[Melora]

Tonight we are going to go to Hollywood Studios so Jeffrey can ride Tower of Terror, which he had been talking about forever and also get some dinner.

After we all rested and changed clothes we headed to DHS (Which will always be MGM to me).

On the way over Alex was telling Bri all the interesting facts he knew about the bus service. Jeff said Alex needed to start his own "Bus information hotline" where you could call up and he would impart all sorts of trivia on the Disney bus system. Everyone was laughing and Alex said "My service is now out of business". Everyone laughed even harder.

When we got there, we split up. Jeff, Em, Bri, Alex, Katherine and Jeffrey went straight to Tower of Terror. Erin and I passed on the ride and headed to soak up some AC in the gift shops then went and waited for them in the TOT basement and watched the groups of people come out and view their "terrifying" pictures. Jeffrey had never ridden this before and when he got off he kept saying "I was floating".

We ate at the ABC Commissary for dinner where they took FOREVER to get us our food and then got it wrong but we somehow ended up with a free burger so it worked out.

Then off to The Great Movie Ride and Star Tours. We walked around the New York backlot streets and there wasn't a single person there. It was like they closed the park and it was just us. It was really cool.

We passed Toy Story Mania and the wait was posted at an hour but we figured what the heck and got in line. We waited for about 40 minutes before we got on and it was SO much fun. This was the first time any of us had ridden it.

The queue is a lot of fun with lots of different things to look at.

By the time we got out it was 10 o'clock and Fantasmic was starting in half an hour.
Since none of us had ever done this either, we decided to give it a whirl.
Here we are on the way:

The theater was half empty and everyone enjoyed it.
This was the only shot that came out:

We got back to the room about 11:30 and were all asleep by midnight.

We had a really great fun first day.

 

[Melora]

Day 3 and we are totally in the swing of being here... well unless you count showing up at Hollywood Studios about 11 AM. As I said, we west coasters just can't seem to get it together too early in the morning. We'd be aces if this was Disneyland!! Of course Em and Bri didnt even make it with us at this point.

When we got into the park, Jeff headed over to Tower of Terror to get Fastpasses while the rest of us stopped and watched a street show with Otto van BonBon and Tutu Tulllula.
It was hilarious. The kids couldn't stop laughing.

Everyone enjoyed it so much they wanted to get their picture taken with TuTu.
She was holding her "X marks the spot" prop.

Oh how I LOVE classic cars.
And this one if from California too!

Alex and Jeff headed over to ToT while Erin, Katherine, Jeffrey and I went shopping and stopped to watch the High School Musical Show in front of the Hat.
This was not Jeffrey's idea of a good time so while the girls watched I walked him around to the pin carts and traded pins with the cast members.

It wasn't long before it was time for our reservations for the Sci-Fi Dine-in where Em and Bri met us and we had a really great lunch.
This is another of my favorites! (I think I say that too much). But I love sci-fi and love the retro 50's look of everything. I actually like the food there too!

The entire group minus Jeffrey and myself then headed over to Rock n Roller Coaster. He and I walked around, played some games in the Toy Story arcade, traded some pins and took some fun pictures to pass the time.

By the time we met up with everyone it was hotter than blazes so most of us headed back to the room to relax.

Em and Bri stayed for a little more Rock n Roller Coaster action:

Back at the room the little kids took a bath in the jacuzzi tub, put in too much bubble bath and had bubbles up to the ceiling.
But they had a good time. I used at least 5 towels to sop up the bubble overflow.

Jeff relaxing and being silly in the room:

We cooled off for about an hour than headed to EPCOT and caught a ride on Mission Space. Katherine tried the orange side with Alex this time and became an immediate convert. No more wimpy baby side for her! We tried to go on Test Track but the ride broke down so instead of waiting we bailed.

It was about time for our reservations at Tokyo Dining where we would be celebrating Bri's 21st birthday.

Happy Birthday Bri!!

The dinner was superb! The little kids got to eat their dinner in dishes shaped like high speed trains.

The wait staff brought out a cake and we all sang Happy Birthday!

We finished just in time to go out on the balcony and watch Illuminations.
Another first for us! I really enjoyed it!

We got back to the room around 10:30 where we watched Michael Phelps win his 8th gold medal then fell exhausted into bed.

 

[Melora]

By day 4 I had hoped maybe we could actually get an early start morning but apparently some of us don't read the memos:

You've met our son, Mr Pretzel Leg ?

Alex on the other hand is ALWAYS up early, but he goes out to the patio and plays his Nintendo.
Mr Plans-ahead!

A few shots of all the plants surrounding our balcony:

When everyone was finally up, we headed to Animal Kingdom. It took absolutely forever to get there.
There were no AK buses for 45 minutes then 3 of them showed up in a row. Fortunately that doesn't happen very often.

We immediately got some fastpasses for Expedition Everest then walked the Maharajah Jungle Trek. It is so beautiful!

Boy Bats (sorry to point out the obvious.. I'm really just a 10 year old boy at heart)

When we were done it was time for lunch so we headed over to the Yak and Yeti for our reservations and took some more pictures while waiting for Em and Bri to get there.
They had an even harder time getting started this morning than the rest of us.

Once they arrived we got seated pretty quickly. The food was excellent but the meal took almost 2 hours. Again, this was because our waiter took forever to bring drinks (almost 10 minutes from when he took the order), then took forever to come back and take our food order (at least another 10 minutes) and then it was another 20 minutes until the food arrived. After he brought the check it took 10 minutes for him to come back and pick it up then another 10 minutes to bring back the credit card. Slow and forgetful wait staff seems to be a running theme this trip. At least we were enjoying each others company so it wasn't as bad as it could have been.

We walked over to EE when we were done and my stomach was in knots all over again anticipating the ride, even though I knew what to expect. We got in the fastpass lane and 2 minutes later the ride broke down and that was that. Secret happy dance for me!

We went into the store there where Katherine bought a cute round stuffed Yeti. As we were gathering up our stuff by the stroller Erin noticed we were missing Jeffrey. (Yes his sister noticed, not his mother). I hurried back into the store but couldn't find him. After a few frantic minutes he turned up outside with a cast member who said he was very matter of fact about the whole thing telling her he was lost and he knew to ask a cast member and could she help him find us. I was relieved because I was afraid that he might have ended up getting caught up in the crowd and people surfing in one direction or another to the other side of the park.

We headed back to the room because it was beyond hot, as the cool morning clouds had cleared and the sun had come out in all its fury.

We only spent about an hour cooling down before we turned around and made our way to the Magic Kingdom for the first time this trip.

We rode lots of rides including Buzz Lightyear, Carousel of Progress and People Mover before we stopped to eat at Cosmic Rays. Then onto Philharmagic, Small World and Haunted Mansion (where we all agreed it was much spookier when you ride it at night).

We then found a perfect spot to watch the fireworks. The show was fantastic!
There is nothing like a Disney fireworks show!!

We waited for the crowd to clear then went on Jungle Cruise, Pirates, Big Thunder Mountain (extra good at night), Autopia and Winnie the Pooh.

We tried to get on Space Mountain but it was going on 1 AM and the line was almost an hour.

Off to the resort and off to bed!

 

[Melora]

Today we went back to EPCOT because had scored reservations at Le Cellier for lunch.

The Candian grounds are just beautiful.

It's raining in this picture:

While we waited to be seated, the kids started to make a mask so they could get it stamped at each country around the World Showcase.
Unfortunately, when it rained after lunch the masks got soaked.

We didn't have to wait very long and as we expected, the food was absolutely wonderful!
I of course had a steak and cheddar cheese soup.

The kids each got a chocolate moose for dessert.

We stopped for a group shot after lunch while it wasn't raining:

When we were done we headed over to Station Cool where you can get samples of free drinks from around the world.

Hmmmm, which one should Bri try?

That one Bri... "Beverly"..... I think you'll like it!

OH well, maybe not!!

After Bri told said she would never trust us again, we headed into the museum tucked inside one of the pavilions that had vintage EPCOT memoribilia in it. I love it!

Then we headed out to walk the countries, stopping into Mexico first to ride the ride and see the gorgeous handmade animals.

The ride pictures came out blurry but I added them anyway:

Off to Norway where we took usual picture of everyone under the troll. The little kids insisted on wearing hats:

.

 

[Melora]

We skipped the next couple of countries and headed straight for Japan.
I can taste the yummy candy now!

We watched Miyuki make caramel animals. This is a dragon that didn't photograph clearly:

We watched the Taiko drummers. Another highlight of our trips!

Then we went up into the gardens

and checked out the Koi fish who wanted us to feed them

And then we got our first Kaki-gori of the trip.
Shaved Ice! YUM YUM.
I always get melon and the kids get rainbow.
Jeff likes Cherry.

Then we took a walk through the tin toy exhibit.
I didn't know it at the time but this was the last time I would be able to see this.
It's been there for about 5 years and this was the last year before all the toys went back to Japan.
If I had a lot of money I would seriously consider collecting these because I JUST love the them, especially the robots.
I have a ton of other pictures from previous trips fortunately.

ACK! Blurry pic again!
These are pictures of the boxes that the toys originally came in.

The Fastpasses we had gotten earlier for Test Track were good so we headed over there and took a silly picture.

Of course after that thrilling ride, everyone wants to drive their own car.

It started raining again, this time pretty hard so we headed back to the room to stay dry and watch more Olympics before hitting the sack.

 

[Melora]

Day 6 already!!

Today was MGM day.... (oh sorry) Hollywood Studios.

This was the bus ride at about 10AM.... we were the only ones all the way there.
Sometimes it didn't seem like it was the middle of August because the crowds were so low

We had reservations at the 50's Prime Time Diner. One of my favorite places to eat.

Erin and Jeffrey:

Our waiter (Cousin Dave) who was great fun:

Don't you just love these "old" TVs?
I waited forever to get a picture while the castle was up on the screen!

And here is Emily deciding what she should get for dessert:

Brownie Sundae!
OH YUMMY!

When we were done Jeff, Bri and Alex wanted to go on Tower of Terror (Jeffrey said he didn't want to "float")
so while the 3 of them did that, the rest of us relaxed in the Tower basement out of the rain.

While we waited I took some pictures of the Hotel.

Look at those storm clouds!

These are all taken in the "basement".

 

[Melora]

By now Tropical Storm Faye had stalled over the Orlando area and it was raining more and more and harder and harder.
After the ride, we wandered around trying to keep dry, scooting in and out of the stores. We decided to try the back lot tour since there was no line at all.
We discovered it was NOT a good way to keep dry (especially if you are sitting on the outside of the tram):

Oh goody!
Another chance to get even wetter!

Then we gave the Muppet Show a try which was MUCH drier.
Don't they look Faaaaaabulous Dah-ling?

By this time the rain was coming down so hard it was nearly impossible to enjoy anything so we headed back to the hotel.

These pictures don't do the storm justice.
As we were leaving:

And back at the resort:

and from our balcony:

Time to get inside, stay dry and warm and watch the Olympics.

 

[Melora]

The last 2 days were kind of a blur. It rained so hard we couldn't do as much as we wanted. And I couldn't take out my camera much either so my picture taking suffered terribly.

We still had a good time though and when we weren't at the parks we were enjoying the Olympics.

Our last day we slogged around the Magic Kingdom and enjoyed the Tiki Room:

The Jungle Cruise:

Here it is folks......
Can you believe it??
THE BACK SIDE OF WATER!!

Shirley's Temple:

He'll trade you two of his heads for one of yours!
Pretty good deal when you think about it!

Then we hit Pirates and onto Tomorrowland for Buzz Lightyear.

 

[Melora]

I grabbed a couple pictures of the scenery:

And some ducks who were loving the rain:

One last look at the castle:

And finally a train ride around the park where I took some more ominous cloud photos:

We reluctantly headed back to the resort for the last time, but not before Jeffrey made friends at the bus stop with some ducks who were looking for handouts.

Once we arrived back to Old Key West, we got our bags out of storage and took our last ride, The Magical Express (aka The Sad Bus), back to the airport. We grabbed some dinner before hopping on an evening flight back to California.

We had some beautiful views as we took off:

The plane ride would have been completely uneventful if not for some guy on our plane who had an allergic reaction to peanuts, went into shock and we had to make an emergency landing somewhere in Texas.
He turned out to be OK because he walked off the plane by himself.

The only plus side was that they allowed us free access to the pay-per-view movies after that and everyone got to watch whatever we wanted on our personal video screens the rest of the way home.

Jeffrey and I watched Kung Fu Panda... very funny!

Jeff watched Iron Man but lost the last 10 minutes when we landed and they turned off the TVs.

Ah well!

Overall we had a really great trip and I am looking forward to doing it again next year!!!

 

[Melora]

Well that's it for 2008 folks!



Thanks for reading!!!