A Commando on Valium - A 7 Day Solo Trip at AKL ***Update 3/23 page 19

[Quacktatty]

I had a sunken treasure on my trip as well... no idea if it was w/ or w/o malibu but it was gud!

i think it would have been good even with the malibu, but I went with Tony's recommendation!

I'm glad your trip is looking up! It took me 2 full days until I really felt comfortable with the solo thing.... sounds like you got in the groove alot quicker than I did

This was my second solo trip, I think it was definitely easier the second time around

I am really hoping for a savannah view room if we get to go in dec. I don't know if I told you or not, but there is a possibility we might be able to go...it just depends if work gives matt off or not.

Hope you get to go in December! I'm thinking about trying Dreams Unlimited for my next trip, how are they?

Cool facts about the AKL and its animals! I also didn't know that they bring in all the animals from the safari at AK at night -- that must be quite a job!

At AK, all the animals have a signal that calls them in for the evening. Technically they don't have to go to their night houses, but they usually do because that's where the food is! AKL feeds right on the Savannah, so no need to go back to the night house.

 

[Quacktatty]

I walked down stairs from Victoria Falls and found what appeared to be a fairly busy Jiko. I approached the podium and said that I didn't have reservations, but was wondering if it would be possible to eat at the bar. They took my name and I was seated immediately.

The seats really aren't at the bar, although there is one, but instead there are 4 round tables that can seat 4 or 5 people. I was seated at the table closest to the check-in podium. This was fine by me as I liked hearing what was going on. I witnessed more than a few people who were on the DDP that didn't have ADRs.

I purused the menu until my server, Jodi, arrived. I started with a fruity martini type thing called a Hangin' Out in Cape Town. I can't remember what was in it, but it was good.

Before my bread arrived, in walked two people - they also had a small child with them. Why you would bring your baby to a nice place and sit at the bar I'll never know, but at least she was a very quiet kid. I'm not sure if they were seated or they sat themselves, but they walked in like they owned the place. The guy had a baseball hat on, and the hostess came over quickly and asked him to remove it. He gave her a look like she had just killed his dog. Dude, it's a NICE restaurant, take the hat off.

My bread arrived and it was sooooo good!!! I could have made a meal just off of that. The spread it came with was really interesting, spicy, but not at all hot.

As I was eating my bread, the now annoying couple started to order. They were on the DxDDP (with no ADR remember) and asked so many questions and were so picky about everything. What's this? Can I substitute that? Can we get our cheese plate to go? Blah blah blah blah blah. And to top it all off, the mother had her bra straps hanging out of her tank top the entire meal. If only the hostess had said something about that too!

For my entree I got the Kenyan Coffee Barbecue Beef Short Ribs. Now I love me some BBQ, so I figured this would be pretty good. OMG it was incredible!!!!!!! I just about inhaled it and sopped up all the sauce with more bread.

As if I wasn't already so stuffed that I was going to explode, I ordered some dessert too. Oh and of course, another drink.

The Nutty African - an alcoholy coffee drink

And the Tanzanian Chocolate Cheesecake

Again, SO GOOD!!!! Of course, in the spirit of good times being ruined on this trip I had two things happened that kind of irked me. While I was eating dessert, bra straps turned around and said, "eating alone?" I just replied, "yep" and she adds, "That's nice, must be a rare treat." Of course I wasn't going to go into the fact that I was here alone and eating alone is a normal thing for me nor the fact that it was no longer a treat since they arrived and gave me a dinner show, but whatever!

Then, as I'm finishing up my meal, a man walks right up to me and says - are you almost done?? He was trying to steal my seat right out from under me. I really wanted to just sit there as long as possible, and I certainly did take my time signing my check and saying goodbye to my wonderful server, but I had to leave eventually. I would never do that to someone in a restaurant, not even a counter service place!! Boo to people.

At this point, I'm a little drunk. I don't drink a lot anymore and so 3 drinks in the span of about 2 hours really did me in. Nevertheless, I decided to hit up DTD. It was looking like it was going to rain and I was seeing lightning in the distance, but since DTD is mostly inside I took my chances.

The bus to DTD took about 20 minutes, probably the longest of any bus rides on property from AKL. I stopped at Goofy's Candy Company first where I got two make your own treats.

An apple dipped in milk chocolate with sprinkles and peanut butter cups and drizzled with caramel.

And pretzel rods - milk chocolate with mini M&Ms, milk chocolate with peanut butter cups and white chocolate with sprinkles.

After getting my delicious treats, I went to Once Upon a Toy for Mr. Potato Head pieces. I got a good variety including a Storm Trooper outfit, Mary Poppins (with Cruella DeVille shoes because they didn't have Mary Poppins Shoes) and some other miscellaneous pieces.

I really wanted to go to Basin. I love bath stuff! There I picked up 3 bath bombs, some bath salts, a foot massager, a wooden soap dish and some tea tree soap. I have used a couple of the bath bombs and I really like them! They smell good and make you feel smooth when you get out of the tub.

The last thing I picked up was some coasters at World of Disney. I spent a lot of time there, but only the coasters really jumped out at me. They are currently in use in my basement TV room.

I was pretty tuckered out by now so I walked out, stopping in the Christmas shop where I didn't end up buying anything. Just as I got to the bus it started raining, but I didn't get wet because I was under cover! We arrived back at AKL and I dragged my tired and still slightly drunk body back to my room where I crashed pretty quickly. It ended up being a not so bad day after all.

 

[2xcited2sleep]

Yikes! Bra strap lady and hat guy sound like quite a pair!! Sorry that they and table stealing guy marred your visit. But overall it sounds pretty good. That martini looks especially yummy! And I love the coasters you bought. Always great to bring a little Disney home with you!!

 

[Girldreamer02]

Love the update! We ate at Jiko in dec and I didn't think I would like it b/c I am super picky, but I loved it! I don't recall what i had, but I do recall it was freakin' delicious! To bad you had some not so great company sitting by you, but at least the child was quiet like you said. The drinks look and sound amazing. I don't usually drink at disney for the reason you said. I am not a big drinker to begin with so those drinks will kick my butt pretty quickly. I drank on the disney cruise and I was sleeping about 40 minutes after that lol. Light weight yes I know. Your treats from goofys look so awesome! I think we need to stop in there in dec and treat ourself. We always go in, but never make anything. Usually to full I guess. Dreams unlimited is great to work with. Our guy that we've used twice now is name dan(i can get more specfics from dh if you were to decide you wanted to use them b/c he deals with them for us.) , but he is very helpful an even when adr's are full he'll still try to find a way to squeeze us in or he'll keep calling back trying to get us in. We booked through them for our honeymoon disney cruise in july...not with dan, but somebody else and they did an awesome job and they even sent a little present to our stateroom, which would very sweet! We couldn't figure out where it came from until matt had to sign a paper saying we received it and it said the sender on it. I know what you mean about that long walk back to the room from the bus stop and if you were a little tipsy i'm sure that didn't make it anymore fun. At first I wondered why the bus stop is so far away from the building then it occurred to me that they were probably trying to keep the noise far away from the animals so they feel at home in their surroundings. Can't wait to hear more!

 

[If U Had Wings]

Jiko sounds great, but boo to those people for their rudeness. That's just wrong. I may need to think about adding Jiko on to my to-do list for next year.

 

[OhMari]

Hope you come back and finish.

When we were asked if we were on the Dining Plan, I was almost glad to say, "no dining plan".

 

[Quacktatty]

I'm back! Life caught up with me these last few weeks. Tis the season to be busy afterall. New installments coming up soon!

 

[Quacktatty]

I was up early this morning, around 6:30. I had scheduled to have some in-room dining delivered the night before. I showered and dressed first and my breakfast arrived promptly at 7am. I had pancakes, bacon and potatoes. The pancakes were really thick, and there were 5 on the plate. I could only finish about half, but they were delicious. The bacon was crispy and wonderful. The potatoes were on the only disappointment, a little on the gritty side.

The plan for today is to go to DHS and ride Toy Story Mania then go to Fort Wilderness for my Segway tour. Before leaving for the bus, I walked around the resort a little bit, seeing different sides of the animals.

I left on the early side and arrived at DHS by 8:30am. While I was waiting to get in the park, I saw a DISer. Of course, I didn't get her name, but she noticed my LGMH. They let us in at exactly 8:45 and I wiggled my way to the front for rope drop. The opening show here does very little to thrill me to say the least, and today was no exception. When they dropped the rope, I started walking like crazy. Somehow, I made my way to the front of the pack heading to TSM. I ended up being the very first person in line!!!

It was really cool being the first person on the ride. Nothing special happened, but it was a good ride. One of the benefits of being in the first group was that I got the high score for the day! That lasted all of about 10 seconds and I actually saw it get wiped away when the next people came through.

I got right back on for a second ride, this time it took about 25-30 minutes. I did a little better this time around.

I stopped at One Man's Dream on my way out of the park to see if I could get a dream, but no such luck. I walked toward the exit and was out of the park by 10am.

The next stop was the TTC. The bus wait was long, but the ride was pretty short. I then hopped on the resort monorail loop to MK since I had some time to kill. Once I got to MK, I found the boat to take me to Fort Wilderness. It's a pretty complicated thing getting from park to park, that's for sure.

An hour and fifteen minutes later I finally arrived at Mickey's BBQ Pavilion for the Segway Tour which was exactly when I was supposed to get there. I was one of the last to arrive which is totally not like me!

Up next, Frank and Robert are better guides than Paul

 

[Quacktatty]

I had a sour taste in my mouth with the Tour Guide CMs this trip. Paul from Utica, MI had almost ruined my vacation after all. Frank and Robert introduced themselves and I just thought to myself, you've got some small shoes to fill guys.

They both ended up being a lot of fun as they took us around Fort Wilderness and the Wilderness Lodge on our Segways. We visited lots of places, including the Horse Barn. There are lots of nature trails throughout the grounds and we hit up many of those as well. We even saw a real live deer on our way from WL to FW. We played some Disney Trivia which I enjoyed and ended the tour in about 2 hours. It was well worth the time. There wasn't as much training as the Epcot Segway tour so it was more "off roading" time.

I was glad it only lasted 2 hours since my feet hurt SO bad by the end of it. It's really hard standing in one place for that long. At the end of the tour we were all given pins and sent on our merry way.

Thanks Frank and Robert!

I made my way back to the boat dock and took the boat to MK and then the resort monorail to the Poly for my lunch reservations at Kona Cafe.

Is this River Country?

When I checked in, I was a little early and I told her that I had an ADR, but for a little bit later, would I be able to be seated now? She actually LAUGHED at me!!! The place was pretty empty, but it was Free Dining time, you never know. She said to me, and I quote: "Oh you alone, you don't need no reservation when you eat alone." Whatever lady.

Thankfully, my server was much nicer. I ordered a coke, crab cakes and sticky wings. The crab cake were very good. Too small in my opinion, but still delicious. The sticky wings were OK, but certainly not as good as I remembered them being. I had a Kona Cone for dessert, and that hit the spot. I covered it in M&Ms, Sprinkles and Coconut. No nuts though, I think they were peanuts and I don't do peanuts!

I left the restaurant feeling fairly satisfied. I stopped at the bathroom before going to the bus stop. It seems to be tradition that I stop in the Poly lobby bathroom whenever I am there! A bus quickly arrived for DHS and off I went again.

Up Next: How I messed up the CPers picture

 

[Quacktatty]

I arrived back at DHS in no time and made another mad dash for TSM. I can't remember for sure, but I must have had a FastPass from earlier in the day. The posted wait time was 70 minutes, but there is no way that it was that long once you got inside.

This was the first time I had to ride next to somebody, but it didn't end up being so bad. Plus I beat the guy, so that's really all that matters, right?

By the time I got off my arm was quite sore, but jeez if I don't love that ride!! I considered hopping back in line, but the posted wait time was 270 minutes! I wasn't going to find out how accurate it was.

Next I went to the Magic of Disney Animation. I just wanted to do the drawing class, so I skipped the show and walked in through the gift shop. There were quite a few characters out doing meet and greets, I thought about getting in line, but didn't want to miss the drawing since it's only done every half hour or so.

We drew Donald Duck, mine came out looking quite demented. I got to use some of my Disney Trivia that I learned on the Segway tour early that day as well - Donald has a sister named Dumbella.

I walked through One Man's Dream which I always love and this time decided to stay for the movie. That poor movie is so sad. The sound is distorted at parts and the theater smells like basement. Poor Walt...

I decided to check out Star Tours next. I ended up next to these two people that made jokes and stupid comments the entire time. It was slightly amusing at first, but it got quite annoying after a while. And the guy was wearing a fleece jacket....umm, it's early September and about 89 degrees out, hello??

Is this a hidden mickey??

I followed Star Tours with Muppet Vision 3D (I think). I didn't write down that I did it, but I have pictures...

I also went on the great movie ride. The host was an old guy and our gangster was a woman, how lame???

My last ride of the day was Rockin Roller Coaster. I went through the Single Rider Line (of course) and got put in a car with these 3 College Program girls. They were talking about what sign they were going to make at the picture part and I offered to join them so it didn't look too off. I was trying to be nice. They thought it was a great idea and they showed me what they were going to do. Well, when it came to be picture time I somehow screwed it up and got the sign backwards. Sorry CP girls, I'm a big dork.

By now it was 7pm and I was ready to leave. At this point in my vacation I was pretty anxious to get back to the resort to see the animals outside my window. A nice change of pace from my usual go all night method of touring.

Of course the bus took forever to show up, as usual with DHS - bad bus mojo. I got back to my room and didn't find too many animals out. It was getting dark so they were probably all eating dinner and finding their spots to bed down for the night.

Eventually I saw a giraffe come by, but most of the pictures turned out too dark.

Bad bus mojo struck again as I sat waiting for the DTD bus. It seriously took about 20 minutes! Then it's a 20 minute bus ride on top of that. My main goal for the night was to eat at Earl of Sandwich. I ordered a BLT, a sprite and some macaroni salad. My plan was to just eat half the sandwich then go to Ghirardelli for ice cream. However, the sandwich was SO good I inhaled the whole thing, the macaroni salad too. I still crave that BLT. The bread was soft, the mayo was yummy, the bacon cooked perfectly.

I went to the Pin trading shop with the intention of trading something on the Pin board, but it was turned over for the night. I looked around at the pins, but didn't see anything that really jumped out at me.

The Art of Disney was on my way out, I wanted to check out the art work and maybe pick something else up. Nothing caught my eye, I did pick up a few things, but then put them back without buying. By 10pm I was done and ready for bed.

The bus came pretty quickly to bring me back to the resort. It was relatively empty and I grabbed the seat right behind the driver. There was a little boy, maybe about 9 or 10 who sat next to me the whole ride. He was very quiet and not a bother at all. I think he was just really interested in the goings on of the bus.

I was going to hit the bar for a night cap before heading back to my room, but I was just so tired I didn't even stop. I was asleep by 11pm after eating some of my caramel apple from Goofy's - which wasn't very good and really hard to eat!

Up next: Why I rode IASW two times in a row

 

[Hollywoodhaha]

Your comments make me laugh so hard


You remind me of myself.

Then again, maybe not. I get annoyed easily and love to make sarcastic comments about people around us that make my parents yell "HOLLY!"

 

[Girldreamer02]

I love earl of sandwich too!!! Delicious! Sounds like you had a very eventful day. I agree with the bad bus mojo of dhs...it seems like we ALWAYS wait forever there for a bus and that they fill up fast there too so you sometimes have to wait for a second one if you aren't first in line. So sucky! We are pin traders too and the board in dtd was also closed for the night when we went last year. So that was a bummer. I believe the year before I actually found two good pins on there that were keepers. I'm glad that you've come back to update this trippie. I missed your updates!

 

[If U Had Wings]

Your day sounded like it was alot of fun. That is so cool that you got to be the first person on Toy Story Mania. I don't think I've ever been the first one of the day on anything.

I'm glad to hear about the Fort Wilderness Segway tour. I'm thinking of doing that one on my trip next year.. I've done the around the World on a Segway one twice, and really want to try something new. Which one did you like better?

 

[Tiggerfaninaz]

I love your TR so far. Awesome pictures. The animals look so neat. I'd love to have that view. Maybe someday. I used to live in CT too, about 8 years ago. East Haven in 2000 and Glastonbury in 2001. I miss the ocean. Can't wait to read more.

Karen

 

[Quacktatty]

You remind me of myself.

...I get annoyed easily and love to make sarcastic comments about people around us that make my parents yell "HOLLY!"

Except for the yelling Holly part, we do sound a lot alike!

I love earl of sandwich too!!! Delicious!

It's so good, I dream about it.

I'm glad to hear about the Fort Wilderness Segway tour. I'm thinking of doing that one on my trip next year.. I've done the around the World on a Segway one twice, and really want to try something new. Which one did you like better?

I've done Around the World twice now as well. I liked Fort Wilderness better. They are different Segways and it's a lot more riding time. I'm kinda over the Epcot tour at this point. I don't know if you'll find the same thing that I did but most of the FW people were riders with experience, not noobs like Epcot.

I love your TR so far. Awesome pictures. The animals look so neat. I'd love to have that view. Maybe someday. I used to live in CT too, about 8 years ago. East Haven in 2000 and Glastonbury in 2001. I miss the ocean. Can't wait to read more.

My dad moved to East Haven in 2000, so we might have been neighbors (although I never actually lived their myself). And now I live in Wethersfield, so again practically neighbors!

 

[MomofCKJ]

Hey! I'm caught up!I love that Ankole Cattle pic, what an expression on his face!

I haven't been around these boards in the last month or two (as evidenced by my own sorely neglected trippie) but I really want to try and catch up!

Sorry to hear you ran into some crummy people (the CMs with the solo comments and hat guy). I do think staying at AKL sound so nice though for the benefit of seeing all the animals. I would love to stay there someday!

Allyson

 

[Quacktatty]

Hey! I'm caught up!I love that Ankole Cattle pic, what an expression on his face!

Isn't that one the best? It makes me want to buy one and take it home. Glad to see you back, looking forward to catching up on your TR!

 

[2xcited2sleep]

Just caught up on your updates. Glad you had fun on the Wilderness Segway tour and on TSM! I had the BLT too at EoS... YUM-O!

 

[Quacktatty]

I woke up to the phone for the first time today, it felt good to sleep in a little bit. By now I was in the habit of throwing open the curtains to look for the animals each morning. Unfortunately, none were there today. So I went down to Mara to get some breakfast. I wasn't terribly hungry and I had lunch coming up at Liberty Tree Tavern so I ate light - Bagel w/ cream cheese and strawberry jam and a banana.

I tried to make a mocha by combining the Hot Chocolate and Coffee, but it was truly disgusting.

After eating, I walked to the bus stop, arriving around 8:28. Just as I got there, the bus to MK was pulling away. Lucky for me, the driver saw me and stopped and let me on. At this point I realize that I will barely make rope drop.

I ended up making it JUST in time. I actually waited outside the gates to watch the show rather than trying to cram into the front.

I love the CMs with the Mickey hands waving as you walk into the park, but this lady got the award today!

Being solo pays off during rope drop. I was able to sneak my way again towards the front of the pack to Tomorrowland. I was on and off Space Mountain in only 15 minutes. Buzz was a walk on, but I grabbed a FP for later just in case.

I ended up riding Buzz 4 times, 3 times getting in the 400,000 range. The last time I decided to go lefty, because my right hand was killing me from squeezing the trigger. I did HORRIBLE and scored a measly 90,000 points.

It was time for a break and a ride on the TTA, I took some video - which I won't post because it's so shaky - and ate my banana.

Remember, there is no dancing on the TTA.

With that done, I made my way over to Fantasyland. Nearly everything was a walkon, including Peter Pan and Dumbo. I did Teacups first:

Then Snow White, Peter Pan and IASW. I was about to head to Haunted Mansion when I saw the dream squad! They were walking in the exit as I was getting off IASW. They had their vests on and everything. So of course, like any good dream junkie would, I turned around and got right back on the ride. There is no other reason any human being should ride IASW twice in a row. It did give me a chance to get some more good photos.

When I got off, there was no sign of the dream squad. Ah well, so much for that.

Up next - Yo ho, Yo ho, this guy is sure crazy

 

[Quacktatty]

Still sulking from missing out on the Dream Squad I traveled east? west? to my right to ride Haunted Mansion.

There wasn't much of a line, maybe a 5 minute wait at the most. In front of me was a family, dare I say Rednecks, with the two parents and a handful of older children. The dad and two of the boys kept spitting into the graveyard the entire wait....lovely.

Also right behind me was another family with older kids. There was one who looked about 18 or 20, around there, who looked at his family and said, "The only thing I care about seeing is Cinderella's Castle!" I guess it gets to everybody

After HM, which I don't think stopped one time, I went to get a FP for Splash Mountain. On the way I ran into Woody's Roundup. I can't say that I ever watched a whole show, but that song is so catchy that I still find myself singing it!

On my way to Splash I passed Frontierland Donald who didn't have much of a line, so I grabbed some pictures. He is SO tiny. I really was trying to not think about who was inside of the costume that day!!

The line for Splash was pretty short, but I didn't want to get wet before lunch so I played it safe with the FP. Then I rode BTMRR which had about a 10 minute wait, although they were opening up more parts of the line as we were going through. The CMs doing the seating were not very good, people ended up just sitting mostly where they wanted to, which just causes problems. I ended up in the second to last seat which I really liked, you do go faster in the back.

My next stop was the Train Station. I almost never ride the train just for the sake of riding the train, so that's what I wanted to do. While we were waiting for the next train to arrive there was a foreign family asking if this was BTMRR. Their English wasn't the best, but eventually the CM working the train station pointed them in the right direction.

I took the train to the Main Street station where I stood out to look at the castle. It's safe to say that that is my favorite view of the park.

I walked down main street and got some Photopass Pictures done as well as stopping to watch a marching band perform.

I walked towards Adventureland with the intention of riding Jungle Cruise.

Since it was nearing lunch time and the wait was 30 minutes, I elected to get a FP. After getting my FP, I stopped in to see the Enchanted Tiki Room. I don't care what anybody says, this show relaxes me. I sit all the way in the back and put my feet up and enjoy the cool air.

I had time for one more ride and decided on Pirates. On my way over, I saw Captain Hook and Mr. Smee so I got in line for a photo. Unfortunately, they were just taking a break as I got there.

I got to the entrance of Pirates where I went to the right side line. There was NOBODY in it. I think people don't realize that both sides are even open.

I was seated alone in the second to last row of the boat. Behind me was another solo rider. When they loaded him, the CM asked that he sit in the middle of the boat to keep it balanced - he was a pretty big guy. Of course, he didn't listen and I was worried we'd tip over the entire time. I stayed as still as possible in the middle of my row!!

This guy was beyond weird. He talked to himself the entire ride, or rather, he talked to the AAs in the ride. Every scene it was something, "Get him Barbosa" "Don't give him the keys doggie!" I know you want to have fun, even as a solo, but there was something seriously wrong with him.

Up next, The real world sneaks up on me