A Salute to All Orlando Area Theme Parks But Mostly Walt Disney World ***THE END***

[jash08]

Yay

The party is really fantastic. Wow, the evening of your wedding? That's definitely something.

It was amazing. We had our "happily ever after" buttons on and I had the bride ears and "wedding hair" and my husband had on groom ears. We were standing in line for popcorn and the gentleman waiting in front of us turned around and said, "congrats! How long have you been married?" We both looked at our watches and responded, "6 hours!" All he could say was wow.

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

You must be slowing down, 'cause I'm caught up again.

Your pictures of the video stills of the parade turned out pretty well.

I've got to meet the Tremaine's one of these days! That is a must do.

Glad you liked the party.

Great picture of K8, after forgetting her ticket.

Haha, nah I just think you're reading faster.
Besides, if I slowed down too much this report may end up going like a year or more... and who would do that?
... OH wait... (Sorry I just couldn't resist)

Thanks Glenn, You know all things considered, I guess they could have been worse. It's a FABULOUS parade. I loved it!

I cannot recommend it more. They are ridiculously fun. I had been wanting to for a while, but I was not expecting them to be that much fun. I plan to see them again for sure.

It's so fantastic. I hope to do it again many more times in the future.

Ahaha, I loved that too. It was so funny.

PHEW!!! All caught up here!

(Let's just not talk about your other report quite yet, ok?)

You had a nice afternoon at DTD. I can see why you were enthralled by the butterfly- it is gorgeous!

The Lego creations are incredible. We had to make a pilgrimage to DTD last week just to go to the Lego store. They are Ben's favorite things and for years, our living room was called "The Lego Room"- we had a special Lego table and countless bins of bricks separated by color.

Thanks for the tour through World of Disney. I have to admit- I am allergic to shopping. I really don't enjoy it. At home or on vacation. WOD stresses me out!

The princess parade was too cute!

You have totally sold me on MNSSHP- the low crowds, the amazing parade (I'm not a parade person either), incredible fireworks. Oh, and chocolate!

I have some friends who are trying to peer-pressure me into doing a girls meet up trip at the end of October. Halloween happens to be my birthday and this would be an awesome place to celebrate.

Love your pictures from Little Mermaid.

I have never seen that skull and crossbones projected on BTM. Cool!

I love your description and pictures of your meeting with the Tremaines. Like you, I have never set foot in the GF, either.

I learned that Stacey was filming new Must-Dos while we were at the World last week. Oh-Em-Gee I would have died if I saw her. Such a fan!

That's awesome Dee (and impressive). I think both you and Glenn were doing some serious speed reading.

Baha... Ok, not a word.

It really was. I think what was amazing was we BOTH were taking photos without really realizing that the other was too.

They really are. Haha, I remember when legos were just blocks!

You are quite welcome. I'm generally an in/out shopper at home, but I have to admit, I go a little crazy in WOD. I just want it all!!!

I thought so too. I thought it was a cute touch to give these little kids that extra attention. What little kid doesn't want to be in a parade?

That's wicked. And you hit on all the great stuff plus awesome characters.

You should really consider it. It is sooooo much fun. If Stacey didn't add it recently, it should be at the top of her Must Dos!

Aww thank you. Great queue and a really cute ride.

It was cool. It was specific to the party. They have projections all over. For some reason this is the only one I took.

OMG Dee they are truly special. I just loved them.

Oh I know. It's probably good I wasn't there for that. That could have been dangerous.

It was amazing. We had our "happily ever after" buttons on and I had the bride ears and "wedding hair" and my husband had on groom ears. We were standing in line for popcorn and the gentleman waiting in front of us turned around and said, "congrats! How long have you been married?" We both looked at our watches and responded, "6 hours!" All he could say was wow.

Goodness that's so fantastic! I love it!

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

IT’S TIME TO GET OUR SCARE ON... AGAIN!
Day 10 – October 17, 2012 Part 2


I have very few photos from this night remaining, so the rest will sadly be text heavy.

But, so that this instalment isn't ENTIRELY text, here's a photo that's not mine, but one I just found to be absolutely brilliant.

Hungry Hungry Vampire.

We had a few more houses to go through, so we headed over to House of Horrors.

It was in this line that we got talking to a couple guys from Jersey who come to this event yearly.

I will add now that they… would have enjoyed the cowboys in the Boo To You Parade.
Again… Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

To make a long story short, we ended end hanging with them for the rest of the night

I could tell that K8 was happy because just earlier that day she was telling how much she always wanted to have a gay male friend.
I can’t even remember how it came up, but it was just so funny that we ended up meeting these guys that very same night.

They were both hysterically funny and really nice guys, so I enjoyed their company as well.

Anyway, we did House of Horrors with nothing out of the ordinary.

The next house was Alice Cooper.

Back in the instalments covering the first night at HHN, I described the house thusly…

“I guess if you’re really familiar with his music, in particular Welcome to My Nightmare, then you would get more out of it than say someone who only has a passing familiarity.
We would be the latter.
Nonetheless, I still enjoyed it.
I enjoyed it the most on our second night, but I’ll get to that when the time comes.

Well, that time has come.

We entered the Alice Cooper line with our new friends.
As we were entering into the tent, I was the last of the four of us.

Behind us was a foursome of two guys and two girls.
I assumed they were couples.

Anyway, the girl behind me said that she gets really scared in the houses and that she may end up grabbing my arm at some point.
She just wanted to give me a heads up.

Not a problem I told her, as we entered into the house.

By the time we were half way through the first room, she had both hands on my shoulders.

OK, I thought, she's just trying to make her way though, it’s dark, whatever.

By the time we got to the half way point, I was pretty sure I was going to have to buy her dinner.

She had both arms wrapped around me and trust me when I say there was more room between an ant and the ground than there was between the two of us.

Now, in no way was I complaining as she was quite attractive,
But it did seem odd to me that she was with 2 other guys, one of which I assumed was her boyfriend.

Why was she not walking behind them?

Not to mention that, while K8 and I are just friends, this person did not know that.

Anyway, at the exit to one of the rooms, there is an actor hiding above the doorway.

I had not seen him on prior run-throughs, so I was not expecting an arm to come reaching down when it did.

Needless to say I reacted, which caused both of us to almost hit the floor.

She then said to me, "I'm some glad you're in front of me."

We finally left the house and the girl finally let go of the death grip she had on me.
She apologized, and I told it was totally fine.

Little did she know that she was providing a great story to be told right here on the DISboards.

The walkway from the house exit takes you up to the entrance of Men In Black, with a short wall on the left, and shrubbery on top.

Some of the roaming legions were staked out in said shrubbery giving some great fright to all of us.

There's nothing quite like a Beast or a Prisoner with a chainsaw "attacking" you from out of nowhere.

When we arrived back into civilization (in front of Men in Black), we stopped to discuss our next destination.

This was the first time K8 and I had a chance to talk and we had quite the laugh over my "Alice Cooper experience”.

K8 told me at one point she had looked back and saw this girl locked onto me, and the girls face apparently was priceless as she mouthed "Is this OK?"

I'm curious what would have happened if K8 had mouth back, "NO!"



CONTINUED NEXT POST​

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

Day 10 – October 17, 2012 Part 2 Cont.


Between the four of us we compared notes to see what houses we still had express for.

It turned out it was for all the same houses.

So we headed over to The Walking Dead.

The regular line was 3 hours and the "express" line was long as well.
I was told it was a good 30-40 minutes wait.

We were even told to come back later.

I was not amused and I voiced my opinion that the "express" line should not be that long.

But again, Universal wants to make money, so they, in my opinion, oversold the Express.

I heard that some people who complained at Guest Services were told that "Express only guarantees that it will be shorter than the regular line"

They were charging upwards of $90/night for express, which is more than what a one night ticket to the entire event costs.

And it's only guaranteed to be “shorter”.
To me, 40 minutes is not express, but maybe that's just me.

Once again, Universal ain't Disney.

In any event we did come back later and waited in the express line and were greeted with something that wasn't there the other night...

Note: Not my photo

Note: Not my photo

As a fan of the show, I was freaking out and was totally unprepared with my camera since you can't use it in the houses.

I squealed with joy which she apparently picked up on as she proceeded to follow right behind me up until the house entrance.

I was ecstatic!

I would face forward to make sure I didn’t walk into anyone, and when I turned around, she was right there… staring at me... and growling.

It was awesome.

For the remainder of the night we walked around with our new Jersey friends, checked out some more houses, and just enjoyed the evening.

K8 and our Two Jersey Boys.

Katie and I both really enjoyed Halloween Horror Nights.

We both agreed though, that the first night was better overall, as we saw very little of the roaming hoards on this night.

Again, it all comes down to timing.

I would definitely go back, and if I find myself in Orlando in Sept/Oct, I will do just that.



UP NEXT… MY MISTRESS… AND A LITTLE TNA! ​

 

[emmysmommy]

Wait... I'm confused! You enjoyed the first HHN better but that didn't have your little friend who was holding on to your like she was on the back of a motorcycle doing a wheelie?? You were quite the security blanket! Sounds like you didn't object but we'll keep it between us because you never know how Stacey may react.

Sheesh! I would NOT be happy if I paid for Express and had a 40 minute wait. Did you pull out your Disney AP and say "do you know who I am?" Oh wait.. that's another park!

Like you said... "Universal 'aint Disney!" So true.

 

[teekathepony]

Oh my word, your new friend in the house was too fun y! I can't imagine hanging on to a stranger like that, scared or not! What if you were a mass murderer who was in that house for inspiration? Lmao
I would have love to see K8 say no it's not alright! Poor thing maybe she couldn't open her hands.
Love that you made some new friends, that's always fun!
A 40 minute wait in the Fastpass line at Disney is one thing -- that service is free! But at Universal where they charge you an arm and a leg, that's really not ok. Universal sure ain't no Disney!

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

 

[natebenma]

I love that you met some new, and "close" friends, at the Universal scare night! Do you keep in touch with your Jersey boys?

That is a funny story about the girl in the Alice Cooper house! Odd. But funny! Maybe the guys were her brothers?

The Walking Dead house sounds really creepy and well done.

 

[khertz]

Wow that girl in the haunted house is just hilarious! I can't believe she would get herself that close to a complete stranger (that, like you said, was with a girl that she didn't know wasn't your girlfriend), but I'm glad she did because it made for a funny story! Pretty cool that y'all made a couple of friends along the way too.

 

[TheMaxRebo]

great update though I am still not sure why your new friend from the Alice Cooper house latched on to you rather than one of the guys she was with.

Maybe you were more attractive than the guy she was with and she was trying to upgrade?

Maybe she actually showed up alone that night and she was trying to add one more to her brood?

Of course you do realize that the only way that story would have been better would be if K8 didn't find it OK and physically remove her from you prompting one of your new Jersey friends to yell "Cat fight!"

 

[geckodani]

And please feel free to leave a comment or even just a quick hello. It would really mean a lot to me to know that someone is actually reading this thing.[/SIZE]

I just found your TRs (both of them!) and am immensely enjoying them! And this comment struck home for me, so I wanted to say, Hellloooo (human)! It's always nerve wracking to be writing a TR and wonder if anyone is reading! So hi, and I'm enjoying every word!

 

[glennbo123]

Random strangers clinging to me. Oh yeah, that kind of thing happens to me all the time. It's a curse.

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

Wait... I'm confused! You enjoyed the first HHN better but that didn't have your little friend who was holding on to your like she was on the back of a motorcycle doing a wheelie?? You were quite the security blanket! Sounds like you didn't object but we'll keep it between us because you never know how Stacey may react.

Sheesh! I would NOT be happy if I paid for Express and had a 40 minute wait. Did you pull out your Disney AP and say "do you know who I am?" Oh wait.. that's another park!

Like you said... "Universal 'aint Disney!" So true.

Hahaha, yeah I should clarify. We liked the first night better overall, probably because it was all fresh and new... BUT... that little incident was for sure a highlight of epic proportions. Yes please don't tell Stacey.

OMG I know Brenda, it was ridiculous. I was not pleased for the price that I paid. Guest Relations was really backpeddling on that one. There was never any mention of this "just guaranteed to be shorter" line when purchasing the pass. Unfortunately I didn't have my AP yet, but I totally would have done that!

Absolutely the gospel truth!!!!!!!!!

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

Oh my word, your new friend in the house was too fun y! I can't imagine hanging on to a stranger like that, scared or not! What if you were a mass murderer who was in that house for inspiration? Lmao
I would have love to see K8 say no it's not alright! Poor thing maybe she couldn't open her hands.
Love that you made some new friends, that's always fun!
A 40 minute wait in the Fastpass line at Disney is one thing -- that service is free! But at Universal where they charge you an arm and a leg, that's really not ok. Universal sure ain't no Disney!

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

It was sooooo strange Wendy. Again, no complaining on my part, but yeah, it was weird... but incredibly funny too. I guess she felt she needed protection from the... ummm.... people in costumes.
I even wondered if she was maybe a pick pocket or something, but unless she had three hands, that wasn't going to work out for her.

Haha, I'm not sure if she could have let go even if she wanted to.

Oh they were so much fun too. Awesome guys.

EXACTLY!! Honestly, I don't think I've even had a 40 minute Fastpass wait, but at least it's free. My mind was seriously boggled on that one.

I love that you met some new, and "close" friends, at the Universal scare night! Do you keep in touch with your Jersey boys?

That is a funny story about the girl in the Alice Cooper house! Odd. But funny! Maybe the guys were her brothers?

The Walking Dead house sounds really creepy and well done.

K8 had actually exchanged info with them but she never did hear back sadly. At the time they invited us to their house sometime as they throw a great Halloween party in August apparently. I'm thinking they just lost her info and she never thought to get their's. It's too bad as they were great guys.

OMG Dee it was something. Not gonna lie, I kinda wanted to see what house they were going to next.

It was good. It really stepped up when they added the "little girl" at the beginning. She was the very first walker in the series, so I was just a little fanboy in that moment. I'd so love to go this year as they're doing another Walking Dead house. So disappointed I'm not going to see it.

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

Wow that girl in the haunted house is just hilarious! I can't believe she would get herself that close to a complete stranger (that, like you said, was with a girl that she didn't know wasn't your girlfriend), but I'm glad she did because it made for a funny story! Pretty cool that y'all made a couple of friends along the way too.

It was so funny and yet very strange. Again, no complaints at all though.

Meeting those guys was a true highlight. They were so enjoyable to be around and really help make the night a lot of fun.

great update though I am still not sure why your new friend from the Alice Cooper house latched on to you rather than one of the guys she was with.

Maybe you were more attractive than the guy she was with and she was trying to upgrade?

Maybe she actually showed up alone that night and she was trying to add one more to her brood?

Of course you do realize that the only way that story would have been better would be if K8 didn't find it OK and physically remove her from you prompting one of your new Jersey friends to yell "Cat fight!"

Haha. You and me both. It was... different.

Hmmm... Yeah let's go with that!

Ah, another possibility... but I like the other one better.

Bahaha, now THAT would have been something.

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

I just found your TRs (both of them!) and am immensely enjoying them! And this comment struck home for me, so I wanted to say, Hellloooo (human)! It's always nerve wracking to be writing a TR and wonder if anyone is reading! So hi, and I'm enjoying every word!

Thank you so much and I do so love reading comments and hearing people's thoughts. Thank you very much for reading and for your kind words.

Random strangers clinging to me. Oh yeah, that kind of thing happens to me all the time. It's a curse.

Haha, thanks Glenn. It's good to hear I'm not alone.

 

[katt789]

That picture is downright scary!

YAY NEW FRIENDS! Ahahahahaha who DOESN’T enjoy the Boo To You cowboys?!?!

Ahaha nice Alice house story! Bahah! Awesome stories! Again, too scary for me to ever want to do it, but hey, that’s okay, I’ll stick to my cowboys at MNSSHP! Baha!

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

That picture is downright scary!

YAY NEW FRIENDS! Ahahahahaha who DOESN’T enjoy the Boo To You cowboys?!?!

Ahaha nice Alice house story! Bahah! Awesome stories! Again, too scary for me to ever want to do it, but hey, that’s okay, I’ll stick to my cowboys at MNSSHP! Baha!

Hahaha, I agree, but it's funny at the same time.

They were so cool and so much fun to hang with. Ahahaha... I suppose.

OMG it was so unreal. Again, no complaining.
The event is a lot of fun if you can handle it. I sooooo want to go this year.
And I want to go to MNSSHP too... cowboys and all!

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

MY MISTRESS… AND A LITTLE TNA!
Day 11 – October 18, 2012 Part 1


After another late night at HHN, we relaxed a bit at the condo before heading out to revisit my Mistress.

One really nice thing about Seaworld, is they offered a free ticket for an extra day.

All you had to do was go and claim it at Guest Services before leaving, which I did a few days prior when we were there.

So with our free ticket in hand, we headed back to Seaworld for a bit.

We got our picture taken with Shamu shortly after arriving.

And then, of course, take flight with Manta.

We followed that up with the only other ride in the park other than Manta and Kraken,

Journey to Atlantis.

This is somewhat similar to Splash Mountain, though not as good, but still enjoyable.

They don’t like you taking redneck photos, but I did anyway.

My favourite thing about this ride is not the ride itself; It’s the area out in front.

There are stations where you can put in quarters and push a button to spray the folks in the boat as they drift by.

This is just so much fun and I always make sure to have some quarters on me just for that.

After spraying some guests, we headed to something completely brand new to me…

The brand new Turtle Trek.

The wait was just too long when we were last here, but today it wasn’t too bad at all.

It was my main goal for this visit… other than Manta of course.

You first enter into the habitat of the Manatee,

Then you enter into the habitat of the Sea Turtle.

You wait in here for a little while and are free to ask questions of an on site expert.

I tried to ask the turtles directly, but unlike Turtle Talk at Epcot… there was no response dude.

From here we were led into a huge domed theatre, completely surrounded by screen.
The theatre is the world’s first 360 degree domed theatre in 3D.

The film shows the journey of a sea turtle from birth all the way through to adulthood, and you as the viewer are right in the middle of it.

What can I say about this other than… WOW!

We were ooh-ing and ahh-ing all throughout.

It is spectacular.

We had one more thing to do that we had skipped on the prior visit, and that was visit the Wild Arctic.

On the way we passed the divers, so of course I had to stop for some photos.

There are 2 ways to get to the Wild Arctic; by walking, or by helicopter.

The “helicopter” is basically a simulator like Star Tours, and a pretty bad one at that.
I’d done it before, and it is not worth the wait, in my opinion.

So we elected to “walk”.
The walking option still required a little wait outside, so we took the opportunity to get a selfie.

The wait is basically done just to stagger crowds a bit.

The first Arctic animal is the Balooga Whale.

There is also a Polar Bear area, but unfortunately he wasn’t out and about.

I have seen him in the past, and it is wicked cool to see a real polar bear without having to go back, back over the falls.

We finished off our tour in the underwater area with a bit more Balooga

And also some Walruses.

After visiting the Wild Arctic, Katie and I both were mesmerized by the fish in the lagoon as we crossed the bridge to the other side of the park.

They just seemed to come out of nowhere and look right up as us, assumingly looking for food.

I had mentioned to K8 about the Dolphin nursery so we headed there and just watched.

The great thing here is the dolphins will often interact with you, even though you can’t get closed enough to touch.

There just so playful and so much fun to watch.

I could seriously stay there all day.

But we didn’t.

I wanted a couple more rides before departing for the evening.

So, we rode the Kraken one more time…

Then one more Manta,

Before leaving the park for the last time and heading to Universal to be on Live TV.



TO BE CONTINUED… ​

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

MY MISTRESS… AND A LITTLE TNA!
Day 11 – October 18, 2012 Part 2


We drove up to Universal and passed by this.

Folks were starting to gather for that night’s HHN.

Part of me wanted to join them, but we had our sights set on something different.

TNA Impact Wrestling which would be broadcast live on Spike TV.

There was no cost to attend, but seating is limited to first come, first served.

During the day, guests can pick up free tickets to guarantee entry.
There was I believe 2 different coloured tickets which amounted to 2 lines plus a stand-by line.

Since we spent the day at Seaworld, we were Stand-By.

While we were waiting, someone came along and said that he had 2 tickets that he couldn’t use.
So we were quick to take them and join the 2nd “preferred line”.

The lack of organization was unbelievably bad, as the lines were not set up well at all.

We moved to the back of our line and waited, and others arrived filling in the line behind us.
Over time others showed up who had tickets, but apparently they decided they were special and just sort of hovered around the sides of the line, essentially trying to put themselves in front.

The back of the line by this point was quite far back.

The lines themselves were administered by Universal staff, so it came as no shock that it was run this poorly.

There were actually a couple Disney CM's right in front of us so I told them to take over.

They thought that was amusing.

A guy and girl even came and stood right beside K8 and me like they deserved to be close to the front.

Finally, someone went to the front to complain. The response she got was “What can I do?”

Seriously!

So she told him to announce that anyone who hasn’t been standing in this line for at least the past hour, the back of the line is that way!

Of course the 2 who had staked out right beside us just ignored this proclamation until I called them on it.
So the guy blew a raspberry.

It was all I could do to not drop this punk right there, but I’d been waiting for this long and I wasn’t about to get arrested for assault.

I think the guy got the point from my look though, as he and his girl made their way to the back.

After all the foolishness and disorganization, we were finally let into the sound-stage.

We made our way around the ring and found seats opposite the hard camera, so we were hopeful to be on TV.

They started off with some warm up matches, one of which featured the girls, so…

Then at 8pm EST, we were live on Spike TV.

A good brawl to start the show.

Even if you’ve never watched wresting ever, you know Hulk Hogan.

Big Brother fans might recognize this guy… yup, that would be Jesse.

And a brawl to end the show.

Overall, it was lot of fun and definitely something different.

And if you’re wondering if we ever made it on to TV…

During a commercial break we went to the washroom and when we returned they were back on the air.

Ah well, at least we were on TV.



UP NEXT… A PRELUDE TO A SOLO TRIP! ​

 

[TheMaxRebo]

haha fun update. I've heard some bad stories about the TNA crowd. Good thing about it is that it is free - the bad thing about it is that it is free so some people just go and think it is more about them than the show and act all smarkish.

Some people complain about crowds and stuff at Disney but sometimes all you need to do is go somewhere else to realize how good it actually is at Disney