And They Lived Happily Ever After - A June '11 Disneymoon TR! THE END - NEW PTR!

[SOUTHERNtinkerBELLE]

I'm glad your back, I have missed your updates.
Good luck for your last assessments I'm sure it will be a massive relief when it's all over!

What a scary experience with the small child, something you shouldn't have to see in the happiest place on earth.

Your pool cabana looked amazing definitely adding that to my Disney must do list hehe

I have missed the boards! I'm sorry I haven't been too good with updating! Life just seems to keep getting in the way.

Definitely try the cabanas if you have a chance! They are amazing!

Wow, what a terrible, awful thing to have seen! I can't imagine how you or even the parents felt. That definitely would have broken my heart. So sorry that you had to experience it!

I have to say, the Cabana looked and sounded heavenly...what a great way to spend the day!!


Sorry to hear that Kona and the Yachtsman didn't quite live up to what you were expecting. That steak did look marvelous! I do hope that you get the chance to try them again one day and that it will be better. I can understand how disappointed you were to find what you were hoping to order was changed or totally missing! Definitely a bummer!

Good luck with the rest of your school...it sounds like your project is definitely very involved, so I can only imagine how busy you've been with it!

I would love to go back to Yachtsman and order the steak that Miguel got. I would never be able to finish it, but it was so yummy.

Sadly the school work is only going to get worse before it gets better! I've got a large paper, a presentation, four more rounds of decisions, and a final all due in the next 3 weeks. At least it's almost over!

I am SO sorry you had to witness such a crazy incident...just reading it made my heart drop in my stomach, so I cannot imagine being there to witness it!

I am glad that you were able to have a great rest of the day though, your TSM scores were really close

What an amazing day relaxing in the cabana, that looks and sounds like a perfect vacation day to me

That has to be one of the biggest steaks I have ever seen !!!

The steak was huge! It was so good though. It would be a perfect meal to share!

Wow Courtney - being a Mother to an (almost) toddler I am in tears over what you had to witness. I'm so very sorry that you had to witness that

We keep wanting to try Kona for dinner but can't ever find another reservation we are willing to give up for it

The cabana sounds absolutely heavenly and after the little one gets a bit bigger I think it is definitely on our must do list

Such a bummer that you weren't blown away with Yachtsman. I always think I want to try it and then I stumble across a review similar to yours and talk myself out of it.

As always, can't wait to hear what happens next

I can't imagine how the little boy's mother most have felt. Just seeing her reaction was almost as bad as the event itself. She was traumatized!

I am so sorry you had to witness that horrible incident with the child. I sincerely hope that everyone was alright, how scary! I can also completely understand what a damper it would put on your day! You don't expect to see things like that at Disney, and it just seems worse, juxtaposed with a place that is so magical!

On one of our trips we witnessed an elderly person collapse on the ramp up to the monorail. It was terrible, her family was just freaking out, but luckily Disney security was there in a heart-beat, and we saw the ambulance pulling up as we were leaving. I hope that it was just heat exhaustion or something like that and she was OK, but we never did find out. It really effected me, and we ended up just calling it a quiet night instead of heading back to the parks.

On a happier note- Those cabanas look awesome! What a wonderful way to spend a day!

I absolutely hate to see anything "un-magical" at Disney! I know it's not realistic, because those things happen everywhere, but we can still dream, right?

I hope the lady at the monorail ended up being ok! That is so scary!

OMG I can't believe what happened with that baby! That is such a horrible thing to see happen in Disney! Those poor parents! I'm glad the baby was ok, though.

LMA is something I'm SO not interested in, but I think Brandon would love it! We were going to go on our trip, but it was closed, so maybe next time!

Good call on canceling Mama Melrose and just going back to the Poly! Sometimes you just have to make adjustments like that, Disney is so tiring!

And the next day sounded amazing-that cabana looks so awesome! I'd love to book one someday, if I ever get to stay at the Poly, but I doubt it would be in my budget!

I totally agree with you about the Yacht Club, it's nice, but it's definitely very masculine! I would pick the Beach Club any day, however, a part of me would like to try the Yacht Club someday...weird, because I never thought I'd want to stay there!

Yachtsman looks amazing, even though you liked Miguel's dinner better than yours! I'm thinking of possibly going there on our anniversary trip!

You should give LMA a chance! It is actually really interesting. It's more so about the making of the stunts than the stunts themselves (if that kind of thing interests you).

The cabana would be so worth it! They are a little pricey, but I think they are worth every penny. The 4 hour rental price isn't too bad.

Ok the baby incident I would have been like you and been out of it after that. I almost hope that that teenager has some disorder and that he's just not a mean boy! Thank goodness the baby was ok.

What a wonderful down day! Ok be honest, did you take all the soda with you when you left the cabana for the day?? I would have!

I've read lots of great reviews of Yachtsman, I'm sorry that yours wasn't up to par.

There was definitely something wrong with the teenager. I could tell by the way he was acting after the fact. He kept screaming and hitting himself in the head - so awful. His father literally had to restrain him. Makes me sick just thinking about it!

I think we took a soda each, but we didn't take them all! I think Miguel wanted to and I was too embarrassed!

 

[SOUTHERNtinkerBELLE]

DAY 9 – Pt. 1

After our very relaxing cabana day, Miguel and I were more than ready for a fun-filled day at Epcot! As nice as it is to have a leisurely day with no plans other than eating (LOL) we have a hard time staying out of the parks for too long!

Getting ready this morning was pretty fast since I didn’t have to go down to CC for food because we were eating at Akershus! One of our favorites!

We quickly made our way to Epcot, very excited to be returning to our favorite park!

I think Epcot is my favorite place to have an early-morning ADR. Sure it’s nice to see the castle without hordes of people around it, but there is something about Epcot that is so peaceful. I love the walk from the entrance back to the World Showcase. It puts me in the best mood!

When we made it back to Norway, we were greeted with quite a crowd of people. I got us checked in, and then we waited, and waited and waited!

This was definitely our longest wait to be seated during the whole trip, so I guess I can’t complain too much. It had started to drizzle a bit, though, so we were very thankfully when our name was finally called!

We always enjoy breakfast at Akershus. All of the food is really tasty and the princesses are always fun and so easy to talk to!

After our meal, we ventured out to our first stop of the day: Test Track!

I was excited to get the red time checker!

After TT, we both felt like doing Spaceship Earth. There was one problem though:

It was packed!

I had never seen a line so long for SE! We decided to wait, though, and 20 minutes later we were going back in time and in to our future.

Finally, we headed over to the Land! Our favorite place!

I’m sure that we got a couple of FastPasses before riding Test Track that morning, because I’m sure the line would have been well over an hour by the time we made it over there.

We decided to end our time at Epcot (for the afternoon) at Living With the Land, another attraction on our (long) list of favorites.

Since we knew we’d be back later in the evening, we decided to head back to the Poly for some lunch and relaxation!

I stopped by Captain Cooks on the way to the room, and picked up a pizza and salad for myself. Miguel wasn’t hungry since we had had such a big breakfast, so he just lounged around while I ate.

After my lunch and a little TV-time, we headed down to the pool to spend a few hours.

There were lots of fun activities for kids going on, and we had a great time just being spectators! We mostly just sat down in the shallowest part of the pool and watched the dance party that was going on and listened to the music. Even though there wasn’t much too it, it was so much fun and it became one of my favorite memories of our trip!

When we’d had enough of the pool, we decided to explore the beach area a bit. We found a swing and sat down and took in the sights.

You can definitely tell Miguel had been in the sun in this picture!

After quite a bit of relaxing it was getting late so we headed back up to our room to get ready for our evening in Epcot!

 

[SOUTHERNtinkerBELLE]

DAY 9 – Pt. 2

After our time at the pool, we both showered and changed clothes for our evening back at Epcot!

We were going back to one of our new favorites, La Hacienda, and we could not wait! On the way to the park, the skies opened up and it poured! Thankfully, I had remembered to bring our ponchos along, so we suited up and made a mad dash for Hacienda. Because of the rain, the entry way was absolutely packed. I literally felt like a sardine. I think even people who didn’t intend to eat there pilled in just so they could get out of the rain. Needless to say, I was very relieved when we were able to get out of the crowd and settle in at our table. Since I had planned for us to watch Illuminations there, I was really hoping for a table by the window.

Thankfully, that is right where we were taken!

We decided to get started with some margaritas! The last time we ate at Hacienda, I wasn’t crazy about my margarita. It was was to strong and the flavors were just a little too adventurous for me. I asked if they could do just a regular strawberry margarita, and our waiter said they could!

It ended up being the frozen strawberry margaritas that they sell at the stand outside of the Mexico pavilion, but I think they added a little something to it, because it was really good!

We decided to get the botana plate for our appetizer. It has a chicken tostada, a cheese empanada, and a pork dish that is on something a little fluffier than a tortilla, but not quite a bread, if that makes sense.

It was delicious!

Miguel was dying to try the queso fundido, so we went with that too.

It was very good, but it’s a rich dish! It’s basically a slab of melted cheese with Mexican sausage and peppers. Very good on tortillas, but super greasy!

We chose the paradila plate for our entrée. It’s a huge serving of meats, vegetables and the most amazing corn and is made for two people to share. I pretty much only eat the chicken and the corn, but boy is it yummy!

You also get rice, beans and plenty of tortillas on the side. This meal is quite a feast!

The restaurant was a little slow that night, so the time for Illuminations was fast approaching. I was getting more and more nervous that sitting inside wasn’t the best idea, and I was anxious for our check so that we could dash outside if need be.

The lights in the restaurant dimmed, and I knew the show was about to start. Thankfully, at the same time our waiter finally brought our bill. We quickly paid, positioned our chairs for the best possible view, and waited for the display to begin.

Unfortunately, there was a post that was sort of blocking our view, and with that and the rain, my plan to watch the fireworks inside the restaurant ended up not being a very good idea after all.

After a few fireworks went off, I motioned for Miguel and the two of us hurried outside as quickly as we could. Obviously, there were no good spots to stand, but we got in the crowd and tried to get the best possible view that we could.

Even with dozens of people in our way, Illuminations was still wonderful. My pictures are terrible, but here are few.

This is definitely my favorite nighttime show at Disney. I know I said that I was going to be more diligent about getting a good spot to really enjoy the show on this trip, but that obviously didn’t happen. I will add it to my “to do” list for our next trip!

Epcot was having extra magic hours that night, so we thought about doing a few attractions that night. We wandered over to Test Track and noticed that the posted wait time was only 20 minutes.

I don’t think the sign was accurate, though, because the line was roped around the outside of the building and after about 15 minutes in line and very little progress, we decided to just call it a night. When we walked out, the wait time had been upped to 60 minutes!

We slowly strolled out of Epcot and made our way back to the car. I was sad to have to say goodbye to Spaceship Earth. The last look at a park icon is always bittersweet!

On our way back to the Poly, I was really hoping that we would be back in time for Wishes. If you remember from one of my earlier posts, I mentioned that we had a partial view of the fireworks from our balcony. Believe it or not, we had actually seen part of Wishes every night of our trip so far, from either the beach, our balcony, the monorail or the park. I knew that we would be seeing it the following night (on our cruise!) so I really wanted to make it back in time so that we could say that we saw it each night!

We ended up making it back in the nick of time, and we both stood on the balcony to watch Wishes there one last time! It was the perfect ending to our evening!

Up next: It’s our last FULL day at Disney, with no real plans. How will we spend it? Also, we go on our Wishes cruise!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!!!

 

[Mrs T 2009]

Your day at EPCOT sounds like a great one i love EPCOT! Still haven't eaten at Akershus or La Hacienda, but they are on my wish list! LOL

I think it's so cool and something special to remember that you watched Wishes every night of your disneymoon in some way/shape/form

Im sad to hear that your last full day has quickly approached! BUT you get to go back soon, so that's a plus

 

[TinkerbellLuvr7]

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!!

2 good restaurant reviews!!

I haven't been to Norway for breakfast or the other one but they both look good!!

Can't wait to hear the Wishes cruise review!!

 

[klacey1]

I hope you and Miguel have a wonderful Thanksgiving!! I love the shirt you wore to La Hacienda! Your meal looks amazing-- that plate looks delicious!!

 

[disneybarbie]

Lovely update Courtney!
I'd love to try Akershus one trip - the theme & food look great, but while I'd love the princesses, I'm not sure I could convince DH

I had to look back at my TR/notes then because I thought we had been in Epcot this same night watching Illuminations, but it was a different night.. that would've been quite funny if we'd been in there at the same time watching Illumiations!


Happy Thanksgiving to you & your family




Emma x

 

[Nermel9]

Great update! I love Epcot, just knowing I'm on my way there puts me in such a great mood too!

I really need to try Akershus someday, I think I'd only go there for breakfast though, the food for dinner seems a little strange to me. I should just do it and get over my princess fear, once and for all! Your pictures with them are so cute!

Wow that line for SE is crazy! When I see lines like that, it makes me remember my childhood trips, because that's how every line was back then! Before the FP days!

The Poly pool is so pretty, but I can't stand those dance parties. I'm happy you guys liked it, because they are SO annoying to me, I try to avoid the pool when those are going on!

OMG you have totally made me want to go to La Hacienda now. I've never wanted to, but your review made everything look so amazing, I might just try to grab and ADR there for our December trip!

 

[Shannon84]

Akershus looks like so much fun, I really was a little scared to try it due to the food choices, but breakfast looks right up my alley!! I need to add that to the must try list

Even though you didn't have a great spot for Illuminations inside, its good that the timing worked out for you to go outside and see it

 

[Princess_K]

That's exactly what my simulation is! Was yours called Capsim?

You should definitely rent a cabana on your honeymoon! They have then at the GF!

That was it! It took up so much time. We did really well through the first few rounds, and then made a few mistakes and ended up not doing so hot. Unfortunately, it was quite a big portion of our final grade!

Your day looks like such fun! You look so pretty that night

I hope you and Miguel had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

 

[ronnmel]

The contrast between how dark Miguel gets after being in the sun while you remain quite pale reminds me of how Ron and I look on our Cuba pictures. It doesn't matter how long I stay in the sun, I barely tan while he gets way darker.

The last day at Epcot on a trip is a very sad thing indeed. But what an accomplishment to say that you have seen at least part of Wishes every single night of your trip!

 

[ariel1025]

Awww, I'm so sad to see that the end of your honeymoon report is nearing

That is awesome that you are able to say that you were able to see Wishes somehow every single night. It is my favorite nighttime show - as much as I love Illuminations- Wishes is close to my heart because that was when I wished for James

Can't wait to hear how you spent your last day ...

 

[Tracy161]

You looked stunning for your dinner at La Hacienda! And your meal looked great as well! Wow, I cannot believe you are down to just one more day already! And yes, it is very bittersweet to have your last glance at a park icon before leaving... how I wish I lived closer to Disney!!!

 

[pjennings]

We loved La Hacienda when we are there in May. It is now one of our favorite places to eat

 

[SOUTHERNtinkerBELLE]

Your day at EPCOT sounds like a great one i love EPCOT! Still haven't eaten at Akershus or La Hacienda, but they are on my wish list! LOL

I think it's so cool and something special to remember that you watched Wishes every night of your disneymoon in some way/shape/form

Im sad to hear that your last full day has quickly approached! BUT you get to go back soon, so that's a plus

You should try both Akershus and Hacienda! They are two of our favorites and we are consistently pleased with both of them.

I was very excited about our Wishes accomplishment! I was not expecting that!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!!

2 good restaurant reviews!!

I haven't been to Norway for breakfast or the other one but they both look good!!

Can't wait to hear the Wishes cruise review!!

Thanks! Both restaurants are favorites in our book. I highly recommend them!

I hope you and Miguel have a wonderful Thanksgiving!! I love the shirt you wore to La Hacienda! Your meal looks amazing-- that plate looks delicious!!

We did! Hope you and Zach did as well!

Thank you! When I saw that shirt I immediately thought of La Hacienda, so I had to buy it!

Lovely update Courtney!
I'd love to try Akershus one trip - the theme & food look great, but while I'd love the princesses, I'm not sure I could convince DH

I had to look back at my TR/notes then because I thought we had been in Epcot this same night watching Illuminations, but it was a different night.. that would've been quite funny if we'd been in there at the same time watching Illumiations!


Happy Thanksgiving to you & your family




Emma x

Thank you, Emma! We had a great Thanksgiving. I hope you can convince Steve to give Akershus a try sometime. I think you would really enjoy it!

Great update! I love Epcot, just knowing I'm on my way there puts me in such a great mood too!

I really need to try Akershus someday, I think I'd only go there for breakfast though, the food for dinner seems a little strange to me. I should just do it and get over my princess fear, once and for all! Your pictures with them are so cute!

Wow that line for SE is crazy! When I see lines like that, it makes me remember my childhood trips, because that's how every line was back then! Before the FP days!

The Poly pool is so pretty, but I can't stand those dance parties. I'm happy you guys liked it, because they are SO annoying to me, I try to avoid the pool when those are going on!

OMG you have totally made me want to go to La Hacienda now. I've never wanted to, but your review made everything look so amazing, I might just try to grab and ADR there for our December trip!

Thank you! How I love Epcot, too. Wish I was there right now!

I have the same memory from my childhood trips! Everything had a long wait back then!

 

[SOUTHERNtinkerBELLE]

Akershus looks like so much fun, I really was a little scared to try it due to the food choices, but breakfast looks right up my alley!! I need to add that to the must try list

Even though you didn't have a great spot for Illuminations inside, its good that the timing worked out for you to go outside and see it

I don't think I would care for Akershus at lunch or dinner, but the breakfast is really good.

I was glad that we made it outside for Illuminations. I don't think we would have enjoyed it very much if we'd stayed inside!

That was it! It took up so much time. We did really well through the first few rounds, and then made a few mistakes and ended up not doing so hot. Unfortunately, it was quite a big portion of our final grade!

Your day looks like such fun! You look so pretty that night

I hope you and Miguel had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Haha, that is too funny. My team has been doing the opposite! We weren't doing so well in the first couple of rounds, but we've since turned it around. We just did the second to last round tonight and *I think* we're in second place.

It was a fun day! Thank you!

The contrast between how dark Miguel gets after being in the sun while you remain quite pale reminds me of how Ron and I look on our Cuba pictures. It doesn't matter how long I stay in the sun, I barely tan while he gets way darker.

The last day at Epcot on a trip is a very sad thing indeed. But what an accomplishment to say that you have seen at least part of Wishes every single night of your trip!

I never tan either! Just burn unfortunately.

I wasn't expecting to be able to see Wishes from our room, much less be able to see a piece of it every night. It was a very nice surprise!

Awww, I'm so sad to see that the end of your honeymoon report is nearing

That is awesome that you are able to say that you were able to see Wishes somehow every single night. It is my favorite nighttime show - as much as I love Illuminations- Wishes is close to my heart because that was when I wished for James

Can't wait to hear how you spent your last day ...

It's always sad when a report comes to a close! Although I can't believe it's taken me so long to finish it!

Awww, that is to sweet that you wished for James during Wishes! I can see what it's so special to you!

You looked stunning for your dinner at La Hacienda! And your meal looked great as well! Wow, I cannot believe you are down to just one more day already! And yes, it is very bittersweet to have your last glance at a park icon before leaving... how I wish I lived closer to Disney!!!

Thank you! It was a great meal!

We loved La Hacienda when we are there in May. It is now one of our favorite places to eat

It is a favorite of ours, too!

 

[SOUTHERNtinkerBELLE]

DAY 10 – Pt. 1

I purposely planned the last full day of our honeymoon as a free day. I figured by this point, we would have done everything we wanted to do in the parks so I thought it might be nice to have at least one day where we could wake up and just do whatever we felt like. When we went to bed the night before we both agreed on no alarm for the morning and we ended up sleeping until almost 10:00! This was quite an accomplishment! At home, 10:00 on a weekend is still pretty early, but at Disney, 10:00 is LATE! I guess 9 days of park touring, with early mornings and late nights had caught up with us, though.

I originally planned on us going to a park (just didn’t know which one), but when we woke up late we both felt kind of lazy so we instead decided to just hang around the room for a while and then go to DTD later for lunch and shopping.

I ventured down to Captain Cooks for some breakfast one last time and came back with this beauty:

Can’t go to Disney without having a Mickey waffle! This was really yummy, and the strawberry sauce that it came with made it even better. The sausages still weren’t very good, but the waffle made up for it.

We mostly lounged around for the next couple of hours; Miguel watched TV and I started to get things organized to begin packing later that night. Around 12:30, we decided to head out to DTD since Miguel was getting hungry and I was hungry for some shopping!

Since I had of course planned out every meal of the trip, I let Miguel pick our lunch spot at DTD. I figured he would probably go with EOS since he loves it so much (he’s actually a bigger fan than I am) but he ended up choosing this:

Funny thing, we actually have a fairly new Pollo Campero at home that Miguel has been wanting to try, but we’ve just never made it over there. I’ll be honest, this wasn’t exactly my ideal spot for the final lunch of our honeymoon, but I was trying to go with the flow!

Pollo Campero is kind of like a Latin KFC. It has grilled and fried chicken and Latin sides (mostly beans and rice, but you can get fries and other American dishes, too). Every meal is also served with fresh corn tortillas, which we both loved! We both got the fried chicken. I chose rice for my side, and Miguel got rice and beans.

There is also a salsa bar where you can get salsas (obviously), onions, tomatoes, cilantro and other typical Latin taco accompaniments.

I actually ended up really enjoying this meal. Sure, it’s nothing fancy and you aren’t getting the normal Disney experience that I like in a meal, but the food was good and the restaurant was bright and cheery. I’m not sure if we’d go back to Pollo Campero on vacation, but I have a feeling we will eventually make it to the one at home!

On the way out, I decided to stop by Babycakes, which is housed in the same building as Pollo Campero (along with another restaurant called Fresh A Peel), to try a cupcake. They looked so pretty, and are supposedly pretty healthy as well (no gluten, etc).

Ugh. This was the worst cupcake I have ever tried in my life. I literally took one bite and threw the rest in the trash.

After our yummy lunch and gross dessert, we decided to do some shopping! Our first stop was the Lego store!

We went in here just with the intention of looking around, but I ended up going to the cashier twice. Once for this:

And once for this:

I was surprised at how much I enjoyed looking around there. It’s such an interactive store. Miguel was like a kid in a candy shop!

After we’d had our feel of Legos, we went over to sports store (sorry – can’t remember the actual name). By this point it had started to pour outside, so we were tried to waste a good bit of time. Meanwhile, I was getting worried that our Wishes curise would be rained out!

We briefly passed through Tren-D. I must admit though, that the stuff in this store isn’t really my style. We pretty much just walked through.

Finally, we ended up in the toy store. We had lots of fun in here!

By that point, the rain had let up enough, and so we headed back to the Poly to rest up for our evening – the final one of our honeymoon!

 

[SOUTHERNtinkerBELLE]

DAY 10 – Pt. 2

Since I wanted for the last night of our honeymoon to be very special, I had planned on a nice dinner and a surprise for my new husband – a Wishes cruise! Thankfully, the rain that we experienced at DTD let up, so no changing of those plans. However, we did have another change in plans, and that came in the form of our dinner location!

Originally, I booked an ADR at the California Grill. I thought what better location for our final meal! The only problem though, and one that I struggled with on my PTR, was the timing of the meal. Because of the popularity of CG I was only able to get a very early or very late ADR. Obviously, the late ADR wouldn’t work since we had to be ready for our cruise at 9:00. I booked the early ADR (at 5:45) but I worried the whole time leading up to the evening that it would be way too early for us, and that we wouldn’t be able to fully enjoy our meal (we are typically late eaters. 8:00 is the perfect dinner time for us!) Around 3:30 I knew that there was no way we were going to be able to really enjoy dinner at the Cali Grill. We wouldn’t even be hungry!

And so I had a bit of a dilemma on my hands. I wanted to keep our dinner as a signature meal, but we needed to be at an MK hotel so that the cruise could pick us up. Being very last minute (for the third time on this trip!) I wasn’t sure what I could find. So, I secretly did a quick search, and found an opening at Artist Pointe for 6:30! I had been wanting to try AP and to visit the WL, so I figured this was the perfect opportunity. I quickly called the WDW Recreation number and changed our cruise pick up location, and we were all set! Piece of cake!

I was sad to have to let our CG ADR go. I had been so happy when I was able to secure it! Plus, I was really hoping to bump into Emma (disneybarbie) and her new husband Steve because they were going to be there on the same night! I was glad though, that I felt like I was giving us a chance to really savor our final meal at Disney.

A little after 6:00, we made our way to the car for the very short drive over to the WL. Miguel still had no idea about the cruise, by the way! I had debated about when to tell him, and I decided that I would do it after dinner, right before we walked to the boat!

The WL is really lovely. We truly felt like we had been transported to another part of the country. It definitely has that secluded feel.

After a little bit of exploration, we made our way to AP. We were once again given a table in a great location – right by the window. We had a beautiful view!

We got started with some bread, and then with the famous mushroom soup.

The bread I wasn’t crazy about, but boy was the soup yummy! It definitely lived up to its hype.

For our entrees, I chose the filet, and Miguel got the bison. I was happy with his choice because it meant that I could try some of the mac & cheese!

It was here that opinion of AP suffered. We didn’t enjoy our entrees AT ALL. It might not look like it in the pictures, but the portions were really small. My steak was super pepper-y and the potatoes were flavorless. The beans were cold! Miguel wasn’t crazy about his bison. I tried a bite and had a hard time getting it down, to be honest. And that mac & cheese that I was dying to try? Much like the potatoes and the beans it was flavorless and cold.

Neither of us ate too much, so since we were still a bit hungry I decided to try the berry cobbler.

This was ok. Not bad, but nothing special.

Artist Pointe is a lovely restaurant, and the views can’t be beat. This was probably the most romantic restaurant of our trip, but the food left us disappointed. I just don’t think these flavors worked for us. I am not adventurous when it comes to meat (I don’t like anything game-y) and that is most of what AP offers. Maybe we were just there on an off-night, but I don’t think we will be returning.

After our meal, we ventured out to the pool area to look around a bit and snap some pictures.

Finally, it was time for me to reveal the surprise! Miguel was a little confused at first, but once he saw the boat that was all for us, he was very excited!

We got settled in, and off we went! The first part of the cruise mostly consists of the captain giving you a “tour” of the area and going over some Disney trivia. I loved this!

We also got a front-row seat for the water pageant.

Finally, it was time for Wishes! My pictures do not do the view justice. I thought that the Poly beach was my favorite spot for the show until I got to see it from the lake! What an amazing sight!

I am so, so glad that we did the Wishes cruise. It was an incredible experience! I learned some really neat things about Disney and got to see the show from a completely different perspective. I would highly recommend doing this if you have the time. We felt like it was worth every penny, and we have plans to do another fireworks cruise in the future!

After our captain returned us to the WL, we slowly made our way back to the car. It was a bittersweet moment. The trip that I had been planning for a year was coming to an end. It was almost time to go back to the real world…

Even despite the lack of plans, the rain and the less-than-great dinner, it had been the perfect final day. It was spontaneous, relaxing, surprising and romantic all at the same time.

Up next: Departure Day, Final Thoughts, and what’s up next?

 

[Dream426]

I always have to get a Mickey waffle as well when I go to Disney. I love them. I love to shop in DTD. I do too much damage when we go to shop there especially at their Christmas store. It is bad. I try to leave room in our luggage before we leave because I know I am going to need it with the shopping I do. Sorry to hear you both didn't like your entree. The pictures of the food look really good...haha What a nice way to watch Wishes. Very romantic. I would of had a hard time keeping it a surprise but it makes it so special. Great update!!

 

[UGAFan0829]

OMGosh, I can't believe your trip is coming to an end...so sad!!

I have to agree that your last day/night seemed like the perfect ending. I'm sorry that you didn't like Artist Point...but from the sounds of it, I don't think I would have either, though I do think my hubby would since he loves all that different kind of meat.

The Wishes cruise sounds absolutely perfect. I didn't realize that you would have a boat all to yourselves--that makes it even more romantic! And I thought your pics were pretty good!

I can't wait to hear the rest--especially what's next!