Anniversary Trip - Fantasmic, Blue Bayou, Segway Tour, Lilly Belle and More!

[Kayla's Mom]

Travel Day

Background: This trip was an early anniversary celebration for DH and I (11 years).

We left Phoenix about 4:00 on Thursday, Sept 17th. We were making great time until we got stuck in traffic from an accident outside of Thousand Palms. Luckily this only delayed us about 30-40 minutes. We arrived at Hojos a little after 10:00 PM and I was excited to see we got Building 2 as I requested.

As I opened our hotel room door, this is what I saw:

On our wedding night DH had our hotel room filled (and I mean filled) with red, white and black balloons (our wedding colors). So he surprised me and had a company come in earlier in the day and decorate our room. The company he used was F2 Balloons & Design, in case anyone is interested. Michelle did a FABULOUS job with the balloons and was very reasonable, especially considering my DH called her THAT MORNING and asked her to do it. (DH doesn't have the planning gene that I have!). Anyway, a great way to start our trip!

Day One - Friday, Sept 18th

In the morning when I woke up I noticed I could actually hear the freeway noise, which I never have heard before in building 2. We were a few doors down from the elevator which was the closest we have ever been to that side of the building, so maybe that was why. It didn't bother me though (and I am someone that has trouble sleeping with noise), we also had the a/c unit blasting the entire time which masked the noise. I remember reading someone else's review of Hojos recently about how it was humid in the room and the a/c didn't seem to ever cool the room off. I felt that way as well on our first night. It was very humid in the room and I didn't start getting comfortable until the next day. We have never had to run our a/c on the highest/coolest setting consistently for our entire stay. We even left a note for housekeeping to please keep the a/c running. I was afraid they would turn it off!

So we left the hotel at 8 AM (for park opening at 9:00). I needed to get to guest services to pickup our Fantasmic Dessert tickets (surprise for DH), so I made something up to him about needing to get our rewards dollars transferred and went to pick them up. Also picked up our anniversary buttons there. We were let into the park a little after 8:30 and browsed Main Street.

A few notes about our day:

*At rope drop I "walked with purpose" to Peter Pan (dragging DH along the way), only to find that it was closed. DH thought it was absolutely hilarious to see me and others looking completely lost as to what to do (that was NOT in the plan!!).

*We had an awesome skipper on Jungle Cruise - his name was Jose and he was great. Way better than any of the skippers we have had on our last trips. He had some jokes I hadn't heard and just was a lot of fun.

*We had lunch at Cafe Orleans and the food was great as usual and so was the service! Normally we don't have bad service, it just isn't that great. Maybe it was because we were there for lunch and had one of the first seatings, but service was great! Our server brought us two beignets for our anniversary.

Monte Cristo:

Blackened Chicken Caesar:

Pommes Frites:

Beignets:

*We were able to ride the Lilly Belle! We went about 2:00 to see if we could ride that day and they told us they were a little short staffed at the moment and to come back at about 4:00 and it might be possible then. At 3:30 we were hopping back to DL and we saw the Lilly Belle at the Main Street train station! We hurried up the stairs and told them we were told to come back at about 4:00. The CM said it was too late to get on for that ride but we could stick around for the next one. So we did. It was a really neat experience to ride in it and totally worth it, even though it was hot (no a/c, only little fans in the car). The CM that rode with us sat on the opposite end of the car and actually napped for part of the ride.

Nap time for the CM!

*We ate dinner at Carnation Cafe, another favorite of ours. We both had the usual Loaded Baked Potato soup (DH gets the sandwich/soup combo). It was fabulous as usual.

Half Turkey Sandwich and Loaded Baked Potato Soup Combo:

Loaded Baked Potato Soup Bowl

*After Carnation Cafe I popped into the bakery to get my favorite macaroons with chocolate. I bought 2 so I could have one once we got home too.

*Random note - saw a kid absolutely freak out because he didn't want to ride Pinocchio. Dad was very upset that he had to take his son out of line (kept telling his son, "It's only Pinocchio"). I of course, don't know the whole situation, but it seemed really silly for the dad to be getting SO upset just because his son didn't want to ride the ride. If dad really wanted to go on it, it was a walk on and would have been very easy to come on the ride when the rest of his party was off. Felt really bad for the little boy....

More to come.....!

 

[Kayla's Mom]

*We saw a neat show that we had never seen before with Mary Poppins and Bert in front of the castle.

*At about 6:45 we headed over to New Orleans Square, I wanted to start scoping out the line for the Fantasmic seating that DH still had no idea about. When I saw that there were already 3 groups in line, I told DH about the surprise. We debated about whether or not to get in line at that point and finally decided to go for it, we were tired and ok with sitting down for awhile. DH went and bought some playing cards that we had seen earlier at Pooh Corner and we played a couple of games of War before it got too dark. By a little after 7:00 there was quite a little line going already for check in and I was glad we had stayed. Finally at 8:00 we were able to start checking in. Come to find out one of the 3 groups of people in front of us was there for the 10:30 show, so we lucked out and still got front row of the center section. The show was great, loved the dragon, it was so cool to finally see her! The lady that was sitting next to me during the show was incredibly nice and a regular. All the CMs knew her and she had been to the show numerous times already. Dustin was the CM that seated us and was awesome. He got the crowd going. He stood up on the railing and YELLED to the entire area of people seated below us to do the wave -- lots of fun. He also had everyone in the area singing happy birthday to the people in our section with b-days. Tina was our actual CM serving us and she was great, extremely nice. DH and I each had two drinks while we were there. The box of goodies was great. My favorites were the chocolate thing and the coconut macaroon. We stayed in our seats for the fireworks and I was finally able to see Dumbo flying (when we were there in June, the show was stopped right before the Dumbo portion due to winds).

The only thing I didn't like about the dessert seating was having to wait to get the tickets. Not sure why they don't assign the seating as you call in. Also, I think it would be GREAT if once you checked in at 8:00, you could go ahead and sit down in your seats rather than having to wait until 8:30.

Day Two - Saturday, September 19th

Normally I am all about getting up early and being to the parks right when they open. But for once, we actually slept in. The parks opened at 8:00 and we got there at 9:00.

*I was FINALLY able to ride the canoes! We are always there in the off season during the week so I have never ridden them. The one day we were there in June they weren't open for some reason. So I was super excited to finally get to ride them. DH thought I was crazy for wanting to do it and wanted to make sure I knew I was going to have to actually paddle... I got just as wet on this ride as I did on Splash. There was a cute little girl behind me that was trying to paddle the wrong way and every time she did, I got more wet.

*For lunch we had Pizza Port. DH and I split the chicken fusilli, a side salad and the bread. Unfortunately we were just about done when I realized we forgot to take pictures.

*All of the CMs we encountered on this trip were fabulous. They constantly wished us a happy anniversary (lots of other guests did too) and were just really nice and friendly. The only un-Disney-like moment came from the CM standing around the FP machines at Buzz. Now, to give you a little background, DH does not ride any of the mountains except Splash. He gets motion sickness very easily. So the only rides he will go on with FP is Buzz and Splash. So pretty much our entire stay we had FPs for those two rides.

So we were getting ready to go on Buzz with our FPs and I wanted to grab 2 more before we went on. The very loud and obnoxious CM starts telling me how I don't need a FP for the ride because the wait is only 15 minutes. Ummmm...ok, well thanks but I will get one for later then. He proceeds to tell me that I won't need one for later either because the wait won't get any longer. Ok, again, thanks but I am going to get one anyway. So I stick my first AP in and out comes the ticket saying "not a valid FP" (I was about 2 minutes too early), so the CM proceeds to very loudly say, "NOT A VALID FP, YOU CAN ONLY GET ONE FP UNTIL THE TIME IS UP....blah blah blah" Sheesh! I proceed to tell him I know how it works (very nicely) and walk away.

So after DH and I ride Buzz we come out and I go to get the FP again. Well, of course, Mr. Obnoxious is still standing there and proceeds to start yelling over to me "You don't need a FP for this ride, only for Indy or Splash, you will wait longer with the FP than just waiting in line" HUH?? I completely and totally ignore him and pretend like he isn't even there and get my FPs. It really irritated me that he went out of his way to tell me over and over that I shouldn't be getting the FP. And what I really didn't get was how he could say it would be quicker standing in the 15 minute standby line, when I could bypass the entire outside line by using my FP and waiting 5 minutes.

*We rode POTC right before our dinner at Blue Bayou. While we were in the line outside of the building, I noticed a DISer (or two) ahead of us in line. They were just entering the building and too far ahead for me to say anything without totally making a scene. One had a LGMH from Home Depot and the other had more of a cookie cutter looking one. Also saw a lady near them on a scooter that had a bright, lime green shirt on, so not sure if she was with them too?

*Our dinner at Blue Bayou I was really excited for because I was finally going to eat there AND DH's boss was paying for it! We arrived for our 4:30 PS at 4:20. I nicely asked the hostess if we could wait for waterside. She told us it would be about 30-45 minutes which we said was fine. I was actually hoping that it would take that long because I wasn't hungry yet! I had told DH how everyone on the boards says that whenever they are told 30-45 minutes they usually are seating after only 15. After 20 minutes our table was ready! We had a perfect table next to the water. Right off the bat though, we had some heckling from the boats. One lady thought it would be hilarious to yell "Hey, throw me a chicken bone" OVER AND OVER AND OVER until she was out of site.

Our server was awesome and the food was incredible! I wasn't sure what to expect because of the mixed reviews, but we loved it. DH got the filet and I got the chicken, then we split that. I thought both meals were excellent, but think I actually preferred the chicken. The potatoes were to die for and the salad was wonderful too. Loved the bread (although it would be nice if it were warm) and the cookie boat was really good too. DH did not want to take pictures while we were there, so unfortunately no food porn pics from BB.

While we were eating POTC broke down. There were two or three boats backed up with in our view. They sat there for about 30-45 minutes without moving. A few of the people were laughing and asking us to throw them bread but after awhile the people in one boat started getting upset and yelling. One actually stood up and tried to grab onto the cabin where the man is sitting. We thought he was going to jump up on it, but he must have changed his mind. We saw several CMs go running by in the background of the ride, not sure what had happened? They didn't start running like that until the ride had been stopped for awhile so we wondered if someone started freaking out or having a panic attack or something. Never found out what happened, but as we were leaving Blue Bayou, some of the people that had been stuck were just getting off the ride (and not happy).

Day Three - Segway Tour!

This was also a surprise for DH, so he wondered why we were up at 5:45 in the morning! We parked at DTD (free parking if you are taking the tour) and got to the security tables at 7:00. The gal there asked me why we were there, so I had to tell her quietly why. The tour was awesome and so much fun. They had juice, fruit and muffins for us and showed us how the segway worked. Our tour guides were Kirsten and Carmen and they were fabulous! Unfortunately there was a couple there that wasn't able to go on the tour because they were wearing flip-flops. Apparently they had just purchased their tickets from guest services and were not told that they needed toe enclosed shoes. The CMs actually tried to find them some shoes to wear, but were unable to, so they had to reschedule their tour. Because of the inconvenience they were given MM into DL. Thought that was really nice.

I was a little nervous stepping onto the segway, but after the initial awkwardness, it was fine. We did a little obstacle type course and then were on our way around the park. I was a little bummed that the lagoon wasn't filled and that so many construction walls were up, but it was still a great time! Our guides pointed out some facts and hidden Mickey's along the way, which was fun. Then right before the tour was over, we got to cruise up and down the street near the Animation Academy and wave at the people waiting for the rope drop (which I thought was a great advertisement for the tour!). We got a great pin and a group photo at the end of the tour, as well. I highly recommend this tour. DH loved it too.

Unfortunately, we don't have any pics because I was under the impression that we wouldn't be allowed to take any, so we left the camera in the locker. They did allow pictures and actually stopped to take them for people on the tour.

The pin we received, sorry it's so blurry! (the Segway moves!):

A few random pics I like:

 

[Kayla's Mom]

Fun souvenirs I got:

A dark wood shadow box with Mickey heads. It opens up like a book and I plan to put pins in it.

The growth chart that was talked about recently:

My new watch:

And, my new license plate cover:

If anyone has any questions, I would be glad to try and answer them!

 

[2wildchildzmom]

Great report and wonderful pictures!!

 

[CinderALLIE]

Great report. Sounds like you had fun.

I love the fact that you and your husband had arranged little surprises for each other throughout the trip. Thankfully you both didn't arrange the same ones.

 

[BecBennett]

You have an awsome camera! That first picture of Mary Poppins is amazing!

I enjoyed your report, and am hoping to do the Segway tour next time I'm there.

 

[radiatorsprings]

Wow, you took great pictures! What kind of camera do you use?

 

[disneynerd420]

You do realize I'm going to look for you on the arizona roads now... don't you?

BTW... I loved your TR. It sounds like you guys had a magical time

 

[queenie82]

Where oh where did you find my sweet Queen!!!!!!!
I must track her down if I can for my mum (aka The Queen)

Thanks for the report!! I plan to do the segway tour

 

[Kayla's Mom]

Great report. Sounds like you had fun.

I love the fact that you and your husband had arranged little surprises for each other throughout the trip. Thankfully you both didn't arrange the same ones.

I was a little worried that we might plan the same things, but figured he didn't know anything about the tour or dessert seating and I was right!

You have an awsome camera! That first picture of Mary Poppins is amazing!

Thank you! DH is the photographer.

Wow, you took great pictures! What kind of camera do you use?

I just checked DH's camera and it's a Canon EOS 40D.

You do realize I'm going to look for you on the arizona roads now... don't you?

Honk if you see me and flash a LGMH.

Where oh where did you find my sweet Queen!!!!!!!

She was right by the castle, near Snow White's wishing well. I was so excited to see her, as we have never seen her before.

 

[deejdigsdis]

Oh, I loved all your pictures! They just made me so happy! The ones of all the characters on the Mark Twain brought back a good memory that I had TOTALLY forgotten about...from maybe 15 years ago??? We were eating at Hungry Bear, it was late, and we were the only ones sitting by the water. Here comes the Mark Twain sailing by in the dark with all the characters and they started waving -- to us! We were the only ones there and it felt like we were having our own private show. Wow, I had totally forgotten about that! Thanks for the reminder!

 

[chickyann]

I love this shot, it's awesome!!

Thanks for sharing

 

[APX]

I must say this, I read everything, EVERYTHING you typed about your trip, I love it.

Love the pictures, specially the guitar guy, very very pretty.

 

[DisneySuiteFreak]

Loved your TR! The photos are lovely! Tell your DH, he did a great job with them!
I loved your license plate too! Where did you get it? Is it made out of metal or plastic? I've only seen the plastic ones with all the characters on it.
OOOhh, and I love the watch! Can you tell me a bit about it? Like did you get it from the watch store on Main Street? Is it water resistant, and did it cost an arm and half a leg? LOL!
Thanks!

 

[Kayla's Mom]

Oh, I loved all your pictures! They just made me so happy! The ones of all the characters on the Mark Twain brought back a good memory that I had TOTALLY forgotten about...from maybe 15 years ago??? We were eating at Hungry Bear, it was late, and we were the only ones sitting by the water. Here comes the Mark Twain sailing by in the dark with all the characters and they started waving -- to us! We were the only ones there and it felt like we were having our own private show. Wow, I had totally forgotten about that! Thanks for the reminder!

Thank you!! What a neat memory!

I love this shot, it's awesome!! Thanks for sharing

Thanks! I thought that was a neat shot DH got.

I must say this, I read everything, EVERYTHING you typed about your trip, I love it. Love the pictures, specially the guitar guy, very very pretty.

Glad you enjoyed it!

Loved your TR! The photos are lovely! Tell your DH, he did a great job with them!
I loved your license plate too! Where did you get it? Is it made out of metal or plastic? I've only seen the plastic ones with all the characters on it.
OOOhh, and I love the watch! Can you tell me a bit about it? Like did you get it from the watch store on Main Street? Is it water resistant, and did it cost an arm and half a leg? LOL!
Thanks!

Thank you!

The license plate is metal (and heavy), we got it at World of Disney, but I did see them also at the little stand they have just outside the tunnel on the left side. It was 19.00. The watch is stainless steel (at least the back, although they told me the watch band was too), it is water resistant and it cost $85 (also from World of Disney), which I really didn't think was too bad for DL, especially since we got another 10% off with our Disney Visa. I realized once I got home that the other two watches I have both have "bling" around the face too, I guess I am a sucker for bling!

 

[DisneySuiteFreak]

The license plate is metal (and heavy), we got it at World of Disney, but I did see them also at the little stand they have just outside the tunnel on the left side. It was 19.00. The watch is stainless steel (at least the back, although they told me the watch band was too), it is water resistant and it cost $85 (also from World of Disney), which I really didn't think was too bad for DL, especially since we got another 10% off with our Disney Visa. I realized once I got home that the other two watches I have both have "bling" around the face too, I guess I am a sucker for bling!

Thanks for the info. I'll have to check out both items the next time I'm in DL. I am a sucker for bling too! Love it; gotta have it!

 

[Kayla's Mom]

Here are some more pics:

 

[Belle Ella]

I am so absolutely jealous! We asked about the Evil Queen every day that we were there earlier this month but she was never out. Oh, man!

 

[cali_crafter]

Lovely report and beautiful photos!

 

[marcemc]

Here are some more pics:

Thanks for your TR. I couldn't think of a better way to celebrate an anniversary.

This is my favorite pic, I absolute love the tea cups during the night time. Love them, love them, love them.....

BTH, where did you buy the growth chart?

I'm in AZ too , how whas the weather during your stay? Please don't say cold, please don't say cold!!