Another Magical Trip at the Happiest Place on Earth!

[beckyb29]

Another Magical Trip in the Books


After 7 wonderful nights at WDW, we were forced to come back to the reality of North Carolina, where I am already trying to figure out when we can take another trip (and how we'll afford it!).

The Cast

Me-Becky, 25. I am a huge Walt Disney fan! I love the parks, the movies, the music, etc. I have been to WDW around 10 times (not sure of the exact number, because many of the trips were when I was younger, with my family, and with various school groups).

Joe-my husband, 28. Joe has been a great sport about Disney since he met me. He had never been to WDW before I came along, but now he seems to really like the parks, and even agreed to marry me at the Wedding Pavillion at
WDW last November! This will be his 3rd trip to WDW.

Joe and I on our Disneymoon last November:

The Plan

I am currently a college student, and classes would end on Tuesday August 7. That day ended up being very stressful because of exams, but I did manage to do a little bit of getting ready (mainly laundry). Wednesday I took care of our "fur-children". They're not just pets, they are our kids. If you have pets, you understand. We have a 9 month old Lab Puppy named Molly, and a four year old Cat named Cleo. Both of them are mainly inside animals and are spoiled rotten. Yep, it's our fault, but like I said, they are our kids!

Our "kids"

My Mom (twistoflemon) graciously and bravely volunteered to watch them for us while we were gone. She had kept Cleo many times before, but this would be the first time that she would have to "put up with" the hyper new puppy! She said she didn't mind, and I asked her a few thousand times if she was sure, and eventually I thanked her and agreed that she would keep them for 9whole days.

Wed afternoon I headed up towards Reidsville NC (about 2 1/2 hours north of Hickory, where we live) with Molly and Cleo in my car. I was pretty worried, especially since Cleo and Molly don't really get along. Joe had to work so that he could save the extra vacation days for our next trip, so I was on my own. I made it there and back without incident, and told my Mom "Good Luck!" when I left. I knew that they would be in good hands while we were gone. I got back to Hickory around 10PM, and still had a lot of packing to do. I knew I wasn't going to get much sleep that night-I never do before a trip to WDW!! Finally finshed packing and actually went to sleep for a few short hours.

Thursday, August 9, 2007
We left for the Charlotte airport around 4:15AM-VERY EARLY! I am NOT a morning person, except while at WDW. However, I wasn't there yet, and it was, as I said, very early. We made it to the airport, checked in with Delta, where there were no lines, and got our boarding passes. Security, on the other hand, was a different story. The line was wrapped around the front of the terminal, and there seemed to be no air conditioning. I think I slept most of the way through the line, and we made it through without incident. Charlotte now has the new "sniffer" metal detectors, in which you stand in the middle while it sniffs you-I'd never seen this before. Neither of us got "sniffed", but we saw a few people who did. (Coming back home I noticed that MCO had the original metal detectors-I guess Charlotte is more
advanced than I thought.) We made it through security with no problem, and found our gate. We had some free time, and the plane took off on time around 7:30AM.

We had a short flight to Atlanta, where we had about a 2
hour layover. Getting through the Atlanta airport was surprisingly easy. I'd only been there once, about 9 years ago, and didn't really remember it. I had, however, read and heard horror stories about how long it can take to get from one terminal to another. We had to go from the "C" terminal to the "T" terminal, and it took less than 15 minutes. We walked on the moving
walkways, and it was extremely easy to navigate. Once we got to our departing terminal, we got some food, and Joe decided to take a nap. I was running on my "I'm going to Walt Disney World energy" and couldn't really
sit still. I ended up calling home and letting everybody know where we were. I think I read a book and listened to the Ipod, and woke Joe up when it was time to board around 11AM. We were on a Delta Song plane, even though we weren't booked through Song. The plane was really nice (seemed pretty new, according to Joe who has a private pilot's license and used to work at an airport. He always answers my tons of questions about
planes, airports, how it all works, etc). Either way, each seat back had a small tv screen in the back of it, which had free TV stations, radio stations, games, and a GPS. I loved the GPS...I always wonder what town we are
flying over and this was the answer to my question! (Yes, you'll see in this TR that I am easily amused and it doesn't always take a whole lot to make me happy!)

We landed at MCO around 1PM, and I was ready to go! As we walked towards the middle of the airport, I tried not to look at all of the people that were heading home. You can tell who has been at WDW at the airport...the
kids wearing the ears and the Goofy hats, the parents carrying the WDW bags with the newly treasured toys...it's just too depressing. So instead I focused on getting to the ME desk. We found it no problem, as usual. This is our 3rd time using ME, and we love it. I wouldn't do it any other way. In fact, when the day comes that they make us pay for it, I'll do it. That's
how much I like it. I checked us in at the ME desk, and we were on a bus and headed to Pop Century within 10 minutes.

The bus ride was around 35 minutes, and Pop was the first stop. I love pulling up at Pop and seeing all of the kids drawing on the sidewalks with chalk, and knowing that it's time to start our vacation!!

There will be plenty of pictures in this TR, I promise, but there are never many to show for the first few days!

 

[DisneyNotes]

How can I be hooked already? Send more our way soon.

 

[OhioDisneyLover]

Waiting for more....

 

[beckyb29]

Aug 9 Continued

We hopped off of the ME bus and headed for check-in. The line was fairly short and was moving pretty quickly. I had requested a room near the lake on a top floor. I didn't expect either one, as it was a Thursday and in the middle of a very busy season. We found out our room was ready-room 8431 in the 90's section. Hmmmm... Here I got worried but didn't say anything. I had read that the rooms in the 80's and 90's were extremely long walks from Everything Pop, but I held my tongue and thought that we would check it out. I was happy, however, that it was on the 4th floor....less foot traffic usually. Either way, I was sooo happy to be there!

We walked towards our room, and there were lots of people swimming, in the arcade, and in the Everything Pop store. I had asked the Cast Member who checked us in if they had been busy, and he just looked at me and laughed. I mentioned the free dining special coming up, and he replied with something along the lines of "I'm glad I'm off the first few days of that...". I guess they're expecting more crowds

We got to our room, which was very close to the Computer Pool, which was fairly crowded. The room was nice and clean, and had the 2 double beds. Not my favorite, but this was my 3rd time at Pop, and I knew what to expect. We were only going to be in the room to sleep and shower, so this was perfect (not to mention that we only paid about $69/night!!) The view was of a back area with some trees, and we could see some sort of road-I never figured out which road it was(maybe a service road b/c there was never much traffic). It was quiet, and I was happy to actually have a room. Did I mention that it was HOT outside? Yep, it was! Again, I knew this going in to the AUGUST trip, so I wasn't complaining. I was just happy to be in an A/C room after a long morning. (Due to my school schedule, this was the only time we could take the trip. We'd been in August before, so we knew what to expect.) Would we prefer to be there in Nov or Dec? Yep, but I will take ANY day in Disney over a day somewhere else!

These pictures were taken later in the trip because my hand were full with luggage the first afternoon, so ignore all of the bags and dirty laundry in our room!

The computer pool:

The new refillable mugs at Pop(and most other resorts...)

Our very messy room:

The views from our room:

We were both starving, as the breakfast we had in Atlanta had long worn off. We walked towards Everything Pop, and Joe discovered that it was SO much shorter to walk through the parking lot near our room. After crossing the parking lot, we were at the bus stops-not that far away at all! Besides, with all the walking we do at WDW, what are a few more steps? LOL

We both decided on Hot Dogs with French Fries at the Food Court. Off topic-here's a warning: Combined with the fact that we are very "basic" people when it comes to food, and the fact that this was a budget trip, we would be eating almost all of our meals at Counter Service Locations. We're usually perfectly happy with hot dogs, hamburgers, pizza, etc. Sorry to say that there won't be a lot of table service reviews in this trip. You want counter service reports? I got them!

Back to our trip and our lunch! (Late lunch, but still, lunch!) I generally only get a craving for hot dogs about once a year, except at Disney, where I could eat them every day. Don't know why, they're just better there. So we got our food, along with our refillable mugs. The mugs pay for themselves in about a day and a half with us. I personally also think that the fountain diet coke at Disney is sooo good. I'm not sure what it is...maybe everything just tastes better out of a Disney mug? Probably Lunch was really good and fresh, and I was feeling better now that I had some food.

We talked about what to do next. We both decided to go back up to the room, and we slept for about an hour. After some deliberation, we decided to head to the Magic Kingdom for a few hours, since they were open until 11 that night. We hop on a bus to the MK from Pop. I LOVE Disney transportation. We always fly, but if we ever drive, our car will be in the parking lot unless we go off site. Not having to drive, not seeing any Wal Marts, Grocery Stores, or any other every-day places is part of what makes staying on site go great. The new audio system was working on most of the buses that we rode on this trip. They announced where we were going and some "great tips" for that park for the day, such as fastpass, and whatever the newest attraction was at that particular park. After those announcements, they basically say "sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride...we'll be there soon!" And that's just what I did. Pulling into the MK, we were instructed to gather our belongings and take small children by the hand, yada, yada yada. Here's where Joe grabs my hand so that I don't get "lost"! There were also screens installed on every bus with Closed-Captioning on them. When there was no talking, the screen showed the date and the time. The drivers generally don't do much talking anymore, although we ran into a few that did, which I'll get to later in the week.

Up next: MK with no plan....are we crazy?!?!

 

[beckyb29]

Aug 9 cont Again!

I hate to say that there won't be any pictures for this night of the TR....it was dark, and we were in line for most of the evening! I promise, there will be more soon!

Once we got to the MK, we decided to check out the Fast Pass situation over in Tomorrowland. I was not very hopeful that we would find any, but we decided to look anyway. Space moutain was a 60 minute wait, (to be expected), and Buzz Lightyear was about a 30 min wait. Luckily, there were still fastpasses for Buzz! The return times were about an hour later, so we grabbed them and agreed on Pinnochio's Village House for dinner.
Ok, you know how I love Disney? Love it more than other place in the world? Well....here's my complaint. (And I honestly don't have too many about the place.) The counter service locations, service-wise, are awful. Take for example, Pinnochio's. They have about 6 entrees on the menu. A few pizzas, a salad, a sandwhich or 2, and a kids selection. They know when they will be busy. They know what they have to have ready. However, it takes no less than an eternity to get a personal pepperoni pizza at any time. The cashiers are fairly efficient, but the kitchen seems to get so backed up that they don't know what to do. I completely understand that these are not the highest paying jobs, and that it is hot, but they literally stood there and looked at eachother, looking lost. This happened at almost every counter service location we visited. I appreciate that the food is fresh, but the rate of people ordering this food is so high that almost any food will be fresh at the rate that it is being ordered. Okay, off my complaint box. Remember, I really do love Disney....I was just hungry!

Joe and I both had pepperoni pizzas and sodas, cost coming to about $16 or so. Not bad. The pizza was pretty good, and we were able to find a table really easily. Couldn't get one overlooking Small World ( I tried without hovering over the other diners!), but we were lucky to find a table, as we would learn later in the trip.

After we were no longer hungry, it was just about time for our Buzz FastPasses. We headed that way and rode Buzz. The story behind this ride for us is that I am always awful and Joe is always really good. I always seem to get a "defective" laser, while he never has. I was determined on this trip to beat him. No such luck this time, although I didn't have to complain that I was sitting in a defective seat!

I wanted to ride the TTA after that, so we did. I love this ride-I loved it back when it was the WedWay People Mover. This ride takes me back to the trips with my Mom, Dad, and Brother when I was younger when the original Epcot rides(horizons, Imagination etc) were still around. Plus the views from this ride are great...the castle, and how can you beat checking out Space Mountain from the inside! Joe laughs at me because I like the announcement "paging Mr Morrow, Mr Tom Morrow". Ok, yes, I'm a Disney Dork. But that's ok by me!

After I got my TTA fix, we decided to check out the line at Splash Mountain. We saw that it was about 40 mins. I am a firm believer in Fast Pass, but we had nothing else to do, so we decided to wait it out. The line was long, it was hot, but we didn't care. I wanted to see Brer Rabbit(he's so cute!) and Joe wanted to fall over the Laughin Place. While we were in line, we talked to a woman and her daughter who were pretty nice. At one point, while we were all kind of getting tired from waiting, the daughter said "wouldn't it be awful after all this time if it broke and they shut it down?" She got a look from me, Joe and her mom, and we went back to waiting in line. We finally got to the point at the top where the guy takes the fastpasses and the lines are merged into one. Yay!!! We're here!!!! He stops us before we go down the last ramp. Fine, we've waited this long, we'll wait for a few FastPassers to go by. **Announcement** "Ladies and Gentlemen, the ride has temporarily stopped. Please stay seated as your log may begin moving at any moment. Thank you." Ok, the guy looked at us and told us that someone must have tripped one of the many motion sensors(a common problem due to the people who like to get out of their logs). No big deal. 15 Minutes later, his phone rings. He tells us it's a bigger problem, he doesn't know how long it will be. About 25 mins later, there is an announcement that the ride will be evacuated and we all have to leave. It takes too long to re-start the ride and the park will be closed by the time they get it running again. Nobody is happy. Especially those of us crazy enough to stand in the standby line! Yep, that's what we get! Luckily, we got fastpasses good for any ride at the MK until the end of the month. As we evacated the line, I saw the people being evacated from their boats, including one going up the lift hill. Is it wierd that I wish I was one of them stuck inside the ride?? (I have some sort of fascination with behind the scenes, which is why we take a tour later in the week!)

After that long fiasco, we decide we are way too worn out to take much more, and decide to skip Spectro and Wishes, and beat the crowds out. We would see it another day. We walk through the somewhat empty stores on Main Street(everybody was lined up outside) and made it to the bus stops with very few people waiting. Back to Pop without an incident, we refilled our mugs and called it a night.

Up next: A day of relaxation?!? At Disney?!?

 

[TwistofLemon]

subbing to keep you posting Becky!



Love ya!