Aug. 24 land/sea package-land portion

Hobbitmomma

Frodo Lives
Joined
Jun 21, 2006
Messages
373
Well, what a truly wonderful vacation. We took our kids (son-7, daughter-5) on the 7 day land/sea package. We spent 3 nights at WDW at the Poly and 4 nights aboard the Disney Wonder stopping at Nassau and Castaway Cay. If you would like to read about the sea portion of our trip, go to: http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1212270

So our kids had no idea that we were going to Disney and we had been planning this since December. I'm really thankful to some colleagues who advised us to book ADR's as soon as we could. Anyway, we had little clues that we slipped to our kids during the flight. We had them figure it out about 20 minutes before we landed. It was priceless!

I was very impressed at how well Disney has everything organized. We didn't have to get our luggage at baggage claim and in fact never had to handle it again until we were finished with the cruise. We were directed to the Disney desk at the terminal and then got in line for our bus to the Polynesian. The hotel is beautiful and to our surprise our room was ready when we arrived. (12:30) After checking in, we went over to the DCL desk and checked in with them. If you purchase the combo package, you check in at the cruise line desk in the hotel, and don't have to do it at the port terminal. We then went to our room and gave the kids the option of swimming for a little while or jumping right in at the parks. Well, guess what they chose?! We rode the monorail to Magic Kingdom and headed straight for Pirates. We were pleasantly surprised that we only had about a 15 minute wait. I love the addition of Capt. Jack! We then walked around a bit and took some pictures and my daughter was enchanted by Cinderella's castle. We had early dinner reservations at Crystal Palace (3:45) so we headed over there since we were starving. There was a scary moment when the CM sitting at the reservations desk started having some sort of seizure! I thought it must have been the heat. Another CM came and moved everyone away from the window and took care of us manually. We got in and got our seats and I asked if the young lady was OK. Someone came back later and told us that she was going to be fine. Anyway, the kids were delighted with the Pooh characters and we made quick work of the buffet since we hadn't eaten since 8am. I hightly recommend the pork. It was very good. After dinner we headed out for more rides. We rode Dumbo, the carousel, Aladdin's Magic Carpet (My daughter did not like the spitting camel!) and walked through the Swiss Family Robinson house. We then went over to the castle so the kids could see the Cinderellabration. What a lovely show. My son was a little over all of the princesses, but my daughter was thrilled. We also got to the Jungle Cruise and this was the longest line we waited in the whole time. I think it was about half an hour. And my husband insisted on the Haunted Mansion. We walked right onto this with no wait at all. My son hated it. He cried the entire time. My daughter hid her face in my shoulder but peeked occasionally. This kind of made up our minds for us about Dinosaur - No Way!The kids road the teacups with my husband and then we went straight to the "hub" to get a place to watch Spectromagic. We were lucky and got to sit almost on the curb in front of the bridge to Tomorrowland. That parade is so enchanting. Some very nice ladies asked my kids if they wanted to sit in front of them. My daughter did, but my son stayed on my lap. We would have liked to stay for the Wishes parade and fireworks, but the kids were done. So we went back to our room and they were asleep in minutes!
The next morning we got up refreshed and went for breakfast at the Kona Cafe. Now I have heard lots about the Tonga Toast. Well, we took one look at the description and took a pass. I'm sorry, but that is just too sweet for me first thing in the morning. Breakfast was very good though. We headed for Animal Kingdom and this time had a bit better of a strategy. As we approached the gate, Rafiki was posing for pictures so we got a lovely one with our daughter. When we got into the park (Not a long line by the way) we headed straight for the safari. We practically walked right on. We only waited for three trucks to fill before we got on. I love this attraction and so did my family. We saw plenty of animals as it was still early and therefore not too hot for them yet. After that we walked through the "forest trail" (sorry the name escapes me)which was lovely. We then went straight to Kali River Rapids. Again, we did not have a very long line. I think we waited 20 minutes. We all loved this ride but thought that it was short compared to rides like it at other parks. This was the only ride that we repeated because my kids loved it so much. We also went to see "It's Tough to be a Bug." Let me tell you, this terrified my kids. They were ok until the spiders dropped from the ceiling. There was also a child seated in front of us crying. They calmed down a little, but totally freaked out when the "bugs exited the theater." I felt really badly. My kids did not like this at all! (Two strikes for parents!) We had lunch at the Rainforest Cafe which was great. I recommend the crabcake sandwich. The kids loved when the animals "came alive" every so often. We went back into the park and headed for Dinoland. It started to rain and they closed the attractions which made my son very upset. My husband road Dinosaur alone and reported that the kids wouldn't like it. He thought it was funny though. So back to the hotel for naps for the kids. (We had hoped for pool time in the afternoons but got none because of the afternoon rains everyday.) That evening we went to Epcot and my daughter had her night with her princesses. We had dinner at Akershuse (I have no idea how to spell it) and it was very nice. We had a terrific waiter named Knut and enjoyed watching my daughter go nuts over each princess. The ladies were all very gracious and accomodating. We rode Maelstrom after dinner and then walked back towards Spaceship Earth. The only ride we really wanted to do in Epcot was Soarin' but when we got there (before dinner) all of the fast passes were gone and the wait was over an hour. We checked back around 8:30 and the line had gone down, but not enough. The kids were getting tired and we just didn't want to be out until after 10pm again. So we went to the living seas, and then headed out. When we got back to the hotel, we let the kids get into their bathing suits and swim at the volcano pool. We sat on the beach and watched the fireworks over the Magic Kingdom. It was really nice and the kids had a great time.
On Saturday we had breakfast at Ohana's with Lilo and Stitch. My son was particularly happy because he loves Stitch. The food was very good and the kids loved meeting Mickey, Pluto and of course Lilo and Stitch. They also do a parade around the restaurant with all of the kids and give them maracas to shake. It's very cute. We went back to MK for the morning and rode Big Thunder Railroad and Splash Mtn. My kids loved both of those. The wait for BTR was only about 5 minutes and we had a fast pass for SM. (Hubby ran ahead while we got Minnie's autograph and picture on Main St.) In fact, my husband actually had time to ride BTR by himself to check it out before we caught up with him. So he road twice. We walked over to POTC because my husband wanted to get some pirate gear for the kids for the cruise and I wanted to see if Capt. Jack would make an appearance. The kids got pictures with Capt. Hook and Mr. Smee. While in line, I was discussing with another mom how I would wait for hours for Capt. Jack and a photographer standing there said to just hang out for a few minutes. (11:20am) I asked him where and he said right there. So sure enough in about 10 minutes, pirate Mac turned up with his cart and started the show. I knew exactly what was going on so I got my kids over there fast and had them sit down. When my husband got out of the shop I waved him over and he got the whole show on tape. It was really funny. We wanted to go over to Ariel's Grotto, but the kids were hot and hungry, so we got some hotdogs and sat down near Crystal Palace. The skies started looking pretty ominous so we did some shopping and headed back via the ferry to the hotel. Once again, the kids didn't get any swimming in. After naps (while I did laundry) we went to MGM. I really like this park, but we didn't have nearly enough time in it. We had some fast passes so we went to see the Little Mermaid show which is really good. I was very impressed with the puppetry and the effects.The kids really enjoyed it too. We then went over to Star Tours, but my son, who is a huge Star Wars fan, refused to go on. I don't know what he thought it was going to be like, but he suddenly got terrified. So my husband took my daughter on and she liked it. Go figure! From there we went to the Indiana Jones Spectacular. That was great fun. We had dinner at SciFi Cafe and I have to say this was my only disappointment. We thought the atmosphere was terrific, but the food was terrible. I wouldn't eat there again. It had started raining again at this point as we were making our way over to Fantasmic. There seemed to be some question as to whether it would go on because of lightning, but it did. What a fabulous production!! We loved it. It did eventually stop raining but my husband didn't want to take out the video camera, so we didn't get any of that. It was well worth the wait though!
The next day was our embarkation day on the Wonder. If you book the package, you have a choice of being picked up at your hotel around 11:30 or being picked up at Animal Kingdom at 12:30. We opted for AK since we really like it and we wanted one more morning in a park. We had our luggage ready by 8am as instructed (you just leave it in the room and they get it), we headed to breakfast at Kona Cafe and were at AK by 9:10. We checked in at the DCL desk at the entrance to the park and they took our carry-on stuff for us and gave us VIP passes to the Lion King Spectacular. We had planned on going to the 9:40 showing anyway so that worked out perfectly. Let me tell you this is not to be missed!! We absolutely loved it. I took a million pictures. It's so colorful and well done. After the show, I took the kids over to Dinoland since they didn't get to do anything there the other day while my husband went for fast passes to Kali Rapids. The playground that they have there is terrific for small children and my kids really enjoyed themselves climbing and sliding and getting a little wet. We headed over to Kali and got right on with our passes. The kids got really soaked this time and loved it. By this time it was getting near time to head back, so we grabbed some souvenirs, pizza for lunch and headed to the meeting place for the cruise. We were excited about going to the cruise, but sad to leave the parks. Three days is not nearly enough and I really hope that we can return sometime in the near future. Hopefully Hubby and I will get to ride some of the rides that we wanted to but couldn't because of the kids. (Everest, RRR, Dinosaur, just to name a few) We had a really terrific time and the kids are asking when we can go back. Oh, to win the lottery!!
 
from the sounds of your report.......you had a fantastic time......thanks so much for taking the time to tell us about it.....
I guess I am not a sweet breakfast person either....cause I opted for no Krispy Kremes when we were at the Dolphin.......I really wanted one but not in the morning....oh well
Thanks again
 
You sure packed alot into your time in the parks

Thanks for posting

:)
 












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