Back to Back trips in August-The How Could You's Ride Again!- Final Thoughts 4/14

[KatMark]

Linda, awesome photos of the castle, the castle show and Wishes. I've not gotten that far in my TR yet, but we never did see it this trip and I was really depressed about it when we left. But your pictures put a smile on my face as I'll see it in two months and your pictures brought it to life for me.
How nice that you had a visit with others and got to see it again.

 

[Tiggerrn2]

Linda, awesome photos of the castle, the castle show and Wishes. I've not gotten that far in my TR yet, but we never did see it this trip and I was really depressed about it when we left. But your pictures put a smile on my face as I'll see it in two months and your pictures brought it to life for me.
How nice that you had a visit with others and got to see it again.

Thank you for letting me know I made you smile today! Have a great weekend!

 

[Tiggerrn2]

Let's move on with this evening, shall we? A person can't sit at a table at the end of Main Street all night!

After my wonderful visit with the New York family, I moved out to Main Street to watch MSEP!

The music for this parade is so contagious. Sort of like that other ride that shall not be named for fear of singing that song into my slumber later.

Something fundamentally wrong about a Hookah smoking caterpillar in WDW!

Dopey is my favorite. Too bad he was in the dark.

With the parade over, it was time for me to head to New Fantasyland to check out the progress in this area. Last fall all that was open was the twin Dumbos, the water play area and the Barnstormer, so I was anxious to see everything. (and extremely anxious to try that new Brew the Frumps talked so much about)

The back of the castle is so pretty. Some day maybe I will eat up there.

The Mine Train is coming along.

Of course, I took a peak!

 

[Tiggerrn2]

continued MK evening

Look!!! It's a new castle!! No chance to try BOG this trip. Boys!

And the next castle! I tried to ride LM on this night, but it was not operational...guess the ClamMobiles suffer the nonmoving fate here as well.

Let's move along, shall we. I have a beverage to try!!

Sorry, I thought for sure I had taken a photo of my most absolutely, wonderous, tasty, and completely marvelous Le Fou's Brew. But apparently I devoured it too fast to get said photo! It was as awesome as Jess and Lia had said.

This area is beyond beautiful at night.

I wandered on out of NFL and on to check into a couple of rides before all the EMHs were over. Unfortunately, this one was down for some refurb.

So I headed over to check in on Master Gracey. Still resting, I see!

Beware of the spitting Brine pit (or is it the Captain?)

This is, without a doubt, my favorite photo I have ever taken in HM. "There's Always My Way"

By the time I got off HM, my alone time had come to a close. I made my way out of the park and down Mainstreet stopping for a few photos along the way and taking a peak in some cool windows.

What a mostly empty Mainstreet looks like at the end of the night....

Thank you, Roy, for finishing what your brother started!!! The "Florida Project" makes millions of people happy every year!! And gives some of us something a little extra to dream about.

Time to head out. Catching the posters on your way out is much easier than trying to get them on the way in.

Good Night Magic Kingdom!! You have, indeed, Let the Memories Begin!

Headed off to a mostly empty bus and returned to POP around 2am and straight to bed!! Thank goodness we had no rope drops in the morning.

Up next: Moving Day!!!

 

[RGirl]

Just found your report, and I'm joining in for TWO trips!

It looks like y'all are having a great time so far. I'm a little jealous of your alone time at MK. Too fun!

 

[Buzzsgramma]

Beautiful nite time pix of MK...it warmed my heart....

 

[Tiggerrn2]

Just found your report, and I'm joining in for TWO trips!

It looks like y'all are having a great time so far. I'm a little jealous of your alone time at MK. Too fun!

Welcome! So glad to have you joining in! The night at MK is one of my favorite memories.

Beautiful nite time pix of MK...it warmed my heart....

Thanks. So glad I could give you that warm, fuzzy feeling!

 

[iloverags2]

Your fireworks and night time parade pictures always come out so beautiful! My camera is the pits with them. Hmph!

Oh man, Sears Tower opening in 1973...that sign brings back memories. My dad worked for Sears and we got to go up before it opened to the public. That was cool!

And I can tell you that Twister game over at Pop has gotten used in the past.

 

[Tiggerrn2]

Your fireworks and night time parade pictures always come out so beautiful! My camera is the pits with them. Hmph!

Oh man, Sears Tower opening in 1973...that sign brings back memories. My dad worked for Sears and we got to go up before it opened to the public. That was cool!

And I can tell you that Twister game over at Pop has gotten used in the past.

LOVE it!!!! So cool that you got to do that at the Tower. I love my new camera. It's a Canon EOS Rebel T4i. I have over 1000 photos from the second part of the 2-trip trek. And it's too hard to pick and choose which ones to post.

 

[KatMark]

Linda, playing catch-up (we were in Iowa visiting the kids and grand puppy this weekend).

Love the photos of the Main Street Electrical Parade (so mad I missed it again this year).

What great pictures in the new Fantasyland...especially around Gaston's.

"There's Always My Way Out" -- awesome photo.

 

[Tiggerrn2]

Linda, playing catch-up (we were in Iowa visiting the kids and grand puppy this weekend).
Hope you had a great visit!
Love the photos of the Main Street Electrical Parade (so mad I missed it again this year).
I remember when they went to Spectromagic and I was disappointed. Then we saw it MSEP on the West Coast. Made me so happy. I guess because it brings back all the memories of when I went with my Mom. Was really excited when it came back to WDW.
What great pictures in the new Fantasyland...especially around Gaston's.
Thank you
"There's Always My Way Out" -- awesome photo.

Thanks, I loved it, too.

 

[Tiggerrn2]

Today was moving day!! We slept in a bit and then had breakfast in the room to finish up some of those supplies. We packed up and were ready to head out of our room by 11. Originally, the thought was to let Bell Services take care of the bags and head to Epcot for the morning. The boys had other ideas. They wanted to swim because we were heading here......
(borrowed these photos from our 2008 trip because for whatever reason, I did not take them again this trip)

And they could use this pool.....

and use this slide!

So, instead we grabbed a cab and took our stuff with us.

Our last stay at BC we had been upgraded to a water view, and this was our view.

And just for fun, here is a photo of the kids from that balcony.

Wow, have they changed! So fun to look back.

OK so back to this trip. Our prior experience may have tainted my feelings a bit, so I don't want you to think it all was awful, but our experience here this time was not the same. Our room was ready when we got there. I double checked at the front desk about the fridge situation and they assured us there would be a fridge. So we headed on up.

Welcome to our room!

And a few photos around the room.

This was our view looking straight out our balcony.

And looking to the left

Looking to the right was the combo balcony with the room to our diagonal (and we could look right into their room-the neighbors weren't good at keeping their drapes drawn)

So, as I said, past experience may have skewed my feelings a bit, but the room was showing a bit of wear.

And the balcony was obviously not cleaned.

Yes, this is someone's gum wrapper. We left it there to see if the balcony ever got cleaned. It was there our whole stay. Probably there for the next folks as well. And please don't flame me, I know we could've called housekeeping to complain or ask that it get done. It was just an experiment to see if they would ever take care of it. We didn't sit out there much anyway because, being in the corner, there wasn't too much air circulation and really, not much to see.

There was indeed a fridge in the room-the one that couldn't be used. So I called the front desk and they said to call housekeeping, which I did. A gentleman was there within 10 minutes or so wanting to know "what's the problem?" I explained we needed a different fridge as we couldn't use the one we had. I guess he didn't believe me, because he tried to just plug that one in (that had a large 8x10 sign on it saying do not use). After he couldn't get that one to work (and this is the total, honest truth, no exaggeration) he moved the cabinet forward, pulled the metal? backing loose from the cabinet to get the cord inside, then pulled the fridge out of the cabinet. That gentleman then pulled the fridge from the room by the cord! Didn't bother to pick it up to move it out. He said he'd be back with a new fridge. In minutes he returned with another fridge-had to have been taken from the room next door. He put that one in the cabinet and said "there, you should be good now."

In retrospect, I should've gotten his name. Because we have a second encounter with him at the end of our stay!

The carpets in the hallways were looking like they could use a wash, and just the overall feel of the resort seemed worn and tired. But it still sure smelled just as wonderful as ever in the lobby!!! And the beds were absolute heaven!!! The beds at POP leave much to be desired!

Day 5 to be continued....

 

[KatMark]

Linda, I'm with you...I found the Villas needed a little attention as well (I didn't take any pictures). But I saw numerous stains on the carpet, half the supplies were missing in the cabinets in the mini-kitchen, the tile in the bathroom needed a good cleaning.

But I'm glad you got into your room right away so that the boys could go swimming.

Love that photo of your DS and DD.

 

[mickeystoontown]

I'm trying to get all caught up and haven't read the last installment yet. But, I had to stop now and tell you that I absolutely love the "there's always my way" picture that you took inside the stretch room. That's an amazing picture!

Okay, going back to read the rest.

 

[mickeystoontown]

I'm back and all caught up again. I've read other reports that said the resort wasn't quite up to par and in need of a good cleaning. It's sad that the mousekeeping seems to be lacking resort wide.

 

[Tiggerrn2]

Continuing our start of our BC day....
It was after 1230 by now, and everyone was getting a bit hungry. So we headed on down to Hurricane Hannahs to grab some lunch.

We headed out to the main walkway and I snapped a couple of photos.

This sure looks nice after the refurb.

The menu...

As you can see, the BC Ducks are still ever present and willing to join you for lunch!

And OMG, I actually have a food porn photo!!!

This Lobster and Shrimp sandwich was wonderful! In fact, I really would like to have one for lunch today!

DH ordered the Chicken sandwich with coleslaw and the kids each had (surprise) cheeseburgers.

Total cost $41.50.

Service was still slow this time around. In 2008 it was really slow and we were hoping with the refurb everything would have changed. Apparently, the food doesn't cook any faster now than it did then. It was nice to have the refill station for the mugs off to the side for self service.

We headed back to the room to change into our suits and out to the pool for some fun in the sun. I guess I did take a couple of photos from this stay.

We had a nice afternoon at the pool. It was HOT!! I tried to relax in one of the loungers and get some sun, but had to head into the pool to cool off. The lifegaurds were making Mickey Tie Dye shirts at the pool that afternoon, so no Trivia games for me to play. I actually considered doing a shirt for myself, but they didn't look like they held their color very well and it was only pastel color paints that they offered. For the $$, I just didn't think it was worth it.

We stayed at the pool until around 4 and then it was time to head up to shower and change for dinner!! This was the other pick my son HAD to have.

Up next....where are we going for dinner?

 

[KatMark]

Nice afternoon at the pool. I have to tell you that it NEVER looked that empty when we were there in June.

We didn't order food at the bar, but did have drinks and I remember it taking Mary awhile to get back with them.

Can't wait to hear where your DS wanted to go to dinner.

 

[Tiggerrn2]

Linda, I'm with you...I found the Villas needed a little attention as well (I didn't take any pictures). But I saw numerous stains on the carpet, half the supplies were missing in the cabinets in the mini-kitchen, the tile in the bathroom needed a good cleaning.

But I'm glad you got into your room right away so that the boys could go swimming.

Love that photo of your DS and DD.

I agree. I think Disney is skimping on their housekeeping to cut costs. Seems that is where most businesses start. Even hospitals. The boys were very excited to get to swim. And thanks. I love looking at some of those old photos. Seems so long ago.

I'm trying to get all caught up and haven't read the last installment yet. But, I had to stop now and tell you that I absolutely love the "there's always my way" picture that you took inside the stretch room. That's an amazing picture!

Okay, going back to read the rest.

Thanks!! I thought it was pretty cool, too!

I'm back and all caught up again. I've read other reports that said the resort wasn't quite up to par and in need of a good cleaning. It's sad that the mousekeeping seems to be lacking resort wide.

Yes, it is very sad. One of the things I loved most was it was always so clean there.

 

[Tiggerrn2]

Nice afternoon at the pool. I have to tell you that it NEVER looked that empty when we were there in June.

We didn't order food at the bar, but did have drinks and I remember it taking Mary awhile to get back with them.

Can't wait to hear where your DS wanted to go to dinner.

I think I took these few photos as we were getting ready to head back up to the room. When we first got out to the pool, most of the chairs out front of the lifeguard area were packed, and the only seats open were the few down behind Hurricane Hannahs in a back corner. People all started to head up to their rooms between 3:30 and 4.

 

[wiigirl]

Great update!