Better late than Never: a speedy trip report

[lonegungal17]

Hey ya! Welcome to my trip report for my August 2007 holiday. We stayed at Pop Century from August 15th to August 24th 2007(10 days, 9 nights in our happy place). My mission if I choose to accept it is to finish this trip report before my next vacation in August of this year. I've been driving myself crazy planning for my next trip, I figured the only way to get around that is to relive the magic.

Me: Mel, 23 on the first day of the trip, turning 24 half way through. Library assistant at the busiest library in England. I'm originally from Michigan but have been living in the United Kingdom with my husband since 2002. Loves everything Disney this was my 2nd trip to the world but first one I remember. I went with my parents in the 80s but my only memories are pictures of me on the trip.

DH: Malc, 46. Teaching assistant at a special needs school. Obessed with gardening/allotments as much as I am with Disney. This was his first time to the world but not to Disney as we had been making multiple trips to Disneyland Paris before this trip.

My DH and I met on an internet chat room called Vzones when I was still living in the states.

After dating online for almost a year I decided to move to England to be with him and attend university. We lived together for a few years and finally married in 2004 and celebrated our 3rd anniversary at Disney on August 23rd (the real date is August 31st but we couldn't stay that long).

The trip started out with a trip to see my family and friends and a trip to Cedar Point as well but I will skip these parts and get to the good stuff you all want to hear about anyway: Disney World.

 

[lonegungal17]

On August 15th we flew from Detroit to Orlando arriving at 2:45pm. We got off the plane and found the airport monorail to enjoy our first ride of the trip. After departing the monorail, collecting our bags (I had forgot to put the magical express tags on them in Detroit), we wandered out of the baggage claim area and lucked upon the magical express gate without even looking at a map. I left Malc in the waiting area and sorted out our bus to POP Century and we were off. A cast member wearing Mickey gloves directed us up the red carpet and into the Pop Century line. We waited a couple minutes before a new cast member told us we could board the bus, a few people got on as well and we were off after five minutes. Malc and I admired the palm trees and amazing Florida weather from the coach until the Magical Express movie started. The movie held my attention long enough that it felt like we hadn't been on the bus long before I spotted the sign for Pop.

I got in line to check in and Malc took some pictures.

I'm a huge X-files fan so seeing Mulder and Scully at a Disney resort was a dream. Plus I own a pair of these action figures myself. I know my inner nerd is showing.

When we were called up I handed the check in lady our passports and reservation information and she typed some info into her computer. She looked up at me and said I can't find your reservation. My mouth dropped and I looked a bit like this . I picked my jaw off the floor and said we booked back in February and handed her my travel information from the UK Disney travel agent. She looked at the paper and asked your name is (my married name), I thought it was (my maiden name). I then realized she had misread my passport (most people do. I had it edited for my name change when I got married but my maiden name is still by picture. It says it's been changed on one of the back pages). She tried my maiden name and found our reservation and my room requests I had made back in Feburary. We would be staying in building 50 on the ground floor (just what I had asked for). We walked away from the desk to set off to find our room when I suddenly remembered I had forgotten something. I had signed up for the Dis crocodile exchange before our trip and my croc Faolan should have been waiting for me at the resort. I went back up the desk and got the same lady and told her I had forgotten I should have had a package waiting for me. She put my info into the computer again and said I did and went off to fetch it for me. I was a bit annoyed that she hadn't noticed the package was there when we checked in. She brought me out my package and Malc and I finally made our way to our room 1141 in the 50s. I was a bit worried about the room because everyone on the Dis had complained about how small the rooms were at Pop but I was happy to see the room was massive compared to european hotel rooms or even our own bedroom at home. The first thing I did was throw down my bags and tear into the package I had just picked up. I was then introduced to Faolan O' Focker. Here he is later on in our other member of our traveling party Stitch.

Stitch is a bag I had gotten in Disneyland Paris to dress up for this trip in Disney costumes. You'll see more of his outfits later in this report.

We started to unpack and get out our costumes for the Pirate and Princess Party we would be attending that night when the phone rang. It was GardenGrocer, they were at the resort with our food delivery. I told them our room number and they wheeled over our food. When the bloke arrived and started unpacking our food, I realized I had ordered way too much food for ten days.

Oh well lessen learned, we ended up leaving behind 3/4 of the food next to our door for some lucky soul to find.

Next up Pirate and Princess Party and the Crystal Palace.

Mel

 

[lonegungal17]

After biding the Grocer Grocer delivery man goodbye. We settled in to watch a bid of Stacey on the TV as we changed into our costumes. I was dressed as Tinkerbell, Malc and Stitch were dressed as a pirates and Faolan didn't have a costume. We don't take any pictures at the time but here are some from later on in the evening.

We left the room around 6 o'clock for our 6:25pm reservation at Crystal Palace with no idea how long it would take to get to the Magic Kingdom. When we got to the Pop bus stop I started to feel stupid about how I was dressed as no one else in the Magic Kingdom was dressed up for the party not even the children. Everyone our line and the others stared at us like we were crazy, I asked Malc if he was alright and wanted to go back and change. He said he was fine and they were just looking at us because I looked so much like Tinkerbell. A few more minutes later a family arrived with pirate hats and eyepatches, that was enough to make me feel less out of place. The ride to the magic kingdom took much longer than I thought it would. Going to Disneyland Paris so much had made me think you could get anywhere on property within 20 minutes (walking) but not here. It was already 6:30 when we arrived in the Magic Kingdom, so we were already late for our Crystal Palace reservation. Great way to start out a trip. We legged it through bag check, through the entrance and up Main Street. I got a few "Hi, Tinkerbell" from some cast members and guests. We finally checked into Crystal Palace at 6:40 and were given a buzzer and told we would have to wait for a table.
We grabbed a nearby bench and Malc took pictures of me and castle.

Mel

 

[lonegungal17]

We were seated about five minutes later we were seated at a table for two on the right hand side of the restaurant. I saw Pooh walking around and my first thought was autograph book, I had forgotten to buy one in our made rush to get here. Oh, well at least we could take pictures.

After we had went up and gotten our food, I noticed the little boy at the next table staring at me with a huge smile on his face. He'd blushand turn away when ever I looked at him but go right back to staring right after. Finally, his mom said to me, he thinks your Tinkerbell. Not to ruin the Disney magic I agreed I was Tinkerbell and played along until they left a short while later.
Soon it was time to meet the characters.

I missed a few because I was getting my dessert when they came around but Malc got them on film.

All and all we both loved the food at Crystal Palace. Malc is a vegetarian and found many choices on the buffet that he could eat and thought it was the best restaurant we went to on the trip.

Mel