Dolphin Kisses, Rainy Day at Blizzard Beach and many Magical Memories - Jan 2012 TR

[tifaas]

Hi everyone and welcome to our Jan trip report! We had such a wonderful trip that was filled with lots of magical moments.

Who:

Our group consisted of myself aka Tammy, my DH of 10 years Ian, my MIL Peggy and my FIL Eric.

When: We were there from Jan 22nd through Jan 29th of this year.

Where: We stayed at the Coronado Springs Resort

Why: We were celebrating our wedding anniversary of ten years and my IL's of 46 years.

We came up with this title because we were able to go to Discovery Cove on this trip. I had always dreamed about going here since it first opened and was thrilled we could fit it into our schedule. The rainy day at Blizzard beach is pretty obvious. We had only one semi bad weather day while we were on our trip. It was mostly beautiful sunny skies, highs in the low 80's. We decided to add the water park fun and more option after we drove by Blizzard Beach. We had planned for the Friday of our trip to be spent as half day at Magic Kingdom, Half day at Animal Kingdom but since we pretty much did everything we wanted in the days before we thought it would be fun to go to Blizzard Beach and the Disney Quest that night. You will hear about this day more later on in the trip, but lets just say it was a rainy day. Would we make it to Blizzard beach after all. You will have to stay and read more to find out.
Finally the many Magical Memories comes from all the wonderful times we had while we were there. There were a lot of laughs, and some tears but they were good tears.

So sit back and relax and I will be back with tons of updates, photos galore and hopefully share some magic.

 

[tifaas]

We woke up bright and early as it was finally the day we would be leaving for Disney World. We had some bagels, fruit and some coffee for breakfast. We weren't going to be leaving for the airport until around 11 AM as our flight wasn't until 2:45. It only takes about an hour to get to the airport in Austin from where we live in Georgetown. So once we hit the magic hour we loaded up the car and made our way to the lot we were parking in while we were going to be gone.

We made it through security pretty fast and found a quick bite for lunch before settling in at the gate. This is where we ran into a little bit of bad news. Our plan apparently needed to be changed out in Orlando due to maintenance so their flight was late leaving which meant ours would be late as well. However, I am glad they thought to take it out and give us a different plane if there were issues with it. I would much rather be safe than arrive on time. So we didn't actually take off until around 3:15 but they made up for it on our flight.

Here we are at the gate waiting patiently. My FIL took the picture and my MIL is the one reading the book.

We made it into Orlando only like 10 minutes later than what we should have been. I would check the flight map every so often and they would be going like 550 - 600 mph and flying at around 40k elevation. We could definitely feel it when we started the descent as the plane was slowing down and dropping around 2k each time.

We made it to the magical express check in area and since we had our stuff with us it was straight into a line and on a bus. We were the first to be dropped off so we were even more thankful for that. When we were getting checked in we had mentioned we were celebrating our ten year anniversary so they had pins for us and balloons and a card signed by Mickey as well. We felt special!

After finding out we were going to be put in the Ranchos section I was a little bummed because we were hoping for the Casitas but they were full due to the conventions. Bummer. However once we found out how close we were to Bus stop 4 and the Dig Site pool we were actually kind of happy. It wasn't a horrible walk either from the room to the El Centro either.

We had a bite to eat at the Pepper Market which was wonderful. We went back to the room after checking out the store and waited for our luggage to arrive so we could get unpacked as we had an early morning tomorrow to go swim with some dolphins at Discovery Cove.

 

[ash-n-brensmom]

I'm here!! You're right, better safe than sorry! Glad they were able to make up the time, though. And nice surprise with the balloons!!

 

[tifaas]

I'm here!! You're right, better safe than sorry! Glad they were able to make up the time, though. And nice surprise with the balloons!!

to the TR thread.

I was glad they were safe with us because let me tell you on the plane ride home I wasn't so sure about it, but more on that later. I checked mail and noticed we received our photo pass pictures today so busy uploading those and will be back with a ton of pictures to upload from those as well.

We just got back home from dinner at Salt Grass and it was wonderful. I'm sneaking some time in while the hubby showers and then we are going to settle in for a chick flick of my choice. He's such a good hubby to me.

 

[tifaas]

So we had arranged for a taxi van to pick us up at 7:45 AM and we had to make our way from the back of the resort in the Ranchos section to the front area. So our alarm was set for 6:30 AM as I am not a morning person and neither is the hubby. We knew we would be hitting the snooze quite a few times. We finally got ready and made our way to the front and waited patiently for the taxi to show up.

We made it to Discovery cove by 8:15 and were checked in. The lobby is beautiful here. We found out we were in the first group for a dolphin swim so was super excited for that. We got to swim with Lester and Alani or something like that.

Here are some beautiful pictures of the lobby and the Starfish Cabana that we had to meet up at for our orientation.

Once we had our orientation it was time to meet our dolphins. We had two wonderful trainers with us and for some reason I didn't think to write their names down. We got to learn about them and then did some fun hand tricks with them.

More to come in the next post.

 

[tifaas]

So after we did some kissing with the dolphins we had the pull by Lester. He took off a lot faster than what I imagined he would. They tell you to hold on and I did but sheesh I thought he was going to leave me in the middle of the lagoon. LOL.

I had some tears in my eyes as this was something I had been dreaming about for years. That is where the happy teams come into play from my first post.

So after our dolphin swim we decided we wanted to go hit up the bird aviary to check it out. We picked up a cup of food to feed and pretty much right away had birds landing on us.

Once we were done in the aviary we were needing something to drink and snack on as it had been a few hours since the breakfast. So we grabbed some pina coladas, beer for the boys and some pretzels.

It was quite a nice refreshing snack to top us off for the time being. We decided it was time to finally hit up the Grand Reef. So my inlaws went to change and put on some sunscreen because it was getting really sunny and warm and definitely turning a little pink on the cheeks and nose.

More to come in the next post!

 

[tifaas]

So we were off to the Grand Reef. They had recently done an expansion on this area and it was amazing. I have snorkeled with sting rays in Grand Cayman before but in the Grand Reef it was different. Plus they had huge schools of fish and when you are in the open ocean they tend to hide from you.

This was of the shark area. They are behind glass so not in the water with you but the way they have it angled it seemed like they were right below you.

We spent a lot of time in the grand reef. They also have a lazy river that winds under the aviary which was awesome. The water on that was heated to around 80 or so. It was varying depths so they have noodles you can use as it takes you around the park.

Needless to say we had an amazing day here. We left for the resort around 4pm as we had dining reservations for the Maya Grill at 6PM and I wanted to get a shower before it.

 

[ash-n-brensmom]

Looks like you guys had a wonderful experience here!

 

[tifaas]

Looks like you guys had a wonderful experience here!

It was awesome! I didn't want to leave and would love to go back one day and do the trainer for a day. I would have probably signed up for that this time but my IL's only wanted to pay for the entrance fee for themselves and I knew if we signed up for that we would be apart a majority of the day. So it gives me a good excuse to come back and do this.

Update coming up!

 

[tifaas]

So after a busy but fun filled day at Discovery Cove we were ready to begin the fun at Disney. We set the alarm for 7:30 AM so we could be out for the bus by 8:30 at the latest. We were actually up and at the bus stop by 8AM as we were ready for some fun at Hollywood Studios.

I had been reading on the Dis about the park opening around 8:30 AM but I think the CM's were still asleep because we didn't even get to start going through the turnstiles until 8:50 AM. Where did we head first I bet you are asking yourselves? I bet you would say Toy Story Mania but alas you would be wrong. We went to Starring Rolls for some breakfast. We all decided to be good and had an ET bagel with cream cheese. It was pretty delicious and was fun to just people watch.

Once we were done with breakfast we decided to slowly make our way to that crazy upside down ride Rock N Roller coaster. We of course saw a photo pass person on our way and we got some good shots with Tower of Terror in the background. Since we had our anniversary buttons on they wanted us to kiss.

Then of course the obligatory scared shot

So we found our way to the ride and the IL's decided it was not for them after we told them it would go upside down. So we got a quick picture of the entrance and left the camera with them.

I wish I would have taken our camera to get the redneck shot of the ride photo. We both look scared and excited. We were put in the front car of the last car on the limo. Needless to say what a first ride ever on it. We loved it and would have probably ridden it again had we not see a huge tour group just enter the queue chanting. That was the one and only time we actually ran into them at all on this entire trip if you could believe it.

So after riding that and finding the IL's we decided to make our way over towards Beauty and the Beast to see when the first show was. Sadly it was still over an hour away so we weren't going to sit around and wait for it.

We saw the motorcade coming of the street performers so got a few pictures of them.

So we started to make our way to the Animation area because we really wanted to do a drawing class. However we realized they had just started one and it would be another 30 mintues to the next one and saw the Voyage of the Littler Mermaid was about to begin so got in line for that. What a waste of time for us. I really thought it would be better than what it was and was a little disappointed.

Going to continue in the next post.

 

[tifaas]

We were walking around trying to figure out what we were going to do next when Ian spotted a photo pass person so we took another photo.

My inlaws wanted to to the backlot tour as they figured it would be fun. I had not been on this ride since I was a kid and it was very different. It seemed much shorter to me and didn't show as much as they did before. We got some kind of cool pictures I will share though.

Water about to hit the guy!

I loved the movie "Flight of the Navigator" as a kid and thought this reminded me of the ship.

The hubby being a ham

I want to say when we finished that we had a snack and did some people watching before making our way to ride the new Star Tours. We went on it when we came in July and loved it. We weren't sure how the IL's would do but they really liked it. I think we went on it a few more times because it was literally a walk on.

Part 3 coming up next!

 

[tifaas]

After our tours to the galaxy we decided to try the Great Movie Ride out. I had never been on this and while it was interesting I don't think we would do it again unless we were just wanting to get off our feet for a few minutes. After we got out of the movie ride, we decided to shop some as we had some time to kill before the parade. We bought a Jedi Mickey picture as the hubby loves anything Star Wars.

My IL's had no desire to watch the parade so they found a comfy table under some shade near the commissary building. While Ian and I went just up the path a little and watched the parade.

We didn't have a front row seat but we could see fine where we were.

Mr Incredible leading the way!

I just adore Sully!

After the parade it was time to make our way to the Sci Fi Diner as we had a dining reservation set for 4 PM. We were a little early but they were able to get us seated pretty quick with no problem. I tried to remember to take food pictures but I'm horrible about remembering. LOL.

Some fun pictures..

The MIL was supposed to act surprised but my FIL didn't get a good picture of her acting surprised.

After we had dinner we decided to call it a day as we were pretty tired from going since 8 AM. We hit the dig site pool for a little time in the hot tub and then the IL's left us to go back to their room. Ian and I stayed and got some margaritas at the pool bar and relaxed. We crashed probably around 10 PM which was ok because we had an early morning ADR for Crystal Palace in the morning.

 

[jenny105]

I'm here!

How amazing is Discovery Cove? I went there in 2010 as part of a TA group and loved it. It doesn't even feel like you're in Orlando. It's like you're on a tropical island somewhere. So relaxing and fun!

I love all the pictures from DHS! Cute

 

[tifaas]

I'm here!

How amazing is Discovery Cove? I went there in 2010 as part of a TA group and loved it. It doesn't even feel like you're in Orlando. It's like you're on a tropical island somewhere. So relaxing and fun!

I love all the pictures from DHS! Cute

We absolutely loved Discovery Cove. I had no idea you could feel so far away from where you really were before. I really thought we had went on a cruise and were on an island at this neat place. They do an amazing job with their theming.

 

[tifaas]

We woke up bright and early as we had a breakfast ADR set for Crystal Palace. I had never imagined that I would book a character dining experience as an adult only trip but we were determined to meet some characters this trip. I have been a big fan of Pooh since I was a little girl so when I read about Crystal Palace I knew it would need to be in our trip plans. Our ADR was set for 8:15 so we could get into the park before it opened. I wanted to get some fun pictures of the castle with lesser crowds. We arrived at 8 AM and they let us right in. My sister had a request for us as well for my oldest nieces 1st grade class. They had just read about Flat Stanley so we had him shipped to us and my niece wanted a picture of him with the castle in the background. So what better time to get it.

So we check in for the ADR and they start announcing family names and we were like the 5th one in. We were sat on the right when you first walk in and were seated where the characters first start coming around. So we were excited. I of course had heard all about the Poohs puffed french toast and knew it was on the kidding buffet so that was my first stop. That stuff was so yummy. I of course got some eggs, sausage, and fruit. I am horrible about taking food pictures so nothing was taken regarding that. I hope to be better on the next trip, especially with the food and wine festival.

So the characters start coming around and we got some good ones with them so pictures up next.

 

[tifaas]

Pooh was around first and for some reason I'm not finding the picture of me with Pooh but I love this one of my MIL and Pooh.

I was so excited to meet Eeyore as he is my 2nd favorite and he snuck up on me.

He also poked his nose in between the IL's. My FIL is usually shy about getting his picture taken but he was right there and loving it so it was neat to see him like that.

We then had Piglet come around for some fun pictures.

Then last but not least was Tigger. My hubby wanted in this picture finally as that is his favorite. He was bouncing and Tigger bounced with him. It was too cute. We got video of it but no pictures.

After Tigger it was time to head out on our full day at the park.

 

[tifaas]

I don't know why those first two pictures came out so small. Oh well. So we headed out and decided that we would go left first to Adventureland. We were walking towards the sign and Ian spotted a photo pass person so we of course had to get some pictures to mark this occasion.

We noticed the meet and greet with the fairies so we checked on the wait and it was only like 5 minutes so heck yeah. My nieces love the fairies and we wanted to meet them. So my In-laws waited for us by shopping of course.

We lucked out as both Tink and Terrence were in there. Terrence was telling us about how Tink loves to draw treasure maps and that she likes shiny things so if we threw something shiny she would go for it.

Here we are discussing that Texas only has the one star and how are we going to find Neverland if we only have one star. She was also telling us about how they found all the treasure on the shore and needed to draw a new treasure map. She was a lot of fun to interact with.

 

[tifaas]

So after our adventures with the fairies we headed for the Jungle cruise. It was only like a 10 min wait and the line moved faster than that. After a quick spin we had to go see the pirates of course. Pirate goofy was out for picture ops but we just snapped a quick one.

We didn't take any pictures while on the ride as my camera without the flash would make the pictures very blurry. It was a walk on of course and we all really enjoyed it. We made our way for Splash mountain next. Only Ian and I were going to ride as the IL's didn't want to get wet. I had been telling them oh you won't get wet unless you are put in the front row. Well after our fast walk through the queue as this was another walk on, we were put in the front row. We of course got pretty wet and I didn't hear the end of it for a while. Meanwhile I made sure they all knew I said we would only get wet if we were in the front and that is where we were put.

My FIL tried to get a picture of us going down but you never know when you will come out but he did get one of us coming around the corner from the bridge.

That was our first time on the ride and it was a blast. I can now see why a lot of people like it so much. We would have went on Big Thunder next but it was down for renovation. Hopefully it will be back up and rolling for Oct as that was my favorite as a kid.

So after Pirates we started to make our way for the Haunted Mansion. I hadn't been on it since they had done the new queue so we walked through it. It would have been another walk on had we chosen to do that but it was still only about 10 mins and that was because we were going slow through the queue.

I thought I had more pictures of the queue but I guess it was more video than anything else.

 

[tifaas]

So after the Haunted Mansion we went on the riverboat as that was my MIL's request. I thought it was actually supposed to be down for refurbishment already so was surprised to see it open. After a quick trip on it, we were off for Fantasyland. We only went on "It's a Small World" as the lines for Peter Pan was at like 50 mins. I was in disbelief as everything had been a walk on or was 10 mins. We were pretty thirsty at this point so we found a quiet place to sit and get a few bottles of water. It was getting closer to our dunch ADR at Tony's Town Square.

Yes, I called it dunch because it was set for 2:15 and it was going to be our last meal of the day as we had reservations for the Wish's Dessert Party. We wanted to have plenty of room for those lovely dessert's. I want to say around 2 we made our way for the restaurant and were taken right in. We had a great waitress that we made sure to leave a comment card for. I was a little worried as I had heard mixed reviews and we originally had a dinner reservation set for Kona but I was worried it would be too much with the dessert party. We were pleasently surprised. It wasn't our best meal here, but the food came out hot, and tasty. I know my MIL and hubby had the baked ziti, my FIL had the meatball sliders and I had spaghetti with meatballs and sausage. The only thing I didn't like was the bread that came with my meal. It was a little hard. We passed on dessert because we had a big buffet of them to come.

So after our wonderful meal the parade was making it's way around and we watched the tail end of it from the steps on the restaurant.

My favorite princess

 

[tifaas]

So after dunch we made our way up Main Street to do some shopping. I ended up finding a really nice watch at the watch shop. I can't remember the name of it for the life of me. It's a simple silver band but in between the bands is a mickey head linking the two bands together. It has a light blue face and at the 12 is a mickey head as well. I love it. After a bunch of shopping it was time to head for Tomorrowland as we still had some things to get done over there before the 7pm dessert party. It was now like 3:30 or so.

Our first stop was the Monster's Inc laugh floor as the wait was like 5 minutes. We ended up sitting in like the third row on the right side by where you enter at. My DH was put up on the screen with the "Are we there yet" caption and my FIL ended up being picked as "THAT GUY". Yep..I was in between the two. There was a kid next to my MIL that was chosen for the joke telling at the end so our row was in the show quite a bit. It's kind of funny too because now my FIL signs all his emails to us as "That guy". We are trying to think of a funny shirt or coffee cup with that caption and a picture we got of him in the parks that just incorporates it.

Back to the story...so after Monster's Inc we had to go save the galaxy of course and headed for Buzz. It was only about a 15 min wait so why not. My hubby kicked my butt. I don't even remember the scores now but I want to say I only got around 75k and his was in the triple digits. We did grab some redneck shots of the photos thought.

So up next was the people mover. Yes I still call it that because that is what it is to me.