Dreams, Mojo, Food pics and more! TR starts on pg. 4, updated 3/15/09.

I'm here - your favorite Yankee fan!

Can't wait to hear how your trip was!

How did I miss this!?! I feel so ashamed!

I can't wait to hear alllll about your trip!! :goodvibes

I am here to hear all about it.

Where or where have Beka's updates gone, or where or where can they be???

I'm looking forward to hearing about your trip.


Hello everyone! Thanks for reading along so far. I am a HUGE procrastinator as you can see. But I figured while I was watching the Red Sox win their way to the World Series again, that I would get started on this TR. Sorry about your Yankees Cam, there's always next year...maybe. :eek: :flower3:

Here we go!

~Beka~
 
What a tease...I thought it was an update. But very acceptable that you are watching the game!
 
My bags were packed and all I had to do was get through 4 hours of work and I would be off Disney World! I had anticipated a major catastrophe or two since that's what usually happens when you need to leave early to go somewhere. But somehow it turned out to be a normal day and I was out of there at noon. DBF picked me up and we brought the car back to the parking garage where a friend would pick us up to bring us to the airport. We did this because DBF's work pays for his parking pass at the garage so it doesn't cost anything to park while we're gone and it's only 5 minutes from the airport. We got dropped off at the airport with no delays and went to check in. While checking in DBF spotted a child in a wheelchair with mickey ears on. I turned around to check it out and saw a mom sitting with her two kids with Magical Express luggage tags applied to their bags. After breathing a sigh of relief that our bags were not over 50 lbs, we decided to say hi to the Disney family. They were waiting for Dad to meet back up with them and this was their 1st trip to the World! (Now, I asked a question which I'm not sure was appropiate or not, so maybe some of you can give me some insight. I will preface it with the fact that I work in the medical field and more importantly in an orthopaedic office so I'm always curious about what is wrong with people. This child had incisions on his legs but he could move them.) Since it was their first trip to the World I asked if it was a WISH trip. The mother said no and we continued our conversation. They were staying at the Beach Club for 5 or 6 days. I can't remember now. I asked almost immediately if they were a part of the DIS boards, but the mother said they had just found it a few days before. But mostly I spoke to the boy in the wheelchair, he was probably 8 or 9? He was beyond excited to be going to Disney and said that he thought it was just as much fun to do the planning as to go on the actual trip. Can we say future DISer??? We shared what we each were most excited about doing. Then Dad came back and we parted ways. So we headed upstairs to go through the security line. We got through in no time and were left with a couple of hours to wander around. Mind you, Portland is a very small airport so there is one gift shop and one restaurant. No joke. Luckily the restaurant is a local brewery pub so we decided to get some burgers there. Here are the first of the food pics:
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Here is us eating. Can you read the excitement on our faces?
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After eating we browsed the tiny gift shop and looked at all the Maine merchandise. :thumbsup2 That took all of 5 minutes so we were relegated to watching the planes come in and playing games on my DS. I spotted the Disney family but didn't want to seem too stalkerish so I waited until a few minutes before the plane was leaving to approach them again. We chatted a little while longer and shared some Disney knowledge with them. It was then time for them to board. While waiting to board ourselves I couldn't help but notice two very unruly boys, ages 7 and 12 I'll say, who nobody was reprimanding. It wasn't until one of them decided to book it down the loading bridge and got yelled at by the attendant did somebody say something! Anyways, all I could think was I hope they aren't sitting behind us! It's now our turn to board and we had picked our seats month's ago. Well, wouldn't you know it! Guess who's sitting right behind us? That's right, the monster children! And the people in front of us was the Disney family. This was a 3 hour flight and about maybe 45 minutes into it, the younger Disney family boy, age 2, started to fuss. Monster children's mother goes over to nice Disney mother and offers her some children's medicine to help with the flight. She says, and I quote "The pediatrician recommended this for my boys because they have a hard time flying." Disney mother declined but all I could think was that the reason that your kids have a hard time flying is because you don't discipline them! These kids were up and down the aisles constantly even when the seatbelt light was on! I could understand if there was an emergency bathroom need, but not to go ask the flight attendant for another snack! I also got hit in the head repeatedly by the younger monster child as he would cup his arm around my headrest while getting up. But we were on our way to Disney and I had a tv in front of me and a headset with which I could turn the volume way up. When I didn't have the headset on I had the pleasure of hearing the older monster child ask idiotic question after idiotic question. Even his dad was exasperated and finally told him to be quiet. Now, I'm all for kids asking questions, but these were just plain annoying. Oh, and did I mention the farting? (yes, that was in my notes) Anyways, enough of that. We landed in sunny Orlando with no issues and made our way to the Magical Express taking the faux monorail on the way.
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We waited maybe 5 minutes at ME and were boarded onto an almost full bus where we had to seperate to find seats. I ended sitting next to a girl probably close to my age who was arguing on her cell phone to someone and was taking up half of my seat with her thigh. So there I was all the way to the hotel with her hot body pressed up next to mine. Ewww. But, I was going to Disney! So I tried my best not to annoy everyone with singing along to M-I-C-K-E-Y on the video. First stop was POP where most people got off and then we arrived at Coronado Springs! I pretty much ran to get to the check in line first and made it with great success. There were only two people working the counter and both were occupied. I was waiting for my turn somewhat patiently and one group repeatedly started to walk away only to turn around and ask more questions. I was getting a little annoyed. Don't people research this stuff before they come??? Anyways, I get up to the counter and double check that our room is not handicapped accessible. We do all the other necessary stuff and I continued to ask some questions and the poor CM asks me to hold on because he is new. He said he wasn't used to guests knowing more than he does. :laughing: Sorry Alex! I told him I was sorry and would wait for him to go through his routine so he didn't miss a step. We got done quickly and went to find our room which was no where near what we had requested. We were in Casitas 5 which was a short walk from El Centro so all was good. There was also a convention planned to start in a couple of days so some of the conventioneers were out. I only took a couple pics of the room, but here they are:
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Sorry, that seems to be all I took. It was a very nice room with a fountain right outside. We were trying to decide on what to do that night since it was already around 8/8:30. We decided on Downtown Disney to get something to eat and browse a couple of our favorite shops, the christmas and art stores. I had wanted to try both Earl of Sandwich and Wolfgang Puck Express, but WPE had a line out the door so we checked out EOS instead and they had seating available, so EOS it was! I had the chicken caesar salad and an iced tea and DBF had The Earl's Club (roast turkey, smoked bacon, Swiss cheese, lettuce and tomato) and a bottled water. We both had chocolate chip cookies for dessert. Total was 21.35. Sorry it was dark so these are overexposed.
Chicken Caesar
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Earl's club
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The salad was yummy and DBF gave his sandwich two thumbs up. Downtown Disney was really packed so we browsed the stores briefly and then decided to go back to our resort so we would be well rested for our day at Animal Kingdom.

Next up: Will we be crushed by a rhino or win our first dream?

~Beka~
 

great start.

I would have said something to the kids parents.
 
I know the answer to this one!!!!

Great update! Now keeping moving on it :)

great start.

I would have said something to the kids parents.


Does replying to these month old messages make this an update? I'm sorry that I've ended up being one of those people that irritate me on the DIS, but life gets in the way. I just don't think I've been as interested in this since I don't have a trip coming up. But I'm not a quitter so I will finish. It will be nice to recount our trip. I promise to have an update by the end of the week. Thanks to anyone still interested in reading along!

~Beka~
 
So we begin Day 2 by going to our favorite park, AK. In the past we always do this park mid-trip and we are already too exhausted to fully enjoy it due to all the walking involved. So this year I wised up and planned this park for our first day. Only took me two years to figure that out! It was another beautiful day and we only had a 9 minute wait for the bus. We got on and again there was no one else on the bus! :thumbsup2 We made it for rope drop for the first time at this park. It was cute of course.
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After this we headed with half of the crowd to ride EE. Since there was no line we went on again and after the second ride we got a fastpass to come back later. Here is a pic from the queue:
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After this we headed to our next favorite destination: Dinosaur. As we were walking in the stopped letting people in. Now, it was not busy at all so I was a little miffed that we had to wait. But such is life. Here are my pics while waiting:
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So we are let into the preshow part and since we have already seen it many times we just edge towards the doors where we will be let onto the ride. I notice that there are a few people standing there but don't think much of it. As the movie ends and the doors open, everyone tries to swarm into the ride. But we are stopped by the people at the door and told that we were all the lucky recipients of dream fastpasses! :yay:
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DBF kept saying that if I hadn't stopped to take this picture:
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that we would've been with the group that was let in before us and wouldn't have won dream fastpasses! :cool1: So yay for me wanting to take more pictures this year to share with my fellow disers. DBF was psyched! Next we went to lunch and decided to try tamu tamu refreshments for something different. Well, it ended up being not very good different.

Up next: What is the mystery meat in this burger?

~Beka~
 
While I have to congratulate you for FINALLY getting going on your TR...I was terribly disappointed that I already knew this part ;) :rotfl: As soon as a saw AK in the title, I thought Oh this is when they win FPs!!!! But I'm still here and reading!!! :wave:
 
Woo Hoo for dream fastpasses!! :yay:

While I have to congratulate you for FINALLY getting going on your TR...I was terribly disappointed that I already knew this part ;) :rotfl: As soon as a saw AK in the title, I thought Oh this is when they win FPs!!!! But I'm still here and reading!!! :wave:

Hey ladies! Nice to know someone's still interested in this! LL, I still need to get caught up on yours. I also see that both of you ladies already have another trip booked! We were very tempted last weekend to book something in jan/feb due to the new promo, but we should really save some money. But we have till December 20th to change our minds. :laughing:

~Beka~
 
Hey ladies! Nice to know someone's still interested in this! LL, I still need to get caught up on yours. I also see that both of you ladies already have another trip booked! We were very tempted last weekend to book something in jan/feb due to the new promo, but we should really save some money. But we have till December 20th to change our minds. :laughing:

~Beka~

Yup, Randy is paying for my room, airfare, and DDP for Xmas/Birthday/Valentine's Day...whatever else he can think of. I'm going for a Disboards meet. I'm buying an AP since we plan to go again for Ash's bday in October so it made sense to buy the AP and get the room discount. (Feb at POP is $49/night :cool1: )
 
So while planning this trip I had written down a few CS places at each park that I wanted to try. Tamu, tamu refreshments was one of them and it happened to be on our way to the safari. They had a very limited selection of food but you were able to get a shake as dessert. Yum! I had the tuna sandwich which came with carrots, chips, water, and of course a chocolate shake. DBF had a cheeseburger, apples, water, and a vanilla shake. It was a lot of food.
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Sorry, I forgot to take pics BEFORE we started eating.
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I disliked the tuna as it was not white meat tuna and had big chunks of celery in it. The tuna was not good to begin with but I have this thing about crunchy things in soft food. Like celery in ham spread, or onions in potato salad. Anyone else with me??? So not good. I scraped a bunch of tuna out of the sandwich and was only able to get about 1/2 of it down. DBF on the other hand was eating a "cheeseburger" that tasted like it could've been made of some animal that might have expired on the safari. I thought he was just being picky but tasted it as well and the flavor was off.
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He finished most of it and we got some of the shakes down before heading off to the safari. We only had to wait 10 minutes in line for our ride. Good line mojo. :thumbsup2 It was your usual ride and I had an end seat so I took a bunch of pics. Here's a few:
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Then...a near death experience. We were coming around the bend and noticed a bunch of rhinos on the little hill next to us.
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Well, the next thing you know a rhino took a couple steps backwards, slid down the hill and ended up about 3 feet from the ride vehicle.
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All I could think was this thing was going to charge us so I wanted to get moving. But our safari guide stopped to let us see this animal up close. So I took a picture and eventually we got moving again and made it to the end without incident. Afterwards we stopped to see the performers outside of tusker house and then saw a bug's life.
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We then headed to Flight's of Wonder as we had never seen this show before mainly because of my unnatural fear of birds. We waited outside for almost twenty minutes but was entertained by a CM showing us an owl and telling us all kinds of facts about it. We enjoyed a tasty snack while waiting as well. I highly recommend these:
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It was a neat show and we made sure to sit way in the back which was a good place to sit if you don't want lots of birds flying over you. We then went back on EE two more times and Dinosaur once again before heading to dinner at Yak and Yeti.
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We were seated almost immediately and our waitress came to get our drink orders and explained to us about the new tipping policy on the DDP. We had a nice seat in the little room at the front of the restaurant that looks out into the park. We were even able to see the parade go by! Service was quite slow already but when the waitress finally came back I ordered the steak and shrimp and DBF ordered the baby back ribs. Both meals were excellent and I liked this meal so much that I would've ate it twice on our trip.
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Then it was on to dessert. DBF was too full to eat his so we took it to go as we were leaving the park after dinner anyways. I had the fried wontons at the restaurant and they were delicious! A little too sweet but very good. DBF took the mango pie to go.
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Seems I didn't get a pic of the wontons but I'm sure all of you have seen them before. Our waitress finally brought us our bill and we headed out of the park and back to the hotel to take a little nap before going to MNSSHP that evening.

Next up: A day at DHS and more eating...
 
OK...no eating at Tamu, Tamu...got it!!!


Great rhino pic!

Wasn't Yak & Yeti the best? I plan to go to AK for a half day now on Aisling's bday trip just so we can eat there!!!
 
OK...no eating at Tamu, Tamu...got it!!!


Great rhino pic!

Wasn't Yak & Yeti the best? I plan to go to AK for a half day now on Aisling's bday trip just so we can eat there!!!

It was awesome except for the service. I still crave that meal. I'm not sure if you listen to the DIS unplugged podcast, but the host ate there recently and hated it. I have no idea why!

~Beka~
 
Once again we made it to rope drop at DHS. Actually, I think we made it to rope drop every day as we are just early risers and don't want to miss out on any Disney time! Anyways, rope drop at DHS consists of streetmosphere performers shooting a film in the middle of the street while you are walking into the park. As DBF and I walked by they called out to us that we were the stars of their latest movie and said to DBF, "Just because you got on 1st base doesn't mean you get to go all the way!" This made DBF a little embarassed and he picked up his pace a little to get outta there! First up we of course went to TSM as it had recently opened and knew that it would be a wait.
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I got in line (which was already a 20 minute wait right after park opening!) while DBF got FP's for later. It was at least a 20 minute wait but we enjoyed looking at all the toys from our childhood in the queue.
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We stood in front of Mr. Potato Head for a few minutes and I tried to get him to take his ear out, but no such luck. He wasn't very lively when we were there.
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Then we finally made it to the ride platform.
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The ride was great but a little short. DBF beat me as per usual and we both had a little bit of a sore shoulder afterwards. After TSM we rode RNR, Star Tours, watched Muppets and then went to lunch at the Pizza Planet. Now I know this place gets bad reviews by lots of people but we eat here almost every trip and I think it's a great CS place. I had the Junkyard meal deal which includes pizza, salad, drink, and dessert. The Junkyard pizza is a veggie pizza with greenpeppers, onions, mushrooms, and tomatoes. DBF had the Woody's meal deal which has a pepperoni pizza instead of the veggie pizza. DBF was good and got apples for dessert while I got the chocolate chip cookie!
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We were planning on staying for Fantasmic since we didn't see it last year, but since this park doesn't entertain us for the whole day we decided to go back to the resort and take a little nap and come back later.

Next up: What happened to Fantasmic and somebody almost experiences the Reversal of Fortune after dinner...
 
Wow...i didn't think I would ever see a sign with a 5 minute standby wait for TSM. It STILL had a 90 minute wait when I was there last month and FPs were gone when I got there around noon!
 












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