First Timers: The Good, The Not Good & The Magical--Days 1,2,3,4 PHOTOS!!

[casaazul]

Day 1 – Planes, busses, monorails, and ferries; OH MY!!!

Our cast of characters:
Me - mom, high school teacher and super vacation planner
DH - hardworking self employed computer guy and is Grumpy at Disney
DS - 12yo 6th grader, loves Disney, Star Wars and Legos

We arrive at Orlando Airport after our 4 hour flight on Southwest and have to find a store that will sell a cell phone charger to DH, who forgot his, and needs his phone to keep tabs on his business. We actually found one at a Inmotion Entertainment near the Ron Jon Surf Shop in the Main Terminal!! We did a little more shopping at NASA and Universal Studios Shop.

We began our search for the Magical Express Bus check in place. This took us awhile!! No signs, or arrows and I had to ask twice for directions, but we finally found the place. We got in line for the POR bus, and waited about 15 minutes. The bus ride was fun, we got to watch a video about WDW and ds was very excited!! The bus ride took about 30 minutes to POR.

Check in at POR went well and 15 minutes later we were headed to our room. I had asked for both a nonsmoking and a room in the Magnolia Terrace area, which we got. We had a room in Parterre Place facing the parking lot, which we did not see as there were plants in front of us. We had a quick walk to the North Bus Station and a little bit longer walk to the restaurants and pool.

We were starving, so a quick stop into the food court was in order. DH got a muffeletta, said it was great, I got a turkey sandwich, also great and DS got fish and chicken strips with fries, he did not like the fish, but the chicken was tasty.

After nourishment, we headed out to Epcot, at about 5:30pm. By 6pm we were in Epcot and ready to play! Our first time to see the geodesic sphere!!!! We walked on Spaceship Earth, then went over to Nemo and rode that. We ended up looking at the aquariums for over an hour. At that point we found Coral Reef Restaurant, our dinner place for Day 2.

We decided to take the monorail over to MK. When we got to TTC we decided to take the ferry over to MK and saw the lagoon light parade as we headed to MK. We walked into MK and hit a wall of humanity, yes, it was Spectromagic time! We watched a bit of it, waited out the crowds after the parade was over and went to VMK central to get quests and make our born in the park character. Most of the crowd was headed towards the castle, so I figured we may be able to get on an attraction while everyone was waiting for fireworks. We headed over to Pirates and walked right on!! No wait or anything!! It was fun to see the ride with Captain Jack Sparrow and crew, but the ride was not as nice as the one at DL. We walked around for a while, got lost and ended up watching the fireworks from somewhere near BTMR.

After that we were tired and headed back to the resort. DH wanted to get a bottle of wine, but the store had closed at 11pm. We found that you could buy a bottle of wine from the bar, so we did and also got a snack at the food court, a make your own pasta dish! It was great!!! We ate back in the room and ds reminded us about the pool!! We had promised the kid some pool time, so off to the pool at midnight! It was so nice and warm and quiet, and DS loved the pool at POR. We had a glass of wine while DS swam around and went to bed about 1:30am!

The Good: Epcot aquariums were totally unexpected and awesome
The Not So Good: Crowds at MK (which will haunt us this trip)
The Magical: Swimming at the pool late at night!

 

[jcc0621]

Great start. Can't wait to hear more

 

[always on vacation]

can't wait to hear more & see more of those beautiful flowers!

 

[nts4wdw]

Enjoying it so far! We love the POR. I have a 13 ds who loves Star Wars, too. Are you going to go to a Star Wars weekend? Waiting for more.

 

[casaazul]

Day 2

Epcot Rules!!! Even Grumpy liked it!

After our late night swimming, of course we did not get up at the scheduled time to get to Epcot exactly at opening. We arrived about 9:45am after a quick coffee and snack in the room. I headed straight to Test Track to get Fastpass, got a 1:30-2:30 time. DH and DS went to a drink cart to get iced coffee and a slush drink of some kind.

We headed over to the Universe of Energy and got in line. I had no idea about this attraction except Ellen was in it. We watched the pre show movie and then moved in to the “ride” area. I was totally amazed with this attraction, how it moves around etc. DH and DS also really enjoyed this and after our ride, we headed out into the Florida sun and tried to decide what to do next.

We decided to head over to World Showcase, so walked towards the fountain and then off to Canada, England, and France. We rushed through these three as we all were starving and had plans to have lunch at Tangerine Café and got there a little before 12pm. Had nice lunch (more later on my dining report) and the food was great. We all had Shawarma Platters, yummo!

DH had to do some business (self employed remember, LOL) so DS and I looked around Morocco, took photos and headed over to Japan. DS wanted to check out the Mitsukoshi Department Store in Japan for some game cards etc. I left him shopping and went back to get DH as he would never find us in the shop! We loved that shop and could have bought a bunch of beautiful rice bowls, tea sets and Saki sets. I ended up buying nothing but DS got some lucky cats for him and a gift for a friend.

After Japan we walked through Italy taking photos and enjoying a street performer.

Then to Germany to see the trains...

Time for Test Track so we got on the ferry to head back to Future World. But first, DH got 2 German beers for us and a pretzel for the kid, yummo again!! We used these ferry boats a number of times. Epcot was much larger than I imagined and when we all started getting hot and tired, it was nice to have a boat ride to relax on.

We got to Test Track and even the Fast Pass line was a wait, about 10 minutes, not bad compared to the over 1 hour everyone else was waiting! This was a great ride and our favorite ride of the trip. We had fun in the after ride area looking at the cars, DS looks cool in the blue truck, I’m sure he was thinking only 4 more years and this baby will be mine!!!!!

We moved on to Innoventions and DH and DS played there while I went to look for Fastpasses, at either Soarin (yeah right) or The Land. Soarin was out of FP, so the Land it is. After another ½ hour at Innoventions we went off to The Land. What a fun ride. I loved this place and even DH and DS enjoyed it. After The Land, we rode on Journey Into Imagination with Figment, it was silly but fun.

By that time we were getting ready for dinner, we headed to Coral Reef for our first Table Service meal! We waited about 5 minutes and were seated right at our ADR time of 5:20. They first tried to give us a booth that looked at a wall between the aquarium windows. I asked for another seat... “How about that table, right next to the window?” The hostess looked confused, but sat us there. Great seat!!! Never be afraid to ask for a better seat, I am not shy and since I’m the one forking out the big bucks, I want a good seat!!!

We had a great waiter, Jose from Colombia, and we ordered our meal. We are the on DDP, so we had appetizers, entrée, dessert and drinks, plus we also ordered special drinks which paid for OOP. DH had the Ahi Tuna, DS had the Mahi Mahi and I had the Blackened Catfish, all the meals were good, but the Mahi Mahi was the best!! Watch for my dining report later!!

The best part of the meal was the view! The fish were so much fun to watch. We had a little snapper that stayed right at the window staring at us most of the meal. Funny little fish! It reminded us of our dog Rosie, who stares at us during meals hoping we will feed her something, so we named the little snapper Rosie!!

There were a number of scuba divers swimming around too. We saw a 90 year old grouper and an 80 year old sea turtle (ages given to us by our waiter). Fun meal and our favorite of the trip.

After dinner we walked around the aquarium, looked at more flowers, and headed over to Norway to see if we could ride on Maelstrom. The line was at 40 minutes, so we just looked around and about 8pm we found a spot to watch Illuminations. My DH stayed put at our spot, which was between Norway and Mexico, right near the margarita cart. DS and I looked around some more.

There were high school marching bands there during our trip and 3 of them marched by while we were waiting. Kind of fun to see and reminded me of my marching band trip to Disneyland oh so many years ago!!!

We met a nice family who also stationed themselves to wait for the show. DS and their son traded pins and talked about all the fun they were having. It was nice to visit with others and soon it was time for the show. We had a great location and Illuminations was wonderful.

After the show we waited for people to leave, and then started walking toward the exit. We stopped and shopped a bit at MouseGear and then left the park. Again we decided to head to MK to see if we could ride on anything and again we were hit with the huge crowd. We decided it was time to go and got back to POR by 10:30.

We stopped by the store, got a bottle of wine and headed to our room. Then off to the pool for nightly swim time. It was very nice again. We were tired, so all of us were ready for sleep. We have an early day the next day at AK and my plan says we have to be there before 8am!!!

The Good: Universe of Energy & Coral Reef
The Not So Good: Crowds at MK again!
The Magical: Illuminations, what a great show!!

For more photos, visit my Photobucket place....http://s152.photobucket.com/albums/s190/casaazul18/WDW07/

 

[always on vacation]

Great TR..fab pix...WE're going in 3 weeks & hadnt planned on getting to the parks until around 10 thinking it was off season & wanting to sleep in on vacation...maybe we'd better rethink if we want our 8 yr old nephew to get on all the rides in only 5 days...YIKES...sounds like no sleeping late for us..LOL

 

[Illuminations_Rocks]

I love all of your pictures! Too bad for all the crowds; music in the parks is always so busy. I feel like I'm right in the magic with you... Great TR so far, keep 'em coming !

 

[Jill72]

I am loving this trip report - it is really getting me excited for our trip in 13 days!! I am a little sick today with a head cold and your reports and beautiful pics are transporting me right to the magic of Disney and making me feel all better - thanks!

 

[casaazul]

I hope to have day 3 up soon.

I recommend getting to parks early, and next time we go, it will be early for us to every park!!! As much as we needed to sleep in, I think getting to the parks is much better.

Have fun planning and reading this report!!!

 

[ballarinamom]

Thanks for mentioning the parade while you were on the ferry! I would like to time it that way for us as well! I guess that means more DIS time for me

 

[casaazul]

We got on the ferry before 9 as we arrived at MK during the 9pm Spectromagic parade. It was a nice magical surprise for us!!!

Have fun planning!!

 

[RevBob]

Love your report. And what great pics as well. Keep them coming.

 

[amy2girls]

great pictures

 

[Our2Girls&Disney]

Great job! I love the pictures. We leave in two weeks and you are getting me so excited. Keep it up!

 

[mumom95]

Great report so far!! Looking forward to reading more.

 

[suzimar57]

enjoying your report, especially the pictures

the flowers are beautiful in them!

and it was nice to see the monorail all "painted", too!

 

[casaazul]

Day 3

The Animals Had To Wait!!

Our AK day, the plan was get up early, arrive early and ride early. I was ready the night before, clothes ironed, day bags packed and family prepped. Breakfast was in the fridge and I was going for coffee as soon as I wake up!!! All we had to do was get up and go!!

BUT… we do not wake up until 8am! Oh well there go my plans!!! I got up and headed to the food court to get coffee. When I got back the guys were just waking up, very cranky and not interested in getting up. Not a good sign!!! (just a little foreshadowing here….LOL)

I got the guys moving and we headed out for the bus and it was already hot! The bus for AK showed up after about 5 minutes and off we went. First stop was at Blizzard Beach, boy those slides look scary!!! We arrived at AK about 9:30 and I started the forced march to Everest to get a FastPass. Got one for about 12:30!! Ok, now we can relax.

We stopped, got water and iced coffee, headed to Kali to get our VMK quest stamped. Time now to walk to Kilimanjaro Safari and along the way we ran into DeVine. Cool!! Then we saw these cool entertainers...

Once we got to Safari, we were hit with a 40 minute line but the line went fast, and it was in the shade.

We were seated in the back row and were able to take photos behind us too. This was a great ride and we saw lots of animals. I saw the cheetah, but DH and DS did not.

After this ride we looked at the Pangani Forest Exploration Trail and realized it was time for Everest! DH was not going on the ride so he held all our stuff. DS and I loved this ride and wanted to do it again. But the FastPass return time was 6pm and we were going to be eating at Boma then.

After Everest we headed to Flame Tree BBQ and had a great lunch. Took us awhile to find a table, but it was a fun lunch. I had photos but our camera card has decided to be weird and lots of photos did not show up!! Grrrrrrr!!! DH had ribs, DS had ½ chicken and I had pork sandwich. All were great and the desserts looked good, chocolate cake, key lime pie and frozen lemonade. I did not want any, but DS loved all 3 for us!! This was a great stop for us as it was getting very hot and actually seemed hotter than at Epcot the day before. Heat and a tired DS caused us to have a not so fun afternoon (much more blatant foreshadowing, LOL).

After lunch we walked around and looked at all the animals carved into the Tree of Life. What a neat place and we enjoyed that walk. It was cool, quiet and uncrowded!

Time to try to go on Dinosaur, headed there and got FastPass for ½ hour later. DH found a cool spot to sit at the Cretaceous Trail; he had more business to deal with! DS and I went to see if we could get on Primeval Whirl, but the line was over 45 minutes. So we looked around and decided the crowds were just too much for us and went back to sit with DH. DS decided to do some exploring on his own, took his cell phone and walked around for awhile. He wanted to find the Boneyard so we could visit there after the Dinosaur ride.

Our FastPass time for Dinosaur came and we took off to ride it. I liked the preshow area with the museum feel to it. We got on the ride and it was fun. Not as much fun as Indiana Jones at DL, but still fun. After the ride, we got out and DS realized his glasses were not in the pouch. We turned around and the CM helped us find them on the floor of the car! PHEW!! That would have been a disaster!! Thanks to the people in the car for looking and the CM for helping us!! Great Disney magic there!!!!

We then headed to the Boneyard where DS played for almost an hour. He loved digging in the sand to find the dinosaur bones, and was working with another boy about his age. They uncovered a huge bone and had a great time. DH and I sat in the shade relaxing! I pin traded for a cool pin and we had a fun quiet time.

We were all tired and hot and decided to head over to AKL early. We ran into the crowd waiting for the parade and our day took an interesting twist. This is when we all got separated and caused a ½ hour of near panic for me. DS thought he was following me, ended up it was another person with red shirt. DH followed DS and I was left alone to try to find them. Oh, you say, just use your cell phone to call …. oh wait, the cell phones are with DH and DS! Rats!! Eventually our attractor beam worked and DH and I found each other. By then, DS was frazzled, I was cranky and DH was just done!

We headed to AKL at 4pm, and our ADR for Boma was at 5:30. We looked around the resort, took photos and had a drink at the bar. By this time we had all cooled down physically and emotionally and all was good!

Dinner at Boma was next! I had been waiting for this one for a long time and was anticipating some great food. We were seated in a nice spot, ordered our beer and a drink for DS and headed to the buffet. I was going to try everything. I was being adventurous; I was going to have fun!

We all filled our plates, headed back to eat and ….. yuck! I tried to like the food, really I did, but what ever spice they used in everything, I did not like. I ended up eating mac and cheese and hummus. DH did not really love anything except the seafood soup, but he did not have the adverse reaction that I did. DS tried some things and also only liked a few things. Boy was I disappointed. Even dessert was just ok, and the famous zebra domes were not good!

After dinner, we headed back to POR. Too tired to swim and DS cranky, tired and I forgot to mention, getting a cold! We played VMK for awhile then went to sleep.

The Good: Expedition Everest
The Not So Good: Boma for dinner
The Magical: Kilamanjaro Safari, probably my favorite of the trip!

I lost a bunch of photos off my camera card. If anyone knows of a program that could repair them, please let me know.

 

[belle8306]

I am enjoying your report. Great pictures.

 

[robin09]

Absolutely love your pictures. You make me want to be there! And as for Boma, I also didn't like it. We were there last year during a thunderstorm. I just was unhappy with it. I didn't like the zebra domes either. I can't wait to hear about your dining! Thanks for sending me here, love your report!

 

[byoung]

Nice report and pictures so far, keep it up.