French Quarter trip 5/15-5/21

VonSweets

Earning My Ears
Joined
Apr 9, 2019
Cast for this trip is me, Ashlynn 40, my husband, Jim 49, and our son, Riley 8. Jim and I had our honeymoon at FQ in 2011. When Riley was 4 we took him to POP, but we had our vacation interrupted by a family emergency back home. When he was 5 we took him to Disneyland and again had a family emergency almost cancel the trip. After the pandemic I wanted a do over and wanted to go back to the FQ. We decided to go in January and we booked in February. I then took a college level class in All Ears and DFB videos, I watched hours and hours and over prepared. And it was so worth the time.



Day 1 Travel Day.



Our flight from Denver is at 10:30 so we wake up at 6:00 and are on the road by 6:45. My work gets me a huge discount at off airport covered parking so we take advantage and catch the shuttle to the airport. We decided to do 3 carry on cases for a week trip so no checking luggage, straight through security and plenty of time to wait and get snack at the airport.



We had a very smooth flight, ended up early and went straight to MEARS. Probably waiting about 20 min and got on a bus to Disney! We stopped at OKW first and then FQ. It felt like coming home. I already got our room number when we landed, got the 3rd floor pool view like I requested. So we went straight to our room and got settled in. It was about 5 pm by this point and Riley was begging to go in the pool. We had a 8:10 Boatwrites reservation so plenty of time. We went to the bar and got cocktails and played in the pool for a couple hours.



A storm was rolling in and boats were shut down so we walked up to Riverside a bit early and hung out. Riley and I walked around the gift shop while Jim got a drink at the bar and made friends. Riley and I sat down and he told me he really wanted another glow cube like I got in DL for him. He uses them in the bath. A couple near by heard him and gave him theirs, saying they live near by and have too many already. Total magic moment for Riley.



When we went to Boatwrites Jim knew the host from talking at the bar and he hooked us up with a great seat. He also kept coming back to the table and we really got to know him, kinda reminded me of Robbin Williams. Good guy. The food was FANTASTIC, I highly recommend the shrimp and grits and I don’t normally eat grits. There was a huge thunderstorm during dinner, but it cleared out while we were eating. Walking back into the FQ we still had and hour left of the pool being open but no one was in there. Riley yelled to the lifeguards, “I am coming in!” One yelled back, “see you soon!” We did an hour in the pool by our selves while one lifeguard taught Riley the tricks to go down the slide the fastest.



Time to rest for possibly the best Disney day we will ever have in our lives.
 
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Parks Day 1

Let me start by saying even though we stayed on property we didn’t use the extra morning hours once. Not an option for my night owl family and we are from Colorado. I knew this going in.

I was so nervous to wake up at 6:57 am to book lightning lanes. It was 4:57 our time. And I read so many stories on here about how hard it was.

I was amazingly surprised. We had a 8:45 Rainforest Cafe Breakfast reservation. This made sure I could get my boys to the park kinda early. I booked FOP at 9:45-10:45. And then Safari from 10:00-11:00. I even had time to book Rise of the Resistance from 6-7 pm. What a score on my first morning! I had told Riley I couldn’t promise him Rise because he was most excited for Star Wars but that was awesome to wake him up with!

We got to Animal Kingdom and it seemed like Rainforest was taking forever to seat us. Probably because I had us on a tight schedule. But we had the best seat by the water and gorillas, and got served fast. It was actually great food. We went in the back way to the park out the gift shop and headed for pandora.

It was our first time in Pandora and all of us LOVED it! We scanned in for the lightning lane and both Jim and Riley kept telling me, “how did you do this!? We are passing everyone!” During and after the ride Jim had tears, he doesn’t cry like EVER. He said it was the best ride he has been on in his life.

After that we walked the back way to Africa and it was CROWDED. Probably the most crowds we saw all week, I was scared to lose Riley and we all grabbed each others shirts.

We basically walked on Safari with our LL and asked for the back row, granted. Great ride and animals were very lively.

Once we had scanned into Safari I booked us Mount Everest. We walked over there. Took a break for water, and to watch the monkeys. Kite Tails was going on so we watched that too.

We did our LL for Everest and Jim asked for the front row, they have that small extra wait for the front row. I waited with the boys and got In the second row. Mount Everest was awesome, Riley didn’t care for it much. Once we scanned in there I booked dinosaur. We walked over there and had about a half hour so Riley checked out the bone yard but wasn’t too impressed so we chilled and then road Dinosaur. Riley loved it!

Dinosaur has an awesome gift shop. Probably my favorite In the parks with the train running around overhead. Riley picked out a Donald Duck stuffy. Jim asked a cast member if we could get it other places and she checked, she said it was sold out in other parks. (We found out she was right) and so Riley got his first stuffy.

While we walked around the shop we decided to go back to FQ for lunch and pool time. I had a 7:10 Mama Melrose reservation in Hollywood Studios for dinner. And I grabbed a 5-6 Millennium Falcon LL.

We had lunch by the pool and Riley played pool games. He won a Minecraft rubber duck. Jim and I had a couple margaritas. While they played in the pool It was time for me to book another LL. I had my margarita and sat in the shade and “fiddle faddled” for Slinky dog, it was unavailable but I refreshed enough and scored a 8:20-9:00 time! I was so stoked but my boys didn’t realize what a score I got.

I got them out of the pool and we headed to HS. We went straight to Batu and LOVED it! Rode MFSR and we all agreed it wasn’t that great. I could book another LL and grabbed TSMM for 7:45-8:45. Not even knowing if we would have time.

We walked around Batu and then rode Rise. AMAZING! What a ride. I had goose bumps when we got off.

We had dinner at Mama Melrose, great server and great food. I was so skeptical because of reviews and had dinning alerts for other HS restaurants. But it was actually really good food.

Got out of there about 8:20 and we went to Toy Story Land, it’s so amazing at night! I didn’t want to miss Slinky dog but it was pretty calm crowd wise so I said let’s try to do TSMM first. It’s Jim‘s favorite ride from California Adventure. So we did that and then power walked over to Slinky Dog. No way would I wait more than 45 minutes during the day. It was so hot there at 8:40 at night! We basically walked on with our LL and loved it!

We walked past the Chinese Theater while they were doing the night time show. Seemed really cool but we had a long day so we went to the bus stop. Not a long wait but we got to see the fireworks from HS and EPCOT while waiting.

Got back to FQ and went in the pool till right before it closed at 11:00 pm. The boys went to fill up our mugs and a cast member gave Riley a turtle balloon animal. Seriously? What a magical day!!
 
You’re my idol !! We’ll be at POFQ in 25 days and plan on touring the parks much the same as you did. Get to the parks early ( but not too early), take afternoon breaks and go back at night. Can’t wait to hear about the rest of your trip.
 


You’re my idol !! We’ll be at POFQ in 25 days and plan on touring the parks much the same as you did. Get to the parks early ( but not too early), take afternoon breaks and go back at night. Can’t wait to hear about the rest of your trip.
Day one I planned to be the most active day. I know my boys so well, they were excited to go full steam but I knew it wouldn’t last. But afternoon breaks are essential and they wanted as much pool time as I could get them.
 
Parks day 2

Since we were up late at the pool and didn’t really go to bed until midnight (10:00 Colorado time) the boys asked for a late start. I woke up at 6:57 and got Seven Dwarves for 1:00-2:00, what I wanted. Then went to big Thunder and refreshed a few times and grabbed 10:10-11:10.

We got up about 8:30 and got beignets. The boys got the Mickey beignets and I got the gluten free. I kid you not, mine were way better. The gluten free kind were exactly like cafe du monde in NOLA, the Mickey shaped ones were way to cakey and dense. But no one complained they were all great.

Easy bus ride to Magic Kingdom, FQ has great bus service, and we had time to take the obligatory castle and Main Street photos. We walked on big Thunder with our LL and then I was scared because everything was so far out. Jim wanted to to Haunted Mansion but it was 2 hours out. I finally said fine and clicked on it and it gave me an immediate return time! We love haunted mansion, we always do a huge Halloween display and have tombstones from the ride In our yard every year.

I got Small Word LL for 20 min out so we took a water break and then went on that. It’s one of our favorites except DL is so much better because they have characters in each world. Riley insisted on the front row and there is no leg room. Don’t do front row on small world!

After that I got a Winnie the Pooh LL for an hour out. Riley LOVES Winnie and we actually canceled a Crystal Palace lunch that day because the characters didn’t come back. Riley sleeps with a Winnie the Pooh his great grandma got him when he was born and we had just spread her ashes on a ski slope two weeks before we left. So it was a must do.

We went to Philharmagic and walked in basically. Then did some shopping. Winnie the Pooh went down and we got a multi pass redemption. I took Riley on Dumbo a walk on, my first time ever and his, even after going to WDW so many times. We then did our Seven Dwarves ILL and it was awesome!

Winnie was still down so I promised him we would be back on Thursday and make it. It was about 1:30 pm so we went back to FQ for lunch and pool time. We let the multi experience LL go, as hard as that was for me.

I grabbed a soarin’ FP for 6:00-7:00. Riley did the pool party at FQ and won the “Mickey says” game.

We headed for EPCOT and did soarin and then went to our Garden Grill reservation. We loved that restaurant in 2018 but all felt it went way down hill. Food was the worst we had in the parks. But it was our only character meal and Riley loved seeing the characters. I asked them all to play Rock Paper Scissors with Riley and he really loved the game with them.

I had a Living with the Land and Spaceship Earth LL booked but we skipped both because the boys wanted more pool time and we would be back to Epcot on Friday. So we caught the bus home and swam till about 10:45 at night and then watched Mickey cartoons till midnight.
 
Lots of family memories from French Quarter. We have stayed at other resorts and we thought they were just as nice, but besides staying at Fort Wilderness in our own coach, French Quarter will always be home.
Thanks for posting.
 


Parks day 3

After staying up late again we were needing a bit more sleep. We were heading to Hollywood Studios for the day and everyone wanted to do Rise again and Jim really wanted to ride ToT, Riley agreed to go on it even though he hated the Guardian Breakout in DL. I woke up early and easily got Rise for 1-2 (We had Olga’s Cantina for 2:20.) I also got ToT for 11:00. I went back to sleep for a couple extra hours, which was very needed. At Breakfast Riley told us he really didn’t want to go on ToT but Jim said wait until we get there. We get to Hollywood Studios at about 10:30 and I book Mickey and Minnie for 3:00-4:00. Hollywood was the hardest park for Genie, I had to fiddle faddle for a while to even get Mickey and Minnie at that time.

Riley still refused to do ToT so Jim offered to sit with him while I rode. I have no problems going on rides by myself but Jim won’t. They met me at the exit and we said hello to Goofy. They wanted to see the gift shop and Jim found a hat he loved. This was also the HOTTEST day at the park, we were miserable. We soaked all our hats in a water fountain to help us stay cool. We had till 12:30 to book another LL so we went to the Muppets show, Jim loves the muppets. It was extremely cute and I highly recommend it as a filler attraction at the park. We sat in the shade at Pizza Rizzo and I ordered Jim and I a drink from Blacklot and Riley a Wookiee cookie. I just carried everything over to Pizza Rizzo since there was way more seating there.

At 12:30 we booked Stars Tours. In Disneyland Star Tours had a much longer wait. It’s always been one of our favorite rides and we loved it again. It was time for our Rise LL so we went to Batu and rode Rise for the second time, that is SUCH an amazing ride. Riley wanted to look at the first order shops again and the storm troopers were out so he talked with them and got a First order pin from the gift shop. There really wasn’t much to choose from in the gift shops just a few items but spread all over the shop.

It was time for Olga’s and that place was awesome. We got a “seat” at the bar right by the tank with the alien laying eggs, and could see the DJ perfectly. I had the fuzzy tauntaun, made my lips numb, Jim had the Outer Rim, and Riley had the Carbon Freeze. Riley was blown away by his drink. The alcohol drinks there were the strongest we had on property, we had a nice little buzz when we walked out.

We headed over to Mickey and Minnie and absolutely LOVED that ride. Especially since the boys had discovered the new Mickey cartoons this trip and were watching them every night. It was really well done.

By this time the heat was getting to all of us so we went back to French Quarter for snacks and pool time. I had grabbed us a TSMM LL but we didn’t use it and let it go.

That night we had a dinning reservation at Frontera Cocina in Disney springs. We wanted to take the boat down but it was raining when we had to leave so we hopped on the bus. We ducked in and out of a few shops and went to have dinner. I do not recommend Frontera Cocina at all. Chips were stale and soggy, the service was SLOW and food was not very good at all. We will never being going back again and won’t be surprised when that restaurant is gone from Disney Springs.

After dinner we went to the LEGO store and all built mini figs together. The weather was better so we took the boat back to French Quarter. That was the only time we got to ride the boat and it was such an awesome and relaxing ride. Riley got to be by the “captain” and he gave Riley a stack of Disney boat stickers for talking to him and keeping him company.

By the time we got back to our room the pool was closed again due to weather so we watched Mikey cartoons and got some sleep.
 

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