From the Land to the World - Californians take on Disney World - Sept-Oct Pre Trip Report

[BariTravis]

Hey Everyone,

This is my first trip to the world!!!! My fiance, Paul has been a few times with his family when he was a teen, but this is our first official trip to do what we wish! We are DisneyLand AP holders and cannot wait to check out the world.

Our trip dates are Sept 27 - October 4.

More to come - I'll try to make this a nightly ritual until it's complete.

80 Days Until Disney!!! Woot Woot!

 

[BariTravis]

Okay! Post #2

Here is the cast for this trip!



Me on the Left and Paul on the right!

After much debate we finally buckled down on our dates .

September 27 Arriving 3pmish

And Sadly Leaving on

October 4th

You may asked why we picked these dates ... Well let me tell ya, since this is our first trip to the World together we wanted to go all out and experience 2 things

First:

Yep, thats right Food And Wine 2015!!!

We decided this because we really want to be exposed to different types of foods and alcoholic beverages!

And reason #2 Is



I LOVE LOVE LOOOOOVE Halloween - So I could not miss this opportunity! I mean - exclusive access to merchandise and lower crowds ! I can't get enough!

More to come later tonight . Now its time to practice music

 

[totebagg]

Following along! We will be there part of the time that you are - we are going 10/1-10/11. We love the F&WF and hope you do too! We still have not been to the MNSSHP but may go this year...I hear it is fab-u-lous!

 

[BariTravis]

Following along! We will be there part of the time that you are - we are going 10/1-10/11. We love the F&WF and hope you do too! We still have not been to the MNSSHP but may go this year...I hear it is fab-u-lous!

I can NOT wait until the MNSSHP! I heard this is one of the better times to go, despite the heat.

 

[BariTravis]

Sorry for the delay guys! Photobucket was down when I logged back in last night

Anyways, Continuing ...

Travel Day Plans (And the night before)

The Saturday before we leave, we will be dropping off this adorable guy to be pampered and to enjoy his week of R & R!


Shortly after we will finish packing and head to bed. We will have to be up at 2am pst!

Wake up time! I doubt I will sleep well.... but it will be 2am and time for Disney!

Our flight leaves at 5:50am

Luckily we only have one connecting flight to make from LA, which is Atlanta. We plan on getting a quick snack since we only have an hour before the next flight takes us to the World!

If everything works out right we should be at MCO at 3:45PM PST!

Then we get to ride the Magic Express!!!!

After much debate about our hotel choices we decided to stay at:


We were contending with Art of Animation - Especially since I love the Lion King and the Little Mermaid.

But then our lovely disneyagent told us about the free dining offer and that saved us well over 800 and we even added
an extra day to our trip! Talk about savings! I'll hop on a savings boat on an instant! - With the savings we also got memory maker.

After much thought, I think Pop Century is a great resort for a first timer. We plan on mostly just sleeping at the resort anyways AND
we can walk over to AoA for photo ops!

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At this point, we hope to be checking into the hotel. We plan to rest for about an hour (take showers and whatnot) then head over to DTD for some time at
DisneQuest and our first ADR.

We are very excited about this ADR because it is at:


.....



..


Wait for it...





I Can NOT wait for this! I have becoming more and more acclimated to different types of seafood (and loving it). I use to only eat cod .. until 4 years ago I started enjoying shrimp. So this will be amazing! our ADR is at 8:30pm - so we should have plenty of time to explore before and after.

We hope to be back at the Pop by 11pm.
We want to do a rope drop for EMH at our park of choice - details in next post!

 

[totebagg]

We went the exact same time last year. The crowds were great and the weather was decent. Some days were really hot and humid and in addition to the normal FL pop up showers, there was a couple of days of downpours but that is not the norm! I think you will love this time of year.

But then our lovely disneyagent told us about the free dining offer and that saved us well over 800 and we even added
an extra day to our trip! Talk about savings!

This is awesome to not only get free dining and add an extra day! Congrats!!

Wait for it...

Oh how exciting. I've always wanted to eat there it is such a cool looking restaurant and I've heard good reviews about the food! I look forward to hearing about your experience! Don't you love when plans start coming together.

 

[BariTravis]

We went the exact same time last year. The crowds were great and the weather was decent. Some days were really hot and humid and in addition to the normal FL pop up showers, there was a couple of days of downpours but that is not the norm! I think you will love this time of year.

We rarely get rain here in Cali! We are both from the South, TN and KY, and we miss the rain. We will enjoy it haha - and it will not damper our plans!

[QUOTE="totebagg, post: 54019700, member: 483911"Oh how exciting. I've always wanted to eat there it is such a cool looking restaurant and I've heard good reviews about the food! I look forward to hearing about your experience! Don't you love when plans start coming together.[/QUOTE]

I love how these plans are coming along - I even did spreadsheets. But I'm going to leave a litle flex time in, just so we are not too worn out!

 

[totebagg]

We are both from the South, TN and KY, and we miss the rain. We will enjoy it haha - and it will not damper our plans!

If you are from the south then you will be fine! I met a native SoCal last year and the heat/humidity was really getting to them. The rain is actually great because it does cool things down and lots of people leave the parks - we stayed and was able to walk on many rides! What part of TN and KY are you guys from? I grew up in SW VA and lived in TN for several years.

Isn't it crazy that you have to have a spreadsheet to plan a vacation, but I actually like it since it makes planning fun. Then we you get there you have an idea of what you are doing! It is very smart to leave in some flex time and not to push yourself to hard. The first year - we went from sun up to sun down although we accomplished a lot, we were exhausted. Last year we built in more flex/down time and enjoyed it so much more.

 

[BariTravis]

Alright guys! It's time for day 2 of our trip (and our first official day at Disney)

Our park of choice this day is:



I just went to my itenerary on the disneyworld website and discovered the hours changed - we get to semi-sleep in! Woot Woot!
We will have plenty of time to stop by the Pop food court for breakfast and make it to rope drop at 9AM!!!

I'm very happy about this for many reason but one is - I love sleep! I don't know how I will do at Disney considering I love Disney too

Also, we now have EMH until 11pm - This means we can take a mid-day swim or nap!

Anywho- lets get on to the plans.

My FastPass Picks will be:
Rockin' Roller Coaster, Tower of Terror, and Star Tours!

We will probably plan these all early so we can try to get a fastpass for Fantasmic- but if we can not get it no issues - cause there is a 2nd showing for EMH!

Now the reasoning for these picks is because:
Rock N Roll Coaster - They do not have this at Disney and I love Coasters!
ToT - We want to feel the difference in this ToT vs. Disney CA Adventures ToT
Star Tours - Well I love Star Wars and I hope I get a different scene than the ones we have in the Land!

We really like the shows and plan on seeing the Beauty and the beast and the Little Mermaid Musicals!
We also want to see the Indiana Jones Stunt Show.

I heard the recent news about the animation academy and I don't know how I feel I was looking forward to learning to draw a few new characters and see the whole hall I just hope they keep the academy somewhere!

At this point it will be after our swim/nap and time for dinner.

I'm very excited about this because; I love buffets and I was able to snag a dinner reservation at:



We read the information about their dessert lineups and immediately said yes to this place! I hope it is as good as it sounds!


Since we have so much time availble after dinner and before the show = we are going to look for as many photo-ops as we can! We didnt pay for the memory maker for nothing, haha. - I'm hoping for a pic with the sorcerer Mickey and possibly a jedi or storm trooper!

 

[BariTravis]

If you are from the south then you will be fine! I met a native SoCal last year and the heat/humidity was really getting to them. The rain is actually great because it does cool things down and lots of people leave the parks - we stayed and was able to walk on many rides! What part of TN and KY are you guys from? I grew up in SW VA and lived in TN for several years.

Yeah, I hate humidity but I'm prepared for it (packing an extra tshirt in my drawstring bag, haha) I'm originally from Lynchburg, TN -Jack Daniels Town and Paul is from Ashland/Cattlesburg, KY area.

It definitely makes it fun - at least for me! We did Sun up to Sun down at Disneyland before and were exhausted (that was only two days) I can't imagine doing that for 4 or more!

 

[BariTravis]

Okay On to day #2 at Disney!

I'm so glad that I had to check the park times - we get to sleep in a little late on Tuesday too!

We are planning on visiting :



I'm SOOOO excited for this! There are so many meet and greets that I want to do, as well as the different rides that they have (compared to DLand).

Top Rides and Possible FP+ Reservations for this visit (planning on 9am rope drop show to 4pm.

7 Dwarves Mine Train!!
Splash Mountain
Space Mountain

Non- FP+ attractions:
Sorcerer's of the Kingdom - We are gamers and this sounds like so much fun!
Mickey's Philharmonic
Stitch's great Escape
People Mover!

This is not our only visit to the Magic Kingdom, by any means!

We will then go back to the hotel for an hour nap and to get ready for our next destination and dinner!

Our next destination is going to be our favorite and also a repeat park for us during this trip:



Our goal for this afternoon will be to bypass futureworld and go to World showcase. We want to start on the noms as quickly as possible - it will be dinner time after all!

We also want to watch Illuminations this night! And after Illuminations we have EMH from 9-11pm - We still plan to just stick to the World showcase - Future world will be another day.

Around 10:30pm we will wrap it up and start heading to the bus for the night.

Tomorrow I will post the next days plan - hint hint - it will be very early!

 

[totebagg]

Top Rides and Possible FP+ Reservations for this visit (planning on 9am rope drop show to 4pm.

7 Dwarves Mine Train!!
Splash Mountain
Space Mountain

You really can get in a lot of rides during that first couple of hours and you have chosen some great rides for your fastpass. Just remember when planning, that these three are in different lands and can be a bit of a walk 7DMT and Space Mtn are pretty close together!

Non- FP+ attractions:
Sorcerer's of the Kingdom - We are gamers and this sounds like so much fun!
Mickey's Philharmonic
Stitch's great Escape
People Mover!

We too want to play Sorcerer's of the Kingdom since we haven't before and sound like fun! We haven't done Stitch's Great Escape but love Monster's Laugh Floor which is in the same area. Also love Mickey's Philharmonic and the People Mover - they are nice rides to relax and enjoy!

We want to start on the noms as quickly as possible - it will be dinner time after all!

Love FWF and this is a great way to end the evening with good food and drink and Fireworks!

Can't wait to hear more about your plans!

 

[MataHari22]

Following along. It's a good time of year to go down. I stayed at Pop last year, and will be staying there this year again. We loved MNSSHP! Hallowen is my favorite holiday and I just loved it. The parade was great, with the Headless Horseman kicking it off. Hallowishes was amazeballs!


Plans sound great so far, you guys will have a blast.

 

[NPRinLA]

Yay! So excited for your trip! Fellow DL-er here! Following Along!

 

[BariTravis]

You really can get in a lot of rides during that first couple of hours and you have chosen some great rides for your fastpass. Just remember when planning, that these three are in different lands and can be a bit of a walk 7DMT and Space Mtn are pretty close together!



We too want to play Sorcerer's of the Kingdom since we haven't before and sound like fun! We haven't done Stitch's Great Escape but love Monster's Laugh Floor which is in the same area. Also love Mickey's Philharmonic and the People Mover - they are nice rides to relax and enjoy!



Love FWF and this is a great way to end the evening with good food and drink and Fireworks!

Can't wait to hear more about your plans!

We are very excited - We really do plan to do a lot of walking! Gotta work off the carbs for more noms! haha

 

[BariTravis]

Following along. It's a good time of year to go down. I stayed at Pop last year, and will be staying there this year again. We loved MNSSHP! Hollowen is my favorite holiday and I just loved it. The parade was great, with the Headless Horseman kicking it off. Hallowishes was amazeballs!


Plans sound great so far, you guys will have a blast.

Thanks! I love Halloween and I just can't wait for the parade and wishes! Also - being a kid again and getting candy!

 

[BariTravis]

Yay! So excited for your trip! Fellow DL-er here! Following Along!

Thanks for following! I wonder if the decor is similar during the fall like it is here at the Land?

 

[NPRinLA]

Thanks for following! I wonder if the decor is similar during the fall like it is here at the Land?

I've only been to Disney World once during the fall, and the decorations are similar. But I know that they don't convert The Haunted Mansion over to the Nightmare Before Christmas like DL does. Which is one of the changes I look forward to every year.

 

[BariTravis]

I've only been to Disney World once during the fall, and the decorations are similar. But I know that they don't convert The Haunted Mansion over to the Nightmare Before Christmas like DL does. Which is one of the changes I look forward to every year.

Oh okay! Well at least I can see the overlay back home! I just really want to get a photopass photo with the pumpkin mickey!

 

[BariTravis]

Here comes day 3!!! Hump Day for us.

I said this would be an early morning, didn't I?

We are waking up early for some EMH at Epcot!!!

But we will be riding this early in the morning - before breakfast



And



Then we will either find a QS place for breakfast or find a snack in the future world area. Depending on what time it is we may start heading over to the FW festival and start exploring the individual countries!

While going around the countries I'm looking for photos with :
Mulan, Aurora, Chip N' Dale, and Mary Poppins!

After all of this it should be around 2pm and time for us to get on the bus back to Pop! (Nap Time!!!)

Around 3:45pm we will be getting on a bus to AKL for my most anticipated ADR of the trip, and second buffet!



We originally were going to Jiku but we wanted to save that for another trip.

After dinner we are planning on exploring the loge and resorts (Hopefully we can find a place to do the night vision safari viewing).
Depending on what time it is, we may go back to Epcot or Downtown Disney for some exploring.

That's the plan for Wednesday