Decided might be time for a full trip report from our recent trip. Apologies for the length.
1/7 - flew Omaha to Atlanta to Orlando and got in around 6pm. Airports were fairly busy, both planes nearly full, with middle seats empty on Delta still. We rented a car as I wanted to cut out some potential transportation contact points. My daughter had no idea where we were until she saw the sign welcoming us to Walt Disney World! Lol, was a fun surprise for her.
We stayed at AoA for 4 nights, so first night we ate at Landscape of Flavors. We mobile ordered, then said we were here when we started walking. Food was ready by the time we got there.
1/8 was my 40th birthday. I was up early and dying with anticipation for 7am boarding group drop. Fortunately even with jittery fingers, I was able to get BG27. We mobile ordered breakfast from landscape again before driving to DHS. We got in line between 745-750. We were 4th car back from security, then when security let us go up to toll gate, around 755, we were second in line. Toll let us through around 815. I should also mention I did see skyliner running on our way back to our room from breakfast and was already running to DHS when we got in line with the car. I'm not sure if people were riding or not.
We quickly went through temp checks, security and scanned magic bands with hardly any wait. I was indecisive going in if we should do MMRR or sdd first, but when we got up to MMRR, people were walking straight into the building, so we followed and walked all the way to line boarding area. After we went to TSL and rode all 3 rides. Sdd had about a 15 minute wait with the rest near walk ons. We also had time for snacks, restrooms, and photopass pix. We got all that done by 10am. Our boarding group was called at 1015 and we headed to Galaxies Edge for the first time. I was very impressed. So amazing to see in person. We saw storm troopers, kylo ren, Chewy and others hanging out. When we got off RotR, we went to Droid Depot. I had a reservation for 1145, but they let us in at 1115. I was glad they did as we had to wait in lines a bit before building. I built an R series droid and my daughter, well mostly my wife
, built bb8. They went standard bb8 colors while I did a red with white and black trim r2d2. Hehe. We then did the Millennium Falcon photopass with our droids. We then checked in for our SciFi lunch 20 minutes early and waited about 10 minutes before we had a table ready. Was decent lunch, I mainly did the reservation to ensure we had a table to eat lunch. After lunch we did the Disney Visa photopass. They dropped in some storm troopers and another character. We then went back to our room for a break. We had dinner reservations at Hollywood and Vine at park closing time. We tried to convince our daughter to do more rides, but she wasn't having it, didn't even want the frozen musical, so we did the Mickey shorts theater and Muppets before walking around GE at night. H&V dinner was really good and we loved the character interactions. We did several character dinners and they were all great. Sure they don't come right to your table, but they come close enough and are very easy to get pix of, though not always with.
1/9 was our Epcot day. I was slightly nervous about Epcot on a weekend, but it really wasn't too bad. I think chilly weather kept people away, though there were some bigger crowds in the afternoon. We took skyliner from AoA and waited in line maybe 40 minutes between the AoA station and CBR station, though mostly at CBR. Ended up inside the park after 11, and did a slow walk to Frozen Ever After, which was still at a 10 minute wait at 1145. After that, we mobile ordered from Regal Eagle. I heard great reviews, but personally I wasn't impressed with their food. Sorry to all that like it. Lol. Maybe I need to try something else next time. We watched an animation experience show while we are. They were drawing Goofy. After we walked towards UK/Canada pavilions, saw Alice in wonderland come out, then she was upstaged by a Mickey/Minnie cavalcade. We went to the showplace and saw some live art entertainers then went to pop eats, I had to get a Pop't Art cookie. Lol. It was good, not spectacular. Wasn't very sweet, most of the sweetness comes from the strawberry filling. We went to the figment area and did the Disney Visa photopass. They took a lot of pics, but only one that included added in characters with Goofy and Mickey, then watched the short film festival. As we headed over to ride Figment, we saw Pooh playing around in the grassy area between figment and the land. He ended up leaving the area near Figment, so we went and got a little closer to say hi and get pix. Then Chip and Dale came outside, so said hi to them. We then did figment and living with the land before our Garden Grill ADR. Unfortunately the rotation mechanism broke just before our trip, so we were stuck in place. Mickey and friends came around 3 times during our meal. They come up behind your table and have some fun. I played fetch with Pluto. Lol. He was funny. After dinner, we rode Nemo and spaceship earth then began a slow walk out of the park, but stopped by Germany for some delicious Caramel popcorn. I bought 3 bags so I could munch on some when I got back to work. My wife laughed at me for spending 20 bucks on popcorn but it's pretty good stuff. All the rides we did had a 15 minute wait or less. In fact,we probably waited in line for the skyliner at the end of the night longer than we waited for the rides combined, though we didn't do Soarin, test track or mission space, which all had the longest waits. The CBR station did not have any wait a after we got there though.
1/10 was beach day! I had a park reservation to DHS and tried for another Boarding Group, but the screen moved down when I was on the second join screen, so it took me to the ride details page and I missed out. We drove towards Cocoa Beach at 11, got there a little after 12, had a turkey leg at the food stand, and we played on the beach. It was mid 60s, so wasn't too bad. Several people were out surfing, but we stayed mostly on the sand, lol. We got back to our hotel around 4 and hung out a bit, going to DHS at 5, did some shopping, then rode MMRR once and TSM and AS2 both twice before 7. Could have gotten in line for SDD had we wanted, but my daughter got freaked out by the speed so chose not to this time.
1/11 Animal Kingdom and Animal Kingdom Lodge day. We packed up the entire hotel room in the morning and headed to AK. We stopped at McDs for breakfast and ate in the parking lot, just so we weren't having to deal with finding a place to sit and eat. When we got in, we went to Pandora, 10 minute wait for Navi where my daughter and I went and 35 for FoP where my wife went. We then went over to Africa and rode Kilimanjaro Safari, then started on what became our day - Wilderness Explorers! Lol. My daughter really loved spotting the WE stations and learning about the wild. We did the trail by KS, then rode the train to Rafikis, where we did the animation experience - drew crush and squirt from Nemo. I actually did an ok job, for always being terrible at drawing. We then did lunch at Flametree, which, in my opinion had way better bbq than Regal Eagle, again sorry to Regal fans and Sam Eagle. We did the super zoom photopass, and I just got those photos in my account today, only took a week, lol. Those were the only pics I didn't get in a reasonable time, so was wondering if because it happened after our AoA check out time and before we checked into AKL, that it had an issue adding to our account, just a theory tho. We left at 3 to check into AKL. We had a Jambo DVC studio booked. They upgraded us to a 1 bdrm and let me just say, it was spectacular. My wife loved getting spoiled by that extra room. My daughter, after throwing long fits about leaving the little mermaid room, quickly fell in love with all the wildlife right outside our balcony doors. It was a truly amazing experience and I look forward to going back. I originally booked this last February with the intention of a post birthday cruise stay where we just relaxed, but once the pandemic began getting worse in America, I knew that wasn't going to happen,so I booked the WDW stay in June when they became available. So to go back and stay without wanting to also rush off to a park would be fun. We had an ADR for Sanaa this night as well. We got dressed up all fancy and headed over, there's no dress code, my wife and daughter just wanted a fancy dinner. I chose this one since it wasn't in a park, lol. Sanaa is really good food. Definitely get a reservation here if you can. It was after dark when we ate, but I'd recommend daylight and request a seat near the windows to experience the wildlife if possible.
1/12 MK day...sort of. My wife was parked out and she wanted our daughter to get some homework done. Yeah right, that was like herding cats then giving them a bath... Lol. 5 hours to do 4 pages of first grade math. Yuck. So we went to MK at 2pm. Rode Buzz Light-years ride, then my wife wanted to leave. Convinced her to ride dumbo, tea cups and Winnie the Pooh with us, grabbed a snack, I had been wanting the Peter Pan float, so finally tried that and it was so good. We then went back to the room and waited til 6 to hop aboard a bus back to MK for our BoG ADR. We ended up arriving right at 7pm, so had to explain to every cast member that we had an ADR. Was kinda funny being the only ones headed in while everyone else was heading out. The food at BoG was amazing. Such good food. Every time I checked into a restaurant, I marked it was my birthday, but this was the first place that actually did something extra, they made a special plate of the gray stuff in the shape of Mickey and let me just say, it's delicious! Lol. Was our first time at BoG so first time I got to try the official gray stuff. It was so good, I ate the Mickey shaped gray stuff and the chip cup filled with it. If only I could get a truck load delivered to my house! Got some great mostly empty pix of the park when we were done. When we headed to the buses, they told us which one to get on. We were the only ones on it, but the driver took off right away!
1/13 heading home. I booked an early ADR for a Topolinos grand finale. I originally had it for 730 due to 11 am flight, but as Delta kept trying to push us up earlier, I kept pushing back, so we ended up with a 1pm flight and moved the ADR back to 9, which was good, it gave the family some sleep in time, plus extra time to pack. We got to RR right about the time of our ADR, so I checked in as we were heading in and as we got on the elevator, got the table ready notification. The food here was probably the best of the vacation, and it was just breakfast! The food is so full of Flavor and just amazing. Was worth it just for the food, but we also got to see Mickey, Minnie, Donald and Daisy! Those characters in their artist outfits were really fun to see. We were able to get lots of great pix with these characters. Definitely a place worth going to again. Was a great last hurrah to a fun week.
The airports on this day, Wednesday, mid day, were very empty. The lines to check bags were short. The security signs showed a 5-10 minute wait at TSA, but we were able to go straight to the x-ray machines, putting our stuff in the bins, etc, so in and out quickly. The tram to our gate had 3 cars and 4 total parties got into the 3 cars. Our flight, however, was pretty full going to Detroit 50 rows with middle seats open. The detroit airport was very empty. We were off getting food when they started boarding our flight and we were the last ones on a half full plane. This one had 18 rows and was just quiet the whole way. Our home airport was also nearly empty when we arrived.
Overall, we did several mobile orders, those were almost always ready if we said we were there while walking to the restaurant. We also did 7 ADRs - 4 were character meals. You can check in up to 20 minutes early. Most of the time, our table was ready within 10 minutes of us checking in. They were all fairly socially distanced, I'd say the exception being SciFi, that seemed a little close. I felt comfortable with them all, though I wasn't overly concerned about seeing others mask compliance or distanced for the most part, but my wife made sure I gave others space. The markers in ride queues were nice when we did have to stop, but so many rides were near walk ons for us the markers didn't matter much. I was nearly ran over by a
scooter though. I was oblivious to it, someone pointed it out to me. I was trying to show my daughter a gingerbread Mickey ears hat someone was wearing and didn't notice the crash right next to me. Poor lady ran into a moveable souvenirs rack inside one of the DHS stores. I didn't check on her as others had already went to help. I would just say, make sure you know how to operate those things before going into small spaces. I'm sure it was just a slip of a button or something. Even without long lines, there's still plenty of people inside the parks and other areas, and there are definitely bottle necks in places. If you feel uncomfortable getting stuck near others, it's probably best to stay away a few more months. Hopefully not much longer though as the vaccine ramps up. WDW might be more comfortable for some people after they've been vaccinated. To anyone going soon, hope you have a great time.
ETA: One thing I forgot to mention, I mailed my droids home from the AoA resort store. We took the droids with us from DHS and played with them a bit in our rooms. Then Sunday, I took them to the shop. Was $17 to ship 2 droids. The droids were delivered to our house on Friday. In case anyone is interested in not carrying it all over the place, especially the airport.
