ROBEAR84
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Feb 7, 2010
- Messages
- 742
Not sure if I should post here or in the TR section so apoligies mods if you need to move it!
I'm not going to do a full trip report I'm afraid as I waffle on so much in a brief post that we'd probably be off on our next trip by the time I finished a full trippie!
Anyhoooo...
Highs...
Just being in Florida and at WDW! Had a few moments, especially during the first day where I just found myself thinking "I can't believe we're actually here!"
Ohana breakfast - we were up early, parked to TTC and walked to Ohana for our 7:30 res on our first day. So glad we made it, in laws thought we were mad!
DD2 first ever character meet and as soon as she laid eyes on Lilo and Stitch... my heart melted, so cute! arms out, big cheesey grin, just lush 
CRT on first day... for exactly the same reasons as above. DD2 now adores Ariel! food was better than expected and kids loved it. Our first day was so so special.
HHN - Ok so not Disney but was blooming brilliant! such a shame we won't be able to do it for another 12 years (when DD2 is 13!
) as won't have baby sitters with us next time. Would thoroughly recommend though, DH was really worried beforehand, I bullied him into it! but he wound up loving it, laughed (and screamed!) so much.
Legoland - Didn't expect much from this but great park! so so quiet, wonder how they keep it running as most reviews seem to say the same. Had free tickets with our Universal passes and so glad we went. Kids had an absolute blast, helped that it was one of the few days with no rain! Even DH was pleasantly surprised though as Florida is very much about Disney and Universal to him.
Getting to ride a few rides we weren't sure we'd be able to! - Got Seven Dwarves Mine Train done during MNSSHP, said 40 mins but didn't seem that long - though may just be as the queue area is pretty cool! I screamed my head off (don't do coasters of any kind! my DH later roared with laughter behind me on BTM too!
) but it was great and the kids loved it. Also got to Universal early on our IOA day and got Gringotts done, pretty much walk on by the time we got through the queue areas and baby swapped with DD2. Took Hogwarts Express to IOA with no wait either. Wasn't expecting the interactive aspects of that at all either so brilliant!!
Frozen sing a long - Thanks to the September extention, fastpass+ and MIL coming with us to this so we were in the front row, DD2 lapped it up and even got a little wave from Elsa during the finale "Let it gooooooo..."
Frozen fireworks (once we got there!!) - Amazing! DD1s favourite evening during the whole 2 weeks (even after the fiasco beforehand... keep reading
)
Lows... unfortunately a few
Staying offsite - couldn't be helped, wasn't just our holiday and wasn't our choice, but we know (and did before we went to be fair) that for us, onsite is definitely the way to go. At DLP - although completely different I know - afternoon breaks work for us, and I think we needed that all the more at WDW. We are already planning a return though, this time it will just be us and we'll be able to do things our way which will help no end I'm sure. It's so so difficult to get a happy balance going with others, I felt bad for having fastpasses as they (in laws) just go with the flow and I could feel the eyes rolling a few times, but there were attractions that we just wouldn't have got done without them. They would head back by mid afternoon most days where as we would still be at the parks hours later, and I felt a little annoyed about feeling guilty if that makes sense.
Weather... Oh how it rained!!! We expected rain, DH and his family have always gone in September, but even the locals were saying this was wet even for the wet season. Tottential downpours for up to 4-5 hours at some points. Our first attempt at MNSSHP was such a wash out we had to go to City Hall at 7pm and rearrange our tickets! Alot of people did this and our rearranged night then wound up being very very busy (was a friday too).
We did try to make the most of it - sweating away in ponchos for half the trip!
Plain bad luck - During one downpour I jumped out of the car at Publix in Davenport to get cash out and I think the lanyard with the tickets fell off my lap, as I ran back to the car and jumped in so quickly I obviously just didn't spot it. Wasn't until we got to the Studios that I realised the tickets were gone, drove all the way back to Publix, no sign, in tears went back to villa, got online to see that it was easy enough to sort and left younger kids with in laws and went back to the studios... no idea why I didn't just go ask at guest relations when we got there earlier, but essentially wasted two hours doing nothing. Was so annoyed with myself. Had new tickets in 2 mins (after a 30 min queue) and was just intime to get to our Fantillusion fp+ and then Frozen Fireworks... DD was happy she got to see them though (and with her IHOP pancakes at 10:30pm on the way back to the villa!)
Bad luck continued... DH has a varicose vein in his leg that has never caused him any bother, ended up in excruciating pain at our first HHN at Universal, standing still in queues made it unbearable so had to leave at 8:30 - went again later in the holiday but still difficult. Shame as we loved it but ended up missing 2 houses and both shows. It also caused our last day at MK to be cut short
Tusker House - 40 mins late on our reservation (wouldn't have been so bad if they'd said this when we got there - could have made use of the time) rushed, bad service, rushed characters, big dissapointment as had high hopes for somewhere so well recommended. I think we probably just got unlucky here, our server was very accomodating to later guests once it calmed down but didn't even tell us where to find anything, not sure I'd bother trying here again.
Looks like the lows outweigh the highs but it really was a fab holiday, we did leave feeling a little underwhelmed, but I think we did just get unlucky on a few things that were out of anyones control. I am confident that next time will be better, and there will definitely be a next time! Need to get saving once we return from DLP at Easter but DH is hoping for a 2016 return (I think more likely to be 2017 but we shall see!... watch this space!)
Thanks for all the help on this board! I'm hoping to be able to utilise a lot more of what i've learned next time!
I'm not going to do a full trip report I'm afraid as I waffle on so much in a brief post that we'd probably be off on our next trip by the time I finished a full trippie!
Anyhoooo...
Highs...
Just being in Florida and at WDW! Had a few moments, especially during the first day where I just found myself thinking "I can't believe we're actually here!"
Ohana breakfast - we were up early, parked to TTC and walked to Ohana for our 7:30 res on our first day. So glad we made it, in laws thought we were mad!
DD2 first ever character meet and as soon as she laid eyes on Lilo and Stitch... my heart melted, so cute! arms out, big cheesey grin, just lush CRT on first day... for exactly the same reasons as above. DD2 now adores Ariel! food was better than expected and kids loved it. Our first day was so so special.
HHN - Ok so not Disney but was blooming brilliant! such a shame we won't be able to do it for another 12 years (when DD2 is 13!
) as won't have baby sitters with us next time. Would thoroughly recommend though, DH was really worried beforehand, I bullied him into it! but he wound up loving it, laughed (and screamed!) so much.Legoland - Didn't expect much from this but great park! so so quiet, wonder how they keep it running as most reviews seem to say the same. Had free tickets with our Universal passes and so glad we went. Kids had an absolute blast, helped that it was one of the few days with no rain! Even DH was pleasantly surprised though as Florida is very much about Disney and Universal to him.
Getting to ride a few rides we weren't sure we'd be able to! - Got Seven Dwarves Mine Train done during MNSSHP, said 40 mins but didn't seem that long - though may just be as the queue area is pretty cool! I screamed my head off (don't do coasters of any kind! my DH later roared with laughter behind me on BTM too!
) but it was great and the kids loved it. Also got to Universal early on our IOA day and got Gringotts done, pretty much walk on by the time we got through the queue areas and baby swapped with DD2. Took Hogwarts Express to IOA with no wait either. Wasn't expecting the interactive aspects of that at all either so brilliant!!Frozen sing a long - Thanks to the September extention, fastpass+ and MIL coming with us to this so we were in the front row, DD2 lapped it up and even got a little wave from Elsa during the finale "Let it gooooooo..."
Frozen fireworks (once we got there!!) - Amazing! DD1s favourite evening during the whole 2 weeks (even after the fiasco beforehand... keep reading
)Lows... unfortunately a few
Staying offsite - couldn't be helped, wasn't just our holiday and wasn't our choice, but we know (and did before we went to be fair) that for us, onsite is definitely the way to go. At DLP - although completely different I know - afternoon breaks work for us, and I think we needed that all the more at WDW. We are already planning a return though, this time it will just be us and we'll be able to do things our way which will help no end I'm sure. It's so so difficult to get a happy balance going with others, I felt bad for having fastpasses as they (in laws) just go with the flow and I could feel the eyes rolling a few times, but there were attractions that we just wouldn't have got done without them. They would head back by mid afternoon most days where as we would still be at the parks hours later, and I felt a little annoyed about feeling guilty if that makes sense.
Weather... Oh how it rained!!! We expected rain, DH and his family have always gone in September, but even the locals were saying this was wet even for the wet season. Tottential downpours for up to 4-5 hours at some points. Our first attempt at MNSSHP was such a wash out we had to go to City Hall at 7pm and rearrange our tickets! Alot of people did this and our rearranged night then wound up being very very busy (was a friday too).
We did try to make the most of it - sweating away in ponchos for half the trip!
Plain bad luck - During one downpour I jumped out of the car at Publix in Davenport to get cash out and I think the lanyard with the tickets fell off my lap, as I ran back to the car and jumped in so quickly I obviously just didn't spot it. Wasn't until we got to the Studios that I realised the tickets were gone, drove all the way back to Publix, no sign, in tears went back to villa, got online to see that it was easy enough to sort and left younger kids with in laws and went back to the studios... no idea why I didn't just go ask at guest relations when we got there earlier, but essentially wasted two hours doing nothing. Was so annoyed with myself. Had new tickets in 2 mins (after a 30 min queue) and was just intime to get to our Fantillusion fp+ and then Frozen Fireworks... DD was happy she got to see them though (and with her IHOP pancakes at 10:30pm on the way back to the villa!)
Bad luck continued... DH has a varicose vein in his leg that has never caused him any bother, ended up in excruciating pain at our first HHN at Universal, standing still in queues made it unbearable so had to leave at 8:30 - went again later in the holiday but still difficult. Shame as we loved it but ended up missing 2 houses and both shows. It also caused our last day at MK to be cut short
Tusker House - 40 mins late on our reservation (wouldn't have been so bad if they'd said this when we got there - could have made use of the time) rushed, bad service, rushed characters, big dissapointment as had high hopes for somewhere so well recommended. I think we probably just got unlucky here, our server was very accomodating to later guests once it calmed down but didn't even tell us where to find anything, not sure I'd bother trying here again.
Looks like the lows outweigh the highs but it really was a fab holiday, we did leave feeling a little underwhelmed, but I think we did just get unlucky on a few things that were out of anyones control. I am confident that next time will be better, and there will definitely be a next time! Need to get saving once we return from DLP at Easter but DH is hoping for a 2016 return (I think more likely to be 2017 but we shall see!... watch this space!)
Thanks for all the help on this board! I'm hoping to be able to utilise a lot more of what i've learned next time!
