I Regret NOTHING or How One Girl Rediscovers the Magic!!! A Feb 2012 Trip Report

[StarGirl11]

Welcome to my Trip Report on my first solo vacation!

The title is a reference to some of my what could be considered slightly childish at time decisions on the trip. And my decision to spend two days at Magic Kingdom walking around, right before running a half marathon. Yeah not exactly the smartest decision of the face of the planet but as the title implies I regret absolutely nothing I did on this trip. The other half of the title was how I finally let go and realized that I was being trying to be to old in a kids park. Once I realized what I was doing and went basically screw it with my age I had the time of my life.

My real name is Sophia! I'm 22 years old and the resident theme park and Disney geek of the family.

Favorite Disney World Ride: Space Mountain
Favorite Disneyland ride: A toss up between California Screamin, Indiana Jones (yes I actually like that ride), and their Space Mountain (still want Disney World to install music on their version of the ride)
Favorite Disney World Restaurant: A Tie Between Liberty Tree Tavern and 1900 Park Fare
Favorite Disney World Park: Disney's Hollywood Studios (or as I have a tendency to still call it sometimes MGM)
Favorite Disney Princess: Cinderella
Favorite Disney Prince: Eric (this used to be Charming, then I ran into the Eric on this trip, will be explained on the race day portion of the report)
Favorite Disney Movie: Cinderella
Favorite Disney Villains: The Step Family From Cinderella (notice the pattern here)
Favorite Pixar Movie: Up

My hobbies include following horse racing, reading up on natural disasters (I want to study earthquakes once I'm finally done with school), reading and writing.

Now this trip was pretty big for me. This was my first time vacationing on my own. Sure my Mom had turned me loose on my own at more theme parks than I can count (she isn't a park goer) but never had I been on a trip entirely on my own. This is partly my age since at 22 I still can't rent a car. However due to the way Disney runs things I could afford to make the trip out for the Princess Half completely on my own without racking up taxi fares.

I planned this trip to the T. I knew where I was going, when I was going well for the most part anyway. I had all my ADRs set up with an exception of one that I added on Friday afternoon for lunch on Saturday. The original plan was one day at Magic Kingdom and then a day at Blizzard Beach. However that turned into two days at Magic Kingdom when the weather didn't cooperate with my Blizzard Beach plans (ADR in park prevented me from switching what day I could go where). And while I wish I could have gone to Blizzard Beach I ended up having so much fun at Magic Kingdom I ended up not really minding.

After the great time I had the previous month when traveling for the WDW Marathon (the reason why I'm back a month later will be explained) I had high expectations for this trip. This trip exceeded those expectations from the get go with a few exceptions here and there.

Admittedly this was a short trip. Me being in college couldn't really afford to take off more than a day. Especially when I thought I was going to have presentations on Monday which I would get a zero for if not there. Yeah well, its now a week later and I'm only now getting to present. Go figure. But I do have two other classes on Monday anyway so couldn't really afford to take it off or catch a flight then (MCO to DIA flights don't leave early enough).

Anyways Here's where the parts will go:
Day 1 A Perfect Start
Day 2 Why is it in the Tent?
Day 3 I still can't believe I got this
Day 4 Hide and Go Seek with the Pace Balloons

 

[ColleenG]

Can't wait to read about the rest of you trip!

 

[Twingle]

Looking forward to hearing all about it!

 

[Jubilee]

Awesome!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[StarGirl11]

Sorry about the wait I had the first part written up for a while but kept getting sidetracked.

Day 1: A Semi-Perfect Start​

Part 1: Of Course There's Snow!​

So its day one for me. The day I've been counting down for since approaching my parents with the idea of returning to the World on my own to grab the second half of the Coast to Coast Medal. My first attempt at a Walt Disney World race had been unsuccessful due to getting the sinus infection that would not go away. So not even a day after being pulled on to the sweep bus I approached my parents about returning for the Princess on my own. With one Disneyland race under my belt and another coming up in September it was simply a matter of which race would I end up running in again hopefully.

So three hours after a fore mentioned unsuccessful race I talked my Dad into doing the Princess!!! My Mom spent the next two weeks in denial that he actually said yes to the trip. And also saying how she wish she could be there (once again not a park goer but she likes coming with me to the races). Over the next month and a half we reluctantly book POR (wanted POFQ but a room never opened up) and I started booking my ADRs. The only last minute change came about a week before when me and my Dad had the following conversation basically:

Me: Dad why am I on the 6:00 flight (gets in around 10ish if anyone wants to know)?

Dad: Because I thought you had a morning class

Me: But that's on Wednesday the only class I have on Thurs I am going to miss anyway because of its timing (last flight is at 6:00, class is at 6:00)

Dad: So do you want to change planes then?

Me: Yeah there's a nice nonstop at 9:45 to Orlando that gets in around 3:00 (the earliest a 6:00 was way to early for me considering the next three days).

Dad: All right I'll change it.

So I earned a half day in Orlando! Not in the parks because by that point I had all ready purchased and received my two day tickets. But I figured I would get a nice dinner and spend the evening at DTD. Ended up getting ADRs at Garden Grove which turned out to be a disappointment.

So fast forward to trip morning. It is now 5:00 and for all intent and purposes I got no sleep the night before. Plan to catch some snoozes on the plan. Double checking to make sure I didn't forget something important (which tends to happen to me whenever I'm traveling, on this trip the list of last minute nearly forgot items included: bathroom bag, swimsuit (I was planning to go the POR pool also, that never happened), and pajamas). Finally satisfied with the fact that I'm almost positive I have everything I finally leave about 6:30ish for my 9:45 flight from DIA. And then my normally 30ish drive to the airport takes an hour. I should probably clarify that I very rarely am in downtown during rush hour and forgot to accommodate for that traffic. And I was not expecting snow on the ground! I was REALLY surprised when I opened my garage that morning to find a couple of inches of it on the ground. On the bright side I still arrived at the airport two hours ahead of flight like I'm supposed to.

After saying goodbye to my checked luggage finally it started sinking in that I was actually going. It hadn't really hit me before that moment. After using the much faster concourse A check point (DIA's best kept secret, the lines can be huge downstairs and really short upstairs on certain days because not everyone realizes you can use it to get to the other terminals). I was in the concourse by 8:00 ish and headed to my favorite airport restaurant (Timberloin Grill). And decided to spice things up a bit and instead of getting my usual breakfast (eggs and pancakes) I got steak and eggs and some orane juice:

The juice

The steak and eggs (Delicious would get again). And yes those are pancakes in the corner.

The pancakes were a big disapointment for me because I remember having them a few years back and loving them, however they were so-so on this day so I took two bites and then just waved down my waitress requesting my check.

By the time I finally got to my gate it was around 9 ish. However when I got there I got a bit confused because it was showing this:

And then this:

For those who can't read it the first sign says Islip and the second says Orlando.

Now normally I am fairly good with geography however I had never heard of Islip in my life and I was confused. This was mostly due to the fact that this was supposed to be a non stop flight so why was it stopping in Islip. After a quick conversation with a gate worker who told me Islip was in New York and the flight was going there AFTER Orlando I settled down in at one of the charger stations and started charging my compact camera battery since I didn't know if I would be taking that or my nice Canon T3i with me when I went out and about that evening.

The flight got in on time and we boarded. Grabbing a seat in the second row because I wanted off the airplane as quickly as possible. It was a full flight there and I had two entertaining ladies next to me. One who was traveling for the Daytona 500 and the other who worked in airports (cant remember what exactly other than that). While I did nap for a good hour or so I did spend quiet a bit of time on my computer (we had internet going but not coming back go figure on that one?) and talking to the two ladies. While it wasn't the most comfortable of flights (the lady next to me was nice but was rather large and I am no small person myself) it was a good flight. I snapped this pretty pic not long before we began descent:

And before I knew it we were on the ground.

A shot of us taxing to the gate.

A shot of the gate we arrived at.

And to top everything off? We were twenty minutes early!!!!!

Now I had plans to grab a photo of the airport monorail, however I got sidetracked when speaking to a woman while waiting for it to come (just missed it by a minute, that seemed to happen a few times this trip) about my other passion in life: horse racing. Above all else, except for my future career field that is, I love the sport of kings, yes even more than Disney. And once I get started on it it can be nearly impossible to shut me up especially if you are showing indications of actually listening to me. Take that as a fair warning if you ever meet me in real life that if you get me started than don't expect me to shut up for the next five to ten minutes at least.

Remembering the airport fairly well from my trip there the previous month I was able to fairly easily navigate my way to the ME though the walk's length kind of surprised me (maybe it had something to do with where I got out of the elevator).

The first real WDW thing I saw as I got out of the secure area.

The first ME sign I saw after getting out of the secure area.

But soon enough I was there!

And much to my delight all the buses were ME buses (after hearing about the MEARS busses I was really hopping for the former).

And much to my surprise there were no lines (though as I realized later they were all on the bus)!

I managed to get one of the last seats on the bus to Port Orleans Riverside. And we were off!

End of Part 1​

I'll stop it here for right now and hopefully it won't take a week for the next update. By the way yes there is going to be quiet a few photos in this. I am an avid photographer and using my nice camera for the first time at Disney here so you get the idea.

 

[Twingle]

Lovely! Looking forward to more!