If we can DREAM it, we can do it! ..... another 30 day vacation Update 02/07

[MAGICFOR2]

Hi Karin! We actually did stay at a nice place in Ft Lauderdale when we cruised out of Miami. It was a Marriott, but there was no ocean view. I guess you have to be really careful what you get there. Sorry about the disappointment.

Now it looks like your Contemporary room will make up for it a little bit?

Wishing you and Tom a very Merry Christmas! I know it will be the 24th there soon!

 

[annmarieda]

Your room looks amazing!!! Just a little bit more comfortable than the one in Ft. Lauderdale, yes?

 

[englishrose47]

Merry Christmas Karin & Tom

 

[jenseib]

BEAUTIFUL!!!!!! You guys got the royal treatment at check in. how cool is that?

 

[KatMark]

I'm a couple of updates behind, again.

That is a sorry excuse for a room; I think I would have continued to complain..no excuse for that. The beach, however, looks lovely.

You got the royal treatment at the Contemporary....good for you. We've not stayed there since either 1990 or 1991. I have a feeling you got a great view.

 

[jenseib]

Merry Christmas Karin and Tom !!!!!

 

[dizneeat]

to all our DISfriends.
Have a magical Christmas! ​

 

[HowieHowie]

Merry Christmas from Disney World Karin & Tom

 

[englishrose47]

Tom Thank you so much for the Austrian Christmas Tradition lesson!! It is wonderful to learn of other countries traditions. In England we have Father Christmas ,not Santa, and he only fills stockings ( or for the innoventive English child) a pillowcase, traditionally always an orange and nuts were in the stocking. Gifts under the tree were from family and friends. At my house we could open our stocking/pillowcase first thing Christmas morning. Then we went to church and when we came home opened the gifts under the tree!!

 

[jedijill]

Merry Christmas! Love the room at the Contemporary...totally makes up for the nasty room in Ft Lauderdale.

Jill in CO

 

[MEK]

Well, your sunrise in Fort Lauderdale was what I needed because it has been so dark and gloomy here for the past few days. And cold. And did I mention gloomy?

Then your room at the contemporary is gorgeous! WOW! I have stayed at BLT in a studio, but seriously, what can possible be better than those MK view club level rooms? Nice. Very Nice indeed!

Merry Christmas

 

[dizneeat]

The pictures of the clouds look like the frogs kissing from the Princess and the frog. Cute!

The Contemporary Resort looks so beautiful! I wish that one day I could stay there.

I had to go back and look for the cloud. And you are right, it does look like a frog being kissed.
We always wanted to stay at the Contemporary and once did ... using an Austrian TA and ended up in the Garden Wing. Now since we could grab a nice discount we went all out and booked concierge MK view. What a luxury .... it was worth waiting for it!

Hi Karin! We actually did stay at a nice place in Ft Lauderdale when we cruised out of Miami. It was a Marriott, but there was no ocean view. I guess you have to be really careful what you get there. Sorry about the disappointment.

Now it looks like your Contemporary room will make up for it a little bit?

Wishing you and Tom a very Merry Christmas! I know it will be the 24th there soon!

Hope your Christmas was wonderful too, Tammie!

We might not have been that disappointed in the Ft. Lauderdale hotel if we hadn't just stayed at the Southernmost and had the Contemporary ahead of us. But I don't think we'll return to Ft. Lauderdale any time soon.

The room at the Contemporary was just awesome and the view =
And we had such an awesome time there!

Your room looks amazing!!! Just a little bit more comfortable than the one in Ft. Lauderdale, yes?

It was an absolutely heavenly place ...... room, service, view, everything was just top notch - I was heartbroken when we had to move out again.

Merry Christmas Karin & Tom

Thank you, Rosie! I hope your Christmas was wonderful too!

 

[dizneeat]

BEAUTIFUL!!!!!! You guys got the royal treatment at check in. how cool is that?

We really felt like celebrities, when she came up to us and welcomed us to the hotel. I so was NOT prepared for it!

I'm a couple of updates behind, again.

That is a sorry excuse for a room; I think I would have continued to complain..no excuse for that. The beach, however, looks lovely.

You got the royal treatment at the Contemporary....good for you. We've not stayed there since either 1990 or 1991. I have a feeling you got a great view.

Kathy, we were so tired when we got to Ft. Lauderdale, and we just stayed the night, so we built our castle in front of the door , slept the night and were out of there first thing in the morning.

The treatment and room at the Contemporary on the other hand were just outstanding. Lots of pixie dust and Disney magic.

Merry Christmas Karin and Tom !!!!!

Thank you, Jennifer! I really hope you had a wonderful Christmas too!

Merry Christmas from Disney World Karin & Tom

Ah, Christmas at WDW! Hope you had a wonderful time there and thanks for the cute picture (and your card!!!!!!!)

 

[dizneeat]

Tom Thank you so much for the Austrian Christmas Tradition lesson!! It is wonderful to learn of other countries traditions. In England we have Father Christmas ,not Santa, and he only fills stockings ( or for the innoventive English child) a pillowcase, traditionally always an orange and nuts were in the stocking. Gifts under the tree were from family and friends. At my house we could open our stocking/pillowcase first thing Christmas morning. Then we went to church and when we came home opened the gifts under the tree!!

Rosie, I knew about Father Christmas, but didn't know about the pillowcases, which made me

Merry Christmas! Love the room at the Contemporary...totally makes up for the nasty room in Ft Lauderdale.

Jill in CO

Merry Christmas to you too!
We had an awesome room with a view at the Contemporary! It was so wonderful.

Well, your sunrise in Fort Lauderdale was what I needed because it has been so dark and gloomy here for the past few days. And cold. And did I mention gloomy?

Then your room at the contemporary is gorgeous! WOW! I have stayed at BLT in a studio, but seriously, what can possible be better than those MK view club level rooms? Nice. Very Nice indeed!

Merry Christmas

And a belated Merry Christmas to you too!

It was dark and gloomy? It was cold and dark and gloomy here too! But you are right the sunrise in Ft. Lauderdale was worth the crummy room.

We LOVED our stay at the CR. We spent A LOT of time at the resort, as I just didn't want to let go of our view.
Hey, and guess what, we stayed at a BLT studio as well. Our first DVC stay! We booked lake view (no MK view available) and lucked out big time. We could see a part of MK, then the Contemporary, Epcot, DHS and AK - it was truly amazing! I just love those MK resorts!

 

[dizneeat]

Day 7, August 17

“Are you kidding me?” - Part 2


“Are you kidding me? Is this all for real?”
The view was just breathtaking.

We stood out on the balcony for a few minutes until we heard a knock at the door and our luggage arrived.
We started to unpack some of it and filled the fridge with the drinks we had brought and after enjoying the view and the room for some time we went to check out the offerings in the lounge.
When we arrived it was pretty empty and we were able to get a good look around. We both had some coffee,

as they had a great Nespresso machine. Needless to say we needed to sample

the cookies they offered and they did not disappoint. They were as good as they looked and we sat even longer than we had intended on. When we had finished our coffees, Tom went to try

their ice-tea, while I had some Coke.
When we were finally done we walked back to our room, got our tickets and headed over to the Magic Kingdom. We did not intend to stay overly long, but we just wanted to pay a short visit.
So we walked over to the park, through the turnstiles and up Main Street. We found it packed and went on the Peoplemover before checking out the Main Street stores and fled the park again. Back at the Contemporary we checked out the stores and got a DVC backpack for Tom before we headed back up and got ready for our reservation at the California Grill.
We had written to Ron and he was sure he would be there the day we would dine there, so we put the presents we had bought for him into a gift bag and headed down to the second floor to sign in. We were very surprised to hear that Ron was NOT working that day after all. But we were both looking forward to our dinner and didn’t think much of it.
After checking in we were taken upstairs and as usual told that they were running late and it would take about 20 minutes until they were going to seat us. So we decided to walk out onto the platform to take in the view

(and the Owner's Locker van)

(and our car - the Convertible )

and it took less than 5 minutes until our buzzer went off and we were led to our table.
The table was in the bar area and right in the path of the servers. To say that I was pleased with the table was an understatement. We quickly talked about the table and when our server came around I asked if there was any other table available as I was truly unhappy there. He went to ask and came back a minute later and we were taken to another room, this time in the Wine room, my favourite place to dine. We were seated at a four top and placed our order for drinks. We both ordered some Diet Coke, Tom had a

Whisky Sour, while I ordered my usual

Strawberry Daiquiri.


To be continued ............

Advent's/Christmas Calendar - FOOD


Advent's/Christmas Calendar - HATS​

 

[Caseheidi]

I am finally joining in. Have been catching up on your report for the past several days, and been truly enjoying it. So here are my thoughts!

I love how you leave us readers dangling for more. Makes it hard to put down when I was so far behind.

Loved your side trips to Italy and Paris. I have always wanted to visit Europe, but DH is worried about traveling anywhere that English is not the main language. I think I almost have him convinced to go with the help of Samantha Brown and her European travel show.

Never been to the Keys, but your stay sure make it look worth the travel (we are in Oregon, so at least 7 hours of flights just to Orlando for us). If we ever make it there, I do believe the Southern is where I now want to stay.

FL does look scary, but boy that sunrise was worth the early wake up. Since our body clocks are three hours behind, we have never witnessed a sunrise on our WDW vacations.

I have never wanted to stay at the CR until seeing you room pictures, views and hearing of your check in. I am not a modern / contemporary kind of gal, but that room looks so relaxing and comfortable that maybe I can be converted.

Looking forward to more of your report. Especially the cruise. We have yet to do one, but have been thinking about it. We are thinking maybe 2015 when DD turns 6.

 

[WDisneyMom]

Hope you and Tom had a very Merry Christmas, Karin!

Wow, that hotel in Ft Lauderdale was the pits!! Glad to see you enjoying The Contemporary so far!

 

[MEK]

Wow - the view from your room is amazing.

California Grill for the first night - what a great way to get this party started!

 

[Disney9.9.10]

I hope that you both had a merry Christmas Karin!

Your view at the CR is breathtaking! I'm glad that CG was so accommodating and you were able to get a new table. I hope that the rest of the meal was good

 

[dizneeat]

I am finally joining in. Have been catching up on your report for the past several days, and been truly enjoying it. So here are my thoughts!

I love how you leave us readers dangling for more. Makes it hard to put down when I was so far behind.

Loved your side trips to Italy and Paris. I have always wanted to visit Europe, but DH is worried about traveling anywhere that English is not the main language. I think I almost have him convinced to go with the help of Samantha Brown and her European travel show.

Never been to the Keys, but your stay sure make it look worth the travel (we are in Oregon, so at least 7 hours of flights just to Orlando for us). If we ever make it there, I do believe the Southern is where I now want to stay.

FL does look scary, but boy that sunrise was worth the early wake up. Since our body clocks are three hours behind, we have never witnessed a sunrise on our WDW vacations.

I have never wanted to stay at the CR until seeing you room pictures, views and hearing of your check in. I am not a modern / contemporary kind of gal, but that room looks so relaxing and comfortable that maybe I can be converted.

Looking forward to more of your report. Especially the cruise. We have yet to do one, but have been thinking about it. We are thinking maybe 2015 when DD turns 6.

I am glad you decided to join us on our travels!

I am very happy to hear that you enjoyed the "side" trips to France and Italy and please let you husband know that Europe does speak English , no problem, even though I learned French at school I do all my conversations in English and have never had a problem.

And, if you ever have time, please go to the Keys. It is beautiful, the drive is so awesome over all those bridges. Just take enough time to stop as there are lots of awesome vista points.

You know, your mentioning of your body clocks being behind had me . Ours are 6 hours ahead and we always wake up at 4 or 5 on our first day. But we just push ourselves through the first few days and then it's getting pretty easy.

I know the design of the Contemporary is not for everyone, but to me it is the one hotel Walt Disney had a huge influence in. So that was something that pulled us in first hand, then on the other hand, once you have seen those awesome rooms and the view down to the 4th floor it is just really fun.

More report coming up shortly .... and we did a back to back cruise, so there are 9 days of cruise report. But be warned, once you have cruised once (and been to CC) it's hard not to cruise any more. We started out with a once in our lifetime cruise and going on our 10th in February.

Hope you and Tom had a very Merry Christmas, Karin!

Wow, that hotel in Ft Lauderdale was the pits!! Glad to see you enjoying The Contemporary so far!

Thank you! Hope your Christmas was really special too!

You are SO right about the Fort Lauderdale hotel. Not what we had thought of, but the Contemporary made more than up for it.

Wow - the view from your room is amazing.

California Grill for the first night - what a great way to get this party started!

Even though we were at the far end of the hotel the view was awesome. I mean you could see so many icons and if we looked out the back of the hotel, there was Epcot right in front of it. I would LOVE to go back there in a heartbeat!

We just love the California Grill and make it a point to have a reservation there every trip. Unfortunately it will be closed in February, but we are hoping to be back in August.
Plus, I knew I would not want to leave that hotel room much, so the California Grill was the best option.

I hope that you both had a merry Christmas Karin!

Your view at the CR is breathtaking! I'm glad that CG was so accommodating and you were able to get a new table. I hope that the rest of the meal was good

Thank you! We had a real good time, once our problems around the house were solved. Very laid back Christmas.
Hope your Christmas was awesome too!
I just LOVED the view and would love to go back.
Yip, that first table at the CG was not much fun. Right in the servers way and where people were walking out onto the deck. I would not have enjoyed my meal there and we were actually prepared to just have a starter and then leave if they wouldn't have seated us somewhere else.