Is there Gluten in Whiskey? Sept trip: 9 days, 3 boys, 1 urgent care visit NEWx2 11/7

[3prettyprincesses]

Hi there. I have really been enjoying your TR! I too am gluten free (not by choice, sigh!) and reading about your experience has been great!

We've not done Garden Grill yet but I'm thinking we should. My middle DD has a thing for the chipmunks! The food looks pretty good. Did the restaurant turning bother you at all? I get a bit of motion sickness sometimes and was curious.

I thought your pictures turned out wonderful! The lighting is really nice, very natural looking as opposed to the harshness using the flash can sometimes create.

Looking forward to reading more, thanks for including the dining part of it too, it's very helpful!

 

[kokotg]

I'm thinking that we'll keep GG off our list for the next trip. (I cancelled it last trip). We can get so-so food at plenty of places!

I'm also very sensitive to rude people in customer service situations. I always try to be understanding and polite, but then end up being angry with myself for not saying anything.

I think your character photos turned out just fine! Pluto is DD's favorite! She always calls him "that silly doggie"

Ha--he is a silly doggie! yeah, I don't know that we'll be back, even though the character interaction was really good. I'd compare the food to the LTT dinner, I guess, but I prefer LTT's version...I just wish they still had a character meal there!

Hi there. I have really been enjoying your TR! I too am gluten free (not by choice, sigh!) and reading about your experience has been great!

We've not done Garden Grill yet but I'm thinking we should. My middle DD has a thing for the chipmunks! The food looks pretty good. Did the restaurant turning bother you at all? I get a bit of motion sickness sometimes and was curious.

I thought your pictures turned out wonderful! The lighting is really nice, very natural looking as opposed to the harshness using the flash can sometimes create.

Looking forward to reading more, thanks for including the dining part of it too, it's very helpful!

Thanks for reading!

I clicked on your dining reviews, and I remember them from my mad researching days before our trip! I'm rereading them now...it's almost a year until our next trip, but writing this TR is kind of keeping me in obsessive planning mode . Love your reviews--so much detail!

ETA: oh, I forgot: restaurant turning didn't bother us at all. It's very slow. I'm not especially prone to motion sickness (tea cups and primeval whirl are fine; Mission Space Orange is not!), but my husband is more than I am, and he didn't have a problem either.

 

[Mombits]

That's one way not to break them Another way would be to tell the kids not to empty the dishwasher anymore...

and very nice! Is that Tinkerbell on the frame?

Yep, and she lit up too. It was adorable. I have that frame sitting on my dresser.

Hmmm, I think if my kids ever emptied the dishwasher I might die of shock. No way would I ever tell them NOT to do it. I'd sacrifice some wine glasses for that in a heartbeat!

 

[jcano]

So...did you ever get desserts sent to a park restaurant from Babycakes???? Inquiring minds want to know! How do you do it? Does it cost extra? My girls would LOVE this!

 

[kokotg]

So...did you ever get desserts sent to a park restaurant from Babycakes???? Inquiring minds want to know! How do you do it? Does it cost extra? My girls would LOVE this!

Nope, they said "no delivery." ...whoever Dave talked to on the phone didn't say anything about whether they'd be doing it in the future...I've read on here that they're trying to set it up, but that's all I know!

 

[jcano]

Nope, they said "no delivery." ...whoever Dave talked to on the phone didn't say anything about whether they'd be doing it in the future...I've read on here that they're trying to set it up, but that's all I know!

Oh well....

 

[kokotg]

Chapter 38: Epcot evening

We left Garden Grill and used our fastpasses for Soarin'

Surely the rain would be over by now, right? Rain never lasts long in Florida!

We had been thinking we'd run by Test Track and use our FPs there, then head back to World Showcase for a few more Kim Possible missions before Illuminations. But it was raining. Kim Possible missions in the rain didn't sound like much fun.

We went on Spaceship Earth again, stalling and still hoping the rain would stop. It didn't. We went by the camera place to pick up our FREE! photo. The guy there was really nice and spent a lot of time getting the picture just perfect for us, even though they weren't making any money off of it (too bad you can't see the great picture, since I still can't find it).

Then inspiration struck. Innoventions is inside! And we've never done The Sum of All Thrills! And Gus is tall enough for it!

There was a short (10 minutes or so?) wait for this. We had a bit of a crisis while waiting in line trying to figure out who was going to ride with whom. Gus wasn't tall enough to go upside down, and I was going to ride with him. But then Ari and Milo were going to go together, only Ari wanted to go upside down and Milo didn't. They were both really upset and refusing to budge when Ari finally said, “why don't I just go by myself?” Oh. That was easy enough.

They give you about four seconds to design your ride once you get in there. Okay, a little longer than that, but not long enough, at least if your designing partner is a five year old. But we managed to design a roller coaster with some hills and stuff and name it...umm...Lightning something. And we were off!

It turns out, if you listen to my kids tell it, that Sum of All Thrills was the most exciting ride of our whole trip. They LOVED it. Thank goodness for all that rain, or we might never have bothered to check it out. But....truth? I didn't much care for it.

When we went to Legoland in California a couple of years ago, we went on a ride called the Knight's Challenge, I think, that used a similar robotic arm thing. Only there was no theming at all with that...you didn't get to design anything; you didn't have a screen that made it look like you were actually going somewhere—they just hauled you out over a pond on the end of that robotic arm and jerked you all over the place for a couple of tortuous minutes. I didn't care for it.

I was worried that Sum of All Thrills would be something like that. Which is why I was not at all disappointed to have under 54 inches Gus as my ride companion, keeping me right side up. It wasn't like that. It was very smooth. It was just kind of....boring. I thought. But my children could not disagree more. So there you have it. Different strokes...

We left Innoventions and walked over to Test Track to use our ride broken down FPs. But it was down AGAIN! We decided to walk back over to World Showcase in the on again, off again rain, still hoping it would eventually stop for good.

Aww...the ducks and the bunny are FRIENDS! I can't believe it was still light out at this point; I feel like we'd been there for 100 hours. But it looks like it was

Disney snail!

We rode Maelstrom, tried on hats in the gift shop, and then actually went inside the little Viking museum.

The....Three Hats of Ari the Viking

Now everyone was tired. It was still raining. So I talked Dave out of staying for Illuminations. In retrospect, I feel kind of bad about this. At the time, though, we all agreed it was the right thing to do. I think the kids all wanted to leave, and that was the clincher. Tired and wet, watching Illuminations is one thing. Watching Illuminations tired and wet, with grumpy kids who are also tired and wet AND don't want to be there is another.

We decided to run by Test Track and see if it was running and then head back to Pop. By some miracle, it WAS running. So we rode it. In the rain. Which was kinda cool.

I still have an awful lot of pictures left to sort through for someone who's about to write about her last full day at Disney. I'm just sayin'. Looks like I took a lot of pictures on Friday and/or Saturday. Be prepared!

 

[TanzUnited99]

Love the character pics at Garden Grill - sounds like a great meal!

Oh no on the rain at Epcot. Good call going into Innoventions.

Looking forward to all the upcoming pictures!

 

[teekathepony]

I'm too claustrophobic (read: Chicken) to try the Sum of All Thrills. DH likes it though!
Too bad about all that rain I'd say I would have made the same decision to not wait for IllumiNations though.

 

[kokotg]

Love the character pics at Garden Grill - sounds like a great meal!

Oh no on the rain at Epcot. Good call going into Innoventions.

Looking forward to all the upcoming pictures!

Not sure how good the pictures will be, since half of them are probably from the Halloween party--so in the dark...we'll see what I have, though!

I'm too claustrophobic (read: Chicken) to try the Sum of All Thrills. DH likes it though!
Too bad about all that rain I'd say I would have made the same decision to not wait for IllumiNations though.

Yeah, looking back, it seems the weather got progressively worse as the week went on--hotter and wetter! But Thursday was the worst of it--the only day when the rain was more than a minor speed bump.

 

[kokotg]

In-laws in town this week, so updates will probably be sparse! Plus I'm getting near the end, and it makes me sad, so I'm trying to draw it out ALSO, if I draw it out long enough I can sneak a mini Dollywood TR in

 

[fromscratchmom]

ALSO, if I draw it out long enough I can sneak a mini Dollywood TR in

I vote that you should definitely draw out and get that in!

 

[nadira36]

Your day at EPCOT sounded long

We've been talking it over and we just decided to cancel our Akershus BF we had planned on our last day - and instead we're heading to MK for a 4th day. Only doing EPCOT once with the girls. We might try Kim Possible, but with 4.5 being our oldest we're not sure how things will work for us. Otherwise we'll be at the Land and Seas pavilions with a quick hop over to figment which 2 of our 3 won't ride due to a certain noxious smell.

The rain is the one part of Sept that has me worried when we book a late summer trip. So far we've had awesome luck and the rains stayed away most of the time, but it can be so tough with wet kids - though if the sun was shinning they'd demand we let them sit in the fountains until they were soaked.

Looking forward to hearing about the party - we LOVED it last year. Ella was so sad when she discovered we weren't going trick-or-treating at WDW this year But next year I think we'll make MNSSHP.

 

[kokotg]

I vote that you should definitely draw out and get that in!

Thanks! I suspect it won't take too much arm twisting to get me to do it

Your day at EPCOT sounded long

We've been talking it over and we just decided to cancel our Akershus BF we had planned on our last day - and instead we're heading to MK for a 4th day. Only doing EPCOT once with the girls. We might try Kim Possible, but with 4.5 being our oldest we're not sure how things will work for us. Otherwise we'll be at the Land and Seas pavilions with a quick hop over to figment which 2 of our 3 won't ride due to a certain noxious smell.

The rain is the one part of Sept that has me worried when we book a late summer trip. So far we've had awesome luck and the rains stayed away most of the time, but it can be so tough with wet kids - though if the sun was shinning they'd demand we let them sit in the fountains until they were soaked.

Looking forward to hearing about the party - we LOVED it last year. Ella was so sad when she discovered we weren't going trick-or-treating at WDW this year But next year I think we'll make MNSSHP.

It seemed long to me, too! We love Epcot, but we seemed to have bad luck there this year. Day one: sick kid, day two: rain, day three.....well, you'll see

My in-laws are gone! So I'll work on an update tonight and try to get it up either tonight or tomorrow! Now off to catch up on everyone else's TR!

 

[kokotg]

I'm back! I have two short installments to put up tonight, and then I get into the Halloween party!

Chapter 39: Friday, 9/23: Checking out Port Orleans

Last full day! We slept in until nine, but the kids did not, so it wasn't a very sound sleeping in. Once we got up, I did some packing and took a shower, for we were in no hurry—it was Halloween party day! Originally we'd planned to head to the Magic Kingdom early, use the last day on our tickets, and then eat lunch at Crystal Palace at 2, before the party. But then we'd decided this was a waste of a day on the park tickets (and we wanted to use the last day the next day), so we'd changed things around. We had a lunch reservation for Planet Hollywood instead. I've never been even a tiny bit interested in checking out Planet Hollywood before, but I'd read a couple of good gluten-free reviews AND there weren't that many choices that still had availability by the time we were making our reservation anyway.

Before lunch, since we now had that reservation for Port Orleans Riverside for next year, we decided to drive over there and check it out. This was our one and only time getting completely, miserably LOST on this trip. We wound up a couple of miles outside of Disney World before we managed to get ourselves to the right place. But we didn't yell at each other at all! So that was good anyway.

We walked around for awhile at POR. I was hoping we'd be able to peek into one of the renovated rooms, but the opportunity did not present itself. It looked really nice; I'm excited about staying there next year! I am a little concerned about how far the walk is from the Alligator Bayou section to the main building, but I suppose we can handle if after spending a week in the '80's. And anyway, it's a lovely walk. Lots more shade than Pop!

 

[kokotg]

Chapter 40: Planet Hollywood

I don't think we actually needed our reservation. There weren't many other people in the restaurant when we got there. Our server came out to take our drink order and told us the chef would come out to talk to us about the gluten stuff.

So I'd heard that Planet Hollywood would do things like GF chicken fingers, cut up potatoes and turn them into steak fries for you, etc. The chef we talked to didn't seem especially eager to do adapt anything for us to make it GF. He came out and asked us what we felt like eating. We asked about chicken fingers for the kids, but he told us he'd rather not do those because of the shared fryer issue. We ended up ordering grilled chicken and mashed potatoes for Milo and Gus, and the ½ roasted chicken from the adult menu for Ari. Dave asked about ribs, but the sauce had gluten in it. So we both ordered a strip steak and mashed potatoes. Lots of mashed potatoes. I'd also heard they keep GF buns around for burgers and sandwiches, but I didn't ask about them so I can't confirm or deny.

I only have pictures of the desserts here. The food was good, if pretty ordinary. I seem to remember the mashed potatoes tasting really, really good, though. It was pretty empty while we were there, so I don't know that we got the same impression of the atmosphere as we would have on a busy evening. I was worried it would be loud and overwhelming, but it definitely wasn't.

Desserts! Some of us got cookies, and some got a brownie with ice cream.

These were pretty good...I wished the cookies had been heated so that they'd be softer and gooier, but you can't have everything. The nice thing about the desserts was that they were, we were told, made in house, so they weren't exactly the same cookies and brownies we'd gotten everywhere else. They also had sugar cookies and, I think, cinnamon cookies available.

So..Planet Hollywood. Was fine. Service was fine; food was fine. I don't know that it was exciting enough that we'll be back anytime soon, though.

 

[shan23877]

Nice that you got to check out Riverside, it looks so pretty.

at the not yelling at each other when you got lost. DH and I are really bad about turning on each other when we got lost.

Can't wait to hear your take on the Halloween Party.

 

[okw19]

POR is so pretty! I hope you guys love staying there!
Sounds like Planet Hollywood was a little bit of a let down. I've only been to one once, and that was enough for me.
Can't wait to hear about the Halloween party!

 

[TanzUnited99]

Thanks for sharing the pics of POR as I am hoping to stay here on a future trip as well. Lol at not yelling at each other when getting lost - that sure is a result!

Oh no on PH not being very accomodating over your requests. I have also heard good things of the place.

 

[Mombits]

I'm excited about the POR pics! We are staying there when we go in March. Mom and I stayed years ago when it was Dixie Landings, but my dh and kids haven't ever been there. Looks so peaceful.
Too bad PH wasn't a bit nicer.