It's My Birthday Everyday!-A May 2022 Disney/Universal TR-Completed 8/6

[Raeven]

My name is Raeven!




I'm 29 (turning 30 next month), work as an admin, and I'm the planner, photographer, & TR writer for our trips. I'm a Slytherin, love Universal & Disney, and since I'm not a Disney AP this is the closest I got to the new Guardians ride this trip.

This is my trip partner and boyfriend of 8.5 years, Josh:



He's 36 and works for the Highway Dept. He likes horror movies, roller coasters, stand up comedy & delicious food.

A little background: We took our first Disney/Universal trip in September 2015. After that trip we agreed we definitely wanted to go back every year. We've been AP holders at Universal ever since, and usually do a mix of Universal and Disney 1-2 times a year.



This trip we went from May 5th-14th, and stayed at Sapphire Falls, The Dolphin at Disney, and Royal Pacific. We tried to take it a bit easier on this trip, and a lot of our plans were food centric. This trip was for my birthday, but about a month early. I do think we got a lot done despite the relaxing pace, but towards the end of the trip I wasn't feeling well so those days will just be really relaxing.



If you want to look back on the planning for this trip my PTR is here:
May/September 2022 PTR

And here's my DTR link:
But Why Is the Rum Gone?-A May 2022 Disney/Universal Dining Report
​

Stay tuned if you want to hear:
-Reviews for the three hotels we stayed at
-What new ride we tried at Disney
-Our experience with Genie+
-About Universal's Mother's Day Brunch
-Where we had the worst meal I've ever had at Universal
-About our meet up with Tom and Carole
-What we tried at Flower & Garden this year
-What our first character meet in two years was like
-& our crazy airport story

​

 

[Raeven]

Table of Contents
5/5-Fine Art at the Airport
5/6-Phantom of the Meatballs
5/7-Tornados, Monsters, & Rum
5/8-Sunsets Over IOA
5/9-Hi Zebra! Hi Chicken!
5/10-The Main Street Chaos Parade
5/11-"You Grabbed a Wild Turtle?"
5/12 & 5/13-Airport Drama
Trip Wrap Up​

 

[mommy2allyandaveri]

Following, love your reports!

 

[Raeven]

Following, love your reports!​

Thanks for following along! ​

 

[jrmint427]

Looking forward to reading more, we were at Sapphire Falls last month and are staying at the Dolphin next month!

 

[schumigirl]

Looking forward to this one!

 

[Raeven]

Looking forward to reading more, we were at Sapphire Falls last month and are staying at the Dolphin next month!​

Thanks for following along! That's awesome! ​

Looking forward to this one!​

​

 

[Raeven]

Fine Art at the Airport

Our flight was later in the day so we had plenty of time to pack. Normally we’ll take a morning flight, but Southwest didn’t have any direct morning flights to MCO for most of May. (They also don’t in September either and JetBlue the only other airline that flies direct also only has afternoon/night flights ).

At around 2 pm, my dad took us to the airport. So we had plenty of time so we took in the airport art.



This is what appears to be a wooden ball covered in door knockers and held together with staples, and if you didn’t see my DTR post you can enjoy a picture of that here.



I had some lunch, and then witnessed a kid yelling at his grandma in the bathroom that she better not be doing No 2.



For once the flight wasn’t full so we got a row to ourselves. The flight was also kind of turbulent, and the flight attendants made a very strange announcement at some point telling people that they can’t have permission to move around, but no one can tell them no if they just do it. I think they were telling people they could still use the bathroom because I don’t really know why else anyone would need to get up on such a short flight, but I’ve never heard them tell people to just do whatever they want.



I watched the Moon Knight finale (I liked the last two episodes, but felt most of the series dragged a bit). My dad felt the same way (we were watching it together until the last one). I also watched some Dexter which I’m rewatching, and soon we were there.



We had a fantastic Lyft ride with Mirielle, and then checked into our first hotel: Sapphire Falls.
They also gave me a birthday button at the front desk:



Although I never remembered to wear it.

I’m sure I’ve shared what a room looks like at Sapphire Falls since I’ve stayed there recently but here’s some pics of the room:





We had no issues with the room, and had a lovely stay there. My only complaints were that the wifi kept disconnecting randomly on my phone and this happened almost constantly. I didn’t realize this was happening at first, and it used quite a bit of data. And there were some issues with the food service there (both at Amatista and the grab and go) but I’ll get into those later.

Once we got settled in we went to dinner:

Margaritaville Review



Next up
Our first full day

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[Leonyy09]

Hey, you look so lovelyy! Need to follow you on Inst!

 

[amalone1013]

This is what appears to be a wooden ball covered in door knockers and held together with staples

Better or worse than our demon horse...

 

[Raeven]

Better or worse than our demon horse... ​

I feel like your demon horse is more interesting than whatever is going on here...

Why do airports try so hard to be cool? ​

 

[jump00]

Really enjoyed your first day - great pictures! Can’t wait to read more!!
Brenda

 

[jrmint427]

We had no issues with the room, and had a lovely stay there. My only complaints were that the wifi kept disconnecting randomly on my phone and this happened almost constantly. I didn’t realize this was happening at first, and it used quite a bit of data.

We had the same issue with wifi at Sapphire Falls! Thought it might just be our room but we couldn’t connect much at all and were not able to FaceTime with family from our room.

 

[BroadwayHermione5]

I can’t wait for the rest of this trip report!

 

[Raeven]

Really enjoyed your first day - great pictures! Can’t wait to read more!!
Brenda​

Thank you!
​

We had the same issue with wifi at Sapphire Falls! Thought it might just be our room but we couldn’t connect much at all and were not able to FaceTime with family from our room.​

It was awful! I’ve never had it disconnect every second like that.
​

I can’t wait for the rest of this trip report!​

Thanks for following along! ​

 

[Raeven]

Phantom of the Meatballs

This morning I went to the gym & placed an Instacart order. I ordered bottled water, toothpaste (the mini one I packed was a gross flavor), and hand soap (I always hate that hotels don’t have liquid hand soap). This was easy to get, and probably saved us like $100 in bottled water.

While I was getting ready to go to Disney Springs we also saw an episode of Jerry Springer where a man appeared above the stage like the Phantom of the Opera except he was throwing meatballs at people.



We got lunch in Disney Springs:

The Daily Poutine/Polite Pig/Salt & Straw Review



Did some shopping:



Josh got his favorite Basin soap and some Stance socks, and a belt because he forgot to pack one. I just looked around and took pics of things I may want because I wanted to check out the stores in the parks before making any purchases.

Then we went to see Dr Strange 2, and we actually really liked it. We love the Evil Dead movies and there were a lot of homages to those. And I liked Scarlet Witch’s villain arc. I didn’t really go into the movie expecting anything or having read much about it, but I guess people expected more cameos in it. I liked that we finally have a horror-ish Marvel movie, and I’ll probably watch it again when it's on Disney+.

Crowds were really low in Disney Springs that day, and I was hopeful it meant the rest of our trip would also be low crowds.

After the movie we went to explore some resorts before dinner.



We took a bus to the Polynesian:





We checked on the wait for Trader Sam’s, but it was a couple hours long so we grabbed some of the drinks at the bar by the pool where they have Trader Sam’s drinks in regular cups.

Next we took the monorail to the Grand Floridian:




A little porch with a view:





Some pictures of animals sitting in chairs :




And a crazy eyed Remy:






It was finally dinner time! We took a Lyft over to AKL Kidani.

Trader Sam's/Sanaa Review

When we got back to Sapphire Falls I noticed something super weird with our shower. Basically we could hear people in what I assume was the room below ours through the drain? This has never happened before, and didn't happen again either so I assume the people have to be in the shower at the exact same time as you for this to happen. But it was so loud and clear it was like they were in the bathroom with me. And it was creepy! There was a child singing/laughing and it sounded like a ghost at first. It was kind of funny, but weird how clearly I could hear them talking.

Next up
We take a trip to Universal!



​

 

[Raeven]

Tornados, Monsters, & Rum

We had a fun middle of the night wakeup around 4:30 am today. A loud siren like noise was coming out of my phone. It turns out that that’s what a tornado alert sounds like!



There didn’t seem to be anything going on outside, but I guess there were some tornados in the general area of Orlando and that’s pretty common for the time of year. I have never heard my phone go off for any kind of emergency alert but we don’t really have tornados in NY.

We also sadly missed baby goat yoga in the morning. We had debated canceling it because it was a bit of a distance to Uber. (The other one we’d gone to last year was closer and we had a car). I could’ve requested a refund 48 hours before. But I wanted to try and make it, and we were mostly running on schedule until I went to order the Lyft….and none came on time. The times they gave me would’ve had us there 10-20 mins late and they wouldn’t have let us in the class then. So I guess I should’ve cancelled it beforehand. I did try to get them to move the tickets to September, but they never contacted me back which I guess makes sense because it was so last minute.

Instead we moved our brunch earlier.

Cityworks Review

After that we went back to Universal so we could spend some time in the parks. It was a Saturday so we knew it would be busy, and we didn’t have express so we just did a lap around looking at the new stuff. We checked out the temporary Universal monsters store:











Back in the room we watched Jumanji until dinner time.



Then we got ready for dinner:





Strongwater Tavern Review

And during dinner we finally met up with @schumigirl!



Carole and I have been following each other on here for years, and always go around the same time, but have never run into each other. We were seated next to each other at dinner so we finally got to chat.

Next Up

A big brunch & Islands of Adventure

​

 

[Raeven]

Sunsets Over IOA

We started today with a very large brunch at Trattoria Del Porto.
Trattoria Del Porto Brunch Review



As you can see by the menu we were in a food coma afterwards although we did take some pictures outside at Portofino before heading back to our hotel.





It was gorgeous out!

Back at our hotel Josh took a nap.



I watched Killer Couples & then went to the gym. Where a pack of preteens kept that had come from the pool were playing what appeared to be musical chairs with the gym equipment. (They’d get up and all trade machines every 5 mins).



Later that day we headed to Islands of Adventure.





We got into the park after 6 pm and the crowds were really low. We rode Spiderman first and it was a walk on.



Then Josh went to ride Velocicoaster (the wait was 25 mins).


While I met the baby raptor. Which tried to attack me.





We walked through Hogsmeade and the Lost Continent. And checked out the new All Hallows Boutique overlay.



I considered buying the HHN 2022 shirt, but I’m hoping to see the rest of the merch before I buy anything.

I watched the sunset from the back of Mythos.





Had to take a picture of Honk Honkers of course.



We had dinner at Confisco Grille around the time the park closed.
Confisco Grille Review

Because the water taxis were so busy we decided to walk back to Sapphire Falls. It wasn’t the worst walk, but it was kind of long. After that we watched a crazy Lifetime movie, and went to bed.

Next Up
We head to Disney!


​

 

[TotallyTink]

Love that Hogsmeade shirt! Our first Universal trip is in 2 weeks and I am going to have to get that shirt for myself!

 

[Raeven]

Love that Hogsmeade shirt! Our first Universal trip is in 2 weeks and I am going to have to get that shirt for myself!​

Thank you! The Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley ones are really cute. ​