Jingle Bells....AKL....Disney for 10 Whole Days! ** Updated June 2015: Videos Added**

[thornton0511]

Great report! All caught up and ready to hear more. What a delightful whirlwind of a start. I would love to go to WDW during the holidays one day.....

Thank you and welcome! I am happy to have you tag along . Whirlwind would describe most of this trip I am afraid lol. This was our first time to see the world decorated for a holiday and it was amazing! If you ever get a chance to at least do it once I would say that it's definitely worth it

 

[thornton0511]

An Afternoon in Downtown Disney

So at this point we had filled our bellies and were headed off to explore Downtown a bit….well the Marketplace side anyways. Since this was the first trip for the in laws that meant that this was their first look at just how awesome Disney can be with the themes and detail. They were pretty impressed. Who wouldn't be?

It was now 2:15 and the first place we stopped was the Lego Store. My kids will spend hours in here if you let them. With Christmas only being a few weeks away we were not going to be making any lego purchases on this trip so we opted for a few pics with the hulk instead.

We made our way outside and gave the kids a chance to build a racecar and have it compete in a downhill race. At this point I was really starting to get tired and grouchy. The phrase from the Dinosaur ride at Animal Kingdom kept running through my head and I kept thinking "you're not going to make it! You're not going to make it!" I knew my clock was ticking but I just kept pushing on. We made our way to the World of Disney.

This has got to be the best store in the world! How awesome is Disney I mean really? We wandered around the different themed rooms and then came across this Disney princess magic mirror. Have you guys seen this? When you stand in front of it several Disney princess dresses will appear on your reflected image in the mirror and it essentially allows you to play dress up. Sydney loved playing with this and I had a hard time pulling her away.

We made our way into the room that has several hats and immediately members of my family had to try them on….obviously.

Then I noticed something. Shoes to be exact. Crocs…..with Mickey. These particular shoes I had previously seen online and really really wanted a pair. Unfortunately no one had them for me to buy, but now here they were in Disney just begging me to buy them and put them on my feet. The only thing was that they were a little pricey so I decided to wait for now and see if the price was something I could swallow.

It was now getting close to 3pm and I was getting to not be very happy in a very happy environment and needing to get some rest. So was everyone else. I tried to manage one more snap shot with the kids in front of some snowmen on the way out. Yeah there was no way I was going to ask the kids for a real smile at this point…my poor babies.
We were all so exhausted. I don't really even remember how long it took to get a bus but I am sure it felt like an eternity and we probably made the stupid stop at Pleasure Island and I am sure they switched drivers too. Story of my life every time I get on a DDisney bus! The important thing is that at some point we were headed back to get some sleep….except one of us did not even make it to the resort…..

to be continued......

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[scottny]

LOL we really did get to the airport very early. Too early. I was the only one voting for leaving a bit later than everyone else and lost that argument! I have gotten a bit better with flying but I still hate it. I wish Amtrak would fix the leg of track in the south that hurricane Katrina destroyed so that there would be an alternate way for us to travel to WDW, especially with the cost of flying being so expensive. We decided in May 2012 to drive instead of flying and that took about 18 hrs. Ah well I suppose if we just moved closer to Disney none of this would be an issue

I just try not to think about it when I fly. it doesn't work most of the time.
A train would be nice but I love the fact you get so fast with a plane.
18 hours is a long time. it might be that for us being we are in the Bronx. Not sure.
Their you go now you have a solution.


Great updates and pics.
I am so with you about the first floor and snakes. My fear also.
T-Rex is a great place to eat but pricey.

Looking forward to more.

 

[thornton0511]

I just try not to think about it when I fly. it doesn't work most of the time.
A train would be nice but I love the fact you get so fast with a plane.
18 hours is a long time. it might be that for us being we are in the Bronx. Not sure.
Their you go now you have a solution.


Great updates and pics.
I am so with you about the first floor and snakes. My fear also.
T-Rex is a great place to eat but pricey.

Looking forward to more.

How about snakes on a plane? Wait isn't that a movie? lol I'm not sure but it does sound like and awful combination!

 

[thornton0511]

Sharing Our First Vacation Day with a Very Important Person
We made our way back to the POP and to our room and….CRASHED! I am pretty sure I was asleep before my head hit the pillow. No alarm was set, since we were not on a schedule today, and eventually when I woke up the first thing I noticed was that it was dark outside.

I really thought it had to be super late at this point but it was only around 5:30. Sweet. I woke up the fam and we all got ready to head out again. But with Downtown Disney already done and no park tickets what was the plan for the evening? Well we knew that at some point we had to have dinner, although we were all still pretty full from our feast at lunch. It was decided that for now we would walk around and explore the resort. There are so many picture spots here. Oh my goodness! I think we took like a gazillion pictures. Fortunately for you most of them included a larger than life character or prop with a little bitty family member standing beneath it……in the dark…. so I will not bore you with everyone of them…only a few.

After doing quite a bit of sightseeing and visiting all of the POP eras we made our way to the lobby and quick service location. Even though the idea of trying tie dye cheesecake was pretty enticing no one was really feeling this for dinner so we purchased a few sodas to take with us and made our way out through the POP store.
As we were walking through I noticed a poster board with several quiz questions about Walt himself. I had just recently finished reading Bob Thomas's book on Mr. Disney and felt quite proud that I knew most of the answers. Then it hit me. One of the questions was about Walt's birthday…..which I knew was December 5th. At this moment it dawned on me that TODAY WAS DECEMBER 5TH! I blamed this realization not hitting me earlier due to my lack of sleep but how cool is that?! We not only had gotten the chance to get a bonus day at Disney, but also start our vacation on Walt Disney's birthday! Wow! I really felt like this vacation was started on this day for a reason and I felt so happy to be here.
We had decided what our plan was going to be at this point and we headed toward the bus stop. There was something on my Disney bucket list that I really wanted to do and figured that an extra day with no plans would be the perfect time to do it. We were on a resort hopping mission. The problem was that even with all of the research and planning that I have done for WDW I never really took into account getting somewhere with our park tickets and that would make our destination a little tricky. I knew the resort I wanted to get to was close to Epcot and Hollywood Studios but was not sure which would be quicker. Finally I decided to leave it up to fate and we would just take which ever bus came first. Epcot. Destination…..The Beach Club Resort. Life lesson #2 would be soon to follow.
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[thornton0511]

Life Lesson #2:
Never resort hop using Disney transportation to new places if you are experiencing sleep deprivation

Alright so we were on an Epcot bus. I was trying to remember how to get to the beach club from Epcot. I had the google map image branded in my head in case I was ever given the opportunity to go there using Disney transportation. I knew that you could walk or take a boat from the international gateway but for some reason (using the lack of sleep card here again) I was assuming this was the only way from Epcot and that there was a walkway to the there that we could take without entering the park….what was I thinking?
We got off the bus and I just could not think straight. This did not seem right. But just to make sure we found a cast member outside the park and DH and I proceed to ask him. He confirmed my now clearer thinking that indeed there was no access or walkway and that the best bet was a bus to Hollywood Studios. Lightbulb. I was thinking about the wrong park. HS has the walkway and a boat outside the entrance…not Epcot. I was feeling pretty stupid at this point and also thinking about the time we had wasted coming to the wrong park.
But the conversation with the CM did not end there….oh no. He proceeded to ask what would seem to be a simple innocent question, "So where are you guys trying to get to?" to which I responded Beaches and Cream for dinner. (This was the item on my bucket list) At this point he felt the need to ask a follow up question…."Do you have a reservation?" Now on a side note I do realize that you can now make an ADR for Beaches and Cream at the 180 day mark but on Dec 5, 2013 this was not the case. I responded with a no and before I could say anything else he butted in with "yeah well that is a very hard restaurant to get in to and without a reservation you may not be able to get in."
Okay. In this guy's defense I am sure I seemed like someone who was not familiar with Disney seeing how I had asked him where the walkway to beaches and cream was from here, but he was messing with the wrong girl at this time. My DH could tell by my body language that I was about to give this poor seeming arrogant CM a lesson in Disney knowledge and took a step back. I decided to take the high road and just simply respond with "huh that's funny because I was under the impression that they do not take advance reservations" he quickly responded with a chuckle and "well that's news to me".
My blood was boiling and I suddenly felt my DH hand in mine as he pulled me away and thanked the guy for his help. Oh how I wanted to set him straight! I wished at this moment that I had a badge with a big lime green Mickey stamp on it with my name that I could flash to this guy to show him that I am a member on the disboards. He then would have responded by saying "I'm sorry ma'am I did not realize…you are probably right about the whole thing."
This image did seem to make me laugh a little and lightened my mood a bit. Unfortunately for us I still was not thinking 100% straight and instead of waiting at the bus stop for a beach club bus to take us directly to the resort we thoughtlessly waited for a bus to take us to Hollywood. I needed to wake up and get us off this wild goose chase, but I am afraid that at this point my Disney ninja skills were just not happening and we boarded a bus to HS. Life Lesson #2: Never resort hop using Disney transportation to new places if you are experiencing sleep deprivation. Would we ever get there?
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[heaven2dc]

Such a fun TR already! So glad the airlines worked with you and that you avoided delays on your original travel day. 10 days at Disney during Christmas time - lucky you!!

I wouldn't have known how to get to the Beach Club resort from POP without actually having to use a park ticket to get into Epcot or than traveling to HS and using the ferry or walk there. We've only stayed at BWV so it would have been hard to know how to get to POP but you had the right idea I think. I didn't know that Beaches & Cream didn't take advance reservations so I learned something from you - thanks!! I hope you got to eat there at least sometime during your trip!

 

[I_Luv_Stitch]

Joining in

I hate travel day just because of the sleep depravation as an outcome!
That food at T-Rex looked good, but a lot of it!
You are correct no ADR is needed for Beaches and Creams, you should have told that arrogant CM that he was wrong!

Can't wait to hear about your stay at AKL!

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

Hi Jenn, just found your TR today.

Your story leading up to departure day was quite riveting. I was actually in Disney around that time and remember hearing about the weather around the U.S. being just in a deep freeze EXCEPT for Florida, which was hot and sunny. It was crazy!!!

Haha, your father in law sounds a lot like me. I love talking to people, and often will get a photo too.

You'll get no argument from me staying at POP. I love me some POP. It's also the first and only Disney resort I've stayed at, so it does have sentimental value.

Ahh my future bride Stacey. Turning on the Must Dos is absolutely a must do.

Obviously you already know that you are correct in not needing a ressie for Beaches & Cream and in fact couldn't make one if you wanted to (at that time). Sorry Mr. CM, you were wrong.

 

[thornton0511]

Beaches and Cream For Dinner....Yes Please!
When I left off we were on a wild goose chase to get to Beaches and Cream from Pop Century. We had just hopped on a bus and were headed to Hollywood Studios where the plan was now to either take the walkway to the Beach Club Resort or wait for a ferry at HS to take us there. The only good thing about our decision to get on another park bus from Epcot was that the distance between the two parks is close and we were at HS in a few minutes.
Now off the bus we had to decide if we wanted to walk the path or wait for a ferry. We happened to notice that there was a ferry docked at this very moment and there were not a lot of people in line so we booked it to the ferry. My family has ran to catch Disney transportation on many occasions because we know that if you don't get on you are looking at a 20 minute wait for the next one. This being said even though we did make it to the dock before the boat departed unfortunately the reason the line looked short is because they had already been boarding and there were a lot of people already on the boat. Since we were already in line and now very out of breath we opted to just stay where we were and wait for the next ferry. No worries. 20 minutes right?

This was our view while waiting for the ferry. It was now 8:00pm and we were patiently waiting for the next ferry. More people began to get in line behind us and pretty soon the line was backed up a good distance. I dont recall exactly how long it took the next ferry to get there but it seemed like an eternity! Finally a boat pulled in and we were off.

By the time our boat docked at the Yacht Club the time was now 9:00pm. That was a fun hour&..

We found our way to the beach club and then the restaurant and put our name on the wait list. They informed us the wait would be about an hour and at this point I really did not even care. I knew that we would probably have to wait a good while and after all we had been through to get here I was not about to leave and go somewhere else. We were still not too hungry from the abundance of food we had ordered from lunch anyways so waiting would maybe help out with that.

We passed the time by taking pictures first. Then the kids played a few games in the arcade which was conveniently right next door. DFIL passed the time by having a conversation with one of the hostesses as they talked about her Disney College Program. At this point his talking to people was still kind of fun to watch and not causing issues. At 9:30pm our pager went off. I am not sure if other people decided not to wait and left essentially bumping us up on the list or what but I was not going to question it. We were in and that was all that mattered!

I was so super excited to be eating here. I have had this on my Disney bucket list for quite some time but since we have been on the DDP this place did not make the list. But seeing how we were not on the DDP until tomorrow and paying OOP for dinner well&&it just seemed like the thing to do!

We were taken to a large booth which I was so happy to be sitting in. The kids took to coloring on there menus while we looked the menu over. I also went to taking pictures of my surroundings and once again was taken by the details that Disney puts into everything.


With our orders now put in I went to the task of trying to update our fp+ selections for the next day since we would be getting to the park earlier due to our early arrival.

See how happy I am to be on MDE? This would be the only time this week that I would be smiling while on My Disney Experience. I was somehow able this one time to tweak our passes with little or no problems from the webpage.
Soon enough our food was ready and brought to the table. The kids both went with a hot dog meal from the kids menu

DH and I still not being very hungry and also wanting dessert decided to split the Angus Beef Burger with fries. The in laws chose to do the same

The food hit the spot and was pretty good. I would definitely eat here again. Now for the whole reason that anyone would wait this long to eat here&the desserts! The kids went with a Mickey Mouse sundae with their choice of ice cream flavor. My kiddos went with good old vanilla and chocolate.

The in laws decided to spit the Fudge Mud Slide and DH and I spit the ever famous No Way Jose

This was so good&nom nom nom! With the ice cream mostly eaten (except for DS because he does not care too much for ice cream) it was time to pay our tab. We noticed that they had charged us an extra $2 for each of the kids ice cream sundaes which I was pretty certain was included with their meal , but decided not to make a big deal out of the $4 and paid the bill, especially since they allowed our DS who is 12 yrs old to eat off the kids menu without making a fuss. Our total for this meal was $78.06 OOP. We headed out but I had once more stop I wanted to make before we caught a bus back to the resort. Would my seemingly patient family hold on just a little longer for my detour, especially after sending us on a wild goose chase? You will have to wait and see&..

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[AlohaAnnie]

Hi

following along.


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[thornton0511]

Such a fun TR already! So glad the airlines worked with you and that you avoided delays on your original travel day. 10 days at Disney during Christmas time - lucky you!!

I wouldn't have known how to get to the Beach Club resort from POP without actually having to use a park ticket to get into Epcot or than traveling to HS and using the ferry or walk there. We've only stayed at BWV so it would have been hard to know how to get to POP but you had the right idea I think. I didn't know that Beaches & Cream didn't take advance reservations so I learned something from you - thanks!! I hope you got to eat there at least sometime during your trip!

Thank you! Yes we felt very fortunate to have everything work out the way it did and be able to get there early. It can be hard to navigate how to get to places in the World when relying on Disney transportation but we love it! It's my understanding that you can now make ADR's for Beaches and Cream however this change was made recently and at the time of our trip it was not, nor had it been, the case.

Joining in

I hate travel day just because of the sleep depravation as an outcome!
That food at T-Rex looked good, but a lot of it!
You are correct no ADR is needed for Beaches and Creams, you should have told that arrogant CM that he was wrong!

Can't wait to hear about your stay at AKL!

Yes this first day was tough sleep wise!
I really had forgotten how big the portion sizes are lol!
Ha! I really hate conflict and I do not by any means try to make it out like I know everything there is to know about WDW but this guy just kept on and on and I have a hard time not correcting people when I know they are misinformed.

Hi Jenn, just found your TR today.

Your story leading up to departure day was quite riveting. I was actually in Disney around that time and remember hearing about the weather around the U.S. being just in a deep freeze EXCEPT for Florida, which was hot and sunny. It was crazy!!!

Haha, your father in law sounds a lot like me. I love talking to people, and often will get a photo too.

You'll get no argument from me staying at POP. I love me some POP. It's also the first and only Disney resort I've stayed at, so it does have sentimental value.

Ahh my future bride Stacey. Turning on the Must Dos is absolutely a must do.

Obviously you already know that you are correct in not needing a ressie for Beaches & Cream and in fact couldn't make one if you wanted to (at that time). Sorry Mr. CM, you were wrong.

Hi there and welcome! Yeah that winter storm was something. We thought it was funny and strange that Florida seemed to be the only state not affected at all by the storm...weird. My father in law is a hoot and we really enjoyed having my husbands parents join us this year but he would literally get talking to anyone at anytime and we would have to pull him away in some cases (not to spoil the story though). We loved our one night at the Pop and could see staying there again....me and the kids think Stacey is pretty awesome and so funny! My husband doesn't get it though . The misinformed CM just really threw me for a loop and I think the combination of no sleep and frustration of getting there just made him in the wrong place at the wrong time lol!

Hi

following along.


.

Hello there and welcome so happy to have you following along!

 

[thornton0511]

Detour to Yacht Club

After we had left Beaches and Cream I wanted to make one quick little detour before heading back. The Yacht Club is on my bucket list for resorts I want to someday stay at, and being so close I really wanted to go in and see it for myself. The family agreed and we headed in that direction. This place is so incredibly beautiful!

We walked around for a bit exploring the lobby area and the kids really enjoyed the holiday train set they had.

After taking a few pics DH decided that it was time for us to go and tried his best to drag me out of the lobby so we could get back to the resort and get some sleep. It was well after 10:30pm and I knew he was right. Today had been a great start to our trip and to think we were not even supposed to be here until tomorrow morning made it all the better. We eventually found our way back to Pop and unlike the night before I had no issue whatsoever getting to sleep this night…I promise!

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[DisneyKid4Life]

I so wanted to do Beaches & Cream last time, but when I got there the wait was just too long and I was just too hungry. I ended up at Hurricane Hannas kinda nearby, and I have to say it was awesome. Beaches is still on my personal bucket list though...
I swear the more I cross off, I add twice as much. Oh well, means more trip, right?

I've been to Disney dozens of times, and yet I only just saw the Yacht Club. Well, at least the inside. Scandelous. That's one goal I have is to stay in an Epcot resort.

There's really nothing quite like a bonus Disney day.

 

[thornton0511]

It's an Animal Kingdom Kind of Day

Today was Friday December 6th. We woke up fairly early because we wanted to take advantage of the fact that we were still several hours ahead of our original schedule. We wanted to try to make rope drop at Animal Kingdom but it was 9:00 right now so that was not going to happen.
While the kids ate cereal bars, that I had packed, for breakfast I got ready and made sure we had everything packed and ready to be moved to our new resort. Today we would be moving over to a DVC studio room at AKL. Once we were all ready we called and had our bags picked up to be transferred along with a tip. I love the convenience of Disney. We were happy and headed out the door when….

We broke the Mickey Scanner! It just fell off the door! So we just….popped…it ….back….on and went along our merry way to the lobby to checkout. Once we were checked out I was really wanting to make sure our new Mickey Bands were active and working. This is a new technology for me and my thinking was that they were "turned on" automatically and we could go straight to the park without first checking in to AKL. I had linked our bands with our tickets and checked in online at the 60 day mark….but I wanted to be sure before we arrived at AK only to be turned away and told to go to the resort. No wild goose chases today please. This request seemed to puzzle the CM's at registration and I was told to go and ask the concierge. Okay. So I walked down to the line for the concierge. The CM there seemed confused somewhat by my request also and kept telling me that I would need to check with AKL since I was checked out of POP. I was just wanting someone to scan one of our bands with their Mickey things and tell me if they were on or whatever. I know that this new system is confusing for everyone and decided that we would just stick with the plan and hope for the best.

Soon we were on a bus and headed to Animal Kingdom!

We arrived at 10:15am still a few hours ahead of schedule. Now our original plan had us getting to a park around noon and so I figured that AK was the best park for that arrival time. It was also a recommended park for the day and Disney had recently extended the hours from 5pm to 7pm. Score! I had booked our FP+ as soon as it became available (I think in November sometime?) and had us down for:
Kilomanjaro Safari 12:35 - 1:35
Expedition Everest 2:00 - 3:00
Dinosaur 3:55 - 4:55
Now as we all know I had gone back the night before to rearrange a few of these since we would be getting to the park before noon. Being the great trip reporter I was aiming to be I did not write down anywhere what the new ones were. No matter though because as the day went on well….we will get to that in a bit. So here was the moment of truth. Would our bands let us into the park or would we have to turn around and go to the resort first…….
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[thornton0511]

A Green Mickey is a Happy Mickey
So when I left off it was 10:15am and we had just arrived at AK and were about to attempt to enter the parks with our magic bands for the first time without checking into the resort first (since I had already checked in online and linked our tickets and dining). DS Cory was up first and was instructed to touch Mickey to Mickey the little white light went around and around and then…..

It turned green….hooray we were in! Goodness that was a relief. Once inside the gates we headed to the right and through the oasis. Poor oasis does anyone ever stop here for more than a few seconds. I really do hope that on our next trip we can make time to fully enjoy this part of Animal Kingdom. It is really pretty. We stopped only to get a few photos and then we were off again.

Our first stop was Dinoland!

Every time we visit AK we always head to Africa first to do Kilomanjaro. Not this time! Since it seemed always a tradition at MK in the old days to ride Dumbo first and foremost we decided to keep with that tradition and make our first official WDW ride the dino dumbo, as my DD would call it. So Triceratop Spin it was! It was also a walk on seeing how no one was in dinoland at this time in the morning.

It was a really fun ride to start off with and everyone seemed to enjoy the little dinos.

Now a little after 10:30am and we headed over to Primeval Whirl.

This too was a walk on. Last year this ride was a first for us…well two of us anyways. Sydney was not quite tall enough yet and my DH has a fear of what spinning rides will do to him for the rest of the day (bad experience with Harry Potter years ago that kept him dizzy and nauseous for hours) and this ride looked like spinning tea cups on a track so he sat out with DD while DS and I rode. One of my favorites for sure! Well this year DD was tall enough but still not sure about getting on. She does not like surprises and it takes a while for her to feel comfortable with things. So DH once again not feeling it sat out while DS, me, and the in laws hopped on. We laughed the whole way! I had never seen my husband's parent s have so much fun screaming and laughing. It was a priceless moment for sure. After we got off and DH saw how much his parents enjoyed it I think he was starting to second guess not riding it. At first his thinking was well maybe later in the week, to which I responded with "what if you end up waiting and ride it on say the last day and have so much fun that you regret not getting on it the first day and missed out all week?" That was all he needed to hear.

I sat out with DD while the other four walked back on the ride….and guess what? He loved it and it did not make him sick! Yay for new experiences! So moving on, after we had been whipped around a bit we made our way over to my DH most favorite ride….DINOSAUR!
I don't know why he loves this ride so much. I think that it's about the scariest and loudest ride I have ever been on….other than Alien Encounter at MK in the 90's which just about made me pee my pants when I was 14 lol! Anyways sorry but I have to flashback a bit for DINOSAUR,
When I was planning our first trip for May 2011 this ride was one of the few that I just could not get a good grasp of what exactly it was. All of the videos on you tube were dark and most reviews stated how scary it was for adults and children alike. I just could not imagine what could be so scary….it's Disney after all! So when we were in line for the first time I told DH I really did not know what to expect but it was not a rollercoaster and it had animatronic dinosaurs….why not put our timid unsure children on it. They were 5 and 9 at the time. All I can say is wow! I never felt so bad for our screaming kids but at the same time could not stop laughing through the whole experience. We had no idea. The funny thing is that afterward they wanted to do it again. So we did. Over and over. It was the strangest thing. And when we asked our then 5 year old DD what she liked best….the beginning when the one dinosaur is eating the smaller one. My child can be so bizarre sometimes. To this day it is a family favorite even though it scares us half to death every time.
Needless to say we were more than happy to share this ride with my husband's parents lol. We did tell them what to expect for the most part and they really did seem to enjoy it. Probably not as much as we do but we are weird like that.

You can see that my kids still do not look lol.So after the ride we walked through the gift shop that the ride spits you out into and I saw this

Seriously?! Come on you gotta admit that's funny. Because he's a T-Rex… and has stubby hands so he can't….oh well you hate it or love it!
Alright so here is where we were at a crossroad. I really was not 100% sold yet on this FP+ thing and we have always been a FP grabbing family. I just was not ready to quit yet. We did not have our KTTWC yet but since I had bought my tickets through Disney separately I still had my physical tickets with me just in case there was an issue with the bands. But they were linked to the bands so I was not sure if they would work or not. We needed to test them. So DH and I walked over to the FP machine for DINOSAUR and put our 6 tickets in one by one…..and they spit out 6 fastpasses. This was good news for us….don't judge me lol.

With FP in hand we met up with the rest of the group and proceed to head out of dinoland for now and to the tree of life. It was now 11:30am and we wanted to see a show with bugs!

It's tough to be a bug had a 5 min wait but by the time you walk all the way there….your wait time is up. We walked into the theatre and took our seats.

This was another one that DD was a little timid with last time we saw it and ended up in my lap the whole time. She braved the whole show in her own seat this time and I was very proud of her. I did not warn the in laws about the bugs under the seat at the end and that was fun. Ahhhh it never gets old either.
The time was now 12:00 and our FP window for DINOSAUR was open so we backtracked to dinoland once more to use our fastpasses.

After the ride we stopped to get a picture of the kids with their Nana and a dinosaur.

Apparently at 12:30 we were in the window for the first changed FP+ of the day which was Primeval Whirl. Not sure what we did in between that time though….bad trip reporter.
I remember using our bands to get on the ride and getting a green Mickey. One of us must have sat out with Sydney but my memory is a little foggy here. Sorry about that. I do know that after this we were getting hungry and the plan was to eat lunch at Flame Tree Barbecue. This is where we hit a snag in our plans…..yeah I am going to leave you hanging a bit on this one!
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[eangel12]

Looking forward to your review. My dream is a Disney Christmas trip and I think it is my husband's nightmare!! Can't wait to see your photos.

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

Haha, you're the second ones I know of that have broken the Mickey scanner. Very fragile apparently.

You sure do have a knack for finding CM's with no information.

So funny that the first thing I noticed was your Donald shirt. I met up with a DISer last trip and her daughter had the exact same shirt!!

OK, I absolutely miss Alien Encounter and always feel overjoyed when someone mentions it even though it did terrify you.

No judgement here on using legacy FP. It's gone now, so get it while you can!! Plus, the return times there aren't that far ahead, so it's not like you were taking them away from anybody. Obviously there were plenty available for the day.

 

[thornton0511]

I so wanted to do Beaches & Cream last time, but when I got there the wait was just too long and I was just too hungry. I ended up at Hurricane Hannas kinda nearby, and I have to say it was awesome. Beaches is still on my personal bucket list though...
I swear the more I cross off, I add twice as much. Oh well, means more trip, right?

I've been to Disney dozens of times, and yet I only just saw the Yacht Club. Well, at least the inside. Scandelous. That's one goal I have is to stay in an Epcot resort.

There's really nothing quite like a bonus Disney day.

Yes that is what is so great but so overwhelming about WDW is that there is so many things to do! You could take 100 trips and still find things that you haven't done I was glad to get to eat at Beaches and if we are ever there again and not on the dining plan we will definitely return!And someday I will stay at the Yacht Club.....someday

Looking forward to your review. My dream is a Disney Christmas trip and I think it is my husband's nightmare!! Can't wait to see your photos.

Ha! We actually went right in between Thanksgiving and Christmas and there seems to be a kind of sweet spot where the crowds are more moderate than anything. I could not imagine going during the holiday crowds! I need my space because I have a personal bubble that I don't like for people to get in lol! You should totally tell your husband to take you in early December when the decorations are up and no crowds! It's your dream after all

Haha, you're the second ones I know of that have broken the Mickey scanner. Very fragile apparently.

You sure do have a knack for finding CM's with no information.

So funny that the first thing I noticed was your Donald shirt. I met up with a DISer last trip and her daughter had the exact same shirt!!

OK, I absolutely miss Alien Encounter and always feel overjoyed when someone mentions it even though it did terrify you.

No judgement here on using legacy FP. It's gone now, so get it while you can!! Plus, the return times there aren't that far ahead, so it's not like you were taking them away from anybody. Obviously there were plenty available for the day.

that is funny with the door scanners falling off....they really must not be very durable lol.

The DISer daughter you met must be pretty cool because Donald is awesome obviously!

I do miss Alien Encounter. I refuse to go to Stitch's Great Escape because I am afraid it will only ruin the great scary memories I have of the original show!

It is going to be hard on future trips to not have the FP machines. That is part of what made Disney so great for us and we really just did not like the FP+ that much. Unless they REALLY work on MDE and get it to load faster and not glitch FP+ will remain a headache IMO.

BTW I just noticed that you are from Canada! I am so jealous! I would uproot our family in a second and move there if we could lol. Reading the Anne of Green Gables books and watching Avonlea as a kid I wanted to live on Prince Edward Island so bad! Texas is no Canada for sure

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

BTW I just noticed that you are from Canada! I am so jealous! I would uproot our family in a second and move there if we could lol. Reading the Anne of Green Gables books and watching Avonlea as a kid I wanted to live on Prince Edward Island so bad! Texas is no Canada for sure

Aww that's too funny and quite sweet too. You are most welcome to visit or move to Canada anytime you like. What's really funny is I went to Disney twice last year alone, yet I haven't been to Prince Edward Island in YEARS, even though it would only take a couple of hours to drive. But it is as gorgeous as it looks and I actually do hope to get over this summer. It's been far too long.