Johnson Family Summer Vacation - COMPLETE -Days 1-16- PICS FIXED!!

[marciemi]

Okay – Day 5 begins at MGM. If you’re one of those people who only want to read about wonderful, glowing, carefree Disney days, you might want to skip this segment! Really, it was nothing that was Disney’s fault, but I think by this point we’d done too many days in a row and it was starting to get hotter, the kids (and us!) were getting more tired, and, as a result – cranky!

We still arrived bright and early. Not doing so was not an option in our family, despite the teens lack of enthusiasm! We had time to get some pics of the kids – back in our fluorescent yellow again!

Although we were first in line at the turnstiles, we had some completely clueless CM’s at both our turnstile, and the one next to it. An older husband/wife team who seemed more focused on socializing with one another than actually doing their job. Okay, it was cute before the park was open, but when other turnstiles were letting lots of folks through and we were standing there while they tried to figure out how to make theirs work (which should have been done long before that), it was extremely frustrating. Even though we were there early, we ended up getting into the park after a very large number of other folks, and had to do our best to work our way towards the front once inside.

We decided it would be easier to have just Royce get ahead and wind his way through to the ToT FP machine, and the rest of us would not fight the crowds and just head right to RNR and hopefully he’d meet us right as we got there. This part worked fine – not as many folks going to ToT, so when the rope dropped he got to the front and got FP’s immediately. We got to RNR as he approached us and we all jumped in the line and rode fairly quickly. Doing great!

We then ran over to ride ToT (we’d wanted to do this twice). By this point (I’m guessing 9:20 or so), there was already a 20 minute posted wait – which it definitely was. Here is where we started encountering our first experiences with “line cutting”. There was an actual line. This wasn’t outside the queue area. And yet there seemed to be a lot of folks who hadn’t gotten the message that “the line starts in the rear!” All the “I’m joining some folks who are already in line” people. At first I ignored it, but after a couple, was more like “no, they need to join you back HERE!” Of course this didn’t work because it was a fairly open queue (in the outdoors part) and they could just jump the railing and cut over to their group. Again sort of annoying.

Once we got inside (finally – where it was a bit cooler!), we ended up talking with several other folks – many of whom hadn’t been on the ride before. We waited and finally got onto an elevator with them (they were quite nervous!). Briefing, safety belts on, close the doors, and...what’s this? Open the doors again? Sorry – your elevator is broken! Wait – isn’t it supposed to be? Other folks asking us if they always do this and we’re like “um, no, they don’t usually make you get back off the elevator!”

Take us all off and put us back in the area where you line up for your elevator. Takes them a few minutes (while several other elevators load and go) to determine this elevator’s not going anywhere. Finally move us to another elevator in front of other folks. We ride and get out of there, but by now the damage is done. We at least grab RNR FP’s for later (since we’re well in the window for our first set by this point) and head out.

Our next goal was the Great Movie Ride. I was hoping to be here by 9:30 or so and that it would be a walkon. Well, it was after 10 by now and the posted wait time was 45 minutes. We really wanted to do this, and it doesn’t have FP, so we decided we had to do it now. This wasn’t a fun wait and this was when we started to determine that in our book at least, MGM was much hotter and more miserable than Animal Kingdom. I’d never waited in lines here before and never been here when it was this hot before and didn’t realize or remember that so many of the lines were outdoors. One thing that frustrated me was that after waiting for probably 30 of the 45 minutes out in the heat and sun, when we then got into the theater area where you watch the clips before loading, that they only had about 3 of the queue lines in there not roped off. They could have at least had you inside the air-conditioning for a much longer part of the line. Anyways, DS amused himself by playing with a flower he found:

Sorry these aren’t great pics – we really didn’t take that many this day because we were just SO hot and miserable. Finally got to ride (the line was only 37 minutes by my watch, not 45 luckily), so it was after 11 by the time we got out. We wanted to see the first LMA at 11:50 and were trying to debate if we’d have enough time to squeeze Muppetvision in beforehand. We ran there, and they were just finishing allowing folks into the preshow area so we quickly joined the end of the line. Ran into another DIS’er who recognized my lime green Baggallini and said hi! Quickly got into the theater and were out by 11:30 or so.

We headed to LMA, grabbing Star Tours FP’s along the way, and watched the show there. It was quite hot in the theater, but the weather was beginning to get really threatening. They announced that the show might not go or might be cut short because of the weather, but we were high enough up to be covered so we waited it out. It did start sprinkling during the show, and we think they cut some out because it wasn’t as long of a show as I’d read. But plenty long enough for me! I think Royce and the boys really enjoyed the show, but it wasn’t a must do in my book!

Well, by the time we left, it was definitely storming. Not as bad as other days, but at least a bit. We ran right to the Backlot Tour, but after waiting inside a bit, they told us that it would be delayed indefinitely due to the weather. Well, since we were in our window for Star Tours already, we decided to go there and ride. This wasn’t on our list of “must do’s” either, but there aren’t that many FP rides in this park, and hey – it would be indoors!

We headed there and got in the FP line and this was great! 60 minute wait in the regular line and we got to walk right past all of them and onto the next car! Even though I wasn’t that excited to do this ride, this made it all worthwhile! A lot of places I felt that the FP didn’t save us all that much time, but here it was definitely a fun plus! We rode, and headed back out. By this time the sun was breaking back out and we decided to check Backlot Tour one more time. Although it hadn’t opened yet, the CM there kind of tactfully told us he thought it would any minute and sure enough – about 30 seconds later they opened the line. We enjoyed the preshow part of this, and then boarded the tram for the Catastrophe Canyon part:

Well, we ended up in the first row of a car – behind the completely glassed in part in front of us. All I can say at this point is that it was HOT! There was no breeze, we were packed in, the sun was out but because of the water everywhere, it just felt like being in a steam room. I haven’t been this miserable lately. Just couldn’t wait to get out of there.

When we finally did, the weather was getting ominous again. We decided to go back, use our RNR and ToT FP’s quickly, and get out! Well, again, we got to RNR, on quickly, no problems. And again – went to ToT – this time in the FP line, and encountered the same thing. Apparently you don’t have to wait in line for ToT? It’s okay to just cut ahead of everyone there.

The FP line was fairly long too, and a group of about 4 folks cut ahead of us. Again, I ignore it the first time, but reach the confrontation point at some point. The next 2 people who tried to go ahead of us, I tactfully pointed out that this was a line, and they needed to wait. They said they were with the group ahead of them (the first 4). I said no, they’d cut ahead of us too. They insisted they were joining 2 others up ahead in line. I again insisted that they all should come back together in line. The bizarre thing was that this entire group was British – who I’ve never experienced any trouble with at any time, and from what I’d read on the boards, thought were the most respectful of lines.

At this point the group in front of us (about 8 people) who hadn’t been involved in the conversation at all, told us to let the last couple people ahead to their group and they’d let us go ahead of their group. I was frustrated more by this point because my annoyance was less with the fact of having 2 more people in front of us than in have 6 folks just decide it was okay for them to go ahead of everyone. I explained to the new group that it wasn’t fair to them and that I wasn’t trying to get ahead of anyone. But they insisted – the last line cutters joined their group and we were put ahead of the other group. Just so confusing and frustrating!

But we rode this time without a problem and decided that if we didn’t leave soon we’d either melt or strangle the next person that tried to cut in front of us! As we started walking to the gate, the rain started. Decided to skip the trams and sprint to the car – go there as the rain began in earnest. It was just completely pouring by this point. DH pulled out quickly and we headed back to the house.

As we’re driving, he starts pointing out that the car sounds funny, but convinces himself it’s probably because it’s raining so hard. We drive all the way off Disney property and onto the road leading down to Emerald Island off of 192. A car passing us waves at us and points at our tire – great! DH pulls over into a parking lot, still in the heavy rain, to discover that as he pulled out of our parking place at MGM, he ran over a nose cone, which is now jammed up inside the wheel well of the SUV! He literally spends a few minutes getting it out in the rain, while maneuvering the car back and forth to loosen it! We left the nose cone there, but went back later to get a pic of him with it!

At this point, we just collapsed at home. Ate some lunch and just relaxed. By around 4, the rain had let up, and we thought it would be a great day to head over to Blizzard Beach since hopefully the storms would have scared folks off, but it was still quite warm, although not sunny. We called the Disney information number and clicked through the options only to talk to someone who told us that BB was closed due to the weather.

We decided to wait a bit and try again. Called about 4:30, then around 5, then around 5:30 – each time being told it was closed. Since it hadn’t been storming for several hours by this point, this seemed strange to us. Finally, when we tried calling back by 6 (and we’d just finally given up and let the kids go in the pool), and were still told it was closed, we asked for a direct number to BB. Called it, and found out that they’d actually been open since around 3! AAUUGGHH! For anyone who wants it after all our troubles – the direct number was 407-560-7646.

Debated whether it was still worth going, but since we knew we’d have more waterpark options than we’d end up using, we ran over there. Well, this is the way to do it folks! After the storms, apparently it just clears out, especially on a Tuesday, especially as closing nears. No sun to worry about, no crowds, warm enough to be comfortable. We rode every single slide, including Summit Plummet twice (except Slush Gusher because no one wanted to). Did the lazy river, played in the wave pool and the pre-teen play area. Summit Plummet was about a 2 minute wait, none anywhere else unless the tubes/mats got backed up. We just had a great time. Probably did more in those 90 minutes than you'd do all day on say Saturday! Awesome! We stayed until they announced the park was closed. A couple more of the “now and then” pics for you guys from 1998 and 2007 of youngest DS & I on the family raft ride:

1998 (DS age 3 then) – okay, we both look scared!:

2007 (DS age 12 now):

Okay – I think he’s changed more than I have, don’t you agree? Anyways, we headed back to the house to try to get some sleep before yet another early morning the following day!

 

[loribell]

Yeah I would say that by this time you were all pretty pooped! I do totally agree though about the line thing. It just boggles my mind that they will send one or two people into a line and then several minutes later have the rest of the party join them. They all need to wait until the entire party is there to enter the line.

 

[marciemi]

Day 6 complete the first “Phase” of our trip. We’d broken the trip down into 3 phases. The first phase was the “Park Intensive” phase – 5 days of parks in a row, including all 4 parks, a waterpark, and 2 days at the MK. It got easier from here on out. Phase two was the primarily Universal phase and phase 3 was more of a “hitting the highlights again” phase, but we’ll get to those later.

On our fifth straight day of park touring, it was good that we were going back to the MK. Without a doubt, this is my favorite park. For whatever reason, the MK is all that is magical about Disney to me. When we went to Universal this time, I had a lot of people ask me if it compared to Disney. My response was that it did – I’d put it online with say Epcot. I enjoy all the other parks at Disney (including California’s Adventure), but none of them can even compare with the Magic Kingdom or Disneyland itself. I don’t know if it’s because I first went there when I was 12 (although I went to Epcot at 16) or if it’s something more, but every other park (including the other Disney and Universal ones) seem just like more of a basic theme park to me – obviously a step up from say Six Flags, but just don’t have the true magic of the MK.

And after our day at MGM yesterday, we were ready for some magic. We decided our goals for today were Tomorrowland and Toontown, including all the small attractions, and meeting a TGM’er (Kristy) for lunch at Columbia Harbour House. The golfers in our party had reservations at the Palm at 3:30, so we knew we’d have to be leaving the MK by around 2:30.

We again got there early and after entering the turnstiles and waiting at the rope near the train station had Kristy and family come up and join us. We had a brief chance to socialize before the morning countdown and determined that she was sprinting to Space Mountain to get FP’s as well. We ran together to the next rope in the Tomorrowland Noodle restaurant near Space.

We then did the typical Space Mountain Dash. Royce sprinted ahead, and once he found a FP machine that worked (lots of trouble with them this morning), came and found us at the entrance where we joined the line together. We rode quickly and headed to Buzz Lightyear. Rode this the first time with absolutely no wait and found one of the 100,000 point targets, which would help us throughout the trip. Rode it a second time with only a very minimal wait, but when we tried to run back for the third time, the line was already posted at 20 minutes. Decided it was time to move on! Oh, incidentally, Eric and I had very competitive scores. On our second time through, he’d gotten 394,600 and I’d gotten 395,000 – pretty close!

We went over to the tea cups next. Did another “then and now” shot for you guys:

1998:

2007:

After the teacups, we saw Alice and the Mad Hatter, and of course had to stop and get a pic with them as well:

Compare this with 1997:

Although it was only about 9:45, I’d read on the boards that sometimes Toontown opens early so we headed there next. Sure enough, it was already open. We decided to go try to catch Mickey at home first, and luckily enough, were successful. We were treated like old friends:

Then we got the formal shot for another then and now moment:

1997:

2007:

We left Mickey and decided to hit the Barnstormer next. Again there was no line, but apparently this ride wasn’t all that thrilling to us big coaster fans, since 2 of us couldn’t keep our eyes open for the picture:

We now decided to go do everything we hadn’t in Tomorrowland. There were still fairly short rides for the Speedway and Astro Orbiters, but since it was so hot, no one even wanted to be out in the sun for long enough to actually ride them, let alone wait in any lines. So we grabbed a FP for Buzz, then waited probably about 10 minutes for the Monster’s Inc. show. It was really hot and crowded inside (we weren’t in a queue, just a gaggle inside the holding area), but the kids at least were able to amuse themselves by texting jokes for the show. We went in and enjoyed the show and Matt’s joke was one of the ones they chose!

Next we did Stitch – okay, I know, big mistake, but DH hadn’t seen it on our last trip, and the kids hadn’t thought it was “that” bad. Again, it wasn’t particularly impressive – I’d take the original Mission to Mars over this any day – but for 3 teen/pre-teen boys, it wasn’t horrible.

This seemed like a good time to go see the Carousel of Progress and relax in the A/C for a bit. We really enjoy this ride, but Royce and I miss the old song (“Now is the time, now is the best time, now is the best time of your life!”). I know this is the original, but that was the one I remember the best. We then hit the TTA and got some pics of one another, which you can compare to ours from 2000 (first pics from that trip):

By now it was time to go battle Emperor Zurg again, so we stopped in there with our FP’s and afterwards got a pic of the boys with him, to complement the one we’d taken in 2005:

2007:

2005:

Then we went back with our Space FP and rode here as well. Another ride in which half the fun is walking past everyone with your FP! After we were done here it was a little after noon. We were meeting Kristy at 1pm, so we decided to shop a bit. Got some pins, decided which t-shirts we wanted to buy later and looked at photo albums. But we still had time, so decided catching the Hall of Presidents at 12:30 would put us out right in the right area for CHH.

I hadn’t seen this show since 2000, and I guess forgot it actually had a “show” component – I’d only remembered the role call at the end. The kids weren’t ecstatic to see this, but still ranked it higher than Country Bears. During the last couple minutes of the show, Kristy called. As soon as the show ended, Royce called her back and they were already at CHH. We arrived a minute or so later.

She’d already sent her kids upstairs to procure tables for all of us. We found out what our kids wanted to eat, and sent them up to join Kristy’s kids. Then all the adults got in line to purchase the food. Meanwhile, Matt comes down and joins us. I ask him why he’s not upstairs. He points out that none of the adults are up there. I explain, that yes, we’re all buying the food, and tell him to go talk to the kids. He says (scornfully, as only a “mature” 15 year old can), “I don’t speak ‘kid’”!

We all get our food and move upstairs. This is a great place to meet anyone. We easily had room for all 9 of us, and since we were in a corner of the upstairs, hardly anyone came over into the area at all. It was nice and quiet and a great place to talk. We even had a hard time finding someone to take a pic of all of us afterwards:

Well, unfortunately 2:30 rolled around pretty quickly. We needed to head out for golf so said goodbye to Kristy, Jeff, and the crew! Got out to the car easily and then needed to find the Palm, which required stopping CM’s several times and asking for help. Yes, I know it’s “right there” by the MK, but getting out of the parking lot on the right road proved to be a challenge. Finally found it and got them there and dropped off.

Matt doing what he did best during the trip – texting his girlfriend:

Eric actually golfing:

Well, here’s where we encountered our first challenge. Anyone who’s tried calling Disney knows that if you call 3 different times, you’ll get 3 different answers. Well, this was our experience with the golf. Royce was golfing with Eric and Matt. We weren’t sure how this would work out since the Disney courses require a cart, but Matt’s only 15. The first time I called, I was assured that it was no problem for him to drive a cart at 15 – “they do it all the time”.

When I called and actually made the reservations, I got a different story. You had to be 16 to drive a cart, with a Drivers’ License (usually the case around here). However, this was DISNEY – of course they’d pair you up and Matt would just ride with whoever made the 4th in their foursome. No problem.

Well, when we actually arrived, they didn’t have a fourth. And they insisted that he wasn’t allowed to drive the cart. A bit frustrating in the main (admin) area where they had us pay, but couldn’t even guarantee he’d be allowed to play. And in the meantime, the weather was getting more ominous (probably why they didn’t have a fourth!) and they just wanted to get out there. Finally, they sent them out to the starter to deal with the situation, who luckily was of the first camp “oh, he’s fine driving”.

So we left them and drove back to the house – not having any idea how much they’d be able to get in before the storms hit in earnest. Stephen and I decided when we got back to try the mountain bikes provided in the gameroom of our house, and bike up to the Emerald Island Clubhouse to use the pool/hot tub there.

Well, we quickly found out that the mountain bikes pretty much didn’t work at all. We couldn’t find any that had brakes that worked and the chains didn’t seem inclined to remain on the bike. However, since it was downhill to the clubhouse, we decided to do our best and glide downhill. Once we got there, we went in and swam, but quickly decided our pool at the house was nicer. We did warm up in the hot tub for a few minutes (we hadn’t had the one at the house heated), but it really wasn’t necessary in the heat of the day!

By now it was beginning to rain in earnest so we decided to head back. As you can imagine, riding uphill on bikes without brakes, that the chain/gears kept slipping on, was quite an experience. Ended up walking much of the way. Right as we got back to the house, Royce called and said they were on the 6th hole, but stopped because of lightning and were sitting out in a course building. This was surprising to us because although it was raining where we were (about 20 minutes away), there was no sign of lightning or thunder.

We kicked back and relaxed awhile. We debated going out for dinner, but about the time we kind of got motivated, it started storming like crazy – lightning/thunder – the whole works. So we decided to just eat at the house. Meanwhile, Royce called back and said they were now playing again and had just finished the front 9. I was amazed that they could be having such different weather than us being so close.

They again called later – by this point it was nearing dusk and, although it was no longer lightning & thundering, the rain never let up. They’d completed 14 holes, but were getting cold, hungry, dark, and tired of losing balls! So they told us to come get them. We headed out – stupidly deciding this time to use the Mapquest directions of a “back” way to the golf course – going up the new toll road and cutting across, rather than going the way we’d gone up to the MK each time so far. Well, we drove back and forth along this road, trying to find the exit Mapquest recommended, which apparently didn’t exist (and spending $2.50 in the process!). We finally ended up getting back on 192 and heading over to World Drive the old-fashioned way!

As you can imagine, when we arrived nearly an hour later in the dark, they were a bit annoyed with us, but happy to see us finally! We all headed back to the house to get them into some dry clothes and fed!

The wet, motley crew:

They did have fun, and Matt especially enjoyed the driving experience. Also, the carts were equipped with GPS that gave you all the info about each hole, which they’d never seen anything like before:

And thus ended another exhausting day!

 

[RVGal]

Okay, where did my previous reply go??? I swear I posted before. Maybe I did the preview thing instead? Sigh. I hate that. I'm sure I said something profound.

Anyway...

I'm enjoying the reports. The mini daily ones were fun, but these really take us there.

 

[marciemi]

Okay – we’ve done parks 5 days in a row – hitting ropedrop each day. So it should be time for a break, right? Well, that’s originally what this day was planned as. However, it then became designated as a surfing day. And unfortunately, during the summer, surfing at Typhoon Lagoon means being there by 5:45am! Which means in our case getting up at 4:45am to get some food, dressed, and over there! As you can see, we look bright-eyed and bushy-tailed:

Without a doubt, this was the number one highlight of our 15 day trip! The whole experience was just awesome! Our entire class of 13 people was kids between the ages of 12 and 16 (including our DS's - 12 and 15, Stephen opted to be our photographer because he didn't want to do it), Royce and myself. All the kids had parents along watching and filming, but not participating. Add in the fact that all the instructors were probably early 20's, and yes, we felt old! But what made the class the coolest for me was that I was definitely one of the best at it! There was one 13 year old who was just a natural at it, but other than that I think I did the best which made it fun because I was sure I would not be hanging with these teens! At one point I asked Stephen if I was doing better than anyone else in our family, and his reply was “Surprisingly...yes!”

The way it worked was that there's a large wave followed by a small wave every 95 seconds. 2 people go at a time. There are "pros" in the water to help you get started. You go in, do a run, paddle back in position, and then do a second run. Then you paddle in and carry your board back to the start point and get in line again. There are two types of waves. First you start on the small waves, then when you master them, go on to the large waves. The first "big" wave comes first, and this is the actual "surfing" part. If you want, your pro will hold your board through that part and after the big wave goes through, it's followed by a smaller wave. This wave is much easier to stand up and get your balance on and a lot of people never went beyond this point and still had fun.

Riding the big wave is a lot different. As soon as the wave comes, you have to react and be up and standing in a matter of seconds, with your weight correctly distributed.

You probably get about 10 tries in all per person. I did 5 small waves and decided to move up to the larger waves. Wiped out the first time, but the next 4 managed to make it up and all the way in each time! Well, not completely because the kid I went with twice and I managed to crash into each other 2 of the times. Stephen taped it all with our camera!

Many of the folks never tried to do the large waves at all; both DS's managed to kind of get up on one, Royce never did. At the end, TL was open for EMH and there were all kinds of folks watching us which was neat because we finally had the hang of it by then. It was REALLY exhausting, though - not the surfing itself, but you did 2 runs at a time and after the first would have to paddle all the way back out and then after the second, paddle all the way into shore (you stopped a distance out because of the shallow water) and then carry your 10 foot (heavy) board all the way back to where you'd started.

In case you're wondering how much fun it was, we'd booked back up reservations for the following Tuesday, just in case we got weathered out today. Well, we decided to go back for a second time! Heck with the $140pp, heck with the 5am wakeup, we were doing it again! In case it's not clear, it was a lot of fun and I strongly recommend it!

Early morning paddling practice:

Land training – yep, it’s still dark:

Royce wiping out on a small wave:

And then succeeding:

Me having fun on a small wave:

And mastering a big wave:

Matt trying to keep his balance:

Eric “not” mastering a big wave:

And staying up while kneeling at least. I think the wall of water behind him here is pretty impressive:

And to give you an idea of the size of the boards:

Okay, after surfing, they incidentally didn't make us leave the park and scan back in. They said they would but never did. We stayed (knew we’d end up with water parks left over anyways) and it started raining steadily as soon as the surfing ended. We went and did Crush N Gusher (which we didn't think was that much different than many others we've done like that at Wisconsin Dells and Cedar Point) and then did Shark Reef twice which I thought was awesome as well. Rode the lazy river around and by then the kids were getting tired, hungry and cold so we got changed (still driving rain) and went to the car and McD's for replenishment.

We got to Disney Quest around 11:10 (opening at 11:30) hoping to do some of the bigger rides. Well, not sure if it was because of summer or the rain, but the line was literally around the building at that time! Probably didn't get scanned in until around 11:50 or so and by then most of the lines were huge. I took a pic of the ride board about an hour or so later with a couple line times around 75 minutes! Just crazy!

We went right to Cyberspace Mountain and waited about 20 minutes (as soon as we got in).

Can you tell the difference in the boys 2.5 years later? Cyberspace Mountain (Matt and Stephen) in 2005:

And in 2007:

Did Alien Encounter and waited about 15 minutes there. Then waited a good half hour for Buzz Lightyear (bumper cars). Gave up at this point and spent 15 minutes looking for a table to sit at while Royce got cheesecake. Hung at the table while the kids played the arcade type games.

We then waited a good half hour for the place where you make your own music CD's. My kids love doing this more than anything else here. Finally made them, waited in line to buy them, and then had to come back to pick them up. Left, started driving home, put one in the CD player, and...oops, it starts part way into the song. Turn around, drive back, no parking anywhere of course so Royce drops Eric (who'd made the song) and I off. We try to go in to find that DQ is at capacity and they're not letting anyone in. I go to the exit and explain our problem to a not-very-sympathetic employee who tells me to just go to the front of the line. I explain that the folks in line probably won't appreciate that but she says to anyways. I walk to the entrance, talk to a different CM who takes us to the front of the line and scans us in the entrance.

Go back to the place we bought it and the CM was very helpful there. Explains that happens a lot on the song he'd chosen and recommends doing a different song. Took us to the front of the line to do a new one, refunds our money, gives us the old CD (which worked other than missing the beginning) and makes him the CD of the new song for free! Pretty cool!

I just couldn’t believe the number of people in DQ, and the number of people still waiting to get in! Folks – some (evidently not obvious!) advice. If it’s at capacity – you’re not going to accomplish much when you do get in. If you’re there just for the games, or (as in my case!) the cheesecake, okay. Otherwise, it’s just not worth it!

As you can imagine, by this point we were exhausted. We worked our way back home and pretty much collapsed for the rest of the day. Made some dinner and called it an early night!

 

[marciemi]

Day 8 will be our last early morning before a break day – thank goodness! There bright and early again where we engaged in our normal pre-ropedrop routine – socializing with the CM’s and putting on suntan lotion:

We got in the park and once again saw Daniel (our favorite CM), waiting to escort the folks to Soarin’:

Here’s where it pays to be nice to the CM’s – Daniel gave Royce a set of FP’s for Soarin’ good any time that day! We decided rather than all of us rushing to Soarin’, that Royce would go ahead and get a set of FP’s, and I’d take the kids to guest relations. As I mentioned earlier, I’m hearing impaired. I’ve always used the reflective captioning at show with it at WDW, but never got a chance to get one of the handheld captioning devices that the maps always say they have. I’ve asked before, but you have to get them at guest relations INSIDE the park, and I’ve just never been willing to give up my early morning touring time to rush over there.

But today, we headed there and got one. You have to give them a $100 deposit, with a credit card. I was surprised to find out that they do immediately charge your card that $100. If you turn it back in, then they issue you a refund. I would have expected them to just hold the number in case you didn’t return it, but evidently not the case.

The device was fun, but definitely not up to date. It also didn’t work as well as it was supposed to – as you went in rides, it was supposed to turn on and follow automatically, but I found this only happened about half the time. Also, anything new hadn’t been updated – some rides it listed as having it were NOT on it, and others it had a different script – for example on the Land boat ride – it gave you a “sample tour” from when they used live tour guides, which only somewhat followed the recorded one now. In Ellen’s Energy adventure, it kept resetting back to the beginning. Oh, and it was supposed to work like a remote to turn on closed-captioning on any tv’s in the preshow areas (Soarin’, Mission Space, Test Track), but I never got that to work either.

However, it was fun to just play with. You could pull up any ride and scroll through all the captioning for the entire ride – you can imagine how detailed rides like Buzz Lightyear and It’s A Small World (“It’s a small world after all, it’s a small world after all – repeat over and over!) were! Jungle Cruise was funny because it gave a “sample” ride with “sample” jokes! If you’re interested in getting one, definitely do, but just expect to scroll through the captions yourself, not have it work perfectly for you! Anyways, the gadget:

It only took a couple minutes to get the device, and we all quickly rendezvous’d together at Test Track. The line looked long already, but I figured they were probably just starting and once they filled in the rooms, it would move quickly. No such luck. Not only didn’t the line move quickly, it didn’t move at all. After about 10 minutes, we started to suspect something was wrong. Waited another couple minutes and realized that they were no longer letting anyone into the line – uh, oh! We left the line and decided to get a FP later. It was probably about 9:25 by now, so we weren’t in our first FP window yet (9:45 for Soarin’), so we decided to work our way back there and use our free set from Daniel. Yes, I look thrilled, you can tell:

We rode Soarin’, and by now were in our window for the second time. We decided we needed to get a FP first, so sent Royce sprinting back to TT, while the kids and I rode the Land ride once again. I was surprised they enjoyed this ride so much, but they were pointing out all the differences between this ride and Monday’s (lemons had been picked, pumpkins harvested, etc.). Royce was back by the time we got off and we all rode Soarin’ with our other set of FP’s. Unfortunately, since TT was STILL down, evidently everyone was just getting FP’s for it and our return time wasn’t until 1:30pm.

We left the Land, and headed quickly to the Living Seas. Since we’d already done Turtle Talk on Monday, plus had plenty of time to explore the aquarium with the Aqua Tour, we really just wanted to see the Nemo ride. It was still pretty much a walk-on, and we enjoyed it, but it was more “cute” rather than “wow”. Unless I had a kid who was a huge Nemo fan, I probably wouldn’t wait more than 5-10 minutes for this. Also, one other quick warning. These “clammobiles” are NOT very big – they’re nowhere near the size of the “doommobiles” in HM or the old cars in Horizons. Each time we rode this, they put us 2 & 3 into cars, and trust me – 3 people (each time one adult, one teen, and a 12 year old), do NOT fit comfortably in the cars. We should have had one of us go alone. Coming out of here we ran into Kristy and family again, and got a group pic of all of us:

We then went and rode Imagination with the kids – just a nice, corny air-conditioned break from the parks! By now it was about 10:45. The next HISTA wasn’t until 11 and we didn’t want to just stand there. So we decided to head over to Norway to see Maelstrom – hopefully catching it right when it opened. We got there around 10:57 – perfect timing, or so we thought. But the ride didn’t end up opening until around 11:10, while we stood directly out in the sun just waiting. At least if we’d done HISTA first we would have been waiting inside!

We rode this and reconfirmed our belief that it certainly wasn’t a necessity. Walked back and decided to do Ellen’s Energy Adventure. This is a bit too long, but at least you don’t have a long pre-show if you time it well. My only frustration with the pre-show area of this ride is that there is seating for about half the people. Everyone else just sits down and gets comfortable on the floor and then they start yelling at you to stand up. There should either be no seats, or just put benches in the entire area so everyone can sit. I was on the floor and conveniently ignored their “admonitions” to get up, along with about a third of the audience! We finished up here around 12:15 and decided if we hurried we could get to the 12:30 HISTA and still have time to meet Kristy and family at Garden Grill at 1:10 for our ADR.

This turned out to almost not be right. We got there, and in before 12:30, but assumed it was the showtime, not the “allow people into the holding area” time, where we stood for a long time. Then when I figured it HAD to be time to go into the show area, they started the long preshow. Finally we went in and the theater was 100 percent full so it took forever to get everyone seated and moved ALL the way across the rows. By the time we got out of there, it was definitely after 1:00, and we ran over to GG and checked in just as Kristy arrived.

We had an awesome time there. We ate with Kristy (KristyInCO) & family and were all able to sit together at a table for 9 on the lower level with a great view of the scenery going by. The food was very good and the service was excellent. All the characters (Chip, Dale, Pluto, Mickey) came to the table at least twice during the slightly over an hour we were there. About the only downside were the kids from the table next to us who thought it was cool to race around the restaurant in the narrow aisle between the table and the rail (viewing the Land) on their Heely's (that the poor servers are navigating with the food). I was very tempted to go take a picture of their parents as an example of the types of completely self-absorbed idiots you see at Disney and post it for you guys! Anyways, the pics of us instead!

Our family with Mickey:

All of us with Mickey:

The boys with Mickey. Does Matt not look exceptionally tall or was this just a really short Mickey?

Being “muscular” with Chip:

Pluto sampling Eric for lunch:

Eric demonstrating his napkin-folding skills that he learned on our cruise 3 years ago by making a dead chicken:

The boys concocting some bizarre drink mixture containing ice cream, berries from the dessert, different beverages and crayons, and daring one another to try it:

We used our TT FP's together after lunch, then we did some shopping, went to Guest Relations to get our tickets replaced for the third time (they kept demagnetizing and not working in the machines). We snapped a pic of the “ball” with the crane over it:

We then did a bit more shopping (candy and postcards!) and headed back to the house and pool. First time we actually had sun in the afternoon at the pool - a hot sunny day with NO rain for once!

Around 7 we headed over to MGM for Fantasmic. Had one ticket replaced AGAIN when it didn't work (this seemed to happen to us once a day!). We got in line for Fantasmic around 7:20, and I'd guess they started letting folks in around 7:40. Used the waiting time to write all those postcards we’d been meaning to write all week:

Got a seat, but then checked into the reflective captioning and they had designated seats for it in the center section, but last 3 rows (ahead of the wheelchair seating row). So we had to move there, but those ended up being good seats in terms of view and getting out afterwards. We really didn't find this as intimidating as we'd expected - show ended around 9:30, I grabbed youngest DS's hand and told older 2 to hold onto DH and we walked quickly out once the lights came on. We were in our car by 9:40 and home before 10 so it wasn't as late as I'd feared it would be. The theater was completely full, however, and when we went out, there was already a huge line for the 10:30 show.

We got back to the house and decided to call it a week – we’re at the halfway point – 8 days down and 8 to go! We need a sleep in day tomorrow!

 

[marciemi]

Day 9 should be a much easier day to summarize. We let everyone sleep in (ourselves included!), although Eric was still up and around by 8 or so (he’s not a sleep-in kind of kid). It was nice not to have to rush anywhere and since the forecast for the next several days was just plain HOT (temps in the mid 90’s, with heat indices around 105), it didn’t take much to convince us to just hang out in the air-conditioned house and relax!

After eating a large and late breakfast, we were ready to head over to Universal. Royce and Stephen were going to see Blue Man Group since they’re the ones that enjoy this kind of stuff the most. We’d gotten them tickets early for the 3pm show (only on select Saturdays) and they were in the front row which they thought was excellent. They both really, really loved this show. Royce got called up on stage and got to be a part of it and they enjoyed being right up front by the action.

I didn’t go, so can’t give a lot of details. I do know that a lot of folks ask on the boards whether this show or Cirque is better. DH and DS (who saw both) felt that they really couldn’t be compared fairly since they were completely different shows. They thought BGM was just a blast – it was more like improv and just meant to be funny and a whole lot of fun. However, Cirque was more of a perfectly polished breath-taking show more meant to impress and be spell-binding. They thought both were excellent but completely different.

Anyways, some pics from the show, outside, and afterwards:

Meanwhile, Eric couldn’t come up with any motivation to go anywhere. Eric had started the Harry Potter books on the trip. We’d brought book one along, which he quickly finished and had managed to find book 2, which he also read quickly (Eric is not normally a fast or enthusiastic reader) and 3 at Wal-Mart. While we were out today, our goal was to find a bookstore to get book 4 for him, but he just wanted to stay home, read, and take it easy. So we left him with a cell phone and checked in with him every hour or so.

I talked Matt into coming with me to check out Universal while the others were at BMG. As I’d mentioned, it had been over a decade since our last visit here and we just wanted to get a feel for the layout and see what there was to do. We’d ordered our tickets online, and wanted to make sure we could pick them up today (7 day ones) so we wouldn’t have to worry about it early the next morning.

We got there and got our tickets without a problem, but once we entered IOA it was just plain HOT. Just miserably hot. We walked around the park, literally stopping about 5 times in a fast-food restaurant to just sit down, share a drink, and enjoy the air-conditioning! We checked out any water rides we passed, but they all had about 90 minute waits and we wouldn’t have FOTL until the next morning when we checked into Royal Pacific. Overall, this was a pretty miserable time for both of us.

We then went over to Universal itself and tried to walk around a bit, but were even less motivated. Decided to relax with milkshakes and just not even try. We were supposed to meet Royce and Stephen at Margaritaville around 4:30, so we headed there next. Waited a bit for them and decided the line there was prohibitive so we left the area.

We stopped at a Barnes and Noble to get Eric his book 4, and then just went to Ponderosa for dinner. This was a mistake since it was just way too much mediocre food! I’d say if you’re really hungry, this wouldn’t be bad, but it was just too much stuff and nothing was particularly great. We drove through and got Eric McD’s, and headed back to the house. Relaxed in the pool for a bit (it was a bit more bearable out there now that the sun had gone down some) and went to bed to get ready for an early morning trek out to Universal tomorrow!

 

[RVGal]

Cool pics from BMG! I really want to see it, but haven't yet.

 

[marciemi]

Day 10 and we’re still getting up early! But we got some driving to do to get over to Universal this morning, and want to get checked in at RPR to get our Express passes, and still make it to park opening! And of course being type-A people, we’re walking into RPR at 7:30, just in case. Surprisingly, believe it or not, they have a room ready for us! Unfortunately, though, right then their printers weren’t working so they couldn’t print out room keys for us. They had someone escort us to the room and let us in, and told us to check with the front desk in about a half hour or so to check on the keys. Since we were still staying at the house and just one night here for the Express passes, we had very little to bring up with us. We all went up while DH parked the car. Basically, then, since we were ready to go, we just hung out for a bit and relaxed:

Yes, there was another bed – the kids are just being silly! This for some reason is the only picture we took of the room at all! Our room overlooked the dog walk area, so the kids were watching the different dogs going by. Finally around 8am, Royce called the front desk and the printer was working! So we gathered up all of our stuff and headed downstairs, got the keys, and headed to IOA, arriving there by around 8:30.

First learning point is that it’s not quite as chaotic arriving at Universal in the mornings as at Disney. Even though we were there at least a half hour later than our normal arrival time at Disney, we still weren’t that far back in line. And we found that pretty much all morning you didn’t even really need the express passes because the lines didn’t build until then.

We went in, got a locker, and went right to Hulk, where we rode on the front row. After this, we went and did Spiderman before going back and getting our stuff out of the lockers. After Matt and I walked around the entire park yesterday, we determined that we didn’t want to be backtracking, so we’d just hit all the rides in order as we worked around the park, whether it involved getting wet or not. It was supposed to be another scorcher of a day, so getting wet didn’t sound all that bad!

We did the water rides as we hit them – really enjoying Popeye’s. Again, though, there were no lines for any of these yet. Jurassic Park seemed like a bit of a coin toss. Since we were wet already, it didn’t matter, but Stephen got drenched on this ride while the rest of us didn’t even get wet at all.

We waited about 15 minutes for Pteranodon Flyers, but since we wanted to try it once, now seemed to be the time. We enjoyed it once, but agree that it’s certainly not worth the wait for such a short ride. I thought you’d have time to enjoy looking around the park, but it seemed like by the time you started it was time to pull back into the station!

We watched the Sindbad show and enjoyed it. Then we ate at Enchanted Oak for lunch. We'd seen a special at Mel's the previous day where if you used Mastercard and bought a large coke for $2.99 (normally $6.99), you got a souvenir glass free good for 69 cent refills. Matt and I had asked if this was just valid at Mel’s and they assured us they had the deal all over both parks. Well, they'd never heard of it at Enchanted Oak - they asked the manager who said he'd check. We said never mind and just got water. He later came out to our table and said it was only for certain restaurants, but he was surprised he hadn't heard of it and gave us 2 of them for free! So we used them both days (some places said same day only, but no one ever checked and other places didn't list that restriction) and refilled them many times in the 105 degree heat indices!

We went back to working our way around. Stopped in at Mythos and made a reservation for the following day. Went in Poseidon’s Fury, which we couldn’t really enjoy because we were so wet and it was so air-conditioned in there that we were freezing. We got to Dueling Dragons and quickly rode Ice with only a minimal weight. Tried to ride on Fire, but it was closed for mechanical reasons at that point, so we just rode Ice a second time.

We went to Seuss-Land and enjoyed all the attractions there. I think the boys even enjoyed the One Fish, Two Fish ride, although they couldn’t understand why we would consider waiting for it (probably a 10 minute wait with the express passes).

We did the carousel primarily to get the cute pictures!

And rode Cat in the Hat and the High in the Sky Trolley Ride:

By this point the kids were again getting hot and exhausted and we thought it would be a great time to just go back to RPR and get refreshed in the huge pool. We decided to walk back rather than go over to the boat area, since it would probably be quicker (which I think it was!). But we were definitely warm by the time we got back and quickly changed into our swimsuits and went down to the pool.

Only to be disappointed that the water wasn’t remotely refreshing at all! This water had to have been near 100 degrees – even warmer if you went over in the very shallow (zero depth) entry area! Just miserable. Matt, Royce, and Stephen decided to at least have some fun playing water volleyball:

It was way too sunny for Eric and I there so we just found a spot in the pool that was in the shade and had some fun hanging out:

Really, the only remotely cool water was in the play area outside of the pool. Here’s Royce at least cooling off some:

We left them playing volleyball and Eric and I went up to the room to get showered – at least here we could adjust the temperature of the water! The shower was really nice though. The rest of the family came up shortly and we collapsed for awhile and watched a movie on TV (yes, the Drake and Josh movie which even I’ve seen like 3 times before!). Around 4:15, we decided to get ready and head to Citywalk for dinner.

We went to Margaritaville, expecting to be early, however the wait for seating already was near an hour. They said the deck was first come first served, but it also seemed to be full and very hot! We almost gave up, when someone told us to try the bar tables, which were also not reserved. Just then a group was leaving and we were able to grab 2 small tables (really designed for 2 people each, but we squeezed 3 at one of them). We had 2 Movie and Meal passes that I’d gotten so they included 2 free meals from a limited menu. We’d also gotten a coupon for a kids’ meal free with an adult purchase, so since only Eric was young enough for the kids’ meal, worked out. We basically paid for 2 regular adult meals (I think Matt got some kind of buffalo chicken and Stephen a cheeseburger) and got Eric and Royce and my meals for free! We enjoy Jimmy Buffett a lot, but the atmosphere was so crowded and loud, it was really hard to enjoy a meal. Probably more calm in the main area, but at least this way we got out more quickly. I probably wouldn’t eat here again unless I had a lot of discounts again!

We went to Universal and couldn’t believe how crowded it was. Just completely packed with pretty much 60 minute waits for everything. Yes, we had FOTL, but found this pretty much reduced our times to 20 minutes or so – definitely not walk-on. We rode Jimmy Neutron after a fairly long, hot wait – with folks cutting into the FOTL line and no one enforcing it – even after we asked a TM about it. Just a bit frustrating! The kids did love this ride though and just found it hilarious – even as teens they’re not too old for the Nick stuff.

We then went and rode Mummy, which surprisingly wasn’t a long wait. We all loved this ride, but felt it was too short. It was like it just got started and it was over, but it was a lot of fun. We then went to Earthquake, where Matt got chosen to be one of the “volunteers”. Sorry the pic is so bad, but we didn’t want to use a flash:

We worked our way to Jaws and rode after a reasonable wait. We couldn’t enjoy this attraction that well because of the group a couple rows in front of us that had several small kids with them who were absolutely terrified of the ride, and screaming accordingly. For whatever reason, their parents seemed to find this absolutely hilarious. Needless to say, I didn’t find it quite as funny. Royce also wasn’t as enthused on this ride because he was about the only one on our boat who got soaked! Again he was trying to shield the camera and wasn’t amused that the rest of us were nicely dry while he was wringing his wallet out!

We went back to Men In Black, which we’d wanted to ride a couple times, but the 20 minute or so FOTL line helped us decide that once would be enough. We all enjoyed this ride, but obviously it’s one that the more you do, the more you enjoy and we were all pretty clueless about what to do. The single rider in our car, who was a pro at it (a 20-something female) got about 700,000 more points than any of us did! We snapped a quick pick of the monitor with our pic:

By now, it was getting late and dark. We started working our way out, but they were just finishing loading for a Terminator show as we walked by, so we quickly ran in as they closed the doors (literally, the TM’s were encouraging us and another family “Run, run” as we sprinted through the queue and grabbed our 3D glasses). Saw the pre-show which I thought was funny and much more imaginative than most of the ones at Disney. The show was a bit surprising regarding the amount of violence. I’d read in some guidebooks that this show was much less violent than the movies – guess I’m glad I never saw the movies if this was “non-violent”! My kids are older and we enjoyed it, but I was amazed at the number of young kids in there and just wondered if their folks knew what they were in for when they came in!

By this point of course we were all completely exhausted. It was well after 9, but no one could muster the motivation to stay for the evening show. We took the boat back to RPR, after allowing the kids to play a few games they’d wanted to in the Boardwalk area of Citywalk, and quickly just collapsed in the room.

 

[hannymom]

thanks for taking the time to post such a detailed trip report. the pictures are great, especially the before and afters. my kids prefer universal now that they are older but i'm still all disney. which parks do your boys like better?
looking forward to hearing about the rest of your trip.

 

[marciemi]

They enjoyed both, but I still think like the overall Disney atmosphere better. They liked a lot of the Universal rides, like Hulk, but I think our opinion was tainted somewhat by just how hot and crowded it was there. I'd like to do Universal again someday a bit more "off season". We all liked IOA a lot better than Universal itself, however. I'm not sure - you read on the boards a lot about the difference in the crowd makeup between Disney and Uni, but we didn't see that. We did, however, see it between IOA and US. Seemed like we saw a lot more swearing, line cutting, and people just being rude and obnoxious in general in US, which we didn't see at all at IOA. Seemed weird since we went to both parks both days we were there so it shouldn't have been affect by day of the week or whatever. Who knows? We loved Mythos, though, which I'll get to in tomorrow's report!

 

[keishashadow]

marci - both your pics & descriptions make we wanna go back - tomorrow i wish

you've really captured the magic, glad your family had such a great time.

i agree that it's difficult to not wilt in the FL summer heat (the older we get, the earlier in the afternoon we head back to the pool). We're water dogs, don't care if it's warm or cold just nice to not be walking...keep telling myself i'd rather suffer thru the heat there instead of home.

 

[Sharon G]

I love the photo of your boys on the carousel! Too cute!
My DH also spent time wringing out his wallet. I tried to get him to leave it in the room, but no luck. 3 days later, it was still damp!

 

[marciemi]

Day 11 and we’re still at Universal and IOA. We actually got to sleep in a bit since we didn’t need to leave for the parks until around 8:30 to be early enough. Let the kids sleep until about 8 while we packed up what little we’d brought and ate an elaborate meal of Poptarts and water/apple juice. We were eating at Mythos at 11:30, however, and figured it might be a good meal to be hungry for! Also since we were going to Mythos, we decided to start our day in IOA, even though most of what we hadn’t seen yet was in US. But most of them were shows that wouldn’t even start until around 11, so we decided to hit the highlights of IOA again.

We threw everything in the car, checked out, and got to IOA again before opening. We headed right to Hulk. The first thing we found out today was that to our surprise, the park was much more crowded today – on a Monday – than yesterday (Sunday). I would have expected the opposite. But even by the time we got the locker and got to Hulk, the line was long for the front row so we decided to go with quantity over quality (since we’d ridden the front row the previous day) and ride it 3 times in another row instead. Royce only rode once and got our stuff out of the locker while the rest of us rode again. Then we headed over to Spiderman one more time. We also quickly rode Storm Force Accelatron (again without Royce!).

We stopped in Toon Lagoon for a little while, in order to take some of the neat pictures, and to play a bit in some of the fun things they had. We also of course had to shoot water at some of the folks riding on Dudley Do Right.

Matt missing his girlfriend:

Since we had decided against doing water rides again today, we were really limited in what we wanted to do. We went to Dueling Dragons, hoping to get to ride Fire this time. We all got in line together and rode it without a problem. Royce was again ready to sit out though (2 is more than his coaster limit per day) so the rest of us went back in line again. This time we decided to try to coordinate it with some of us on Fire and some on Ice. So we got in line. And waited. Evidently they were having problems with Fire again. So they kept loading Ice and running it, but waiting on Fire. Finally, they unloaded the folks on Fire and had them come back out. By this point people are leaving the line to head over to Ice. My kids over at Ice came over by us to see what was going on. We decided to move to the front line (since everyone else had left from it) and wait it out.

Well, after about 15 minutes, the TM’s came over to us and the rest of the folks still waiting and tactfully told us they didn’t see it would be running. Surprisingly to me, they then led us over to Ice and loaded a car directly with everyone who’d waited. I though this was very nice of them as I’ve never seen anything like this at any other park. However, there was one problem. The TM who led us through was probably early 20-something and just ducked under the wood railings in the queue to cut us through. But some of us old folks (okay, me!) evidently weren’t coordinated enough to duck far enough. As I went under one, I just took a huge chunk of skin out of my back. Yes, I was in serious pain, and you can imagine how much riding Ice right then helped that out! Decided we were done with coasters for the time and got back to Royce to help me dig a bandaid out of my fanny pack and at least protect my back some.

At this point we had about a half hour until we had to be at Mythos, but really nothing left we wanted to do. We went over to Seussland to shop since we wanted the Things 1, 2, & 3 t-shirts for the boys. Side note that I was a bit disappointed with these. We brought them back to the house and I washed them before the boys wore them since they were a bright red and I didn’t want the color to bleed. Two of them (Things 1 & 2) had the white circle (in which Thing 1, etc. was written) really flake off, to the point where it almost looked like a tie-dye pattern. Thing 3, although I did the exact same thing, was fine. Just a bit frustrating to pay $20 each for the shirts and have them fade so much in one washing. We considered going back to try to exchange them, but it didn’t seem worth the hour of driving plus parking, etc.

Anyways, on to Mythos. We checked in before 11:30 and were seated promptly. I’d read to request a table by the window so you could look out at the park, but it appeared that all of those table only seated 4 or less. We were a bit back, but could still see the park. I thought the atmosphere was nice here – a bit more subdued than say Rainforest Café or whatever, but still nice and different. Well, we really, really, really loved this restaurant. Without a doubt, this was the best meal that we had during our entire trip. In terms of both food quality and cost, it was an excellent meal.

I got the filet, which came with 3 small filet cuts, all of which were perfectly done. Royce got the Corvina (a fish) which he thought was excellent too. Matt got a buffalo chicken sandwich, but probably should have gone with the filet as well. Incidentally, they were more than willing to allow each of the boys to order off the kids’ menu if they’d wanted. Stephen and Eric both did – Stephen getting the hamburger and Eric the kids’ steak – and again, he should have just paid the extra $4 and gotten the adult filet since he got a whole lot less of it.

We had a lot of fun with the desserts – I think the little shot glass desserts are a perfect size and it’s fun to try different once. The boys all ordered the rice krispie sushi treats which they thought were great too! (Of course they tried the adult desserts as well!)

We got our bill and got the AAA discount (be sure to ask!) and with all this, plus at least 2 desserts per person, including a good tip, the total was still under $100 for 5 people!

We really considered coming back here a couple days later when we had a more “free” day, where we hadn’t decided what we were doing for sure. We’d have just slept in and gone in (our 7 day passes would still be good) to eat at Mythos! On one hand, I really wish we’d done this because we don’t have any restaurants like this and probably won’t be back again, but on the other hand it probably wouldn’t have lived up to our excellent experience the first time and we would have been disappointed. At least this way it can be just a great memory for all of us!

We were ready now to head over to US. Got there and went right on Shrek. The kids really enjoyed this show, although even at this time we still had a moderate wait for it.
We got out and decided if we really hurried, we could make it to the Animal Actors show. We’d missed the first couple minutes, but the kids enjoyed the show, which as far as I can tell hadn’t changed one bit since Royce and I saw it in 1991!

We now wanted to ride MIB a few times before leaving and were astounded to see the line as we walked in to just try to get a locker. There were just mobs of people waiting around trying to find an empty locker (most of the screens displayed full). I volunteered to wait with the stuff and just let them jump in line. Even with the Express, they still waited about 20 minutes. When they came out, we’d planned to switch and have Royce wait with the stuff (guess in retrospect I could have been looking for a locker rather than just sitting in the air-conditioned area!). Well, they came out and I ran back with the kids, only to have the Express line flowing out the door. I asked the boys if the line was that long on their first time through and they said no, that they’d been a couple rooms up. We waited about 5 minutes and still weren’t near that point, so evidently the wait was going to be well over 30 minutes so we just decided it wasn’t worth it.

At this point we decided to split up before heading out. Matt and Stephen really wanted to ride Mummy again, but Eric wanted to do Jimmy Neutron again (love that chicken dance!). Royce wasn’t up to Mummy and no one else cared, so I went with Matt and Stephen while Royce and Eric took off together. We decided to meet at the magic store, which Stephen had wanted to check out.

We got in line for Mummy (long line, but at least indoors!). We were about half way through the line, when we saw Kristy and family about 20 folks behind us! Waved and said hi, but my kids refused to wait for them in line. We rode the ride and waited for them in the gift shop, where we told them all our experiences for a few minutes. They were just arriving and were on their first ride and we were done with Universal! Said goodbye, met up with Royce and Eric, and headed out. We did catch a boat again, and got in the car and headed back to the house.

The pic that summarizes the entire trip:

The kids were happy just to relax for the rest of the day. Our pool temperature at the house was a good 15 degrees cooler than the RPR, which felt great in the soaring heat! We caught up on some laundry, made a light dinner, and floated around the pool. Since we had another very early morning coming up with more surfing, we got to bed nice and early!

 

[Sharon G]

Marcie
I really like the photo of your "boys" at Mythos.

Royce must be hungry, got his napkin in his lap already! I've enjoyed reading about your vacation, almost as good as being there in person!

 

[marciemi]

Onto Day 12 and another day of surfing! Royce decided to sit it out this time – thought it was fun, but more of a “once is enough” type thing. So he agreed to come along as our photographer. Stephen (who we couldn’t convince to try it even this time) as a result got to sleep in and have a nice relaxing day! So once again we were up before 5 in order to head over bright and early. Royce managed to get a nice shot of Eric waiting to get in the water, with the clock in the dark background:

We thought this was a funny shot of Matt discoursing to the rest of us on the best way to do something:

I didn’t do quite as well this time. I rode one small wave easily, and spent the rest of the time riding large waves, but probably managed to stay up only about half the time. Of course the kids showed a marked improvement and had fun looking like “pros” compared to the other first-timers in the class!

Me having fun:

Eric showing off:

And the unfortunate result:

Being more impressive:

And a shot of Matt:

All of us relaxing afterwards:

This time we didn’t have time to hang out afterwards because Royce and Eric had a 10:10 tee time at Osprey Ridge. We got dressed quickly as soon as the class was over, and drove through McD’s again quickly on the way. We got there in plenty of time and dropped them off, but it was already becoming a scorcher of a day. They each brought 2 water bottles, and ended up filling them regularly and buying a couple extra Gatorades during the 18 holes. Apparently, they also filled their floppy hats with water and dumped them on their heads at nearly every hole. They had a good time, but agreed never again in that heat (again the heat index was around 105). Some pics of the cute golf cart:

And of the hidden Mickey they could see from their GPS screen on the golf cart, but they said you really couldn’t tell in person was one (unlike the famous Mickey-head sandtrap on the Magnolia course):

During this time, Matt and I went over to Downtown Disney to do some shopping. I have a friend who's going to WDW in November and had some old tickets that she wanted to see how much was left on them so I went to Guest Relations there. Didn't tell them anything and just asked what was on them and they told me (which coincided with what my friend thought), but when I asked them if one was a child ticket and how you could tell (which she'd also thought), it was suddenly third degree time. Where I'd gotten them, etc. Explained the situation and the CM then refused to tell me anything more and was really witchy about it and the fact that she shouldn't even have told me anything since they weren't my tickets. I knew you had to do it in person, but didn't know they were so paranoid about it!

Then we came home and just relaxed - managed to read the entire Harry Potter book (7) that day! It was just too hot to even bother going out in the pool and we were just too tired. As I mentioned, Eric had suddenly discovered Harry Potter and got through 4 of the books, while the rest of all worked on the new one during the trip.

We finally picked them all up around 3pm and Eric came home and just melted into the sofa. We just had a bad storm for an hour or so and he finally got his second wind and went out to the pool to cool off. Royce, Stephen and Matt headed in for Cirque during the storm, but really enjoyed the show as I’d mentioned earlier, and thought that the seats that we’d gotten (first row of the second section) were perfect for seeing everything that was going on. They were considering doing some of Downtown Disney while they were over there, but due to the rain didn’t when they got there and afterwards decided they were too tired (can’t imagine why – just because they’d been up since 4:45?). So they came back, we got stuff ready for the next day, and called it a night!

 

[marciemi]

Day 13 and once again we’re rushing over to the MK early in the morning. This morning we had a reason, however. We were doing an 8:05 character breakfast at the Crystal Palace. When we got to the monorail, however, there was hardly anyone waiting for it since we were so early. Royce took a chance and asked if possibly the front was open and it was! So he and the boys went up front (limit 4). Got another now and then shot from 2003. Unfortunately this year’s came out dark:

And 2003’s:

We knew of two other families from the boards also doing early breakfasts and were excited to see both of them in line while we waited to enter the MK. Unfortunately, once we got inside and to the restaurants we lost them both, but it was great to say hi!

We checked in at the podium and were one of the first families seated. We enjoy the character meals since it gives the boys a chance to relax and enjoy the characters, without worrying about lines or “looking stupid”. Everyone looks and acts stupid around the characters here so they could let down their “cool shield” a bit.

We got some food quickly since we were among the first in and the characters weren’t circulating yet. As we got part-way through our meal, we had our first encounter with Pooh. We got a neighboring table to snap a pic of us so we could had another now and then shot. So first of all, Pooh and all of us from 1997:

And this time:

We got a couple other pics of the boys with the characters for a change. Piglet:

And Eeyore, who incidentally loved my cute Eeyore shirt:

Well, all good things must come to an end. Tigger hadn’t made it over to our side of the room yet, but we were all done eating, and they were getting ready to have a “Pooh-rade”, so we decided maybe we’d need to wrap up since we wanted to get out in the park early to get some pics. Here’s a pic of Matt’s face when we told him we weren’t going to wait around for Tigger to make it to our table:

We then got out and had a chance to stock up on Photopass pics since there were lots of photographers around and the parks hadn’t opened yet. We had a couple castle pics done, to compare to our cute old pic from a decade ago. This years’:

And going back to 1997:

Then we did a "best of the best" day. Space first, then Pooh and Peter Pan, FP'd Splash, did Jungle Cruise and Pirates, rode Splash, train back to Toontown and Tomorrowland to do Space again and Buzz (with some shopping, TTA, etc. between them while we waited for FP's). As we went by the Tomorrowland Speedway (which still no one wanted to ride), we wanted to get a pic of the boys to compare with our 1997 one. The car out front of the ride had changed even more than the boys had! 2007:

1997:

We shopped down Main Street on our way out (and visited Guest Relations to get our tickets replaced AGAIN since they weren't working) and left the park by around 12:30. While we were there, I checked on my friend’s tickets, obviously presenting them this time as my own, and the CM helping me was much friendlier and more helpful. We even got a cute pic of the boys waiting:

We went back to the house for lunch, sleep, and pool time, then went back into the MK at around 6:30. The monorail was completely empty riding in, so the kids decided to do some gymnastics on the center bar (Warning: Professional driver, closed course. Do not attempt!)

We rode Space one last time (got Buzz FP's first), again did a bit of just shopping and people watching and rode Buzz. We couldn’t believe how crowded the park still was, and it wasn’t supposed to be a busy day according to the crowd charts. Royce took a snap of the masses of folks:

We went over to Main Street and got a spot near the entrance for the parade around 8pm. We just stayed there, although I went and got fries and soda for the group at one point. Useful tip - position yourself in front of an airconditioned store doorway while you wait. We were on the curb, but the blasts of cool air coming out kept us cool as well.

We really didn't have any of the trouble I always read about - people being rude or crowding. As the parade started, we definitely got more crunched in, but no one tried to move in front of us or anything. Had fun socializing with all the folks near us, and we'd brought a bunch of light up character pens (that we'd gotten closeout cheap) that Stephen had fun passing out to all the little kids near us. We enjoyed seeing Spectro, but I won’t try to include any of our not-to-good pictures from that.

We left before Wishes and felt like salmon swimming upstream trying to leave the park! Evidently everyone moves more towards the castle for Wishes after the parade? It was still a bit crowded getting on the monorail/tram, but we were home by about 10.

 

[bubba's mom]

Royce took a snap of the masses of folks:

Enjoying your TR Marcie....however.....this crowd, well quite frankly, scares me!

Kudos to you, for you are braver than I!

 

[hannymom]

what am i going to read every day when your trip report is over???
thanks for posting, it's been fun following the trip. the before/after pictures are priceless.

 

[marciemi]

Well, we’re up to day 14 and we need a break! Today was supposed to be a choice between going back to Universal for a day, or either MGM or AK, whichever we decided we wanted to do more. Well, for some reason, folks decided that what they wanted to do MOST was just sleep in. We debated going to Universal as I mentioned just for Mythos, but just couldn’t motivate ourselves to drive that far. We still hadn’t really explored Downtown Disney, and decided this would be a good morning for it. Well, I use the word “morning” loosely since it was closer to 11 before we got moving.

Matt was still asleep so we decided to just let him sleep in since he’d been getting less sleep than the rest of us trying to stay in touch with his girlfriend. Eric just couldn’t muster any motivation to do anything and decided to stay home and keep Matt company (if he ever woke up). So Stephen, Royce and I headed out. It was yet another miserably hot day without rain. We’d considered doing the little speedboats at DD (water sprites, aqua mice? – they keep changing the name), but it just seemed like it would be miserably hot out there in the sun.

We thought this would be a good time to head to Disney Quest and maybe hit a couple of the big rides before it got crowded. It was a nice sunny day – DQ shouldn’t be that crowded, right? Wrong! We again got there for opening, only to wait in a 30 minute line in the hot sun (to get in) to then wait in all 30 minute plus lines even right then. If you just want to go for the games, fine, go later in the day. But if you really want to ride the attractions, at least in the summer there doesn't seem to be a way to do it. We tried opening 3 different mornings and every time there were about 3 day care groups of 100 kids each, plus a zillion other people. I'd definitely skip it on our next trip. Maybe on a week day in mid Sept, but not in the summer.

We ended up doing Pirates after a 30 min wait, dealing once again with folks who don’t feel the waiting in line thing applies to them. It’s okay for dad to wait, then mom and 3 kids to join him half an hour later. I don’t think so! We got a snack at Cheesecake Factory again (my only reason for going to DQ!), then went and did some shopping. Got a really nice golf shirt at the ESPN store for Eric – a Nike Disney one. The adult ones were like $80 and the kids (we got him an XL) were more like $40! We also loved seeing the cute shirts that said “You can’t spell Princess without ESPN”, but didn’t think they’d be applicable for any of our teen boys!

Next we spent some time at the World of Disney store where we got souvenirs for the folks we owed them to, along with t-shirts, photo albums, and all that necessary “junk” we had to get! Got some inexpensive Lego’s at the Lego store and some Disney ornaments to remember the trip by at the Christmas store, and decided to call it an afternoon. We got a pic of Stephen by the Lego dragon – we’d wanted to get one of all the boys like we had from 1998, but never had all 3 boys at DD at the same time (I went with Matt, Royce went with Stephen and Matt, Royce and I went with Stephen – guess Eric never even made it there!). Anyways, Stephen (our big Lego fan):

And all 3 boys back in 98:

Came home to relax for a bit with the other boys and do a nice big lunch/dinner. While waiting for the food to grill, we decided to try to replicate our shot from 1998 of the boys jumping into the pool. After some fighting, splashing, getting the camera wet, Matt kicking Stephen, people falling in randomly, etc., we finally got a good shot:

The old one to compare it to:

Matt enjoying the sun:

And Eric once again with his Harry Potter book (up to book 4 by now!):

Next we went to AK just to use our special FP's Eric had gotten (from our first day when he opened the time board for them at rope drop and was given a FP for one ride for all of us but we never used it that day because of the rain). Just went in, rode Everest, did some pics/photopass, and left. One plus was that since AK closed at 7 and we got there about 5:30, they didn't even have anyone collecting for parking.

This time when we rode Everest, we were able to get some pics since we weren’t as focused on seeing it for the first time:

In the first pic there, we had plenty of time to get a good shot since we stopped at that point for quite awhile. It was actually about the scariest ride of our trip because we stopped, were waiting to go backwards and didn’t. Meanwhile, you could hear the other trains continuing to run off in the distance and there was just this small fear that just maybe, suddenly, another train was going to slam into us! I was fairly confident that Disney would have worked this out, but still! So we took some pics, enjoyed the view, and eventually began our downward descent! Afterward we decided not to buy another pic, but took a snap of the monitor which turned out almost as good as the one we paid $20 for:

A few more posed pics, and a quick stop to see Minnie and we were on our way out:

We then went over to BB which was PACKED, even still at 6:30pm. We stayed until closing, but did very little other than float in the lazy river and wave pool. We did the ski lift to get pics (about a 25 min wait) and waited a bit for the family raft ride, but that was it. Even at 7:45 when we checked Summit Plummet still posted a 90 minute wait. I'm sure they probably had cut it off already. Crazy. Glad we did it all the other day - go on a rainy day instead! But it was a chance to use up our waterproof cameras and get some more of the famous “now and then” shots!

The boys on the ski lift:

Family raft ride:

Sonny’s Sleds (don’t you love how their shirts match the towels that came with the house perfectly?):

We went back to the pre-teen area to compare a couple old shots:

Eric on the t-bar at 12:

And at 3:

There’s a funny story that goes with the second pic. Back on our trip in 1998, at 3, Eric was a pretty good swimmer already. We’d gone to BB a couple times and each time he’d done the t-bar drop with his floaties on. Well, on our third visit, he really wanted to try it without them. I went up with him to help him get on (he wasn’t tall enough to reach the bar himself) and Royce went down by the water to help him just in case. Well, I lift him up to start and the lifeguard (at the end of the drop) just leaps up, rescue buoy in hand, and yells to me, as I release him, “Can HE swim?!” I reply (yes, a nomination for the good mom award!), “We’ll see!” Eric did a great job of dropping in the water and swimming to the side without any problem, but the look of shock on the lifeguard’s face was priceless!

Anyways, we also tried to replicate the pic and Stephen and Eric having a nice conversation as they went down the slide in that area, which used to allow 2 people at a time before they divided it:

And this time on the divided slide:

We then went over to the wave pool and just swam around for a bit. Got back to the house and dried everything and got packed up for tomorrow – our last day at the parks! Guess all good things have to come to an end sometime!