Just back. A few thoughts if you care to read them! :)

[SnackyStacky]

• Wait times: Except for Night of Joy, NONE! With the exception of Soarin', I can't think of a single thing that we had to wait for. Nothing was necessarily "walk-on", but we were always let past that first gate before you get assigned your number. ("Rows 8 & 9 please!")
  
• Crowds: Compared to Septembers past, quite a bit more! Like I said, the lines were pretty much non-existant, but there were lots more people in the parks. On Sunday, I hadn't made any Advanced Dining Reservations, and nothing was available at the Disney-MGM Studios until 8:45. We grabbed the boat, and ate dinner at Spoodles instead.
  
• Night of Joy: I had read it a million times, and related it to people when they asked. And now I can say that I've experienced it in person: Go for the music, not the rides! I got tickets for my wife since she mentioned she might like to go. It was her anniversary gift. I got the 2 night tickets for us. The first night, there really weren't any performers that we wanted to see. From about 5:30 until 7:00, the rides were walk-ons. We got through Pirates, Splash, Big Thunder, Haunted Mansion, and Small World before the lines got to be REALLY long. The line for Space Mountain stretched back to the TTA track. When it got to that point, we left. The second night, we rode Space Mountain, Buzz Lightyear and Stitch. (Who's brain fart was that anyway? That chili dog was just foul, and the smell stayed with me all night. BLECH!) We then just enjoyed the atmosphere as we looked over the moat from the Tomorrowland Noodle Station seating area. We saw some of Donnie McClerkin's set (forgive my spelling of his name), and then headed over to Tomorrowland to see CeCe Winans. Everyone was dead tired, so we just headed out after that.
  
• The parks themselves: A couple of the restrooms were NASTY. I don't mean a little TP on the floor, I mean they were gross. I didn't really notice anything major other than that. The merchandise (to me) seems to get more and more homogenous every time we go. I really wish they would cut down on the merchandising just a bit, and make some of the things genuinely unique.
  
• Cast members: With the exception of one or two snarky cast members (particularly at Soarin' - don't know why) - everyone was absolutely wonderful. They really impressed the newbies in my travel group!
  
• A word of caution: WATCH YOUR HYDRATION AND EXHAUSTION LEVELS!!!! One member (the newbie) of my group simply did not heed the warnings. He couldn't sleep for a week before we left, and got maybe an hour of sleep the night before we left. We warned him that he HAD to sleep. We warned him to stay hydrated. In the 90 degree heat, with insane humidity - he wore a t-shirt with a heavy jersey over the top. He sweat profusely, and in the 5 nights we were there - he consumed MAYBE one bottle of water and two other glasses of a non-caffeinated beverage. Sunday night, he was gone. When we came back for a late mid-day break, he wasn't keeping any food down and just couldn't move. He spent the rest of the day and night in bed and missed out his last chance to ride the Tower of Terror and Rockin' Roller Coaster.
  
  PLEASE be sure that you wear loose, breathable clothes and unless it's December/January/February - DON'T LAYER!!!! If you're thirsty, you've gone without liquid too long. Drink water, sprite, caffeine free Coke, or powerade. The lemonade functions as a diuretic and drains your body of fluid. Caffeine does the same thing so everything but the Sprite from the soft drink selection will reverse the hydration process.
  
• Transporation: I prefer to have my own car, but there came a point when we had to split up. My wife ended up having to wait for a bus for 25-30 minutes. I don't know if this is considered good by Disney transporation standards, but it REALLY cut into our mid-day break time. By a lot.

This was probably our last trip for a while. We need to save some money and pay off some credit cards now, and will return probably in about 3-4 years to see Everest.

It was a FANTASTIC last-trip-for-a-while trip!

 

[Simba's Mom]

Thanks for the report! Sounds like this is a great time of year to go. How long did you wait for Soarin'? And please share-where were those unpleasant restrooms?

 

[k5thbeatle]

Agree with the merchandising comments. What about dining experience? Specifically did you find getting in for dinner was any more difficult with this free dining thing going on? If you did not dine with/at Disney please disregard.

 

[Pixiedusttravel]

Thanks for the report! I was wondering how the crowds would be for our trip next week. You sound like you had a blast.

 

[Pau]

Thanks for the helpful report! Leavin' next week! Gotta love Sept DW trips!

 

[Mom of Sleepy Bashful and BabyDoc]

The parks themselves: A couple of the restrooms were NASTY. I don't mean a little TP on the floor, I mean they were gross. I didn't really notice anything major other than that. The merchandise (to me) seems to get more and more homogenous every time we go. I really wish they would cut down on the merchandising just a bit, and make some of the things genuinely unique.

[*]A word of caution: WATCH YOUR HYDRATION AND EXHAUSTION LEVELS!!!! One member (the newbie) of my group simply did not heed the warnings. He couldn't sleep for a week before we left, and got maybe an hour of sleep the night before we left. We warned him that he HAD to sleep. We warned him to stay hydrated. In the 90 degree heat, with insane humidity - he wore a t-shirt with a heavy jersey over the top. He sweat profusely, and in the 5 nights we were there - he consumed MAYBE one bottle of water and two other glasses of a non-caffeinated beverage. Sunday night, he was gone. When we came back for a late mid-day break, he wasn't keeping any food down and just couldn't move. He spent the rest of the day and night in bed and missed out his last chance to ride the Tower of Terror and Rockin' Roller Coaster.

[*]Transporation: I prefer to have my own car, but there came a point when we had to split up. My wife ended up having to wait for a bus for 25-30 minutes. I don't know if this is considered good by Disney transporation standards, but it REALLY cut into our mid-day break time. By a lot.

It was a FANTASTIC last-trip-for-a-while trip!

Thanks for the report, Dan. Glad you had a great Anniv. trip......Happy 1st!!

Oh, man.......I seem to be reading a lot of posts about cleanliness going down hill. That always been one of the things that WDW apart from other parks for me. Hope this trend doesn't continue.

You are SO right about the hydration. We were there the first week of Sept. last year and I was literally a puddle on the concrete most days. I couldn't believe the heat! We would bring bottles of water with us to the parks and were thru them in the first couple hours. Then we proceeded to spend $$$$ hydrating ourselves the rest of the day.

And I know what you are saying about the transportation. Even when we are on-site we drive our van. People think that it takes so much longer to take a mid day break when you stay off-site, but it took us less time to get to our condo than it did when we stayed on-site and waited for the buses.

Glad it was a good trip overall. And I don't know, something tells me it won't be 3-4 years for you until you go back...........

 

[TomB'sWidow]

Thanks for posting sounds like overall good trip.

 

[SnackyStacky]

Thanks for the report! Sounds like this is a great time of year to go. How long did you wait for Soarin'? And please share-where were those unpleasant restrooms?

The sign said 20 minutes, it was probably about 10 minutes. We grabbed fastpasses after exiting, and at our return time, Standby time was listed as 40 minutes.

The nasty bathrooms: Tusker House at Animal Kingdom was one of them, the ones right at the Tomorrowland Noodle Station thingee, and a couple others that I'm not remembering off hand.

What about dining experience? Specifically did you find getting in for dinner was any more difficult with this free dining thing going on? If you did not dine with/at Disney please disregard.

There were a LOT more people dining. Like I said - on Sunday at MGM - we went to make ADRs at about 6-6:30 and nothing until 8:30. Most of our dining times were at the beginning of a serving period, so we didn't really wait for anything.

 

[SnackyStacky]

Ooh! I uploaded my pictures too if anyone wants to look.

http://albums.photo.epson.com/j/AlbumList?u=4329967

 

[DISNEYFAMILYOFFOUR]

Thanks for the post and sharing your pictures. I enjoyed reading your captions.