Just came back from Disney World. We saw all 4 parks in 3 days and 4 hours. Needless to say, we are exhausted, but happy. I'm not one for long trip reports, so here is a short summary.
1. The name tag for my DS5 was a huge hit. I got him the Stitch one that says "Here comes trouble". I had cast members asking me where I got it (and wanting one for themselves). DS was totally flabbergasted the first time someone called him by name. His eyes flew open and he said "How did she know my name?" The Stitch character noticed when we asked for an autograph and made a big deal out of it. When we saw Belle, she said "Oh, so Stitch has his own name tags now?"
2. Pop Century was great. The front desk delivered a birthday cake that I surprised my fiance with after the first night at the park. We were in 3465, which had a terrific view of the lake. We could see the Spaceship Earth in the distance from our window. Had we been in our rooms, we could have watched the fireworks but we were at the park instead. I loved the fact that the food court was still open late. We came back from a park at 9 p.m. one night and the hot food lines were still serving!
3. Evening extra magic hours were awesome! We walked onto everything that was open. We rarely waited more than 5 minutes in line. It was the only way we could get all 4 parks done in 3 days. Epcot was open till midnight on one of the days, but it was rainy, windy and freezing cold and we didn't last past 10 p.m! That was the only bummer of the whole trip.
4. DS got to ride with the monorail driver into MK during the morning EMH. He loved it! The driver even let him sit in driver's seat while we were waiting for another monorail to leave the station, but she told him not to touch the controls!
5. DS also got pulled out of the audience to be in the Festival of the Lion King show at AK. That was another highlight. He couldn't stop talking about having walked all around the stage with a shaker! The things that 5 year olds find amusing!
6. Fiance and I LOVED Test Track, even though we had to ride it separately because DS was a chicken about fast rides. That was probably the longest wait. Even the single rider line was 30 minutes long, but since we did child swap, fiance went through the fastpass line after I waited the 30 minutes and it was much faster. Fast passes ran out very quickly for this ride.
7. We ate at 50s prime time cafe for lunch, liberty tree tavern for lunch and marrakesh for dinner one night. All were terrific. The lunch ones especially had fast service. They seemed to understand that we were ready to get on with the other rides and shows and not spend a lot of time eating (even if it was a sit down meal.) Service was a little slow at Marrakesh because it was so busy, but the belly dancer kept us entertained.
8. DS loved the passport and kidcot fun stops at the World Showcase. Some of them wrote very personalized messages to him in the passport.
9. As part of a conference in Orlando, I was invited to a private party held at the Wonders of Life pavillion. It was totally awesome. We had the whole pavillion to ourselves and they staged this circus festival, complete with chinese acrobats, stilt walkers and jugglers. There was an amazing woman who made candy animals out of taffy. She turned out some very elaborate ones every 2 minutes or so. After a buffet dinner, they led us outside to a private viewing area directly in front of the lake to view Illuminations. They served us coffee and desserts out there. I am sure the company shelled out some big bucks for that, but Disney did not disappoint.
10. The castle looks beautiful. They had the green walls up, but you could get right up to the castle and it was not really intrusive. We got some great pictures and you would never know they were working on it.
We can't wait to go back, but it will probably be a while. Now on to planning my wedding (and sadly, it will not be at Disney although I must say I drooled when I saw the facilities at the Grand Floridian from the monorail.)
This board has been so incredibly helpful to me in my planning. Feel free to ask me questions if I can return the favor!
1. The name tag for my DS5 was a huge hit. I got him the Stitch one that says "Here comes trouble". I had cast members asking me where I got it (and wanting one for themselves). DS was totally flabbergasted the first time someone called him by name. His eyes flew open and he said "How did she know my name?" The Stitch character noticed when we asked for an autograph and made a big deal out of it. When we saw Belle, she said "Oh, so Stitch has his own name tags now?"
2. Pop Century was great. The front desk delivered a birthday cake that I surprised my fiance with after the first night at the park. We were in 3465, which had a terrific view of the lake. We could see the Spaceship Earth in the distance from our window. Had we been in our rooms, we could have watched the fireworks but we were at the park instead. I loved the fact that the food court was still open late. We came back from a park at 9 p.m. one night and the hot food lines were still serving!
3. Evening extra magic hours were awesome! We walked onto everything that was open. We rarely waited more than 5 minutes in line. It was the only way we could get all 4 parks done in 3 days. Epcot was open till midnight on one of the days, but it was rainy, windy and freezing cold and we didn't last past 10 p.m! That was the only bummer of the whole trip.
4. DS got to ride with the monorail driver into MK during the morning EMH. He loved it! The driver even let him sit in driver's seat while we were waiting for another monorail to leave the station, but she told him not to touch the controls!
5. DS also got pulled out of the audience to be in the Festival of the Lion King show at AK. That was another highlight. He couldn't stop talking about having walked all around the stage with a shaker! The things that 5 year olds find amusing!
6. Fiance and I LOVED Test Track, even though we had to ride it separately because DS was a chicken about fast rides. That was probably the longest wait. Even the single rider line was 30 minutes long, but since we did child swap, fiance went through the fastpass line after I waited the 30 minutes and it was much faster. Fast passes ran out very quickly for this ride.
7. We ate at 50s prime time cafe for lunch, liberty tree tavern for lunch and marrakesh for dinner one night. All were terrific. The lunch ones especially had fast service. They seemed to understand that we were ready to get on with the other rides and shows and not spend a lot of time eating (even if it was a sit down meal.) Service was a little slow at Marrakesh because it was so busy, but the belly dancer kept us entertained.
8. DS loved the passport and kidcot fun stops at the World Showcase. Some of them wrote very personalized messages to him in the passport.
9. As part of a conference in Orlando, I was invited to a private party held at the Wonders of Life pavillion. It was totally awesome. We had the whole pavillion to ourselves and they staged this circus festival, complete with chinese acrobats, stilt walkers and jugglers. There was an amazing woman who made candy animals out of taffy. She turned out some very elaborate ones every 2 minutes or so. After a buffet dinner, they led us outside to a private viewing area directly in front of the lake to view Illuminations. They served us coffee and desserts out there. I am sure the company shelled out some big bucks for that, but Disney did not disappoint.
10. The castle looks beautiful. They had the green walls up, but you could get right up to the castle and it was not really intrusive. We got some great pictures and you would never know they were working on it.
We can't wait to go back, but it will probably be a while. Now on to planning my wedding (and sadly, it will not be at Disney although I must say I drooled when I saw the facilities at the Grand Floridian from the monorail.)
This board has been so incredibly helpful to me in my planning. Feel free to ask me questions if I can return the favor!
