Just Home. Updated 9/22/07-Stuck on monorail

[hoffman1]

Quick report--I am in my room now at POP. We arrived yesterday. The park seem a little more crowded this year than last year at this same time. The buses here are terrible!! I am not sure if it is just the Pop buses or what but they are not very frequent (more like every 40 minutes than every 20) and are very crowded. (We have stayed at POR last few years and maybe we got spoiled.)
We ate at Raglan Road last night--Yummy! Chef Mickey's for breakfast this morning--also yummy.

 

[hoffman1]

I will try to check back every couple of days so feel free to post any questions that you might have.

 

[hoffman1]

Well, I have not been very good at posting. I have been too tired after being at the park all day to come back and post. It has been extremely hot and has rained often.
We had our Dinner with an Imagineer on Thursday at Artist Point. I got to meet mizliz (from here on the boards) and her DH at the dinner. The dinner was OK. I did not care for the food (the soup and dessert were ok but my entree came out cold). The Imagineer was very nice and down to earth and very open to answering what questions that he could (but no big secrets were revealed). Everyone at the table was very nice and we did not get done with dinner until around 9:00pm. I will post a detailed report when I get home on this.
The Halloween party was Friday. It rained. It rained hard and for a long time. This was the second year that we have been. We started out with dinner at Liberty Tree Tavern. It was neat to see all the characters dressed up. We ended up being there longer than anticipated because our waiter was terrible and had no personality (we noticed his name tag said he was from our home state so we asked him about it-he said "yeah" and walked off ).
Afterwards, we rode the Haunted Mansion--the updates are great!
We spent most of the night in the shops avoiding the downpour. We finally made a run for it and we to Exposition Hall to sit in the theater. There was this great photopass girl there who was trying to entertain the kids who were bored by having them put on a little play. I wish I had gotten her name so I could send a letter Disney. She was having a great time and trying her best to make a bad situation magical for those kids. The rain finally cleared out about half way through Hallowishes. We headed back toward Frontierland because even though we never heard any announcement it looked like they were setting up for the parade. When we got back there it had already started and there were people everywhere. We could only half-way see it. I think there was a new Capt. Hook float but I could be mistaken. We got some candy and saw the Laugh Floor Comedy Club and by the time that show was over it was 12:15. As we were leaving I saw a girl handing out something. I told DH to go over there and they were giving out cards that basically said that due to the weather, your ticket to the party would be good for one day's admission to MK anytime within the next year. I thought that was very nice. I was really bummed that the rain ruined the party but Disney really can not help it that it rained.
We have not won anything from the Dream Squad but we are still hoping. We have seen some ears, lanyards (mizliz had won a lanyard the day we met her), and dream fastpasses in the parks.
We are thinking of staying a day longer. It is so hard to leave.

 

[Pugrpooh]

How is the bus situation now? We're arriving tomorrow to Pop and most of the reviews talk about the great bus service there. Has the weather cooled off any? The forecast for next week has it in the mid-80's. Hopefully the humidity will be lower!

Any lovebugs? Can't do much about it now though -- we're packed and ready to leave in the morning.

 

[averill94]

What a bummer about the rain!

SOrry about the buses- any impprovement? Last year we thought they were awesome at POP.

Hope you add the extra day

 

[hoffman1]

Still hot. No rain today. The buses are still terrible--This morning we had to wait for the third bus to come before we could get on to got to MK. No love bugs this year though!
We did add the extra day.

 

[TinkAsh2001]

Hey! A fellow Kentuckyian! Hope you are having a blast! To bad for the rain but atleast they were kind enough to give a free park admission! I will be staying at POP for the first time in march and april! Is there a place at the resort that sells postcards and a place to mail them?! Also, do they still have the refillable mugs?! One last thing did you decorate your window?! LOL! I have been getting things together to decorate ours. I made our mousekeeping envelopes today!

 

[IMN2DSNY]

Still hot. No rain today. The buses are still terrible--This morning we had to wait for the third bus to come before we could get on to got to MK. No love bugs this year though!
We did add the extra day.

Hiya! So sorry to hear about your bus issues. I just got back on Friday from Pop and the buses where great. I waited no longer than 20 minutes and that was only once. More than once, they sent 2 buses at the same time. All in all, it was great. The crowds are crazy mad there, though. It seemed to have gotten much worse as the week went on.

I hope you continue to have a wonderful trip!

 

[tinawv]

Thanks for the live updates. I glad that you aren't having any issues with the lovebugs. My sister and I were there last year about this time, and they were horrible. I know they are harmless, but they sure are a nusiance. Have you asked why it is taking so long to get a bus. I think I would at least mention it to them. Have a wonderful time.

 

[hoffman1]

Just got back home this morning. We started seeing a few of the dreaded love bugs the last couple days of our trip.

Tink, yes they do sell postcards at the shop and there is a place to mail them. We did decorate our window. We went to the outlets our first day there and they had a big package of Halloween window clings for $3 (we had bought the exact same ones last year at MNSSHP for around $6) and used those since we were there for the party. I also put my lime green mickey head in the window and the maid had put a couple of towel animals in the window.

I will try to give a more detailed report later but for now I will just tell you that our last day there was not our most magical. We went out and we were going to drive to the MK and our car battery was dead. We called security but had to wait 30-45 minutes for them to come. We looked a around for a while, got some last minute treats, and got on the pink monorail to head back to the Ticket and Transportation Center. We were not too far out when the monorail lost all power! The driver came on to reassure us that everything was fine and we would be moving along soon. Well, to make a long story short, we were stuck for around 45 minutes. There were only 53 passengers total on that particular monorail at that time the driver told us. It was extremely hot and kind of tense (we could see a bucket truck under us). They did tow us back to the station and we had to climb over the seats because they did not open the doors on our side. (I may get flamed for this next part.) The driver had indicated when he talked to our car that there would be "people" to talk to us when we got off. My DH and I talked to the other people in our car and we all assumed that they would in some way try to make up for the problem. What we found when we got off was someone handing out fastpasses to MK. This would have been OK if we were on the monorail going to MK but we were on the monorail leaving MK. Those were really no good to anyone on that monorail. The people in the car with us were heading to AK which closed at 5 so they only had a couple of hours left. We would have probably gotten in our car and left if they had someone on the platform sincerely saying they were sorry for the inconvenience and given us each a bottle of water but it seemed so insensitive that they would give us fastpasses to a park we were leaving and not even saying anything.
I will try to cut to the end, once we got to the ticket and transportation center a few of us talked to a manager who gave us one day passes good for a year. She was very nice and wanted to do what it took to make us happy.
I will try to post more later. We had a good time but this was not one our better trips.