My Very First PTR/TR!!! A Magical Weekend Escape Mar 4-6, 2011

[cloudconnected1039]

So...this will end up being a fail of a TR Although most of my pictures are gone, and lost, and will forever be that way, I did manage to get a few pictures recovered But let me stress that there's only a FEW. Forgive me if I'm a little hazy on the details of the trip, as I was using my camera as a sort of play by play scrapbook of what we did on each day. With all that said, I will remember the most important details and the things most people will want to hear about!! So let's get this show on the road...

DBF called me at around 300pm when he arrive at SMF (Sacramento airport) and told me he was going to be about 20 minutes late arriving. I was a little bummed, as I was soooo excited to get this vacation started, but the situation could be ALOT worse, so I'm all smiles . I left my apartment to run a couple of errands expecting DBF to arrive in around 600pm. Well...I get to Target for my 2nd to last errand at 540pm and he calls me saying that he's waiting for me in SNA at the drop off Whoa!!! They really booked it on the flight then, because they ended up arriving on time?? I was floored, but ecstatic so I ditched Target and drove the 5 miles to SNA

I picked him up and we scurried back to my apartment to drop off his luggage and get ready to go to dinner. We eventually get moving and get hungry, so we head towards the ocean and find Joe's Crab Shack fairly quickly; in about 10 minutes. Parking was a little confusing and frustrating as I was never the best parallel parker in the world So after that fiasco, we headed in, got seated right away and had our dinner. It was nice looking out at the ocean, seeing the million dollar yachts pass by We got our food after a while; I got the fisherman's platter with some fish, calamari, shrimp, and some sort of crab/jalapeno ball things that DBF wanted to try, and fries on top of that OMG lots of food. The best part was that the waitress brought me some malt vinegar for my fish Soooo yummy. DBF had a chipotle barbeque cheeseburger that he seemed to like, as he gobbled it up pretty fast And he ate all of my shrimp, and it looked like I barely even made a dent in my food by the time I was stuffed. We paid the bill and we headed back to the apartment to watch Going the Distance and go to sleep as tomorrow was going to be a big day!!

Again I'm sorry for the pictureless TR!!! I understand it'll be pretty dull, but I've got some pictures from our time at DLR. That about wraps it up for day 1. Not much going on, of course, but the next installment will be a good deal more exciting I hope

Oh yeah!! I also gave him his surprise cup when we got back...and he freaked out!! He almost didn't believe me when I told him we were staying at the GCH To say he was thrilled would be an understatement

 

[cloudconnected1039]

So, I return after a long hiatus. Where have I been?? Oh, working towards finals was one reason. 2 weeks after our mini-vacation, I had a week full of finals!! And of course, the week before that was full of studying for finals!! And then I had spring break, where I just spent my time sleeping at home and doing nothing productive at all (with the exception of doing a little petty computer work for my mom's hospice business). And then I made my way back to school, where I took time to get set up again and settle in. So...here I am!!! I’m so happy to be back I've been posting on the boards, but I can only dedicate a small amount of time each day for that. But for this, I wanted a good cushion area where I could have plenty of time to hash out what really happened on our trip. On to the report!!

The trip really begins today on Day 2. I woke up at 7, as usual, and made my way to my 8 am class. Before I left, I shook DBF as he was sleeping on the couch. He grumbled and I told him I was going to class and that I would like if he was at least awake when I came back. Of course, that didn’t really happen. But I knew that would happen in the back of my mind, so I left without much expectation. Class…was fine. I was just too giddy to sit still!! I could hardly wait to run out of there, re-wakeup DBF and be on our way!! So I did just that. I ran back to my apartment, made sure DBF was awake for the last time, and began packing. Before long, we were ready to go and I double, triple, and quadruple checked everything. We packed up the car, and made our way to the most magical place on Earth!! But, I did forget all of my hats, which saddened me very much .

About 20 minutes later, we were pulling into the GCH, and DBF was in awe. He has never been in GCH before, so this was definitely a first for him. After parking the car, we hurried over to check-in with all of our luggage in tow. By this time, it was probably around 1030, so we had to have them hold our luggage until our room was ready.

DBF was pretty obsessed with the hotel, just so you know

Then it was time for Goofy’s Kitchen!! We had a reservation at 1140 am, so we went over a little early just to see if we could get in. Thankfully, we were able to get in right away and we took our picture with Goofy, and got seated. The food was great as always for us. I had a bowl of clam chowder, lots of mac and cheese and some peanut butter and jelly pizza. DBF got a made to order omelet (his favorite), mickey waffles and some peanut butter and jelly pizza The only unfortunate thing we found was that it took a VERY long time for our drinks to even be ordered. I’m not sure if our table wasn’t given a waiter or something like that, but we had to flag down an employee who graciously apologized. We weren’t bothered though, we were much happier to just be there!! As far as characters went, we saw Alice and the Mad Hatter, Pluto, Baloo and Goofy, of course!! There were many more characters wandering around, though. We were sort of stuck off in a part where we were a little difficult to see with a tall wall, so I think that may be a factor in us seeing only a few characters. Once again, we were still very happy and nothing could get us down!!!

We left Goofy’s Kitchen full and very, very excited to get into the parks. By some strange twist of fate, we actually started our adventures off in DCA. It was probably about 12 pm right now and we took our time and didn’t spend that much time on rides. We more so wanted to relax, digest and wander about while we wait for our room to be ready. We spent time going through the shops and looking for possible souvenirs. This is when I found out something I was very distraught about the entire rest of the trip!! When stepped into the Animation Academy lobby area, and the room full of giant projector screens that would play songs and show pictures of various Disney movies is being changed!!! All of the screens were blue and there was a message on one saying that it was being changed. I…was very sad. That probably has to be my favorite part of DCA. I love just sitting in there on a hot or cold day, with a Schmoozie and DBF and watch all the screens change and sing to the songs. So I was a bit upset that that was being changed.

We left DCA around 245 and headed to Downtown Disney because I was craving some jelly beans and other random sweets. So we got to Marcellines confectionary and I filled part of a bag with my favorite jelly bean flavors and other candies that DBF would like. This would end up sitting in our room the entire trip (except for the last day) and we would munch on it during our afternoon rests. We sat down on one of the planter boxes and I ate some jelly beans and waited for my phone to receive the text saying that the room was ready. And long behold, about 10 minutes of snacking later, the room was ready!! We rushed to the Downtown Disney entrance and tried to find our room. We were on the 6th floor, and probably the farthest you could be from an elevator. But it was worth it. We were both tired and we decided to spend a little time savoring the room and resting our feet for the night ahead.

Now, I cannot for the life of me remember when we left, but I do know we went back to DCA. We ordered WOC picnics for that night’s show, so we headed over to WCT to grab them. I was a little unsure if we were going to like the meals, but I thought that having the tickets early was worth the price of the picnics. We received our meals and tickets and grabbed an empty table. And I was worried with good reason; we didn’t like the meals much. Our chicken was dry and the coleslaw was mediocre. But, DBF did like the apple pie desserts and took both for himself. We then noticed the tickets were for the first show. I remember picking the second show of the night when ordering the picnics, so I thought this was a little strange. I was upset though, it really didn’t matter when we saw the show, I just felt the second show would be more convenient for us. So we went off to ride some rides before going to find some substitute for dinner.

We ended up park hopping over to DL as I was in the mood for some pasta. So that obvious choice for dinner was Pizza Port. The place was busy of course, but we managed to get through the lines fairly fast. We picked up a plate of the spiral pasta with alfredo and chicken as well as a Chinese chicken salad to share.

Hit the spot!! They always give you sooooo much food, so we didn’t manage to finish all of it. I’ve never had a bad meal here, and I was definitely happy with my food. Though, we aren’t very hard to please.

By now, it was time to line up for WOC. We got to Paradise Pier about 10 minutes before they let us into the viewing area and they had ALL colors waiting in the same area. It was a little strange and disorganized. We were seated in the Blue section, so when the rope dropped we made our way into the very front section. We followed the path to where we thought the middle of the show would be and sit down. About 5 minutes later, DBF speaks up and says he’s concerned about our spot and thinks we should be sitting farther down. I trust his judgment so we get up and go down a bit farther to an empty spot. Thankfully DBF spoke up because this was the most AMAZING spot I’ve seen the show in. I always get worried about being so far in front because I love to see the entire scope and panorama of the show, but that definitely not a problem where we were standing. It was fantastic as always, and after the show, we decided to call it a day and headed back to the GCH for relaxation and bedtime.

Hopefully another update will come soon!!!

 

[Soaptopia]

Great TR! That must have been horrible to find all of your pictures didn't work.. so sad! But I like reading what you did. How was your stay at the GCH? what sort of view did you have? I am staying there for a split stay in September and I'm sooo excited. I've never stayed onsite anywhere.

 

[cloudconnected1039]

Yeah it was pretty unfortunate that the pictures were lost, but I had my breakdown about it and then rebounded back right away Can't do much about it, so why get mad??

We LOVED the GCH. I had stayed there once before, so I knew what to expect. The only strange thing that happened was that my mother sent us a package, but we never got a message or notification about it I only found out when she called me on Saturday night wondering if we got anything. I then had DBF go down to the front desk to see if they had anything for us, which of course they did!! They apparently had had it the day before we even arrived, so I'm sure the message got lost somewhere. Other than that little mishap, I couldn't have been happier!!! We had hoped that they would upgrade us to a view room for free like I had had on my previous trip, but they had none available. We had a standard view room, so we essentially got a view of the PPH DBF had stayed at the DLH and PPH before and I'd stayed in the DLH before and we obviously both agreed that GCH is a step above. But, I still love DLH!! Anything onsite is fantastic

Have a great time!! It's pretty hard not to And thanks so much for reading!!

 

[skiingfast]

Sounds like a wonderful quick trip for you and your guy!

 

[cloudconnected1039]

So now that it's been over a month since my last post, I think I've deduced that I'm just NOT the best TR-writer I'm not sure if I'm just lazy, busy or just not motivated by it Which is very frustrating because I was soooo excited to write this!! Maybe the lack of pictures had something to do with it...I really couldn't tell you I'm so sorry for my lack of updates and wasting your time

 

[skiingfast]

Oh boy have I been mad you stopped writing.

JK When you get to it your get to it, and I will be fine, but happy if there is more.