Our first EVER (maybe ONLY)trip to WDW! 9/23-9/29

[jrasmom]

We were at Movies at the same time -- 1862 & 1863. Since this was trip 20+ our experience was much different, but I'm enjoying your story, please continue. In many ways your first trip is the best and the one you remember the most.

Thanks for sharing.

​

As in worse then ours, you didn't enjoy Movies? I'd like to hear your experience.

I will finish....but I've got to do some major housework this weekend and I'm entertaining tomorrow evening so it may be Monday before I get time to add the next installment.

 

[jrasmom]

THANKS FOR READING, EVERYONE!!

I'll finish in a few days.............................hopefully.

 

[Scot-n-Michelle]

Just read thur your trip report and really enjoyed it. Wondering why this could be the only trip? More Please!!!!!

 

[mickaholic4077]

I hope that this is the first of many trip reports from you. It is really good!!!!

 

[S.Poppins]

Great TR! I am looking forward to more!

 

[bushdianee]

I'm looking forward to reading more.

 

[jrasmom]

Day Six....Thursday, September 28th. Downtown Disney (to shop) and Magic Kingdom

Our Oldest son LOVES LEGO's and had been looking forward to a trip to the LEGO store for several weeks now, already plotting spending some $$$$, well he'd spent the money that was given to each kid to blow on ANYTHING they wanted our first day so he now had to depend on Dad & Mom for money, which means.....get cheap-o Dad to approve what he wanted to spend $20 on (this was just a starting figure, we'd spent that much on the youngest and they all had already spent over $35 so it wasn't like they were coming home empty handed )

So, we decide to do some shopping, walking around, etc. at Downtown Disney Thursday morning then go back into the Magic Kingdom later in the day and stay until closing since we had a better time in the evening on Monday.

We waited at the resort for quite some time for our bus, for some reason. Every other stop had been picked up and one or two had already had 2 pick ups before we finally got a bus. Then it was quite a ride! I didn't realize we were so far away from DTD at ASMo, of course that is why we used their transportation too so we wouldn't have to find our way around this maze!!

First things first....we need food!!! So we stop in at Earl of Sandwich. I'd read all kinds of reviews here and we were expecting out of this world sandwiches.

DS1 had the pizza sandwich which was good, if a bit small for his appetite. DH had a grilled cheese that had bleu cheese and 2 other cheese on it and he didn't care for the taste , he just wanted plain old cheddar cheese I guess. DD had a egg & cheese sandwich....except she didn't want it on the bread so I took it apart and she ate most of the egg & cheese off of it and DS2 ate the bread & cheese and whatever else he could get. I had the Caribbean Jerk Chicken Sandwich with no jerk sauce. It was decent but if we ever return I'll try some other sandwich.

We're off to look for and find the gift shop of things $10 and under before we buy Ds1 & DD something. Boy, this place is just a little "walkthru" shop and it's not labeled very well!! I was looking at the map and couldn't find a sign for that Mickey Mart and we were practically standing right in front of it!

They find nothing here so it's on towards the Lego store, WHOA! Look at that dinosaur outside!! Now, I'd seen these here on the Dis BUT to see them in person and really SEE the detail!! Someone has either 1.) Too much time on their hands or 2.) One of the BEST jobs around, they get paid to play with LEGO'S?

which we knew was where Ds1 would pick out his thing. He ended up with the Lego, Star Wars game for his X-box that he's been wanting, it was on clearance since a new one is coming out now. The stores were neat, decorated amazingly and the Lego things..

These things are amazing!! Real LEGOS, and the little size LEGOs too.

We pick up a few more things, you know for the dog sitter, the cat sitter & mail picker-upper back home. Not to mention Granny had sent money for the kids to buy a disposable camera and we kept forgetting so they bought souvenir cups instead!! I much prefer to spend $20 on 3 cups then $25 on two cameras AND have to keep track of everyone's camera all week long SSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH, don't tell her I said that She was a *professional* photographer a few years back and thinks the kids should've had their own camera to show her *the World* thru their eyes. Then we're heading back to the hotel to store away the goodies. And we put a few bags in the van since we'll be going express check out the following morning.

Back in the Magic Kingdom, the crane is down so we can get some good shots of the castle without anything else in the picture!

Other then that we pretty much planned to repeat things we really enjoyed the first day in.

But there were a few firsts, we ate dinner at Columbia Harbor House (it was so-so). We saw Captain Hook, Peter Pan & Wendy but did NOT stand in line to meet any of these guys, the lines were WAY to long. Oh...and I can NOT forget to mention....I DID get to try Aloha Isle this time!! I ordered the Pineapple Float and we ALL enjoyed that!

DD & I braved Space Mountain and it scared her to death...first thing she was scared of all week!! And I'll just say I never have to ride it again either. We rode the TomorrowLand Transit Authority Blue Line ride twice this day, the kids enjoyed it better in the dark. And Peter Pans Flight had 45-60 minute wait every time we tried to get on so we just skipped riding it again, sadly.

But we DID manage to do:

Well dd & dh did, I played around with the camera while ds2 was napping and ds2 was looking around the gift shop with me or just sitting with me.
[/img]http://shim1.shutterfly.com/procgserv/47b6ce23b3127cce985489388d8300000017108YaNnDNo1g[/img]

And last but not least, we rode Buzz Lightyear 2 more times that day. ALL the kids really LOVED this ride.

And of course, my favorite 3-D thing all week was Mickey's Philharmagic so we did it again, this time I convinced Ds2 to watch and he LOVED it!!! YAY!!! I knew he would because he loves Mickey, Goofy, Donald..those characters but earlier in the week he was still thinking "it's dark & scary in there"

Back to the hotel just as fireworks are ending, this time we rode the bus to Music (with NO waiting!!!)and walked across the street to the room.

And I forgot to mention Hall of Presidents on Monday, it was a nice break during the HOT day and DS1 especially enjoyed it since he's learning more about the Presidents at school this year.


Next up............Our last day, check-out and Epcot (DETERMINED to at least walk THRU the World Showcase) even if it IS the first day of the F&W festival.

 

[lexmelinda]

Great installment...can't wait to hear about F&W. I really wish we had done that instead of MNSSHP.

 

[ntsammy5]

As in worse then ours, you didn't enjoy Movies? I'd like to hear your experience.

I will finish....but I've got to do some major housework this weekend and I'm entertaining tomorrow evening so it may be Monday before I get time to add the next installment.

Sorry, been busy compiling videos of DD wedding, Disney Wedding and nieces wedding along with sorting through all the digital photos.

Since we were all adults and it was not our first trip to Disney it was just a different experience than yours. We loved Movies -- all the kids are great to watch. We only got to the parks early on 1 morning and stayed late most nights. If you heard a commotion at the pool early in the morning on Saturday, Sunday or Monday, it was probably the crew I was with. The guys were heavy into drinking before the wedding. I was not one of them though.

I will post a trip report sometime this week, but most of the time we spent was in Epcot (Food & Wine and eating) and a behind the scenes tours. We had a great time........

​

 

[jrasmom]

Great installment...can't wait to hear about F&W. I really wish we had done that instead of MNSSHP.

Sorry to disappoint but we didn't actually *do* the F&W, we just happened to be at the World Showcase the first official day of the F&W. We didn't do anything *extra* this trip. Honestly, we'd never to the wine part anyways, we don't drink...the food possibly.

 

[jrasmom]

Day Seven....Friday, September 29th. Last day...check out, Epcot (the World Showcase), Sunshine Seasons, co-piloting the Monorail

First off let me just say, I apologize if I butcher names of things in the World Showcase...this was my first time and I can't remember the EXACT names of all the places and I can't find our souvenir map we brought home either.

Okay, so we know we're going to get a little later start today, had to load everything back into the van as once we leave the room we're checked out. And since I used the express check out option I don't have to stand in line to check out AND we get to keep our "keys to the Kingdom" as souvenirs, I guess that is a nice little bonus for the scrapbook.

We were one of the *odd* ones this trip that decided to trade in several of our table service credits (if you've been paying attention we only visited 3 table service establishments this week)for counter service credits + extras. Well, this morning we're starting out with 4 of the coupons to trade in PLUS 9 snack credits left on our dining plan.... WHOA, we need to spend some of those I think.

So, we stop downstairs in the gift shop to get the kids each one free lanyard with pin and a Free poster, that takes care of those 4 coupons we'd received. And I bought my beautiful Tinkerbell purse/tote bag that I'd looked at and debated about all week. And we bought a photo album to put all our pictures and things in too, it just doesn't seem fitting to come home and get digital prints printed out and put them in anything OTHER then a WDW photo album does it?

So I send the hubby BACK to the van (then think I should've went with him, the bus stop at music is RIGHT there! duh. ) by the time I think of that I call his cell phone and he's coming out the door of our resort. So we line up for our bus to Epcot, hhhmmmmm seems to take longer then it has all week, hope this doesn't mean Epcot is going to be crowded, of course...it IS the first day of the Food & Wine Festival.

Once we get there hubby & dd go in ahead of me & the boys (since we had to go thru the bag check line) to get on Test Track, only there is a long line so they get a fastpass and wait for us to meet up. AND : they get a surprise fastpass to Mission Space so after we catch up to them they go ride that, while once again I'm left sitting with the two boys who are either too little OR doesn't want to ride. Of course, it was a moot point that the oldest didn't want to ride because they only had 2 fastpasses anyways.

Then we head into the Land again to check out Soarin....again too long of a wait so they took the other two tickets and get two fastpasses for that...which I thought I was going to use one of but later on hubby & dd go ride AGAIN after saying to me "take him to Innoventions and let him do the robot race again" then dashing off before I could say anything different.

So now we're done with the rides! And waiting ALONE outside all the time......I think.

We head over to The Living Seas to see if we can catch the dolphin presentation ( I LOVE dolphins and was upset when we missed them the first day). We check the board and see the next show starts in 15 minutes, so we go ahead in to see if we see them just swimming around. We notice there are divers in the middle tank and wonder what that is about but we can't get close enough to see. So we park ourselves in a front row view for when the dolphin show will start and watch the dolphins coming & going playing in the mean time.

so.........the show starts. ONLY the dolphin doesn't want to co-operate with his trainer upstairs because he is being too nosey by checking out the divers. So they put him in a time out.....which is when the trainer downstair notices in the family next to us a little boy has gotten his knee wedged between two of the bars (if you've been there you know...the railing that goes around the second level & first level walkways?...that!) so she sends for someone to *butter* him up to get him loose. YAY! they get him loose!! I'd think Disney Imagineers could come up with a better railing system so little kids don't go thru this! And try to start the show back up...guess what, they decide to cancel it because the dolphin won't work.

*now just tossing this out there, no flaming please...BUT obviosly, I need a trip to Sea World to see the dolphins again. Only I loved the one in Ohio (not to mention it was ALOT closer) and it's no longer open.* SIGH

......

 

[jrasmom]

Onto The World Showcase.
DD is throwing a fit because she wants a frozen lemonade but every stand we've passed hasn't had them so we get water instead to keep all from dehaydrating and such and promise her lemonade as soon as we see them.

We go into Mexico, first AND everyone just wants to keep walking as we approach.

Well, dd is still whining,so I park the stroller grab the backpack & ds2 and go up the steps, they can either follow or stay behind outside. At this point I didn't really care. As we come down the ramp inside we're just looking around trying to figure out where to go, etc. and a cast member comes up behind us "hola" and I say "hola" back. She asks if we've ridden the boat ride yet...no, we weren't really sure where we were headed.

Well, she bends over and asks my dd if she'd like to be the princess of the boat ride ixiedust: and once dd perks up at her (she must think I'm the only one that needs to see her crabby fit) and answers "yes" she deems Rachel the princess of the ride and takes us all in thru the exit line and puts us in a boat all to ourselves, then when we return Rachel gets a Tinkerbell certificate commentorating her ride as "Princess of the Mayan El Temple de Rio" or something to that effect.

We travel on around the world showcase.......let me just stop here and say I was sooooooooooooooooo looking forward to going in all the little shops and seeing things.

But we mostly just walk, and dh snaps the pictures, again I've gotten *into* photography quite a bit since April and I don't even get to use my own camera! All I got to do was fool with the fussing dd (who is in a somewhat better mood for a worn out 6 yr. old), the stroller with the 2 yr. old and keep an eye on the 9 yr. old. There were just too many people in some places for me to feel comfortable cramming my way into with all 3 of them.

We go thru Norway:

then thru the other places China, the outpost and onto Germany

.....and the other places....see, I told you my brain was fried

So, we get to the American spot and see

the drum & fife band coming out so we watch that for a few minutes then go inside The Liberty Inn and get the kids a hot dog and some lemonade (not frozen but for now it pleases her ).

Once we come out of there we hit Japan, then Moracco and there is Genie from Aladdin so ddl & ds2 get in line to meet him, there weren't many people waiting in line, most were in line for the food & wine .

Don't stop now....keep walking! Around the countries we go. In France

and dd met the only princess she had yet to meet this week Sleeping Beauty (Aurora) and Belle (in her Blue Dress ). We get to UK and walk into a store where it's supposed to be Pooh & friends and it's

Mary Poppins & Alice from Alice in Wonderland instead but dd & ds2 (he was mad when I didn't get him out of the stroller for Aurora & Belle! LOL! don't care they want to meet them too so they do.

By this time, it's around 4 or 5pm and we're ready to leave, get on the road towards home, etc. We stop for popcorn in Canada and to let the kids play in the water a little as we leave The World Showcase & enter Future World again.

We decide to take one more ride on the monorail and while doing all my reseach I learned that you can sometimes sit up front with the driver, only 4 allowed so I ask and send dh with the kids once it arrives and I ride in the car behind them. They liked that alot too...shoot they liked riding it anytime (especially the youngest one everytime one went over our heads while in Epcot he'd say "I want to ride that again!") loved riding the monorail, and even had the driver honking the horn a few times and when we all get off at TTC they had little license and stickers

Now we transfer to the monorail to the MK to get a bus to our resort. Where we go to the restroom one last time AND use our last 6 snack credits(EEK!) on 4 drinks and 2 bags of chips for the ride.

we pull out at 6pm and begin the long, long drive on to Brunswick, Georgia where we stay in a Motel 6 for the night, before heading the rest of the way home to WV (another 9.5/10hours).

nope, we're not done yet.

There are still a few of you wondering WHY this could/would be our only trip to the World, right?

I'll come back and tell you

 

[uhtimex]

[

I]First off let me just say, I apologize if I butcher names of things in the World Showcase...this was my first time and I can't remember the EXACT names of all the places and I can't find our souvenir map we brought home either.[/I]

This is a great TR I am enjoying your trip.
Tell me more about exchanging your dinning credits for other stuff?

 

[OhMari]

I can't figure out what the problem could be, unless your car broke down and the car will never see WDW again.

 

[jrasmom]

[
This is a great TR I am enjoying your trip.
Tell me more about exchanging your dinning credits for other stuff?

Because of the overwhelming success of the Free dining plan Disney offered that you could use your Table Service Credits at Counter Service places if you chose to do so.

IF you chose to do so you not only got to use your TS as CS they also gave you a little postcard that you could use later to trade in for 2 snack credits, one collectible trading pin & lanyard OR one collectible poster.

We only used 12 of our TS credits (we had 20 to begin with) so we had 8 of those postcards...which means we could've had an extra 16 snack credits which was WAY more then we needed. So we used 4 of the cards to get each of our kids the pin/lanyard thing and one poster in the gift shop.

I think this was something that was only available during the Free dining period.

And we (unlike alot of others I think)preferred more time in the parks to do more stuff, etc. then to take 2-3 hours to eat in a more sit down place, etc. everyday.

 

[roque]

great trip report

 

[lexmelinda]

Hello....last trip??? Don't leave us hanging!

 

[jrasmom]

Honestly?

I wasn't trying to *hook* anyone, etc. just couldn't think of a REAL title for this post so I just put what we were calling the trip.

Nothing happened to the car, goodness I hope not, it's a 2005 and paid for I'd hate to have another car payment anytime soon!!

We have never paid that much money (which some people think we got off cheap for $1298, and in a sense we did)for a vacation before. We go to the beach for a week once a year, almost yearly (we've missed 3 years since getting married in 1995) usually we spend less then $400. So a trip that costs this kind of money to us in once in a lifetime.

We sold our first house last spring and had promised the kids we would set aside money from that sale and take them once ds2 was older but then FREE dining offer came out so we jumped on it. We always said we'd wait till he was old enough to remember it & enjoy it since it'd only happen once.

And by Thursday & Friday of this trip our oldest seemed to be a bit bored. He rode everything he'd wanted to ride everywhere and refused to get back onto much of anything a second time around....I'm thinking he did the blue line transit authority ride more then once, Mickey's Philharmagic, Pooh's ride, It's a Small World things of that sort but that is pretty much it. He didn't want to do Stitch again, there were a few he just didn't care to do again. I don't know if he'd have much fun if we were to take him back and to leave him home while the rest of us take a nice vacation just doesn't seem fair since we only do one vacation a year usually.

We pay everything in cash, he works I'm a stay at home mom, the only thing we owe on currently is our mortgage, we know in a few years we'll need to replace the older minivan with something (hubby is hoping a MINI cooper) so we're saving so we can pay alot in cash hopefully, so we just don't splurge on things like this often. $1300 is ALOT of money to us to spend in one week AND next time it'd cost at least another $1000 ( I checked) because the youngest would be 3 so we'd need a bigger resort room & tickets for him AND the oldest becomes an adult.

But then again.....I went into this thinking "I'm not going to mention going back to hubby anytime soon" (knowing him the way I do BUT he had a better time then HE & I both thought he would )and an hour after we left on Friday evening he says to me "If we come back I'd like to try in January/February when it's cooler" (which would cost even more for food!!)

so, I honestly don't know if we will ever be back.....again.

Who knows ???

If we decide to splurge that much we may opt to go to the Grand Canyon, Montana, visit friends in CA., head to Hawaii (my dream destination) or Alaska (his dream destination) or England somewhere (both of us dream of this) OR we may just well be back at WDW another time

 

[Zippa D Doodah]

Fine trip report! Thanks for letting us see the "World" through your observant eyes.

 

[OhMari]

so, I honestly don't know if we will ever be back.....again.

I bet you will. We went when our youngest was 10. She was the perfect age. She still believed and loved the princesses and yet she was old enough to go on the big rides. My older 3, 12, 16 & 18, were slightly bored, but I told them the MK was about her and start seeing it through her eyes. It changed their attitudes and we had a great day.

If we decide to splurge that much we may opt to go to the Grand Canyon,

This is my husbands dream vacation. Me-I panick just thinking that one of my kids will fall off the side. I told my husband i will go if he hikes down and back. So we are sort of at a stale mate with this one.

head to Hawaii (my dream destination) or Alaska (his dream destination) or England somewhere (both of us dream of this) OR we may just well be back at WDW another time

You guys really sound like me and my husband-we were so close to going to Alaska this year, but our youngest is Marching at the MK in April at the parade, so WDW won out for our 25th wedding anniv. trip. It will probably take another 4 years to save for the Alaska. He wants to do the train, ship excursion.

Thanks for sharing your vacation with us.