Our First Trip as a Family of Four - A July 2017 PTR - Updated 6/26

AK is so gorgeous at night :love: I absolutely love the ToL Awakenings and simply walking around at night; and while I know you won't do this with little ones, riding EE at night is like 100x more awesome than riding during the day! We did do the safari at dusk once and saw a lot less animals than we do when we ride first thing in the morning, but that hasn't stopped me from wanting to do a true NIGHT safari for the experience.

We are excited, and yes, I will for sure enjoy Everest at night! The kids will just have to wait...ha!

Yes, I've heard the Safari at dusk isn't quite as good as early in the morning, but hoping the new nighttime safari will be good since it is designed for night time.
 
Back from our trip and ready to catch up!

We are planning on riding Soarin’ at rope drop before moving on and using FP’s at the Character Spot, Test Track, and Spaceship Earth. This is just our morning to take care of all of the rides we like in Future World. We love using a FP at the Character Spot as it is usually a long and slow moving line and a good use of one of those tier 2 FP’s.
Good luck with TT. It was down a lot while we were there. I guess because of all the rain. We never actually got to do it. We haven't gotten to do it in awhile actually. Will try next trip.

We did do the Character Spot FP and got great interactions and photos!

We’re also going to visit Club Cool of course, a must do stop for us in Epcot!

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Introduced it to all my boys this trip. Even tricked DH with the Beverly! Otherwise, we loved all the flavors.

Finally, at about 8:30 we’ll begin looking for a spot to watch the new fireworks, Happily Ever After.
It is spectacular! I boo hoo'd a few times.

After the fireworks are over our plan is to head back into the park as we have a sleep in day the next day. We are looking at heading to Fantasyland to ride things like Winnie the Pooh, Dumbo, and the Barnstormer. The park is open until 10:00 PM and we may try and make it a while, or at least DS5 and me might.
Love, love the parks, especially MK, at night. We closed it down for an 11pm close one night of our trip!
 
Doing the safari at dusk is better than dark, and you should be okay at your time. There are several different animals out at dusk than morning and the lions are usually more active. If you do it too late though you won't see much.

I hope you enjoy the River Journey. We had planned to go back to AK one more night to do it with a FP but the boys ix-nayed the plan and wanted more MK time. Since it was more MK (my fave park) time at night, I readily agreed. We will just have to check out NRJ next trip.

And @ariane37 is correct that EE is ridiculous at night! Amazing!
 


Back from our trip and ready to catch up!

Welcome home! Hope you had a fantastic time and can't wait to read about it.

Good luck with TT. It was down a lot while we were there. I guess because of all the rain. We never actually got to do it. We haven't gotten to do it in awhile actually. Will try next trip.

Yeah, we've had that happen in the past to so we'll pray for good vibes on test track!

We did do the Character Spot FP and got great interactions and photos!

Yes! We love this use of a FP since it is tier 2, glad it went well for you.

Introduced it to all my boys this trip. Even tricked DH with the Beverly! Otherwise, we loved all the flavors.

Love this place. Just came up on my timehop yesterday of us in there and one of the pictures was DW trying the Beverly!

It is spectacular! I boo hoo'd a few times.

Good to hear. We are excited!

Love, love the parks, especially MK, at night. We closed it down for an 11pm close one night of our trip!

Yes...we love nights too! Our boys aren't old enough yet to close the parks down most of the time, but someday we will!

Doing the safari at dusk is better than dark, and you should be okay at your time. There are several different animals out at dusk than morning and the lions are usually more active. If you do it too late though you won't see much.

Good to hear, I was wondering how it works the best. DS5 would love it if we got to see the lions walking. He would freak out!!

I hope you enjoy the River Journey. We had planned to go back to AK one more night to do it with a FP but the boys ix-nayed the plan and wanted more MK time. Since it was more MK (my fave park) time at night, I readily agreed. We will just have to check out NRJ next trip.

Hey, you can't argue with more MK time and the river journey will still be there!!

And @ariane37 is correct that EE is ridiculous at night! Amazing!

I'm super excited for this one at night! Can't wait!!
 
Day 11 Plans

I hope everyone’s week is going great! On this next day of our trip we have a rope drop planned at Epcot. Our primary goals of the morning are to ride Soarin’ at rope drop as I think it is the most doable of the three rides first thing with the new theater. We will then hang out in future world until our 10:15 AM breakfast reservation. We are eating at one of our favorite restaurants, but this is our first time eating breakfast here since they have only started serving breakfast since were last down for a trip.

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We love Garden Grill! The character interactions always seem great, the home grown aspect of the food has always been really good, and DS5 gets a kick out of the spinning restaurant.

After Garden Grill we are going to do a few more things in this park, but we are not using FP’s here this morning as we are saving those for our evening park. We will probably ride Soarin’ again with a child swap pass, or at least whoever didn’t get to ride earlier will, but DS5 will get a second ride! Yay for him!!

We plan on being out of this park fairly early today, by around 12:15 or so as we want a good break. It is going to be a late night at the Magic Kingdom! So we will probably do some swimming for sure this afternoon and a nap as well.

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We plan on heading to the Magic Kingdom around 6 PM as they are open a little later tonight and we will just see how long the kids make it. We are actually not planning on watching the fireworks as we did that earlier in the trip, but tonight can be our backup in case weather cancelled the other night. We did also save our FP’s to use here tonight so we are definitely using one at DS5’s favorite ride:

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We will also probably be eating dinner here:

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I miss the old Pecos Bills menu a little, but have heard good things about the new items so I’m getting a little excited.

We also have FP’s scheduled at Peter Pan and Big Thunder Mountain, some of our favorite rides! We will also spend some time riding rides during the fireworks is our goal as the lines thin out just a little bit.

Again, we are just kind of planning on staying in the park as long as the kids can and want to as we have a sleep in morning planned tomorrow. Have a great finish to the week everyone!

Up Next: Day 12 Plans
 


Hello! Just joining in!

All of your plans sound great! Your boys are super cute!

I love the Garden Grill. It is my favorite restaurant at Disney! The breakfast is sooo good.

I am super jealous of your long stay! The boys will love it!
 
All caught up!!

We are planning on riding Soarin’ at rope drop before moving on and using FP’s at the Character Spot, Test Track, and Spaceship Earth. This is just our morning to take care of all of the rides we like in Future World. We love using a FP at the Character Spot as it is usually a long and slow moving line and a good use of one of those tier 2 FP’s.

My favorite combo of rides at Epcot! Rope drop Soarin' and FPs for Character Spot, Spaceship Earth, and Test Track!
Think we are doing this exact combo of rides in August.

I’m not sure if I’m excited about this meal or not as the buzz around this restaurant has kind of died down since it opened, but we’re going to try it out.

Skipper Canteen was hit or miss for us. Love the theme, and food was ok to good. The Shu mai appetizer dumplings were awesome though.

We also have a FP for 7:30 at Kilimanjaro Safari, which I assume will be the night safari.

An FYI, we did an 8:30pm safari in the dark and there wasn't much to see, but what we DID see were the big lions perched up on the rocks instead of sleeping. That was really cool, but that was the only thing we did see! You may have better luck though!

Our primary goals of the morning are to ride Soarin’ at rope drop as I think it is the most doable of the three rides first thing with the new theater.

Wholeheartedly agree!

We will then hang out in future world until our 10:15 AM breakfast reservation. We are eating at one of our favorite restaurants, but this is our first time eating breakfast here since they have only started serving breakfast since were last down for a trip.

I love Garden Grill breakfast and have been dying to go back here ever since we had it last year. So we're doing it again in August!
 
Hello! Just joining in!

Thanks for joining...glad to have you!

All of your plans sound great! Your boys are super cute!

Thanks! They are pretty cute!

I love the Garden Grill. It is my favorite restaurant at Disney! The breakfast is sooo good.

Good to hear about the breakfast. We've done dinner and loved it so hoping breakfast is just as good.

I am super jealous of your long stay! The boys will love it!

We are pretty lucky for sure!

All caught up!!

:cheer2:

My favorite combo of rides at Epcot! Rope drop Soarin' and FPs for Character Spot, Spaceship Earth, and Test Track!
Think we are doing this exact combo of rides in August.

It's a pretty good lineup considering the tier restrictions in the park. I definitely think it is probably the best option as long as Frozen Ever After is being done on another day.

Skipper Canteen was hit or miss for us. Love the theme, and food was ok to good. The Shu mai appetizer dumplings were awesome though.

Will definitely try that appetizer! I've heard such mixed reviews on the food I don't know if I'm even excited, but we're going to go in with an open mind!

An FYI, we did an 8:30pm safari in the dark and there wasn't much to see, but what we DID see were the big lions perched up on the rocks instead of sleeping. That was really cool, but that was the only thing we did see! You may have better luck though!

Yeah, I've heard that a bunch. Hopefully the lions will be out at least! That would be alright with DS5.

I love Garden Grill breakfast and have been dying to go back here ever since we had it last year. So we're doing it again in August!

Great to hear! We are really looking forward to this one and the characters are always great here as well.
 
How many or our great minds can think alike LOL? We too are doing a GG (snagged a PPO) on our Epcot day with plans to hit Soarin first thing. My kids have zero interest in FEA so we FP character spot, TT and SE too!! They humor me with meeting characters :rotfl:
And Mine Train is bout the only coaster I can coax my son on-we did get him to ride BTMRR last time (awesome in the dark). Also doing an evening (hoping more dusk) safari too! Have only done early morning on those.

Pool time is very important-I swear kids are born with invisible fins and gills they love swimming so much. Your pictures don't show pools are too crowded either-we are hoping this is the case in August as well. The only pool that always seemed busy was stormalong bay last trip, and even then we found loungers together.
 
How many or our great minds can think alike LOL? We too are doing a GG (snagged a PPO) on our Epcot day with plans to hit Soarin first thing.

Great minds think alike for sure!! I think it's a great plan.

My kids have zero interest in FEA so we FP character spot, TT and SE too!! They humor me with meeting characters :rotfl:

Yeah, we are going to FP Frozen on a different day just so we get to do it, but I think DS5 could care less and DS1 only cares about Mickey! At least your kids let you enjoy the characters! Ha!

And Mine Train is bout the only coaster I can coax my son on-we did get him to ride BTMRR last time (awesome in the dark).

Yeah, DS5 was hesitant to ride Big Thunder last time, but he decided...all on his own...to do it and loved it. By the end of the trip he talked us into taking him on Splash Mountain and he loved it too!

Also doing an evening (hoping more dusk) safari too! Have only done early morning on those.

Yep, looking forward to this. Have heard that at least the lions may be more active then.

Pool time is very important-I swear kids are born with invisible fins and gills they love swimming so much.

Very true. Ours LOVE swimming, especially at Disney!

Your pictures don't show pools are too crowded either-we are hoping this is the case in August as well.

Most of those pics are at Pop and the pools seemed very manageable from 1-3 which is when we return from the parks. We usually swim as soon as we get back and then go nap from 3-5 or so as it seems the pools do get a little more crowded as people make their way back from the parks.

The only pool that always seemed busy was stormalong bay last trip, and even then we found loungers together.

I can certainly see that. We did have a crowded pool at Coronado one afternoon on our trip when we went to the main pool, I just failed to take my camera over that day.

Thanks for commenting!!
 
Day 12 Plans

I hope everyone finished with a great week and is having a great weekend so far! We have been busy getting things done around here. Both DW and I work some summer hours at school for extra pay and we’ve been doing that some this week. We’ve also been doing some shopping to get ready for our trip. We sat down yesterday and got a packing list done. I am heading to a work conference for five days before our trip and DW is going with me. It’s kind of an anniversary trip for us as we are leaving the kids with grandparents. But we will only be home for three days between that trip and our Disney vacation, so we want to have quite a bit done before we leave.

Anyways, I’ll probably do a shopping and packing update later this week.

For Day 12 of our trip we are taking it pretty easy as we were in MK late the evening before. We are going to leave the resort at about 9:30 and head to breakfast at one of our favorite places:

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DW loves breakfast here and it is a place she wants to go on every trip so I better keep her happy!

After we finish with breakfast we are going to head into Magic Kingdom for just a few hours. We aren’t going to spend a whole lot of time in the park, but since we were in the area at Wilderness Lodge why not? We don’t have FP’s for this day yet as we can only make 10 days of FP’s since we won’t upgrade to Annual Passes until we arrive. But we plan on making reservations earlier in the trip once we convert our passes at Splash Mountain, Space Mountain, and Peter Pan’s Flight. We also plan on taking in the Hall of Presidents on this day as it will be the afternoon and hot and I’d like to see this again as I haven’t seen it in about four years.

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Our other main goal of this park visit is to watch the Festival of Fantasy Parade. We have never seen it as we are not ever in the park in the middle of the afternoon, we are already gone for a break because of the heat, but we do want to see it so we’ll try to get a good spot and watch.

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Our plan is to be out of the park by around 4:00 at the latest so we have the entire evening to relax and swim at French Quarter. We will probably just have dinner at Sassagoula Floatworks so we can keep this evening as simple and restful as possible.

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Tomorrow will be our final park day and we are going to get our money’s worth!

Have a great weekend everyone!!

Up Next: Day 13 Plans
 
We plan on heading to the Magic Kingdom around 6 PM as they are open a little later tonight and we will just see how long the kids make it. We are actually not planning on watching the fireworks as we did that earlier in the trip, but tonight can be our backup in case weather cancelled the other night. We did also save our FP’s to use here tonight so we are definitely using one at DS5’s favorite ride:
We love MK at night too and the boys always find it is a different atmosphere. We did a few later nights when they were younger and now that they are teenagers, it is a must do.

Our other main goal of this park visit is to watch the Festival of Fantasy Parade. We have never seen it as we are not ever in the park in the middle of the afternoon, we are already gone for a break because of the heat, but we do want to see it so we’ll try to get a good spot and watch.
I've booked this in for my trip too. I haven't seen it in years and am really looking forward to it!
 
We love MK at night too and the boys always find it is a different atmosphere. We did a few later nights when they were younger and now that they are teenagers, it is a must do.

Part of me is excited for touring the parks later with our kids, but that also means they have to grow up, which I'm not sure I want!

I've booked this in for my trip too. I haven't seen it in years and am really looking forward to it!

I was disappointed we missed it on our last trip, but we have to leave ourselves reasons to come back!! ha
 
Day 13 Plans

I hope everyone had a great weekend! DW and are headed out later in the week to an educational conference. Well, I’m going to a conference and DW is tagging along. We’ll see how we do for a few days away from the kids. We will get back from that trip just three days before our Disney trip, so we are trying to get a lot of stuff done before we go so those three days aren’t any crazier than they already will be.

So, let’s look at day 13 of our trip. We had a nice relaxing evening the day before where we went to bed early and today is the last park day of our trip, so naturally we are finishing here:

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The Magic Kingdom has morning EMH today so we will be there for an 8 AM opening, but that means we will most likely be heading out of this park for a break before noon. For our morning of touring we are going to spend most of the EMH in Fantasyland on attractions like Winnie the pooh, Barnstormer, Dumbo, and Under the Sea.

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We also have a final FP for Seven Dwarfs Mine Train early in the day. We have another FP set up at Peter Pan’s Flight and also plan on meeting Minnie & Daisy at Pete’s. We love this character meet and greet location and that building is always very cold inside!!

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We will finish up our morning with a lunch reservation at Be Our Guest. The quick service lunch is really good and the process is super easy.

Our final FP is for Space Mountain as we leave the park and then we’ll make a 4th FP on our phone for the evening. We plan on being out of the park by noon so we get a good afternoon break.

After our break at the resort we plan on heading back to the park around 5:30 or so to finish out our trip with a bang. We really don’t have a plan on this night other than to see what we can get as bonus FP’s and we’ll also use up any child swap passes we might have left over. As long as the weather cooperated early in the trip we will have already seen Happily Ever After, so tonight will just be a backup night for us. The park is open until 10 PM, so we’ll see how long the kids make it. We don’t have any plans to wake up early tomorrow. We just love taking in the MK atmosphere at night.

Have a great week everyone!

Up Next: Shopping & Packing Update
 
Every time I see someone planning to eat at Pecos Bills I'm reminded that I want to try the nachos there! It's been quite ahwile since we've eaten there but I hear the nachos (among other things currently on the menu) are delicious :goodvibes
I'm periodically searching for a lunch BOG reservation for our Aug. trip. Dinner there is one of our favorite TS meals but we've only done lunch once and it was just ok. However I'd like to give it another try!
The rest of your plans look great!
 
Every time I see someone planning to eat at Pecos Bills I'm reminded that I want to try the nachos there! It's been quite ahwile since we've eaten there but I hear the nachos (among other things currently on the menu) are delicious :goodvibes

I've heard the same thing. We get a lot of quality Mexican food here in Oklahoma, but we are still excited about this menu. My wife is most definitely a fan of a good plate of nachos!

I'm periodically searching for a lunch BOG reservation for our Aug. trip. Dinner there is one of our favorite TS meals but we've only done lunch once and it was just ok. However I'd like to give it another try!
The rest of your plans look great!

Good luck in finding that, those lunches are hard to come by. I'm getting up at 5 am in the morning to try and get us one at Christmas this year as tomorrow is our 180 day mark. We enjoyed the lunch last year, but like you we love it at dinner as well. We've only done lunch the one time, but it was a good experience and the food was good.
 

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