LibrarianBecky
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Dec 13, 2010
- Messages
- 383
Walt Disney World trip report
September 17-24, 2011
Background information: Our first trip to Walt Disney World for me, DH, and our five year old son.
Resort: Port Orleans French Quarter. There were lots of things we liked about this resort: the small size, beautiful grounds, and clean, spacious rooms. We had some trouble with bus service, but I dont know if that is just this resort or if it is something that is typical of WDW. The food court was small and choices were fairly limited, but the food we ate there was good.
Dining: This was fairly hit or miss for us. We had booked under a free dining offer. We enjoyed the counter service at Columbia Harbor House quite a bit. I also really liked the lamb shwarma platter at the Tangerine Café in Moracco in Epcot. We had burgers at Pecos Bills, which werent really anything special. I had a muffeletta sandwich and a shrimp po boy in the POFQ food court, both of which were okay.
We booked a table service meal each day. We liked Chef Mickeys quite a bit. All of us found food on the buffet that we liked (the salmon was great, as were the mashed potatoes). I thought the character interaction was good. It was very loud in the restaurant, but we expected that. It was super easy to hop on the monorail and get to Chef Mickeys from Magic Kingdom.
The next day, we did the Fantasmic package at Mama Melrose, which was not so great. We waited a LONG time for our reservation. Our server was great, but the food was mediocre. Very chewy steak, fairly tasteless dessert. Someone posted here once that Mama Melrose was no Olive Garden and I would have to agree.
Biergarten was okay (better than Mama Melrose). I felt like they did not have a huge selection on the buffet, but we enjoyed the food we ate and liked the entertainment. Crystal Palace was fine .again, all of us found some foods on the buffet that we enjoyed, and it was a great way to meet the characters. We also ate at the Cape May Seafood Buffet and thought the food was good (although our server wasnt so great here....really our only experience of bad service during the week. Very slow on drink refills and didnt clear any buffet plates until after we had eaten dessert. Who wants to stare at a bucket of crab shells when they are eating dessert?? Not me!)
We had breakfast as Tusker House on our last day, and the noise and chaos in there was a bit much for us (although, to be fair, we were basically exhausted at this point in the trip). The food was perfectly fine, but we had a long wait to meet all of the characters (we were literally finished with our breakfast before any of the characters had stopped at our table).
My biggest dining disappointment was Ohana. I went in really expecting to like it .and it was only so-so. The pineapple break was okay a bit dry (could have used some butter). The salad was good, and I liked the dressing. I knew that my son wouldnt be interested in eating anything except for the broccoli from the meal. I had read on here that people have asked for fries/chicken nugget type food for their kids at Ohana and received it without a problem. I asked our server, he said he would check and see if he could get my son some French fries .but they never appeared, and the server never offered an explanation. I probably should have asked again, but he made me feel like I was being a bother, so I didnt.
The potstickers were good. The wings were a little soggy? I expected them to be a bit crispy, but they werent at all. The cinnamon flavor of them was not something that my husband or I cared for. The first time I got steak it was delicious .very tender and good flavor. I asked for another piece..and it was literally charcoal. Not edible. When the server came around again with a different skewer and asked, I told him I would like some and he said something along the lines of Yeah, much better than the other time. I agreed with him, but couldnt help but think, If you knew it was bad before, why would you serve it? My chicken was good. Shrimp was a bit dry, but still edible. My husband and I both liked the vegetables and the noodles. My son did the coconut races and the hula, and he enjoyed that. By the time the games were over, dessert was at our table. I know this is probably a sin to say but it was only so-so for me. It was okay, but not something Ill ever think about, dream about, drool over, the way I have heard it described on here. Maybe it was just an off day, but Ohana was probably our least favorite meal. The food at Ohana was slightly better than Mama Melrose .but I had little to no expectations for Mama Melroses. I had high hopes for Ohana, but for me, it just didnt live up to the hype. On a positive note, though, we did not have to wait past our ADR time (we did happen to get there about 30 minutes before our ADR time, but we were seated by the time we had made our ADR for).
September: It was so freakin hot and humid. I have never sweated so much in my life. I knew that it was going to be hot .but I still wasnt prepared for it. Between the walking and the heat, it really took a lot out of my DH and I. We took afternoon breaks nearly everyday, which helped, but I have never been so exhausted on vacation before. I definitely saw love bugs, which were annoying but not actually harmful. The worst we saw them was at Animal Kingdom on Triceratops Spin. I dont know why, but they were EVERYWHERE there. I was afraid I was going to get one in the face while we were going around! Because Ive never gone to WDW before, I am probably not a good judge of crowd levels, but it seemed very busy to me. I know it is the slow season, so I cant imagine what it must be like during the busy season. We did have many rides that were walk on (Snow White, Philharmagic, Carousel, Maelstrom, Nemo), but we used fast pass for things like Peter Pan, Winnie the Pooh, Jungle Cruise, and of course the biggies like TSM and Soarin. Itll probably be a few years before we go again, but I dont think we would go again May-September. I think we would have been able to do more if the heat hadnt zapped our will to live.
A few complaints: Maybe this is just POFQ, maybe it is the whole WDW, but we found the busses to be very inconsistent. Sometimes we would only wait a few minutes for a bus, but there were several times that we waited 45+ minutes for a bus. Not because one bus was full, but because no busses came at all. That seems like a very long time to wait for something that is supposed to be every 20 minutes or so.
Our other frustration was waiting for 45 minutes in the fast pass line for Soarin. Granted, the stand by line was posted as longer than that, but still. I think there may have been something wrong with the ride because a CM announced something further up the line, but you couldnt hear her from where I was, and she didnt come back to explain to the rest of the line, so I really dont know what was going on. I enjoyed the ride, as did my husband and son, but I couldnt convince them to get another fast pass and try again because they did not want to have such a long wait time. (That isnt normal for the FP line at Soarin, is it?)
A few magical moments: I definitely dont want to end my trip report with complaints, so I wanted to share some wonderful things that happened to us as well. In Epcot, we rode Finding Nemo and then did Turtle Talk with Crush. My son wanted to do Finding Nemo again. My husband asked a CM how we got back to the Nemo line. The CM told us to follow him, and he unhooked a rope and let us right into the line. There wasnt any wait time for the ride, but it was so nice of him to do that. I think we would have had to walk outside and come through the whole que again if he hadnt.
Also, while at The Chapeau in MK, a CM said she was going to make our day magical and gave us free embroidery on my sons Mickey ears. It was very nice of her to do that---she certainly didnt have to. During the Jungle Parade at Animal Kingdom (the only parade, outside of Spectromagic, that we were able to attend), Baloo and Brer Bear both gave me kisses, which just made me feel special.
Overall, we had a wonderful trip. Seeing the look on my little boys face when he got to meet Buzz, Mickey, Goofy ..it really was priceless. Well definitely go again---and we learned a lot on our first trip, so our next one will be even better!
September 17-24, 2011
Background information: Our first trip to Walt Disney World for me, DH, and our five year old son.
Resort: Port Orleans French Quarter. There were lots of things we liked about this resort: the small size, beautiful grounds, and clean, spacious rooms. We had some trouble with bus service, but I dont know if that is just this resort or if it is something that is typical of WDW. The food court was small and choices were fairly limited, but the food we ate there was good.
Dining: This was fairly hit or miss for us. We had booked under a free dining offer. We enjoyed the counter service at Columbia Harbor House quite a bit. I also really liked the lamb shwarma platter at the Tangerine Café in Moracco in Epcot. We had burgers at Pecos Bills, which werent really anything special. I had a muffeletta sandwich and a shrimp po boy in the POFQ food court, both of which were okay.
We booked a table service meal each day. We liked Chef Mickeys quite a bit. All of us found food on the buffet that we liked (the salmon was great, as were the mashed potatoes). I thought the character interaction was good. It was very loud in the restaurant, but we expected that. It was super easy to hop on the monorail and get to Chef Mickeys from Magic Kingdom.
The next day, we did the Fantasmic package at Mama Melrose, which was not so great. We waited a LONG time for our reservation. Our server was great, but the food was mediocre. Very chewy steak, fairly tasteless dessert. Someone posted here once that Mama Melrose was no Olive Garden and I would have to agree.
Biergarten was okay (better than Mama Melrose). I felt like they did not have a huge selection on the buffet, but we enjoyed the food we ate and liked the entertainment. Crystal Palace was fine .again, all of us found some foods on the buffet that we enjoyed, and it was a great way to meet the characters. We also ate at the Cape May Seafood Buffet and thought the food was good (although our server wasnt so great here....really our only experience of bad service during the week. Very slow on drink refills and didnt clear any buffet plates until after we had eaten dessert. Who wants to stare at a bucket of crab shells when they are eating dessert?? Not me!)
We had breakfast as Tusker House on our last day, and the noise and chaos in there was a bit much for us (although, to be fair, we were basically exhausted at this point in the trip). The food was perfectly fine, but we had a long wait to meet all of the characters (we were literally finished with our breakfast before any of the characters had stopped at our table).
My biggest dining disappointment was Ohana. I went in really expecting to like it .and it was only so-so. The pineapple break was okay a bit dry (could have used some butter). The salad was good, and I liked the dressing. I knew that my son wouldnt be interested in eating anything except for the broccoli from the meal. I had read on here that people have asked for fries/chicken nugget type food for their kids at Ohana and received it without a problem. I asked our server, he said he would check and see if he could get my son some French fries .but they never appeared, and the server never offered an explanation. I probably should have asked again, but he made me feel like I was being a bother, so I didnt.
The potstickers were good. The wings were a little soggy? I expected them to be a bit crispy, but they werent at all. The cinnamon flavor of them was not something that my husband or I cared for. The first time I got steak it was delicious .very tender and good flavor. I asked for another piece..and it was literally charcoal. Not edible. When the server came around again with a different skewer and asked, I told him I would like some and he said something along the lines of Yeah, much better than the other time. I agreed with him, but couldnt help but think, If you knew it was bad before, why would you serve it? My chicken was good. Shrimp was a bit dry, but still edible. My husband and I both liked the vegetables and the noodles. My son did the coconut races and the hula, and he enjoyed that. By the time the games were over, dessert was at our table. I know this is probably a sin to say but it was only so-so for me. It was okay, but not something Ill ever think about, dream about, drool over, the way I have heard it described on here. Maybe it was just an off day, but Ohana was probably our least favorite meal. The food at Ohana was slightly better than Mama Melrose .but I had little to no expectations for Mama Melroses. I had high hopes for Ohana, but for me, it just didnt live up to the hype. On a positive note, though, we did not have to wait past our ADR time (we did happen to get there about 30 minutes before our ADR time, but we were seated by the time we had made our ADR for).
September: It was so freakin hot and humid. I have never sweated so much in my life. I knew that it was going to be hot .but I still wasnt prepared for it. Between the walking and the heat, it really took a lot out of my DH and I. We took afternoon breaks nearly everyday, which helped, but I have never been so exhausted on vacation before. I definitely saw love bugs, which were annoying but not actually harmful. The worst we saw them was at Animal Kingdom on Triceratops Spin. I dont know why, but they were EVERYWHERE there. I was afraid I was going to get one in the face while we were going around! Because Ive never gone to WDW before, I am probably not a good judge of crowd levels, but it seemed very busy to me. I know it is the slow season, so I cant imagine what it must be like during the busy season. We did have many rides that were walk on (Snow White, Philharmagic, Carousel, Maelstrom, Nemo), but we used fast pass for things like Peter Pan, Winnie the Pooh, Jungle Cruise, and of course the biggies like TSM and Soarin. Itll probably be a few years before we go again, but I dont think we would go again May-September. I think we would have been able to do more if the heat hadnt zapped our will to live.
A few complaints: Maybe this is just POFQ, maybe it is the whole WDW, but we found the busses to be very inconsistent. Sometimes we would only wait a few minutes for a bus, but there were several times that we waited 45+ minutes for a bus. Not because one bus was full, but because no busses came at all. That seems like a very long time to wait for something that is supposed to be every 20 minutes or so.
Our other frustration was waiting for 45 minutes in the fast pass line for Soarin. Granted, the stand by line was posted as longer than that, but still. I think there may have been something wrong with the ride because a CM announced something further up the line, but you couldnt hear her from where I was, and she didnt come back to explain to the rest of the line, so I really dont know what was going on. I enjoyed the ride, as did my husband and son, but I couldnt convince them to get another fast pass and try again because they did not want to have such a long wait time. (That isnt normal for the FP line at Soarin, is it?)
A few magical moments: I definitely dont want to end my trip report with complaints, so I wanted to share some wonderful things that happened to us as well. In Epcot, we rode Finding Nemo and then did Turtle Talk with Crush. My son wanted to do Finding Nemo again. My husband asked a CM how we got back to the Nemo line. The CM told us to follow him, and he unhooked a rope and let us right into the line. There wasnt any wait time for the ride, but it was so nice of him to do that. I think we would have had to walk outside and come through the whole que again if he hadnt.
Also, while at The Chapeau in MK, a CM said she was going to make our day magical and gave us free embroidery on my sons Mickey ears. It was very nice of her to do that---she certainly didnt have to. During the Jungle Parade at Animal Kingdom (the only parade, outside of Spectromagic, that we were able to attend), Baloo and Brer Bear both gave me kisses, which just made me feel special.
Overall, we had a wonderful trip. Seeing the look on my little boys face when he got to meet Buzz, Mickey, Goofy ..it really was priceless. Well definitely go again---and we learned a lot on our first trip, so our next one will be even better!
