Carrieberry
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- Joined
- Nov 30, 1999
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BCV (5 nights) and AKL (1 night) Trip report 2002
Cast: Carrie (aka Carrieberry) 30 years young and DH Mike also 30 years young
WE WENT WITHOUT THE KIDS THIS TIME!!!
Day 1
Sunday December 1, 2002
We left the airport here in Phoenix at 2:35 am. Right on time! Security was not really up to par, as we saw pretty much everyone breeze right through and only those who the computer randomly selected were double checked and no ids were checked at all until we boarded. We were flying first class and it looked like the computers did not choose anyone from this section to be re-checked. Maybe the boarding pass scanner was set up not to check anyone in first class? Who knows, but being that the first class section is closest to the cockpit, I thought it was kind of ridiculous that no one from this section was picked (and this was the case for both legs of our flight to MCO).
We arrived in Dallas Fort Worth with about an hour to kill before our next leg, so we made brief pit stops at the restrooms and then bought two huge cinnamon buns and sat down and ate them while we waited. Soon we noticed that the flight was delayed by 15 minutes. Then another 15 minutes. Then came the announcement that maintenance was checking a few things on the plane and we would be delayed about another 15 or 20 minutes. We figured it was no biggie. Then we saw the crew get off the plane, with all of their luggage, which is never a good sign!! Sure enough, a couple of minutes later they announced that the plane was being pulled out of service and we would have to wait until another plane could taxi over to get us. Well, another half hour later we were finally boarding, and only 2 hours behind schedule. Not bad considering how late some of the other flights were!
We touched down after a hearty in flight meal of pancakes, bacon and fruit (ahh I love first class!) and were happy to see that our driver from Tiffany town Car (Mauro was his name) was there waiting for us as promised. We collected our bags and waited for him to go get the car and soon we were on our way to our grocery stop. Now we have never done one of these before, and since it was just the two of us, we really only wanted to pick up some snacks, and soda and of course, bottles of water. Mauro took us to Kash and Karry and we got the needed items within about 10 minutes. In hindsight, we should have picked up more than one case of water, and some more snacks, but live and learn! We were just in an enormous hurry to get to The Beach Club Villas!!
Soon we were pulling into the beautiful valet area of the Beach Club. We tipped Mauro and reconfirmed that we were being picked up from the Animal Kingdom Lodge on Saturday, and headed to check in. We rented DVC points from a great guy here on the DIS Boards named Jerry (AKA NUTHUT). This was such a wonderful way to be able to stay at an Epcot resort for less money. Jerry had assured me that check in would go smoothly, but still, I was a little nervous. You just never know until you check in , even with a CRO or Disney Travel Company reservation! We have all heard the horror stories of people that have gotten there only to find out their reservation was cancelled, lost, or completely wrong! I stepped up to the counter with butterflies in my stomach and sent my DH Mike off to get some pics of the resort while I checked in. I figured better for him to not be there just in case something happened. He tends to freak out about that sort of stuff!! Anyway, all went fine, and a very friendly CM named Hazel checked me right in, asked if I wanted to leave a credit card for express check out (which I did, and yes, they only authorized it for $1 even though she gave us the $1500 limit) and told us our studio was all ready to check in! We were pleasantly shocked since DVC check in isnt until 4pm and it was only 12:30! We were so tired from flying all night that we wanted to go right to bed for a few hours!! A wonderful bell services guy took us up to our studio and we were thrilled when we saw the room!! It was beautiful!! By far the nicest resort and room we have stayed in (we have stayed at The Poly, ASMo, POFQ, POR). It had a great bathroom, a wonderful little balcony, a queen size bed and a sofa that turned into a bed. The armoire and TV were great , and the drawer space and closet space were fine for just the two of us. All in all, we were thrilled with our choice to stay here!! After we unloaded all of our bags, we wanted to head right out. Our second wind had kicked in and suddenly we were dying to get out and check out the Boardwalk!! So we donned our fanny packs and took off!!
We walked over to the Boardwalk, taking tons of pics along the way of the beautiful scenery, the Swan and Dolphin, and of course the Beach Club. We stopped at the Hot Dog stand and I had a chili dog, and Mike had a corn dog and we shared the best onion rings we have ever eaten!! After that we headed through the Boardwalk lobby and to the bus stops so we could go to Downtown Disney. We had to wait about 20 minutes for a bus, but then we were on our way!
Once at Downtown Disney, we headed straight for the new Once Upon A Toy shop and boy it was everything I hoped it would be!! We vowed to come back and get the Mr. Potato Head Box for our 4 year old son on Saturday before leaving, and we picked out a couple fo things that our 6 year old son would like as well. Since we were changing hotels after 5 nights, we wanted to buy all of our souvenirs the last day, unless we found something somewhere that we knew we would not be able to get at Downtown Disney. After we bowed in there for awhile, we headed for World Of Disney. It was jam packed as usual, and I was a bit disappointed to see nay snowglobes that I couldnt live without as I get one every year. We were in and out of there fairly quickly knowing that with the parks closing early, we would have plenty of opportunities to come back. We were starting to get hungry so we headed towards our standby favorite Woflgang Puck Express. Mike got ½ rotisserie chicken with garlic mashed potatoes, and I got chicken fingers (which I realized after ordering them that they were on the kids menu~oops!) with garlic mashed potatoes as well. I couldnt finish the chicken fingers because they had a weird taste to them. I was honestly afraid they would make me sick but they never did, and now I wonder if I was just being weird about it. Im sure they were fine!
We decided to head back to the hotel and enjoy our room and get some sleep. It was only 7 pm EST which was 5pm to us, but we were so tired from flying all night we just wanted to get some sleep so we could go to AK the next morning and hopefully wake up early enough for Extra Magic Hour. We wanted to look nice and rested for our PS at Donalds Breakfastasaurus!! Well we fell promptly to sleep. Then in what seemed like seconds later, we were awaked by the most horrible booms and squeals!!! I looked sleepily at the clock and saw it was 9:35. Yep, you guessed it~ Illuminations was going on right outside!! I jumped out of bed, ran to the window, and was only able to see a few bolts of color and a bunch of smoke. There was a large bunch of trees blocking our view. Still, no big deal and if you have to be awakened, thats the best way in our opinion!!
Cast: Carrie (aka Carrieberry) 30 years young and DH Mike also 30 years young
WE WENT WITHOUT THE KIDS THIS TIME!!!
Day 1
Sunday December 1, 2002
We left the airport here in Phoenix at 2:35 am. Right on time! Security was not really up to par, as we saw pretty much everyone breeze right through and only those who the computer randomly selected were double checked and no ids were checked at all until we boarded. We were flying first class and it looked like the computers did not choose anyone from this section to be re-checked. Maybe the boarding pass scanner was set up not to check anyone in first class? Who knows, but being that the first class section is closest to the cockpit, I thought it was kind of ridiculous that no one from this section was picked (and this was the case for both legs of our flight to MCO).
We arrived in Dallas Fort Worth with about an hour to kill before our next leg, so we made brief pit stops at the restrooms and then bought two huge cinnamon buns and sat down and ate them while we waited. Soon we noticed that the flight was delayed by 15 minutes. Then another 15 minutes. Then came the announcement that maintenance was checking a few things on the plane and we would be delayed about another 15 or 20 minutes. We figured it was no biggie. Then we saw the crew get off the plane, with all of their luggage, which is never a good sign!! Sure enough, a couple of minutes later they announced that the plane was being pulled out of service and we would have to wait until another plane could taxi over to get us. Well, another half hour later we were finally boarding, and only 2 hours behind schedule. Not bad considering how late some of the other flights were!
We touched down after a hearty in flight meal of pancakes, bacon and fruit (ahh I love first class!) and were happy to see that our driver from Tiffany town Car (Mauro was his name) was there waiting for us as promised. We collected our bags and waited for him to go get the car and soon we were on our way to our grocery stop. Now we have never done one of these before, and since it was just the two of us, we really only wanted to pick up some snacks, and soda and of course, bottles of water. Mauro took us to Kash and Karry and we got the needed items within about 10 minutes. In hindsight, we should have picked up more than one case of water, and some more snacks, but live and learn! We were just in an enormous hurry to get to The Beach Club Villas!!
Soon we were pulling into the beautiful valet area of the Beach Club. We tipped Mauro and reconfirmed that we were being picked up from the Animal Kingdom Lodge on Saturday, and headed to check in. We rented DVC points from a great guy here on the DIS Boards named Jerry (AKA NUTHUT). This was such a wonderful way to be able to stay at an Epcot resort for less money. Jerry had assured me that check in would go smoothly, but still, I was a little nervous. You just never know until you check in , even with a CRO or Disney Travel Company reservation! We have all heard the horror stories of people that have gotten there only to find out their reservation was cancelled, lost, or completely wrong! I stepped up to the counter with butterflies in my stomach and sent my DH Mike off to get some pics of the resort while I checked in. I figured better for him to not be there just in case something happened. He tends to freak out about that sort of stuff!! Anyway, all went fine, and a very friendly CM named Hazel checked me right in, asked if I wanted to leave a credit card for express check out (which I did, and yes, they only authorized it for $1 even though she gave us the $1500 limit) and told us our studio was all ready to check in! We were pleasantly shocked since DVC check in isnt until 4pm and it was only 12:30! We were so tired from flying all night that we wanted to go right to bed for a few hours!! A wonderful bell services guy took us up to our studio and we were thrilled when we saw the room!! It was beautiful!! By far the nicest resort and room we have stayed in (we have stayed at The Poly, ASMo, POFQ, POR). It had a great bathroom, a wonderful little balcony, a queen size bed and a sofa that turned into a bed. The armoire and TV were great , and the drawer space and closet space were fine for just the two of us. All in all, we were thrilled with our choice to stay here!! After we unloaded all of our bags, we wanted to head right out. Our second wind had kicked in and suddenly we were dying to get out and check out the Boardwalk!! So we donned our fanny packs and took off!!
We walked over to the Boardwalk, taking tons of pics along the way of the beautiful scenery, the Swan and Dolphin, and of course the Beach Club. We stopped at the Hot Dog stand and I had a chili dog, and Mike had a corn dog and we shared the best onion rings we have ever eaten!! After that we headed through the Boardwalk lobby and to the bus stops so we could go to Downtown Disney. We had to wait about 20 minutes for a bus, but then we were on our way!
Once at Downtown Disney, we headed straight for the new Once Upon A Toy shop and boy it was everything I hoped it would be!! We vowed to come back and get the Mr. Potato Head Box for our 4 year old son on Saturday before leaving, and we picked out a couple fo things that our 6 year old son would like as well. Since we were changing hotels after 5 nights, we wanted to buy all of our souvenirs the last day, unless we found something somewhere that we knew we would not be able to get at Downtown Disney. After we bowed in there for awhile, we headed for World Of Disney. It was jam packed as usual, and I was a bit disappointed to see nay snowglobes that I couldnt live without as I get one every year. We were in and out of there fairly quickly knowing that with the parks closing early, we would have plenty of opportunities to come back. We were starting to get hungry so we headed towards our standby favorite Woflgang Puck Express. Mike got ½ rotisserie chicken with garlic mashed potatoes, and I got chicken fingers (which I realized after ordering them that they were on the kids menu~oops!) with garlic mashed potatoes as well. I couldnt finish the chicken fingers because they had a weird taste to them. I was honestly afraid they would make me sick but they never did, and now I wonder if I was just being weird about it. Im sure they were fine!
We decided to head back to the hotel and enjoy our room and get some sleep. It was only 7 pm EST which was 5pm to us, but we were so tired from flying all night we just wanted to get some sleep so we could go to AK the next morning and hopefully wake up early enough for Extra Magic Hour. We wanted to look nice and rested for our PS at Donalds Breakfastasaurus!! Well we fell promptly to sleep. Then in what seemed like seconds later, we were awaked by the most horrible booms and squeals!!! I looked sleepily at the clock and saw it was 9:35. Yep, you guessed it~ Illuminations was going on right outside!! I jumped out of bed, ran to the window, and was only able to see a few bolts of color and a bunch of smoke. There was a large bunch of trees blocking our view. Still, no big deal and if you have to be awakened, thats the best way in our opinion!!
That is always a nice surprise.
