PTR: Because We're Insane: Driving & Triple Split Stay!

[JenSop]

Hi everyone!

I was too excited to wait until I actually get back from my trip to start posting about it!! As a result, I've decided to do my first PRE - Trip Report!!!!!

So let's cut right the the chase!


Cue the introductions! (For those of you who have read my other TR's, you can just pass right on by this...)

Jen (ME!) I've been going to Disney since I was a little girl and I just LOVE it! I'm a singer (mostly classical, but other stuff too), voice teacher, travel agent (Disney specialist), and part-time retail worker. (This is what one must do when they have two degrees in music - work lots of jobs!) I also own a successful Christmas caroling business - we sing at holiday events in Victorian costumes and have performed all over - from the local retirement homes to national television.

Brian (DH) Brian's a music teacher (elementary band), he conducts one of the local concert bands, teaches music lessons and works part-time retail as well. He doesn't have as many Disney trips under his belt as I do, but he loves the World almost as much as I do! We joined DVC in 2007 and are SO happy we did!


And for those new to the Dis or my Trip Reports, here's a handy guide to some of the abbreviations...


TR - Trip Report
DVC - Disney Vacation Club (Disney's version of a time share)
MK - Magic Kingdom
DHS - Disney Hollywood Studios
EMH - Extra Magic Hours (each day a park opens early or stays open late for on-site resort guests)
AP - Annual Pass (park ticket that's good for a year)
TIW - Tables in Wonderland (discount dining card)
DDP - Disney Dining Plan
AKV - Animal Kingdom Villas
OKW - Old Key West Resort
BWV - Boardwalk Villas
VWL - Villas at Wilderness Lodge


Now... about that upcoming trip....


We're leaving for Disney on June 17th.


BUT....


There's just one thing.....








We're driving.


Wait, what was that again?







Driving!




After driving down in 2009, we said "NEVER AGAIN!" In fact I was quite adamant about what a horrible mistake it was to drive to Disney. I did my best to talk people out of it whenever I could. I went on and on about the horribleness of it all.

However, when looking for reasonable airfare for our June trip, I was noticing that there was no such thing as reasonable airfare for our June trip! All that I could find was super expensive crazy airfare.


You know how after time goes by, horrible things don't seem quite so horrible? I think that's the case for us. Our Honda Fit gets such AMAZING gas mileage. We spent maybe $250 TOTAL in gas for our entire trip in 2009. That's driving to and from eastern Pennsylvania - about 1000 miles each way. (Although with gas prices being what they are, I'm suspecting we'll probably be closer to $400 in gas vs. the $250 we spent before.) Money is the sole reason that we decided to drive to Disney again.

So that's the insanity part, number 1.

Number 2 is that we're doing a TRIPLE split stay!

We've done split stays before, but always between two resorts.

This is how it happened....

We booked our initial stay a few months ago for Old Key West. We needed a room that didn't cost a lot of points, and we missed our 11 month booking window for value villas at AKV. So OKW it was! We booked a studio at OKW for Sun. 6/19 - Fri. 6/24. And that was it.

But we noticed that Sunday night was going to be evening EMH at MK. We love evening EMH at MK. But how would we be able to stay at MK until 2am after an 18 hour drive overnight into that very morning?!

We were going to have to leave on Friday the 17th and arrive on the 18th. I started looking for cheap off-site hotels at first. You know, just somewhere to crash after our long drive before checking into OKW. But we have AP's and were talking already about the fact that we'll at least want to go into the parks at some point after we get there. But we don't want to have to drive to the parks or figure out transportation!

So we thought it best to stay onsite. Once the discount rates came out for the summer, we booked one night at BWV for that Saturday night at the beginning of our trip. Then once AP discount rates were released, we got our price for BWV lowered and we decided to add a night at the end of the trip at VWL. (I guess that's a benefit to driving - you can change the time or day when you're going to leave.)

And voila! Three resorts in just one stay!

But that's just the beginning! There's so much more to share with you! BUT it will have to wait until my next update!

(Here's a sneak peak....)

On the next episode of Jen's Pre-TR! The terrible scheduling snafu that almost ruined the whole trip! And some great new ideas to improve Jen's travel agent career! (hopefully!) Plus, for the first time, we will be using TIW for part of our trip. AND - we'll be going to Victoria and Albert's for our tenth anniversary!!!! Can't wait to share the pics of what that food is gonna look like!!!!!

 

[ShesAPirate]

I'm in! Wouldn't miss it!

 

[teachermommy78]

Subbing! We will be arriving just as you are leaving!

 

[JenSop]

I'm in! Wouldn't miss it!

Subbing! We will be arriving just as you are leaving!

Yay! Welcome!!!!!

 

[clayfolks]

Sounds like fun! I'm in!!

 

[JenSop]

Sounds like fun! I'm in!!

Welcome aboard!

 

[TanzUnited99]

Hi Jen, I'm looking forward to hearing all about your plans!

After having a terrible ordeal booking our airfare I would take driving any day, if it was an option!

Wow on staying at three different resorts. I'm looking forward to reading more, including all about your anniversary meal at V&A

 

[JenSop]

Hi Jen, I'm looking forward to hearing all about your plans!

After having a terrible ordeal booking our airfare I would take driving any day, if it was an option!

Wow on staying at three different resorts. I'm looking forward to reading more, including all about your anniversary meal at V&A

Thanks for joining!

 

[mamamary]

Hi there! I'm in too . Just discovered your other trip reports yest. when I looked at your post about wash. mach. rec. I was hoping to get lots of ideas as our machine is not working too good. Read two of your old trip reports (yes dinner got delayed as I wanted to finish). I usually don't read pre-trip reports but I really liked your other reports so here I am

 

[JenSop]

Hi there! I'm in too . Just discovered your other trip reports yest. when I looked at your post about wash. mach. rec. I was hoping to get lots of ideas as our machine is not working too good. Read two of your old trip reports (yes dinner got delayed as I wanted to finish). I usually don't read pre-trip reports but I really liked your other reports so here I am

Thanks so much for joining in! (And thanks for reading some of my old TR's!) I love to share my Disney excitement! Hoping to do a Pre-Trip update tonight!

 

[JenSop]

So I thought the next installment should be about how our Disney trip was almost ruined before it happened.

But what could ruin a Disney trip?!?!?!

Lots of snow in the Northeast is what! Snow that adds more and more days to the end of the school year.

Which is a problem when your DH is a teacher.

At first, all those snow days were kind of fun. We were often snowed in together, so we could watch TV and movies and I started playing alot of Epic Mickey.

But as we got more and more of those snow days, I started to get a bit nervous. Brian's last day of school was supposed to be June 8th, so I didn't even think twice about scheduling a trip for June 19th. (Our original start date of vacation.) I figured that even if there were several snow days, that we'd be fine.




Well, it got to the point where the school year would have overlapped with our trip - the school district polled its teachers about who had vacation over that next week that the calendar was going to extend to. Obviously we weren't the only ones, and the district (like many others) added some extra days around Easter and Memorial Day to make up the snow days.

So remember how I mentioned we were leaving on Friday, June 17th? Yeah, that's Brian's last day of school.

The plan is to be completely packed and ready to go the DAY BEFORE so that as soon as Brian gets home from school, we throw it all in the car and go!

That should put us on the road by 4pm. But to head down 95 would be more insane than driving for a triple split stay!!! We'd hit rush hour all along the northeast corridor.

So we're going to try (for the first time) the scenic route - heading down route 81 on to other routes that we're not familiar with until joining back with 95 in South Carolina. If all goes according to plan, we'll be in Disney by 9am. Heck, we better be - we've got a 12:00 ADR for lunch at Le Cellier!!!




More coming soon!

 

[JenSop]

Next up - Itinerary!!!!

Okay - I LOVE making itineraries. I make a cool chart that lists everything.

And now, for the first time in public, I am sharing my chart layout! Eek!

I took out the times and confirmation #'s for obvious reasons (But they're there in the original) and am presenting it here for you dear readers!

Weeeeeeeeee!!!!!


So excited!!!!!!

Look at all our awesome ADR's!!

(I can see that the chart showed up kind of small, so here's a summary....

Sat. - Le Cellier (lunch) & Cape May Cafe (dinner)
Sun. - Kouzzina (dinner)
Mon. - Via Napoli (dinner)
Tues. - Yachtsman Steakhouse (dinner)
Wed. - Hacienda de San Angel (dinner)
Thurs. - Victoria and Albert's (dinner)
Fri. - Fulton's (lunch) & California Grill (dinner)
Sat. - Chefs de France (lunch)

Now, we started with the 5 ADR's in the middle (from Sunday to Thursday.) But as we added days, we added meals. A couple months ago, we added Cape May Cafe for our arrival day dinner. (All you can eat crab legs? Yes please!)

Then over Easter, we had some down-time while visiting Brian's mom for the weekend. It was serious planning crunch time - final decisions had to be made! What would be our final ADR's and how were we going to pay for them?

So what we're doing for our final plan is attaching the DDP to the OKW portion of our stay. Then - we had to decide whether or not to do it on the single night stays on either end of our trip. You see, I'd been doing a lot of reading on the DIS (what's new?) and started thinking more about Tables in Wonderland. We ended up deciding to get TIW and use it on those extra days AND on our Victoria and Albert's meal. We don't want to use it on our entire trip. We like the ease of the DDP - not having to look at prices on the menus is great. But we thought that on either end of the trip, it would be nice to have the option of not ordering full meals every time - maybe just go with sharing appetizers and such. PLUS - now we can finally try Fulton's, as we've never done so since it's not on the DDP! (Plus, we'll use our TIW for our alcohol at our TS meals all week.)

Just looking at all those restaurants makes my mouth water! I can't wait!



On the chart, you can also see that I've listed all the park hours for all the days we'll be there - including which have EMH. I also showed which evening EMH's we're going to do. (MK EMH is our favorite!!!!!)

We have a print-out where we've scribbled which parks we'll probably do on which days, but we actually are kind of relaxed about that. One way or another, we're totally sleeping in on Monday morning after our super late MK EMH the night before!

 

[mamamary]

I know what you mean about the school issues. We are not too far from you here in Maryland. We used up more snow days than were alloted. Our schools are also in session till 6/17.

You have some great ADRs!

 

[TanzUnited99]

I didn't know that you guys had to work extra days to cover the school days. We had snow in the UK over Christmas and were given the time off. We did not have to work extra days but I know they are thinking about it for the next time it snows!

Love the itinerary chart and ADRs! It's funny how many times ADRs change over the course of planning! I'm learning that at the minute

 

[Villainess]

I'm joining in!

OKW is one of our home resorts; nice & peaceful.

The school district we are in goes until June 22 - 2 days past its original last day. I went to this district growing up and we were always the last ones out of school - not looking forward to DD going there next year. Oh well!

 

[JenSop]

I know what you mean about the school issues. We are not too far from you here in Maryland. We used up more snow days than were alloted. Our schools are also in session till 6/17.

You have some great ADRs!

It was a snowy winter, wasn't it? I'm just glad in the end that we didn't end up going into the next week, or we'd have to start from scratch with our trip - something I did NOT want to do. Thanks on the ADR's - can't wait!

I didn't know that you guys had to work extra days to cover the school days. We had snow in the UK over Christmas and were given the time off. We did not have to work extra days but I know they are thinking about it for the next time it snows!

Love the itinerary chart and ADRs! It's funny how many times ADRs change over the course of planning! I'm learning that at the minute

*Sigh* Here in the northeast, it's not too unusual to have the occasional winter that gets LOTS of snow. When I was a senior in high school, we actually had 15 snow days. Not only did we have a bunch of days tacked on to the end of the school year, but we had to go into school twenty minutes or so early every day for the rest of the school year to help make up all those days.

Thanks on the chart! I love to make charts! Anytime something changes, I just go in and switch it in the file. Although, even though we've added a bunch, we haven't actually switched out any of our originals.

I'm joining in!

OKW is one of our home resorts; nice & peaceful.

The school district we are in goes until June 22 - 2 days past its original last day. I went to this district growing up and we were always the last ones out of school - not looking forward to DD going there next year. Oh well!

Thanks for joining my TR! Wow - your school district IS going late!

And I can't wait to try OKW!

 

[Shannon84]

I found your PTR

I am glad to hear you guys are still able to do the trip on the days you planned, but phew you have me exhausted all ready with the driving on the last day of school and triple split stay...but very excited to read about it

You have ADRs at a number of places we haven't tried before, I am excited to read about those when you go!!

 

[JenSop]

I found your PTR

I am glad to hear you guys are still able to do the trip on the days you planned, but phew you have me exhausted all ready with the driving on the last day of school and triple split stay...but very excited to read about it

You have ADRs at a number of places we haven't tried before, I am excited to read about those when you go!!

Welcome!!!

I think I'll be doing the driving on the first leg of the trip, as Brian will have been up early and at school all day. Although, I'm sure I'll have trouble sleeping that night before anyway! Haha!

I just can't wait to eat all that great food!

 

[JenSop]

Brian and I were taking a walk yesterday on the new "Saucon Rail Trail" that goes through our town. (An old railroad track was converted into a wide walking trail - about 5 miles long connecting our town with the next one.)

Walking means talking about Disney planning.

Brian and I are busy. As a result, we can sometimes procrastinate - especially with packing.

Now I'm not talking about the gradual 'putting aside of things' that we all do to get ready for Disney trips (or ANY trips.) I'm talking about the actual packing of the bags so that they're ready to go out the door.

When we drove two years ago, we got on the road MUCH later than we had planned.

But we can't even begin to entertain the thought of leaving later than planned for this coming trip. We have a lunch ADR at Le Cellier!!!

I told Brian that even though he has school the next day, he will not be allowed to go to bed that Thursday night until he is fully and completely packed. That way we can literally leave as soon as he gets home from school that Friday afternoon. The drive should be about 18 hours, as we're not going via 95 (Friday night traffic). Hoping to be on the road by 4:00pm at the latest and arriving at the Boardwalk by 10am.

This'll only be our second time driving together. (Only other two times for me was when I was a little kid going with my family on my first WDW trip and then again when I was 20 with my parents and sister. So I don't remember much about those drives.)

Anyone have any tips for keeping to a tight schedule??? I think we'll need them!

 

[JenSop]

You know, I have to admit that I always have to buy just a few new clothing items when I go to Disney. I just have to. I like wearing fun stuff that is comfy and cute.

So a couple days ago, I got the cutest dress at Old Navy! It fits really cute and the fabric is thin and light-weight. (Which will require wearing nude colored undergarments, but that's no big deal.) I got it in this grey color:

I can't wait to wear it!!!

I've also been wondering which dresses to take for when we go out to dinner, and which of my Disney tees I should take...... hmmmm.... decisions, decisions!