Should I or Shouldn't I....post a trip report? Updated 11/2

[MEK]

Here we are at SSR

Our View...

The MBR...

The MBR BR

The Kids' room - this was really a huge room....

DS 15 checking out the view....

And Acting Goofy....

Another Outside view... near the bus stop

 

[bayoumama2]

Great storytelling....sounds like a wonderful vacation so far. Excellent pics.

 

[TwiddleDeeTwiddleDum]

He kept saying, "why bother when I have a great view from here". I have everything I need - beer, a TV, and a beach front view.

Sounds like something my hubbie would say

 

[MEK]

Great storytelling....sounds like a wonderful vacation so far. Excellent pics.

Thanks bayoumama.

I turned the camera over to DH when we got to the world, so IMO the quality of the pictures is about to decline, but I will sneak some of my own in from my previous trip(s).

 

[MEK]

Sounds like something my hubbie would say

I knew there had to be other DH's out there with the same point of view!

 

[KyDerbyMan]

Great TR! Looking forward to the Dis pics!

 

[fireworks fan]

I am really enjoying your trip report. I am thinking seriously about a DVC resale myself, and its great to hear about your first DVC trip. My kids are 3 and 6, so we would have plenty of time to enjoy DVC with them Now, to find the cash

 

[MEK]

I am really enjoying your trip report. I am thinking seriously about a DVC resale myself, and its great to hear about your first DVC trip. My kids are 3 and 6, so we would have plenty of time to enjoy DVC with them Now, to find the cash

Fireworks fan:

I hear ya! I think it's supposed to be most economical if you have the cash upfront as opposed to financing. The nice thing about resales is you can purchase smaller point amounts, although I think Disney is lowering their minimum purchase points.

 

[MEK]

I wasn't going to post tonight, but my trippie has been bumped to the second page. I need to keep it going. Thanks for everyone who has been reading. If this is your first read, join in and leave me a comment - good, bad, or indifferent.

So where was I - Oh yeah - we almost didn't get to the airport in time to pick up DS's friend. But now that everyone was safe and sound and in the car, we decided to make a Super Taget run. I really like super Target. We do not have them in Delaware. In fact, the closest Target to me is about 35 minutes. So when we stopped, we stocked up on everything we would need for the next 5 days. I did not want to run out of water or gatorade and I wanted lots of breakfast foods. Plus Beer - we needed beer!

Mission accomplished..... then on to a quick Chik-fil-a stop for take out....then back to SSR. Time to suck down some food, hand out some park tickets, and get to MK I gave my kids the lecture about not losing their tickets and not losing their room keys. I gave my kids charging privledges because I knew they would need food and we didn't have the dining plan.

DS15 and his friend were the first out the door and on the bus. DH, DS 13, and I caught the next bus. Here we are getting ready to enter the MK.

DH has a bad habit of photographing my a--. One year we watched all the pictures on a wide screen TV. I lost 15 pounds on weight watchers after that! (and I put it back on, too!)

Again

After we arrived we went right over to Space Mountain, but the FP's were either out for the day or the return time was right at park closing. So we skipped Space and rode my favorite - the Blue Line - I love it. It's so relaxing and always puts me in the right mood. Except that one time a few years ago when we got stuck on it in a hot, humid tunnel - not fun, except we got to escape through Star Traders.

After The blue line we went on Carousel of Progress. I have never seen this attraction before. I think it's because it is usually closed when I visit. Well it was neat in a nostalgic way. I liked the dog, grandma, and the exploding oven. Oh.... and the tune was kinda catchy too...."It's a great big beautiful tomorrow".

I'm gonna cut this post short because I am pretty tired.... but I will continue again tomorrow. Stay tuned.

 

[bayoumama2]

Your welcome. We're going 11/22 - 11/29. Probably last just us family vacation, you know without extras. We haven't been to the World in 10 yrs as a family and I can't wait. Staying on the grounds for the first time.

The first time I went to WDW was in '72 the year after it opened. I've watched Carrousel of Progress change with the times and that has been interesting.

 

[ILuvCrush]

I Love CoP.. so do my kiddos!! I actually scoured the CD shops to find that song....

It's a great BIG beautiful Tomarrow!!!...

It gives me warm fuzzies!!

Paula

 

[MEK]

After CoP I coaxed DH into the Buzz Lightyear ride.
DH doesn't like any ride that has an outside queue.
I convinced him that "this line moves" and it did.
I texted DS15 to see where he was - he was off doing
one of the three mountains. I had a pretty decent score
on Buzz. I think I scored around 160,000, which is good
for me because I usually stink! I only scored over
200,000 once and that was because I shot Zurg right
as he was ready to blow!

I wouldn't be surprised if we hoped the blue one more time
before leaving tomorrowland. I think we probably took a
quick stop in the castle and then on to IASW. DS 15 HATES
this ride - always has, always will. So we took a quick ride
while he wasn't there to complain.

In case you were wondering, he doesn't like clowns either.

After IASW it was parade time, so we tried to find a spot
over in Frontierland. DS 13 and I found a good spot sitting
on one of the stone walls, but DH wouldn't join us. I
nstead he took pictures like this because he wouldn't move to
get a clear shot......

Really crappy shot. DH also doesn't check his photos after he
takes them, so I ended up with quite a few pics in need of deletion.
Let's see if I can find some with better quality.

OK - these pictures are bad. I vow to get better pictures in
December. Not only did DH let way too many people in front
of him, he must have had the camera in some weird setting.

We watched the parade until close to the end, but
we knew we needed to ride some mountains, so as hard
as it was to tear myself away, we went over to Splash
and big thunder just to check ride times. Amazing - splash
was a 10 minute wait, so we got on right about the time
DS and DSF were getting off. They tried to get back in line
with us, but we never did get together. Splash was closed
when I did my solo trip in Jan and I didn't ride it last August
because I got sick one afternoon at MK and missed it and
then I never got around to riding it. So it had been 1 1/2
years since I went to the laughing place. I LOVe THIS ride
.....ESPECIALLY at night. I know it's my imagination, but
the inside always seems darker at night and the beady
little eyes on the bats always seem brighter at night.

We actually got pretty wet on Splash - we got the front
seat and I forgot to duck until too late. I was mesmorized
by the castle as I was screaming ...ahhhhhhhhhhhh!

After splash we hit BTM. I also LOVE this ride EXPECIALLY
at night! It seems way cooler and way faster at night.
The fireworks started while we were in the inside queue.
Oh well - we saw a few flashes while we were on the train,
but not much. So b/c I basically missed the fireworks this night,
I will post a few absentism photos.....

Can I get an "oooohhhhhhhhh" and an "ahhhhhhhhhhhhh"

I think we were getting pretty tired by the time we
got off BTM. My disney spirit wanted to keep going,
but it's funny how a full morning at Vero, a long run, a 2 hour drive, unpacking a full car, almost abandoning a 15 year old at MCO, and
a crash shopping trip to Target will make your body say, "Time for
sleep".

So we texted the older boys that we were leaving.
Ironically they were either already on their way home
or leaving right after us.

Here's is a quick shot as we are leaving Frontierland...

 

[MEK]

I Love CoP.. so do my kiddos!! I actually scoured the CD shops to find that song....

It's a great BIG beautiful Tomarrow!!!...

It gives me warm fuzzies!!

Paula

Well sung! Paula

 

[MEK]

Castle Night!

Castle Day!

 

[MEK]

I think I figured out how to post a link to my trip report, so keep on reading no matter where you see me!

I'll be back later tonight with more pics once they are uploaded. Up next... Animal Kingdom!

 

[MEK]

Oh darn .... I don't think it worked, have to try again!

 

[MEK]

Yeah - I think I got it, I think I got it!

 

[MEK]

On Thursday June 12th we all managed to get up at a decent hour. Well, I always get up at a decent hour, but you know how teenagers are. It can be hit or miss. We were staying in the Carousel building and I wanted to see how far the closet quiet pool was, so I ran in that direction. It was pretty close, but also fairly small. The last time I stayed at SSR it was in the congress park section, right across from DTD, and I recall that the pool seemed larger. Perhaps I was wrong? Maybe I better go run over there and find out. Yup - the pool in congress park is a tad bigger, with a much better view. Yeah - a view of DTD. I really liked the congress park section. It would normally be my first choice, but since I got such a fab view at Vero Beach, I certainly wasn't going to complain about the Carousel section and the lack of a DTD view.

DH, DS 13, and I planned the day at AK. DS 15 and DSF had other plans. They were off to the Studios. I knew we would be going to DS over the weekend, so we decided to go AK today. We definately wanted to show our Daytona Beach friends DS. How could they miss ToT and RRc?

I guess I thought that the one park our friends might want to skip would be AK. As it turns out, I was wrong. So I actually ended up going to AK a second time during this trip.

AK used to be my second favorite park. I think MK has always been my first. MK is just so Walt. It is the prototype for all fantastic theme parks, so it's hard for it to not be my favorite. I think AK is now my 3rd fav park after Epcot. Studios is my least fav. I'm not sure why, because it has two of my absolute favorite rides - ToT and RRc. But if it wasn't for those two rides, I don't think I would ever go to Studios. I think I just don't like it's overall design and I'm not a huge fan of high school musical, which always seems to be taking up space.

Well it would have been nice to get to AK at rope drop, but that would be asking way too much for a 13 year old who would rather sleep and watch soccer than get up at 8am. But I think we got there before 9:30, which was pretty good. We drove there and parked in the AAA lot which was already almost full by the time we arrived. Of course we headed straight to......

to get our FP's. The stand by line was already to the FP machines. With a little over a hour to kill we decided to head to one of my favs - Dinosaur! I have probably ridden dinosaur as many times as the Blue Line at MK. Well almost as many times. When I first started to go to AK I could ride this 4 or 5times a visit. IDK why - I guess because the ride seems different everytime I sit in a different seat. Each seat has its own feel and perspective.

There was no wait for dinosaur and I could easily have ridden it again, but I knew DH would want to do something else. Some people don't like to ride the same ride more than once. I respect that - to a point. So we headed over to Primeval Whirl (I think I spelled that wrong). This was our longest wait of the day, since the second side wasn't opened yet. I was a little worried about how my neck would take it. Remember - my traumatic brain/spinal cord injury on the VB slide. Well, I made out just fine.

Since we killed some time waiting for PW, we were ready to head back to......

OK - I'm not gonna lie - I took these pictures last year. DH decided not to bring the camera to the park. DS 13 was only 12 then and there is a definate difference in his appearance. BTW - the CM's really don't like when you take these pictures. I don't know why they care, since it's hard to get a picture of good quality. If I really wanted one, I would have bought it!

Two other side notes:

1. The best picture I have of EE is actually on my cell phone. It is my background. It greats me everytime I open my phone. I texted it to my son when I was on my solo trip and it made him very jealous. Recently, I met the cutest 9 year old boy on line for a rollercoaster while I was chaperoning a band trip to King's Dominion. His dad told me he knows everything about every coaster, even though he is too young to ride some of them. So I got out my phone and said, "What coaster is this?" EE at AK at WDW he replied. Cool kid.

2. EE measures in at 195ft. It is the tallest of all the mountains and taller than ToT. I think it beats ToT by 5 or 10 feet. The reason it is 195 ft, you ask???? Because Florida has a law that anything 200ft or taller has to have a beacon on it for low flying aircraft. (I learned that on the KTK tour). Can you emagine EE with a beacon?????

After EE I took one for the team and decided to walk over and get our Safari FP's for after lunch. Here I noticed something very interesting..... The standby time for Safari was about 45 minutes. The FP return time was about 50 mins. I seriously would not be standing in the stand by line.

After I walked back to find DH and DS I decided that I could not stand my feet, and the sneakers they were swelling in, any longer.

There is a picture of me in my sneakers. I am to the right of the security guard. My sneakers were very cute and clearly designed for a person of youth. The have a very flat sole and my feet felt like they were going to explode.

So.... I did something I swore I would never do.....I bought a pair of crocks. Yeah, right there on the spot. I said to DH, "I'll be right back" and I walked over to a vender and asked, "How much are these (overpriced) Mickey crocs?" Oh, I think they were like 40 some dollars with tax.

Here is why I never owned crocs - I am a nurse, actually a nurse practitioner. I work in cardiac surgery in a hospital. I have spent many hours in plastic clogs, long before crocs became a huge trend. And I swore I would never buy plastic clogs to wear outside of work. Well, guess what? At that moment I totally didn't care about my vow of never buying over priced plastic clogs to wear outside of work. All I wanted was a little fresh air for my feet. So I bought them, right there on the spot, without a morsel of regret.

Any you know what ... they are actually very comfortable and I have walked many miles in them since. I even bought a mickey face to put in one of the holes. I figured once I hit the point of no return, there was no going back.

Unfortunately, I do not have a picture of my overpriced plastic mickey crocs. But they are tan. I wear a lot of tan and I was in AK, so it seemed like the right color choice - nice and neutral.

After I bought my crocs we went to watch It's a Bug's Life. I never get tired of this show and I like how the lines are so short since EE opened.

After IABL we went to eat at Pizzafari. I definately needed some AC with my lunch. I have been wanting to try the Yak and Yeti, but when I look at the menu it just seems like too much food for the middle of the day. One thing I want to avoid is post lunch lethargy while visiting AK. My DDE was actually good for Pizzafari, so I saved a little $ on lunch. But Pizzafari was very crowded. I don't think there is enough indoor counter service at AK now that Tusker House is a table service. I always liked TH and I was sorry it turned to TS.

Can you guess where we went after lunch?????

We got a really good driver who really played the part well. I thanked him when the ride was over and told him he was one of the best I've ever had. He appreciated that and it made me vow to compliment people more often. I am a church musician and I know how much I appreciate it when someone complements me for doing a good job.

I think safari is one of the most immersive attractions in all the parks. I can't even begin to appreciate all the work that went into that ride. I am amazed by the details and one of these days I will take one of the back stage tours. Or, if I ever get to stay AK villas conceirge, I will take one of the private safaris.

After safari we were all a bit hot and tired. I really wanted to go back and ride dinosaur again, but it was so freak'n far away, so we left. Yeah we really didn't do all that much, but honestly, I've done everything at AK before so I didn't feel too bad about not staying longer. Plus the crowds were pretty thick by now so it was a good time for a break.

And little did I know we would be back in a few days to hit Nemo and ride my favs again.

Up next - an evening at Epcot and our first ADR!

 

[adsrtw]

I'm catching back up. I haven't read the posts I have missed, but I did see a Target post. I too am a Target lover ~ can't imagine living 35 minutes away from one. That must be tough!

 

[KyDerbyMan]

Great so far!! I think I would have had to go for a flashy color on the crocs...just for the heckofit!

Looking forward to the Epcot tale.