The "Oh I Just Love It Here!" Trip Featuring "Besties!!!!" Nov.28 - Dec.2, 2008

[sunny_stace]

Hi Everyone....or as it has been said before "Welcome Foolish Mortals...."
I'm calling you foolish as you've decided to stop by even though I have never done a trip report before! Thanks for coming, read along if you like!

I've decided on the title as DBFF (who was lovely enough to agree to go with me to WDW - again!), starting making fun of me for saying it so often! That along with "I'm so excited to ________!" (fill in the blank as needed).

So here's the cast (of 2!):

Me (Stacy):

I am the big Disney-lover, the planner . I mean, DBFF also loves Disney but not quite like I do! I do all the planning and research and such. I'm 27 and at the time of the trip was working as a Front Desk supervisor in a hotel. In terms of food, I am the pickiest eater you will ever meet. It's not often I eat of the adult menu, at least without modifying the dish of choice! But I thoroughly enjoy what I do like!
Favourite Ride - Haunted Mansion
Favourite Characters - Daisy, Mary Poppins...and everyone else pretty much!

DBFF (Lauren):

Yep! I convince her year after year to go with me. Lauren and I have been friends since our first year of highschool....going on 15 years now. During that time I have learned I can talk her into doing pretty much whatever I want! She is also 27 (celebrated her b-day while we were away!), and she works for a car rental agency. She is a much more adventurous eater than I am. She loves seafood and different types of ethnic food. She'll try nearly anything once! Sometimes she even waits for me to take a picture before she starts eating!
Favourite Ride - Tower Of Terror
Favourite Characters - Wicked Queen, Minnie, etc.

We also decided that we would purchase the Disney Dining Plan this year. I should mention that we are used to going during free Dining in September! This is the first time in 3 years we have paid for food! And we didn't have one bad meal! They were all fantastic! We ate at: Chef Mickey's, Tusker House, 1900 Park Fare, Tutto Italia, Liberty Tree Tavern, 50's Prime Time Cafe, Crystal Palace, and Chefs De France. Plus several snacks and counter service meals!

As for special events we did the Candlelight Processional on December 2 (featuring Neil Patrick Harris), and Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party on December 4.

Up Next: Planning and Departure - remember, they say the journey is half the fun!

 

[CanadianWDWfan]

I'm first !!!

Glad to see you have a TR! You have my attention...so I can't wait to hear all about it.

How nice you have a BFF that will go to Disney with you, and she enjoys it too.

I'm spoiled by the dinning plan now too, it's so hard not taking advantage of the savings.

Sorry to hear you no longer have your job, I hope you are at peace with it.

 

[sunny_stace]

I'm first !!!

Glad to see you have a TR! You have my attention...so I can't wait to hear all about it.

How nice you have a BFF that will go to Disney with you, and she enjoys it too.

I'm spoiled by the dinning plan now too, it's so hard not taking advantage of the savings.

Sorry to hear you no longer have your job, I hope you are at peace with it.

Yay! I'm glad you're here! I am at peace with the whole job thing now. I know I did the right thing, and I know something else will come along that. I still have a couple of paychecks in the bank so I'm ok for awhile! As for the dining plan, I don't know if I would for sure do it again. There was nothing wrong, but it was just so much food! It is very good savings wise though!

 

[sunny_stace]

So on to the planning! I again took the reigns this year, and boy did I have plenty of time! This trip went into the full-on planning stages in January!! And being the Dis-er that I am, I spent a lot of time around here:

I went into lime green madness! Since we don't have the Disney paint in our Home Depot, I was on my own...I had to get crafty! I am not crafty, but I did the best I could do. And I made a nice mess on the table!:

I started off with a tag for my bag:

Then I moved on to decorations for the hotel room window (this photo is just of a few of them, I had several as you'll see later):

I also did my regular little book for keeping my ADR confirmation numbers and times straight:

I also had a special Tinkerbell countdown calendar for the last month, but I forgot to take a picture of it, sorry. It was all sparkly and hung on the fridge, and I would cross off each day with a little squeal of joy!

Eventually, after a loooooooooong countdown, we were ready to blow this popstand and head out! Though we live in a fairly large city, it's really expensive to fly out of London and you generally have to go to Toronto and transfer planes anyhow. Seeing as how we're sort of smack in the middle between Toronto and Detroit, we fly out of Detroit. It's significantly less expensive and always a direct flight.

Both Lauren and I knew neither of us would want to drive home from the airport after the trip so we decided to book an airbus shuttle service. Last year we used the AboutTown service and it was great so we took them again this year! If you're in the area, they are the way to go. They take you round trip and will even pick you up at home! Which was especially good as this is what the weather was like on November 29th (the day before we left - this is the view from my back door):

I had to work the Saturday and came home to try and nap. This did not happen. Despite being previously organized, work had taken over my life and I needed to finish packing....here is what my bed looked like:

So there was no room for me!

So around 7pm I called Lauren exclaiming that I couldn't sleep and was on my way to pick her up! We came back to my house and hung out, watching Disney movies and snacking until the airbus shuttle came to pick us up at 1:30am. The ride was nice and smooth and the border crossing was pretty simple. Just a quick trip into the customs building to show passports and travel documents and we were back on the road.

I figured since it would be Thanksgiving weekend in the USA and the weather wasn't fabulous, that the airport would be swamped and had arranged for us to get there very early....I was wrong! There were no line-ups at all! We had about 5 hours to kill until boarding time! Lauren snoozed mostly and played Nintendo DS, and I wandered around and listened to my iPod. Finally around 7:30am we saw this sucker out the window:

Up next: arrival!

 

[Lady Lallie]

Great Start! I can't wait to hear about Candlelight Processional was with Neil Patrick Harris!!

 

[kschafer]

I'm here I'm here I'm here


SO excited to see you have a TR I didn't even bother to start reading before posting. OK, back to the start!


Two days? I missed noticing this for two days?

I can't wait to hear your thoughts on the dining plan, I love me some Disney dining but I won't do it again either.

Neil Patrick Harris
Um, yeah, I kind of like him Too bad I am NOT his type I would consider leaving DH for him given the chance

Wow, I am feeling very emoticon today...

Must be is coming!

 

[Kimberly815]

You can count me in! Bring on more trip report!

 

[happybratpack]

Great start..hurry and post more!

 

[sunny_stace]

I'm here I'm here I'm here

Neil Patrick Harris
Um, yeah, I kind of like him Too bad I am NOT his type I would consider leaving DH for him given the chance

Yay!! I'm so glad you're here! You and me both on the NPH lovin' I had such a crush on him when he was Doogie...hehe...and even though I know I'm not his type, he's still a pretty handsome fella! I was really excited when he was announced for our dates! It was kinda weird though, hearing him talk at Disney after seeing him in the Harold and Kumar movies!

You can count me in! Bring on more trip report!

Hi and
I am slowly but surely working on getting all the photos on discs and uploaded to photobucket. I just got the email warning me I'm close to my limit!

And I am aggressively searching for a new job too! So far I have an interview set up for a nanny position. I haven't done it for awhile but I'm really looking forward to the idea. Just letting you know that this may upset the trip reporting process, as well as my going to stay at my auntie's and do some dog and house-sitting. They don't have internet so I'll be making pit stops at home to keep checking things out!

Hope you're all having a safe and happy day!

 

[sunny_stace]

Great start..hurry and post more!

Don't worry I will! I love your dogs!! They are so cute! I see you're staying at Riverside - do you know what side?

 

[sunny_stace]

Hello everyone, hope you're all well this evening! For now just sit back, relax, and read along!

Well, after what turned out to be a rather bumpy flight, we landed safely at MCO! (Yay!) I say bumpy flight for several reasons. The first being that we were flying over a nice cold front moving over the east coast causing some real turbulence. Up at home it was making a nice snowy mess from what I heard! I just kept willing the plane with my mind to keep moving away from it! Or as Dory might say:
"Just keep flying, just keep flying, just keep flying flying flying..."

The second reason why I call it a bumpy flight is due to the poor family sitting next to me...

The flight was totally full and since Lauren and I didn't choose our seats until we got to the airport, we did not sit together! She sat directly in front of me, so I got to poke her in the head and pull her hair during the flight! But back to this family...wow did they need some Dis-er help!! It was a husband and wife, their adult daughter and her daughter! They were on their way down for a land/sea vacation. I knew things were going downhill after her first comment to me was about how she figured the lady sitting a couple of rows up likely had to buy two seats because she was "Soooooo fat!"....why she would say this to me I don't know...I'm not a small girl...well, I'm short but rather round! I just semi-smiled and tilted my head back, implying that I had intentions of snoozing. That didn't happen. She started talking about all of the cruises they had taken in the past and how they weren't worried about learning their way around Disneyland as they had been there before. Without wanting to correct her, I asked how many times they had been (mentioning this was my ninth trip to WDW, but I had only been to Disneyland once). She replies with "we've been twice before. Once in '73 on our Honeymoon and then again about 15 years ago. We stayed at the space-type resort on our honeymoon and this time we're gonna stay at the Tahitian Village."
Yep...the Tahitian Villiage....after some investigation I figured out that the "space-type resort" was the Contemporary, and the Tahitian Villiage was the Poly. Being the dummy that I am, I said "Oh! The Poly! You're staying at the Polynesian! It's gorgeous! I've never stayed there but..." And she is just staring at me blankly. "No," she says, "the Tahitian."

Things went even more south after that! They had absolutely no idea that the Magical Express vouchers they had recieved were for getting to the resort from the airport! They thought you had to show them everytime you got on the bus or the "train"! I proceeded to explain to them how the whole thing worked and told them they could walk with us down to the ME check-in counter. The husband and both daughters were sitting on the other side of the aisle and I was sitting next to the matriarch. She proceeded to tell me all about their plans for MK, and so I asked her in return if they were going to any of the other parks. She said "I don't know, I think just Disney and maybe Epcot".....oh dear, dear, dear..... I was done...that was just too much to explain at that point in life!

There was no time anyway, as we were making our "final descent into the Orlando area." I swear I thought my skin was gonna burst off I was so excited! Meanwhile, the daughter is having a complete meltdown across the aisle as she was afraid of flying....oh the poor woman...there were tears and I just felt awful for her. The turbulence got really rocky toward the end of the flight and she was soooo scared. She kept leaning over to me saying "You come here a lot, is this normal? Is it? Please tell me this is normal!"

Despite the fling-around flight, we had the smoothest landing I have ever experienced! What an awesome pilot! We got off the plane and headed down to the Magical Express counter!! I had crazy, perma-smile happening by the time I got to the ME agent! He told me to keep it up and have a magical trip! I smiled harder and thanked him!

After making sure the family from the plane were in the right ME line, Lauren and I got in ours...well, except that there wasn't one! Yep, no Magical Express line and with that, no wait to get on the bus that was sitting right out front waiting for us! - I really thought I might! The magic was starting up fullforce!

- was me on the Magical Express bus! Even though we look gross and exhausted, I was just bubbling over!!

Then the video started up! I love that video! And tinkerbell came along to spread some pixie dust about the bus!

continued in next post...

 

[sunny_stace]

As we had noticed when we boarded the bus, the weather was not very nice. Rain was coming down like it was going out of style! This had absolutely no effect on me, I was at Disney World and nothing was going to put a damper on my spirit!

We had passed under that wonderful sign (sorry, I still couldn't get a picture this year!! I always miss it!), and in no time we pulled up to the Port Orleans resort! The driver announced he would be going to French Quarter first! Yay! What a wonderful driver!

There were a total of two families who got off at the stop and hence, only two families ahead of us in the check-in line! In just a few minutes we were up at the front desk being checked-in! I can't remember the CM's name but he was new, in from China and super friendly! He got a huge kick out of me I think! As we'd been waiting in line, I was studying the Christmas decor and just marvelling - still with scary perma-smile! And then I spotted a hidden mickey! The first one of the trip! I was so excited! The CM was amazed how happy I was about it! He certainly earned his ears with us, I must say! We were checked in with no snags and every request (well, the two) that I had put in were granted! Yay!! Our room was even ready despite it being before check-in time!

We headed over to building 2 (request number one!), and over to room 2101! On the ground floor (request number two!), on the back right hand corner! It was perfect!

I tried to grab some pics of the layout before we trashed it with all of our junk! It was your standard POFQ room, very lovely and clean.

Sorry, I had already set my junk around the table, but here's a photo anyway!

We got sorta situated, decided on which beds we wanted and all. Then we each took a quick potty-break, changed clothes, brushed teeth and reapplied deoderant. The travel starts to wear you out but we were both re-energized and ready to head out again....and so off we went to the Magic Kingdom!

But for now, I need to go get groceries! Magic Kingdom will be up next for you all, thanks for reading!

 

[julezdisney]

Yay! Stacy's trip report! I'm SOOO GLAD you are making one, and it's so nice to have a face to the name!
I love it so far! TOOOO funny about the family & the Disney-ignorant Mom! How much you wanna bet that family won't be returning for another 15 years?

I'm here I'm here I'm here


SO excited to see you have a TR I didn't even bother to start reading before posting. OK, back to the start!


Two days? I missed noticing this for two days?

I can't wait to hear your thoughts on the dining plan, I love me some Disney dining but I won't do it again either.

Neil Patrick Harris
Um, yeah, I kind of like him Too bad I am NOT his type I would consider leaving DH for him given the chance

Yes.... I love Neil Patrick too! He's "awesome".

Yay!! I'm so glad you're here! You and me both on the NPH lovin' I had such a crush on him when he was Doogie...hehe...and even though I know I'm not his type, he's still a pretty handsome fella! I was really excited when he was announced for our dates! It was kinda weird though, hearing him talk at Disney after seeing him in the Harold and Kumar movies!

Right!?!?! Hilarious!!!!!

 

[kschafer]

Yes.... I love Neil Patrick too! He's "awesome".

Make that awe...wait for it...some!! (Barney cracks me up!)

The tahitian huh? Oh my, I wonder what would posess anyone to go to WDW (or any vacation for that matter) without doing any research, or even knowing for sure where they were going! I suppose that's why some people pay, what? $150/hour for a personal guide. DUDE, I would so do that for 1/2 that price! What do you say Stacy, you need a new job, want to go into business with me?

 

[julezdisney]

Make that awe...wait for it...some!! (Barney cracks me up!)

The tahitian huh? Oh my, I wonder what would posess anyone to go to WDW (or any vacation for that matter) without doing any research, or even knowing for sure where they were going! I suppose that's why some people pay, what? $150/hour for a personal guide. DUDE, I would so do that for 1/2 that price! What do you say Stacy, you need a new job, want to go into business with me?

You are SOOO right! I don't understand why someone would go to the trouble of getting on a plane and going somewhere and spending all that money and then obviously spend NO time figuring out what they were doing really or having any kind of intelligence about how they were going to get from point A to point B!!! Or even know the proper name of where they're staying!

Hello???

 

[kschafer]

You are SOOO right! I don't understand why someone would go to the trouble of getting on a plane and going somewhere and spending all that money and then obviously spend NO time figuring out what they were doing really or having any kind of intelligence about how they were going to get from point A to point B!!! Or even know the proper name of where they're staying!

Hello???

It's funny because I really am a type B saggitarius and am happy to go where the wind blows and I would do this on vacation but in a "lets go wander in world showcase and see what we find" or "I wonder what store fronts are in in the backlot of DHS" sort of way not let's go see what they have at Disney World!

 

[julezdisney]

"Dum-de-dum-de-do.... let's go to that there DisneyLAND place in Flor-ee-da"

 

[Lady Lallie]

Great update! I can't believe that lady would that to you about the two seats. Ridiculous!

POFQ looks so cute. It's on my list to try but Riverside first this next trip.

 

[Kimberly815]

Yippee! You have arrived! The POFQ rooms look nice. I have never stayed there. Did you like the resort?

 

[sunny_stace]

"Dum-de-dum-de-do.... let's go to that there DisneyLAND place in Flor-ee-da"

This absolutely stumps me! I do not understand how people could spend that kind of money and not know what they're doing! I seriously was sitting there thinking 'you should pay for my vacation...I'm helping you out and I know what the Poly is called...and the Contemporary! And this isn't DISNEYLAND!' I mean, not only at WDW, but anywhere! If you ask me going somewhere and not knowing the name of your hotel is somewhat dangerous! And I can understand not researching to the point we do, but any guide book will give you some info, or you can look at websites for free! And to not even read the literature Disney sends you with your travel documents (regarding ME)...wow... These were the kind of people who just got in lines, not knowing what they're for, and then were mad it was for popcorn and turkey legs!

Great update! I can't believe that lady would that to you about the two seats. Ridiculous!
POFQ looks so cute. It's on my list to try but Riverside first this next trip.

I could not believe she would say that to me!! I mean, if she thought it and kept it to herself that's one thing...but to make that comment to a total stranger, a stranger who is somewhat overweight! Duh!!

Gotta be honest with ya LL, I am not a fan of Riverside! It is a beautiful resort but it's very big and confusing. But I know some of you like that....but it is the only place on property I have ever recieved truly bad service and had to go to Disney corporate...The front desk manager made me cry and it was my birthday - and not tears of joy! Walt would not have been impressed...and neither were the people I spoke to about it. But isolated incident I'm sure! I know a lot of people love Riverside and I'm sure you will too!

Yippee! You have arrived! The POFQ rooms look nice. I have never stayed there. Did you like the resort?

This was my third trip to POFQ, I love it there! It is nice and small so you don't have to walk 20 miles to the food and shopping and pool, and most importantly, the bus stop. A big plus if you ask me! It's very clean and pretty and good value for the money I think....plus there are beignets! I've never recieved anything but top notch service there.