The road less traveled- a week at Boulder Ridge

[GinnyBear's_mom]

For the first time in just about forever, the school district where I work and the school district where my kids (13, 10, 7) attend had the same spring break! It won't happen again for another 3 years so we thought we would head down to Florida for the week. We own at AKL and VGF and go to Disney once or twice a year. We were looking for something a little different during this trip. I am a little annoyed at Disney's annual pass situation and we decided not to get tickets to any Disney park considering we were just there in August and will return again in July. We settled on a week at Boulder Ridge, our first time staying there, so we could be close to Fort Wilderness and everything they have to offer. This was our first trip to Disney during spring break and I was sure the crowds would be insane, we wanted to spend as much time away from the crowds as possible and we managed to do just that. I made reservations for archery, horseback riding, a carriage ride, fishing and mini golf a few weeks before our trip and was able to get all of the time days/time slots I wanted.

We took the auto train down, which we’ve done several times before and had the most stressful trip yet on the train (read about that here on the auto train thread). Highlights included almost missing the train due to insane holiday traffic and some Jersey Mike’s drama. It won’t stop us from booking the train again, but we will definitely do things differently next time, including bringing tons of food for DD10 so we don’t get stressed if there aren’t options for her to safely eat.

Once the train arrived at the station, we drove straight to Disney Springs and arrived a little after 10. I made a beeline for Gideon’s so I could try their coffee cake cookie and it was as amazing as I dreamed it would be! DD10 picked out a few treats at Erin McKenna’s that she could enjoy throughout the week. Spoiler alert- she did not like the frosting on any of her chosen desserts but learned quickly to scoop it off of everything we bought. We had our traditional arrival lunch at the Polite Pig- the butcher board (I think we ate some sausage before I took a picture) and it was as good as it always is.

Yummy butcher board that we split. I think we added turkey to it as well.


A few allergy friendly treats from Erin McKenna's




After Disney Springs, we headed to Boulder Ridge to drop off our luggage and food with Bell Services and headed to the Fort for archery lessons. Although the Fort Wilderness bus isn’t on the bus display it comes about every 15-20 minutes at bus stop 1 which is the same as the Magic Kingdom bus stop (and both locations occasionally share the same bus). We got to the Bike Barn at the Fort and the archery lessons were a short walk away. The kids loved it but it was a bit too long for my younger kids. Archery lessons are 75 minutes which includes 10 minutes of instruction and about an hour of shooting at targets. Considering kids as young as 6 can sign up, 60 minutes of target shooting is a long time! At the end of the lesson, students can take pictures with their targets. DD13 said archery was one of the highlights of the trip.



Afterwards, we stopped at P&J’s Takeout for an early dinner and drinks at Crockett’s Tavern. The weather was beautiful and we were able to sit at the picnic tables outside to eat. The kids played with the hula hoops at Crockett’s and the playground while we waited for our food. Dinner was so good (and cheap!), we stopped here several more times during the week. One of DD10’s favorite foods is cornbread and even though it isn’t on the menu, you can order gluten free cornbread here!

P&J's chicken & ribs meal


Gluten free cornbread (looks exactly like the regular cornbread but they put it in a special box for us.




We headed to Boulder Ridge (received the room ready text at 3:30) and were pleasantly surprised with our studio. The room was a little tired stylistically but nothing appeared too worn as others have stated. We were on the first floor right by the pool and I would gladly book that room again. We spent the rest of the night relaxing at the pool then went to bed fairly early, we are always tired on our arrival day. Our alarms were set to go off at 7:30am the next morning for horseback riding back at the Fort.

View from our room (1537)

 

[DeeBee3]

Looking forward to hearing more. BR gets dunked on all the time, so glad to hear it is starting off well!

 

[paults]

when we joined in 2002 at BWV, all we could book for our 1st trip was BR (aka VWL) we loved the place and have been back a few more times.

 

[GinnyBear's_mom]

Looking forward to hearing more. BR gets dunked on all the time, so glad to hear it is starting off well!

We were worried, reading all of the complaints about the worn out rooms in DVC groups but we were pleasantly surprised at the resort. I think if we stayed there before we bought at AKL, we might have purchased our contract at VWL instead.

 

[hhisc16]

We were worried, reading all of the complaints about the worn out rooms in DVC groups but we were pleasantly surprised at the resort. I think if we stayed there before we bought at AKL, we might have purchased our contract at VWL instead.

We stayed a studio at VWL/BRV in Dec. 2021 and the room was great! Guess some rooms are better than others with wear/tear.

 

[Stargazer65]

We were there last month for the first time, and I had no issues with our room. Yeah, there was some wear marks on the furniture. But honestly, we never would have noticed except for all the complaints we heard beforehand.

 

[franandaj]

Sounds like a very fun and interesting "park free" trip! Looking forward to more!

 

[GinnyBear's_mom]

Our first full day was Easter Sunday and the resort was very quiet in the morning. I made reservations at our 60 day mark for horseback riding (aka trail ride) at 9:30 so we took the bus to Fort Wilderness. As would be the case for our entire trip, anytime we took the bus from Wilderness Lodge to the Fort, we were the only ones on the bus.


After reaching the Fort’s Settlement area (where Pioneer Hall is located) we had to take a second bus to the Outpost which is located at the opposite end of the Fort. The trail rides start by the Outpost, not at the Tri-Circle-D Ranch as one might think they would. My DDs and DH went on the trail ride. The minimum age for the trail ride is 9 so DS and I did not participate. After the rest of the family got saddled up, DS and I took the bus back to the Outpost to tour the Horse Barn and see if he was short enough for the pony rides. The max height is 48 inches for the ponies on MDE and DS is 48.5 but they did let him ride. There wasn’t a ruler to measure, instead if the children are shorter than a certain railing at the ranch they can ride. It looked like the railing was 49 inches. You can have one or two turns around the path and since we had some time to kill until the older kids were done the trail ride we went around twice. Afterwards, we hung out at Trail’s End for a little hula hooping and a trip to the playground.


There were about 12 people on the trail ride.





For Easter brunch, we had reservations at Whispering Canyon. They were back to their antics which was nice to see. Lots of ketchup, throwing straws at us, ridiculously large refills and screaming directions when people have to use the rest room. My kids loved it. The food was OK, but I wouldn’t pay for the skillets again as the items on them were hit or miss. We ordered 5 skillets. No one liked their potatoes as they weren’t seasoned at all and tasted very bland. They were very slow on the refills, we waited 20 minutes for a refill and they only brought items from DH’s Heritage skillet and never brought anything from my Lighter Side so I just ate off of his skillet instead of waiting any longer. We enjoyed the sausage gravy, waffles and sausage. DD requested to have breakfast here on her birthday but I will be steering everyone away from the skillets and we will order from the a la carte menu instead.

The Lighter Side Skillet part 1-the muesli was excellent



The Lighter Side part 2


Child's Skillet- Mickey biscuit, egg and waffle. Make food Mickey shaped and my kids will eat it all day long.


Child's allergy skillet



We took an afternoon break at the quiet pool and it was very crowded but that was the only time during the week where it felt as crowded as a feature pool. The magic band lock at the back of the pool by Geyser Point malfunctioned most of the week, so anytime we refilled our mugs we had to wait for someone to come out or walk all the way around to the other entrance. We never made it over to the feature pool during the week, the kids liked the idea that the quiet pool was steps away from our patio so we only swam there.

For dinner we went back to P&J’s and we had a fun carriage ride after. We split a few things since we were still stuffed from brunch. DH and I shared the berry salad which I loved. The kids had uncrustables and burgers. They do have gluten free burger buns but you have to order in person for some reason, the don't offer them on mobile order. We walked over to the carriage after even though we were a bit early. The carriage pick up/drop off is outside Trail’s End. The carriage ride was one of the highlights of the trip for me but did end in pouring rain. We felt so bad for our driver as she was soaked but we stayed dry inside the carriage, we made sure to tip her more than we originally planned.

Pioneer Berry Salad- the fruit was so fresh, lots of blueberries, strawberries and blackberries, much better than the fruit they served at Whispering Canyon.


Carriage rides start right at Trail's End/the playground.






We had plans afterward to hang out in the iron spike room but since it was pouring out, the movie was played there instead. We set up camp in one of the smaller rooms off of the iron spike room where we played cards and enjoyed our goodies from Gideon’s and Erin McKenna’s. DD10 decided to watch the movie (Up) and we stayed there playing games until it was over.

A fun game of go fish with some Gideon's.

 

[GinnyBear's_mom]

Something that we tried for the first time on our last trip was a fishing excursion and the kids asked repeatedly to book it for our next trip. We scheduled the fishing trip for 7am and were picked up at the marina next to Geyser Point which was a two minute walk from our room. The bonus of the early fishing trips is that you get to see a beautiful sunrise on the lake. During our 2 hour trip, we caught about 30 fish.






Afterwards, we went over to the Polynesian so DD could get a picture with a particular hidden Mickey on the floor of the lobby. Her social studies teacher offered a Disney scavenger hunt for extra credit and since almost all of the items needed were in the parks, we tried to get pictures of all the items outside of the park. Before the trip she had a 102% in that class and clearly didn’t need the extra credit but when a teen is actually excited to do something early in the morning, you do it lol. While at the Polynesian, we stopped to have breakfast at Capt. Cook’s. We had lots of yummy Mickey waffles and DH tried the roast beef hash which was a bit disappointing, very dry with more bland potatoes. We ate outside since it was a beautiful day. Just as we were finishing breakfast, Donald, Pluto and Goofy appeared on the grass next to us! It was the first day that guests were allowed to hug characters and we were so excited to see them.



We hopped over to the Grand Floridian to see the chocolate Easter eggs and try some snacks at the Grand Cottage. The hot cross buns were delicious but the rainbow “marshmallows” were definitely not marshmallows. I feel like the recipe was created by someone who heard about marshmallows but never actually tried one. They were very wet and strange.

We made our way back to Boulder Ridge and hung out at the quiet pool which was pretty empty. We were able to grab a cabana by the pool which was so nice. I’m surprised Disney doesn’t charge for them. The kids took a short pool break and DH and I went to the Wilderness Lodge Mercantile to do some grocery shopping. We bought a bag of chips, a few apples, hotdogs and buns. We then went to Teton Boat and Bike rentals which is a terrible name for a place that no longer rents boats and bicycles. It seems to be a gathering place for lifeguards and other cast members to start/end shifts. If you can catch one of the cast members there, you can rent a DVC barbeque set. We took the bbq set over to the grills by the cabins and grilled our hotdogs. We enjoyed our dinner by the pool.

The DVC bbq set


The grill by the cabins


Dinner by the pool


After dinner, we got changed and took a ride over to Universal- while we didn't do any Disney parks we did have a few days at Universal since we have APs. When I bought our 15 month APs they were only $250- much easier on the wallet compared to Disney APs. DS is finally tall enough for Hagrid's so we decided to make a special trip and drive over to have butterbeers and his first ride. We went to the Three Broomsticks for our butterbeers and then went to Hagrid's. We were seated on the ride, lap bars were down and we had just started to leave the station when a guest in one of the rows in front of us had a panic attack and wriggled out of his seat and jumped off the ride! That caused an emergency stop and we all had to get off the ride. They led us into a hallway to wait for a bit but the ride never started again and we left the line when the park was about to close at 10pm. They gave us ruby passes to return back to the ride on a different day. Needless to say, DH was a bit sad to get so close to riding but he was happy to know he could skip the line with the ruby passes later in the week.

 

[Stargazer65]

Wow, our families crossed paths but I didn't know any of you of course.

 

[pinkxray]

Thanks for for sharing. We are doing something very similar the week after Thanksgiving. We are staying a week at Bay Lake Tower but only doing the Xmas party one night. Hoping to spend lots of time at Fort wilderness and hopping to the other resorts.

We also have the 15month Universal annual passes and will hop over there for a day. We weren’t planning on renewing them but are considering it since they really are such a good value in our opinion.