The World Won't Know What Hit It!-Girls' Trip! [Updated: 12/30.. 6 Days and Counting]

[SheaBear]

So I've been reading plenty of others pre trippies and I figured I'd fill you all in on mine now that the Phils wonderful season has ended, elections have changed history, and I resorted back to my teeny bopper days with NKOTB.

Back to Reality...

Need to get on this planning fully. We've done our share of Disney trips, but this will be the first we take as a group of friends, without any Parental Supervision.

It all came about when we were talking over the summer how we never really travel together anymore, well atleast not since high school for the majority of us. And I put together this idea for a "girls only" trip. 20 girls were invited, and 6 emerged.

Onto some details....

Dates: Jan 5 - 10
Hotel: Saratoga Springs
Tickets: 6-Day MYW plus PH and Dining

Crew:
Group Smekks is what I like to call it.

ME- Shanea (22): I'll actually be 23 by the time we go (Birthday is NYE!) I'm a college student in South Jersey and even though this trip is in the beginning of Jan, I will still have plenty of time once I get back from WDW to relax before going back to school. I alone have done my fair share of WDW trips (DVC since 1997), and know my way around there pretty well. I know plenty has changed since the last time I was there almost 6 years ago, but I think this is one of the aspects that makes going back such a great idea.

Me at the local park.

Kim (22): Kim and I have been friend since we were 8 years old, and I am really excited to be making this trip with her. She was really hesitant on going, because she is working really hard to get into Grad schools, but realized 'how often do my friends put together an actual vacation together?'. So she caved and is going. I have traveled plenty with Kim over the years, in fact my one trip I've made to Disneyland was experienced with her in 2004. I know she is beyond excited to head the the world, because she hasn't been there since 1992.

Kim and I at 7am after pulling an all night party for her 21st

Katelyn (20): Katelyn is my partner in crime. She's pretty much the girl that I know I can call whenever I have a random idea and know that if we think the plan will fail, she will stick through it with me. Katelyn and I are probably the most Disney obsessed people out of all of our friends. Katelyn too made the trip to Disneyland in 2004, but made her last WDW trip in 2006 and is probably the most enthusiastic one about the Jan. 2009 trip.

Meghan (16): Meghan is Katelyn's little sister and is also obsessed with Disney. She came to join the Jan. 2009 group because one of our friends had to bail due to work obligations and needed someone to fill in. So what better person than a little clone of someone that is already going and loves Disney just as much as the rest of us.

Meghan and Katelyn anxiously awaiting to ride a haunted hayride

Emily (19): Emily is someone Katelyn had grown up with and I over the past 2 years or so have become incredibly close to. Em and I are hippies at heart and traveled to Bonnaroo (a large music festival in Tenn.) in June. And while she is not as much as a Disney fan as the rest of us she is pretty excited about getting away with the girls and just enjoying some fun together. And hey, I figured if I could travel 16 hours in a car down to Tennessee, live in a tent for a week without a shower and make the 14 hour trip back with both of us alive, I could do Disney with her.

Emily and I with the guys right outside of Citizens Bank Park after the Phillies won the WORLD SERIES!

Shauna (20): Shauna is Emily's version of my Kim. Best friends since they were little. Shauna is that type of person that smiles about everything and keeps chugging along even when things bother her. She will be that person that keeps spirits high when we've had a long day and just wanna crash. I'm personally really excited that she is going with us, and she too was a last minute addition.

Shauna and Emily at Rainforest Cafe in Atlantic City

So that's the crew and I'm looking forward to traveling with them. I guess that's a good introduction and I'll be back later with more information, concerning our stay and plans for the vaca.

 

[SheaBear]

Pulling an all nighter to study for a Environmental Science exam in the morning and decided to take a short break and update my TR!


HOTEL

Our hotel accommodations have been booked. I'm pretty excited to be staying at Saratoga Springs. The last time I was at WDW it was just being built.

The group of us will be staying a 2 Bedroom Villa. We're excited to be able to stay in one place rather then being split up into two rooms. And the two bathrooms with large vanities will be well appreciated when 6 girls have to get ready in the morning.

We got the room for $250 a night, which is a splurge for college students. But we were originally looking to stay at Pop and found that for the 6 of us to go it was only $70 extra to stay at Saratoga Springs. I also know that the 2 Bedroom is usually much more expensive, but I think we may have gotten a deal by booking it through a DVC member.

I know we had the chance to use the 7 for 4 deal and probably get better pricing, but we are unable to leave earlier or stay later (I know it's only a day). 4 of the 6 of us our all college students, and Katelyn has to be back at school on the 12th so that makes staying till Sunday a bit difficult. And leaving on the Sunday before is hard because Kim works full time at a vet hospital and could only get off the one full week. But I guess it works out cause we will need some days to recover before taking flight after plenty of New Years and Birthday Celebrations (Mine is on NYE)!

FLIGHT

As for our flight to actually enjoy the hotel stay is still up in the air. Our local airport is priced a little higher than the Philadelphia Airport, but we all decided we were willing to pay a few extra $$ to make it much easier on us since we are looking to catch an early flight out.

We are impatiently waiting for deals to pop up. They are slowly coming down. Yesterday it was at $240 per person for the roundtrip and today it is already down to $210. We are currently debating on whether to grab them now, but there is much hesitation. We are hoping on top of some deal we can get a student discount.

I know most people would grab this up, but the reason we are hesitating is, last year right before Christmas, Spirit announced $0.50 flights. While we don't expect anything quite as low with the economy the way it is, we are hoping for something similar. If we stick with our local airport we will be flying Spirit.

The way the $0.50 flights worked was, for every day you were gone from your initial flight you added $0.50. So for each of us, we would pay $3 but then they charged something like $80 for baggage. But still if you only brought one bag a round trip flight from Jersey to Orlando would only cost each of us $83 plus taxes and insurance.

So, do people have any suggestions? Should we wait it out? Or buy now since they have dropped $30? We're really not sure.


Next update will be Restuarants... which before the deal came out we weren't planning on making any ADRs for our stay, but now that it seems a lot of people have decided to go in Jan. I think we should.

 

[SheaBear]

It's Really Official Now!

As of 11/17, all is booked.

Up until just two days ago, we thought we were staying at SS. Apparently there was some mis-communication between our group and a family member who had offered to let us book the hotel through her DVC. So since the room was not booked when we had thought we gave the green-light, the price raised $100 a night from the original price.

We decided as 6 college students paying our own way, this was too much. Sooo....

We are now staying Jan. 5-10 at ASMu!

I have stayed at ASMu, ASMo, and POP numerous times so I know we will be just fine here too. We are just a bit disappointed to not be staying in the same space. I did however ask for adjoining rooms when I booked our stay. I was told this can't be promised, but that I asked far enough in advance to probably get this.

I know the 4/3 Deal is still available, and was able to take advantage of it by paying for 4 and getting our 5th night free. But we had to buy as a package and I couldn't do that since most of the group is getting their park hopper passes as Christmas presents from their parents. So the deal was a no go. But I understand....

Flight Booked!

We finally decided to just go for it and buy our flight. As I said originally, we were hesitating to buy our flights because of deals that had happened last year. But in the matter of 3 days the roundtrip cost had dropped $100 and we decided to just go for it, not knowing when oil costs were going to start rising again. So roundtrip for 6 of us, including our luggage costs, we spent about $1300 on our flight. Not to bad I guess.

I am not too excited about the costs of flights nowadays, but I can't be too picky. I am however extremely excited about our flight times.

Jan. 5 our flight leaves home at 6:25AM.. Putting us at Orlando Airport around 9AM, which means we will have a large portion of the day to enjoy a park or two.

Jan. 10 our flight leaves Orlando at 9:55PM.. again giving us much of the day to make some last minute memories before having to head to the airport.

I know in my last post I said I was going to talk about our ADR which were booked a week before we even made our hotel reservations... but I will get to them soon.

For Now.. I could use some help!
Since Christmas Eve is our 12 Day mark. I was thinking about doing the 12 Days of Disney idea I've read about numerous times.

I was thinking, each day leading up to our trip starting on Christmas Eve, I could do something cute for each of them or even give them each a small gift that they would need for the trip. To make things easy, we are a pretty simple bunch of girls. We love reverting back to being 5 and coloring and playing with play dough. We're pretty simple like that...

SO any ideas you have, feel free to leave them here or send me a PM. Thanks in advance.

Till later, sending some pixie dust your way!

 

[spoonfulofsugr]

Hey girl! Fancy seeing you here! I am so jealous your trip is so much closer than mine! I can't wait to read more about it!

 

[SheaBear]

I know have plenty of lukers out there, so come join and give some input and ideas.

ADRs

So I had made our ADRs about a week before our hotel reservations, knowing from previous trips that some places tend to fill up very fast. I had asked everyone in our group if there was anywhere they wanted to eat while there. So off of what they had said at that time, I booked 4 ADRs and told them they could be cancelled and changed. (HOPEFULLY!)

We are getting the dining plan, so for 5 nights we have... 5 table service meals, 5 quick service and 5 snacks.

Jan. 5 - Prime Time Cafe for Dinner after Fantasmic!
I've eaten here plenty of times, and while I don't think the food is out of this world, I love the experience. There is plenty of fun to be had here.

Jan. 6 - Hoop-Dee-Do Revue for a very late Dinner
It uses two table service meals which is why I had only done 4. But I haven't been here since I was in Jr. High. Katelyn loves this place so we figure we'd try it out.

Jan. 7 - Chef Mickey's for Dinner
I've never missed a trip to Chef Mickey's ever since I first starting going to Disney. I love it here and I think it's a great place with plenty of options for the group of us to eat. Since we run the gamut from vegitarian to steak lovers.

Jan. 8 - Crystal Palace for Breakfast
I love Crystal Palace for breakfast. I love Eeyore. He's my boy!


So they are the ADRs we have as of this moment. But since Thanksgiving is this week, we will all be home from school and have time to sit down and talk about it all. I only go to school with Emily and Shauna, so I see them all the time but the other 3, we have to take our opportunity when it arises to all get together and make sure everything is in check.

Some people are now mentioning they want to eat at Cinderella's Royal Table and Whispering Canyon at Wilderness Lodge... so there may be some changes in order.

 

[SheaBear]

New Addition!

So Emily got a call the other day from our friends mom who proceeded to ask if it was still possible for her daughter to go with us, cause she wanted to give the trip to her as a Christmas present.

Em called me and I said sure.. I mean what's one more person.

So Katie is now going with us! I've actually only hung out with Katie a few times outside of work, but she's pretty laid back, so I'm cool with that.

I was just looking to go away with the most chill people I know, cause here at home there is a group of like 25 of us that constantly hang out. While it surely makes for some interesting times... 25 people causes drama.

As for life right now, I'm in my last week of school, so that means finals! Really not doing as well as I planned. I have a physics exam in 5 hrs. 8:30am to be exact. I've been studying for hours now and this is my break. After this test, I have one more exam on Monday and a sign language presentation on Tuesday, then it's officially WINTER BREAK!

I also started a new job last week... it uhhh interesting. The people are not what I expected, but hey I'm only there for seasonal help, so I'm done 2 days before my trip.

Trying to get together all the Christmas gifts for my family and set up something for NYE which is also my 23rd birthday. I was really thinking about doing Times Square with a group of friends, now a lot of them have backed out. There are however a few left, and we have friends the live in the city and friends that live in Union, NJ which is only 15 mins from the city so its in debate right now.

But more than anything I am trying to get myself ready for Disney. I am really excited to be going with my friends. We are already down to 31 days, but with so much going on in between it seems so far away. I am hoping that once I hit the teens I will be really excited!

With the trip getting closer, I am sure there will be more updates. I'll be posting pics eventually of the packages my mom and I will be puttin together for the other girls on the trip.

 

[kayla87]

Up until just two days ago, we thought we were staying at SS. Apparently there was some mis-communication between our group and a family member who had offered to let us book the hotel through her DVC. So since the room was not booked when we had thought we gave the green-light, the price raised $100 a night from the original price.

I don't know the usual procedure for renting DVC points, but the price shouldn't have changed. Unless you mean the price for paying for Saratoga through CRO went up. There's a lot each party has to do to protect themselves when renting DVC points, and this is a good example of the danger. At least you were able to get a room somewhere else.

Sending you some good vibes for the end of your semester. I already have my biggest project behind me, but it sucks to still have three tests looming, just waiting for them to be over. Good luck on everything!

 

[LoLaRae]

I'm in!

This trip looks like a blast! I wish I could get my friends to do this.... I just might have to make them read this too to get them in the spirit!!

I'm with you the finals... I have one in 2 1/2 hours (that I should be studying for right now) and one on Monday. Good Luck on yours!

 

[SheaBear]

Glad to see some new people here.

Sorry for such the length of time between posts. Things have been so jammed packed. Between the semester ending, working 2 jobs, trying to make sure everything is set for Disney, along with the Holidays including my Birthday on NYE!!

It's so exciting to only have 6 more nights at home before we head to the World.

Last time I mentioned we had a new addition. Well along with Katie deciding to go, yesterday I got a phone call from someone else who is going through a bad break up and decided it would be best to get away with the girls. So now our friend Robyn is also coming with us. This brings our total to 8 girls going on the trip.

Me, Katelyn and Robyn just being ourselves.

Katie and Shauna


ADRs
So because of the new additions, I had to call and change all of our reservations yesterday. I only ran into 2 issues. We had a reservation for Prime Time Cafe our first night there, but they are completely booked. Everything in HS is completely booked that night soooo, I guess we will try to do a walk up or just grab a quick meal somewhere, which there is plenty to choose from.

Also when I called to add two people to our reservation at Chef Mickey's they said that we would be put at two separate tables and there is no promise that they can put us next to each other. Not sure whether we will keep it, but I'm also thinking if we arrive early enough that we won't have a problem plus our reservation is late.. 9pm.

I did add Whispering Canyons at Wilderness Lodge on our last day for a late breakfast. I thought it would be a fun place to go for our last meal in Disney. I'm thinking hit up there and head to Magic Kingdom for one last hoorah!

I will actually update with a semi schedule and some pictures of what I made the girls. Till then...