Trip #8, but our first during Halloween! (Lots of Pics!)

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Let me start with a quick history. Our first family summer vacation just HAD to be Walt Disney World in 2002 when our daughter was five years old (DD5). We stayed at the CBR and had the time of our lives!

We returned year after year and in 2010 we returned to the CBR where it all began (see my signature for the whole list of trips).

Since my DW is a school teacher, we always had to vacation during the summer months. But this year, one of my jobs paid for my plane fair and two nights of my room stay so that I could attend the IACP Conference at the OCCC. I decided that we had to stay at WDW and turn this advantage into a four night mini vacation!

I picked up our DD13 at school a little early and my DW met us at home right at 3:30 pm. We hopped in the car with our luggage and drove to my work where we left our car. A co-worker drove us to O'Hare airport with our luggage. Just as we were entering the airport, I realized I left our camera, airplane boarding passes, Disney Magic Express passes, and all itinerary papers in the back seat of my car back at work.

I called another co-worker on his cell phone. He broke into my car (no damage, he's good!) and grabbed our stuff. He drove and met us halfway to the airport. We conducted an olympic quality baton hand off and got back to O'Hare in time to make our flight. Disaster averted!

Our flight was a quick and painless 2 and a half hours. We have always driven to WDW over the course of two days in the past. This was our first time flying into Orlando Int'l Airport and our first time using the Magic Express, which is awesome! No worries at all! We loved watching the "on bus" video too!

We arrived at the CBR's Custom House and check in was superfast because of the new online check in (which I had done from home). It was late and we were tired.

Our water view Pirate Room was right by a quiet pool in Trinidad South.

We loved the room!

The beds, the Flying Dutchman on the shower wall, the Jolly Roger on the curtain, the carpet made to look like wood planks, the fridge hidden in the barrel, Cap'n Jack's compass for a table, it was all just so much fun!

We always take a picture of our daughter Lauren sleeping the first morning at Disney. We love traditions!

It was really fun to return to the CBR. We love this Moderate Resort!

We purchased the 5 day Park Hopper tickets with our room and received the Dining Plan for free. We didn't use our first day ticket because we arrived at WDW so late. Hmmmm. I would have to think about that.

Saturday morning was Early Entry at DHS. DD13 Lauren and DW Robin were ready to go!

We realized this was the first trip that we didn't go to MK on our first day. That's okay, we stuck with tradition and took the photo we always take on Main Street, but this time we had a giant sorcerer hat in the background!

Lauren fell in love with the Vinylmation figures. By the time we finished our vacation, she had 7 of them!

Our first character was Winnie the Pooh!

We followed the crowd to get in line for Toy Story Mania. This ride is still the #1 most attended at WDW. The crowd was amazing. Fastpasses were sold out right away. We stood in line and loved the 3D ride again!

We went over to see Lotso at Walt Disney's Animation and Lauren got lotso huggin from him!

 

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We had the character buffet breakfast at the Hollywood & Vine and it was delicious and filling.

Rockin' Roller Coaster was broken all day so we went right on the Twilight Zone Tower of Giggles. This ride just made me laugh and I love the theming in the line queue. However, there was no line so we just went right on!

We saw and did everything we wanted to at DHS. Star Tours was under renovation and we passed on the Indiana Jones show because we've seen it so many times, including last year.

We love the Muppetvision 3D1

The American Idol Experience was just like being there. The three contestants were all great and it was hard to choose a winner.

Did I mention it was Halloween? It was fun to see the Halloween stuff for sale and decorated around the parks. There wasn't a lot around the parks, but there was some.

Robin and Lauren get ready to Voyage of the Little Mermaid (we still love how this show is done with the puppets in the dark!).

Lauren won her first claw machine stuffed animal on this machine back in 2002. Here she is being very serious.

She's serious because she's actually good at claw machines. She goes for the stuffed animals that don't have an arm or a leg stuck down wedged in with other animals.

We saw the Pixar parade with all the trampolines and jumping participants. It was really fun!

We had only seen Lights! Motors! Action! once before and it is truly a spectacular, must see, show. I love cars and have raced a few times and the abilities of the stunt drivers is beyond compare.

This move is really bad for tire wear though!

We had not eaten at Mama Melrose's before and we absolutely loved it!

I am usually a seafood kind of guy, but I couldn't resist the $28.99 marinated steak since it was "free" on our dining plan. Omigosh! It was the best steak I've ever had! Amazing!

Careful Lauren! Your dessert might just sail away!

We noticed some interesting things during this trip. First off there wasn't a single drop of rain the entire time. That was very bizzare for us compared to the summer showers every day. We also spent our time at the parks in different ways. We always saw Fantasmic at DHS and therefore we never really saw the park lit up at night. Because after Fantasmic, it was time to go back to our resort.

Who knew, after seeing him all these years, that this guy's eyes lit up red at night?

Back at the CBR's Old Port Royale, we bought Lauren her first Vinylmation. She got Pete and he was a rare "chase" version. She was a bit disappointed that it was Pete though. Not her favorite character. But they allow trades so she would sleep on it.

The next day, I had a counter service breakfast at Old Port Royale and then I had to take a cab to the OCCC for my first day at the Conference. Ah well, I enjoyed it as I always look forward to it.

Robin and Lauren went to MK. They had a blast and said there were no lines at all. They went on Space Mountain five times in a row. They went on everything! But they only took a few pictures.

At the entrance:

...and Lauren thinks Walt Disney's office window that opens and closes is the coolest thing in the world so she took a photo of it:

She also had Robin take a pic of her in It's A Small World.

I made it back from the Conference, changed in our room, and got to MK at 5:10 pm. The park closed at 7 pm for Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party so I only had an hour and fifty minutes to ride some attractions.

Here's something we've never seen before:

A five minute wait time for Splash Mountain?

 

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A five minute wait time for Splash Mountain?

Here's Lauren and me on Splash Mountain. Robin didn't want to get wet again!

We rode Splash Mountain, Big Thunder Railroad Mountain, Space Mountain, Jungle Cruise, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin all in 1 hour 50 minutes. That's never happened before!

I still love the banter and jokes on the Jungle Cruise. "Can anyone tell me what kind of snake this is? I'll give you a hint. It starts with the letter P. Yes, that's right. Plastic."

Then it was 7pm and we were hustled out of MK. We went back to our room and swam in the themed pool at the CBR. The water was warm. For October, records were set at WDW. It was up 94 degrees during our trip. The heat reminded us very much of our summer trips. We didn't mind it one bit though.

The next day I went to the Conference again. When I was done, I called Robin's cell and she said they were heading back to the resort after a day at Animal Kingdom. They were tired (it was hot!) and wanted to swim and relax. We met up and swam in the quiet pool.

We never see these little guys up in Illinois, so we take a picture when there's one on the wall at the resort:

Then we took the bus to Epcot.

It was Wine and Cheese Festival time.

We rode Test Track but Soarin' had a 90 minute wait. We love Soarin' but it's the second most popular attraction at WDW next to Toy Story Mania.

We went to Norway and rode Maelstrom before our Princess Storybook dinner at Akershus.

The mahi-mahi was terrific and Lauren can still pose like Cinderella!

Lauren and Robin loved the dessert!

So we didn't go to a park on Day 1. We went to DHS on Day 2, Magick Kindgom on Day 3, and Animal Kindgdom and Epcot on Day 3. We had to check out of the CBR at 11am on Day 5. We got everything all set and the Magical Express checkout with our bags was super easy. What a terrific system!

We still had one more table service meal so we book Whispering Canyon for breakfast at the Wilderness Lodge. We had never been there before. We decided to pay to make our two remaining park hopper tickets into non-expiring tickets. It made monetary sense and now we have three two-day hopper passes to use some day. We may take a cruise out of Florida and then stop at WDW on our way driving back home next summer. Perfect!

The moon over the monorail in the morning.

MK all done up for Halloween!

At the Wilderness. What a great resort!

Breakfast was fantastic! When we arrived at WDW, we had $486 to spend from our Disney Chase Rewards VISA card. We had $36 dollars left over on our last morning. I decided to spend them renting two Searacers for me and Lauren. Robin didn't want to go in one because she was wearing jeans for the flight back to Chicago (where is was much colder). She was hot in her jeans and baking in the little boats wasn't on her "to do" list.

Lauren and I had a blast! It was really fun to see her driving the boat around all by herself. It was also a really neat way to see MK from the Seven Seas Lagoon!

The ferry boat back to MK is really a nice ride.

We took the bus back to the CBR. One more photo by the fountain!

Then it was time to go! The Magic Express bus picked us up at 1:30 to make our 4:48 pm flight back to Chicago.

To make a long, long, lonnnnnnnnnnnnng story short: Our flight took off on time despite the horrendously windy weather in the Midwest that closed O'Hare for a portion of the day. We were sort of amazed that we took off on time. But the pilot apologized that the a/c vents weren't working on our United flight because a generator went out. After an hour in the air, we had to go back and land at Tampa because the generator problem somehow became a safety issue. Ugh.

We became stuck in Tampa while the airline tried to figure out what to do. They wound up fixing the generator. We got airborne again and made it to Chicago many, many hours later. We sure were tired when we got home, but our dog was super happy to see us and we were glad to see him.

Now I'm still off work but Robin and Lauren are off at work and school while I got to stay home and type all this out!

I hope you all enjoyed our trip report!

We were happy to have no rain and very little crowds. The CBR is a fun resort and the inter-resort bus makes short work of the walking around the luscious grounds of this spread out resort.

Trip #8 is now behind us but we still have those two day Park Hopper tickets ready to go for next time!

-Steve

 

[myramann]

I really enjoyed reading your trip report and your pictures are so good. It looks like you all had a great time! Thanks for posting!

 

[mm6mm6]

Thanks Myramann! We had a great time!