mindeola
Mad About the Mouse!
- Joined
- Jan 19, 2011
- Messages
- 735
We just returned home from an incredible 25th Anniversary Trip. This was a different kind of trip for us. We took a relaxed approach. I thought this might be difficult for me as I am an open to close type touring plan person. My husband does not love Disney and we just went on a big family trip last May. I tried to cater the trip to his tastes since he is such a trooper! This one might have converted him!
We rented DVC points for AKL, Jambo House , Savannah view. We used David's and they were fantastic from start to finish!
5/1- Drove in from St Augustine where we had spent the first three days of our trip. I had intended for this to be a resort day only, but my DH had stated that he wanted to do Midway Mania , The Frozen sing along ( LOL) , and ToT. Arrived at the park around 0930.Really took our time wandering the streets and shops and enjoying the street performers. Used FP for TSMM, Star Tours and Tower of Terror. DH did single rider on Rock N Roller Coaster and was in and out in about 20 minutes. Saw several other attractions/shows with minimal wait. Grabbed lunch at Pizzarizzo . I had a good Antipasto salad. DH did not love his pizza, but said it was decent. I was able to snag another FP for TSMM while we were in India Jones. We rode that and while I was in line, I grabbed another one for just 5 minutes later! We decided to leave about 4:00 and check in. I had gotten a text around 1:00 that our room was ready. I had picked AKL because his favorite park is AK and he loves animals. The view did not disappoint! We saw plenty of giraffes, zebras and antelope type animal throughout our stay. We had dinner at Sanaa and it was fabulous like always.
5/2- This day was actually our anniversary. Grabbed a quick bfast at The Mara. We arrived at the park about an hour before opening for our Wild Africa Trek. This was an incredible experience! Our group had ten people. More than half of the group was in their sixties and had no problems at all. We had one child and she was bout 10. She asked lots of questions and they were really good ones! Our guides, Moira and Meg, were so knowledgeable. I felt safe at all times. We received metal water flasks with the logo, personalized name tags and a cord to hold our glasses. Right after we crossed the rope bridges we got a torrential downpour. We were all given the Mickey ponchos. Yeah! Our snack was beautifully presented and so yummy. It had great cheeses and meats. The yogurt with granola was very tasty. This place had a bathroom and water refill stations. The guides took so many great pictures and those were all included with our package. Our vehicle was able to go off the beaten path and we had some wonderful close encounters with giraffes. I was sad when this 3 hour tour came to an end. I felt it was worth every penny of the $189 price tag. I would love to bring my kids on this in the future. That evening we had a ROL package with Tiffins. It was my first time to eat at Tiffins, The service was impeccable and friendly. The food was superb. We sat at the Nomad lounge beforehand and enjoyed some drinks while enviously looking at the cast member line into their preview party at Pandora! I wore my anniversary button hoping for some crazy Pixie Dust that would get me into Pandora, but no such luck. I will be back in November though. We were surprised with a special dessert plate that had Happy Anniversary written in chocolate. We had already had dessert, but had no problem eating that one as well. We were surprised to receive the lotus flower popcorn bucket at the end of our meal. Everyone with a package received one. I'm not sure if this is a new thing? It was appreciated! It would have been nice to have a popcorn cart right by the show entrance. I hopped over to Dino Land and filled it and then made it back to our excellent seats. I thought the show was really beautiful and it seemed a good way to end this perfect day. I was not completely wow'ed by it, but I did enjoy it.
5/3 Ate at Kona for breakfast and headed to Epcot. Was surprised to have to go through bag check again after we had already gone through it before boarding the monorail at the TTC. Arrived about 10 minutes after opening and went straight to Soarin'. It had a posted wait of 40 minutes. I rarely get in a line that is longer than thirty minutes, but this was a must! Soarin' is a favorite and we had not seen the new version. Luckily the wait was right at 20 minutes and the interactive game on our phones was a fun time killer while in line. We did single rider at TT and did a few other attractions. They were out of Beverly at Club Cool! I have never seen that before. I love Flower and Garden and just taking time to see all of the topiaries. We walked counter clockwise around WS and had lunch at San Angel Inn. I have made and cancelled ADR's here for years! I am always scared away by the negative reviews. I was determined to finally try it. I am so glad we did. It was one of the best meals we had and we ate at a lot of great places! We had met a cast member at TT. He had asked me my favorite pavilion and I told Him Mexico. He was actually from Mexico and told us he had eaten at San Angel Inn the week before and it was "75% authentic".
He recommended the Carne Asada Tampiqueña as a favorite of his back home and he enjoyed their version. My husband ordered that and I had the Tacos al Pastor. We also have Queso Fundido and margaritas. We have lived in California ( great Mexican food!) and we are from Texas ( great Tex-Mex and Mexican food) so we are pretty picky. We were both really impressed! We had FP Frozen. Meh. It was okay. Not something I would wait in line for. I miss Maelstrom! After that we headed to MK- along with every cheerleader group on property. At least that is what it felt like. They were perfectly well behaved, but it did make the park the biggest crowd we had seen that trip. We took it easy, enjoyed the glassblowing and the Barbershop Quartet. Grabbed a couple of FP and rode all of our favorites. Had a Dole Whip, of course. Watched one last Wishes. I will miss it, but I am excited to see the new show!
5/4 Ate bfast at Boma. Fantastic selection. We had a great waiter named Jimmy. Toyed with the idea of doing 4 parks in 1 day. We really wanted to get on the road by about 2:00 though. Decided to just do HS. It was May 4th after all. How could we resist? Enjoyed a fairly low key day. It was fun to see all of the SW Disney Bounding people did. Lots of Princess Leia buns! Grabbed two carrot cake cookies for the road and headed to the beach for the last part of the trip.
Well, I wrote way more than I intended to! All in all, we had a really great trip. My husband enjoyed the low key approach and the resort. The Wild Africa Trek was an experience we will remember forever. Tried 6 new to us restaurants- the food bucket list is getting much smaller. I would love to share some Trek photos later.
UPDATE: I was telling a friend about our low key trip and DH heard me say it was slow paced. He did not agree. LOL I think he would actually like a resort stay with a couple hours a day in a park and golf each day. Good thing he has so many other great qualities!
*** We did not use a dining plan and saved right at $200.00 . That was enough to pay tips and alcohol. This our third trip without the DDP and where we have saved a good amount of money by not using it. As you can see we still ate at really great restaurants!
We rented DVC points for AKL, Jambo House , Savannah view. We used David's and they were fantastic from start to finish!
5/1- Drove in from St Augustine where we had spent the first three days of our trip. I had intended for this to be a resort day only, but my DH had stated that he wanted to do Midway Mania , The Frozen sing along ( LOL) , and ToT. Arrived at the park around 0930.Really took our time wandering the streets and shops and enjoying the street performers. Used FP for TSMM, Star Tours and Tower of Terror. DH did single rider on Rock N Roller Coaster and was in and out in about 20 minutes. Saw several other attractions/shows with minimal wait. Grabbed lunch at Pizzarizzo . I had a good Antipasto salad. DH did not love his pizza, but said it was decent. I was able to snag another FP for TSMM while we were in India Jones. We rode that and while I was in line, I grabbed another one for just 5 minutes later! We decided to leave about 4:00 and check in. I had gotten a text around 1:00 that our room was ready. I had picked AKL because his favorite park is AK and he loves animals. The view did not disappoint! We saw plenty of giraffes, zebras and antelope type animal throughout our stay. We had dinner at Sanaa and it was fabulous like always.
5/2- This day was actually our anniversary. Grabbed a quick bfast at The Mara. We arrived at the park about an hour before opening for our Wild Africa Trek. This was an incredible experience! Our group had ten people. More than half of the group was in their sixties and had no problems at all. We had one child and she was bout 10. She asked lots of questions and they were really good ones! Our guides, Moira and Meg, were so knowledgeable. I felt safe at all times. We received metal water flasks with the logo, personalized name tags and a cord to hold our glasses. Right after we crossed the rope bridges we got a torrential downpour. We were all given the Mickey ponchos. Yeah! Our snack was beautifully presented and so yummy. It had great cheeses and meats. The yogurt with granola was very tasty. This place had a bathroom and water refill stations. The guides took so many great pictures and those were all included with our package. Our vehicle was able to go off the beaten path and we had some wonderful close encounters with giraffes. I was sad when this 3 hour tour came to an end. I felt it was worth every penny of the $189 price tag. I would love to bring my kids on this in the future. That evening we had a ROL package with Tiffins. It was my first time to eat at Tiffins, The service was impeccable and friendly. The food was superb. We sat at the Nomad lounge beforehand and enjoyed some drinks while enviously looking at the cast member line into their preview party at Pandora! I wore my anniversary button hoping for some crazy Pixie Dust that would get me into Pandora, but no such luck. I will be back in November though. We were surprised with a special dessert plate that had Happy Anniversary written in chocolate. We had already had dessert, but had no problem eating that one as well. We were surprised to receive the lotus flower popcorn bucket at the end of our meal. Everyone with a package received one. I'm not sure if this is a new thing? It was appreciated! It would have been nice to have a popcorn cart right by the show entrance. I hopped over to Dino Land and filled it and then made it back to our excellent seats. I thought the show was really beautiful and it seemed a good way to end this perfect day. I was not completely wow'ed by it, but I did enjoy it.
5/3 Ate at Kona for breakfast and headed to Epcot. Was surprised to have to go through bag check again after we had already gone through it before boarding the monorail at the TTC. Arrived about 10 minutes after opening and went straight to Soarin'. It had a posted wait of 40 minutes. I rarely get in a line that is longer than thirty minutes, but this was a must! Soarin' is a favorite and we had not seen the new version. Luckily the wait was right at 20 minutes and the interactive game on our phones was a fun time killer while in line. We did single rider at TT and did a few other attractions. They were out of Beverly at Club Cool! I have never seen that before. I love Flower and Garden and just taking time to see all of the topiaries. We walked counter clockwise around WS and had lunch at San Angel Inn. I have made and cancelled ADR's here for years! I am always scared away by the negative reviews. I was determined to finally try it. I am so glad we did. It was one of the best meals we had and we ate at a lot of great places! We had met a cast member at TT. He had asked me my favorite pavilion and I told Him Mexico. He was actually from Mexico and told us he had eaten at San Angel Inn the week before and it was "75% authentic".
He recommended the Carne Asada Tampiqueña as a favorite of his back home and he enjoyed their version. My husband ordered that and I had the Tacos al Pastor. We also have Queso Fundido and margaritas. We have lived in California ( great Mexican food!) and we are from Texas ( great Tex-Mex and Mexican food) so we are pretty picky. We were both really impressed! We had FP Frozen. Meh. It was okay. Not something I would wait in line for. I miss Maelstrom! After that we headed to MK- along with every cheerleader group on property. At least that is what it felt like. They were perfectly well behaved, but it did make the park the biggest crowd we had seen that trip. We took it easy, enjoyed the glassblowing and the Barbershop Quartet. Grabbed a couple of FP and rode all of our favorites. Had a Dole Whip, of course. Watched one last Wishes. I will miss it, but I am excited to see the new show!5/4 Ate bfast at Boma. Fantastic selection. We had a great waiter named Jimmy. Toyed with the idea of doing 4 parks in 1 day. We really wanted to get on the road by about 2:00 though. Decided to just do HS. It was May 4th after all. How could we resist? Enjoyed a fairly low key day. It was fun to see all of the SW Disney Bounding people did. Lots of Princess Leia buns! Grabbed two carrot cake cookies for the road and headed to the beach for the last part of the trip.
Well, I wrote way more than I intended to! All in all, we had a really great trip. My husband enjoyed the low key approach and the resort. The Wild Africa Trek was an experience we will remember forever. Tried 6 new to us restaurants- the food bucket list is getting much smaller. I would love to share some Trek photos later.
UPDATE: I was telling a friend about our low key trip and DH heard me say it was slow paced. He did not agree. LOL I think he would actually like a resort stay with a couple hours a day in a park and golf each day. Good thing he has so many other great qualities!
*** We did not use a dining plan and saved right at $200.00 . That was enough to pay tips and alcohol. This our third trip without the DDP and where we have saved a good amount of money by not using it. As you can see we still ate at really great restaurants!
This past August was the first trip that we went back to the resort each day to nap in the afternoon.
It was our first time going during the summer when the park hours are longer. We have typically go in late September when the Magic Kingdom closes at 9 PM, Hollywood studios at 8 PM, Animal Kingdom at 5 PM… Even with taking a break in the afternoon in August we still had plenty of time at night when it. Plus the parks just look awesome at night.
