Two Aussie first-timers in Disney! Lots of photos! NEW- FINAL CHAPTER! - Ch 20, Pg 30

[Andrea_loves_Disney]

Love your report so far!!!! I want more! Your pictures are great too. I am so amazed that you can go on vacation for 7 weeks!!!! That is SO awesome!! Keep it coming!!!!

 

[Scutapipig]

I'm living vicariously through your trip report! Really enjoying it!

 

[tkd lisa]

Keep writing! I'm really enjoying this. It's so neat to hear about other people's experiences.

I've spent quite a bit of time in San Diego for work, and yes there are very nice people there. I hope you enjoyed some of the excellent Mexican food in Old San Diego.

I have to say I have no desire to ever visit Vegas. I flew there once on my way to a work trip out in the California desert. I was NOT impressed.

Looking forward to the Disney part.

 

[meloneyb21]

This is great! This is the type of vacation that I can only dream of taking. I would love to do all of this at once, but I guess I wouldn't mind doing it all separately either. I know you had so much fun! I can't wait for the rest .

 

[Ciciwoowoo]

Oh, you missed the Australian show in Vegas! Thunda from Down Unda...




Ummm...

 

[dimoe]

I love your trip report !

 

[aussiedaisy]

Love your trip report so far!! I also live in Melbourne. Great to know there is another disney fan in Melbourne!! Glad you have another trip to look forward to in 2008! Happy disney planning. Where in Melbourne do you live? I am on the Mornington Peninsula.

 

[disneyaddicted]

Subscribing. I love my United States and I love to hear peoples take on it. Your trip sounds like a dream, oh my gosh, I just had the biggest feeling of jealousy sweep over me.

I am really looking forward to your Disney part of this report. Hope it's soon

Thanks for the pics, I am one of those people who love to look at vacation photos, yours were truly exciting.

 

[A fat english gent]

Hey! Thanks to all those people who have replied - it's great to know there are people actually reading my report! It's all so exciting!

A Fat English Gent... (What a name!) 7 weeks WAS a bloody jolly! I'm not quite sure what that means, but I'm sure you're right!!

A "jolly" is ryming slang for holly= HOLIDAY....sorry

Part 2… San Diego & Las Vegas

Yay, let’s keep going with the report! Cause you know what comes after Las Vegas on our trip? Disney World! Yahooooo!

So we drove from Los Angeles to San Diego in our Cruiser, which only took about 3 hours. When we got there we had to drop off our little blue Cruiser to the hire car place, since we wouldn’t be using it anymore. I was so sad to say goodbye to our cute little car!

But first we had to fill it up with gas – and we couldn’t work out how! When we did it last time, we just paid more for the garage attendant to do it. Seriously, it’s much trickier in America than Australia!! Ha! Anyway, you know what? San Diego has lots of NICE people!!

A guy in his early 20’s who was also filling up his car saw us struggling with the gas pump, so he came over and offered to help. Which was nice enough, but then when our Australian credit cards wouldn’t work in the machine on the gas pump, he offered to pay for our fuel, too!!! Augh! So nice! We wouldn’t let him, of course, but wow! What a nice guy!

And then when we eventually returned our car, we asked the nice lady in the hire car place if we could use her phone to call for a taxi, and she said, “Don’t do that! I’ll just drive you to your hotel!” So she did! She closed the hire car place, we all hopped in her car, and she drove us to our hotel! It was only 10 minutes away, but wow!! So many nice people in San Diego!!

We stayed at the DoubleTree in San Diego, which was actually really, really nice. And you know what? After 8 days of non-stop sight-seeing and driving, we were tired. Really tired. Especially after flying for 14 hours and never really resting afterward. So in San Diego, we rested!! We swam in the hotel pool, and slept in late, and drank lots of cocktails! It was really our “vacation” part of our trip.

Here’s me sipping a late-night ‘Grasshopper’ cocktail by the poolside firepits! Nice!

We did go into the centre of San Diego a couple of times, but really just to shop and eat at restaurants. Looking back, we kinda feel bad that we didn’t actually see much of San Diego (not even a beach!), but at the time, we were exhausted and needed to relax and chill for a bit! (And also, when we went shopping one day, a scary man approached me and asked if I had any crack. Ummm. No.)

We did go to SeaWorld for a day though, which I loved. I’m a sucker for SeaWorld!! I love water rides and all the cool animal shows! It was DF’s birthday that day, so we booked a table to “Dine with Shamu”, the killer whale. We had a delicious buffet lunch next to Shamu’s big tank, and watched her do some tricks. It was actually very cool!

Here’s Shamu dining on her buffet lunch… Hmmm, delicious!

So after 4 nights in San Diego, we flew to… Las Vegas!!

We stayed at the Monte Carlo, one of the big hotels on The Strip. It was fancy from the outside, but not so much on the inside. Which is a good way to describe Vegas in general actually!

Let’s just say, I wasn’t a huge fan of Las Vegas. Although it didn’t help that when we were there, it was the long weekend and it was absolutely PACKED. Plus, to quote Elaine from Seinfeld, “The HEAT! My GOD, the HEAT!!” Because ooooohhhhhhh, wow. It was hot. It reached about 112 degrees F when we were there, but it felt even hotter. There’s no shade in Vegas. Only a zillion other sweaty, smelly, drunken bodies walking along next to you. And the only escape is into one of the casinos, which I’m really not into. Aye, aye, aye!

Or, you could go to my favourite place in Vegas – the M&M store!! Now that was cool!

One night in Vegas we went out for a nice meal at a nice restaurant, and DF ate some nice steak, and later that night, DF threw up that nice steak into our nice toilet. All night. Poor guy!! He had some serious food poisoning. So as you can tell, we just didn’t have the best run in Vegas!

While there, we went on a day tour to the Grand Canyon via a tiny airplane, which was pretty cool. Although all the lookouts we went to looked pretty much like this…

I mean, I know it’s really just a big hole, but I thought we might see some different scenery. Heee. Oh well. It’s nice to say we’ve “been to the Grand Canyon!”

You know what else didn’t help me enjoy Vegas? Knowing that we were only DAYS away from Disney!! I really just wanted to leave Vegas and fly to Disney World already!!

The night before we left Vegas, DF had a happy surprise… He won $240 on the slot machines! Yayyyyyy! So Vegas wasn’t so bad after all!!

No, I shouldn’t say that. It really wasn’t terrible. It was just really hot and really crowded. We had some fun times – like lounging around the pool, and playing in the M&M store, and walking around some of the themed casinos…

And you know what comes next?!!! Yep! DISNEY WORLD!!!! Yayyyyyy!

Up next… “AUGH!! I can’t believe we’re actually here!!”

If the wall your BF sat on is at a bar ive sat on the that very wall but saw nothing because the hole was full of cotton wool....

 

[AussieAngel]

Heya, all you nice people reading my trippie!!

ILMICKEY... I'm definitely enjoying reliving our trip! I love writing, and I loved our trip, so it's lots of fun writing this trip report!! I'm excited about writing the Disney parts of it too - after all, that's why we're all here! To talk about Disney!

MA Pigletfan... You hit the nail right on the head! Vegas WAS an experience, but one I'm not really likely to do again! Hee!

wee-haggis... (Love your name, by the way!) Where did you live while you were in Australia?! We visited Toronto while we were in Canada, and loved it, although it was a bit chilly! Thanks for dropping by!!

Luv2Trav... I didn't get the Vegas vibe either! I guess lots of people love it. DF liked it more than I did. Maybe it's a boy thing!!

NMAmy... A light tan Cruiser!! Nice!! My maroon car is always filthy, so I totally understand about the car washing laziness! I laughed at your comment about people in San Diego either being nice, or crackheads! Hee!

Marion... I know! We're very bad not going to the San Diego Zoo. It was on our "To Do" list, but we were just too tired! Plus, DF said, "You've seen one elephant, you've seen em all!" Boooo!

ben's disneymom... Sounds like we've been to lots of the same places! You'll have to check out San Diego soon - and go to the Zoo, just for Marion, okay!!? Have a fantastic time at Disney in July! I'm so jealous!!

Andrea loves Disney... Thanks for stopping by, and for your nice comments!! I'll keep the report coming, don't worry! So far I've been pretty good at keeping up with my promise of writing a new chapter every couple of days!!

Scutapipig... Feel free to live vicariously!! Why not!? Heee!!

tkd lisa... Sad news - we didn't even go to Old San Diego!! I love Mexican food, so it sounds like we missed out! Poo! Glad you're enjoying the report though!

meloneyb21... Thanks for your nice comments! Visiting the cities seperately might be a good idea - at least then you might get to spend longer at each place!! We spent 3 or 4 nights in each city. We saw a lot, but in each city there was SO much more that we wanted to do, but just didn't have the time! Except for Vegas, maybe. Heee.

Ciciwoowoo... Thunda from Down Unda! Haaa!! We saw lots of ads for it while we were in Vegas, but... darn it, we just didn't have the time! Heee. Actually we did, but ew.

dimoe... Thanks for stopping by and leaving such a happy little note!!

aussiedaisy... Wow!! Another Melbournian!! How exciting! My father lives on the Morninton Peninsula! I live in Camberwell. What a small world! I see you're heading to Disney in just over a month - how exciting!

disneyaddicted... Glad you're enjoying my trippie and the photos! I love looking at other people's holiday photos too!!

A fat english gent... Thanks for the explanation of "jolly"!! It reminds me of Bert in Mary Poppins singing, "It's a jolly holiday with Mary..." Hee! As for my DF sitting on a hole at a bar filled with cotton wool... Ummm... I'm afraid I'm a little bamboozled again!! He's sitting on a wall at the Grand Canyon! That would have to be some BIG cotton wool to fill that hole up!! Hehee!

Anyway, thanks again to everybody for reading and replying to my trip report!!

It's 2am here in Australia, so I'd better head to bed! But I'll post the next instalment tomorrow. And it's an exciting one, cause we arrive at DISNEY! Yahoooo!

 

[A fat english gent]

We did a Grand Canyon tour and we stopped at some some bar which over looked the Canyon but because the weather was rubbish we saw NOTHING not a dam thing.....All that way to see NOTHING...

PS...I loved Vegas BUT a day was enough for me and the thought of staying longer than that

 

[AussieAngel]

Chapter 3… We’re going to Disney TODAY!!

Well, the big day was FINALLY here!! It was Tuesday, September 5th, and you know what that means?! DISNEY WORLD!! Auuuhhhhhhhhh!!!! Not only did we get to leave Las Vegas, but we got to fly to Disney World! Yaaaaay!

Our flight leaving Las Vegas (hey, that would be a good name for a movie….) was at 7.05am. Oh, dear. Did I mention I’m not a morning person? I’m really not a morning person. I’m a late night person. We didn’t get to bed until around midnight the night before, since we were packing our suitcases and watching X-Files marathons on cable. You know, all those important things.

But alas, the alarm rang at 4.20am. Nasty!! Even though we were going to Disney, I still rolled over and grumbled. Because I hate mornings. And that wasn’t even morning. That was the middle of the night. And we only just went to bed!!

Nevertheless, we rolled out of bed, threw some clothes on, and checked out of the Monte Carlo hotel. Yippee!! We caught a taxi to the Vegas airport, checked in, and waited in the security line. And waited. And waited. And waited. Oh, DEAR!! We were 2 hours early, getting to the airport, and you know what? We waited in that security line for an hour and a half. It was MASSIVE. After FINALLY getting through security, we ran to our gate, where they were already boarding people. Woah, nelly! To say I was stressing out was an understatement. I was PANICING. I just wanted to scream at the top of my lungs, “Hurry it along people, we’re going to Disney World!!”

We finally boarded our plane with 7 minutes to spare. Crikeys! I don’t know if the security lines are always that bad in Vegas, or if it was just because of the new “No Liquids” rule, or if it was because of the end of the long weekend… probably a mixture of all three. But whatever! We made our plane! Yay!

So the rest of the flight was pretty uneventful, really. We watched bad tv, read lots of PassPorter info for the 892nd time, and listened to my ipod. It took a long time though! We left Vegas at 7.05am, and arrived in Orlando at 4.17pm. Minus the 3 hour time difference, that’s a 6 hour flight. Booo! We had to stop in Dallas for an hour, and watched a mother change her 2 year old’s diaper in the middle of the airport waiting lounge. Nice.

But guess what!? We made it to Orlando!! I couldn’t get the smile off my face, and neither could DF!! He pretended he was sensible and wasn’t excited to be going to Disney World, but secretly, he was just as excited as me. Heee.

Finding Magical Express was a bit of a blur. We just followed a couple of signs, and all of a sudden, there we were! Nobody at all was in the Magical Express check-in line, so we walked straight up, checked in, and were sent to a bus! All very smooth and hassle-free!

Here we are on the Magical Express! Silly grins and all!!

By the way, DF hadn’t shaved in a while. Apparently it’s a vacation thing.

After waiting for a few more people to join our bus, we were off! We’d strategically placed ourselves just behind a little tv, since I’d heard about the ME Disney video. We had a perfect view of the video, which was very cute and fun, except… I couldn’t stop looking out the window! Florida is SO GREEN!! Not just any green, it’s BRIGHT green!! It’s amazing!

Australia is, in case you weren’t aware, in the middle of a massive drought. Areas which were once green in Australia are now brown and dead. We had huge water restrictions, and if it doesn’t rain here in Melbourne soon, we won’t be able to water our gardens at all. Already, we can’t wash our cars, or top up swimming pools, or use watering systems. People are learning to put buckets in their showers, and to use that caught water on their gardens. Anyway, things are grim and things are brown. And Orlando? WOW. I’ve seriously never seen such a bright green before. We were amazed, to say the least! Gorgeous!

Before too long, we entered the world of Disney! Actually, I think that’s what our driver said. She had a really thick accent and was really hard to understand, but I think that was the gist of it! Guess where the bus’s first stop was? Yep, Pop Century!

Things just ran so smoothly for us that day! Like clockwork! We thanked our driver, who said, “Thwertyjick suetyawaj!” back to us. We smiled and nodded.

We walked straight into the Pop lobby, and walked straight up to the desk – no lines again! We were checked in very quickly, and were given our 468 page packet of brochures and info. Once again, we thanked our lucky stars for stumbling across the DIS boards before coming to Disney. Seriously, if it wasn’t for DIS, we would have had to sit down and actually read those brochures! We would have been all, “Oh! There’s different parks! And whoops, we were meant to book restaurants a long time ago!” Hee! Thanks DIS!

So when we made our reservations, we’d requested a preferred room, with a King bed, on a higher floor. We were given room 4209. which was in a great location, in the 60’s building, on the second floor, overlooking the pool and very close to the lobby and food court. It wasn’t a king room, or a higher floor, but oh well! We were here! In Disney World! We so didn’t care which floor we were on!! Heee!

We made it to our room, and had a little look around. There wasn’t that much to look at, really! Just a pretty standard room. Except that the beds seemed even tinier than normal double beds. Heee. That might be a problem later. We flicked through the tv channels, and met Stacie for the first time. Whoa, boy. She really needs to calm down a little bit.

So our original plan that day was to just relax. Swim, have something to eat at Pop, and have an early night. Because, after all, we’d only slept for 4 hours and had a very early flight. But… we were in Disney World!! Who wants to just sit in their hotel room!? Not us!!

So we went for an explore around Pop Century, and took lots of photos. What can I say about Pop? Well, it’s bright. VERY bright. One wouldn’t want to have a large hangover while walking around the buildings, that’s for sure. There are also LOTS of kids. I mean, lots. I know it’s Disney, so there’s always going to be lots of kids, but I didn’t quite imagine that many crazy kids running around the steps and the food court and the pool and… everywhere! I’m a school teacher – I teach 5 and 6 year olds this year – so I find it really, really difficult to not say, “Hey! Slow down a little bit!” or “Stop! Freeze! Go back to where you can from, and WALK this time!” Anyway. I like kids, I’m just sayin’. Heee.

Here’s some Pop photos…

We liked Pop. We did. It was fun and bright and very Disney. It just wasn’t the most relaxing place on earth. We chose Pop because we were already spending so much money on our 7 week vacation, that we just couldn’t justify staying at one of the more expensive hotels. Especially because we’d hardly be at the hotel, anyway. But next time? Next time we’re definitely staying somewhere a bit more relaxing, like Wilderness Lodge or the Polynesian. But Pop was fun though!

So, we’d explored Pop. It was still only around 6.30pm. And Magic Kingdom was open until 9pm. We were tired, but we were pumped. We wanted to keep going! We wanted to see some Disney! So… Magic Kingdom it was!!

Up next… Our first ever Magic Kingdom adventure!!

PS. Before I go, I have a little question for you all to ponder! I’ve already done a dining report. With photos and detailed reviews of everywhere we ate. So my question is… Should I put my dining photos in this report too, with a brief description as we go? Or should I leave you to go and explore my other thread? What do you reckon!? Let me know!! Thanks!!

 

[meloneyb21]

OOOOOOOh, please add the dining report here! I would love to read it right away and not search for it. It would fit right in with the trip report .

 

[A fat english gent]

Keep it coming your doing a fine job....

 

[caralyn817]

I say, add the dining report with this one. I love your report so far.

 

[lisaj]

Aussieangel, I have already read the dining report but I say add it here. One of the best dining reviews I have seen on disboards and I can't wait for the rest of your trip report.

 

[ben's disneymom]

I am also for adding the dining report. I am fairly new at this and don't know if I could find it.

 

[Marion]

It's your call I read your dining report already too... if it's easier for you, you could always just add a direct link to that report from here?

PS... you're in Disney! Yay! Can't wait to read more!

 

[puffinp51]

Loving your trip report! What a great adventure so far . . . . can't wait for more. I agree with you about Las Vegas. For me it's fun for about, hmmmm, 18 hours or so, on my way to someplace else. Love the slots! And then it's time to move on . . . . and you got to move on to Disney!

Waiting for your next installment! And I'd love to see pictures of food.

 

[MissDisney121]

I am totally loving your trip report. I would love to go on an adventure like you guys did. It must have just been the most amazing time.