Disneyluvr81
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Nov 17, 2006
- Messages
- 462
Hello everyone! For those following over from my PTR, welcome back! For any new readers, WELCOME!! I have mostly been a Disboards lurker but earlier this year I got up the courage to write my very first PTR which you can read here (Two Castles in 24 Hours...Bring it On! A Sept 2013 PTR) if you would like all the details on how this trip came to be plus a mini TR from doing the WDW Marathon in January.
If you just wanna jump right in to our big DL/WDW trip...here we go!!!
Hi there, Im Krista.
I am 32, a marketing manager for a property management firm and have lived in Southern California all of my life. Ive never lived more than 30 minutes away from Disneyland but surprisingly, we never went much growing up. The occasional trip with my parents and then a few trips in High School. It wasnt until I started dating my now amazing husband that I got my first Annual Pass (April 29th, 2006 - just one week after our first date...Disney love at first sight). Disneyland became our happy place and we have had many a Disney Date night together. We even had the amazing pleasure of being married at the Disneyland Hotel Rose Garden (my absolute dream and honestly a venue that I never thought would be in our cards) and our reception at the Grand Californian.
Although I have many favorites memories with DH of Disneyland, one of my all time favorite memories stems from when I was 9 or 10 and my Uncle was watching my DB and I for a long weekend. One of the days turned out to be a Disneyland day with one of our meals being at the old Tahitian Terrace (it was a Polynesian dinner show inside of Adventureland - for those who have been to Disneyland its where the Aladdin meet and greet is now). Well, my Uncle, no thanks to DB and I, had the pleasure of dancing up on stage in a coconut bra and hula skirt. Unluckily for us (and luckily for him) the film in the camera from that day somehow got damaged, I still call conspiracy, and we were never left with photographic evidence of his 15 minutes of fame. 20+ years later and we still razz him for it.
My favorites at Disneyland would be Space Mountain, Pirates of the Caribbean, Haunted Mansion Holiday, Small World Holiday and Radiator Springs Racers. For Disney World favorites would include Expedition Everest, Haunted Mansion, Test Track, People Mover and Tower of Terror.
My counterpart in this tale and my amazing husband of over 5 years is Brian (or B).
He is also 32 and works as a network field technician for an IT company. We grew up about 15 minutes away from each other but our paths never truly crossed until we met for our first date. One of the things I love most about him is that he is a big kid who never truly grew up. He is an avid comic book collector (especially Walking Dead, Chew and Batman), still loves Legos and of course video games (me not so much...Lego Lord of the Rings is about my speed). On our last trip in January he made the leap to pin trading for the very first time and well, is hooked and on a mission to find an orange WDW Flag cast member pin (which, still eludes him).
B's favorites at Disneyland are Space Mountain, Buzz Lightyear, Star Tours, Indy and Pirates. His favorites at Walt Disney World are the People Mover, Splash Mountain, Space Mountain, Test Track, Tower of Terror, Indy Stunt Show & Expedition Everest.
We do not have any children but do have two super cute fuzzy bunnies.
Lucky, who someone let go in my parents neighborhood when she was less than 6 months old and has been in our lives now for 4 years and Snowflake, who is our special needs shelter rescue who recently turned 3 and who has enriched our lives for almost 2 years now.
For those who haven't read the PTR, this trip was never on our radar for 2013. Over 3 year ago, I started running with my DSIL which eventually led to my first Disneyland 1/2 marathon in 2011. The draw of a special 20th Anniversary medal for the 2013 WDW Marathon gave me the courage to make the leap to training for a full marathon in 2012 (which perfectly coincided with the 1/2 training plan for the 2012 Disneyland 1/2 Marathon).
Our January trip to the World was short - we arrived midday Friday and left for home early afternoon Tuesday. The reason we were there was the Marathon, a WDW vacation in January had not been in our grand scheme of things. We barely did any park touring (before because I didnt want to overdue it and after because I was nursing blisters and a nasty heat rash...thank you Florida for the record breaking heat and humidity). But, even with the heat, I did it, I finished my very first marathon ever. Took me about an hour + longer than I had been training at because of the heat but I finished it in 6 hours, 59 minutes and 56 seconds...talk about timing!
In my darkest miles during the marathon I was done with running and never wanted to do it again (yeah, that didnt last) and decided that if I got swept or couldnt finish the marathon there would be no reason for me to run Disneyland in August because there would be no Coast to Coast medal. Our 5 year wedding anniversary was August 30th and what better way to spend it then to just take off and go back to Disney World, a repeat of our honeymoon. At some point after the marathon I told B about my negative train of thoughts and boy did it get him thinking. Suddenly talk started swirling about, well, why dont we come back in September? The guy who wasnt even sure he wanted to do a trip in December 2014 was now talking about When we come back in September. It helped that we had been given a bounce back offer of 35% off a room stay when we checked in (something we had not gotten on previous trips) and on the morning we were supposed to be leaving for home, we were now booked to come back September 2nd through the 10th at our all time favorite resort, Wilderness Lodge.
Well as the months ticked by our plan slowly evolved and we added on not only a day to our trip but a whole new resort too! No longer were we just staying at WL, we started the first 3 nights club level at the Polynesian (also got an awesome room only discount) and then the last 5 nights club level at WL, coming home on the 11th instead so we could hit up the very first MNSSHP!!!
So without further ado, lets get this trip report rolling with the first of the two castles...
If you just wanna jump right in to our big DL/WDW trip...here we go!!!
Hi there, Im Krista.
I am 32, a marketing manager for a property management firm and have lived in Southern California all of my life. Ive never lived more than 30 minutes away from Disneyland but surprisingly, we never went much growing up. The occasional trip with my parents and then a few trips in High School. It wasnt until I started dating my now amazing husband that I got my first Annual Pass (April 29th, 2006 - just one week after our first date...Disney love at first sight). Disneyland became our happy place and we have had many a Disney Date night together. We even had the amazing pleasure of being married at the Disneyland Hotel Rose Garden (my absolute dream and honestly a venue that I never thought would be in our cards) and our reception at the Grand Californian.
Although I have many favorites memories with DH of Disneyland, one of my all time favorite memories stems from when I was 9 or 10 and my Uncle was watching my DB and I for a long weekend. One of the days turned out to be a Disneyland day with one of our meals being at the old Tahitian Terrace (it was a Polynesian dinner show inside of Adventureland - for those who have been to Disneyland its where the Aladdin meet and greet is now). Well, my Uncle, no thanks to DB and I, had the pleasure of dancing up on stage in a coconut bra and hula skirt. Unluckily for us (and luckily for him) the film in the camera from that day somehow got damaged, I still call conspiracy, and we were never left with photographic evidence of his 15 minutes of fame. 20+ years later and we still razz him for it.
My favorites at Disneyland would be Space Mountain, Pirates of the Caribbean, Haunted Mansion Holiday, Small World Holiday and Radiator Springs Racers. For Disney World favorites would include Expedition Everest, Haunted Mansion, Test Track, People Mover and Tower of Terror.
My counterpart in this tale and my amazing husband of over 5 years is Brian (or B).
He is also 32 and works as a network field technician for an IT company. We grew up about 15 minutes away from each other but our paths never truly crossed until we met for our first date. One of the things I love most about him is that he is a big kid who never truly grew up. He is an avid comic book collector (especially Walking Dead, Chew and Batman), still loves Legos and of course video games (me not so much...Lego Lord of the Rings is about my speed). On our last trip in January he made the leap to pin trading for the very first time and well, is hooked and on a mission to find an orange WDW Flag cast member pin (which, still eludes him).
B's favorites at Disneyland are Space Mountain, Buzz Lightyear, Star Tours, Indy and Pirates. His favorites at Walt Disney World are the People Mover, Splash Mountain, Space Mountain, Test Track, Tower of Terror, Indy Stunt Show & Expedition Everest.
We do not have any children but do have two super cute fuzzy bunnies.
Lucky, who someone let go in my parents neighborhood when she was less than 6 months old and has been in our lives now for 4 years and Snowflake, who is our special needs shelter rescue who recently turned 3 and who has enriched our lives for almost 2 years now.
For those who haven't read the PTR, this trip was never on our radar for 2013. Over 3 year ago, I started running with my DSIL which eventually led to my first Disneyland 1/2 marathon in 2011. The draw of a special 20th Anniversary medal for the 2013 WDW Marathon gave me the courage to make the leap to training for a full marathon in 2012 (which perfectly coincided with the 1/2 training plan for the 2012 Disneyland 1/2 Marathon).
Our January trip to the World was short - we arrived midday Friday and left for home early afternoon Tuesday. The reason we were there was the Marathon, a WDW vacation in January had not been in our grand scheme of things. We barely did any park touring (before because I didnt want to overdue it and after because I was nursing blisters and a nasty heat rash...thank you Florida for the record breaking heat and humidity). But, even with the heat, I did it, I finished my very first marathon ever. Took me about an hour + longer than I had been training at because of the heat but I finished it in 6 hours, 59 minutes and 56 seconds...talk about timing!
In my darkest miles during the marathon I was done with running and never wanted to do it again (yeah, that didnt last) and decided that if I got swept or couldnt finish the marathon there would be no reason for me to run Disneyland in August because there would be no Coast to Coast medal. Our 5 year wedding anniversary was August 30th and what better way to spend it then to just take off and go back to Disney World, a repeat of our honeymoon. At some point after the marathon I told B about my negative train of thoughts and boy did it get him thinking. Suddenly talk started swirling about, well, why dont we come back in September? The guy who wasnt even sure he wanted to do a trip in December 2014 was now talking about When we come back in September. It helped that we had been given a bounce back offer of 35% off a room stay when we checked in (something we had not gotten on previous trips) and on the morning we were supposed to be leaving for home, we were now booked to come back September 2nd through the 10th at our all time favorite resort, Wilderness Lodge.
Well as the months ticked by our plan slowly evolved and we added on not only a day to our trip but a whole new resort too! No longer were we just staying at WL, we started the first 3 nights club level at the Polynesian (also got an awesome room only discount) and then the last 5 nights club level at WL, coming home on the 11th instead so we could hit up the very first MNSSHP!!!
So without further ado, lets get this trip report rolling with the first of the two castles...
Seriously it was hard to tell where the line for packet picket ended and the lines for the expo and then the official merchandise began (which no surprise, this one was the longest). I blame not taking a pictures at this point on shock and being way too hot for that early in the morning. Given the high temps, the humidity and almost all of the lines being in full sun (I hadnt even thought to sunblock for this part of the morning), I jumped in the shortest of the lines, which turned out to be for the Expo. This actually turned out to be a great decision on my part because I did have a very important goal for the Expo....
We passed the checkout line for the merchandise and it rivaled Space Mountain on a summer day. People literally ended up waiting 2+ hours just to check out! Craziness I tell you!! Wish I had gotten a picture - speaking of pictures, showing off the Dumbo pride!
Happy to have you following along!!
