I just returned from a wonderful honeymoon and a fun trip to Disney World. I decided not to do a day by day report because I can't even begin to remember exactly where I was and what I did every day! Instead I will report on some of the things we did and the highlights and lowlights of the parks on this trip.
We arrived at the Caribbean Beach resort at 7:30 a.m. on Sunday morning. I had them make a note on my reservation that it was our honeymoon and the specific preferences we requested and I also faxed my requests 5 days before. I figured that if we checked in early we would probably get what we requested and boy was I WRONG. I requested Aruba near the bridge and they put us in Trinidad North in section 33(the furtherest from the food court). When I told the CM that I had requested Aruba he replied that no request is gauranteed. I then asked if we might be able to be switched since we were checking in so early and we didn't care how long it took to get into the room. Well, he just gave me an agitated look and said that he couldn't. I knew that it was possible to be switched because I have always checked in early and they have always been able to accomodate building requests. Also there were hardly any cars in any of the parking lots when we checked in so I knew that they weren't full to capacity yet. But since it was our honeymoon I decided not to argue and start the trip off on a bad note. BTW, the room was refurbished and was really pretty. The lake in the middle was about 5 feet low due to the drought and I didn't see many boats running except in one small corner of the lake. All of the fountains at CBR were turned off and had large signs on them that said due to the drought they weren't running them in order to conserve water. The only days that I could smell smoke were the 10th and 11th and it was really bad in the morning and at night but after that we didn't smell it for the rest of the trip. It rained really hard last Thursday for about an hour so that really helped to cool things off but we didn't have any rain for the rest of the trip.
Magic Kingdom looked great aside from the big wall up on Main Street for the Emporium refurbishment. Overall the park was being kept up and everything was fairly clean. I did note that Carrousel of progress was only open from 10 to 5, Hall of Presidents was only open from 10 to 6, Timekeeper was closed and there was no character greeting area in its place like I had heard earlier, Main Street bake shop and the Ice Cream Parlor were closed, El Pirita Y El Perico counter service was closed and a couple of the stands in Fantasyland were closed.
MGM had a lot of walls up everywhere we looked with signs saying "This area is being refurbished for your future enjoyment" The hat infront of Manns Chinese theatre looked hideous IMHO-I just can't believe that they couldn't find a better place for it. We did WWTBAM PLay it! and it was really fun. We also saw Fantasmic and it was a good show but not anything I would wait more than an hour for.
Epcot also had quite a few walls up in different areas being refurbished. I went to the Living Seas one evening around 7:30 pm and was shocked to see a sign saying that it closed promptly at 7:00. We ended up going back to Epcot a few days later to do it before 7. The World Showcase was beautiful and we went through every country. I noticed that the Maelstrom was closed the day we went to Norway.
Animal Kingdom was better than I remembered it in the past. We did the Safari ride first thing in the morning and all of the animals were out and roaming around. Asia didn't open until 9 or 10 (?) and I noticed a large crowd of people waiting at the entrance to Asia. When we walked by Kali River Rapids the wait was only 10 minutes (I was shocked) we didn't go on it though because we rode it in April and didn't really like it.
General observations: lines were not really long at any of the parks. We used Fast Pass a great deal and because so many attractions have FP now the FP lines were really short because people were holding FP for other attractions. EE mornings were great, we were able to do several attractions without FP with little to no wait.
We did 2 E-nights when we were there and had basically no wait to get on rides. Big Thunder Mtn. was the only ride that they let us stay on without having to get off- all of the other rides made us get off and walk back around.
We were able to ride in front of the monorail by asking a very nice CM-thanks for the tip DISers.
We met a few nice CMs while we were there but suprisingly I noticed quite a few CMs who were agitated and yelling at people-something I have never seen before.
The are getting a little lax with the dress code. I can't begin to count the number of men I saw with no shirts on and women with small bikini tops on. I also saw several children with no shoes on running around Frontierland. I know that it was hot but they were not in a waterpark and I sure didn't want to spend my time standing in line behind a sweaty shirtless man.
I also saw several parents forcing hysterical children onto rides, only once did it really alarm me. We were waiting to get on Splash Mtn. and there was a foreign family infront of me with a father, mother and a little boy who looked to be around 4 yrs. old. I could tell that they were trying to convince him to get in the log and he kept screaming no and shaking his head. The father picked him up and carried him into the log as he was crying and sat him on his lap. The CMs at SM were watching the whole time and all they said to him was, "Sir he can't sit on your lap he has to be on the seat." The man attempted move the little boy from his lap to the seat and they boy screamed and clung onto him. The CM repeated to the man that the little boy had to sit on the seat and the man literally pried the child off of him and used his right hand to hold the boy down on the seat. The worst part is the CMs let the boat go and of course the man put the child back in his lap. On the bright side I also saw many more families with young children having a great time.
I will do a dining report on the restaraunt board and if anyone has any questions please feel free to ask.
P.S.- Almost forgot, we saw La Nouba and it was absolutely wonderful!!! I would highly recommend it
We arrived at the Caribbean Beach resort at 7:30 a.m. on Sunday morning. I had them make a note on my reservation that it was our honeymoon and the specific preferences we requested and I also faxed my requests 5 days before. I figured that if we checked in early we would probably get what we requested and boy was I WRONG. I requested Aruba near the bridge and they put us in Trinidad North in section 33(the furtherest from the food court). When I told the CM that I had requested Aruba he replied that no request is gauranteed. I then asked if we might be able to be switched since we were checking in so early and we didn't care how long it took to get into the room. Well, he just gave me an agitated look and said that he couldn't. I knew that it was possible to be switched because I have always checked in early and they have always been able to accomodate building requests. Also there were hardly any cars in any of the parking lots when we checked in so I knew that they weren't full to capacity yet. But since it was our honeymoon I decided not to argue and start the trip off on a bad note. BTW, the room was refurbished and was really pretty. The lake in the middle was about 5 feet low due to the drought and I didn't see many boats running except in one small corner of the lake. All of the fountains at CBR were turned off and had large signs on them that said due to the drought they weren't running them in order to conserve water. The only days that I could smell smoke were the 10th and 11th and it was really bad in the morning and at night but after that we didn't smell it for the rest of the trip. It rained really hard last Thursday for about an hour so that really helped to cool things off but we didn't have any rain for the rest of the trip.
Magic Kingdom looked great aside from the big wall up on Main Street for the Emporium refurbishment. Overall the park was being kept up and everything was fairly clean. I did note that Carrousel of progress was only open from 10 to 5, Hall of Presidents was only open from 10 to 6, Timekeeper was closed and there was no character greeting area in its place like I had heard earlier, Main Street bake shop and the Ice Cream Parlor were closed, El Pirita Y El Perico counter service was closed and a couple of the stands in Fantasyland were closed.
MGM had a lot of walls up everywhere we looked with signs saying "This area is being refurbished for your future enjoyment" The hat infront of Manns Chinese theatre looked hideous IMHO-I just can't believe that they couldn't find a better place for it. We did WWTBAM PLay it! and it was really fun. We also saw Fantasmic and it was a good show but not anything I would wait more than an hour for.
Epcot also had quite a few walls up in different areas being refurbished. I went to the Living Seas one evening around 7:30 pm and was shocked to see a sign saying that it closed promptly at 7:00. We ended up going back to Epcot a few days later to do it before 7. The World Showcase was beautiful and we went through every country. I noticed that the Maelstrom was closed the day we went to Norway.
Animal Kingdom was better than I remembered it in the past. We did the Safari ride first thing in the morning and all of the animals were out and roaming around. Asia didn't open until 9 or 10 (?) and I noticed a large crowd of people waiting at the entrance to Asia. When we walked by Kali River Rapids the wait was only 10 minutes (I was shocked) we didn't go on it though because we rode it in April and didn't really like it.
General observations: lines were not really long at any of the parks. We used Fast Pass a great deal and because so many attractions have FP now the FP lines were really short because people were holding FP for other attractions. EE mornings were great, we were able to do several attractions without FP with little to no wait.
We did 2 E-nights when we were there and had basically no wait to get on rides. Big Thunder Mtn. was the only ride that they let us stay on without having to get off- all of the other rides made us get off and walk back around.
We were able to ride in front of the monorail by asking a very nice CM-thanks for the tip DISers.
We met a few nice CMs while we were there but suprisingly I noticed quite a few CMs who were agitated and yelling at people-something I have never seen before.
The are getting a little lax with the dress code. I can't begin to count the number of men I saw with no shirts on and women with small bikini tops on. I also saw several children with no shoes on running around Frontierland. I know that it was hot but they were not in a waterpark and I sure didn't want to spend my time standing in line behind a sweaty shirtless man.
I also saw several parents forcing hysterical children onto rides, only once did it really alarm me. We were waiting to get on Splash Mtn. and there was a foreign family infront of me with a father, mother and a little boy who looked to be around 4 yrs. old. I could tell that they were trying to convince him to get in the log and he kept screaming no and shaking his head. The father picked him up and carried him into the log as he was crying and sat him on his lap. The CMs at SM were watching the whole time and all they said to him was, "Sir he can't sit on your lap he has to be on the seat." The man attempted move the little boy from his lap to the seat and they boy screamed and clung onto him. The CM repeated to the man that the little boy had to sit on the seat and the man literally pried the child off of him and used his right hand to hold the boy down on the seat. The worst part is the CMs let the boat go and of course the man put the child back in his lap. On the bright side I also saw many more families with young children having a great time.
I will do a dining report on the restaraunt board and if anyone has any questions please feel free to ask.
P.S.- Almost forgot, we saw La Nouba and it was absolutely wonderful!!! I would highly recommend it
