We're not on the plane yet..our July WL family trip report-NEW Day 8-8/7

[lindamomof3]

I am really enjoying your trip report- My girls are almost 5, 3, and 2. I am getting some great ideas for our next trip!

linda

 

[TylerAggie]

I have really enjoyed reading about your trip. My family will be staying at Wilderness Lodge next June for my son's 3rd birthday along with my husband and 6-year old daughter. None of us have ever been to Disney World and your trip sounds exactly like what I am trying to plan. Can't wait to hear more.

 

[Figment56]

Vassar, I have greatly enjoyed your reports! We will be leaving for WDW in about 3 weeks and we will be staying at the VWL. We have been going to WDW for many years ourselves. I also am from MA! My DD was 6 when she first went. She is now 18! Boy, does the time fly! I am very wistful when I read about your reports and your 2 beautiful DD's because I remember my DD's eyes and expressions when she was younger and I wish she still was that sweet, innocent little girl again. She is leaving for college in the fall and my heart is breaking. This may be our last "family" trip together but I have many, many good memories of our times at WDW and I know you will too!

 

[IluvXU]

I just found your report and love it... I have two girls and we are headed to the WL. Thanks for sharing so much- and I want that yummy cookie/ice cream snack!

We are eating at LeCellier and Grand Floridian Cafe and Norway too! Princess crazy I guess!

 

[Lifelong_Dreamer]

I am really enjoying your report! You have such a nice family and the girls are adorable especially with their princess tiaras. I can't wait to hear about the rest of your trip especially now that the grandparents have arrived.

 

[vassar36]

Day 6: AK day/ Artist Point Dinner



This morning the wake up call is scheduled to come at 7:00am. The plan is for us to get dressed, get breakfast in the room and be at the bus stop by 7:45am to make sure and get the 1st bus to AK. Grammy and Papa, need to meet us later b/c they are having and electric wheelchair delivered to the room at 9:30am. The plan is that they will meet us at AK after that later in the morning.

So usually Daphnie is the toughest to get up and the crankiest in the morning, I think we are in for it when she hits the teenage years!!! Already this trip I have had to threaten her that I would call a babysitter to sit in the room with her while the rest of us go out to the parks if she doesn’t get up.

So she wakes up before the wake up call and tells me she has to go to the bathroom, so we go, because it is dark and she is scared. When we get back in bed, I whisper that we are going to see elephants today, and now she wants to get up and get dressed!!! Well it was only about 5 minutes before our scheduled wake up call, and I know that if she falls back asleep it will be hard to get her up, so we jump out of bed and get dressed, while Scott and Cassie (the natural morning people) are still sleeping.

Cassie wakes up too and is upset she isn’t the 1st person awake, but soon gets over it. Scott jumps in the shower and I answer the wake up call. I get the kids dressed and breakfast ready. After Scott get out of the shower he goes down to participate in the coffee parade. But by the time he gets back it is time to go, so we take our coffee to go and head on down to the bus stop.

We catch the 1st bus to AK and things seem to be going right on schedule today.

We arrive at AK at about 8:30. There is already a long line at the turnstiles waiting o go in to the park and it is HOT. We hear it is going to be over a 100 degrees with the heat index factored in!!!!!!!!

We follow TGM’s advice on getting into the park and it works like a charm!! Cassie has to go to the bathroom before the open the turnstlyes open and so we split up and Scott and I plan on meeting at the Tree of Life where they let you go up to until the rope drops. So we meet up but it is VERY crowded!! The opening ceremony was cute below is a picture, you can see Minnie mouse on the bottom right hand side…

After they drop the rope we walk quickly to Safari, and I get FP’s and then we go in the stand-by line. We are not big thrill ride people yet, so the other “biggie rides” don’t interest us right now. Maybe in a few years we will be making the Everest dash, but now, we are all about the safari.

Last year we were at the AK early b/c we did the early Donald’s breakfast, & right after the park opened we went on the Primeval whirl and then the Safari last year, and the Safari was GREAT, we saw so many animals, my mom said it was the best she had ever seen, so we chalked it up to catching the safari early in the morning..we figured that is why we saw so many animals…so this year we thought we see the 1st Safari of the day and that would ensure us seeing the most animals, at least that is what we were banking on this year.

Ok so we go on one of the 1st Safari rides out and we see some animals not a lot…Daphnie really wants to see some elephants, we see one, (at least we saw that we figure).

So it was good, but a bit disappointing because our expectations were high.
After the Safari we head over to see the Tigers in Asia b/c we didn’t even make it over to the Asia side of the park last year. as we walked to Asia we see this bench. I love the details in Disney and especially in AK, the details are one of the things that separates Disney from every other park…

On the way to Asia we also pass a cool water fountain so the kids HAVE to touch it right??

We get to the entrance of the Maharajah Jungle Trek Jungle trek and let me tell you if you haven’t one here, you should it is beautiful!!!!!!

We walk around and you really feel like you are not in central FL but in an exotic country in Asia… the ambience is incredible!!! We are on a TIGER missions and then we look and see them:

We have never been so close to the tigers before, it was great!!!

We keep on going down the path and it is really unique I must say. There a lot of great details to look at and Cassie spots a hidden Mickey in one of the carvings.

So now we nearing the end of the jungle path and we decide we can catch the 10:40 Lion King Show, for our big lion ling fan! We head back to Africa on our way to the Lion King Show and I grab some more FP for my mom and step day, so we can all FP Safari when they meet us.

We wait in line for the lion king show and end up being behind a big tour group, but we get good seats anyway, that place holds a lot of people!!! (And it’s air conditioned inside, which is KEY!)

We have never seen the show and we heard it was great, and it did not disappoint, it was TERRIFIC!!! Also it was refreshing, sitting, in the A/C when it was so hot outside and it was a revitalizing break and gave us a bit more energy to keep going.

After the show, we were hungry, so we plan to meet Grammy(my mom) and Papa(Irwin) at the Tusker House for lunch. But the kids were cranky and fought over who was taking up too much room in the stroller, who was touching who, who didn’t say the word “Please” when they asked the other one to move the map etc…. So needless to say the kids had a total meltdown as we are walking to lunch. Scott and I are hot and tried, just like the kids, but we find a table in Tusker house and I sit down with the kids and Scott goes to call Grammy and Papa to tell them where we are seated because it is a BIG place, and Irwin and my mom are VERY slow to get places now. I sit down with the kids who are still seconds away from a potential meltdown and they both have tears in their eyes and are sniffling, and I am aggravated too. Scott goes and orders lunch and I can tell the kids are ready to go back to the hotel, (ya think??) but hope after lunch they will be bit better. I feel bad b/c my mom and Irwin just got to AK and are here to see us and the kids, and the kids need to go back to the hotel, so now I am caught in the struggle of being a good daughter or being a good mom…

Grammy and Papa come and join us at the table, My mom has a hard time getting her chair maneuvered to our table, but eventually she parks it near the table and walks the rest of the way The food here was good and different than the usual counter service, so if you want a change of pace it is a great place to go.

After lunch, we decide to go on the Safari using the FP after lunch and then we will go back to the hotel, while Grammy and Papa will stay at the AK for a bit longer. Scott and I “bribe” the kids with the promise of ice cream after the Safari if they behave until then.

So we go on the safari using out FP’s b/c the stand by wait by now is over an hour. When you get to the front of the line, the put you into a different loading dock when you are with someone who is in a wheelchair. I wasn’t even aware of this when we went on the regular loading dock. They wait until they have a full truck of people and their parties in this special dock and then they load the truck, and you are off. This time, on the safari we see more animals than earlier in the day!!!! YIPPEE

This time we see lots of elephants and giraffe’s and lots of other animals.

Grammy & Papa on the Safari

After the safari it is CROWDED and HOT in Africa and we are all very tired.
Here is Africa after we left the Safari:

We get the kids some ice cream and leave the park. Grammy & Papa stay to explore the park some more.

At the hotel when we return we find this: (Grammy bought the kids the Cinderella doll yesterday)

As usual, Cassie and daddy go swimming in the pool and Daphnie and I nap in the room. Later Scott and Cassie return to the room and nap too.

Tonight the plan is that Grammy and Papa are going to watch the girls while Scott and I go out for our romantic dinner.

Dinner time comes and we walk the kids down to the Roaring Forls and meet Grammy & Papa and bid goodnight to the kids. Scott & I head to Artist Point.

We are seated right way in the middle of the restaurant. Our waiter was nice and gave his suggestion to what we should order. We paid OPP for this dinner and went with the fixed price menu. Scott went with the salmon and salad, and I went with the Grilled Beef Tenderloin. We each ordered a glass point gris for our apps and red point noir wine for the entrée. For dessert we ordered the Berry Cobbler and the Coffee Two Ways: Mochaccino Bread Pudding and Vanilla Latte Creme Brulee.

Scott read that there was 2 hidden Mickey’s in the restaurant and we asked the waiter for a hint and they were very HARD to find, in the end one of the waiters had to point it out to both of us and it was still very hard to find.

We had very high expectation for this meal, and the main entrees were both good, but not the best we have ever had. However, the Berry Cobbler was AWESOME!!!
Overall it was nice and we are glad we went there but we probably will not go back, unless we can just get the dessert!!

After dinner it was lightly raining, so we went and sat on one of the rockers on the 4th floor overlooking the beautiful lobby. It was nice and romantic …When It stopped raining we went outside by the dock and watched the light parade on the water, which was also romantic. After that we sat some more in the lobby and then reluctantly went back to the room.

To our surprise the kids were still up, so we all watched the fireworks from the room.
We put the kids to bed and got ready for yet another rope drop at Epcot.

Up NEXT: Epcot rope drop, the world showcase tour, and dinner at the Coral Reef.

 

[scottny]

Sounds like a nice time once you got back to the hotel. the heat does affect everyone, especially the little ones. You certainly saw more than us on the safari and nice pics.
Nice update.

 

[anne60]

Thanks for the report - I've always wondered about the campfire, and the pictures were great!! Your daughters are adorable, what great smiles!!

 

[Tinkerbellgal]

I have just found you'r trip report and I love it! You'r girls are so pretty and I love the mathing pink outfits they had at AK! The picture of you'r girls with Cinderella and PC is luvly! We have done 1900 Parc Fair our selves and we loved it and playing to do it this year! =] Anyway keep writing and I can't wait for the next one! =D
Sarah xxx

 

[stepdisney]

Oh no, it's over but wait....you're not on the plane yet!! This is a very good trip report. You sound a lot like me and your DH sounds like mine. He told me to promise no "commando" this trip but I bet when the weather heats up he'll go running for the fast passes.

Quick question. How accurate is TGM? I'm considering membership but I hear mixed reviews. Sounds like you planned your trip using his methods.

 

[vassar36]

Day 7: Friday July 20- Epcot day & Coral Reef Dinner


Yet another Rope Drop day planned, but this time with Grammy & Irwin joining us...

At 8:05am we meet Grammy and Irwin at the elevators. The kids have already been up and eaten breakfast in the room. On the way to the bus stop, I stop in Roaring Forks and fill up our coffee mugs and we take them with us to the bus stop.

We wait about 5 minutes and the bus pulls up. Yesterday Grammy had a hard time backing up her electric wheelchair to the part of the bus where they lift up the chair, she got embarrassed about it and refuses to “drive” the wheelchair again. To Grammy’s credit, she has never been in an electric wheelchair before now, and isn’t a great driver anyway (shh… don’t tell Grammy that). So when the bus pulls up, she gets out of the chair and Scott helps her on the bus, Papa Irwin gets in the chair and backs that thing up!!

We get on the bus and we are still making good time. Cassie says she is sad because this is our last day at Epcot and soon we will be going home, so we tell her the mantra again, we are not on the plane yet, so enjoy this time today, Cassie smiles and her mood lightens up.

We stop at Ft Wilderness again, but this time no trouble with the gate..we go right onto Epcot. We make good time and are at Epcot before rope drop.

They were doing construction on space ship earth when we were there so you can see the crane I think near the ball.

Scott and I argue over which line is shorter vs. shadier to stand in while we wait for them to open the turnstiles, finally we stand on a shortest line with a bit of shade on this hot July morning. We go over the “plan” for the morning. I hand Scott my notecards and tell him to review TGM’s tips about the Soarin stampede. I actually make him read the card, then I tell everyone once we all get in give Scott your tickets to he can go get our Soarin’ FP’s. I tell Scott he is a “dead man” if he loses the notecards and or the tickets. Scott looks a bit apprehensive.

Our plan is once the rope drops Scott goes and gets FP for Soarin while the rest of us get the stroller and head over to the Character Connection to get some pictures and autographs with the Characters with little to no lines. Then onto Imaginations and then Soarin’ with the FP and the countries to have the kids finish up getting their charms for the masks and get their “prize”.

They start letting people in and I go get the stroller, the kids hop in and we head off to the Character Connection. We are somewhat slow moving , again because of Papa and Grammy (and I am trying not to let this bother me, but it does and I take some deep breaths). We get to the Character Connection and there are only a couple of people ahead of us, I was hoping to be first but this is good too. This is a fabulous spot to get the classic characters and next time I would plan less Character meals and just go to places like these to get the Characters signature and pictures. We see Mickey Mouse, Chip and Dale, GOOFY (who we missed at Chef Mickey’s), Pluto, Chip & Dale, and Scott comes back in time for a group shot of Minnie Mouse!!! When Scott returns he hands me the FP’s tickets and my note cards right away and breaths a sigh of relief.

So now we leave the Character Connection and Papa is hungry because he did not eat breakfast yet. So I am flexible today, trying not to be too commando, (even though it goes against ever grain of my Disney being) and I say he could get something at Sunshine seasons in the Land Pavillion. So we head on over there and I see this Yummie looking strawberry shortcake, that would be delicious now but I hold out.

Papa wants to sit down and eat with Grammie, so I suggest they do that while the kids, Scott and I go on the Land ride. It is a walk on right now, and it was a nice boat ride and interesting ride.

When we get off the ride it is almost time for us to go on Soarin with our FP. We hit the bathrooms for a break and go on Soarin. This is Grammy’s and Papa’s 1st time on Soarin, so they are a little nervous, but the kids are so excited that they run ahead of us. Daphnie gets measured again and she makes the cut off, she smiles and says “I a big girl, I go on Soarin ride”. Daphnie sits on the trash can toward the end of the line que and she says “look at me Cassie, I Soarin” and Cassie answers her, “No your not, you are just sitting on a trash can”.

When we get to the boarding area, they tell us we will be in the 3rd row. Well we have been in the 2nd row and the 3rd row before, so I ask nicely if we could possibly go in the 1st row this time, since we have never been, and of course we would be willing to wait for the next “flight” to do so. The nice CM says of course, and so we do. When we load Cassie sits next to Grammy, and throughout the ride she says “Grammy look at this, Grammy look at that” so that is sweet and makes me happy. For those who haven’t been in the 1st row it is the best b/c you don’t see people’s legs that distract you when you are experiencing the ride. The kids loved it b/c they got to go up the highest of all three rows. It was an awesome ride and now Cassie’s favorite!!!

As we are leaving Soarin the kids say they want to go again so we all get FP for later on that night.

We then head on over to Imaginations. As we are walking into the ride (still a walk on) Scott realizes he left the backpack at Soarin (see why I hold all of the tickets?) so he goes back to retrieve it while Grammy, Papa and the kids and I go on Imaginations. The kids now cover their noses when they get to the smell center!!! Afterwards as we are exited, I let the kids play a bit in the play area outside the ride. The World Showcase doesn’t open till 11pm anyway, so we have some time to kill. The kids like playing here and it is hard to drag them out.

Outside daddy is waiting by the stroller and it has gotten hotter!!! We pack the kids in the stroller and we head over to the World Showcase. The kids have already gotten the charms for their masks at Canada, Mexico, China, & Germany from the other night when we were here for dinner and Illumination.

We head to the UK and a pleasant surprise is waiting for us there. Who comes SKIPPING up to Cassie but Alice from Wonderland!!!! This was the best character interaction yet! Alice skips right up to Cassie and asks her about the holes in her shoes, she is wearing crocs. She has a full conversation with Cassie and is very nice and sweet, signs their autograph book and takes a picture with the kids. This was GREAT because there was no one else around so it was really special.

Here’s a pic of Alice talking to Cassie:

Here is Alice and the girls:

After Alice we head to get their charms at the UK toy shop and then we are off to France…

France has a nice Air conditioned place where they give you the charms and the AC feels great b/c it is HOT (have I mentioned how hot it is?)

Next off Morocco, I heard that Disney actually brought in one of the kings? Representatives when they were building Morocco to make sure they built an authentic version of it. It is really a wonderful pavilion, but only problem is no AC, so you do feel like you are in the heat of Africa in the summer. The kids get their charms here too and I have planned for us to eat lunch at the CS Tangerine Café here. Let me tell you the food here is GREAT, one of the best meals of the trip, definitely a must go back to. You really get a lot here on the dinning plan and the food is fresh and good. The only drawback is that it is not air conditioned where you eat, so it was a bit hot, but beautiful.

Here is a picture of Cassie at Tangerine Café:

After lunch, Scott is cranky, I guess the heat does it to him, and so is Daphnie. Daphnie wants to go back to the hotel for a nap, but neither of us wants to take her back while the other stays and looks at the countries. Meanwhile Cassie really wants to finish the countries on her mask so she can get her “prize” at the end, and we only have Japan, America and Italy to go… So we solider on…

We walk to Japan and look at the big fish in the little pond.

The kids get their charms and we look at the cute little toys in the museum and then we move on to America. Along the way we run into a snack cart that has snow cones. The kids decide they want these for their snack, and its hot enough so we agree and they pick out the colors they like.

These snow cones dripped all over their shirts and I thought it would stain when we got home, but it didn’t. However, the snow cones put them in a better mood, so that was key. We went over to America and got the charms, met the local squirrel that hangs out in the kidcot station there and moved onto our last country, Italy. Finally we made it to Italy and the kids go their charm and their “prizes” for completing the masks. It’s a cute little picture that I think they call a poster, but it is the size of a regular sheet of 8x10 piece of paper.

Exhausted, we head toward the exit.

Here is Cassie & Papa waiting at the fountain while Scott returns the stroller. You can see the "poster" in Cassie's hands

As we are walking toward the bus, I see it at our stop in the distance, I think maybe I should “run for it” but I am way too exhausted so I don’t. We end up just missing it. We wait about 20 minutes for a new bus. While we are waiting in line Cassie asks why they load Grammy on the bus 1st, and Grammy says she doesn’t know and Cassie says is it because you are handicapped Grammy?. My mom got a little upset by this comment b/c she doesn’t see her self that way.

Finally, a bus comes. There is a big crowd behind us. They want to load the wheelchair on 1st so Irwin backs the chair up to the loading dock sorta thing and Scott helps my mom on the bus and we all go on and sit with my mom. Well there is something wrong with the thing that lifts the chair onto the bus b/c it is not working. The bus drivers keep trying and trying and and trying..all the while you hear..”beep …beep…. beep” sound as the things that lifts the chair keeps trying to go. So now they shut the bus down and then turn it on again, hoping that will help. Meanwhile, the people outside who are waiting to get on the bus are looking more annoyed by the minute. Now the bus totally shuts down and won’t even shut back on, its dead. Oh no!!!

We get off and go off to the side of the “angry mob” that is shooting us not good looks. We all stand there and feel just awful about the bus breaking thinking that its our fault. Even Scott who is often oblivious to things or blows them off feels bad. About 2 minutes after the CM radioed in the bus was “dead” a SUV screeches right up behind the dead bus and the boss CM gets out and looks at the bus. The boss CM radios HQ that they need a new bus, so about 2 minutes after that the PoP bus pulls up drops off the guests and turns into the WL & Ft Wilderness bus. We all get on again, and thankfully the wheelchair gets on without issue. When we pulled up to the bus stop at WL we were very thankful to get off the bus and to ur rooms for a nap before dinner.

We get back to our room and the dolls are arranged again. Daphnie says for me to take a picture of this so I do:

So we have a 5:20 reservation for dinner and we make it back to Epcot at 5 pm.
Here are the kids in their “fishy” dresses

I had to change this reservation about a month before we left because when I originally made the reservations for this trip my mom was in chemo & I hoped my mom would be here to join us but didn’t know for sure. I made the reservations for party of 4 instead of 6, b/c I reasoned that if mom was not with us, I didn’t want someone to keep reminding me that I was missing 2 people. So about a month before we left mom decided she was well enough to make the trip and join us, so I increased the reservation from 4 to 6. But for the coral reef that night, they could either sit all of us together at 4:30pm or 5:20pm they could seat us at 2 tables and they said they would try and put us together. So I am hoping that they can place us at a large table. We are all looking forward to this restaurant and have been talking about the tank for months. I am also hopping that they seat us close to the tank so the kids can watch it during dinner. We get there and it looks so COOL inside we are all excited!

There is good news and bad news too our seats. The good news is that we are seated all at the same table GREAT!! The bad news is that the table is in the very last row!!! The kids have a hard time seeing the fish tank, but can see the top portion of it…It is very LOUD in this restaurant, and it is hard to hear anybody talk, maybe it was because we were in the very back of the restaurant, I don’t know but it was hard to have a conversation. The food was great though and everyone liked what they got. I ordered the steak (surprised?), and it was so big I couldn’t finish it. Scott really liked his fish and Papa and Grammy liked their fish too. Everyone but me liked the desserts, I am very picky dessert eater. The kids liked looking at the shark, the divers and the giant sea turtle that swam by. Overall it was a good restaurant and for 1 TS it was a bargain and we would probably go back to this restaurant again.

After dinner we asked the kids what they wanted to do, we had FP for Malestrom and Soarin. The kids chose Soarin b/c they LOVE this ride.

The kids waiting for Soarin

So we all rode it again, and this time we were in the 3rd row. After the ride Grammy said she felt a little sick on it and won’t go on it again, but the kids still loved it. It was 7:45 after we got off of Soarin and we had an early day tomorrow, we were surprising the girls with Cinderella’s Royal Table for breakfast at 8:05am. So we decided to just go back to the hotel instead of going to Malestrom. I made sure to pick up strawberry shortcake that caught my eye earlier that morning and bring it back to the room with me. We took an uneventful bus ride back to the hotel (this time I ran for the bus when I saw it in the distance) I didn’t want to take anymore chances with the bus.

When we got back to the hotel we saw how pretty it is at night:

The we went to see the Electric Water parade again at the dock. It was really nice again and I like the fact that I can pass this memory onto my kids. When we got back to the room we had our turndown service and simba and the animals were arranged on the bed. Simba was reading a quote which said, “We must share what we have and work together”

Next Up: Magic Kingdom Day, CRT, & Wishes

 

[scottny]

Great update. The heat was bad in July. The bus thing I would not have worried about.

 

[vassar36]

I am really enjoying your trip report- My girls are almost 5, 3, and 2. I am getting some great ideas for our next trip!

linda

Thanks Linda. Wow 3 girls. have a great time on your trip!!!

I have really enjoyed reading about your trip. My family will be staying at Wilderness Lodge next June for my son's 3rd birthday along with my husband and 6-year old daughter. None of us have ever been to Disney World and your trip sounds exactly like what I am trying to plan. Can't wait to hear more.

Thanks TylerAggie .....You are going to LOVE WL & Disney!!!

I am really enjoying your report! You have such a nice family and the girls are adorable especially with their princess tiaras. I can't wait to hear about the rest of your trip especially now that the grandparents have arrived.

Thanks Lifelong_Dreamer, it was a magical trip and I am very grateful that we were able to share it with the grandparents!!!

I just found your report and love it... I have two girls and we are headed to the WL. Thanks for sharing so much- and I want that yummy cookie/ice cream snack!

IluvXU Can you bring me back that cookie ice cream snack????
Have a great time at WL!!!!!!

We are eating at LeCellier and Grand Floridian Cafe and Norway too! Princess crazy I guess!

All great places for our princesses to meet the big princesses
Have a great time!!!

Vassar, I have greatly enjoyed your reports! We will be leaving for WDW in about 3 weeks and we will be staying at the VWL. We have been going to WDW for many years ourselves. I also am from MA! My DD was 6 when she first went. She is now 18! Boy, does the time fly! I am very wistful when I read about your reports and your 2 beautiful DD's because I remember my DD's eyes and expressions when she was younger and I wish she still was that sweet, innocent little girl again. She is leaving for college in the fall and my heart is breaking. This may be our last "family" trip together but I have many, many good memories of our times at WDW and I know you will too!

Figment56: Yes it is magical to see Disney through the girls eyes, and I am treasuring this time..Have a wonderful trip you'll be there soon!!!!

Oh no, it's over but wait....you're not on the plane yet!! This is a very good trip report. You sound a lot like me and your DH sounds like mine. He told me to promise no "commando" this trip but I bet when the weather heats up he'll go running for the fast passes.

stepdisney, how can you not go comando at Disney..its like there is something in the water there

Quick question. How accurate is TGM? I'm considering membership but I hear mixed reviews. Sounds like you planned your trip using his methods.

He is pretty accurate but you will have to spend time digging and finding the information in his site, but he helped tremendously....

I have just found you'r trip report and I love it! You'r girls are so pretty and I love the mathing pink outfits they had at AK! The picture of you'r girls with Cinderella and PC is luvly! We have done 1900 Parc Fair our selves and we loved it and playing to do it this year! =] Anyway keep writing and I can't wait for the next one! =D
Sarah xxx

Thank you Tinkerbellgal!!!

Yesterday 09:03 AM

Thanks for the report - I've always wondered about the campfire, and the pictures were great!! Your daughters are adorable, what great smiles!!

anne60 Thank you, yes the campfire was fun and we thought we would try it once.......

Sounds like a nice time once you got back to the hotel. the heat does affect everyone, especially the little ones. You certainly saw more than us on the safari and nice pics.
Nice update.

Thanks scottny and thanks for reading!!!!!

Great update. The heat was bad in July. The bus thing I would not have worried about.

Hi Scott, yes it was hot, i have forgotten just how hot it gets in FL in July....

 

[vassar36]

Day 8: CRT, MK and Wishes

Last Full Day at Disney, we are all a bit sad, but then again, we are NOT ON THE PLANE YET, so….6:30am the wakeup call rings, we get up at out of bed, not with the excitement of the 1st day, but with the “final push” energy of knowing its our last full day. I get dressed head down for my last “coffee parade” of the trip. When I open the door I see the dreaded Magical Express tag on our door. I place it on the inside of the door, out of sight out of mind right???

Again we get the kids dressed and tell them that we want to make it to the MK for one last rope drop. They have no idea that we are going to CRT to eat at the castle, so Scott and I are excited to give them one last surprise.

Grammy and Papa are sitting this one out and will meet us at the park later in the morning. ….We have a 8:10am ressie at CRT, and I had to make this reservation 180 days out early on that morning. I knew about a month before when Grammy said she would come there would be no way to change this ressie so I didn’t even bother trying.

We go to the boat dock at 7am and we are the 1st people there. We look at the fish in the water, Daphnie says which ones are the mommy, daddy, big sister and baby fish based on their size, and we wait for out boat to the Contemporary. A boat pulls in right away, but it is someone “practicing” so we can’t get on that boat, there are a few boats out on the lake this early in the morning, I guess that is when they practice driving the boats for the new skippers.

A few minutes later our boat arrives, and we hop on, & it is the same skipper that drove the boat for our 1st morning when we went to Chef Mickey’s. We soak in the beautiful and peaceful boat ride to the Contemporary Hotel. When we dock we jump out and head for the monorail, which we will ride on last time to the MK.

When we get to the monorail, I notice no one is sitting in the front, and I have heard that it is fun to sit in front, and I remember doing it a couple of times when I was a kid, but I decide against suggesting it because I think that it will be something special to do next time (when ever that is). We get in the 1st car and everyone is all excited to get to the MK (the kids still think we are just trying to make rope drop so they don’t suspect a thing!)Cassie lists her 3 “must do’s” for today: Buzz, Cinderella’s Carousel and Teacups.
Daphnie lists hers: Peter Pan, Small World and Cinderella’s Carousel. And Teacups ( I know its 4 but just like my husband, give Daphnie and inch and she’ll try to get a mile…)

We arrive at the MK making good time, and get off of the monorail and go though the gates. Cassie and Daphnie still think we are trying to just get to rope drop. They need to go to the bathroom, so we stop at the restrooms @ CP. The park is nice and almost empty, I think the next time we come I’ll make an early ressie at CP just to get in here early. It is so much more relaxed than the Rope Drop rush, so that is very nice!

CRT

As we walk up to the castle I say, hey let’s eat breakfast in the Castle today. What do you think? Cassie, (really a mini me) says, “Ok Mommy, but rides 1st, then we can eat, we need to do the rides 1st b/c its only going to get more crowded as the morning goes on…” I think my jaw dropped. This was not the reaction that I was hoping for!!!

I had to explain to her that it was OK that Mommy had booked this before Rope Drop, so the rides won’t be open until AFTER we finish eating. It took her a while to get this, and eventually she was on board!!!

We check in at 8am and we are shown inside to Cinderella shortly. The girls are tired and it shows in this picture.

cindy & the girls

We are soon escorted up the stairs and the inside of the castle is beautiful!

Inside CRT

The girls are given wands….

Wands

And our waiter comes over and gives us more coffee and takes our orders.
The food here is pretty good, nice and hot. The atmosphere itself is quite royal and I was debating on whether to cancel this reservation before we ate here, but I kept on reading nice things about it before we left. That was one of the reasons we kept it a secret from the kids, because I didn’t want them to be upset if we canceled it. I am glad we ate here, and like most people said, you should do it once, if you haven’t done it before, I am not sure we would do it again, because of the price. Most of the princesses were the same ones from the Norway breakfast and then we got Cinderella and the Fairy godmother at the GF. The only princess that was “new” for us here was Jasmine.

Jasmine

The other princesses were, Belle in her blue dress, the fairy godmother, & Snow White.

Snow White

It was about 8:50 am and we had seen all the princessess and they said the wishing ceremony was coming up next. I wanted to book it out of there and get ready to run, I mean walk to Dumbo when the park opens, but Scott made us stay.

Here is a picture of Cassie making her wish.

Wishing_Cassie

It all worked out anyway, because we were out of there by 8:55 and we were already in Fantasyland, before rope drop!!!! Does it get any better than this!!!!!! Now being in Fantasy land before rope drop may have been well worth my money!!! (yes I am a bit crazy!! )

Ok before the rope drops Scott is putting sun screen on the kids, and oh no he is going to make us miss the 1st ride of Dumbo, I’ll kill him, can’t he put the sunscreen on after Dumbo!!!! I mean what difference is 5 minutes in the sun gong to make?? But he thinks I am crazy and continues anyway.
It’s getting closer to the time where they will let us go…I tell the kids to get in the stroller and I take the reigns. Scott is still calmly applying sun block on himself its only seconds before its time…what is he thinking?..., they say we can go…… off I go with the kids and the stroller , we leave Scott behind in a cloud of dust, oh well he’ll catch up I reason, he has a long stride you know….

Scott, none to happy catches up to us as the kids are getting out of the stroller at Dumbo. I am a bit annoyed at him, so when he asks me how his face looks (ie does he have to rub in the sunscreen more? Or does he look like Casper the ghost) I lie and tell him he’s fine, “Casper…”

So for the 1st time ever we are on the 1st Dumbo ride of the Day!!! Timing is going A-OK

1st dumbo of the day

After Dumbo, its bouncing with Tigger time on Winnie the Pooh, and then off to fight the wicked Captain Hook on Peter Pan, & picked up FP for later. When we walk out of Peter Pan I see that the carousal is letting riders off and the next ride is going to start soon, so we head on over to the Carousel and we hope on our horse.

Carousel-Daphnie

Even I get on one too!!!

After the carousel we go on Snow White & Small World, Daphnie sees the Pink Elephant again, and Cassie tries to guess the countries…Cassie likes the chess set in the 1st room.

Now I send Scott over to the teacups to ride with the girls while I go run and get FP for Buzz for later. The girls have a mini-meltdown before the teacups and Scott is now in a bad mood.

I have to wait b/c its 10 minutes at the FP machines in Tommorrowland till I can get another FP so Scott heads over to ToonTown after the teacups.

My mom calls and says she and Papa are at the park, and I tell them to meet us at Toontown. After I hang up with Mom I realize that we were planning on taking the Train over to Frontierland to then go to Pirates, and since mom is in the electric wheelchair she cannot ride the train, so I call her back, and tell her to meet us over at the Frontierland train station. I wait another 3 minutes and finally it is my time to get another set of FP tickets for Buzz. I get them and book it over to ToonTown. When I approach ToonTown, the train just pulled in. I call Scott on the phone and tell him to get the kids out of Mickey’s house and onto the train. Scott is in no hurry, and we miss the train. So we start talking to the nice CM who is working at the train station.

When the train pulls up in a few minutes we hop on and Daphnie drops her wand that she got at CRT over the side of the train, the nice CM comes over and picks it up or her, and tells her to hold on tight, b/c he won’t be there when the train pulls away from the tracks. We thanks him and then he tells us, that we should get off at Main Street, b/c he just got a call that the Dream Team was heading over there!!! That is where we saw them the other day. We have been wanting those dream Mickey ears so we all get excited. Scott wants to high five me, but being the optimist I am I tell him not to count his chicken’s before their hatched. ((((Scott is the eternal optimist, every year (even before the Red Sox’s won the World Series a few years ago) he would say at the beginning of the baseball season, “This is the year, I feel it, I know it!! The Sox’s are going to win this year.” My dad would call him each year and ask him if this is the year and Scott would answer sincerely, yes, this is the year, and my dad and I would get a nice chuckle out of it)))) Ok back to our pursuit of the dream team: So we get off at Main Street as directed and………….Nothing…no Dream Team in Sight…

Ok so now we decided to walk over to POC, but we forgot to call my mom and Irwin and let them know that we would not be meeting them at FL train station, but instead at POC. (needless to say I had a couple of people that were frustrated at me that morning)…

We meet up with Grammie & Papa at POC and go and wait in line. Grammie has to leave her chair at the entrance and walk about 500 yards says the CM, so she does. Again the caves where you wait feels nice and cool on a hot July day. Finally we get on the ride and it is great once again. Daphnie gets a kick out of the pirate with the dirty foot when you go under that bridge.

When we get out I ask the CM at the gift shop if she knows where Peter Pan is b/c I heard he hangs out around here. She motions for me to go over to the other side, I go over and check and lo and behold…PETER PAN and WENDY. I race over to get in line with the kids. And it’s a good thing I did b/c the handler closed the line behind us. We have been waiting all week to see Peter Pan, who is Daphnie’s favorite Character , and I made sure to tell the handler that too. I ask Daphnie who her favorite character is and she says Peter Pan!!! Daphnie is very excited to meet Peter Pan, Cassie wants to meet Wendy. As we get closer to our turn, Daphnie starts getting shy, she nuzzles her head into my legs and says very quietly she doesn’t want to meet Peter Pan now. OH NO you don’t Daphnie…Mommy knows where this is going…for those of you who don’t know where this is going... here’s how it usually goes down…. the minute Peter Pan goes away she will tell me she wants to meet him and will be upset and start to cry that she didn’t meet him, and there will be nothing I can do….so we will be having none of that on our last day at the MK….I tell her not to be shy and she is meeting Peter Pan. It’s our turn and I give her a gentle push toward Peter, he can see that she is shy and says to her, “Oh no you can’t be shy we have the same color hair,” He then points to a line in the concrete and says, “Why don’t you jump over this shy line and then you won’t be shy anymore”. Can you say Magic b/ c that’s what it was….. They talked for a bit to both the kids and Peter kept asking Daphnie to give him a wish with her wand and Daphnie kept telling him no, Cassie spoke to Wendy and it was so great. There are pics below.
Peter Pan
Daphnie over the “shy line”

After they left Daphnie wouldn’t leave the spot where she was standing, she told me she was going to wait right there until Peter Pan came back and talked with her. I had to persuade her to move on, but it was not an easy task as she refused to do so for about a full five minutes.

When we were leaving Peter Pan we were “Scheduled” to eat but we weren’t hungry b/c we just had breakfast a few hours ago, so we decided to go to Mickey’s Philharmonic. It was very hot and Scott was very cranky, he even told me he was gasp…”Disney’d Out”…and just wanted to get away from all of the crowds….I got mad at him, how can he say that on our last day there? I mean I know it is a lot but tomorrow we will finally be on the plane….I told him to go back to the hotel by himself, and I would stay here with the kids and Grammy and Papa, but then he changed his mind and decided to stay too.

So we made our way through the crowds into Fantasy Land and to Mickey’s Phil. I went ahead of Grammy & Papa and grabbed some FP for Pooh later tonight. We all go into Mickey’s Phil and we go with Grammie down to the far right side of the entrance as you are looking at the doors to the theater. Little did I know this was the very BACK of the theater. I have never sat in the very back, and never will again. It just wasn’t the same, now mind you I am not that picky of a person, I do not need to sit in the middle of the row in the middle of the theater, but these seats were bad. It did not feel like everything was in 3D you could see many people’s heads, the kids had a hard time seeing things, and I was just disappointed that these were the designated seats for those in wheelchairs and their party members.

Once out of Mickey’s Philharmonic we made our way down Main Street and stopped at the Candy store to have the kids pick out a snack they could eat after lunch. Cassie got a lollypop and Daphnie got some chocolate princesses. Then we headed back to the boat dock and then back to the Wilderness Lodge for Lunch at Roaring Forks, a swim, a nap, before heading back out for dinner at Tony’s tonight.

Afterwards for the rest of the day Daphnie kept asking me when was she going to get to talk to the real Peter Pan again??

Here was Nala and Simba back at the hotel room

Grammy offered to go swimming with Cassie while we took a nap in the room. Cassie and Grammy had a good time swimming, and we had a long nap.

Up next Dinner at Tony’s and out last night in Disney with Wishes.

 

[Lifelong_Dreamer]

That picture of Daphnie with Peter Pan was darling!

 

[vassar36]

That picture of Daphnie with Peter Pan was darling!

Thanks you, yes i think she was in love

nice one on the "darling" you know b/c of Wendy "Darling"

 

[Lifelong_Dreamer]

Thanks you, yes i think she was in love

nice one on the "darling" you know b/c of Wendy "Darling"

Glad you caught that

 

[momof2boyz12]

Great trip report. I have been trying to catch up. We arrived at WDW on July 20, and wow was it hot! I think you already said that, but I just wanted to put my two cents in!

We ate at Hollywood & Vine one evening, and we were not impressed with the food either. Unfortunately, we weren't there for the characters, so all in all it was an expensive bad meal. IMO.

I love the title of this report. I will remember that line for our next trip as my boys kept asking me "how many more days until we go home, mom?". I wouldn't answer them because I just did not want to even think about i.

Great pictures. I look forward to hearing about the last day!

 

[anne60]

Is there anything more depressing than the last day when you wake up to your bill hanging on the door????? I did not realize that ME left you something as well!!

You should frame the picture of Daphne and Peter Pan - it's a classic!!!

 

[arizonacolbys]

Just found your report today & have really enjoyed it! We're staying at the WL in just 18 days, so it's great to hear all about it.

Your girls are SO cute - love the one of Daphne & Peter - she just looks thrilled!