"Why must everyone fart in front of me?" WDW/US 10/11-10/18 TR

[Melissa_E]

Nuts and Bolts:

Dates: Oct. 11-18

Travel: Southwest and rented a car from Dollar

Venue: Shades of Green

Parks: MNSSHP, MK, Epcot, DAK, DHS; USIOA, USO

Eats: Columbia Harbor house, BOG, Pinocchio’s, Food and Wine, Tusker House, Narcoossee’s, Three Broomsticks, Rain Forest Café, Yachtsman Steakhouse, Boma; Sorry no pictures of food!

Cast: Reed- my wonderful husband of 14 years, he’s been to Disney once before, when we celebrated his 20 year anniversary in the Army.

Penny- my fantastic and fun loving mother, she hasn’t been to Disney since 1986 or 87, she needed this trip after losing my dad earlier this year

Katie- our amazing 13 year old daughter. Last time she was in the world, she was 4. There is some that she remembers but I’m sure a lot she has forgotten

Me (Melissa)- I’m a fun loving uber planner.

Quick Synopsis:

Crowded! Both WDW and US were crowded.

Hot and HUMID! I am accustomed to 30% humidity being a “humid” day. But the heat was above 85 most days.

Do not flame me here, I am not a smoker and I hate the entire concept of smoking. However, I am married to a smoker (who is not allowed to smoke in the house or the car) and my mother is a smoker. US does a much better job with the locations of their smoking areas which made our days at Universal so much more pleasant for everyone involved. Even though US has many more smoking areas available, you don’t smell smoke all around the park. Just having two areas in every park at WDW was a hassle.

Drinks: Universal’s Coke Freestyle system is awesome. WDW needs to consider moving to something like this. Yes, WDW has the refillable mugs, but you can’t refill them at the parks.

ECV and wheelchairs: We had similar service from both parks getting ECVs and wheelchairs. The WDW ECVs can charge a cell phone with a USB cable. However, the ECVs at Universal were easier to drive. What we didn’t realize until day two was that there are complimentary wheelchairs from the park to the parking lot.

Entrance and Exit: At WDW, it seemed that whenever we were trying to enter and exit a park, the entrance and exit was always on the opposite side where the ECV rentals were. Unless there was a special entrance and exit for those renting that I missed, this is ridiculous. At US, entrances and exits were much closer to the ECV and wheelchair rental locations.

 

[Melissa_E]

Oct. 11, 2016—traveling to Disney, Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party, Columbia Harbor House

Today is the YEAH we are going to Disney day!!! Our flight was scheduled for 10:40am, not a bad time since we have to drive 90 minutes to the airport. That didn’t stop us from waking up at 5 to get going!

Our flight landed about 4pm, I rushed to Dollar to get the car while Reed, Katie, and my mom got the bags. Unfortunately, I got confused by the signage and left the airport instead of returning to the arrivals. Arg. Picking up the car was a snap. The drive from MCO to Shades of Green was easy and fairly quick, we paid tolls in cash. Check-in was easy as was finding a place to park in the garage.

My plan was to just drop off the stuff and run to the parks, but of course, it always takes longer than you think to get the herd moving. We finally arrived at MNSSHP around 6pm, this of course was during the crush of traffic of people leaving MK and people arriving for MNSSHP. Mom had to get an ECV and try to navigate the traffic with it. With getting up early, being hungry, and getting hit in the face with crowds and humidity, tempers were flaring.

We stopped at Columbia Harbor House to get some much needed nourishment and to figure out our game plan. We had the shrimp platter and I also got a serving of clam chowder. It was GOOD!

Next stop, Haunted Mansion. We barely had a wait here and the crowd wasn’t nearly has insane in the back of the park as it was in the hub and on Main Street. Katie remembered little bits and pieces of the ride, but certainly not everything. She LOVED it! At first she thought it was going to be scary, but I kept reminding her that Disney is built for kids. I loved the new addition of taking information off of magic bands and including some personalization at the end of the ride. We got a photo at the stagecoach and off we went to find other stuff.

Trick or treating locations looked like they were full and a lot wait, but we found that the line snakes very quickly. We could have hit many more locations than we did because I didn’t realize just how quick they went.

That night we also rode: Space Mountain and Pirates of the Caribbean (twice! But I’m not sure if I like some of the changes). We saw the Monsters Inc. Dance Party, that was a lot of fun. We shopped a little bit and just really enjoyed the atmosphere of the night. We staked out a spot in the Casey’s Hot dog grassy area for Hallowishes which was absolutely AMAZING!

By 11:45 we were running out of steam and started to make our way back to the entrance. Katie and I stopped by several magic photopass locations on the way out. We took the boat to TTC and the Shades of Green bus back to Shades. I think I was asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow.

The decorations for the fall are gorgeous.

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[disneyAndi14]

We were at the same MNSSHP, we loved it as well. Loved the fireworks and the parade. Love the magic shot with the headless horseman very cool! Excited to follow along. We also did US and IOA, we did HHN on 10/16 and it was very scary, not like Disney but we loved it.

 

[Melissa_E]

We didn't dare to HHN, I don't mind a scare every so often, but I figured that would be too intense for Katie and me.

 

[SwimDanceTaxi]

The mere mention of any type of body noises means I'M IN

 

[Melissa_E]

The mere mention of any type of body noises means I'M IN

I wouldn't have minded noises, all I got was smell.

 

[ariane37]

Wonderful title lol!! MNSSHP is my absolute favorite special event in Disney and I'm dying to get back, haven't been since 2014. Love the headless horseman shot!

 

[Melissa_E]

Oct. 12: EPCOT and Food and Wine Festival



Who needs to sleep in on vacation? We had a hard time getting started and didn’t make rope drop. I had to activate our tickets from military passes to our magic bands. I had everything in the computer so it was just a few minutes.

We went on Spaceship Earth, Mission Space (I will NOT do orange again! But my family thought it was awesome), Soarin (OMG so amazing), Living with the Land, Nemo, and Turtle Talk with Crush. Katie and I also met Baymax, Joy and Sadness. We waited an hour for Joy and Sadness, the line moves VERY slowly.

Our food plan was to eat our way through the World Showcase and we certainly accomplished that. Some of the highlights were: warm chocolate pudding from Ireland (we had three helpings), heirloom tomato salad (so simple yet delicious!), chicken gyro from Greece. We stopped in Germany and bought a brat, pretzel, and a beer from their QS restaurant. The pour of beer was $8 but a true pour vs. the minuscule amount you get from the F&W booths. We walked around and enjoyed the scenery, stayed until Illuminations and rushed with the crowd to the exit.


I don’t know about you, but I thought Illuminations was better nine years ago. Maybe it was due to us watching from World Showcase. The opening fire was amazing, but I thought the fireworks were lackluster.

 

[Rozz]

Great trip report!
Following along!

 

[ariane37]

Love the magic shot with Remy, I've never seen that one before!