WOW... 7 days at the World (and 2 extra kids) later.... January 2010 Trip Report

[jkjjhuddle]

We did a pre-trip report and shared the details of how we got to the point of taking Our family and our two nieces to WDW... Pre Trip Report

Now for the nitty gritty of how the trip went~

Cast:

Me: Planner and Mom to the group
DH: Disney fan that loves my planning most of the time
DS 10: Happy to be a Disney
DS 6: Wide open and crazy most of the time. The rest of the time he is wired to the hilt!

DN 15: Love to be a little girl when she is allowed to be. Too grown up for her age
DN 10: Not so much a princess, but loves the pirates rides. The wilder the better.

 

[jkjjhuddle]

So we begin with leaving town:

January 15 after DN15 finished her exams we pick up the kids and we are ready to hit the road by 12:00 (actually 11:45. Oh the joy on their face when they come to the school office. The teachers are all excited and reminding the kids to journal and to have fun.

After a quick drive thru lunch we are on our way!!!

The trip was pretty uneventful. It was a total of about 9 hours, but that included stopping for gas and a dinner at Golden Coral. (yes we were hitting the big time buffet)

We arrive at the Baymont Inn. I was a little concerned about this place. We needed something for just one night. After looking for places that would hold 6 of us comfortably... I just could not find anything in the price range I wanted. I wanted CHEAP! I went to hotwire and ended up getting two rooms for 71.00 total. I was so happy, but then I read the most horrible reviews. I would not even post on here where we were staying that first night because I did not want to hear more bad stuff.

The rooms were very nice. The outside of the hotel was a little run down. You enter the rooms and it is so nice. 2 queen beds. A nice flat pannel TV. Everything was clean and very comfortable. My DS15 kept saying that she did not understand what problems people could possible be having...

Then we went to sleep.. well.. if anyone is in the outside hallways you can hear everything... But for the most part it was ok. Nothing that a little excedrin PM and cranking up the fan on the AC couldn't fix.

They had a breakfast bar the next morning. Fruit, cereal, bagles, waffles, juice, toast, pastries.... yea.. pretty much the norm, but it was fresh and well maintained.

I do not think I would stay a week here, but really for one night.. I would do it again. It was just fine.

So then it was on to Animal Kingdom before checking into Bonnet Creek. I will write more about that later... and we will have many pictures to follow.

 

[jkjjhuddle]

So we head out to Animal Kingdom. We arrive around 9:15.. so it is just after park opening.

We send DH to Everest and I take the kids to meet him at Dinosaur. After waiting we realize that I do not have my cell phone so we wait and wait and wait...

He gets there and we walk on to Dinosaur.
We play for a bit in Dino Land.

Side Note: If you have never been to Dinoland... prepare yourself. It has a beach boardwalk feel to it. The rides with the exception of Dinosaur are cheesy. It is designed that way. I heard so many people complaining and saying how disappointed they were in Disney based on this section of the park.

The kids rode Primevil Whirl. (I sat this one out. - the jerking movement is too much for me on this)

Then we headed to watch the 10:30 of Nemo. LOVED the show. We have always missed it because it takes so long, but since this day was just a taste of what was to come we figured why not.

We headed over to ride Everest and got FP's to ride again later. Then we had lunch at Yak and Yetti.

OHHH I love Yak and Yetti and I will link to my food report a review from this counterservice later...

We then did Tought to be a bug while DH and DS6 went to ride dinosaur again. DS6 is afraid of bugs. He was not going near this show and had said so since he knew about the trip.

We then went to the safari and back to Everest before leaving the park to head to Bonnet Creek.

Not bad for a first day in the parks.

 

[jkjjhuddle]

Checking in at Bonnet Creek (Wyndham Resort) Went very smooth.

We were assigned to Building 4 and were on the 9th floor facing the fireworks. We could see Epcot (golf ball as the kids call it) from our balcony.

I headed out to get some much needed groceries while the kids and DH got everything else settled.

Upon returning we have just about an hour before we needed to head over to Magic Kingdom to see Spectro and Wishes.

NOT A Good Idea at all, but the only other night Spectro was going on was not a good night either.. so we went for it as we have never seen Spectro!

We got into the park at 6:00 and there were crowds all over main street. We headed to Liberty Square to get a seat and there was plenty of room, however you could tell it was time to get seated. My DH who for some reason did not understand this suggested that I take the kids to ride Hunted Mansion. Well, because I have four kids all excited about riding a ride and he was so sure it would be well we headed that way. After getting stuck on the ride three different times we make it out just in time to rescue our seats from the crowds closing in around us. But I have to say the parade was wonderful and really worth it.

Then we headed to the back of the castle to catch Wishes. We were starving... so we grabbed a quick dinner and sat our on the porch of Pinocchio Village Haus and waited.

Well, umm.. it is not the best seats to see Wishes, but we were seated and eating so no one really cared and it turned out just fine, however, if you want a good seat to view wishes this is not the place.

We then headed out of the park with a pit stop at POTC.

Tomorrow it is on to EPCOT for rope drop???? maybe we should rethink this one. Everyone is grumpy and NOT in a Disney magic mood.

 

[cmp1111]

Good start! I'm glad you were happy enough with your cheap hotel.

 

[jkjjhuddle]

Day 2.

We decided after getting back so late from MK that maybe we should rething the rope drop thing. We knew we would be back later in the week so we could do rope drop them.

First.. rope drop IS important. It is even more important when the park is crowded such as MLK weekend, however, we knew there would be crowds and we knew we would be back so we took it in stride.

We arrived about 10:30. Headed straight to Soarin'. got a fast pass for 1:30.

We road Living with the Land and then headed to The Living Seas to take in the finding Nemo ride and Turtle Talk.

Once all that was done we were ready for lunch.

We ate at Sunshine Seasons. I really liked the variety that was avalible. (will link to our full dining report on this place) It was crowded, but it was still fairly easy to figure out what you wanted and where to get it.

After a nice lunch we headed to the other side of the park after riding Space Ship Earth. The kids love this ride.

Once we got to the other side the wait times on the rides were crazy. I think it was 140 min on Test Track which we did not even expect to be open. Then it was 50 min on Mission Space. We grabed a fast pass for Test Track and by the time that was done the Mission Space wait was only 20 min so we headed in.

I did the Green version with DS6 while My DH took the rest of the kidos and headed to the Orange version. Once complete we went to the cool club to check out the drinks.

After getting a snack at the icecream shop near the cool club we headed to ride soarin'. Ahh how I love that ride!

Then we headed back to ride Test Track. Uh oh.. the ride was down...

The fam decided to ride Mission space again, however DS6 and I sat it out this time and waited patiently.

When they came out we went over and caught Ellen's Universe of Energy. All in all it was fine. It was relaxing if nothing else. Then off to check Test Track and it was still down. The fam rode Mission Space yet again...

While they were on the ride TT came back up and we jetted over there as soon as everyone was off Mission Space. The fast pass lane was a little long from all the collected fp's that had not been used and I was nervous because we were only 30 min from our ADR time at Coral Reef. ACK!!!

In line I looked down and noticed that DS10 did not have his bag. Ummm.. where is your bag??? he had it by his feet. Whew... good thing because his pin lanyard was in the bag and we would not want to loose those.

Uh oh. The color drains out of his face and he tells me he left it on Mission Space in the compartment for the bags.

We ride the ride and while DH takes half the fam over to Coral Reef to get checked in I take DS to MS to check on his lanyard. About 10 minutes later they come out with his laynard and all is well. They said they find tons of those all the time and we would be surprised how many are never claimed. We run over to Coral Reef and are seated right away.

With Coral Reef my only disappointment was they no longer have the blackened catfish over grits.

We head home after dinner... and watch Illuminations from our balcony. Ready for a true rope drop at Hollywood Studio the next morning.

There was a lot of back and forth that I would have perfered not to do, however, sleeping in that morning made for a much better day than if we had tried to make rope drop... so it is all good.

 

[jkjjhuddle]

Whew.. we made it to rope drop. We are in line and they come out with their American Idol board and ask if anyone will try out. My DH who is and idol in his own mind tried out and makes it..

Well, he makes it to try out in front of the producer. So we get into the park early.

Cool... well kind of.

He gets to take one person with him in to pick out a song and do some other things. Of course I can not go.. there are 4 kids here... so He takes my DN 15.

I take DS 6 DS 10 and DN10 and we wait outside the American Idol doors until rope drop. Sounds cool except where we were we had to go a long way to get to toy story which was the whole reason we did rope drop. They let us go and we jet as fast as we can over to TSM.

We arrive just in time to see a huge mass of people coming our way... I was going to get FP's and then ride, but there was no way I was going to be able to get through that crown so we just line up and go in and ride. I mean DH is having all kinds of fun in American Idol.. we can not just wait around.

After riding we get FP's for everyone to ride again later. After texting DH I find that he has made it onto the 1:00 show. But it is going to take a bit so we should go ride another ride. We ride The great Movie Ride ... mainly because of its location close to American Idol. They are waiting for us when we get out.

They decide they need to eat because he has to be back at 11:50, but we have some time to do a few things. So we go eat.. by the time that was done.. he really had to get going and we did not have much time as we had to be at the doors at 12:30 so we ride Star Tours. NOT MY FAVORITE RIDE AT ALL. but the kids love it.

We line up for American Idol and they let us in for the sound check. It was pretty cool. He was up aginst two younger girls. One 16 one in their early 20's. He sounded good, but when the 16 year old comes out singing colors of the wind... well, we just knew he would not win. shhh don't tell, but I was hoping he would not win. We had dinner reservations at Texas De Brazil that evening and if we missed them it messed up my plans for the rest of the week.

He will post in more detail about the experience later and I will link it here.

So.. he does not win, but we are ready to go to the big rides.

We head over to Tower and RNRC. We grabbed FP's for Tower and used the fast pass they gave DH to ride RNRC

After that we had done pretty much everything we came for (and more) and then we decide to call it a day and head back to the resort to rest up before dinner.

Just for the record. If you are not on the dinning plan and have a car.. Texas De Brazil is well worth the time and money. I will do a full report on it in my dinning report later.

Our next stop will be Magic Kingdom!

 

[DVC'96]

Sounds like you are having a good time so far! Congrats to your DH for making into Idol. I can see that it can also be a pain when you have to devote a good part of your day there. At least he got to perform and then you all could enjoy the rest of your day.