Yes, I really am 22... Chaperoning around the World March 2012-April 2012~9/1 update!

[msmandapanda]

Hello Boys and Girls and welcome to my first ever Trip Report!!!!! ​

Hi! I'm Amanda!

I'm 22 years old and a Vocal Music Education Major at Lee University in Cleveland, TN. I absolutely love Walt Disney World and can't wait to share my adventures with you! This was my 10th trip.
​

Next we have my sister Shannon:

She's 15 years old and a freshman in High School. However, she's already thinking about majoring in Psychology when she gets to College. She too loves Disney, but not as much as I do. This was her 5th trip.​

This time around, we went with Shannon's Band and Chorus and I got the lovely chance to be a chaperone. We were there 3 days, March 30th-April 1st. We stayed off property but still managed to have fun and visit all 4 of the parks!

My friend Jenelle will also be making an appearance later on. She's a Full-time Cast Member in Future World West. She works the Journey Into Imagination and Captain EO attractions.

Here's a pic of all of us:

Lastly, my sister Kristen who wishes she was making a real appearance, will most likely be commenting a lot on here. here's a pic:

Side note: Kristen and I are in our friend Marissa's (marDgreen88) TR and if you haven't checked it out, I encourage you to do so. Here's a link:

"You Guys Are Cast Members...Right?"

There are 2 sides to my tale: High School Drama vs Vacationing in Disney World. Naturally, I'm going to stick to the funtimes at Disney and spare you the horror of the drama.

DISCLAIMER: my photography and videography skills leave much, and I mean MUCH to be desired. Nonetheless, I hope you enjoy and stick it out with us!


There's no turning back now...​

Continued in Next Post​

Thursday, March 29th, 2012​

Chapter 1: Getting there is by no means half of the fun, but fun nonetheless​

Friday, March 30th, 2012​

Chapter 2: We're finally here!
Chapter 3: I wish I had a VOLCANO!!!!!
Chapter 4: Lions, Tigers, and...Dinosaurs?
Chapter 5: Hooray for Hollywood!
Chapter 6: a backstage tour, a magical performance, and a hop back to Hollywood​

Saturday, March 31st, 2012​

Chapter 7: Experimental Prototype Community Of Tomorrow​

 

[marDgreen88]

I FOUND IT!!!!!!!! Hahaha YAY. I'm excited to hear about it because you have literally told me nothing hahaha. I didn't even know you met up with Jenelle! How awesome! Although I'm not sure why I'm surprised...? Anyways, yay I'm excited to read along! I hope you update soon and I hope you can get some more readers! I think having the link in your signature will help. LET'S GOOOO.

 

[msmandapanda]

Thursday, March 29th, 2012​

Chapter 1: Getting there is by no means half of the fun, but fun nonetheless​

Even though we didn’t have to be at the school until 5:00pm, I decided to take the whole day off from work. Being the last minute packers that we are, it was a good thing too. Shannon had decided to stay at school for the majority of the day, leaving all the packing to me. No worries though, I had “Go With The Flow” stuck in my head the whole time and I dare say it helped the process along. (I know, just reading that title gets it stuck in your head!)

When 2:00pm rolled around, I went to pick Shannon up so that we could both shower before the bus ride. This trip included 2 fun times of riding all night only to go hard core the next full day before finally resting at the hotel. a.k.a. it would be 24 hours before we’d get a shower in again. I know some people can pull it off, but not this girl. Not being able to shower = totally gross.

After showering up, there was one last necessity for this trip; Disney nails. We opted for the Minnie Mouse ones and Shannon added little Mickey heads to her ring fingers:

5:00pm finally came about so we said our goodbyes, and drove over to the school.

The ride to Florida was what you’d expect. High schoolers being high schoolers and all, it was still not too bad. All I can say is thank you Campus Choir! Because of you, I have been fully prepped for how to make it on a 13 hour bus ride. Shannon and I stuck to our own little world of coloring, word searches, card games, snacking, and rocking out to our ipods. Here's a not so awesome pic of us roughing it on the bus:

We also took the liberty of creating our “Must Do” list. I’m a planner and a Disney World trip, no matter how small, is still in need of a plan of attack. Shannon, on the other hand, was content with just occasionally nodding in approval. In her words, “I’m a planner, but not a planner planner.”

Apparently no one really had any movies to watch so at one point, they put in a season of The Big Bang Theory. This was my first time watching it and thankfully, I enjoyed it.

Being the old lady that I am, at 10:30pm it was lights out for me. I got my pillow and blanket situated just right, my sleeping mask to deflect the lights that they would be turning on any time we stopped, and of course, my ipod set to the Disney World playlist. I drifted off to Dreamland and before I knew it, the faint outline of palm trees were outside my window and it was 6:00am!
​

Continued in Next Post​

 

[msmandapanda]

I FOUND IT!!!!!!!! Hahaha YAY. I'm excited to hear about it because you have literally told me nothing hahaha. I didn't even know you met up with Jenelle! How awesome! Although I'm not sure why I'm surprised...? Anyways, yay I'm excited to read along! I hope you update soon and I hope you can get some more readers! I think having the link in your signature will help. LET'S GOOOO.

Hello Miss Marissa! Thanks for joining! Yeah, we DID meet up with Jenelle who, side note: I don't know if you heard or not but she earned her wings at Soarin'! So, she's official now I guess!

Anyways, I'm really excited to get going! Feel free to help spread the word! ​

 

[marDgreen88]

No I have not been sitting on the Dis since I last commented, in between these two comments I went to the Toyota place on West Broad to pick up my Pri Pri. ANYWAYS, hooray!!! Be prepared girlfriend, I WILL be leaving long comments on every single update.

Hmmm, wasn't Shannon the one who told you the dots would look silly in December? I SEEM to remember this. I guessed she realized she was wrooooong! hahah. That girl's got some long ones! Goodness, I can't handle long nails.

Hooooooray for palm trees! And yes, of course I'll spread the word next time I do an update. (I'll probably end up doing one tomorrow, darn these rainy cold April days!) You're definitely getting the hang of this TR business!

OH AND PS. Did Kristen get a dis account? Because if so I'm gonna need her to show herself on our TRs! Are you listening missy?

 

[msmandapanda]

No I have not been sitting on the Dis since I last commented, in between these two comments I went to the Toyota place on West Broad to pick up my Pri Pri. ANYWAYS, hooray!!! Be prepared girlfriend, I WILL be leaving long comments on every single update.

Hmmm, wasn't Shannon the one who told you the dots would look silly in December? I SEEM to remember this. I guessed she realized she was wrooooong! hahah. That girl's got some long ones! Goodness, I can't handle long nails.

Hooooooray for palm trees! And yes, of course I'll spread the word next time I do an update. (I'll probably end up doing one tomorrow, darn these rainy cold April days!) You're definitely getting the hang of this TR business!

OH AND PS. Did Kristen get a dis account? Because if so I'm gonna need her to show herself on our TRs! Are you listening missy?

Haha! No, it's not like I've been sitting on here either...

I don't believe Kristen has a Dis account yet. I've told her to get one though. p.s. bout to post again!​

 

[msmandapanda]

Friday, March 30th, 2012​

Chapter 2: We're finally here!​

The bus pulled into a rest stop at 6:30am and I took proper precaution to shield myself from the bright lights and the very loud “good morning, get off the bus and go change NOW” spiel. Shannon, however, was not so lucky. I’m pretty much an any time of day person and can be awake when you need me to be i.e. if you’re commanding me to do so. Shannon is not though, especially when it comes to early mornings. I was ready to run off the bus and get a stall to change in before they were all taken, and Shannon was still rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. So, like any good big sis, I stayed and waited with her.

When we finally did get off, we were literally the last ones in line. Yikes… It all worked out though. We had plenty of time to converse about how excited we were and about the fact that we were finally in Florida and literally like 30min from Disney!

After getting a chance to freshen up, it was time to hop back on the bus and drive on over to this lovely site!

Nevermind those dead bugs all over the windshield, haha.

Now I’ve read several TRs on here and they all seem to include a very excited version of something along the lines of: “Yay! We’re finally here” when passing through the gates. So naturally, I was hoping for a similar reaction. I mean come on; it’s bound to happen with a bus full of high school kids, right? Apparently, that’d be incorrect. All we managed to get was a nonchalant “woohoo…yeah…we’re in Disney World ya’ll.” Like, literally from one orchestra guy in the back. It was quite hilarious actually! Thank you orchestra guy and know that I was right there with you in spirit.

I was so happy to be back on Disney property. It’s crazy to think that it had only been a 3 month wait since my previous trip! I’ll tell ya though, those felt like the longest 3 months of my life.

We drove around and made our way to the Animal Kindgom gates. By now, everyone was fully awake and the entire bus broke out into a sleepy I’ve-been-on-this-bus-for-13-hours rendition of “The Circle of Life”. Not gonna lie, it was slightly awesome. What wasn’t so awesome was the fact that we literally drove around the parking lot and then went right out the way we came in. Huh? We were all talking about the awesomeness of Animal Kingdom and what rides we were gonna do first and one of the teachers even got on the microphone and was like “You’ve got to go see Festival of the Lion King”, and we leave the park…

The buses just drove all around for a while, while everyone was like “What happened? Do you think we forgot something? Is there somewhere else we have to go first?”. They then drove right back into AK and parked. Ok? We still aren’t quite sure why that happened, but my theory is that our tour guide Charlie hadn’t gotten there yet so they decided to keep us confused and guessing while riding around as opposed to hearing us complain as we just sat in the parking lot. Makes sense to me anyways.

We then hopped off of the bus, got familiarized with our groups, and made our way towards the bag check stations!
​

Continued in Next Post​

 

[marDgreen88]

This time I don't really have an excuse... I'm just bored today. It's too cold for ALMOST MAY!!!!

Hahaha, good for that orchestra guy. You go orchestra guy. I feel like this is de ja vu of my Magical Express experience in December... only there was no orchestra guy there to join in my excitement.

Hahaha what the heck? So your bus played a little ring around the parking lot I guess. That's cool, it's not like we want to be at Animal Kingdom or anything?? Looking forward to hearing about your Rainforest breakfast! YAY I LOVE THAT YOU HAVE A TR!!!

 

[msmandapanda]

Chapter 3: I wish I had a VOLCANO!!!!!​

It was about 8:30am and Shannon and I were booking it to bag check. It was a little crowded so I looked over to the far left, found the shortest line, and pulled Shannon into it. I can’t remember where I heard/read if from, but supposedly if there’s more than one line, people are most likely to go towards the right. It’s just an automatic impulse or something. So, when there are multiple lines, ALWAYS try the ones on the left. I’ve been doing it ever since I learned about it and it’s always proven to be a shorter wait.

Once we got through bag check, we headed left for our breakfast at:

We had to wait a good few minutes for the rest of the entire crew to join us (should’ve taken those left lines!) so we entertained ourselves with a couple of pics:

Then everyone else got the same idea and we got booted out of our shady spot. It was all good though because it wasn’t too hot yet and after about a 10 minute wait, it was time to head in!

We were greeted with a breakfast buffet and then went and sat down by the water fall. I was literally right there by it and kind of got splashed the whole time, but I didn’t mind because hey, it was my first day at Disney! Here’s a pic:

“…and now the eighth wonder of the world the backside of water!”

So, buffet food… I’ve been to a Rainforest Café breakfast 3 times in my life and have honestly enjoyed every one. They used to only do it for groups that booked in advance but I believe they do it regularly now? Probably not buffets like this one though. There’s only about 7 items to pick from but they’re all pretty good. Kind of cold, but you can expect that knowing that it’s a restaurant that does not normally have a buffet. Here’s a pic of my plate:

Starting at the top and going clockwise we've got: eggs, potatoes, pineapple (because I love me some pineapple), a cherry pastry, bread pudding, and bacon.

Everything was pretty good. I like my bacon crunchy and was very pleased with this batch. I was a little confused with the bread pudding because in my last 2 breakfast experiences, I remembered it being french toaste with powdered sugar and pecans. I've got a funny thing with food texture so mushy bread pudding wasn't my absolute favorite but still decent.

I’ve always had a special place in my heart for Rainforest Café ever since my first visit in 2002. It’s just a neat little place to eat and shop. I really enjoy the Heavenly Disney Water smell in there and the thunderstorm effect that happens about every 25 minutes that makes the animals come to life. Then there’s the super awesome concoction that is the Volcano! For those of you who don’t know, it’s pretty much a more awesome version of Shoney’s Hot Fudge Cake but in the shape of a volcano complete with a giant toothpick that has sparkly streamers coming off the top which Shannon says: “just makes you feel awesome!” . When the wait staff bring it out, they yell “VOLCANO!!!” and if you’re located far enough away, you’ll get to hear them yell it a couple of times and even join in! Yes, half of the experience IS just the ability to yell it out for all to hear in hopes of making others jealous and left wishing they could have one.

We ate and chatted with one of the girls in our group who had never been to Disney World before! I know. So, I decided to not overwhelm her and just stuck to explaining Animal Kingdom for the moment and then invited her to explore the park with us. The students had the option to break up into smaller groups and didn’t have to stick with the chaperones the whole time. I’m not gonna lie, I was really relieved about that because Shannon and I had our plans and didn’t want to have to deviate too much for the sake of keeping up with our group (I know, such a great chaperone right?). We then finished up, I handed out the Park Hopper Passes, and it was time to officially start the day! Yay!
​

Continued in Next Post​

 

[marDgreen88]

I'm so confused because I thought RFC did a legit breakfast now? Like with a menu. And options. Hahaha I guess it's a lot easier to do a buffet with a large group though? At least you got good bacon! That's so rare for Disney hahaha.

Excuse me... these poor high schoolers have never been to Disney? Tell them to try waiting until they're 21. I KID.

 

[ChattaAlley]

Excited to read about your report. I as you can tell from my name live in Chattanooga and I am Church of God so therefore I know exactly where Lee University is and have had many friends attend. Beautiful place up there.

 

[marDgreen88]

Excited to read about your report. I as you can tell from my name live in Chattanooga and I am Church of God so therefore I know exactly where Lee University is and have had many friends attend. Beautiful place up there.

I went/go there too! I've 'seen you around' the boards before and your name stuck out to me, at one point I was going to PM you and ask you about it but I didn't want to seem like a stalker so I never did. Even though I kinda seem like a stalker right now. BUT ANYWAYS! Small world!

 

[wdwgirl03]

Came over from Marissa's report...joining in!

 

[dara00]

thanks Marissa for the heads up, I'm subbing!

 

[Merida]

Subbing in from Marissa's report as well. I did two of these trips when I was in high school and they were great (though we didn't have nearly as cool chaperones !

 

[CandleontheWater]

How fun that you were able to be a chaperon! I went to Disney twice with my high school band so I am very familiar with the kind of drama high school kids can bring to Disney. I'm glad you didn't let it get to you and you still managed to have a nice trip. Did you get a discount on the trip for agreeing to chaperone? Maybe I should find a high school to partner with, lol!

 

[Nermel9]

Joining in from Marissa's TR as well! Great start so far! I especially love the Disney nails, I'm thinking of doing the same design for my upcoming trip!

 

[therussells08]

Hi! I'm hopping over from Marissa's TR! I am loving it so far. I am a high school teacher, so I can totally relate to your chaperoning!

I can't wait to read more!

 

[msmandapanda]

I'm so confused because I thought RFC did a legit breakfast now? Like with a menu. And options. Hahaha I guess it's a lot easier to do a buffet with a large group though? At least you got good bacon! That's so rare for Disney hahaha.

Excuse me... these poor high schoolers have never been to Disney? Tell them to try waiting until they're 21. I KID.

No, as far as I know you're correct. They DO have a legit breakfast with a menu and options Before they did that though, they only did breakfast for groups that booked in advance and it was always a buffet. I guess they still do that even now, haha. And yes! I DID get good Disney bacon! Come to think of it though, I must've always lucked out because I've never had bad Disney bacon.​

Haha, well it's not that much more of a wait, right? ​

Excited to read about your report. I as you can tell from my name live in Chattanooga and I am Church of God so therefore I know exactly where Lee University is and have had many friends attend. Beautiful place up there.

Hi! Thanks for joining in! My sister Kristen and I are also COG! May I ask what church you go to?​

Came over from Marissa's report...joining in!

Hello! Thanks for joining! ​

thanks Marissa for the heads up, I'm subbing!

Hi! Thanks for comin' over! ​

Subbing in from Marissa's report as well. I did two of these trips when I was in high school and they were great (though we didn't have nearly as cool chaperones !

Haha, aw thanks for coming on over!​

How fun that you were able to be a chaperon! I went to Disney twice with my high school band so I am very familiar with the kind of drama high school kids can bring to Disney. I'm glad you didn't let it get to you and you still managed to have a nice trip. Did you get a discount on the trip for agreeing to chaperone? Maybe I should find a high school to partner with, lol!

Hiya! thanks for joining in!

It was pretty fun getting to be a chaperone! I think we actually did get a discount so, yes! Definitely get involved in those Disney field trips! ​

Joining in from Marissa's TR as well! Great start so far! I especially love the Disney nails, I'm thinking of doing the same design for my upcoming trip!

Hello! and thanks! they're surprisingly really easy to do! Just don't press down too hard if you use a pen to make the polka dots because we found out the hard way that that can lead to accidents ​

Hi! I'm hopping over from Marissa's TR! I am loving it so far. I am a high school teacher, so I can totally relate to your chaperoning!

I can't wait to read more!

Why hello! Thanks for hoppin' on over! Nice to meet a fellow educator. What subject do you teach? my sister Kristen and I both want to teach at the High School level when we finally get out there.​

 

[JessicaFaye508]

Hey Amanda! Thanks to Marissa, I found my way over to your trip report. I'm excited to read about your trip!

Hey! One of the kids from my school works at Captain EO/Journey to Imagination with Figment!!! He's on the college program right now and his name is Bobby. Your friend Jenelle probably knows him!