You're Going Again??? Or, How the Once in a Lifetime Trip is Only the Beginning

[bbangel]

So you may or may not know that I took my first trip to Disney World in December of 2006 to celebrate my birthday. It was supposed to be the only trip I took there (or at least the last one for a long time).

But Disney obviously sensed that I was susceptible to their unique brand of magic, had already swallowed the hook and began a campaign to reel me back in.

It started subtly enough with the occasional email about upcoming events. This of course made me start thinking about going back much sooner than I had planned. Then they made me an offer I couldn't refuse. I received one of the coveted pin code emails. With a room rate of $49 a night, how could I refuse? I couldn't.

Up next: Plan A

 

[bbangel]

So Disney's great room rate bait worked. I started looking for someone to go with me. I couldn't find anyone who wanted to go, who also had the time and money to go. So I decided to do a solo trip.

I made the call and booked the first week of October. Then I started looking for airfare, which was the tricky part. Finally found a great rate (well great when you are on the west coast of the wrong country anyway). So I had a room and a flight by the end of February.

Since we had done the dining plan on the December trip I was aware of how much food that is. I decided to save my time and money and wing it for this trip. Since I would be on my own and there were no must try restaurants on my list I made no ADR's. I know that is breaking one of the cardinal rules of the DIS but I made a choice and I know it will work for me.

So then I started saving money for the trip. I love saving money. It is probably my second favourite thing after travelling (or planning to travel, which I guess would make it third). I started saving coins in a jar and stepped up my activity on Sunshine Rewards. I resisted the temptation to eat out and buy new things and saved quite a bit.

By the end of March I had schedules of what parks I would be in on what day, what rides I would ride and food I would eat, had found a DISboards MNSSHP meet and in general done my best to plan (or is that overplan) everything.

But that left me with way too much time on my hands. Time in which I started doing some reading. Reading about Disney's not so secret, secret. And so plans started to change just a little.

Up Next: Plan B

 

[Poohtigeey]

I'm in! Oh, by the way, if you ever need someone to go to Disney with you again just ask!!! I'm sure you could round up several new friends on the DIS willing to drop everything to join you!

 

[bbangel]

I'm in! Oh, by the way, if you ever need someone to go to Disney with you again just ask!!! I'm sure you could round up several new friends on the DIS willing to drop everything to join you!

Welcome! And I'll be sure to keep that in mind for next time.

 

[bbangel]

So as I said, I had way too much time on my hands and started doing a bit too much reading. That led me to the DVC Boards. I then started doing the math, which is never a good thing.

By the middle of April I had convinced myself that DVC was a good fit. Even though I have no kids, no partner, and live on the other coast. And Disney can't sell to me directly since they don't have a license here.

So I ended up at The Timeshare Store, where Jamie was more than happy to help me on my way to buying 100 points at Saratoga Springs. Got a good price and passed ROFR by May.

Only problem was the contract that was the best fit for me couldn't close until August (I presume they had a reservation to use up the 2006 points). So I had to wait until August to find out if I could switch my trip from Pop Century to a DVC studio.

After closing, but still waiting for my points to show up in the Disney system, I got an email from my step mother. She asked if I was still interested in having someone come with me, as she had found (and booked) a great flight deal out of her city. Pretty hard to refuse when someone has already booked the flight!

So I saw my dreams of a nice relaxing solo trip fly out the window. The trip will still be wonderful, just not quite how I had been planning for all those months. And then I started to panic. I have no ADR's. I'm going to MNSSHP and meeting a bunch of people and she doesn't have a ticket, doesn't know these people and there probably isn't room at dinner anyway! I have no idea if she would want to come or if she is expecting sit down meals. I had a bit of a freak out in my over planner mind. Then I calmly asked her what her wishes were figuring that at almost 7 weeks out I could still get a few places, even if the times were bad.

Happily, she wants a quiet night at the hotel the night I'm doing MNSSHP, so no need to change my plans. And she is happiest eating as we go and doing counter service just like me.

A few days later the lovely people at Member Services tell me I am in the system, but sadly there is nothing available at all for two of my nights and staying in DVC would mean we would have to move 4 times. I decided to keep my Pop ressie since it was such a great rate and save my points for another trip next year. So this years points got banked and my plans were finally done.

The People:

Me (the admitted over planner): People are still asking how old I am, but I don't let it bother me.

My step mother (loves to travel): We travel well together, which surprises people and she is surprisingly spry for her age.

The Final Plan:

Pop Century Resort from Oct. 2 - 8
MNSSHP and DIS meet Oct. 5

 

[Poohtigeey]

Wow! It's coming up! You're going to have a great time! I've never stayed at Pop, but everyone likes it!

Oh, by the way, How old are you?

 

[bbangel]

Wow! It's coming up! You're going to have a great time! I've never stayed at Pop, but everyone likes it!

Oh, by the way, How old are you?

I stayed at Pop in December and it was great.

I'm almost 33 and tired of everyone asking me what grade I'm in.

 

[bbangel]

A few minor problems have cropped up along the way.
The biggest headache has been dealing with Magical Express. I set up flights for myself and for my step mother with ME about 35 days to go before the trip. When I still didn't have my tags at about 18 days out, I called ME to see if they had been sent. They had but couldn't be delivered because they didn't have my city and province (not sure why but have since heard this is a common problem). So address completed, they sent them out. I received them pretty quickly about 5 days later. Open them up and discover they only sent tags for me, but with my step mother's flight info.

So another call to ME to find out what went wrong. They are showing the right room ressie info but not the right flight info. So correct all that. So they should now have us in the system correctly. Only problem is that it is too late to get tags to my step mother who lives in another province.

The plan is to collect our luggage ourselves (bonus this way we won't have to wait 3 hours for it to appear) and then head to the ME desk. Here's hoping it all goes smoothly from now on.

 

[bbangel]

So my first day was almost all travel.

I had to get up at 3:30 and be on the way to the airport by 4:00 am. My flight to Seattle left at 6:30 and was thankfully on time. The gate scheduling gods smiled down upon me and my connecting flight was only a few gates away. I had been anticipating a mad dash across the airport to make my flight to Orlando. Instead I had a few minutes to buy a water and bagel as a snack on the flight. While I was waiting for the flight to be called, I met a few people in the waiting area. One couple had just got married and were heading for their Disneymoon. They ended up sitting in my row on the way down. We had fun talking about all our plans so the flight didn't seem that long (even though is was 5 and a half hours).

We finally made it to Orlando only a few minutes late (it seemed like we circled the airport for a long time though). I had to go grab my bags and then find my stepmother who was supposed to arrive a few minutes after me. She made it to the Magical Express counter first because it took forever for my bag to come out. And my flight was sharing a carousel with a flight from San Juan and a rowdy group of teens had to push to the front even though their bags weren't coming out yet. I didn't let it ruin the excitement of almost being in Disney!

So I found my stepmother and we checked in for ME. There was no line and they had held the Pop Century bus for us. Not sure how the two or three families already on the bus felt about that, or how long they had been waiting.

Check in at Pop was also smooth. I was using Disney gift cards to pay for my room (I had ordered them through Sunshine Rewards!) It took a minute for the Cast Member to enter the numbers and then we were all paid. And I still had money left over - bonus! We ended up in Building 1, which is in the 50's and has Lady as the icon.

We decided to change (both of us came from colder areas and definately weren't dressed for the hot, humid Florida weather), and unpack. We took a bit of a walk around the resort and then had dinner in the cafeteria. Even though I had stayed there in December I don't think we ever ate dinner there since we were on the dining plan. Both of us enjoyed our meals. We took another short walk by the lake after dinner and then went back to the room. We watched House (one of my favourite shows) and then went to sleep.

 

[stitchlover]

Hope you are having a wonderful time! I have to say I really liked the food court at All Star Movies better than POFQ. Keep us posted and have a great time!

 

[bbangel]

We started our morning bright and early by having breakfast in the room. Both of us had various breakfast bars and neither of us is a large breakfast eater.

By 8:00 we were headed to the Epcot bus stop and managed to make it there for the rope drop ceremony. We then went with the majority of the crowd to Soarin'. By the time we walked through the line there was no wait to ride and we managed to get the front row. Other than my stepmother thinking she might fall out we both enjoyed.

We took advantage of being in the Land to ride Living with the land. I love the Mickey pumpkins and seeing the neat growing systems.

After that we spent some time with Nemo in the Seas before heading over to do Test Track. We grabbed a fast pass for that and then went through Innoventions. I though my stepmother was going to freak out on the outside part of Test Track. The look on her face in the ride picture was very telling! We passed on Mission Space as it makes me ill.

We were both getting a little hungry so decided to head to thw World Showcase and the Food and Wine booths. We ate pierogies and sausage at Poland. Just enough to take the edge off.

After eating we decided to take a break back at the hotel for a bit. Given the heat in the middle of the day this is the best thing we did every day. Gave us a chance to rest our feet and eyes, not to mention picking up a frozen coke with our resort mugs!

We headed over to the Magic Kingdom at about 3 pm. Main Street looks great with all the decorations.

We caught Suzy and Perla setting up just as we came in the park and got a great photo.

I was expecting it to be crowded but almost everything was a walk on. We managed to ride everything in Adventure Land and Fanasyland, plus do a good portion of Tomorrow Land. We also did some character photos in Toon Town. At some point we had dinner at Cosmic Rays and then we found a spot for Spectro Magic and then the fireworks, which were both great as usual.
After the fireworks we waited a bit for the crowds to clear and then headed for the bus. They were doing a pretty good job of managing the closing crowds.

 

[bbangel]

We were up early again even though we had had a bit of a late night. This morning we were headed to the Magic Kingdom. After a quick bite in the room, off we went to the bus. Lots of people were heading to MK because of early hours. Because of that we had to wait for a second bus, but it came pretty quickly. We found they were generally on top of the crowd and bus situation.

Upon entering we found Mary Poppins and Bert strolling down Main Street. They just had time for a quick picture.

We headed into Fantasyland and did our favourite rides again and then hit Tomorrowland for a few rides there. We spotted Stitch and got a photo with him before heading over to the opening of Toon Town. We got pictures with the big cheese and the princesses and then left the crowds of little people to find Captain Jack!

He was wonderful as usual. Too bad there was no meet and greet for him!

We did some other things over there I'm sure although don't ask me what as my memory is fuzzy. Then we had lunch at Pecos Bills before heading back to the resort for our afternoon break. More frozen coke, yummmmm.

In a reverse of Day Two we then headed to Epcot for the afternoon. We were tackling the World Showcase and had a blast. We met Mary Poppins in the UK, the Beast in France, Jasmine and Aladdin in Morocco, and Snow White in Germany. We also checked out all the Food and Wine booths but nothing appealed enough to try. Edmonton has a great international festival the first weekend of August and the food is much better there!

We ended up having dinner at the cafe in Morocco. I love their lamb and chicken platter.

We kind of poked our way around the countries, from Canada to Mexico. We got a bit of the music from the Family Stone concert. We looked in some of the stores and almost gagged to death on the noxious perfume in Norway. That stuff is foul and to get out of Maelstrom you have to pass through that store. Yuck!

When we were finished with all our poking around we still had more than an hour to go before Illuminations. I had never managed to see it when I was there last time so I was determined to hold out. We put our ponchos down on the ground and held a spot near Mexico. We got to witness a special agent looking guy get dropped off from an inflatable boat and then later return to the boat. Kind of freaked a few people out which was funny. We mainly just did some people watching which is always fun at Disney.

Illuminations is okay. I wouldn't wait that long for it again. After the show we headed with all the other masses of people for the exit. We detoured through the Mouse Gear store to allow the lines to clear a little.

 

[lynn71092]

I really like your report, and the pictures are great.
Pop Century is my favorite resort!!
We might have been there around the same time, we were there from
Oct. 5th-9th.

 

[bbangel]

I really like your report, and the pictures are great.
Pop Century is my favorite resort!!
We might have been there around the same time, we were there from
Oct. 5th-9th.

Which building were you in? We may have passed each other and not even known it!

 

[lynn71092]

Actually this was the 1st time we did not stay at a Value, we stood at the Royal Plaza in DTD because I got such a great rate from Mousesavers and while it was a very nice hotel with a very nice staff, it just wasn't "Disney".
My sister kept saying she wanted to go back to the Pop.

 

[tinkerbell87512]

Yay I finally found your TR!!! Love all your pictures! Thats so exciting that you are a DVC owner now you must be very excited. Can't wait to read more

 

[bbangel]

Yay I finally found your TR!!! Love all your pictures! Thats so exciting that you are a DVC owner now you must be very excited. Can't wait to read more

Welcome! I was hidden on the pre trip board for awhile.

I'm completely excited about being a DVC owner. I just wish airfare from here was cheaper!

 

[bbangel]

Today I was really excited because that evening I was going to Mickey's Not so Scary Halloween Party and meeting a group of people from the DIS.

But first, we were headed to Animal Kingdom for the morning. We again had breakfast in the room, and then headed for the bus.

The talking palm tree was out entertaining the crowds waiting for the gate to open. People's reactions to this thing were priceless.

We were right at the front of the rope drop, but as if the rain took a cue from the Cast Members, it started raining as soon as they let us in the gates. It let up enough by show time that it went ahead but I didn't want to use my camera in the rain, so my perfect position was wasted

We did the safari first thing and saw lots of animals. My favourites were the giraffes, which hadn't been out at all on my first trip.

After the safari we headed for Camp Minnie Mickey, where we got photos with Mickey, Minnie, Goofy and Donald. We finished that up in time for the first performance of Festival of the Lion King. I love this show! The acrobats/monkeys are amazing.

After the show we left for Downtown Disney, with a short detour to visit the Animal Kingdom Lodge. Not my kind of resort but I can see why it appeals to people. We hit the key spots for shopping: World of Disney, the Christmas store, Goofy's Candy store etc. Then back to Pop for a rest, and of course more frozen coke!

 

[Fairy_Tale_Bride]

I'm here!
FINALLY!

I just love reading all of our Trip Reports!
It's so much fun reading everyone's experiences, especially when you know everyone now!

I am so glad you were able to come to the DIS Dinner and Party! We had such a blast! I can't believe we may be doing it again! I can't wait!

That's so great that you are a DVC member now! I hope to be one day!

I still haven't seen the talking plam tree at AK! I think that would be quite the sight to see!

 

[bbangel]

After the afternoon break at the hotel it was time for me to head to my DIS dinner meet at Liberty Tree Tavern. I went a bit early and rode the train around the park. I love the train! I got a lot of funny looks because I already had my meet shirt and my lovely lime green wig on. Many people made comments on my hair. My favourite was a question "Did Tinkerbelle do that to your hair?"

It didn't take long for the group to find one another at the LTT. I wonder why? Here are a few of the girls (Cheryl, Lindsey, Carol, Leslie and Jen) waiting for our seating.

Soon Minnie, Chip, Dale, Pluto and Goofy came out to welcome everyone to dinner. Their costumes are so cute!

We had a group of 12 people in two long tables near the back. It was the perfect location since the characters left that way so we had lots of time for all our photos. A lot of the CM's had haunted mansionesque makeup on and looked really cool.

The dinner itself was so yummy. Except for the green beans. I'm allergic to beans and hate them. But the meat and stuffing and mashed potatoes and mac and cheese were all really good. Only problem was it was hard to eat things while they were hot since the characters kept coming! The apple cobbler and ice cream for dessert was so good. It reminded me of going to my grandma's.

We were a pretty loud group and I did feel a little sorry for the people around us and our waitress. Especially when we all asked for separate bills at the end. She was a trooper though.

For more pictures, check out our DIS Meet thread or Lindsay's (Fairy_tale_bride) awesome trip report.

After the dinner the group split up a little. I went with four of the girls (Lindsey, Cheryl, Jen and Carol) to the front of the park, where we got our wristbands and treat bags for the party. They all needed lockers to store stuff as they had ordered a candy cake and had been to the Bibbity Bobbity Boutique before dinner. It was around this time that it became clear that the rain was not going to go away. We were all a little sad knowing that many of the party activities would likely be cancelled. We hung around the shops on mainstreet until close to 7 when we were meeting a big group of DISsers at the Haunted Mansion.

This was a perfect way to start off the party! Walking through the line we spotted the widow bride.

She looked so cool!

After the ride the group split up again. More on our adventures later.

I highly recommend meeting up with people you've been chatting with for awhile. It was such fun to meet people, and put names and faces together. I don't think I've laughed that much in years! We had so much fun we are tryiing to arrange another get together in May!