Zis Way! A French Quarter Honeymoon

Greysamaze

Earning My Ears
Joined
Jul 8, 2010
Messages
30
Hello and welcome - or welcome back to some of you!

My name’s Georgia, and this will be my second trip report, but hopefully the first one I finish!

You may be coming here from my first trip report about our trip in April of 2023, where Harriet and I got engaged. Well, I’m pleased to tell you that this will be our honeymoon TR!

For those of you who are new, I will introduce us.

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Hello, I’m Georgia and I’m the author of this TR. I’m 28 and I teach in a prison. I was a Disney kid growing up, visiting DLP, WDW, and going on several Disney Cruises. As an adult I visited DCA and worked for DCL as a Youth Activities Counselor on the Disney Magic. Harriet is 27 and works at an outdoor activity centre. We live together with our three cats; Maggie, Amber and Simon.

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My (at time of writing) fiance was not a Disney kid, but was introduced to it via me. After my contract with DCL ended in 2019 we visited WDW together for the first time and since then she has been hooked. We visited WDW again in 2023 (my previous, unfinished TR) where I proposed, and have been yearning to get back to the magic ever since. We knew pretty much right away that our honeymoon would be featuring some kind of Disney trip, and so here we are!

We get married on September 6th, with a reception the following week, and fly to Orlando on September 16th. We are flying with Virgin Atlantic in Premium as a wedding treat to ourselves, and should be landing around 1pm. We are staying at POFQ for sixteen (16!!!!!!!) nights. We have the 14 day parkhopper pass with the QSDP, and have booked MNSSHP. We’ve also got two table services booked - Hoop Dee Doo Revue and Crystal Palace breakfast.

We’ve also just had our DAS registration call which I wanted to talk about as I know many people have negative experiences with this process. Our experience was faultless.

During our first trip we didn’t have DAS, but on our second we did. I detailed in my past TR our need for it; Harriet’s autism and ADHD, and how much it enhanced our second trip. However, between our previous trip and this one the DAS pass has changed drastically and we are led to believe it is now much harder to get one. We have only really read negative experiences of trying to get DAS passes, and Harriet was essentially at the point where she didn’t even want to try for one as she believed it would be a 2 hour call in which she would be grilled about her lived experiences and ultimately told no.

I managed to convince her to try just once (at the suggestion of trying a second and third time if we were denied, I was firmly told no), and I’m so glad I did. First I had to agree to the terms and conditions, then speak to a bot to confirm our identity. Almost immediately the cast member joined our call and introduced herself. I answered one of the bot questions wrong (I thought they were asking for Harriet’s middle name, when they were actually asking for my name) which became a source of humour throughout the call. I spoke to the cast member like she was a human; I didn’t go in with any expectations or ambitions to do what it takes to be granted a DAS pass. I just wanted to be honest about Harriet’s experience.

Harriet did not speak throughout the whole call, apart from right at the end to verify her identity.

The cast member started by asking what the concerns were about Harriet waiting in line. I spoke about the differing experiences between our first and second trips, and then explained the difficulties for Harriet with keeping her body still for long periods of time, the unpredictability of queues, and the forced proximity with strangers.

She then asked if Harriet had any special arrangements, either at work or at school as a kid. I explained that we have special arrangements for our airport/flight, and the deal with Harriet’s current job.

That was all it took.

The cast member said she wanted to go ahead and get us registered, and that she needed to verify Harriet’s identity, as we were doing the call from my MDE account. She took a photo of Harriet, and we were done! She also sent us two documents; one about the sensory experiences guests can expect to experience at WDW, and an accessibility planning guide. The call ended. Two questions asked.

I want to stress that work did go into this; I wrote a whole three-page letter detailing exactly what Harriet’s needs were, why she should have the DAS pass, why alternatives wouldn’t work, and the benefits it would bring to our honeymoon overall. There was a lot of emotive language and I was planning on having to play the honeymoon card over and over in an attempt to rack up some points. In the end, I didn’t even mention that it was our honeymoon, or indeed that we were even a couple! She was clearly there for the facts, and so I just presented them as-is. This approach worked for us.

Obviously I think this is hugely dependent upon the cast member you get, but I think having the points written out in note form (I’d read that some cast members are not receptive to having letters/essays read out in place of an interview), was a massive help.

My hope is that sharing our story will inspire those who are uncertain/discouraged from applying for DAS to do it. There are people out there who still care and want to help. It isn’t always as bleak as it is made out to be online - or everyone else’s experiences aren’t necessarily going to be yours!

That’s about all I have for my introduction - if you would like a more thorough one I would recommend hopping over to my first TR!

See you soon for our travel day.

(A/N: all of this was written before our trip - it's now two days after we got back and I am beginning to write up my notes. I'll do it as quickly as I can!)
 

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