Travel dates: 9/4 – 9/10, 2008
Travel method: United Airlines, Disney’s Magical Express, Payless Car Rental
Resort: Port Orleans - Riverside
Accommodations: We've requested a king, but I'll let you know after the trip.
Ages Represented in Group: Dyan (37), Jeff (39)
Disney Resort Experience Represented in Group: Jeff (None), Dyan (1983, Offsite)
Cast of characters: Dyan (Wife), Jeff (Hubby)

Comments:
6-Day Park Hopper w/Free Dining Plan

This is a trip to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary and my 40th birthday. Grandparents will be watching the kids for a week so that we can go on our 2nd honeymoon.

This trip has been talked about since before we were married and we got the Disney Visa card because of it. In the mean time, we survived some marital strife and were blessed with three wonderful children (4 ˝ girl & 14 mo. B/G twins). When Dyan’s parents offered to watch the kids so that we could go this year we jumped at the chance and started planning in June 2008. We were able to accumulate over 900 Disney Dream Reward Dollars to use for this trip. We also had accumulated enough frequent flier miles to cover the air fare.

We decided to rent a car after reading several of these sites, and after we realized that parking is free for Disney resort guests :). We felt it was worth spending $125 for the car to save time and have the convenience. We also have some early morning activities planned.

We have basically planned on spending an entire day in Animal Kingdom & Hollywood Studios, two days in EPCOT, and almost a day in the Magic Kingdom (since we live within 3 hours of Disneyland & have both been there several times). We also will be going to Kennedy Space Center on 9/8 and my wonderful wife bought me a Richard Petty Driving Experience for my birthday which will be on 9/5 :D. ADVICE: There is a 20% AAA discount for the Richard Petty Experience.

Here’s our ADR’s:
9/4: None
9/5: None
9/6: Narcoossee’s
9/7: California Grill
9/8: Boma for breakfast & Chefs de France for dinner
9/9: Brown Derby w/Fantasmic
9/10: Coral Reef or Chef Mickey’s for lunch (Have ADR for both, haven’t decided where yet)

The resort and restaurants have been notified that we are there for the birthday & anniversary. We plan on reminding them though. We hope to get a nice view of fireworks from the California Grill & Narcoossee's if it's available.

Can’t believe it's almost here. Check back later for a full report!

Thanks to everyone who contributes to this site. It has been extremely helpful!

What a terrific trip! Hope you have a WONDERFUL 2nd honeymoon. Looking forward to the TR on the "flip side."

Great Pick Narcoussee {?} Try & Get Their 1 Hour Early
If Possible & Get A Adult Bev Of Your Choice & Pull Up A Chair In The Lobby & People Watch & Listen To The Piano
Player & The Little Band On The 2nd Floor Ah !! Wish I Was Their Right Now.but Wait! I Will Be In T - 18 Working Days & Counting :)

OH !!! AND IF YOU HAVE A CHANCE, SEE MY BUDDY BOB JACKSON IN THE RIVER ROOST LOUNGE . HE IS A HOOT & TELL HIM THAT DUSTY WILL SEE HIM ON SAT 9/13. :p

Day 1 - Thu. Sept. 4
After a night of very little sleep because of the excitement of going, we woke up around 3:30 am (just before the alarm went off), to catch our 6:00 am flight from the west coast. All of our flights were on time and the trip was uneventful. At least waking up that early helped a little with the jet lag. We arrived at MCO around 5:30 pm.

One of the many changes we made from the Pre-Trip Report was that we decided to rent the car from Alamo. I found a better deal from Costco.com, and Alamo is in the terminal instead of off-site like Payless. I had also read on some of these board that there was a high level of dissatisfaction with Payless. So, our rental was $88.28, I didn't have to ride a shuttle to the lot, and I was able to drop it off at the Disney Car Care Center. Easy decision to change. I drove to POR while DW rode ME with our luggage.

One comment about driving on Disney Property. I borrowed my dad's GPS and I was glad I did. Renting one from Alamo would have cost $12.95/day. It was really helpful though and I don't know if I'd try and drive there w/o one again. The biggest confusion and difficulty I had was that if you miss your exit, it may be another 3-5 miles before you can turn around. It got better after a few days. Back to our report...

DW was almost done checking in when I arrived at POR. Let me just say how beautiful the grounds are :D. We thoroughly enjoyed our time here and could have easily spent the entire week w/o leaving. The CM was doing her first check in so it took a little while partly beacuse of her heavy accent. She was very nice though and helpful. She wished us a happy anniversary and me a happy birthday as we headed off. We were given a room in Magnolia Bend on the 2nd floor that faced the river. Our buliding was a short walk across the bridge to the main office and large pool on Old Man Island. It was also a short walk to the bus stop. Since we had a rental car we only used the bus once from DTD after we rode the boat there.

After we dropped our carry-ons in the room, we freshened up and headed for MK. I've read about how impressive it is to see MK as you approach on the ferry and it lived up to expectations :eek:. It was dusk and the castle was starting to light up. We also had wonderful views of DCR and DGFR.

It was around 8:00 pm and neither of us realized that the last time we really ate was around 11:00 am. I was craving noodles but sadly the Terrace Noodle Station was closed :confused:, so we settled on Cosmic Rays where we shared the rib & chicken platter. One counter service credit down, 11 to go.

The food was very good. I'm a sucker for rotisserie chicken and this was excellent. Juicy and flavorful. I had eaten ribs two other times in the week before we got here, and these were by far the best. A good BBQ flavor and not too spicy. We followed another tip we found on the internet and used the fixin' bar to make a salad to go with dinner also.

We finished dinner and headed for Space Mountain where the wait was only 10 minutes. I assume that since we were in between TS Hannah and hurricane Ike, attendence was down. It was interesting to see the difference between SM here and at DL.

After we rode on SM, we had a good laugh at the Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor :D. This was one of our favorite attractions that we saw all week and we didn't even have our kids with us. I loved how the cartoons are able to interact and improvise with the audience.

We saw that the Haunted Mansion was "newly updated" so I wanted to get on before the park closed at 10:00 pm. Unfortunately, what we found was the same old Hanuted Mansion that we've seen several times at DL :rolleyes:. Oh well, you can't win them all. Wishes was in progress as we exited, and I had a sense of deja vu as I remembered exiting the Haunted Mansion as fireworks were starting at DL before. We watched wishes from the lake area and then headed for the ferry boat with everyone else. I'd hate to see what it's like when the park is busy.

We stopped for snacks at the Riverside Mill before heading to the room. DW grabbed a yogurt and fruit for breakfast the next day. I had a 3-scoop, hot fudge sundae :p. 3 snack credits used.

Our luggage was at the room when we got there so we unpacked and hit the sack, hopeful that the weather would hold up enough for me to drive the race car tomorrow.

Great first day! That was a lot packed in there, my friend! Sounds perfect to me--