Krista Fulkerson - August 2003

Time of Year: Summer
Travel Method: Plane, shuttle
Resort: WL
Accommodations: Standard Room
Ages Represented in Group: Adult
WDW Experience Represented in Group: Veteran
Comments: A casual joke about making a weekend trip to Walt Disney World for the Mission: Space previews planted a seed in Krista's mind that couldn't be denied. As a result we get her first trip report for MousePlanet, and it is a good one.

Krista Fulkerson -- August 2003 -- Walt Disney World (WL)

Characters:

Stephen—26, turning 27 this trip, mechanical engineer, Disney veteran (5th trip)
Krista—25, credit/accounting assistant, Disney veteran, trip reporter (6th trip)
Why write a trip report? There are several reasons. The first is that I really enjoy other trip reports. I feel like I know many of the repeat reporters because I’ve read so many of their trip reports! By reading the reports, I’m getting my “Disney fix”, which is very important on some days! ? My second reason is that it’s important to me to remember every aspect of our trips. Stephen attempted to do a trip report on our last trip in February, he started, but never finished. So this trip I’m taking over the responsibility so that it might get finished! Maybe I’ll inspire him to finish that report, and some of you can read our multiple reports and feel like you know me as much as I feel like I know you!

How this trip came about, or how we squeezed 3 trips to WDW in 1 year. ? As mentioned above, our last trip to WDW was in February, we stayed at the Polynesian and Boardwalk Villas—we had the best time, it was awesome. We already had a trip planned for December with my parents and sister, Jessica, staying at the Boardwalk Villas, 2 trips in one year, should be enough, right???

I came home from work one day in June and in our mailbox was a post card for the Mission: Space preview for annual pass holders the first weekend in August. When Stephen got home from work, I showed him, we laughed and said wouldn’t that be great to go to Disney World for a weekend? After a few minutes of laughing, we looked at each other with an “I wonder” look. Could we do 3 trips in 1 year? Let’s try! The first thing we did was get on mousesavers.com to see if there were any AP rates that weekend. We found that there were some incredible rates: $100 for Wilderness Lodge and Animal Kingdom Lodge and $84 for Caribbean Beach and Coronado Springs. We really wanted to stay at the Wilderness Lodge after seeing it in February and falling in love with it. Stephen called to check availability, we were pretty sure that the Lodge would be booked, it was only a month and a half out and it was the middle of the Fairytale Package. To our surprise, there was availability for the dates we needed.

The next and final hurdle would be airfare. We already decided that we weren’t going to pay more than $170 a ticket, we were pretty sure our plans would end right here. We got on expedia.com to check rates. We are fortunate to live in Cincinnati, our rates are outrageous at Cincinnati International Airport (CVG), but we live within close driving distance to 5 other airports: Dayton, Columbus, Indianapolis, Lexington, and Louisville, we can usually find pretty low airfares at one of those airports. We started playing with different airports as well as different dates; we finally came up with flying out of Indianapolis (IND) on Thursday the 31st at 6:30 am and landing in Orlando at 11:45 for only $130 flying Delta. We took that as a sign that we were meant to go to WDW, so we logged onto Delta.com and bought 2 plane tickets. Now all we have to do is wait and wait and read trip report and get on discussion boards and wait.

Passes: We both have annual passes that were activated in February, so we’re covered there. I like someone’s quote on the disboards (I’m sorry I don’t remember who it was), but the quote is “who says AP’s save you money?”

Meals: We like to eat 1 nice meal a day, usually dinner. Our PS’s this time are: ‘Ohana’s--dinner 7/31, San Angel Inn—lunch 8/1, Chef Mickey’s—dinner 8/1, Boma’s—dinner 8/2, Le Cellier (my favorite ?)—dinner 8/3, Kona Café—breakfast 8/4, Cinderella’s—lunch 8/4. Looks pretty good to me! I’m getting hungry just thinking about it! ?

General Plans:
Thursday—Arrive in WDW around 12:30, check-in, Magic Kingdom in the afternoon, dinner at Ohana’s, Epcot for Illuminations.
Friday: Epcot, lunch at San Angel Inn, dinner at Chef Mickey’s, E-ride night at MK
Saturday: Animal Kingdom, dinner at Boma’s, Fantasmic at MGM
Sunday: MGM, dinner at Le Cellier, Illuminations
Monday (Stephen’s birthday!): breakfast at Kona Café, MK, lunch at CRT, leave for home ?

Thursday July 31st
Plan: Arrive in WDW around 12:30, check-in, Magic Kingdom in the afternoon, dinner at Ohana’s, Epcot for Illuminations.

Reality: The alarm went off at 3 am after a very sleepless night. Stephen and I both jumped out of bed. We’re going to Disney World!! After quick showers and throwing last minute items in the suitcase, we left our apartment at 3:30. The drive to Indy was pretty boring, we talked the whole way about what we were going to do and how excited we were. We finally arrived at the Indy airport at 6:00 (5:00 central time). The flight to Atlanta and then to Orlando were pretty basic flights. Nothing exciting, which is how I like to fly!!

We met our Tiffany Towne Car driver, Shirley, she was fantasic. We’re definitely going to request her when we come back in December with my family. The drive to Disney was good, it was great to be back “home”. There’s nothing like driving under that Disney World sign—what an awesome feeling! We drove up to the Wilderness Lodge, what a magnificent resort! It really does feel like you’re in the Pacific Northwest with all the pine trees. My favorite were the moose made out of sticks on the right hand side of the road. Check them out, they are adorable.

I can’t describe to you how beautiful the lobby is. Stephen and I were blown away by it everytime we walked in the lobby. It is unbelievable with the hardwood floors and the towering totem poles, my favorite is the massive fireplace which represents the geographic layers of the Grand Canyon. Once we stopped googling over the lobby, we went to check-in. There was a small line at check-in, we waited maybe 5 minutes. We didn’t mind, it gave us time to check out the lobby some more. Is it just us, or is everyone absolutely giddy on their first day of vacation?? ?

The CM (cast member) who checked us in was great, I believe her name was Zala, she gave us a complimentary upgrade to a courtyard room, king bed (we had booked a standard room). We have always had great luck with getting rooms with excellent views, this one did not disappoint, but I’m getting ahead of myself, our room was not ready. Since our room wasn’t going to be ready for a couple of hours, it was off to the Magic Kingdom! I have been waiting for this moment since we left 5 ½ months ago. We stopped at Bell Services to get into our luggage, I was wearing sandals and I wanted my gym shoes and Stephen wanted sunscreen. Once the shoes were changed and we were greased up, it was back through the lobby and out to the boat dock. The boat came quickly and we were off to the Magic Kingdom. I know the kids sitting across from us thought I was crazy because I was singing along with songs being played over the speaker, but I didn’t care, I was in Walt Disney World on the way to the Magic Kingdom, sitting next to my husband who loves Disney as much as I do. What could be better?

The boat docked at the MK, we were through security on Main Street within a matter of moments. I stopped on Main Street and just took it all in, the fresh popped popcorn, the excitement of the children there, our own happiness. It was a great feeling! The first order was to get a gigantic Coke, I love Coca-Cola, it is the best thing in the world to me, but I try not to drink too much of it. Well, I promised myself that I was going to get a Coke and drink Coke all weekend long and not feel bad about it. It’s vacation, right?? Stephen and I were both a little hungry, but not starving and we didn’t want to eat a lot and ruin our dinner at ‘Ohana’s that night, so we decided to split the large hot dog from Casey’s—by the way, Casey’s is the ONLY place in the entire world (real world, not Disney) where I will eat hot dogs. They are that good. The hot dog and 2 medium Cokes were about $8 I think. (I’m trying to keep track of food expenses, not so much for us, but for other people who need to know what to budget for food.) We found a place to eat our food, of course all the tables in the shade were gone and it was super hot, but it didn’t matter, we were sitting on Main Street, looking at Cinderella Castle, and listening to the piano player at Casey’s play songs from “Mary Poppins”—I had to call my Mom and rub it in!! ?

After we finished eating, we decided to take a walk and see what attractions had short lines. Stephen and I are not commando tourers, we usually get up early, get to the park at opening, ride the big rides and then do the smaller rides. We don’t run through the parks or stand in super long lines, we are both very relaxed and laid-back people. Having AP’s and having the luxury of going to WDW at least once a year, lets us have a relaxing vacation. Using the tip board on Main Street, we saw that Pirates of the Caribbean had a pretty short line at 15 minutes, it was perfect since that’s one of our favorite rides. We walked over to Adventureland and got in line, both sides were open, we took the right side and waited less than the posted time. I was amazed at how many people were here, it was incredible, everywhere you turned, there was a crowd. We usually go to WDW in the off season, we haven’t been in the summertime in years, not since we were kids and came with our parents.

After Pirates, we raced through Adventureland and took the path to cut across to Liberty Square, trying to beat the parade and get to the Haunted Mansion. Have I mentioned how hot it was today? Scorching! It was so hot, it almost made you sick to be out in the heat for long periods of time. Welcome to Florida in July!! ? The Haunted Mansion was great like always, another classic Disney ride. When we walked out of the Haunted Mansion, we noticed that the sky looked threatening—very threatening. We decided to make a run for it and try to get out of the park and back to the Wilderness Lodge, it was after 3:00 and our room would be ready. I have never left the Magic Kingdom so quickly in my entire life. We didn’t run, we just power walked, very fast. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to walk fast up Main Street, dodging strollers and the trolley tracks? I thought for sure one of us was going to sprain an ankle. That would put a damper on the vacation.

We made it out of the Magic Kingdom safely and in one piece, we walked down to the resort boat dock and waited a few minutes for a boat to come. As soon as we loaded the boat and sat down on the benches, the sky opened up. It was pouring—I was so glad that we made it to the boats and we were on our way to our room and not standing in line somewhere. Once we docked at the WL, we and everyone else, took off running, the rain was coming down in huge drops. When we were on the boat, we called and got our room number, so we went straight up to it. We were in room #4037, looking over the swimming pool and Bay Lake. As soon as we walked in, we both fell in love. What a great room! Like I said earlier, we were in a king size bed, there was a bed spread that looked like a quilt—very cute. The room also had an armoir that had bears and mountains eched into it, a table with 2 chairs, and another chair with an ottoman. The bathroom had outside sinks, a double bowl which was very helpful in the morning and the infamous turbo toilets! It was a very nice room, I would definitely stay here again.

We took a break for a couple of hours, we watched the Disney Tip Channel, I read a magazine, and I think we took a nap. We got up around 5:00 to get ready for our dinner at ‘Ohana’s. We took the boat over to the Magic Kingdom and then took the resort monorail over to the Poly. That first walk in was like heaven—I love the way the Polynesian smells, I can’t quite put my finger on what exactly it is, but every time I walk into the Great Ceremonial House (GCH), I have to take a deep breath! We got a pager and sat in chairs across from the bar, we could see the rain from out the windows (yes, it was STILL raining), smell the wonderful food from ‘Ohana’s and watched the bartender mix up some interesting looking concoctions. This was great! Our pager went off and we went to meet our “Cousin” April. For those who have never been to ‘Ohana’s, that doesn’t make much sense. ‘Ohana means family (and family means nobody gets left behind or forgotten, yeah—sorry, I couldn’t resist!! ? ) and every one at the restaurant is your family for the night, you’re all “cousins”. Anyway, our “cousin” April took us to our table, we were looking over the Volcano Pool, the Seven Seas Lagoon,and we could see Cinderella Castle—a perfect table. But enough about the view, let the feasting begin! Our waitress (Stephanie) brought out the appetizers and we dug in, everything is served family-style on a lazy Susan, they bring out to you honey-coriander chicken wings (my favorite and I don’t even like wings), vegetable stir fry, brown rice, a salad with honey lime dressing, shrimp and vegetable wontons, and 3 dipping sauces—barbeque, pineapple, and peanut. Once you’ve had your appetizers for a few minutes, they start bringing the meat on these huge skewers that have been cooked over an open fire pit in the front-center of the restaurant. The meat you get is steak, tiger shrimp (Stephen’s favorite), pork and turkey (my favorite). Once you’ve eaten all the meat and appetizers you can handle, they bring out dessert, chunks of pineapple with caramel sauce along with a dessert menu in case you want more than pineapple. I am embarrased as to how fast and how much food we ate. But we were starving and the food there is SO good, it’s my second favorite restaurant, next to Le Cellier. The dinner was about $50 before tip.

After eating, we left ‘Ohana’s and went downstairs to walk around the GCH and look at the shops, there were a ton of people there, I think a cruise group had just gotten in. After walking around, we went back up to the monorail to go over to Epcot to watch Illuminations. When we got to the station, we asked if we could ride in the front seat, they told us to have a seat on the “secret” purple bench. The ride into Epcot in the front was beautiful, the sun had just set, so it was still light out, Future World (FW) and Space Ship Earth were twinkling, the only thing that wasn’t pefect was the rain drips on the windshield of the monorail. At least the rain had lightened up, it was barely more than a sprinkle. But the time we got into Epcot, and back to World Showcase (WS), it was almost 9:00, so we didn’t have time to walk around, we decided to just watch Illuminations from the front of WS, we usually watch it from the lower plaza by Great Britain. This was actually a really good place to watch Illuminations from, not as great as our “usual”, but it was pretty good. We left after Illuminations was over, made it back to a very packed bus to go “home”.

After we got back to the WL, we decided to take a quick swim, it felt so good, the water felt like bath water, it was so warm and it felt so nice on our tired legs. Stephen swam for a while and I just floated in the water. We stayed at the pool for about an hour, after we were finished, we went back to our room, each took a shower and we were in bed by midnight.

Friday, August 1st
Plan: Epcot, lunch at San Angel Inn, dinner at Chef Mickey’s, E-ride night at MK

Reality: Mickey woke us up around 7:30, we got up and looked outside—it was beautiful, maybe we would get lucky with weather today! We each took a shower and got ready, since I just pulled my hair back in a pony tail, I didn’t spend much time really doing it. I usually straighten my hair with a straightener/flat iron, but I’m on vacation! Since beauty treatments were minimal, I was ready before Stephen—trust me, that’s a first. I sat outside and read the Bible and watched people get ready for a day of fun. It was a very relaxing way to start the morning, I wish every morning could be like that!

We left the room a little after 8:00, I think maybe 8:20, we walked down to through the lobby and to the bus stop. This was our first experience with the busses at WL, to be completely honest, this is the one and only thing I don’t like about the hotel. The busses took a while to come, over the weekend, we usually waited about 20 minutes. Once the bus came and we got on, we had to drive over to Fort Wilderness and pick up people there, it took probably a half an hour to do that. I know Disney provides transportation as a courtesy to their guests, and I appreciate it, I’m not really complaining, it was frustrating to take out all that extra time. Okay, I’m finished complaining. ?

We made it to Epcot right at opening, we got through security and ticketing and walked toward Mission: Space, the whole reason we planned this trip. As we passed Test Track, Stephen ran over and got us fast passes for later on (I think they were for 11:00)

Once we got our fast passes, we headed over to Mission: Space for the annual pass preview, there were cast members there checking for annual passes and they had all but one entrance blocked. This ride was amazing, I won’t say too much, I don’t want to spoil it, but Stephen and I both thought it was a lot of fun. Some people have been saying that they got motion sickness on the ride, the main thing you need to remember to do is look at the screen and not turn your head, then the ride won’t make you sick. Also, if you are claustrophobic, I would suggest that you not ride, the seats are narrow and there is a screen that comes down and around you, you have maybe 6 inches between your body and the screen. It’s also fairly dark in the 4-person pod, not pitch black, it’s like sitting in a dark movie theatre with the glow from the monitor. All in all it was a great ride, take off was my favorite, very thrilling, I also liked the negative G’s you feel as you enter “space”; you really do feel weightless. It’s an incredible ride, well worth the trip down. ?

After our adventures in space, we were both hungry (we didn’t want to eat before riding Mission: Space), so we sat down by the Wonders of Life pavaillion and ate granola bars. We headed over to Spaceship Earth, my favorite ride at Epcot, there was a little bit of a line, welcome to Disney World in the summer! We made it through the line and got on Spaceship Earth, for some reason, this ride makes me so sleepy, I don’t know if it’s Jeremy Iron’s soothing voice or being in the dark, but whatever it is, it is so relaxing. I spent the next hour yawing! ? After riding Spaceship Earth, we went over to Test Track to turn in our fast passes. I think Test Track is an okay ride, but I would never wait more than 20-30 minutes for it. I’m a thrill junkie, but I also like non-thrill rides, so I don’t mind something educational or laid-back, if it’s advertised that way. I don’t come to Disney World to get my thrills, I go to Cedar Point for that, I go to Disney to relax and have fun, and forget about life for a while. So when I heard about a new thrill ride at Disney World, I was excited, but when I rode it for the first time in 2000, I was so disappointed. Test Track is not a thrill ride. Top Thrill Dragster at Cedar Point is a thrill ride (420 feet high, 120 mph—awesome!!). So if you are a thrill junkie, don’t go on Test Track expecting to be thrilled, and you’ll like it much better.

After our ride on Test Track and checking the GM cars (I’m a Saturn driver, we just got the new Ion after trading our SL2 in, I love it!! ?), it was time for my favorite part of Disney World—World Showcase. A funny thing happened on the way to WS, for some reason I started getting really, super hot. I’m still not sure what happened, I like the heat, it usually doesn’t bother me, and it was still early, so it wasn’t that hot yet. But for some reason, the heat hit me like a ton of bricks. I had to take a break, we went to the America pavallion hoping to catch “The American Adventure”, we had just missed the show, and the next show would cut it close to our ps at San Angel Inn at 1:00. We decided to just sit in the American Adventure building for a few minutes to cool off.

We started talking about how good San Angel Inn was going to be and how hungry we were—we decided to walk down there and see if we could get seated an hour early for ps. If we couldn’t, we figured we could ride El Rio de Tiempo and then go over to Norway and ride Maelstrom. We walked over to Mexico (doesn’t that sound so funny?), and luckily we were seated right away. Stephen and I love Mexican food, I know it’s definitely my favorite kind of food. We both really like San Angel Inn as well, I think SAI is the only restaurant we have eaten at every time we’ve been since our honeymoon (that’s 4 trips). We think the food is delicious, the service is great and the ambiance of the restaurant cannot be beat.

Our server (Fernando) was great, almost as soon as we sat down, he brought out chips and salsa and water. I love the chips and salsa at SAI, the chips are very salty and they have soft spots in the them, you can tell that they are made fresh. Again, Stephen and I embarrased ourselves by devouring the whole basket. I promise I’m not a huge eater, but the food at Disney is so good, I just can’t help it. Oh well,it’s vacation, right? ? Shortly after we finished the chips and salsa, our meals came out, Stephen got the plato mexicano and I got the nachos de pollo. They were both delicious, Stephen cleaned his plate, I didn’t but I ate most of it. We were incredibly full, but we had to get dessert, SAI is one of those places where you HAVE to eat dessert no matter how close you come to busting. We got our favorite, chocolate chimi-chonga, it’s a banana wrapped in a tortilla shell, deep fried and served with vanilla ice cream and chocolate and peanut butter sauce. It’s is so good, probably my favorite dessert in WDW. Our lunch came to $40 before tip. Can’t wait to come back again!

After lunch, we decided to stay in the Mexican spirit and ride El Rio de Tiempo, we were the only people on the entire ride, it was kind of cool, it felt like they were running the ride just for us. The ride itself is really not that great, it needs some serious re-doing. The film clips of Mexico are extremely out dated, you can tell they were taken in the early 80’s. I do really like the room where the kids are riding the carousel and the “fireworks” are going off—very It’s A Small World-like. Oh and I LOVE that song, it gets stuck in my head days, months even. It may be worse than “it’s a small world”. ?

After our adventures in Mexico, we left and walked over to the American pavallion for “The American Adventure”. The pre-show for AA is American Vybe, an acapella singing group that sings American classics, they are fantastic. I meant to buy their CD before we left, but I forgot, I guess it’s something to look forward to in December! “The American Adventure” is one of my favorite attractions in WDW, I love history, and I love the music. For some reason every time I see the video clip for “Golden Dreams”, it makes me cry, especially when they show Walt Disney and Jim Henson.

At this point Stephen and I were just about beat, it was probably around 1:30, and the heat was scorching! We were so ready to go back to the hotel, but first we had to make a detour thru Norway for Maelstrom. I remember the first year I came to WDW when I was 11 and I begged to ride Maelstrom, I must have seen it either in a planning video or brochure. Maelstrom was all I wanted to ride at WDW. My parents wouldn’t take me on it, they thought it would be too scary. When I think about that, it makes me crack up—Maelstrom is not scary at all, the troll part might bother a little kid, under 6 or so, but it’s not a scary ride. When I finally got to ride it on my honeymoon 11 years later, it was a huge let down because it’s so tame! After we conquered the Norwegian seas, we headed out (but not before stopping to get a squirt of hand lotion in the shop, I love the lotion there, it makes my skin incredibly soft, but I’m not spending $40 on a 10 ounce bottle of lotion).

On the way out, we stopped at guest services to make a ps for Whispering Canyon that night. We already had one for Chef Mickey’s at 6:30, but we weren’t sure if that’s what we really wanted. We made a ps for I think 6:00 that night, we walked out of Epcot and got on the bus for WL. Once we got back to the hotel, it hit us how incredibly tired we were. I think it’s the combination of the heat, the crowds, and the immense amount of walking that you have to do at WDW. Stephen and I are both young and in pretty good health, we eat relatively heathly and we try to exercise on a regular basis, but you don’t realize what you put your body through on vacation in Disney World. That’s why we are both firm believers in taking breaks, it’ll make the vacation much more enjoyable and fun.

Back in the room, we put on our jammies, cranked up the air and got under the covers. Stephen turned on the television, and I started reading a magazine, but that didn’t last too long, within probably 30 minutes we were both sound asleep. Stupid us didn’t set an alarm, honestly, we didn’t think we needed to, we got back to the room a little after 2:00, we weren’t planning on being anywhere until 6:00—that’s 4 hours. But of course we fell asleep and woke up about 6:15—we must have been exhausted!! ? We missed our PS for Whispering Canyon and had 15 minutes to make it to the Contemporary for Chef Mickey’s—that’s not going to happen. Oh well, we weren’t hungry anyway. We gave ourselves time to wake-up and get dressed for what we were hoping to be the best part of our vacation: E-ride night and the Magic Kingdom and Spectro Magic Light Parade.

We made it out of the hotel room and to the Magic Kingdom boat in about 30 minutes while keeping an eye to the sky and the accumulating storm clouds. Once we got to the Magic Kingdom, we surveyed the crowds lining up and decided to eat before grabbing a seat for the parade in Liberty Square. We had dinner in our favorite counter-service restaurant: Columbia Harbor House, we both got the “Anchors Away” tuna salad sandwich with chips, I got a medium Coke and Stephen got a large Iced Tea, our meal was about $18. One of the best parts of Columbia Harbor House is the large 2-story dining area. It’s very easy to find a table and you can usually find one in an area by yourself. Stephen and I should have shared a meal, we were both full from lunch (it was a great lunch!), I didn’t even eat half of my sandwich and I’m pretty sure Stephen didn’t finish his either. While we were enjoying our dinner, it just keep getting darker and darker and windier outside. We finished up eating and went out to claim a place on the sidewalk, feeling hopeful that the rain would hold off so I could see my favorite night-time attraction. We settling in across from the Hall of Presidents, outside of the Christmas Shoppe, I spread out to discourage spot stealers and Stephen went walking to see what direction the clouds were moving. Funny thing about clouds in Florida, they don’t move west to east or even north to south, they just keep circling around the area. It was not looking good for Spectro-Magic and E-ride night.

Stephen came back and sat and watched people walk up and down the streets. About an half an hour before the parade was set to start, it started to sprinkle, then it started to pour, then it started thundering and lightening. Great. We ran to the overhang of the Christmas Shoppe, along with what felt like a thousand other people. The rain showed no signs of letting up and the lightening was lighting up the sky, we knew the parade was cancelled. Stephen and I finally worked our way around to the back of the store where some benches were, and sat down, we figured we would be there for a while. About 20 minutes later, we heard the announcement that the Spectro Magic parade had been cancelled due to weather. And we sat, and sat, and sat. It felt like hours, but I guess it was only about 40 minutes, we were crammed under the over hang with probably 20 other people, it’s never comfortable being that close to people you don’t know. The thunder and lightening quit and the rain let up a little bit, so we decided to don our ponchos and make a run for it, we were both sick of the rain. Once we got out on the sidewalks, the rain almost stopped, for the time being, it was only a slight drizzle, but I honestly found that more annoying than a down pour. At least with a down pour, it can only rain for so long, but it can drizzle for hours. Anyway, it was time for Fantasy in the Sky fireworks, we found a place on Main Street to watch them. Obviously Tinkerbell didn’t fly, but it was still a great show—I love the soundtrack the fireworks are set to.

After Fantasy in the Sky, the Magic Kingdom was closed and E-ride nights had officially begun. We had already gotten our bracelets on Main Street when we came to the park earlier that evening, so we were ready to go. We headed off toward Frontierland via Liberty Square, it’s a great feeling watching everyone make their way to the front of the park to leave while you’re headed to one of the biggest rides on property—Splash Mountain. I love Splash Mountain, I love the ride, but even more than that, I love the story. I have never gotten the opportunity to see “Song of the South”, hopefully I will get to one day. Splash Mountain was a walk on, which I find ironic after the hours people spend in line during the day. We got in our log and we were off on the adventure with Bre’r Rabbit. The ride on Splash Mountain was great as always, I can’t wait to get my Mom on it in December, she doesn’t do rides, but she loves “Song of the South”. Stephen and I will make her be brave and ride Splash Mountain.

Next it was off to the wildest ride in the wildnerdess, Big Thunder Mountain. Still no lines, everyone must have been in Tomorrowland. There was a family in front of us, a mom and dad and a little girl about 8. As we were walking thru the line, the little girl asked if we were line for the Mad Tea Cups. Cute. Of course it was still raining, with no signs of stopping, it rained the entire time of our last E-ride night in February, 2002. Maybe it’s us?
We were starting to get soggy, but there was still 3 more rides we had to ride before leaving: the Haunted Mansion, Buzz Lightyear, and Space Mountain. Is it just me or is the Haunted Mansion better at night? It seems more spookier. I love it! My favorite part of the ride is the ballroom scene, I think it is so interesting how the imagineers pulled that off, don’t worry, I won’t spoil it for anyone by telling. I would love to walk thru the Haunted Mansion some day with the lights on, it would be so amazing, but I’m doubting I’ll ever get the chance. Maybe when Stephen and I retire in 40 years, we’ll move to Florida and become cast members. Wouldn’t that be great?? Once we got off the Haunted Mansion, we walked over to Tomorrowland, we found the crowds! Tomorrowland was packed, it looked like a regular day in there. We went on Buzz Lightyear, Space Ranger first. I’m not really into video games, I’ve never really played much, I can count on one hand the number of times I have sat down to play a video game, but I love Buzz Lightyear, it is so much fun. Stephen “Mr. Playstation” crushed me, of course, but I still had fun, and I’m not too horribly bad.

We debated on whether or not we should go on Buzz Lightyear or not, we decided that we just wanted to ride Space Mountain and go, the effects of the rain were wearing on us. The line for Space Mountain was about 20 mintues; long for an E-ride night in our experience, but at least it gave us time to take our ponchos off. I was starting to get sick of wearing yellow plastic! The CM working the top of the line let us pick what side to go on, we chose our favorite, the left side. We bypassed most of the line being a party of 2, I’m going to miss that some day, and we were off into the wild blue yonder, climbing high into the sky. Sorry. ?

We got off Space Mountain and we were greeted with guess what…rain! I wanted to rebel and not put on my poncho, but I finally gave in and put it on, again. Stephen and I decided that we would just head back to the Wildnerness Lodge, it was still early, only around 11:00, but we had done all the rides we wanted to do and our feet were wet. We stopped on Main Street to take some pictures that probably won’t turn out, but Main Street looked so beautiful all lit up, I couldn’t resist not snapping a few. I am the family’s honorary shutter bug. As we were heading out, we both decided that we needed a snack, Stephen went to the ice cream parlor and I went to the bakery. I got a huge Toll House chocolate chip cookie that was warm with melted chips. It was so good! I only wish that I had gotten a big glass of milk. Stephen got a mint chocolate chip ice cream in a sugar cone. We had to test out each other’s purchases, they were both good choices. We ate our treats and walked out of the Magic Kingdom.

Wouldn’t you know that as soon as we got back to the WL it stopped raining. Completely. Grrr!! Since we were both pretty much wired from taking such a long nap earlier, we decided to take a dip in the pool. It felt so refreshing, to just lay back in the pool and relax—no crowds, no heat, and no rain. Heaven! We stayed in the pool and hot tub for probably 45 minutes. Once back in the room, we took showers and we were fast asleep.

Saturday, August 2
Plan: Animal Kingdom, dinner at Boma’s, Fantasmic at MGM

Reality: We didn’t set an alarm today, we just woke up when we woke up. We both enjoy the Animal Kingdom, but neither one of us can stay there the whole day. We do the main attractions, look around Discovery Island and the Tree of Life, but we don’t just hang out there, like we do at Epcot. I could sit in the World Showcase for hours looking around, enjoying the entertainment, people watching, but I can’t do that at Animal Kingdom. It’s a beautiful park, but not my favorite, so we planned on sleeping in, hanging out at the Lodge and getting to AK around 12:30-1:00, staying there until 5:00 and then going over to Animal Kingdom Lodge for our dinner at Boma’s.

We woke up to a beautiful morning, we should have hit the ground running, but we of course didn’t. I think we got up around 10:00, we took our time getting ready, and walked out to the buses. We waited forever for a bus, that’s my one complaint about Wilderness Lodge, the bus system is not the best. Finally the bus came we were off to the Animal Kingdom.

Animal Kingdom was crowded today, but I think the crowds seem more at AK than any other park. We realized that we were hungry when we got to the park, I think it was a little after noon, we didn’t want to eat a huge meal, we knew we had Boma’s that night for dinner. We ended up splitting a barbecue rib meal at Flame Tree BBQ, barbecue ribs are my most favorite food in the entire world, and the ribs at Flame Tree do not disappoint, they’re great. The meal came with a side of corn and baked beans and we got a side of onion rings (my other favorite food). Lunch was good and just the right amount of food, we were full, but not stuffed.

After lunch, we walked over to Dinosaur!, it was pretty much a walk-on, but it was the only ride that was a walk-on, everything else had long waits, nothing shorter than half an hour. We zipped thru Dinosaur! and got on Primeval Whirl. I love Primeval Whirl, I think it’s a great ride, it reminds me a lot of Wild Cat at Cedar Point, it’s just a great carnival ride.

Stephen’s been wanting to see “Tarzan Rocks” for a long time, but we’ve never had the chance to do it. We figured that since we were in the same area, we might as well try to catch the show. We walked to the entrance of the theatre about 10 minutes before the show was set to begin, the cast member kept waving people in. We got to the theatre and it was completely packed, no place to sit anywhere, every sit was filled. We looked around for a couple of minutes before giving up and leaving. I don’t understand why the cast member let us in in the first place, it wasn’t just the 2 of us, there were probably 15 people they let in with us. Oh well, we’ll just catch it next time.

We walked through Dinoland USA, and up towards Africa, our fastpass time had come to ride the Kilmanjaro Safari. The line for the safari was outrageous, we just kept walking past tons of people. We got up the front of the line on our jeep in no time. It was a pretty good safari, we saw lots of animals. It was nice to be able to just ride the ride and not worry about taking pictures or filming everything. We have pictures of every other safari ride we’ve been on, I figured it would be okay to skip taking pictures of this one ride. I did take one picture of a baby elephant, but that was it.

We did have a close encounter with a giraffe, it stood and blocked our road for a couple of minutes, he finally moved and we were able to get past him. We were so close to the giraffe that if you were sitting on the end seat, you could have reached out and touched him. We also had a close encounter with an ostrich, he wouldn’t move, I think he was wanting to charge us, he finally moved and we were able to get by.

As we were finishing up our safari ride, it started to sprinkle and then it started to rain. What a shock. We got off the ride and made a dash to the fastpass distribution area to put on our ponchos. It wasn’t raining that hard, so we decided to just go out and try to enjoy the day anyway. We got as far as the Harambe gift shop before we were forced inside, it was raining so hard, it looked like a monsoon. We were stuck in the shop for 2 hours. 2 HOURS!!!! We just stood at the window and watched it pour. The rain let up a little bit, so we said forget it and went back out. About 5 feet away from the store it started pouring again. Arrgghh!! We tried to go to “Festival of the Lion King”, we got half way there, arguing the whole time because we were soaking and frustrated. We finally just gave up and left the park. We PS’s for Boma’s at 5:30, but there was no way we were going to wait in the pouring down rain.

The bus lines were a mad house, I have never seen so many people waiting for the busses. Of couse the busses were slow, but we were able to get on the first bus, but it took about 25 minutes for it to come. No one standing in line was very happy.

We got back to the room and tried to relax after our yucky day at Animal Kingdom. I was bummed because I really wanted to eat Boma’s, I knew that we wouldn’t be able to eat there in December because my parents wouldn’t like the menu. Stephen made another PS for 8:00 that night, but the problem would be getting to the Animal Kingdom Lodge. Stephen wanted to take a taxi, I did not. I didn’t want the taxi ride to take away from the magic of our trip. But Stephen kept on and on and on, finally I gave in, figuring if nothing else I could say “I told you so.” ? Once our dinner plans were figured out, we sat back and watched a little tv. We didn’t want to sit in our room for hours, so we explored the Lodge. What an incredible hotel. I love all the hidden nooks you can find to sit in and just relax. After our tour of the hotel, it was close to our PS time, I think it was about 7:00. We went down to Bell Services and had them call a taxi for us.

I don’t want to say “I told you so”, but…I told you so. The taxi ride was not a great ride, pretty much your typical taxi ride. The taxi stunk, the driver talked the whole time about who knows what. And it was expensive—to go from the Wilderness Lodge to the Animal Kingdom Lodge was $20!! As soon as we got out, Stephen turned to me and said, you’re right, we won’t do that again. ?

The wait for Boma’s was long. Very long. Even with a PS for 2 people who were there at least 20 minutes early, it took about 45 minutes to an hour to be seated. We were not too happy. I think the hostess may have screwed up our PS, when we checked-in we told her who we are and that we were checking in early, I think she took our card and set aside to start our wait from our original PS and not the time we actually checked in. Oh well, at least we could eat. ?

Our meal was fantasic. I love Boma’s, it is one of my favorite places to eat, and this meal did not disappoint. Our server, Jules was great, she took very good care of us, clearing the plates constantly and keeping our drinks fresh. We got to talking with her and she found out that we were from Cincinnati, her husband had graduated from Ohio State. Before we left, she had us sign an autograph book for her. The food was also great, and different from the last time we came. I’m not an adventrous eater, I’m surprised that I even like Boma’s, but I went up to the buffet at least 3 times! ? I had the prime rib, barbecue ribs, the potatoes with Afritude (my favorite), chicken curry soup (delicious), a salad, couscous—that’s all I can remember, I’m sure there was more! All that food did not stop me from going to the dessert bar, in my opinion, these are the best desserts in all of Walt Disney World. I had my favorite chocolate mousse crunch, the banana bread pudding, and a brownie. I think my stomach is going to burst!! I was so full, but it was a good full. ? After we were eating, Stephen and I decided to sit at the table for a complete of minutes before attempting to move. Everything was wonderful. Our meal was about $50 before tip, and I’d pay every bit of that happily.

The rain finally stopped, of course because it was nighttime and the parks were getting ready to close. Stephen and I decided that we were both wide awake and that we didn’t want to go back to the Lodge yet. We are not nightclub people, so Pleasure Island was out, but we decided to go to Downtown Disney for some shopping. We walked thru Disney at Home to see if we saw anything for our bathroom, but there wasn’t much there. We decided to just go straight to World of Disney. Once there, we split up to do some individual shopping, we both had birthday money and intended on spending it! The first thing I did was head to the jewelry room, there was an awesome watch I saw at the Animal Kingdom Lodge, it was a silver Fossil watch that had a light blue face. The 12:00 dot was a diamond shaped like Mickey Mouse and the links on the band were also Mickey Mouse. It was no where to be found at the World of Disney, but the CM’s knew exactly what I was talking about and gave me the item number so I could keep looking in other stores or order once I got home.

It was back to shopping! I ended up getting a white polo with a turquis Mickey, it looked like the Ralph Lauren polos with a polo player on the horse. Very cute shirt, I also got the 2003 scrapbooking kit, and the Disney Magic CD with songs from different attractions at the the parks. Stephen got a polo as well, looks like mine, but it is light blue with navy stripes, he also got a WDW ball cap. After our shopping adventures were over, we walked to the bus stop and arrived “home” quickly.

We didn’t feel like swimming tonight, we had already seen enough water! We decided to just go to bed early, we knew we’d have an early morning.

Sunday, August 3rd
Plan: MGM, dinner at Le Cellier, Illuminations

Reality: Our last full day of vacation. ? We got up bright and early to a beautiful sunny and hot day. We were at the bus stop and to MGM for the opening. On the bus ride over, we sat by a very creepy man. He kept hitting on this lady who was there with her kids and babysitter. He was telling them how he was at Pleasure Island all night, how he got completely smashed and spent the night in his car. How he got to the Wildnerness Lodge and on the bus to MGM I have no idea. After the bus stopped, we waited a couple seconds before getting off, we didn’t want the weirdo to befriend us!

Hollywood Blvd. opened a few minutes before 9:00, but we were kept away from the rides until 9:00. Once the ropes were dropped, we made a run for Rock-n-Rollercoaster, one of our favorite rides at Walt Disney World. We made it all the way up to the sound stages before we were stopped. Not too bad. Within 5 minutes we were in the preshow watching Aersosmith. I LOVE Aerosmith, they are one of my most favorite bands, second only to the Beatles. We saw them in concert last September and they were incredible, I still can’t believe Steven Tyler is doing back flips across the stage. Anyway, back to our vacation, the doors opened to the alley, and we were on our way to the Aerosmith concert across town. My favorite part of RNR is the take-off, what a rush! What a great ride. All to soon it was over and we were getting off.

After our date with Aerosmith, Stephen went over to get fastpasses for Tower of Terror. While he was doing that, I went to the bathroom and then waited for him on the wall outside of RNR. We were planning on riding it again. Stephen came back with the fastpasses and we were off for another ride on RNR, until we saw the line, it was a half and hour, we didn’t feel like waiting, so we decided to pass.

We walked over to the Great Movie Ride to pass the time until we could ride Tower of Terror. There were a lot of people here today! We had about a 20 minute wait for GMR, but it wasn’t too bad because we were in the air conditioning. We had a good ride, and we finally got the Western side. Every time I’ve ridden it, I’ve gotten the Gangster side. It was nice because it something new on a ride that was getting old to me because I’ve ridden it several times. I love the movie clip at the end, I’d love to have the montage of movie music on CD. When we got off GMR, we went to the fastpass ques for Who Wants to Be A Millionaire—Play It, while I was getting the fastpasses, Stephen called Sci-Fi Drive-In to get a PS for lunch. In our opinion the counter service restaurants are not that great at MGM, you’re much better off spending a couple more dollars for a sit-down restaurant. As we were walking to Tower of Terror, we past Mickey Mouse, all by himself! I was so excited, I have a picture with Mickey from every trip, I can’t leave without seeing him. I’ve told Stephen on more than one occasion that if we don’t happen to see Mickey around the parks, I’m not above going to Toon Town and standing in line. ?

After a kiss for the Mouse, it was on to the main attraction: The Hollywood Hotel Tower of Terror. What a fun ride! I don’t think it’s scary at all, of course I am a thrill ride junkie, to me it’s just a fun ride, especially if you get a car without the lap bar. I can’t wait to get my parents and sister on Tower of Terror, my dad hasn’t riden a roller coaster in probably 10 years, my mom doesn’t ride roller coasters, and the biggest ride my sister has ever been on in the Beast at Kings Island, which is a nice size roller coaster, but it can’t compare with Tower of Terror. It’s going to be great!! ?

At this point Who Wants to Be A Millionaire—Play It was open and it was time for our fastpass. Stephen and I were picked to sit in the Fastest Finger seats at the bottom of the theatre. The seats are no different than any other seat in the theatre, it’s not an advantage to sit there, but it was still really neat. Today was the first time I didn’t make it to the leader board, the secret to making it to the leader board is the fastest finger question, usually if you can’t get to the top on that question, it’s hard to make it on the leader board, at least that’s our experience. When we came in February, Stephen was #2 and I was #3, but we never made it to the hot seat.

All too soon WWTBAM was over and it was lunchtime—finally, we were starving! We walked over to Sci-Fi Diner and waited a few minutes to be seated. We waited maybe 10 minutes, which was nothing compared to the 45 minutes-1 hour wait for walk-ups. Our name was called and we followed the skating man to our car. Thankfully we didn’t have to share a car with anyone, I think that would take away from the experience—to be eating with strangers. While our waitress Jenn was getting our drinks, we watched the clips of the “horror” movies. They were hilarious; I can’t believe that people were actually scared of them. Our food came out quickly and we dug in, Stephen got a turkey sandwich with an iced tea and I got a cheeseburger and a root beer. Our food was pretty good; I would definitely eat here again. When we come back in December with my family, I’m going to suggest eating either here or 50’s Prime Time Café; I think my parents would enjoy both restaurants. Our bill came to $28, not too bad for lunch, and we were back out in the sunshine again.

We decided that we would do Muppets 3-D and then leave the park. It was really hot today and we were more than ready for a break. I don’t know how people stay in the park all day long, I remember the first time I came to WDW when I was 11, we stayed off site, we came to the parks 4 days in a row, we were there when the gates opened and stayed until the gates closed. We were miserable and we didn’t have fun. I’ll never do that again, I’m a firm believer in taking breaks during the day and not going to the parks every day (except for this trip).
I love the Muppets and I love Muppets 3-D, especially the pre-show, I think it’s the best pre-show. I grew up watching the Muppets on “The Muppet Show Tonight” and “Sesame Street”; I love Kermit the Frog ALMOST as much I as I love Mickey Mouse, this attraction is a favorite of mine and I hope they never get rid of it. They can update the show, because it’s been the same show, but never get rid of it.

After the Muppets, we were ready to go, we’re not used to being in the parks late in the afternoon, the parade was getting ready to start, and it was really hot and crowded. On the way out, we stopped at a couple of shops on Sunset Blvd—looking for the Mickey Mouse Fossil watch, no luck and to take a couple of pictures. The wait for the bus back to Wilderness Lodge took forever; I know we were sitting there for at least half an hour in the sun. We were so hot and thirsty, should have filled up the water bottles before we left the park! The bus finally came, we had a great bus driver, unfortunately, I didn’t catch his name. We were the only ones on the bus and he and Stephen struck up a conversation about Ford Mustangs. Stephen used to have a ‘99 Mustang GT that he loved, and the bus driver is restoring a Mustang LX. Very enlightening conversation for me. ?

We got back to the WL, and more than ready to take a break. We sat in our nice, freezing room, watched TV and quickly fell asleep. I could get used to taking a nap every day.

We got a little before 5:00 and left for Epcot and what would be our favorite night of vacation. It was of course raining, but lightly, the story of the week. We got to Epcot a little early; we decided to take a spin on Spaceship Earth, one of my favorite rides. After our lesson on the history of communication, we ran into Mouse Gears to see if they by chance had my watch. I was in luck! There it was, we bought it and had links taken out (almost half of them—my wrists are very small) and it was time for Le Cellier.

We walked over to Canada and checked in at the podium, we had about a 15- minute wait. Before we left on vacation, I called the Disney dining services and told them that we were celebrating Stephen’s birthday (it is the 4th—tomorrow), so far nothing had happened, but I was crossing my fingers for tonight.

We were seated in the same section as last time, actually only 1 table over. We started off with Cokes and Cheddar Cheese Soup and then looked at the menu. I didn’t need to look at the menu; I knew exactly what I wanted. I have been craving Le Cellier’s prime rib for 6 months. Our server, Catherine, was fantastic. Hands down the best server we’ve ever had in WDW. She was very attentive, but not over bearing, and extremely friendly, she even brought us 2 orders of breadsticks—the 2nd order being all pretzel breadsticks—my favorite.

I love the food at Le Cellier, but I also love the ambience there too. It is a very beautiful restaurant. Each section represents a different providence in Canada, I forget what providence we were in, I want to say Manitoba, but I may wrong. The restaurant is dimly lit, but it’s not dark, lots of candle light everywhere, it’s a very romantic atmosphere. Even though it’s romantic, dimly lit, and kind of pricey (an entrée is about $20-$25), I think it’s very family friendly. The servers are extremely pleasant and laid back, the table next to us had twin boys, maybe about a year old, these babies trashed the place. There was food everywhere, the parents tried to pick some of it up, the servers immediately stopped them and told them not to worry about it. Once the family left, about 3 or 4 servers cleaned up, they didn’t make a big deal about the mess or get upset.

Our meal was terrific. I got the prime rib and Stephen got the NY Strip, both were delicious. Our steaks were cooked to perfection, I got mine well done and Stephen’s was medium well. With our steaks we had russet potatoes, they were so good as well. This meal is my favorite; I could eat it every night. My mouth is watering now writing about it 2 months later.

After we finished eating, I got up to use the restroom, Stephen was suspicious, thinking that I was doing something for his birthday, but I really wasn’t, I just had to use the restroom. Apparently, while I was away from the table, Catherine came over to clear our plates and to see if we wanted anything for dessert. Stephen declined, saying that we (although I think he blamed me) were stuffed. I came back, and Catherine came back out and told Stephen that she had a little surprise for him and to ask if we were in a hurry. We told her no, we were in no hurry, and she turned and went back to the kitchen. Stephen looked at me, I tried to act like I didn’t know what was going on, but I had to give it up—I told him that I called and linked his birthday with our reservations. He tried to act embarrassed, but I knew he wasn’t.

Catherine brought out a huge piece of layered chocolate cake; on the plate someone had written “Happy Birthday” in chocolate. It looked too pretty to eat, but we ate it anyway. That cake was so good, we were full, but it definitely hit the spot. I took pictures of Stephen, and the man at the table next to us offered to take a picture of the both of us. Very nice gesture. The cake was an awesome topping to a wonderful meal; we will be back again and again. I paid for dinner, since it was Stephens’s birthday, I think it was about $70 before tip, we also filled out a comment card for Catherine, she did an excellent job.

Once we were finished with our meal, we walked around World Showcase; it was getting close for Illuminations to start. Stephen and I got into argument, but I can’t remember what it was about now. I think it was the crowds and the rain getting to the both of us. So we spent the last hour in our favorite park mad at each other, but we worked it out before we got “home” to the Wilderness Lodge.

We watched Illuminations from the top of World Showcase, by Future World. It would have been a good spot, if the wind hadn’t been blowing in our direction. We had ash all over us, and we couldn’t see half of the show because of all the smoke. We left before it was over, to beat the rush. We got to the bus stop and to the Wilderness Lodge shortly.

Once in the room, we took showers, we stunk like smoke and fire works, and started packing our bags—it was home tomorrow. ?

Monday—August 4th—Stephen’s birthday
Plan: Breakfast at Kona Café, MK, lunch at CRT, leave for home ?

Reality: Mickey woke us for the last time, at least until December. We got up and got dressed, I realized that the shirt I bought Saturday night was too big, I had to return it and get a smaller size. Stephen called the Kona Café and rescheduled our PS for 9:30. We quickly got ready and ran down to the bus stop. We waited a while for the bus to come, while waiting, we had a strange experience. The bus coming from Fort Wilderness and going to the TTC pulled up, about 20-25 people dressed in swimming clothes got off the bus and came and stood in our line for Downtown Disney, the bus was also going to Typhoon Lagoon. The bus finally came and we all got on, we pulled out of the Wilderness Lodge and drove over to Fort Wilderness, of course no one was waiting, they were all at the Wilderness Lodge. So why would someone staying at Fort Wilderness ride the bus to Wilderness Lodge, and get on another bus? All of the busses (except for the Animal Kingdom bus) stop at both resorts. I just didn’t understand. After our tour through Fort Wilderness, we drove to Typhoon Lagoon, and then on to Downtown Disney—Market Place. It took at hour to get from our room to Downtown Disney, sometimes renting a car is nice, it was well after 9:00 and we had to make it to the Polynesian by 9:30 for tonga toast. It was going to be close.

We got to the World of Disney right after we opened, I got the shirt, we exchanged it and were back out within 10 minutes, max. We walked back to the bus stop and waited forever for a bus, which wasn’t surprising because Downtown Disney just opened and with the dispatch program, bus were dropping people off, but not picking up for the same resort. Finally the bus for the Polynesian and the Contemporary came, we got and were on our way. The clock was ticking closer and closer to 9:30 and we felt like we’d been running all morning—it would be the theme of the day, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

We got to the Polynesian right after 9:30 and ran up the steps to the Kona Café—we made it! Just a little late, but the restaurant was pretty empty, I think there were only 2 or 3 other families in there. Stephen and I were quickly seated and immediately ordered tonga toast. Tonga toast is heaven on a plate. It’s french toast, but made with huge hunks of bread, it looks like maybe sour dough bread, but I’m not sure. Inside of the bread is a banana and then the outside is rolled in cinnamon sugar. It is awesome. They serve it with syrup and butter, but trust me, it’s not needed, I’ve never even tried the syrup. Of course I couldn’t eat the whole thing, it’s about the size of a half of a loaf of bread, I’m sure full of calories and fat grams, but this is vacation, right?! At least for a couple more hours. ? I took of some pictures of the birthday boy, which I’m sure he loved.

After our delicious and filling breakfast, we walked around the Polynesian, we were too full to do anything else! After saying goodbye, we went upstairs to the monorail, we were going to take it to the Magic Kingdom, and then take the boat back to the Wilderness Lodge. It was a beautiful morning, the sky was so blue and the sun was so bright, but it was hot! What do you expect for Florida in August? ?

Once we got to the Magic Kingdom, we walked down to the boat docks to see if one was coming or if we just missed one. We waited a few minutes, and one came along, but they weren’t letting anyone back on, they said they were taking it down for repairs and that another boat would be along in about 10-15 minutes. Stephen and I took this time to walk toward the Grand Floridian boat dock and take some awesome pictures. We have a timer on our camera, which comes in handy when there’s only 2 of you, we got some great shots of the 2 of us with the Grand Floridian behind us. We took some pictures of the entrance to the Magic Kingdom, and walked back to our boat dock. The boat came along shortly and we were on our way to the Wilderness Lodge for the last time.

We got back to room, finished packing and straightened the room. Here’s where we ran into a major problem with bell services, and some lessons learned. It was maybe 11:00, we were not being picked up by Tiffany Town Cars until 4:30. We called bell services to pick-up our luggage, they sent some one up, he told us that he didn’t have any tickets on him, he would ticket our luggage at the bell services stand. First mistake. He took our luggage and Stephen called the front desk to tell them that we were checking out (love that express check-out), I took a couple more pictures of our room and we left. We walked around the lobby, taking pictures, we decided to go outside to take pictures of the front of the Wilderness Lodge and to see the Villa’s pool. On the way out, we decided to stop by bell services and make sure our luggage was okay. The CM working the bell services desk was extremely rude and short with us. He tried to blame us for the bellman not having any tickets to ticket our luggage. Then he told us to go to the luggage room, find our luggage and have one of the CM’s back there ticket our luggage properly. Excuse me, this is a deluxe hotel, one of your employees made a mistake, and you’re making us, your guest, go to the luggage room and look thru the room for our suitcases? I realize that Stephen and I would have to go back there to identify our luggage, but the CM could have and should have apologized to us, called one of the bell men over and have us escorted to the luggage room to find our luggage instead of blaming us and telling us to do it ourselves. What if we hadn’t checked 3 hours before our flight? What if our car was coming to pick us up and we went to get our luggage only to find that our luggage was lost? It just didn’t sit well with us, but what can you do? We walked over to the luggage room, had someone let us in, found our luggage, and had it tagged, thankfully it was still close to the front of the room.

After our ordeal, we continued with our photo tour of the Wilderness Lodge and the Villas. Stephen walked to the valet parking lot (bad, I know) and took some incredible pictures of the front of the Lodge. We walked around the pool area and out to the beach. I feel sort of dumb, but I didn’t realize that the Wilderness Lodge had a beach like the Polynesian and Grand Floridian do. It looked pretty fun, there was a dad and his kids playing frisbee and having a great time together. That’s what Disney World is, it’s not an amusement park with wild rides, it’s where families and friends can be together with no worries. That’s why we love being there so much. All you have to concentrate on is having a great time, you don’t have to worry about jobs, bills, houses, cars—you can forget all that and be a kid again, if only for a week or two.We walked back to the Lodge and to the bus stop to go to the Magic Kingdom. The Magic Kingdom was absolutely packed, we stopped on Main Street to look at the posted wait times board. There was an 180 minute wait for Splash Mountain, an 120 minute wait for Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and Space Mountain, and a 45 minute wait for It’s a Small World. I couldn’t believe it. We did see that Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress was open, that’s my favorite ride, so we headed off for Tomorrowland.

There was a small line for Carousel of Progress, a show had just started, so we waited on the platform. It was so incrediblely hot and people were crowding up against us. I couldn’t wait to get into the air conditioned theatre! The doors opened and we walked down to the 2nd row. What a great show/ride, I hope they never take it out! I’m a history buff, so I love to be able to take a peek back into the lives of people and how they lived in the past. It’s just so interesting to me, I can’t see how anyone can find it boring. After The Carousel of Progress, we walked over to the TTA, this is another great ride, especially when it’s hot and crowded. It’s very relaxing and it cools you down, riding around above Tomorrowland. As we approached Space Mountain, we noticed that it looked very bright—apparently the ride was broken down and all the lights were on. I grabbed my camera and took a quick picture, who knows how often this happens. The roller coaster is a lot smaller than what you might think, it looks a lot like Primeval Whirl, I think that type of ride is called a mouse trap roller coaster. After TTA, we couldn’t decide what to do. The park was completely packed out, every where you turned, there were people, it got to the point where it wasn’t fun anymore. That’s when we decided to leave, if you’re not having fun, what’s the point of being there?

We walked out and took the monorail to the Contemporary, planning on taking the boat from the Contemporary to the Wilderness Lodge. Why we did this, I’m not sure. I think we just wanted to see what it was like, but there must have been some logic to our madness. Maybe. ? Once to the Contemporary, we walked out to the boat docks, the wind was starting to pick up and you could tell a storm was getting ready to blow in. Of course it took a while for the boat to come. While waiting on the dock, I started to get very sick to my stomach—motion sickness. We got on the boat and I thought for sure I was going to throw up. The water was so choppy and our boat was getting pushed around. Then the rain started, at least we undercover, but we would still have to make it inside the hotel. The boat pulled up to the Wilderness Lodge dock and Stephen and I took off running, we only got a little wet, it wasn’t raining that hard. We were planning on walking around the grounds of the Lodge, getting lunch at Roaring Forks and enjoying our last hour or so of Walt Disney World. With the rain, we chucked that idea and just ran inside to eat at Roaring Forks. The food and selection was okay, pretty typical for a resort counter service restaurant, I got a ham and cheese sandwich and chips, and Stephen got a chicken philly and fries—we both got Cokes to drink. We sat down in the dining room and ate our lunch. Since we had a while until the car was coming to take us to the airport, we took our time eating our lunch and talked about everything we had done on this vacation. We both decided that while we had fun being in Walt Disney World, we probably won’t come in the summer time again. It’s just too crowded, too hot and too wet. Had it been our very first trip, I don’t know how much in a hurry I’d be to come back. We just have more fun in the off season when the weather is more comfortable and it’s not wall to wall people.

Our Tiffany Town driver came, as soon as we got on the road a huge storm hit. It was raining so hard, we could hardly see the cars in front of us. Our driver, Larry, was awesome, he had complete control of the car and did a terrific job. We made it to the airport and waited and waited and waited. Our flight was delayed, story of the night. To make it short, our flight was delayed in Orlando I think an hour and a few minutes. When we finally landed, we had a connecting flight in Atlanta that took off in 10 minutes in another terminal. We took off running thru our terminal to the tram, and then up the escelator thru another tram, only to find out that our flight to Indianapolis was delayed 2 hours. We got into Indianapolis at 1:00 am (Central Time) and drove home, we got home a little after 4:00. Not the best ending to a vacation, but at least we were happy to be in Walt Disney World and anxious to go again in December.

Thanks for reading my report, hope you liked it and that it was helpful. If you have any questions or comments, you can e-mail me.

Krista Fulkerson