I hope you have a fantastic time Chrissy. I look forward to hearing how you got on. HAVE FUN!
I hope you have a fantastic time Chrissy. I look forward to hearing how you got on. HAVE FUN!
Hope you are having a blast Crissy, even as I type this! So many of us will live vicariously through your trip report. I hope this trip is every bit as magical as you hoped for!
Siggy aka Jill
Oh my goodness!! Chrissy, I hope you had such a beautiful, magical and wonderful time at my most favorite place on earth!!! Really enjoyed reading all your posts and fellow Mouseplaneters giving you tips!! Can't wait to hear all about it!!!
Life is magical at Walt Disney World!
Oh BOY oh BOY!!! Do I have a story for you all!!!!!!!!!!!!.........however I will have to have some suspense as I type the whole thing that I hand wrote (yes....hand wrote..had not laptop and strict no internet policy
)...so within the next few days you all will get to listen to my story, and I can hardly wait to share it with everyone!!!
Gonna go soak my feet in the epsom salt, take another aleve, and try to walk carefully back to my bed!
<3 Chrissy
The mosted wasted of days, is the one without laughter-E E Cummings
I. Can. Not. Wait!
There are 10 kinds of people in this world... Those who know binary and those who don't.
I can hardly wait either. Glad you had a good time.
Day One. (24 hours befor our flight I went to southwest website and "checked in" was able to get "B" boarding...yaya)
Flying.....yikers!!! Ok Ok....the truth...you may ask...."was it that bad?" well.....YES! IT! WAS! haha...well not after the xanax kicked in. The arrival to the Sacramento International Airport, the subsequent checking of bags and getting to the security went AMAZINGLY smooth. Walking up to the FSA officer, he smiles and asks me to "remove your ears maam"....I than said, "what would you do if I told you they were permanently attached?".....oh Christine you just are not supposed to mess with these guys, even when you are wearing Mickey Mouse ears and your homemade I AM GOING TO DISNEYWORLD!!! shirt....but this guy without missing a beat tells me...."surgery" haha....so I took off my ears and along we went to wait for 3 hours....hahahaha...yes 3 hours!! I was so excited and so afraid of missing our flight we were there a bit early!!!
We were able to all sit together on the plane which helped out the anxiety a bit...take off (BLEH) and landing in Denver Colorado for a planned stop was not the most fun with alot of turbulence and here I am trying to hold in my silent tears and the guy next to me...started crying too haha...my poor husband...there I was hugging on to my Mickey mouse pillow as tight as I could praying that all this was "normal".
So I had to deal with the taking off part one more time as we headed to Orlando. Can I say that the snacks heading into Orlando were the best snacks of all time??!! There was a huge selection of cookies and yummy things to eat on the plane.
We arrived in Orlando, Florida around 1:15 am. Success.....we had FINALLY arrived!!!!!!
And what a beautiful airport! and soooooooo easy to navigate. We got our bags, walked right to our car rental place, headed for the door to pick out a car and than BAM!!!!!!!! HELLO HUMIDITY!! lol.
Here it was 130 in the morning, and it was like a sauna outside, wet...sticky but WHO CARES GUYS?! THIS is the home of DISNEYWORLD!
A short drive into Kissimmee and a quick check into our gifted time share for the next 10 days...Legacy Vacation Resort. We turn on the lights, and BAM!!!!!! What a Californian would feel was a cockroach...after a long explanation by the staff was some sore of Florida tree bug.....and after a nice explanation of my husband to the desk that we did not care if they were NOT cockroaches, we knew we did not check into a tree!
So they moved us...and long story short on Legacy...we were moved 2 more times due to some really yucky, un clean rooms....however...we ended up in a three bedroom condo that worked out really awesome with a kitchen, laundry and two bathrooms...the beds were hard as a rock, the tile in the bathroom was yucky....but the grounds and pools were immaculate, and we were just thankful to be there.
Ok, so back to our arrival day....we ended up going to sleep, waking up the next morning and totally lost on what time it is, what day it was hahaha....and the 3 hour time change was very difficult to get used to
Day 2 was grocery shopping, putting our things away, swimming at the pool and the Florida State Lottery!
WHAT you say?
Yeah....my hubby won 500 dollars on the 25 dollar scratcher that he bought!! spending money?! yeah we got that!!!!
Ok all, I am gonna leave you hanging......because day 3....was our first day in the parks....Disney's Hollywood Studios!!!!!!!!
The mosted wasted of days, is the one without laughter-E E Cummings
At least waiting in the airport was nice because of the new terminal and great restaurants! I can't believe your luck with the bugs and the rooms at the resort, but I am glad your hubby won on the Florida State Lotto! Can't wait to hear about the rest of your adventure!
Siggy aka Jill
Siggy's right ~ the new terminal at SMF is really nice & I LOVED the part about you wearing your Mickey ears in the airport...that's fantastic; a true fan!
I've always stayed off-site for financial reasons, first at motels and then at a couple of timeshares off of 192 near Animal Kingdom (my MIL has RCI and we buy 'extra vacations' through her account); we've been very happy with both resorts that we usually stay at (High Point & Silver Lake) so I'm very sorry that your experience at Legacy wasn't great as well! Florida definitely has some big bugs.
How fabulous that your hubby won on that scratcher! We've played the Lottery in FL a couple of times, but usually only when their Lotto jackpot was unusually high...what an unexpected surprise!
Looking forward to reading more...
Pam
DL trips: too many to remember actual dates, but they began in the 60s!
WDW trips: 1986, 1988, 1989, 1991, 1993, 1996, 1999, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2013
Thank you!!Originally Posted by Pammer
Siggy's right ~ the new terminal at SMF is really nice & I LOVED the part about you wearing your Mickey ears in the airport...that's fantastic; a true fan!
I've always stayed off-site for financial reasons, first at motels and then at a couple of timeshares off of 192 near Animal Kingdom (my MIL has RCI and we buy 'extra vacations' through her account); we've been very happy with both resorts that we usually stay at (High Point & Silver Lake) so I'm very sorry that your experience at Legacy wasn't great as well! Florida definitely has some big bugs.
How fabulous that your hubby won on that scratcher! We've played the Lottery in FL a couple of times, but usually only when their Lotto jackpot was unusually high...what an unexpected surprise!
Looking forward to reading more...
The mosted wasted of days, is the one without laughter-E E Cummings
Disney's Hollywood Studios.
After figuring out which lot to park in.....all the roads around DWorld resort are like their own freeways....giant bright signs tell you where to go, and which lot to park in...it is pretty easy to figure it out once you realize that you need to pay attention. One missed exit can send you MILES down without a way to turn around
A quick wait into line and the park's morning announcement had me just reeling with excitement!!! We walked down the boulevard and headed straight onto the tower of terror. We love our California tower of terror, but our entire family had to agree that we absolutely LOVED this tower of terror more than our home one!!! The hotel is huge, and looks so real, the courtyard, the balconies, and the cast members here were really awesome! The ride through and effects on the ride were so amazing!!!!
We had only one ADR and it was at the 50's cafe...so before we headed over there to eat, we decided to get on Toy Story, which was so much fun. The backlot tour was closed and there was only one showing of the lights camera action car thing...we never got to see that...but we did go to the Indiana Jones show...and my son was picked to be an extra!! That was fun, the girl who was the MC had a bit of a crush on Andrew, even asked him after the show if he was local and how old he was haha....it was awesome, this show anyways, but being able to watch my son be a part of it was really cool!
We walked through the Walt Disney story, one man's dream...spent quite a bit of time in there...I LOVED going through all the exhibit and watching the theatre show, made me cry....I just love the story of how you can do anything if you have a dream....
We really enjoyed the drawing academy, we drew Stitch and it is sooooooo funny to see how each person's rendition comes out.
Ok...so lunch at the 50's cafe.
We did not wait long, and were seated at one of the back booths..I admit some disapointment...I thought if you had ADR's you would be automatically given a tv seating area...but that's ok we were starving and really hot by that point so we just sat down, and ordered.
We had fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and the hubby had meatloaf. It was all hot, and tasted ok...admittedly not too impressed with the food...but the best part was the PB and J milkshake!!
OH! we did the Rock'n roller coaster....it was sooooooooo awesome and to see the band there in the waiting area was amazing. I did get sick as I always do on these rides, but it was sooooooooo worth it.
By this point we were so hot and tired, so we went back to our home away from home and went swimming. We did not return for Fantasmic....this was our least favorite park...it was sort of like our California Adventure here.
Be sure to write down your parking spot number, bring lots of water, and be prepared to have some snacks on hand...we were not totally prepared for our first day in humidity
Trip report will continue, our next day would be.......Magic Kingdom. We went off of our original touring plan because I could not take the thought of not seeing the castle for one more day!!
The mosted wasted of days, is the one without laughter-E E Cummings
Enjoying the report - keep it coming!
Dan
The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time.
- James Taylor
Sounds like you had a fantastic time Chrissy. Eagerly awaiting the remainder of your trip report.
I look forward to hearing the rest of your report. My family is going on November 16th!! So excited and reading people's recent trip reports adds to that
Yay!! Cant wait to read more Chrissy!! I only "liked" not "loved" 50s Prime Time too. We didnt have a good table and our server was just "ok" and he kept telling me to put my toy (phone) away. Those are fighting words as Im fairly attached to my Iphone (like I turn around in my car if I forget it at home attached!!! ;-) LOL!!)
That's been my problem at the 50's Prime Time - the servers don't quite know the line between having fun and being really annoying!
Dan
The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time.
- James Taylor
Hi Dolls!
So....where was I? oh yes, I know....the MK!!!
After circling the lots, and finding some spots...we parked and began our descent into the kingdom...the one and only MK of Florida!!!
We get to the decision making spot.....you know the one, the monorail? or the boat.....hmmmm choices, choices...it appeared that the monorail had less waiters, so we walked up and waited....the boat left, came back lol and left again...and I was like "dang...I think we picked the wrong travel modality" lol...but whatever we were heading to the MK...it did not matter.
So we finally board the monorail and make our way past the awesome resorts of the Magic Kingdom...so beautiful, majestic and I was admittedly quite jealous...hoping someday to stay at one of those amazing places.....we arrive at the kingdom, disemark and gather our manos and brasos, piez and pienes (dont know if any of that is spelled right lol....but you all know what I am saying).
We bee line our way to the turnstile...and run to the railroad tunnel...and there it was in all it's glory...Main Street USA and the amazing Cinderelley's castle!! Tears, of joy, excitement and again that amazing "finally arrived" feeling hit my bones with a tingle, and like tinkerbell and a wink...we were off to explore the kingdom, and of course compare it to our Cali Disneyland home...I swore I would really try hard to refrain from doing that....but could not help myself. We made it obvious that getting to the castle was first priority, you know us princesses need to size up the competition....
The castle was OFF THE HOOK gorg!! sparkley, and those amazing windows on the back made it so amazing....its very difficult to put into words the feeling of getting close to something you have been dreaming about for....well a long time......nostalgia, joy...heroism....conquer.....
We walked through...into Fantasyland and sort of rushed to get out and around to the first ride we went on....tomorrowland speedway. The cars were cool...and please forgive me, as I will reference our DLand at times...seriously I tried REALLY hard not to be one of those...well you know...comparers
Kids went on space mountain, not my thing, know from experience how sick I get, barely made it through the thought of going on it
What in the WORLD is this "attraction" ....whoa...wierd and oddly painful to the shoulders, and sadly scared the heck out of every single kid...I mean it is pretty dang scarey y'all...it was more like Stitches torture chamber...I mean it was funny in a way...but poor kids were just tortured.....needless to say....did not like much.
We sort of bobbed around the kingdom getting to the things that interested us the most, skipping many things...and now looking back, wished we had done.
We walked onto pooh bear very cute, Mickey's philharmonic was pretty AMAZING...the sounds and sights were just something you truly do not want to miss...I ignored the teen son and whiney husband and forced them to go in the theatre, they both said it was one of their most favorite things.
We went on Dumbo, and as the excitement of not one but TWO dumbos hit me....sadly our dumbo did not "fly"....I swear I almost cried...that is one of my favorite ones.....and you do not get a feather to fly, I have always wondered how DL kept ahold of these feathers all these years anyhow...
We walked right onto Peter Pan...loved it...and the beautiful small world...indoors....wierd at first, but really beautiful, the last scene all white and gorgeous!
We got to Splash mountain and absolutley loved the MK version of SM!!!
Big Thunder Mountain was awesome, we even headed across to check out Tom Sawyer Island...gotta say found another secret spot, that I was astounded not many people were enjoying...rocking chairs on the river and a cold soda machine?! oh yeah baby!
The Haunted Mansion in MK was really awesome, we loved the MK mansion...really creepy looking
We did not make it to the Tiki room sadly, I really LOVE the Tiki room....
We did get onto the Jungle cruise and enjoyed all the animals, the crocodiles looked very real and the skippers were funny.
Ok...dont read this if you dont want the plain truth as I detail a bit about my beloved and favorite DL ride.....the Pirates of the Carribean. Although, the MK attempts to make the POC as good as the Cali version...wow was this one a disapointment for me personally...I guess that I had gone into MK expecting things to be more detailed, larger scale etc.....sort of unfair for me to do....but I did, again...tried hard not too...but felt that this one was a bit of a dud with its one drop into the deep darkness of a pirates lair......
We came back on one of our later dates, Ill report about that visit later...have some exciting things to share with you...a bit of a hint...we were some of the few that were allowed into the new area where Belle's village is....and we got to meet Gaston and ride the Little Mermaid ride as the cast members were being trained...pretty cool stuff for sure!!!!
Wooooo my feet hurt already writing this section of the report hahah....I ll hit you all up tomorrow with some more.
Thanks so much for being so awesomely patient.......I have most of this hand written....
Until tomorrow.....keep your hands, arms, feet, legs and eyes faced forward, head down and smile dang it....your in Disneyworld!
The mosted wasted of days, is the one without laughter-E E Cummings
Chrissy - please tell us more...
Chrissy-I don't usually read trip reports until they are finished. I much prefer to read them all in one sitting! But with so many pages on your thread I couldn't help it and finally broke down and read yours about the time you left for your trip. I really wish I had read your pre-trip report live as it was so much fun reading about your anticipation and planning. If it's not too late, I'd like to add a pretty please with sugar on top to betsyrina's post. I'm dying to hear about the remainder of your trip. Hope everything is well for your family and also hope you didn't get hit too badly with the post Disney blues as I so often do!
Michelle
Next trip May 2014
You are alll so sweet...please forgive me that I have not finished my work
.....I was hit with the post Disney blues that is for sure. No excuse, been quite busy in my thesis for my Masters program....but I will finish this trip report within the week. Thank you all for the concerns, what great friends you all are!!
The mosted wasted of days, is the one without laughter-E E Cummings
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