This is so long so apologies and no need to read. As is tradition, I am back to the forum for the annual trip report. I like writing these and saving them so I can read them ahead of future trips etc. This year we traveled with the usual–my husband Josias, myself, my stepdaughter Ingrid (20), and daughters Katie (6) and Emma (3). After pricing out a few vacation options, it was easy to decide to come back to WDW this summer. We know that we always have an amazing time and despite what people seem to say Europe is not cheaper (we definitely priced it out). Thinking towards next year, I’ll price out Disneyland, Portugal and France, and maybe a Disney cruise, but we still think financially the roads will lead back to DW. While we’ve been to Disney many, many times I am happy to report that it did not feel stale, and if anything we just want to go more frequently (but unfortunately the buck stops somewhere). So here goes…
Day 1: In my aging wisdom I have vowed to not fly in the afternoon or at night to Florida. So we took the earliest flight out of Providence at 6am. I was relieved we had this one booked as the week prior to that many flights were canceled, shut down, or delayed. I figure we have our best luck with avoiding storms and turbulence and not having delays when we fly early. Getting the kids up at 2am was actually super easy and they had that Christmas morning smile when they realized it was time to go. We had made a countdown paper chain so there was a lot of excitement. My husband and I don’t love flying although we’re getting better at it and I coughed up some money for early boarding hoping to avoid turbulence. I just paid for myself as my family would come through family boarding. It worked out well and I was able to get us seats without any confrontations about 6 rows back. The kids were good on the plane and I was surprisingly chill and didn’t even take my back of medicine cabinet plane valium. Getting into Florida early was great, it gave us plenty of time to ease into our trip. We got to Mears without any trouble and while everyone was a little bit tired, we were still holding strong. I had the kids cheer as we went under the Disney World sign and we made our way to Caribbean Beach. It was odd not getting off at Pop as that is our home resort per say, it’s the hotel we’ve always stayed at, but this year Emma counts as a full person so we needed a 5 person room. I had stayed at Caribbean Beach once in college and remember the bus system being miserable and the main pool was closed for refurbishment, but we were excited to go there this trip as we love the Skyliner and know a lot was updated. We got dropped off at Centertown and I went to the desk to check us in. The CM was very sweet but managed to take like 30 minutes checking us in, but did something to our magic bands (maybe for the meal plan) so we were able to have everything taken care of at once. Per our request, we had a first floor room in Aruba. We requested this for easy Skyliner and Riviera access and it worked out great! While I did this, Ingrid set up a DVC tour for us at Rivieira so we could get the $200 gift card promo. However, it was only 50 per adult, which was a bummer. We used Bell Services to drive us to our room and unpack and it felt great to be at the resort and unpacked before lunch (even if it felt like we were nonstop). I brought one of those shoe caddies to hang and organize items, which made our sink area much more clear. The room was nice and clean, although dark, and I felt like there was much more space than Pop. The ability to have the table while the beds were down was a nice moderate bonus. Once unpacked, we put in a Mobile Order for Centertown and went down in our suits and had lunch and looked around the main hotel areas. We then picked a chair in the toddler section of the main pool and hung out for about 2 hours. It was busy, but our kids were obsessed with the Pirate splash area and main pool, they just did slide after slide. The only letdown was that Katie couldn’t play with Emma in the smaller area because she was too tall. I feel like it would’ve been better if it was a 10 and under area. After awhile, we headed back to our room over the central bridge and cleaned up to go over to the Riviera for the DVC tour. While there the kids did some pin trading (Emma lost her lanyard ) and we looked at the model rooms and met with a representation from Rio. He was excited because my husband is Brazilian. We got an idea of how much points we’d need if we ever buy in and asked questions, but I still can’t make the numbers work. When I think of the dues etc., I’m not sure that the value or savings long term is really there. And yet I’ve considered DVC for many years. I might keep researching it but the Riviera contracts were wildly expensive. After our tour, we did a Skyliner ride for fun because we like to play the skyliner game (say the characters of passing cars or boo the plain ones). Then we took a bus to Disney Springs from Riviera for dinner. We bought a Mickey balloon at Disney Springs, but I was disappointed by the World of Disney tour and we popped in the toy and Christmas store, but I almost got worried that we had reached Disney burnout as there just wasn’t anything special or fun in the stores. We went to Rainforest Cafe for dinner and it was our first sit down meal of the dining plan (we did the “free” dining promo). There were exclusions like steak, which kind of stunk. I enjoyed walking the girls around to look at the animatronics. My shrimp was okay and everyone else had an okay meal. It definitely was not our best. We like the nostalgia of this place but the food is never amazing. We used our dessert options to get the volcano and boy was that a disappointment. But overall it was okay. I think the disappointments here were definitely a mix of just okay quality and first day exhaustion. So we headed back to Caribbean Beach and the bus from Disney Springs was super easy to grab, which was a first. The kids love looking at the different Disney busses. Then we headed to bed so we’d be ready to go for our first day. Major impressions we noted were that Caribbean Beach is gorgeous and the pool is a big hit. Overall, tiring but easy travel day.
I realize I write like a novel so if anyone is still reading this, you’re a saint. And I’ll be perfectly honest I’m writing this with so much detail for myself to relive the trip and look back on, but if you’re here thanks for coming along! It has been our pattern to start with Hollywood Studios because it is my least favorite park and is the biggest challenge with little kids. At the parks we used a combination of the new multipass and DAS for Emma. So we could use DAS for some family rides, but had to purchase passes for the larger rides. We rope dropped Hollywood Studios and this is definitely the worst park for feeling overcrowded in the morning. We wish they’d let you into the park sooner. We were there about 20 minutes before they let us in, which definitely pushed Emma and J’s limits. But once we were past that it was smooth sailing. We rope dropped ToT and RnRc because we wouldn’t have DAS with those and stuck to just purchasing the pass for Rise for this day. As soon as we headed down Sunset, we were told RnRC was down so we pivoted and waited in the ToT line. While waiting for the ride to open there was much more space and the kids stayed entertained playing with the bubble wand and had plenty of space to not annoy people. Once at ToT, the CM who sets up RS took so long that tons of people got ahead of us, which we weren’t thrilled by and definitely cost us time. They also were only running 1 shaft so it took us a while to get this one done. By then RnRC was open so we went over there. I waited with the kids first and the line was about 20 minutes. So while waiting, I grabbed some Joffrey’s coffee and donuts, and took the kids over to Lightning McQueens. We’ve never done this and what a treat. First, completely empty clean bathrooms and then I think we were in the show with one other person. The kids had a blast and got to actually do something while waiting out the adults riding RnRc. When it was my time to go RnRc, they took my husband to see Lightning McQueen again. Of course this great kids diversion is gone soon, which seems to be the way with kid-friendly attractions at HS. RnRc was great and smooth this trip…huge improvement! We then headed to Toy Story Land. Katie, who was insistent that she would do the more kiddie coasters chickened out of doing Slinky, and Emma wanted to do it and ended up screaming on it the whole time. Ughh…I’m not sure we’ll ever get to the point of not needing Rider Switch. We were going to try to meet Jesse but the line had to be an hour in the sun. I asked a CM if they ever accommodate DAS and it was a hard no so we had to skip her. We watched the Army men (they’re great) while waiting to do TSM. And luckily TSM was a big hit. We know Katie loves it, but were glad Emma handled it well. Then we did Aliens, which Katie loves, but Emma was not feeling. So Katie was sad not to repeat. We seemed to have done TSL at the right time this trip because that area is just so hot so we got out in time. Then went and saw the Dis Jr characters while waiting out the DAS for Mickey. We had a pillowcases, which the characters did great with and we always appreciate that Doc, Fancy, and Vampirina lines tend to just be a few minutes long. Then we went to Mickey and everything worked well even the preshow. Emma was scared for part of it, but ended up loving it once she realized it ends up all good and doesn’t do anything crazy. We popped in a mobile order for ABC and took a nice AC lunch break. Food here is always consistent and we like the AC. It wasn’t hard to get a seat. After lunch we headed to Star Wars land. We started with Millenium Falcon and oof this one was rough. There was one poor teenage boy with us and we did not know that Emma would lose her mind. She was absolutely terrified and screamed and at the end was screaming “momma we’re not at Disney anymore, we’re crashed.” It was way too realistic for her. I asked the CM to let the teen with us reride, but the kid was a good sport and said he was all good and joked with us on the way out. Next up, we had our RotR ILL or whatever it’s called so we let the girls have a good break under that tunnel while we RS Rise. Katie loved all the Star Wars rides last year, but decided against Rise this year. I think it’s probably just too much Star Wars for her and Rise seems most intense to her. After, we headed to Muppets, which everyone enjoyed (so naturally on the chopping block), except Emma did not like Waldo lol. We did quick rides on Star Tours and then went over to Beauty and the Beast for the girls. We walked in 10 minutes before the show and found a spot in the second row with no one blocking us… so awesome! After, we headed over to our dinner reservation at Hollywood&Vine. We were pleasantly surprised that the characters switched over to Halloween– it made for great pictures to frame to add to our Halloween decorations. The food here was great and we keep coming back satisfied and getting the Fantasmic seating. We think this is one of the best uses of the dining plan. After dinner we did the Frozen Sing Along, which was a nice break and did some rerides of TSM and Mickey before Fantasmic. We still had some more time before the show but not enough to get on anything easily so we just kind of grabbed a bench on Sunset and let the kids play before heading into Fantasmic. Taking our time going to Fantasmic is a huge plus. We were able to walk in casually, politely asked the dining area CM to let us sit in the back of the dining section to accommodate Emma’s sensory needs, and could grab waters before the show. We lucked out that there wasn’t wall to wall people around us and we could spread out and be semi-comfortable. Fantasmic was great, except the dragon didn’t come out, and that ended our night. Both girls loved it. Skyliner back and overall a successful Hollywood Studios day. Worth noting that while I enjoy HS and think it can be pretty, I kept thinking to myself that next time we’ll stick to a half day here. Until the girls enjoy Slinky or all the SW rides, we could easily just come into the park in the afternoon do TSM, Mickey, H&V, ToT, and Fantasmic. While this park has cool rides, we enjoy ourselves best when there’s a lot for all of us to do together and this is the weakest park for this– so here’s my cry to Disney to make this park more kid friendly.
Good to hear! One of my favorites. I hope it stays a long, long time. I always worry they are going to do away with it!
Lucky!
Good to know. H&V is on my short list for next time.
This. Also, it would be lovely if there were some things that “ate” some people. There’s only so much to do and some of the spaces are SO crowded. HS is my family’s favorite–it was my least favorite this last trip due to crowds. Ropedropping was one of the best decisions we made I think, and I will plan to do that again. It was the only saving grace.
100% I always find myself frustrated at this park. I get the feels at Fantasmic and H&V but I definitely left feeling like this will be a max 1/2 day for us until kids are older. I can just rotate each trip which Star Wars ride we get done.
Day 3 AK/Epcot
Our next day we headed to Animal Kingdom. We bought the ILL for FOP so we rope dropped Dinosaur. We took our time here saying our goodbyes. I rode it twice and the first ride I was like eekk…bad shape, but the second one the ride seemed to have woken up and seemed to have more smell and movement. This one is a classic so we will miss it. After we let the kids do the triceratops and then headed to the Bug Show. We noticed that no one was around Moana, so stopped to see her and Russell. My 6 year old who did TTBAB before and handled it fine and the 3 year old hated it, screamed, and I took them out halfway through the show. RIP I guess… It’s too bad they love the movie Bug’s Life, but this show is oddly designed to be scary so we’ll welcome it’s replacement if I can get my kids near it again. After we headed over to the Safari and the animals were active. We raced over to FotLK and got in at the last minute, so not great seats, but still good fun. Then we headed off to Everest, I let J and Ingrid ride first and grabbed a pretzel and waited with the kids. We all rotated using single rider, which took us almost an hour and then headed over to Kali. Both girls chickened out in line at Kali so I ended up waiting to come back. While waiting a super great custodial CM gave the girls a leaf with a Mickey Mouse stamped into it. Such a neat interaction! Went over to Yak and Yeti and relaxed a bit with lunch as we had done almost everything by lunchtime. We missed the bird show this year, which I felt bad because J likes it, but after lunch we decided just to head to Pandora. We rode Navi River and a sweet CM convinced the girls they would love the ride, which of course they did. We then RS FOP, which really makes the preshows annoying, but the ride is just so good. We hit Navi River one more time and then meandered out of the park. While still not the easiest park to do with littles, we love AK. As we left to head to Epcot, we grabbed some lemonade slushies and got to the bus stop just as torrential rain came down. We lucked out having the covering!
By the time we got to Epcot, the ground was a bit wet, but it was no longer coming down. We hopped on Spaceship Earth and I rode with Emma. She clicked on French before I could stop her so we had the entire audio for the ride in French. It didn’t feel quite the same without the iconic Judy Dench voice. While at first nervous with the backwards descent both young girls ended up enjoying the ride. After we headed over to Moana and we loved this new area. Luckily, I brought a change of clothes for the girls as they were soaked by the end. But we thought it was beautiful and the musical water and curtain were fun and charming. They nailed it with making it fit Epcot. Watching my kiddos play in the fountains reminded me of being a kid playing in the Imagination fountains, so just a great feel for Epcot. They need more of this in the other parks that don’t have enough for kids–mostly HS, but AK a bit too. After, we went to talk to Crush and do Nemo. I think there must have been evening hours because the Nemo line was strangely like 25 minutes. We’ve never seen that dark part of the line that looks like the beach get full. But it moved easily. Once done at the Seas, we went to ride Living with the Land before our Garden Grill reservation. I’m obsessed with this ride as it combines old school Disney with plants–two of my favorites. The smell is amazing too. My family all tease me about it, but what was amazing was that Emma LOVED it. It’s one of her favorite rides. After, we went to Garden Grill and had a great dinner. I really miss when they used to have a seafood offering here, but the salad and bread are really great. When I originally planned this day, my thought was to do two World Showcase rides after dinner. But Katie begged to ride Soarin and the line was under 30 minutes so we did that instead. I had to lean into Katie being brave about a bigger ride. So I went ahead with Josias and Katie, and then we swapped so Katie and Ingrid could go. During the swap, we hopped back on Living with the Land and Emma was living her best life (I was too) getting to do the ride twice and then run up and down the escalators. We haven’t been in Future World at night in years because of small kids and just our general progression with through the park, but we had a really great time and my kids love the Land building as much as me. Once we left, the park, while really dark, was beautiful and quiet. Per the kids request, we squeezed in a ride on Figment and then walked out towards the skyliner as the fireworks were going off. Overall, a great day and especially good night. It’s always Epcot or MK that makes me feel like we’re truly at Disney
Looks like a really great trip so far! I definitely struggle with HS too and like you we really enjoyed H&V on this last trip. Although the buffet had the absolute more random combination of food ever.
Beauty and the Beast was like a weird fluke because the show was almost full but people left some of the front open maybe assuming it was handicapped, but only one row was marked for handicap.
It was an older gentleman. He was very sweet and saying how the girls were waiting so nicely, I don’t remember his name but I must have that day because I filled out a cast compliment.
Day 3 MK –Halloween Party!
For this day, we took the day off in the hopes that the girls would make it through the whole party. We slept till about 8 and J and I brought the little girls down to market center for a relaxed breakfast before pool lounging. We had breakfast food in the room, but it was nice to share one of the grab and go sandwiches and sitting around Caribbean Beach is just gorgeous. We kind of felt like we were on a chill island vacation for a little bit. We didn’t realize that the main pool wasn’t open yet so had to wait around maybe 15-20 minutes, perusing the shop, which didn’t have much. So we unintentionally rope dropped Fuerra del Morro. This ended up being great, because I’m a bit of a public spaces germaphobe. So I got to go in and try the slides without anyone there. So fun and great views! Then I camped out in toddler land, while J and Katie enjoyed the bigger pool. I played with Emma and watched her go up and down over and over. At one point she fell and cried a little and this super sweet lifeguard gave her a rubber ducky lifeguard. This was such a small cute gesture that was a highlight. Emma spent the rest of our pool time taking ducky with her on the slides. We left the pool and went back to our room to change and went over to Primo Piatto for lunch. Mobile Order was easy and it’s about a 7 minute walk. The grilled chicken sandwich was pretty good and the croque monsieur was excellent. While the theme of Riviera at times felt sterile, we enjoyed it more this trip and it felt more upscale and was nice and cool. Then we headed back to the room to rest before the party. The girls were good at laying low and Ingrid and I had fun getting ready. I felt like this was a preview into future trips for us, as we like the idea of going into the park late and resting in the heat of the day, which we can finally start to do as the girls get a bit older. We were super excited for the party and put on music in the room and just had fun anticipating the night. Because the kids were getting restless, we decided to leave a bit earlier and take a Skyliner ride to Pop. Pop has a our heart so it was nice to walk around the lobby, take in the smell, and then we hopped a ride to Magic Kingdom for the party.
We arrived at MK around 3:30 and the line was fairly built up. It was hot but it wasn’t as bad as we had read. We wanted to be there right on time so we didn’t lose valuable MK time. We found the waiting to be okay, but didn’t love how they would let you in, then stop you and hold you. It added more confusion and frustration. Once in, we parked the stroller and went right up to the Main Street train station and waited about 8 minutes for a train. We rode the train for the first time on our last trip and I really loved it. We thought it would be a nice way to start the night and take in the park. We had a great time looking at people coming in for the party and there’s something really special about the narration. I especially love the part with Peter and Wendy. While on the train, Katie pulled her party bracelet too tight so once we got off we had to go back to the entrance and have someone cut it off and give her a new one. Rookie mistake and now we know to tie it for kids. After the train, we walked in through the party entrance to grab our bags and then went to Fantasyland to do PhillarMagic–a family favorite. It was precious when in line Katie told me to use my magic hands to grab a gem. So per her request I got some jeweled rings for the girls. Katie kept begging to ask how I do it–Disney Magic! After Phillar, we headed to Adventureland for the Tiki Room, we went right in and had a blast. I love the Tiki birds, my husband has really learned to like them, but Emma just adored it, especially the carved faces. It was so fun watching her watch the show. After we hopped on The Jungle Cruise with no wait and had a fun cruise, and were happy that we got in 4 attractions that wouldn’t be open during the party. We then headed into Pecos Bill for a quick dinner and were surprised about no Mobile Ordering. But the line went fairly quick and the food was just meh. I like the inside of this one, but the menu is rough. After, we hopped on Pirates and then walked towards Frontierland. We weren’t sure if we’d do Tiana’s, but decided in the moment to jump in line. Ingrid and I waited about 35 minutes and the continuously moving line made it better. It was our first time and we enjoyed it more than we thought we would, but I also felt sad missing Splash. I feel like Tiana has untapped potential. I think it will take a few years and family experiences to see if I feel any sense of connection to it. My husband’s reaction was basically…they closed Splash for this…he was not all that impressed. After Tiana’s we lined up in Frontierland for Boo to You. We got a spot easily near Splash where our kids could stand in front and us behind. The kids were chowing down candy as they did a few candy lines near Tiana’s when we were Rider Swapping. I was super excited for the headless horseman and parade. We’ve been listening to the song and watching videos for years. It was an amazing moment. We loved every minute and can’t get over how extensive the parade is–this makes us look forward to the new nighttime parade as a fresh parade is just a great experience. Post–parade, we went over to Big Thunder, but the line looked too long so we headed towards Haunted Mansion. We were able to hope on Mansion and Peter Pan before the fireworks. We got lots of cast compliments on our costumes–we had one person per land in MK. I was Peter Pan for fantasyland, Katie was Jessie for Frontierland, Emma was Mirabel for Adventureland, Ingrid did a space outfit for Tomorrowland, and we put J in a colonial hat and shirt for liberty square. After Pan, we went over to the fireworks about 8 minutes before they started and were able to get a spot to the side with a decent view. It was more crowded that we expected, but a great show. It was super fun to see holiday themed fireworks. We were feeling pretty great as we had done a lot and checked off our must dos (parade and fireworks), so we headed back to Fantasyland and went on Small World then Pooh.I decided that I wanted to go into one trick or treat line because I hadn’t done it all night so we went into Fairytale hall and had the bonus of seeing the witches. We decided to hop in the Mine Train line and J and Ingrid waited about 30 minutes for that. This gave me a chance to let the girls rest and have some icecream (Emma falling asleep in her icecream) and I just sat outside Mine Train and enjoyed the ambiance and music. I thought Emma was done, but then she woke up and rallied so once we finished with Mine Train, we went running to Space (Ingrid wanted the overlay). We got there about 11:40 and they had us bring the kids into line with us because it was towards the end of the night to Rider Swap. We had to convince Katie that she wouldn’t actually be put on the ride. When we got close to the top the CM brought J and the girls in some elevator area while Ingrid and I rode. The overlay was so fun and terrifying. Then they met us at the unload and I took the girls out. The girls were begging to go on more rides so at 11:54 we ran and jumped on the PeopleMover. It was so fun to relax on this and take in the park at the end of the party. The kids continued to beg to ride more and we had to explain that everything was actually closed (so much for thinking a midnight close is too late for littles). So we walked out and watched a few snippets of Hocus Pocus. We all took great cat naps on the bus and it was a total success–so fun!
Day 4-Break Day
No shock that we took the next day off and let everyone sleep in, which meant like 8:30am. We went back and rope dropped the Fuerra del Morro pool and relaxed and played. After, we went back and had lunch at Primo Piatto again. We left from the Riviera and took a Skyliner to Hollywood Studios and then a boat over to the Boardwalk. We walked over to SeaBreeze Point where we were married and saw a wedding happening there, which was cool. We had some snacks and margaritas from Boardwalk Joes and then poked around the gift shop at the Boardwalk. After, we took a bus to Magic Kingdom and monorail to the Grand Floridian for our dinner at 1900 Park Fare. We had extra time before dinner and took cat naps in the Grand Floridian Lobby and listened to the piano player. We then walked around parts of the resort, which are stunning. 1900 Park Fare had some of the best food we had all trip. We enjoyed the wish ceremony and thought Aladdin was a fun character to meet. We then took the monorail and bus back to enjoy some downtime at the pool at night. I took some beautiful pictures of the resort at night and we liked the live music and energy of CBR at night. Overall, a laid back and enjoyable day.
Day 5–full Epcot Day
Family successfully got up to rope drop Epcot. There was a little bit of dragging, but overall we all love Epcot. We entered through IG and waited over in Canada, where we had some Joffreys. Once the park was open, we headed to Soarin and did RS there. We then did LwtL and headed over to Moana for water play. We also hit Nemo and Crush. Then we headed over to WS for our Akershus breakfast reservation. The food here was great-we loved the deli cheeses and meats with breakfast and waffles. I tried one of the sparkling drinks, which looked beautiful but was really too sweet so I didn’t drink much. We liked the location, but the princesses definitely moved along here. After, we rode Frozen Ever After, which Katie still struggles with (the hills) and Emma was a bit freaked out about it. I keep wondering if this is common with other families with littles. We then lined up for Asha and there were only a few families there… We’re still surprised this movie wasn’t more successful, my girls really love it. After we hiked back over to Future World and rode Spaceship Earth and did Rider Swap for Guardians. I rode twice and still didn’t get September–but one day maybe…Then we did Imagination and made the mistake of waiting to see Figment, which just seemed to take awhile. On our way back to World Showcase we took some pictures with the new Walt Disney statue. While it apparently goes against the norm we started WS in Canada, which we’ve done the last few trips. We grabbed a beer here (which ironically we couldn’t find in the real Canada lately) and started our stroll. Canada, UK, then France. In France, we rode Ratatouille, which was a breath of fresh air as everyone enjoys this read. Then we had some treats at Les Halles, which are always divine. We then skipped over a few countries to get to American Adventure. I haven’t seen this show in years and really wanted to catch it this trip. My family doesn’t even remember it. I really enjoyed seeing the Bush art displays and found the show to still be impressive. I was probably the only one though because my family all slept through it. We then backtracked to go through Morocco and Italy. In Germany, we grabbed a grapefruit beer and I spent way too much time staring at cuckoo clocks debating whether to get one. This has become one of my favorite pavilions. Everyone enjoyed the Japan shop and we bought bonsai trees that didn’t grow (we tried) and these cute little dolls for the girls. As we were wrapping up the showcase, we watched the China film and I love the nostalgic feel of the 360 films. Then we went to our dinner reservation at San Angel Inn, which I’ve always wanted to eat at… It took awhile for us to be seated and we wished we had know as we could have done 3 cabs, but I did shop a bit and bought “my own tiki bird.” We were seated fairly close to the water and it took a little while to get used to the dark, but the meal was great. We had to push our waiter because we were now going to miss our DAS to do Remy later and the fireworks. But the food was fantastic, we really liked this spot. We then rode 3 cabs and were running out of time and as we were headed towards the ride exit we had to wait an extra almost 15 minutes because the CMs decided to do their end of night clean out of the boats before everyone was off the ride. We were sooo frustrated as this was really poor show and they just ignored us wanting to exit the ride. Once we were finally off we sprinted to Remys who barely let us in and hence missed the fireworks. So our 2 nights in Epcot we just got the last few mins of the show, but we ended up being okay with this and it didn’t look that mesmerizing to us. Then we hopped into the long Skyliner line and headed back for the night.
Day 6 MK-last day
We planned our trip so that our last day would be a full MK day (not a party day), which is great, but we expected some crowds. We went for rope drop and our plan was to do Space Mountain, so we ran over there only to find out it was closed. So, we rope dropped…the PeopleMover. After PeopleMover we did Carousel of Progress, Buzz, and Monsters. Emma was Boo in the Monster show, which was adorable. Space Mountain reopened so Ingrid and I hopped in line and then it shut down again once we were in so we left. We were grateful we did it the party day as we decided we were done trying. We then went and used our ILL for Tron, which is time consuming to do with RiderSwap. I like Tron for like the first 30 seconds and then find the seat really uncomfortable, so it’s not my favorite. We were pretty relieved to be done with Tomorrowland, which felt kind of hectic. I think there’s just so much to do in MK that it feels very much like a marathon. We then cut through the path to the back of Fantasyland and did Dumbo, which actually had a line and then Under the Sea. We waited a bit for Enchanted Tales even with using Emma’s DAS, but we had such a good time here and all of our girls were in the show. It was so special… Emma was the Beast, Katie was chip, and Emma was a knight. This was super special because Ingrid was the Beast once as a kid. At this point we were famished so we threw in a quick Mobile Order and found a spot on the second floor of Harbor House. This was a much needed break and the food here is always delicious. After lunch we headed over Tiana and Big Thunder. While RS the kids also caught Festival of Fantasy. I’m not sure I would have repeated Tiana’s, it still hasn’t totally won us over. Big Thunder was great, and easy to swap because it’s a pretty short ride. Then we headed over to Pirates, but Katie was not having it so I hung back with her. Once Emma and Ingrid came off, we got in line for Magic Carpets, but it shut down just as we were about to board and they gave us a multipass. At this point everyone was wiped, so we got some orange dole whips and slushies, which were amazing and helped us reset. So then we used our multipass on Haunted Mansion and rode Peter Pan and Small World. We then did the Carousel, Pooh, and PhillarMagic. We were hoping to have time to squeeze in Presidents because we haven’t seen it in a long time but couldn’t squeeze it in before Crystal Palace. We had dinner at Crystal Palace and we still love the Pooh characters, but I find the food to be just okay and I’m just kind of horrified by the bathroom status. It’s super gross and not big enough for everyone in the restaurant. We received our check before seeing Eeyore and had to have the servers help us get a visit with him, waiting at the center of the restaurant. So it didn’t feel like the most organized restaurant. After dinner, we had time to let J and ride Pirates and then see the new Country Bears. This was great–we all enjoyed it and were singing along. We then went and watched Happily Ever After and managed to keep the kids awake to see TinkerBell. After popping in the very crowded Emporium, where I didn’t find anything great, we headed to the busses with tears in our eyes knowing we had a such a great trip.
We headed out of CBR at 3am for Mears, but it works well for us because the early flights out don’t tend to get backed up and are smooth. Overall, it was a really special trip and the kids ask me every day when we can go back. We’re still debating what our trip next year will be and our options are all over the place–California, Europe, Disney/Universal mix, but a lot of these options might be hard still with little kids. So we shall see…
) and we looked at the model rooms and met with a representation from Rio. He was excited because my husband is Brazilian. We got an idea of how much points we’d need if we ever buy in and asked questions, but I still can’t make the numbers work. When I think of the dues etc., I’m not sure that the value or savings long term is really there. And yet I’ve considered DVC for many years. I might keep researching it but the Riviera contracts were wildly expensive. After our tour, we did a Skyliner ride for fun because we like to play the skyliner game (say the characters of passing cars or boo the plain ones). Then we took a bus to Disney Springs from Riviera for dinner. We bought a Mickey balloon at Disney Springs, but I was disappointed by the World of Disney tour and we popped in the toy and Christmas store, but I almost got worried that we had reached Disney burnout as there just wasn’t anything special or fun in the stores. We went to Rainforest Cafe for dinner and it was our first sit down meal of the dining plan (we did the “free” dining promo). There were exclusions like steak, which kind of stunk. I enjoyed walking the girls around to look at the animatronics. My shrimp was okay and everyone else had an okay meal. It definitely was not our best. We like the nostalgia of this place but the food is never amazing. We used our dessert options to get the volcano and boy was that a disappointment. But overall it was okay. I think the disappointments here were definitely a mix of just okay quality and first day exhaustion. So we headed back to Caribbean Beach and the bus from Disney Springs was super easy to grab, which was a first. The kids love looking at the different Disney busses. Then we headed to bed so we’d be ready to go for our first day. Major impressions we noted were that Caribbean Beach is gorgeous and the pool is a big hit. Overall, tiring but easy travel day.
We have addictions here to feed…
Still, that’s a great bit of CM pixie dust!
