MOMCATION! My First Solo Trip (but definitely not the last) Report (LOADS of pictures)

I love this report! I get a couple days at WDW this month by myself and I am so excited.

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Day 3 - Animal Kingdom & Epcot World Showcase

My original plan was to, again, sleep in. I had no fast passes booked for this day because…World Showcase. But I woke up and decided I wanted to rope drop Animal Kingdom since I couldn’t get a fast pass for Flight of Passage. It was a 9am opening morning so I was hoping that if I got there was 7:30, I’d be good. So that’s what I did. This was my view at 7:45…

I will admit that I was worried. I believe my exact words, via text, to my husband were “What a clusterf###. I’m going to be waiting for hours.”
Then they opened the bridge and I went right. Being alone was the key here. I walked up the path that stayed open along the right and got ahead of about 75 people (sorry, not sorry people! Half of you were probably the ones I saw running at the entrance of the park.)
I talked to a Dad and his daughter in line who were super funny and nice. They were planning a trip to Chicago so we were discussing good places to go downtown. The line moved consistently and I was off the ride by 9:05! It worked out perfectly!

I celebrated with a breakfast up Pongu Lumpia & coffee from Pongu Pongu at the ride exit.

This view never gets old…

Then I headed across the park to Dinosaur.
I had ridden Dinosaur before - not the biggest fan. It’s kind of lame. But I came to ride rides so ride I did.


Yes, I’m laughing at the ride…

After this, I had accomplished my goal of riding Flight of Passage so I caught a bus back to the hotel. My plan was to relax, take a nap, and then go to Epcot around 1 for my voyage around world showcase.
Well, I got back to my room. I laid down and immediately thought “they do a FP drop at 11:01”.
It was 10:50.
So, at 11:01, I started refreshing and YEP. Caught a 1:50 FP for Flight of Passage.
Then I thought “Well crap. Now what? Do I go back? I’m supposed to be resting!”
Insert repeat of gratuitous Instagram shot I took about 45 minutes in the pool, got dressed and headed back to Animal Kingdom.
NO REGRETS!

I got to the park at around 1pm. I had time before fast pass time so I decided to conquer Everest.
I had never ridden Everest.
Roller coasters have always scared me and I have pretty much avoided them. Every trip to WDW, I have made excuses as to why I wasn’t going to ride it.
This trip I had vowed to ride EVERY ride possible, ESPECIALLY the ones I hadn’t written before.
I went through the single rider line and was on the ride, in row 2, in less than 5 minutes.
I recorded the whole thing to show my husband and kids that I did it and I didn’t cry. :joy:

Oh.
My.
God.
I LOVE IT! It is easily in my top 5 rides at Disney World.

I stopped at the entrance for a portrait session with the monster flower/plant thingy. Cheese.

Then it was round two of Flight of Passage. This time they asked for singles and I skipped about 30 feet of line. Woohoo!
Apparently Flight of Passage makes me hungry because I stopped at Satuli and got the cheeseburger pod and the Blueberry Cheesecake Mousse thing.

Then it was a quick Lyft ride over to my favorite giant sphere…

My feet and legs HURT by this time. I had been doing 25k steps a day for two days. But I was determined to make World Showcase mine.

My 5 year old son is autistic. He LOVES flags - can tell you what country any flag in the world belongs to - so I wanted to get him one of the small fabric flags from each country in WS. I started with Canada. The flags were sitting right at the register and it was an easy, quick $5 transaction. WOOHOO!
It went downhill from there. UK didn’t have any flags but had the plastic bases. :smirk:
France had the flag but no bases. No big deal. He will want to carry them around anyway.
Oh - had to stop in Les Halles Boulangerie for macarons, eclair and chocolate croissant before grabbing an ice cream at L’Artisan de Glaces. I felt like the glamorous older woman in Under the Tuscan Sun. I just needed the big dress and hat. <3
So decadent.
By Morocco, I knew if I stopped walking, I wouldn’t be able to start again so I gave a quick whirl and continued on my way.
I had to stop at Japan. I love this pavilion. Sadly, they had no flags (or stands).
I skipped America because we have flags here. And, frankly, I was hitting E on the energy level.
Italy - no flags. But the perfume salespeople were hellbent on spraying me. lol
In Germany, we had flag success! AND I got caramel corn along with a couple of sea salt caramels to take home (yum!)
In China, I watched the performance and didn’t see any flags.
In Norway, again no flag but there was SCHOOL BREAD!
And, finally, mi favorito… Mexico <3
I love the Dia de los Muertos exhibit in the entry.

I rode Grand Fiesta Tour and TRIED to get a reservation at San Angel but wasn’t successful. So I walked across to La Cantina and ordered a plate of nachos along with a margarita.

And then I went to the room, soaked in the pool for a bit and CRASHED.

I had one more day to conquer - Animal Kingdom & Hollywood Studios After Hours.

OH! If anyone knows where I can get one of these shirts - or this fabulous fabric - I NEED to make a quilt for my son. And thanks to the sweet CM who let me take a picture of his back. :rofl:

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Day 4 - my final park day…
Animal Kingdom & Hollywood Studios After Hours

This was the day I was going to sleep in. BAHAHAHAHAHA
I woke up at 6:52 and said “Let’s rope drop Animal Kingdom again!”
Because I’m nuts.
This was an extra magic hours morning but I was at the park by 7:30 again. MISTAKE. The lines were HUGE to get into the park. Then the secondary check for resort stay. When the RD line for FOP was being made single file by the bridge, I said “uhm, no” and decided that I was going to rope drop Kilimanjaro Safaris instead. There was a nice little crowd there but nothing like Pandora. The CM holding the line was super nice. All of a sudden his mouth dropped and he said something like, “WOW, I haven’t seen that before.”


If you look in the back of this photo, you can see the guy holding the “Line Starts Here” sign for Flight of Passage. SO glad I decided to go for the safari. :grinning:

I ended up on the first truck of the day with a delightful driver. Lots of animals were out that I hadn’t seen before and the rhinos were crossing the road when we came upon them. They were close enough to touch. It was amazing.

When I got out of the safari, I decided to take a walk to Asia and visit my new favorite ride. The park is so beautiful and peaceful at 8:30 in the morning…

I didn’t really see many people until I got to Asia.

So, while I was in single rider line for Everest, I swapped my 9:10am safari fast pass for a 9am Everest fast pass. Thus began our torrid love affair.

I tapped in for my 9am fast pass at 8:57 and stood to the side in the queue until 9:01. Modified my Primeval Whirl fast pass and caught a 9:05-10:05 Flight of Passage fast pass.
I felt like a Fast Pass Master. I high fived myself (no video of that) and then hopped on for my second Everest Ride of the day!

After my second dance with Everest, I walked across to ride Flight of Passage. Three times in two days, I was calling that a successful trip. :slight_smile:
Then it was back to Asia because I was NOT done with that Yeti.

But first, a little photopass session…

Ride #3:

Ride #4 (as illustrated by my left hand):

Ride #5 (the girl next to me was NOT impressed):

At the end of the fifth ride, I said to myself “Self…You have After Hours at Hollywood Studios tonight. Go. To. Your. Room.”

So, like all of my children, I didn’t listen.
I had baked macaroni & cheese with pulled pork from the snack cart.
And while I was eating, DOZENS of macaws came zooming through. Then two perched in the tree above us and loudly complained for about five minutes. They were gorgeous. And they knew it.

And then I went to see Mickey & Minnie.

I want Minnie’s outfit.

THEN I went to my room.

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Day 4 - This is the end…for now.
Hollywood Studios After Hours.

After some pool time, where I finished another podcast episode (seriously - Armchair Expert is some VERY intelligent, funny, deep stuff) I headed out for Hollywood Studios After Hours on an EMPTY bus.

I wanted to do some shows and character meets before the event started so I prioritized those first. It was about 4pm so I had three and a half hours to event start time.

I started with Star Tours. Why? I don’t know other than I love it and it was only a 10 minute wait.
From there, I continued over to Muppetvision 3D. I had not seen this show before and feel its days are numbered so I wanted to experience it first hand. Such a cute show - I’m sad that we never made an effort to take the kids in. Hopefully we get back before it’s gone.

Then I went to see the other tall, furry man in my life - Chewy.


I love that Wookie.

I was walking toward Toy Story Land and remembered MIKE & SULLY! So I had to stop and see them.

I didn’t want to miss The Incredibles so I walked over and grabbed a Key Lime Pie on a stick before getting in line to see the fabulous Edna Mode. That pie on a stick was YUM.


(I was Edna for Halloween - my son was Dash. It was epic.)

After Edna, I knew I needed to find a show to sit and relax for a bit. So I stopped at the kiosk to get my wristband for the event.

And then I headed toward Frozen Sing A Long. I nabbed a fast pass for the 7:00 show and walked next door to see Olaf.

I sat in the theater for the Frozen Sing Along, slouched down, stretched out my legs and closed my eyes.
Yes. I napped in the Frozen Sing Along.
No. Regrets.

I think I took this before Frozen but I’m not sure. I DO know that I immediately sent it to my family. #saltinthewound #mykidswillneverforgiveme

By this time it was 7:30 so I walked back to Star Tours, since it’s right there and went for another spin with C3PO and R2D2. Those crazy droids.
Beautiful nighttime shot though, as I was leaving.

THEN it was time to ride some rides! I headed to RNRC first. I have a love/hate relationship with this ride. It’s fun but I leave feeling like I’ve been boxed about the ears.


First ride - car to myself. WOOHOO!

After the first RNRC ride, I knew what I had to do… I had to face my Goliath…
Tower of Terror.
I swore I would never go on this stupid ride. But I also promised that I was going to ride EVERYTHING on this trip. I was going to be brave and adventurous.
After all, it’s Disney! How bad can it really be?


I’m glad that I’m in the corner because I look like I’m sh***ing myself.
My husband asked “Did you love it?”
I responded “NO!”
But I’ll ride it again, next time, with him. And a spare clean pair of shorts.

I stopped on the way back from that experience and rode RNRC again. This time there was a bit of a wait.

Then I headed over toward Toy Story Land. My hope was that wait times had dropped enough that I could do each of the rides a couple of times. I was pleased.

Final Toy Story Land ride count:
4x slinky dog dash
2x Toy Story midway mania
Alien swirling saucers

Wait time for SDD was 20 minutes pretty consistently but I timed it in line and it was more like 15. Definitely the reason a lot of people bought DAH tickets. And SO worth the cost of admission.

After my 4th time on SDD, I walked back over and road RNRC one more time.

Grabbed a Mickey bar and a couple of waters for the road.

And took one last picture.

And then, just like that, the adventure was over.
It was time to sleep one last Disney slumber before heading back to reality.

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Four day total:
Steps: 93,919
Miles walked: 42.18
Rides experienced: 46 (counting each once)

I can’t think of anything I would do differently about this trip, other than slow down. But I know that’s not me, or how I Disney.

Frequently Asked Questions:
Was it awkward? Nope.
Did you miss your family? Nope.

I think the best part, for me, was experiencing things in the standby queues. As I said in one of the earlier posts, my son is autistic. So we utilize the DAS when we bring him, along with the stroller as wheelchair tag, to keep him safe. Sadly, we miss a lot of the theming in the standby queues because we bypass them. So it was cool to see these magical touches that Disney brings to everything, big and small.

It was an amazing, whirlwind trip. I will DEFINITELY do a solo trip again. But first I have a few family trips to take.

And a funny story, not Disney related at all.
When I got to MCO, I was walking to the United Club with my head down and headphones in, watching about 5 feet in front of me as I walked.
I was tired. I was focused. I had food and a cup of coffee in my hands.
I nearly ran into a couple coming out of the United Club.
That couple was none other than my husband’s ex-wife and her boyfriend.
Of all the airports, in all the world… I wish I would have had a Photopass photographer to capture THAT moment. :rofl:

Thanks for following along on my trip down short term memory lane. I’m going to have to find a way to copy and paste this into Word so that I have it for when that ball goes missing in my long term memory.

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I Love your trip report!! (Read some of it out loud to my husband!)

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Definitely do it!!
I take two one-week trips a year by myself. One in March/April and one in October/November.
I am a firm believer in the fact that we are able to be better moms when we are able to be individuals outside of the label. REAL people.
I am SO glad I didn’t listen to my friends who were asking “why would you go somewhere swarming with kids?!?”
Even if it’s just a weekend away somewhere (I recommend flying distance so it’s harder to come home early), book it.

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Me too! I was holding out hope for so long and finally gave up on FPP day. :cry::cry:

Since I haven’t been to WDW since 2011, I am new to the non paper FP. Can someone explain what she meant by “They do a FP drop at 11:01am?” Does this mean she used up her FPP+ and could now reserve more? But I thought you had to reserve at a park kiosks after you use up your 3 FPPs. Sounded like she reserved additional FP at the resort…on the app??? I know WDW doesn’t have the DL’s MaxPass where you can continue to reserve FP from your iPhone app. Confused.

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What a fabulous start! Can’t wait to read more.

I am self conscious about selfies too, made even worse by my teen’s embarrassment!

Your AK RD pic has me very worried! Pandora wasn’t open on our last trip. I’m glad you enjoyed EE, it’s such a great ride!

This was such a great report, I have loved reading it!

You don’t need to use the kiosks, you can book more on MDE either on the app or website. Some of the more popular rides drop FPs for that day - for FOP they drop at 11.01, 1.01, 3.01, and 5.01. If you’ve used your first 3, you can just book another. Or you can modify another you’ve already got, but if you’re still in your first 3 then the normal tier rules apply (ie you can only have 1 tier 1) so if you’d had a FOP/NRJ FP and used it, but still had your other 2 to use, you’d have to wait until you’d used your first 3 and try to get it as a 4th. If you’d booked NRJ in your first 3 and not used it yet, you could modify it. If you’d only booked 3 tier 2s, you could modify any of them if you hadn’t used them all.

Does this make sense? It’s actually pretty simple but hard to explain!!

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Your description on your Everest ride made me laugh (the forum refuses to let me quote it this morning)! Yay for conquering the mountain! Isn’t it great?

Great trip report. My kids are older and out of the house. My wife and I go twice a year together and often are accompanied by friends or family. As much as love going with a group and love going with my wife, I still go 1 or 2 weeks a year solo. Nothing beats the freedom of doing what you want when you want. Nothing awkward about it, often I meet some really great people. you get so much more done solo and it is so much quicker to navigate the parks.

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Love your writing style, glad it was such a fun trip, you did so much.

From one mom to another - YES FOR TAKING CARE OF YOURSELF!! And what a fun trip you had. Thanks for sharing.

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You are hilarious! I loved reading your trip report!

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yea -I did a few “girl” trips when sons were young…just not to Disney. Now that sons have flown the coop, it would be a WIFECATION :slight_smile: I LOVED LOVED reading your report!

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