Trip Report 11/3/16-11/9/16

Introduction

Hey Guys! I wanted to make a trip report because reading others were so helpful! I’m the DD22 of my family and I planned the ENTIRE trip. Touring plans really helped me out a ton. I could not thank everyone enough that answered all of my silly questions on chat.

We went to Disney World Nov3-9th, 2016. My mother (DM), father (DF), and sister 17 (DSis) went on this vacation with me.

My DSis and I went to Disney World in March of 2015 for 3 days. It was a last second decision because my spring break plans got cancelled. I had the money aside and I said lets go in two days. It was exciting but very unorganized as you could probably imagine. After that trip we needed to go again and do it right. So we booked this trip and after a few months decided to invite our parents to join in on the fun. The last time we all went together as a family I was 10 and my DSis was 5.

Here it goes…

Day 1 (Thursday, Nov 3rd)

We had a 6:10am flight from BWI (Baltimore) to MCO. We checked our bags with Southwest and had the Magical Express luggage tags on our bags. At BWI I had my very first liner meet with @Sorcerers_Apprentice! Here is her post on Instagram (Becky Robbins Ashley on Instagram: "A liner meet before I even got on the plane! #wdwliners. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ #WaltDisneyWorld #wdw #wdwliners #disneyside #disneygram #disneyparks #disneygramers #igers_Wdw #dizcolors #disneyparks #UnforgettableHappensHere #RunDisney #WineDineHalf"). It was so great getting to meet another liner, especially one so close to home. That made the start of the trip very magical. The flight went well with no problems.

Once we arrived we went to the Magical Express. It took a bit to load on the bus but I was kind of expecting that from others experiences. We arrived at Port Orleans Riverside around 9:45am. I did the online check in already but wanted to go to the front desk to ask a few questions and see if they got my room request. I requested building 34 and got it! We were very happy! I picked this building because it was closest to the west bus stop. The west bus stop is the first to be picked up and the first to be dropped off. The CM at the front desk was very helpful. We got the Disney Dining Plan so we went to pick up our refillable mugs to get a drink and walked around the resort a bit to get a feel of it. Our room was not ready yet so we could not go in. After walking around we got a case a mini water bottles ($7) from the resort store and gave the Bell Service our carry on bags and water.

We jumped on a bus and went off to the Magic Kingdom. ~Originally we did not plan on going to the parks the first day but a nice liner pointed out that it would only cost us each $13 more to go to the park so we decided to add it on a few weeks out~ We got to MK around 11:00. We walked in right during a parade with everyone singing “all I want for Christmas is you”… perfect timing… it was a magical start. We had never seen Christmas at Disney before so it was a very special moment walking down Main Street and seeing the castle with everything going on around us.

We purchased the Memory Maker and got a picture in front of the castle right away. After that we went to Columbia Harbor House for lunch. DF and I got the shrimp and chicken, DM got the salmon, DSis got the shrimp mac and cheese. Everything was amazing!

We had FPP for a meet with Mickey, SpaceMtn, and Splash Mtn. We also rode a few other things in between. After Space Mtn we went to the Festival of Fantasy Parade. It was AMAZING! I highly recommend it!

We picked up an extra FPP for it’s a small world and after that one for Philaharmagic. When we got to Philaharmagic it was closed so we were given 4 any time FPP for another day… Score!

We did a few other things and then took the monorail to Poly for our 6:20 dinner at Ohana. Ohana was pretty good. With some of the reviews I was expecting a little bit better. But it was still great. The bread pudding… out of this world!

After dinner we took an Uber to POR. Uber was a great decision. My DF started a joke by re-naming Uber to goober. So from that point on we called many goober rides lol. When we got back to POR we finally got in our room (3433 - look for our bible note). Our luggage arrived just like it was supposed to and the room we perfect. My parents shared one bed, I took the other, and my DSis took the murphy bed. She is 5ft and it fit her just fine. She was pretty happy to have her own bed… So was I! lol

The plan for the next day was MK for the morning and DHS for the evening.

I’ll continue this later and post pictures :smiley:

11 Likes

A few pictures from the first day…

10 Likes

Great pictures! I’m looking forward to more of your report.
Good job planning the trip. I have an almost 22 year old DD who is crazy for Disney.

2 Likes

Oh, I am excited to read this! I enjoyed reading about your planning and it sounds like your trip was off to a great start!

I hope my daughter plans a Disney trip for me one day! :slight_smile:

1 Like

Great report and pictures! When they gave you the anytime FPs at PhilharMagic could you use them on other attractions?

1 Like

Yes! They gave us the paper slips that were good for MK until the end of Nov. The only exclusions were for PPF and SDMT. Could not believe we got them for Philaharmagic!

1 Like

Day 2 (Friday, Nov 4th)

MK opened on Friday at 9AM. We woke up at 7:30 got ready and were at the west bus stop by 8:10. We grabbed granola bars for breakfast and ate them at the bus stop. We arrived at MK early and got to watch the Welcome Show. None of us had ever seen it before. It was super cute and we were glad we got to see it. They then let us into the park about 10-15min early.

I somehow talked my family into using a TP for the morning. My DSis was against this idea because she thought this would ruin the fun. I set it on the slowest walking speed so we were not rushed. It worked nice for giving us an order for doing things but it did not work as well because we were super ahead of schedule so it got messed up quick. I guess that was a great problem to have lol!

We went to “Jingle” Cruise first and we loved it. Did PoC since we were over there and it was barley 9am. From there we went to future world to do a few things over there and then our first FPP.

Our three FPP for the day were Space Mtn, PPF, and SDMT.

We went to Cosmic Rays for lunch and it was good. No problems there at all. We also got Dole Whips a little after lunch.

The only real issue we had that day was waiting forever for Enchanted Tales with Belle. The wait time was 15min and it took us almost 45min! This almost made us miss our SDMT FPP. We cut it too close for comfort. This also made us cut out our mid day break that we were going to have at POR.

We did so many rides in the morning that it felt like be busted out MK. Between the first day and that morning we did almost all of the best rides!

Around 3 we took a bus to DHS. We saw the Little Mermaid show and looked in the museum of Walt before dinner.

We had a 5pm reservation at 50’s Prime Time Cafe. We had a blast! Our server let us have milkshakes with our meal instead of sodas. We gave him just as hard of a time that he was giving us. My mom gave him a hard time because dinner rolls were not served with dinner and her mom would have never let that happened. Next thing you know he brought out a slice of white bread on a plate for her. :laughing: Our food was great. It was probably one of the best meals we had on our trip. I got the stuffed pork chop, my DF got the pork shank. I don’t remember what the others ordered but we all enjoyed our meal.

After dinner we got seats for Fantasmic! Fantasmic is an amazing show. Had to be one of my favorites. Well worth the wait!

After Fantasmic was over the EMH began and the Star Wars show was finishing up. We went right to ToT and rode it two times in a row with no wait. After that we went to TSMM and only waited about 10min.

We were all pooped after that and did not want to stay until the park closed so we went back to POR to go to bed.

4 Likes

Pictures from Day 2

6 Likes

I love your pictures and trip report! How lovely for you to plan your family’s trip, I wish my DS22 would do the same! Tho I’m not sure I could relinquish the control :joy:
Looking forward to the next instalment :wink:

Day 3 (Saturday, Nov 5th)

AK opened at 9AM on Saturday. We woke up around 7:30 like we did the day before and arrived to AK around 8:40. I did not know that the did a little bird show for AK rope drop. It was super cute and we were happy all the parrots fly around.

We did not have any FPP for the morning in AK because we decided to save them for MK in the evening. We went straight to Expedition Everest once they let us in (around 8:55). We took the trail past dino land to get to EE instead of following the crowd…Best decision ever. When we got there we were able to jump right into the front of the line while everyone else was all backed up. We were able to ride EE two times right away with pretty much no wait.

After that we went to Festival of the Lion King show. AMAZING! I had not seen it since I was little. We were all very impressed. We went to It’s Tough to be a Bug next. Never had to wait for anything the whole morning!

We decided to try out Flame Tree BBQ for lunch. BEST LUNCH WE HAD ALL TRIP. The CM at the check out was super friendly and she was nice enough to give us all FPP cards for It’s Tough to be a Bug. We decided to save them for another day. The ribs from FTBBQ were amazing. We all had too much food… so some of the birds got lunch too…shhh lol!

We then went to Flights of Wonder witch was another wonderful show. Around 12:30 we decided to go back to POR and get a break in. We were all starting to feel a little run down from the two busy days before.

We all napped and got drink refills. Even went to the hot tub for a little bit. We wished POR had more than one hot tub because it was jam packed! Only got to put our feet in… but that’s really what needed it anyway haha.

After our break we “Goobered” to the Grand Floridian for our dinner reservation at 1900 Park Fare at 5:20. Uber was once again perfect. No problems at all. We had to wait about 15 min to be seated for dinner. Sadly we were not impressed with 1900PF at all. The food was just okay. The CM who was getting our drinks was a little slow. And the character interactions were not as great as everyone made it seem. The step sisters did not show up and they did not have anyone to replace them. My DF was wondering why in the world I picked this place to eat. Good thing we were on the DDP because it would have hurt a little to pay OOP on that one.

After dinner we monorailed to the MK for the evening. We had FPP’s for Splash Mtn, PoC, and HM. It was very crowded that evening but we did not mind much because we already did most of the attractions we wanted to do on the other two days. We did the Tiki Room just to see what it was all about…Ummm…We felt like we should have been on drugs or something to really enjoy that attraction (We don’t do drugs…I’m kidding). We just all thought it was so strange and kept laughing at the weirdness of it.

After that we went to see the castle and wishes. We were completely blown away seeing the castle all lit up for Christmas. None of us had ever seen it before. We spent a ton of time just looking at it taking pictures. Wishes was of course AMAZING. It almost brought a tear to my eye lol. Loved every second of it. After that the new night projection show Once Upon a Time was going to start soon. We grabbed a mickey pretzel and got a spot. Once Upon a Time show was amazing. I almost loved it as much as Wishes. We were able to get really close and enjoy all of it.

After that we went back to POR and went to bed! It was another great day!

4 Likes

Pictures from Day 3

6 Likes

Great pictures of your trip!! Sounds like you did a great job planning!! We did 1900 on our last trip (our second time there) and thought it was just okay…and that was with the step sisters! I can’t imagine them not being there as the interactions with the other characters were very uninspiring. But at least the rest of your night was amazing!! :grinning:

1 Like

I originally had a Chef Mickeys reservation for that day and so many people told me they did not like it there and to go to 1900 instead… I should have stuck with my original plan. Everything can’t be perfect. The rest of the day was perfect! I can’t complain that much :slight_smile:

2 Likes

Sorry that 1900 PF was a let down. The step sisters were our favorite part. I can understand how disappointing it would be without them.

1 Like

Day 4 (Sunday, Nov 6th)

We woke up around 6:30 so we could catch the bus to DHS for EMH at 8am. We got to DHS around 7:40 just as planned and waited until 8 when they let us in. We walked in and went right to ToT (RnR was closed during our trip :frowning: ). We rode ToT two times and then went to Star Tours. My DF and DSis rode that together and my DM and I went and got Starbucks for everyone. My DM and I are the people that get sick on those types of rides so that is why we skipped out. We had FPP for ToT, TSMM, and the Frozen Sing Along show. We LOVED the Frozen show… all of us laughed so hard and my DSis and I sang the whole time. For some reason I did not hear much talk about that show so I was not expecting it to be that great. It was a nice surprise.

After Frozen we got lunch at ABC. We all thought it was great… although nothing could ever compare to FTBBQ from the day before lol. We used our FPP’s and saw all the other shows except the Indiana Jones one (My DSis and I were not all that in love with it from when we went last time). I made sure to lift up the door mat at Muppets3D to see the key. Got to love Disney… it gave me a good smile.

After we were done with all of the DHS attractions I had to hunt down the famous carrot cake cookie. It took a lot of time to find but it was worth it! I regret only getting one! That was by far the best snack the entire trip IMHO. It makes me sad just thinking about not knowing when I will get another lol. We also had to hunt down the Darth Vader chocolate peanut butter cupcake for my DF. He loved that too!!!

Around 12:30 we went back to POR for nap time! We all needed a good nap!
Our dinner reservation that night was for Be Our Guest at 6:25. Originally the plan was to spend the evening in MK because it was open until 11. But because we were kind of “done” with MK we were trying to come up with other plans.

We hardly made it to our BOG reservation because our bus took a long time to pick us up and we got stuck in traffic. When we got into the park we had to run to BOG… and of course some sort of show was going on so we had to go around the castle and take the long way. We made it with a few min to spare.

I really wanted to sit in the West Wing because the atmosphere seemed cool. The CM called up to the place and made sure we got a West Wing table… So magical! We loved the West Wing! It made it a lot of fun. We also loved our dinner!!! It was the best dinner we had the entire time. My DM and I got the shrimp and scallop dish and we all agreed we made the best pick on the entree. It was AMAZING!!! I highly recommend it!

After dinner we decided to take the monorail over to Epcot. We figured if we saw Illuminations that night we could ride things the next night when everyone else was waiting for the show. We just made Illuminations…It was probably all of our least favorite show so we were glad we did not wait for a spot long.

After Illuminations there was some sort of marathon party going on so we had to leave. My DF and DM went back to POR and my DSis and I went back to MK. (I know it sounds crazy) My DSis and I wanted to used the FPP slips we were given from the first day. Wishes was going on so there were not really any waits for anything. We also picked up FPP for Winnie the Pooh on the way. Pooh was down when we got there so we were given a FPP for anything else again! We went to the Little Mermaid ride and walked right on. After doing some other little things we decided to leave. We gave our paper FPP to a family on the way out that seemed nice. They were very appreciative of it. And on the way out we decided to use our FPP from Pooh to see Tinkerbell. It was a crazy night but we had a blast doing it!

We got a bus back to POR and went to bed!

2 Likes

Pictures from Day 4

5 Likes

I forgot to post this picture from day 3… We got lots of laughs at Splash Mountain for this one lol

5 Likes

Awesome rpt!
I did TOT on that Sunday during emh as well. BUT…
Where did you find the famed carrot cake cookie? I tried to find it at Starring Rolls, and I gave up on the hunt for the place with “The Writer’s” in its name - I think I heard it was closed?

You can get it at Sweet Spells.

I’m loving your report! Can’t wait to read more.