 |  |
| Discussion Boards | Reviews | News | Trip Planning | Shop | Travel | Site Map |
| Disney Trip Report Archive An archive of reader-submitted trip reports | |
| Alex Stroup, editor | Search just the Trip Report Archive. |
|
Patty Thorpe -- October 2000 -- Walt Disney World (ASMuR)October 29 - November 4, 2000 PREFACE I can't tell you the number of hours of enjoyment I've gotten reading the many trip reports on Brian's website, going back to 1996. I've laughed and cried, relived memories, and gotten ideas to create new ones. I thought it was time to repay some of that enjoyment. Thus, we have the following trip report from a special trip my family and I took to celebrate my birthday (okay my 50th, but who's counting?). HISTORY I've been to WDW 4 times since 1979, my last trip being in 1989. I've been trying to get back there ever since! Lots of family events like high school and college graduations, college tuition, weddings, and new jobs came up and each time I had a date picked out for my return, the plans fell through and things got pushed back, a year at a time. I've been reading trip reports on Brian's website since 1996 and each one brought back memories and made me even more determined to get back to my favorite place on earth someday. My wonderful significant other, Bob, who did not understand my obsession with WDW, agreed that we would, indeed, go to WDW, if only to cure me of my obsession. He figured if we went, he wouldn't have to hear about it so much! NOT!!!!! Anyway, I went ahead and bought ALL the books and read them cover to cover. Next, we had to choose a time to go. I knew I didn't want to go during any school vacation time or near any holiday time to avoid crowds and lines, and definitely wanted to go during value season. Another consideration was Bob's work. He is self-employed and we needed to time things around his slow season. The first week of December 1999 was what I was shooting for. This would also provide the bonus of seeing WDW decorated for Christmas. I was working full-time days as a nurse and part-time evenings at home doing medical transcription so, financially, this was a good time for us to go. I went to a travel agent (AAA), and booked reservations for CBR, paid the deposit, and was set to go. That summer I decided to do the part-time job full-time and quit my day nursing job. However, this changed things, as I wouldn't have any vacation time accumulated and would not be paid for my time off. I called the travel agent to cancel and get my deposit back but she convinced me to let it sit and wait and see if things changed. If I decided on new dates, my deposit would already be paid. I started getting discouraged, thinking there was no way in the near future I would be going to WDW, so I got my deposit back. I went back to reading trip reports and dreaming. After my 49th birthday in October 1999, I started thinking about how I would like to celebrate my 50th birthday in 2000. Reading about the Millennium celebration at WDW got me thinking that I would be celebrating my 1/2 century mark during the celebration of the new millennium. I started looking at rental homes near WDW thinking that, if Bob and I could rent one of those huge houses for a week, my family could join us to celebrate my birthday at WDW. The prices were good and Bob said we could go ahead and make plans. My birthday is October 25 and it would have been nice to be in WDW not only on my birthday but also Halloween. On Thanksgiving, I told my family (Bob, Mom, son Michael, daughter-in-law Danielle, daughter Amy, and son-in-law Russ) that I knew what I wanted for my 50th birthday and that was to celebrate it at my favorite place on earth with my favorite people on earth. If Bob and I picked up the tab for the accommodations, all they had to do was come up with the money for transportation and tickets. Everybody agreed that they could save enough in 10 months to make this possible. Before I made any definite arrangements, I kept reading trip reports and looking through the guidebooks and knew that it wouldn't be enough to do Disney as a day visitor. I really, really wanted to stay at Disney. So I checked into how much more it would cost to stay on-site. I priced Hotel Plaza hotels as well as the All-Star Resorts and was going to go with one of the hotels in the Hotel Plaza but the more I read, the more I knew I wanted to be totally immersed in the Magic the entire week. I checked out the All-Stars for prices and availability. From what I had read, it sounded like AS Music would have the least number of kids. Since we wouldn't be traveling with any kids, All-Star Music sounded like our best bet. We would also be traveling during school time, so that would cut down on the kiddie crowd, too. (Not that we don't like kids - one of my biggest priorities was avoiding crowds and lines.) After getting my deposit back from Disney through AAA, I again hiked to the AAA office with my new plan. My birthday is on October 25. Value season started on October 29. I'm no fool - since we were paying for 3 rooms, we needed to save all we could, so we changed our dates of travel to October 29 through November 4. I don't remember the exact amount but 3 rooms for 7 days and 6 nights would cost only a little more than renting a house. PLUS - we didn't have to rent a car and we would get all the Disney perks, including use of all the transportation, sending purchases back to our room, and, best of all, we wouldn't be going TO Walt Disney World, we would be IN Walt Disney World! A few months down the road at a baby shower, I was explaining to my cousin Joy, who also happens to be my daughter's godmother, and who also happens to love Disney, what my plans were for my 50th birthday celebration. She thought that sounded really neat so I asked her, spur of the moment, if she wanted to come. She said she'd love to! YEAAA! Once she checked her schedule for the dates we were traveling and found that it was a good time for her, I called the travel agent to book another room at the ASMuR. So, as of about April or May when all deposits were made and all plans were going forward, this is our cast of characters:
Much as I wanted my mother (70-something) to come with us, she declined. I knew she'd love EPCOT, especially Italy, but she didn't want to go. Didn't want to fly and basically is not a traveler. Likes to sleep in her own little bed at night. There were a few details to get squared away, such as what we would do with the dogs while we were gone (5 and 2 years old and never been away from us). The other big hurdle was going to be transportation. Some of us were WDW virgins, others of us (Amy and me) were airplane virgins. Can you believe we made it to almost 30 and almost 50 years of age, respectively, without ever having flown? Since no one wanted to drive, and a bus was out of the question, and the train (private compartment) was too expensive, flying was our only choice. Two of the considerations were price and availability of non-stop flights. Once I'm up there, I'm not coming back down until I'm in Orlando! Southwest just started flying out of Albany International Airport in May of 1999 and had terrific prices, and a couple of other airlines also had nonstop flights to Orlando. Southwest had the best prices, offered a couple of nonstop flights a day, and - I have to admit it - I checked safety/crash statistics on all the airlines. Southwest won. I think I had also read that Southwest is owned by its employees and I liked that idea a lot and found that somewhat reassuring. Bob, Michael, Danielle, and Joy were veterans of flying and loved it. Amy and I had never flown and were scared. Russ had flown and hated it. As soon as we made the airline reservations, Russ went to his doctor for a Valium prescription. Let's see - hotel reservations set, deposit paid, airplane tickets set, didn't need a car rental. What else? Transportation to and from the airport. I liked what I had read about Tiffany Town Car and they were very pleasant to deal with on the phone. It was between Tiffany and Mears. What I liked about Tiffany was that your driver meets you at the airport and once your gear is loaded, off you go. With Mears, you wait until the van or bus is full, and then you go. And you stop wherever each party on the bus is going. So you are on Mears' schedule rather than your own. Price wise, for a party of 7, it was more economical to use Tiffany. With the Tiffany Internet coupon, it was $90 and this was split 7 ways. Please note: Mears is the official shuttle service of Disney (or was at the time of this trip) so keep this in mind when you are booking, as I'm sure Disney will promote Mears all the way. You don't need a lot of advance notice for Tiffany, either. Once you have made your airline reservations, call or e-mail them with the dates of arrival and departure, times of arrival and departure, flight numbers, and your destination once in Orlando. (I called about 3 days ahead of time to confirm all this.) I shared my guidebooks with everyone. Their assignment was to browse through the books and/or surf the net to get some ideas for what they wanted to see and do. I gave them the website addresses that I used as my Bibles (Brian's MousePlanet and WDWIG). Nobody did their homework except Russ, good son-in-law that he is. This was not going to be a commando tour because I wanted everyone to have a good time in a relaxed, vacation sort of way. I knew from the get-go that there were things that we weren't going to see or get to do, so I kind of had a "Gotta do" list and a "Wanna do" list. I didn't set up PS arrangements for every day. I didn't think we'd encounter crowds and there weren't any places I really, really wanted to eat, except one, and I didn't want to lock us into specific times, so I thought we would just take our chances. This actually turned out to be the best plan. Since this was going to be a vacation and not a guerrilla invasion, I decided that we would skip early entry days at the parks. I had read that it was good to go to parks the day after their early entry days, so I made a list of the parks and when their early entry days were, and set up a chart of what parks were good to visit on which days. Also, I made a note that weekends are when Florida residents visit the parks, and weekdays are when Florida schools go to Epcot on day field trips during the school year. As you will see later, this was a good framework to start with. So with all these factors in mind, this was our starting point:
Danielle had always wanted to do a Medieval Times dinner so I thought we could do that on our first night and then we wouldn't have to leave Disney property again for the rest of the week. We would be arriving on Sunday, October 29, so I booked reservations and got AAA discounts on some of the tickets. I said that we were coming to celebrate my birthday and I wanted to be Queen that night and was told that if it really was my birthday that month, my dinner was free! This was the first of many pleasant surprises. I also knew that I wanted to do the Not So Scary Halloween Party, so the day after those tickets went on sale, I called Disney and ordered those. That put us in the Magic Kingdom for Tuesday night, October 31 and would also cover me for a parade and fireworks. I LOVE fireworks and never, ever tire of seeing them. I also knew that I wanted to go parasailing and so did Bob. (I know, I know - why am I not afraid to go parasailing but I am afraid to fly?) Tuesday, Halloween, during the day seemed like a good time to do this so I made reservations with the Sammy Duvall Recreation Center at the Contemporary for 11:00. Also, Illuminations was also on the "Gotta do" list. Russ wanted to do a dinner at Victoria and Albert's so I made reservations for him and Amy on Monday the 30th at 7 p.m. Very expensive but Amy likes "foo-foo" stuff and Russ said that for a once-in-a-lifetime kind of thing they had to do it. PLEASE NOTE: If you make a dinner reservation here, you must give a credit card number as a deposit. If you do not cancel the reservation giving them at least 24 hours' notice and you do not keep the reservation, you will be billed! No kidding! On the MousePlanet website, there is a calendar of events listed month by month. It is so easy to use and really helpful as it lists dates and hours of operation and dates and times of parades. The Main Street Electrical Parade (my favorite parade) was running only one night during our stay, Friday night at 6:15. That was a Gotta do. A few weeks later, someone's trip report said that a really good place to watch it was on the front porch of the Liberty Tree Tavern. I decided to make PS's here for sometime between 4 and 5:30 to give us time to eat and then go out and get a good spot to see the parade which started at 6:15. In May or June our airline tickets were purchased. Southwest leaving Albany Airport at 8:00 on Sunday morning, October 29, arriving in Orlando at about 10:30 a.m., returning on Saturday, November 4 at 6:10 p.m. Too late to back out now! Next, I had to contact Tiffany to give them our arrival date, time and flight number and departure date and time, and where we were going. Even without the $5 Internet coupon, Tiffany was the most economical and convenient for 7 of us. Fast forward to 4th of July. Danielle's dad, Jim, and her step mom, Loretta, came to visit from Philadelphia. We had a cookout at Michael and Danielle's house and were talking about the upcoming trip. Jim and Loretta have designed several Disney collectibles for Lenox, so there's a Disney link there. Spur of the moment - Wanna come? Jim and Loretta looked at each other and said they did! Jim had never been, Loretta used to live in Orlando, but she hadn't been to Disney in years. They just had to check dates, etc. A few weeks later they e-mailed Michael and Danielle and we were now a party of 9! WOO-HOO!!! The more the merrier. I called Disney directly to reserve another room. Nothing available at ASMuR for those dates. I was told to try again because they get 20,000 phone calls a day and something would more than likely open up. I called the next day and TA-DA, a room was available for October 29 through November 3. This was not a problem. Jim and Loretta would stay until the 3rd, then stay with relatives or friends the last night and fly home on the 4th. I requested that, if at all possible, it at least be in the same building as the other rooms but, since it was short notice, I knew that this might not work out. To be honest, I wasn't sure until we arrived and checked in that any of our rooms were going to be close together, even though it was requested. I couldn't decide what tickets to get so I decided to just wait and get our tickets when we got to WDW. Russ was too excited to wait so he got his 6-day Park Hopper Plus pass (using my MKC card) at the Disney Store at one of our malls. Michael and Danielle weren't sure they wanted to do the Disney thing for the entire week and thought they would do 3 days at Disney and a couple of days at Universal, so they would wait and get their passes when we checked in. Everything was pretty much in place. The dogs were being boarded at the vet, which eased my mind considerably, and they would be together in the same kennel. Amy and Michael live next door to each other and Russ's father lives across the street, so he very kindly consented to drive the 4 of them to the airport. Bob and I decided to start our vacation a day early and booked a room at a hotel near the airport that had free shuttle service to and from the airport, AND free park and fly for up to 2 weeks. Good deal! Don't know how I slept that night, but I did and before I knew it, it was time to get up and head on over to the airport. Michael, Danielle, Russ and Amy were already there. Joy said she would get there about 7:30 (seasoned traveler that she is, this was no big deal to her). Out of 7 of us, 4 love to fly, 2 had never flown, and then there was Russ. He had flown but hated it. One Valium later and he was calming Amy and me down and trying to get us to relax. Because I used to get lots of ear infections when I was little, I bought ear thingies that equalize the pressure in your ears when you are flying (I think they are called Ear Planes). I had read about people spending part of their Disney trip in medical offices being treated for ear and sinus infections, and I didn't want to take any chances. I put those in and they actually worked quite well. Takeoff was a bit traumatic for Amy and me. Joy was rubbing one of my hands while I had a death grip on Bob with the other. After a few tears, Amy and I calmed down and I actually loved looking out the window, so I know it's not a height thing for me. (It's actually a control thing - if I could sit in the cockpit and see everything that was happening, I'd feel ever so much better.) Anyway, it was a beautiful, sunny morning. We followed the Hudson River down to New York City, and a little while later saw Chesapeake Bay, and we could see ocean almost the whole way down to Florida. Before I knew it, the pilot said that we were a little ahead of schedule and would be arriving about 15 minutes early. Joy warned me that I may not like landing and not to get scared when I felt the bump. What bump? I didn't even notice! It was great! I was just totally amazed that we went from 32 degrees to palm trees and sunshine in 2 hours! Big WOO-HOO!!! The Orlando airport is incredible. The mosaic tile patterns on the floor are so bright and sunny, and with the sun shining on it, and the palm trees outside - it's just amazing. Joy took over the job of navigator for the week at this point. She knew just where we had to go so we took the monorail to get our bags. I told everyone to be watching for a sign with Bob's name on it. We saw the Disney Cruise line lady and a few other signs and then, there he was - our driver, David, with the sign for US! We collected all our bags, loaded them into the van (it was a very tight squeeze), and we were on our way. Hard to believe that we would soon be on Disney property. We went directly to ASMuR, as we didn't need to make any stops along the way. (In case you've read other trip reports and are wondering how our Tiffany driver was - he was a good driver. There was no entertainment or great conversation along the way. He was very nice but we had a bit of a language barrier and I think he was trying to promote his own limousine service, if I was understanding him correctly. And we had a different driver going home.) It was very exciting once we were on Disney property and we saw the purple Disney signs and landmarks like the ToT and Blizzard Beach. And then we pulled into the ASMuR. The lobby was jam-packed and I had warned everyone that the rooms wouldn't be ready when we got there. We were prepared to stash our bags and just wander around for a while, but we had already planned to not waste a day on our park hoppers for only a partial day. We were going to buy 6 day Park Hopper Plus passes (3 pluses), and only use 5 days. That way, we would have one day left for our next trip. (What I also didn't realize at the time was that any pluses we didn't use would also be good for the next trip.) As you enter the lobby of the ASMuR, there are 2 customer service counters. The one on the right (with about 50 people waiting to be taken care of) appeared to be specifically for check-in and the one on the left (with a line of about 2) appeared to be for tickets, PS arrangements, etc. While the rest of us got into the line to check in, I sent Amy over to the Guest Relations counter on the left. Smart cookie Amy hadn't used a day from her pass in 1989 and she wanted to redeem it and get her Park Hopper Plus pass. I heard her calling me across the lobby. They needed my MKC card to get the MKC discount on her pass. (I had gotten applications for everyone to get their own MKC cards before we went away but Amy and Russ did not do this. As it turned out, because of the Disney Club and the end of the MKC, it didn't really matter anyway.) Cast member Ralph (from Puerto Rico) not only took care of Amy's pass with the refund and all that that involved, but he told us that, if we were quiet and didn't tell anybody, he would process all of our room check-ins! Who threw that pixie dust around us? While we checked in, we gave Russ money to go to the gift shop to get our refillable mugs. After Bob and I were checked in, I went to call Grandma to let her know we had arrived safe and sound. We had missed about 1-1/2 inches of snow. What a great day to get out of Albany! It was 80 degrees at WDW! After about 30 minutes, we all were checked into our rooms and had our passes. While all of our rooms weren't ready, surprisingly 2 of them were. (Jim and Loretta were flying in that evening from Philadelphia so check-in wouldn't be a problem for them.) I had faxed my room request about 3 days prior to arrival but everybody wants Calypso building so we didn't get that. I also requested that we wanted to at least be in the same building, even if our rooms couldn't be together. Not only were we all in the same building, we were all together on the second floor of Broadway, rooms 5821, 5822, 5823, 5824, and 5825. This was great. I had no other preferences, really, so this was great. We were near the elevators, ice machines, and our balcony/walkway overlooked a quiet little "jungle" area on the opposite side of the pool. The boys all smoke, so this was good for them. If you're anti-smoking, sorry about that. None of the ladies of this group like smoke either, but in all honesty, none of us were bothered by the smoke at all. I know it's dirty and stinky, and nobody complains louder than I do about it, but it truly was not bad. Since we weren't eating dinner until 8 p.m., I thought we better have something to eat now just to tide us over. We hiked to the food court (Broadway is lovely but it really is quite a walk to the main building), tried to get our bearings, and checked the pools out. I've read some negative things about the All-Star Resorts and their food courts in many trip reports. We were totally happy here. The rooms were clean and more than adequate for 2 adults. And really, how much room do you need to sleep and take a shower? Other than that, we didn't spend any other time in our rooms. The sink is outside the actual bathroom and tub area, so 2 can get ready at the same time. The food court had a wonderful variety of things from pizza to pasta to cold sandwiches and salads to ribs and turkey dinners. The prices were very reasonable, too. There was also a terrific bakery with huge cookies. You could also get pre-made sandwiches and salads, and pudding, Jell-O, yogurt and other goodies to go. I don't know what everybody had but among us I know we had lasagna, BBQ pork sandwiches, Cole slaw, cheese fries, fruit, chocolate chip cookie, and probably a burger in there, too. I had the kid's chicken tenders dinner. We were very happy with the quality, price, and quantity. After that, we decided to change into our bathing suits and just relax by the pool. The pool by the Broadway building (the piano pool) was very quiet. There is no fountain in it and no kiddie pool nearby so most of the families with kids went to the guitar pool, which was very cute, big, and always busy. There is also a little baby pool at the Calypso pool so that keeps all the families there, too. (Without getting too graphic, if a toddler has an accident in the kiddie pool, it will be closed so the water can be treated. So if you wonder why you can't take the baby into the wading pool on any given day, that's probably why.) The water temperature was perfect and we decided that it had been a good idea to just relax and not hit the ground running on our first day here. We changed and stashed our stuff in the 2 rooms that were ready and went to the pool. I hadn't made any arrangements for transportation to Medieval Times and was sort of winging it. Michael decided he wanted to rent a van. He and Russ went to the front desk, got transportation to the Car Care Center, and were back in about 45 minutes with a van. Any of you Moms of Michaels know how mischievous Michaels are and how much they love their Moms. It was during this time that Michael took the opportunity to do some scheming and make PS's for us for a couple of birthday parties for me. More on that later. Remember the chart I had made up about what days to do what parks? I brought that with us to the pool to see if anyone had any ideas or suggestions for filling in some of the days. I'm usually pretty organized and pay attention to detail, but I really wanted to relax this trip and not be the Disney Nazi. Back at the pool in the afternoon, Joy, the organizing guru that she is, took my list and, with input from everyone, we fleshed it out so that we sort of knew what parks we were doing on what days. I told everyone that this was important because otherwise we'd end up going around in circles and wasting time trying to decide what to do next. This was our itinerary then (subject to change as the need arose): Monday: Breakfast at the Crystal Palace (PS made) then on to Epcot for the day (Future World). Tuesday: Changed time of parasailing to an earlier time (good thing I called about this. They didn't have our name down at all.) Then on to MGM. Halloween Party beginning at 7 p.m. in the Magic Kingdom. Wednesday: Magic Kingdom. Thursday: Epcot. Possibly Boardwalk, possibly Market Place. Friday: Animal Kingdom during the day, then Liberty Tree Tavern about 4:30 and MSEP at 6:15. Saturday: MGM or Animal Kingdom or shopping? Pick up by Tiffany Town Car at 4 p.m. Somewhere in here we wanted to do Pleasure Island, too, but we were going to play this by ear. Someone checked and found out that the rest of our rooms were now ready, so we went to put things away and freshen up. I'm glad that Michael had rented the van but he should have only booked it for that night or 2 days at most. I won't say how much it was but we could have rented another room at the resort. And we used it for less than 2 days. Happily, he turned it in early and I think he got some of his money back. Our transportation was set. We just had to wait for Jim and Loretta to arrive from the airport. Unfortunately, probably from all the excitement, I had developed a migraine. (NOTE: I'm writing this quite a bit after our trip and I just read a magazine article that said that high altitude can cause migraines. Think it could have been from flying for the first time? Hmmmmm...) Since we had already made the reservations for Medieval Times and this was the only thing Danielle had really wanted to do, I couldn't very well not go. Jim and Loretta arrived literally just as we were getting ready to leave, so we stashed their suitcases in the back of the van and off we went. If you don't care to know about Medieval Times, scroll down here. When you enter you are in a bar/gift shop/lobby area where you wait to go in to eat. Once it's time to be seated, you go into a huge arena. The seats are in a raised arena-like configuration and the dirt floor in the center is where the activity takes place. All around the arena are seats/bleachers painted in different colors. The colors of the sections correspond with the colors of the knights who will be competing and you cheer for the knight wearing the colors you are seated in. We were in the blue and white section so we cheered for the Blue and White Knight! Once everyone is seated, the servers bring beverages around to everyone. Then the photographers come around. The pictures are kind of neat - they take your face and transpose it on the body of a Conan the Barbarian type of body for the guys and a Maid Marion type of body for the ladies. Very cute. Bob became the souvenir king here and bought all the pictures they took of us. Then they came around selling little pennants in the knights' colors to wave during the competitions, and flowers to throw to the knights. (It ends up being a very expensive evening if you buy all the little doodads. And dinner is about $42 apiece.) While the food is being served, an exhibition takes place of trained Andelusian stallions doing tricks and marching in formation, etc. By the way, dinner is served as in medieval times with no eating utensils. Soup is brought in a pewter bowl with handles on each side. Dinner is a baked half chicken and potato. Desert is little Danish-type pastries. Buttered rolls are also served. It really was very nice and I wish I could have enjoyed it more. The horses were beautiful and the knights' events were neat to watch. The knights were very handsome, too! The food was good and there was more than enough of it. Unfortunately, I couldn't eat anything but a few bites of chicken, which was very moist and delicious. I couldn't even eat my birthday cake, but I brought it back to our room for everyone to share later. We made it back to our rooms for a good night's sleep so we would be well rested for our first day at WDW! Monday, October 30. Russ wanted Amy to start her first day at WDW with Pooh so he and Michael had made reservations yesterday at the Crystal Palace for breakfast. My body wakes me up at about 6 o'clock every morning so I didn't put in for a wake-up call and I didn't think to remind anyone else to. Michael and Danielle did, and he was very excited about the fact that Mickey called him to wake him up this morning! I had completely forgotten about this service so I was happy that Michael's day started out this way. (Michael is our very conservative, suit and tie guy. It's hard to tell if he's having fun or not because it's just not cool to show it!) Anyway, I know he got a kick out of this. I was happy because my headache was gone, although my stomach was still a bit queasy. We enjoyed the beautiful weather on our walk to the bus stop. Side note here: In the entire time we were there, there was not one drop of rain. The weather could not have been better - 80s every day. Very comfortable. Another note: We did not wait more than 5 or 10 minutes at our hotel bus stop to go anywhere. (Leaving the parks was another story. The bus stops are arranged by hotel category with value resorts being the farthest away. So, guess where the farthest bus stops were? All Star Resorts!) Sometimes we were dragging so bad that it was an awful effort just to get to the bus stop! We stood a couple of times on the way to the parks, but that was really no big deal. We stood on the bus and talked to a very excited little girl and her mom who were here for only a couple of days for their first trip to WDW. That was pretty exciting and fun! We arrived at the TTC and went through the turnstiles, with my stomach flipping with excitement that we were IN DISNEYWORLD!!! I don't know about anyone else, but the point of highest anticipation for me is seeing the castle for the first time from the end of Main Street. As we were about to turn the corner, Amy turned around to look at me at the same time I was about to tell her that we were going to see it in a minute. We were both beaming. And then, there it was. What a vision. I'm getting misty just thinking about it again. NOW, I really felt like I was at Walt Disney World! Onward we proceeded to the Crystal Palace. We had PSs (thanks to Russ and Michael) and we only waited about 10 minutes. It gave us an opportunity to sit on the porch and people-watch and for the fellas to find a designated smoking area. Our name was called and in we went. The food at the Crystal Palace was very good. It was an all-you-can-eat buffet and was very exciting having Piglet, Eeyore, and Tigger dropping by from time to time! Pooh doesn't make the rounds of the tables - you go to him. Amy went and stood in line to have her picture taken with Pooh. Everyone in our party seemed to enjoy the cheesy potatoes the most. I noticed a couple of times that the servers were bringing birthday cupcakes and singing to different tables in the restaurant. While Joy and I were getting our food, I looked at her and said that that was something I could do without. After we returned to our table, I noticed our waitress with a cupcake followed by other servers. I watched them to see where they were going and they proceeded to our table and sang Happy Birthday to me! Michael had arranged this yesterday. Thanks, Mikey! What fun! We took our time finishing our breakfast and then headed off to Epcot on the Monorail. Bob and Russ wanted to ride the boats but we promised them that we would do that another time and headed for the monorail. Joy truly was a joy - she got the map out every day, carried it with her, and was our navigator for the entire week. On her previous trips, her sister had done this duty, so she said this was fun for her. She also kept us from getting on each other's last nerves (for the most part). She said that she would be awarding points during the week. (Our word for being in a bad mood or really grouchy is pinched.) Anyone who got "pinched" would be awarded positive points. Anyone who did good things and basically kissed up to Joy, would get negative points. The one with the least amount of points at the end of the week would get a prize. This was a good way to keep the lid on things when anyone got a little cranky and also interjected humor to cool things off. Anyway, Russ was on a mission to win the prize! NOTE: Amy and I each bought sets of 2-way radios before we left home. They were terrific. We used them the entire time we were there. We knew that there would be times that some of us would want to go off and do other things and this was a great way to keep in touch. So we had four radios to divide among 9 people. Good investment! A couple of caveats with these, though. With only 12 or 14 channels to choose from and lots of other people having these radios, you will hear other conversations and others will hear yours, so be careful not to say anything you wouldn't say over a public address system! Also, please turn them off while you are in an attraction to be courteous to those around you. RANT ON: The only minor mishap we had involving our radios during the week was a young lady (and I use the term loosely) who decided to have some fun with Russ and pretend to be Amy one afternoon in the Magic Kingdom. She proceeded to lead him on a wild goose chase for about an hour until he realized that he hadn't been talking to Amy. Unfortunately, this led to a few heated words between Russ and the girl's mother who denied that her daughter would do such a thing, but anyway, we finally got things straightened out. So I guess I would also suggest that these things be put into responsible hands. They really aren't toys. RANT OFF. So much had changed in 11 years, that I found nothing as I remembered it and actually became overwhelmed with everything there was to see and do. Epcot was so much different than I remembered it. I remember going through the turnstile, seeing Spaceship Earth with a long walkway with flowers leading to it. Didn't care for the Legacy things there, they distract from Spaceship Earth. Wonder if they're going to move them? Loved Sorcerer Mickey and the sparkly 2000 on top of Spaceship Earth, though. There was a line for Spaceship Earth so we moved on. I had wanted to send e-mails to people but never did find the right place to do this. Russ got very involved in some computer stuff and didn't want to leave. The rest of us did, so we left him there, saying he could play on a computer at home and let's not waste time doing it now. Russ was about to get his first positive points because he became extremely pinched. Amy kept saying we were leaving and that we would keep in touch by radio. Anyway, we lost Russ for a while. AND, he started earning points! BOOOO! We (minus Russ) strolled up to the Living Seas and spent some time here just watching the fish. There was an exhibit with a manatee. Aren't they awesome creatures? We then wandered over to Journey Into Your Imagination. This was okay. Joy gets motion sickness so she spent most of this attraction sitting down looking at the floor. (No one bothered her about sitting on the floor, but it wasn't crowded, so it may be a different story when it's a full house.) We kept trying to reach Russ on the radio and we finally did but it was a couple of hours later! He did not like being left behind so he decided to go off on his own. He headed off to World Showcase where he sampled the wines of the world! From there, we went to Honey I Shrunk the Audience. My chair worked for everything but the mice so I missed that. Everything else was great. AH-CHOOO!!!!!! We hooked up with Michael and Danielle. Jim and Loretta had decided to take a breather and go back to their room. The rest of us checked out Cranium Command. I chickened out on this one and Bob does not like anything that might have biological overtones (blood), so he skipped this one. Joy shopped for a gift and saw something she liked but she decided not to get it at that point. I know we did Universe of Energy and Spaceship Earth. And I had read so much about Ice Station Cool, that I had to go in. Had to try Beverly! Not as bad as I expected. I liked the ginger ale the best (Mexico I think) and it actually made my stomach feel better. The Coca Cola memorabilia in the gift shop was neat but we didn't get anything. NOTE: EVERY ride and attraction at WDW exits into a gift shop! It got to be a running joke with us throughout the week, but be prepared! Amy and Russ had to leave to get ready for their gala dinner at Victoria and Albert's. The rest of us left shortly thereafter to just relax. We had no dinner plans for the evening and decided to just relax by the pool again. Jim and Loretta were the only ones who wisely went back to the hotel each afternoon to rest. If this is your plan, and you happen to be staying in Broadway at ASMuR, the rooms do not get touched until late in the afternoon. Jim and Loretta returned to their room more than once to find their room not made up yet and housekeeping wanting to come in while they were trying to nap. Maybe you can make a request in the morning to be sure your room is made up by a certain time in the afternoon if your plans include time-out from the parks during the day. Joy and I were sitting by the pool waiting to watch Russ and Amy go to V&A's. It was like prom night! After that we just went to the food court and browsed in the gift shop. Bob and I had the turkey dinner with mashed potatoes and it was really good. Don't know what everyone else had. On our drive to Medieval Times yesterday, Michael had seen a Nike outlet. He loves that swoosh so after dinner he decided to make a run there. Somehow or other, I had only packed 3 pairs of socks for Bob for the week. What the heck was I thinking? We gave Michael money to pick up a pack of tube socks for Bob. Bob, Joy, and I hung out while Jim, Loretta, Michael, and Danielle went shopping. About 9:30, everyone arrived back at the rooms at the same time. Bob got his socks, Michael didn't get any sneakers (said the prices weren't that good), and we got to hear about V&A's from Amy and Russ. Truly elegant. Each lady gets 1 long-stemmed red rose and the menus are personalized for each person. The menu changes daily but the night Amy and Russ were there they had Iranian beluga caviar, marinated elk over root vegetable ragout with huckleberry sauce, game bird consommé, prime beef tenderloin over chanterelle risotto (Amy) and roasted young chicken in a mini pumpkin with sweet potatoes and foie gras (Russ), assorted cheeses with burgundy poached pear, caramelized banana gateau. Was it expensive? Very! Was it worth it? Absolutely! Amy and Russ gave this 2 thumbs up as a once in a lifetime experience. While the fellas were having their smokes on the balcony, they heard a rustling in the little jungle area below our balcony and what came roaming out of there but an armadillo! Wish I had gotten to see it. We did see a gecko (not sure how to spell it) on the sidewalk one day, though. Tuesday, October 31 Parasailing day! I had changed our time to 10:00 a.m. because we were going to meet everyone at 1:00 at MGM studios. We had a quick bite in the food court. (Breakfast at the food court is good, too. Everything from Mickey waffles to made-to-order omelets.) Think I had an omelet this day. Very good. Bob, Joy, and I took a bus to the TTC and then waited for a bus to the Contemporary. We asked one bus driver which bus would go to the Contemporary and he said to wait for the bus from one of the other hotels (I can't remember which one) and that would take us there. When that bus finally pulled up (about 9:45) we got on and I just asked, by the way, "You do stop at the Contemporary, don't you?" and he replied, "No ma'am. None of the buses do." All righty-then! We got off the bus and walked rather quickly to the Contemporary. (It wasn't far - we were looking at it from the bus stop.) We got to the Contemporary and found Sammy Duval's in the back and were right on time. Joy waited on the dock as there were 2 other parties going on this excursion. I started having doubts, so let a gentleman and his daughter go first. Bob and I were up next. You can go alone or tandem with another person, one behind the other. I started getting chicken but really wanted to do it and would be very disappointed if I didn't. So we got hooked into the harness. The guys on the boat were great and very funny. They said if I got up there and really didn't like it and wanted to come back, just wave my legs in a scissors fashion and that would be the signal to bring us down. Very slowly and very smoothly, we started rising up off the back of the boat. (You never touch the water. You take off and land from the back of the boat.) We got up to 450 feet and it was awesome! It was totally quiet up there and you could talk to each other in normal voices without shouting. I expected to have the wind whipping around us but it was totally calm. You couldn't even hear the motor of the boat that was pulling us. We could see Cinderella's Castle, some city not far away, and everything. I liked watching our shadow on the water. I tried to take pictures but it was difficult because I was trying to hold onto the harness with my arms, not drop the camera, and then stuff the camera back into my harness/vest without touching the handle that they tell you NEVER to touch. I got some nice pictures of my feet! HINT: Do not bring expensive cameras up here with you! I had Amy's disposable camera with me and I didn't drop it but could have very easily. Too soon, they were reeling us in and we landed very smoothly with no problems. The last person, a teenager, went solo and she went up to 600 feet. What a blast! I highly recommend it unless you are very afraid of heights. The cost was $120 for the two of us, which is cheap considering it is $85 for one person. Bob wants to go alone next time. I think I'd prefer going tandem again. Joy waited patiently at the dock for us and once we were back on land, we went into the Contemporary. I had never been in here before, except riding through on the Monorail. They have the best gift shop here! I could have spent loads of time here but didn't buy anything. I was waiting to check out the World of Disney store before I started buying souvenirs. From there, we took the Monorail to the TTC and then a bus to the studios. I asked to ride up front with the engineer of the monorail. He seemed bored and not too thrilled with having company, but I had never done this and I was celebrating my birthday! I've noticed that others have written about an odor to the monorail and it's been attributed to the glue used for new carpeting. Don't know what it was from but do know that it smelled like a horse barn stall that desperately needed to be cleaned! Got to MGM, beeped the radio and everyone was right where they were supposed to be! I had told everyone that when you go in the entrance, there is a store there called Sid Cahunahuna's (I know that isn't the real name but that's what I call it) so we could meet there. They had just arrived shortly before us so nobody had to wait too long. We started to wander down the street and checked out some of the shops. Some of us like to shop and some of us can't see why we waste time shopping when there are rides to ride! We kind of wandered around a little bit to get our bearings. We did the Great Movie Ride first and got the gangster side. That was fun! Then we headed over to the Backlot Tour. We then headed over to Indiana Jones and got Fastpasses for about 4 p.m. (By the way, this was the first and only time we used Fastpasses all week! Never needed them!) We were sort of wandering around again, not sure where we were going or what we wanted to see but beginning to think about lunch. Russ, Joy, and I really wanted to eat at the 50's Prime Time Café so we headed there. We didn't have PS's but put our name on the list for a party of 9. Amy and Danielle decided they would rather ride the RnRC instead, so they went there and said they would grab something to eat afterward. They didn't want to ride this one on full stomachs! I changed the number of our party to 7 and we waited in the living room and watched some TV. We chatted with a family from Boston and waited about 15 minutes for our table. (This was one of 3 families from Boston we met and chatted with this week.) Finally, our table was ready and we were seated. Doug was our server. Joy, Russ, and I knew what this was like from reading about it and were excited to see if this place was as fun as it sounded. Others in our group had no clue what was going on and were not in the mood to do anything but EAT! Despite the grouches in our group, Doug was a really good sport, very campy, and I thoroughly enjoyed the meal! The food was really good too. If you go here, try Dad's sampler platter for an appetizer. The fried cheese is a ball of boursin cheese with thin slices of toasted bread and a raspberry sauce. The best thing I ate all week. The sampler also has very thinly sliced onion rings with a great horseradish sauce for dipping, and French fries. This enough for 2-4 people to share, depending on how hungry you are. The pot roast dinner is excellent and Michael enjoyed the chicken and biscuit dinner. The portions here, however, are gigantic. Michael had arranged for yet another birthday party, so Doug came out singing Happy Birthday to me with a little dessert thingy and forever after on this trip, I became Patsy. Thanks, Doug! After we ate, we waddled back to Indiana Jones and walked right in with our Fastpasses, after hooking back up with Danielle and Amy. They loved RnRC and were determined to ride it again - and again - and again.... you get the idea. Indiana Jones was fun but I'm not sure I would do it again. I think it was because it was just a little too long. After Indiana Jones we went on Star Tours. I was not real sure about this because I wasn't sure if it would make me dizzy or not, but I took a chance and loved it. We sat in the front row. It wasn't at all what I thought. I think I laughed and screamed all the way through it! We didn't see any shows here this time and I'm sorry to say I missed Muppetvision 3D, but I knew I would be back so what I didn't see this time, I would definitely catch next time. Now, remember, this is Halloween and we have tickets for Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party that begins at 7. I had never done a special event at WDW before so I wasn't really too sure how the party worked. I thought it was like an E-ticket night and the Magic Kingdom was just open from 7 to midnight for those with tickets. Thus, we weren't in a great hurry to get there. This actually worked out okay for us. We didn't hit the Magic Kingdom until 8 p.m. We had just hit the porch of Exposition Hall and were kind of taking in the sights of the little kids all dressed up for Halloween and people watching, when the Halloween parade started. We had perfect seats on the porch of Exposition Hall so keep this in mind if parades are a MUST SEE for you! It's a great viewing spot! After the parade we kind of moseyed our way down and looked for a spot to watch the fireworks. There were some great Halloween effects like the castle turning different colors like a weird green and spooky shade of purple. There were also little ghosts and gremlins projected onto the sidewalk. Don't know how they did that but I managed to get a good picture of one. Then it was time for the fireworks and instead of Tink's flight, a witch flew overhead and the fireworks started. It's so awesome to look up and have the fireworks going off, not just above you but above and all around you. Neat-O! After this, we headed for the Haunted Mansion. Had to do this on Halloween night! BTMRR was closed the whole week we were there for refurbishing. We didn't want to go on Splash Mountain and get wet at night. Took a ride on Pooh but I don't know if it was me or if there was something wrong with the sound, but I have no clue what the story was about. I couldn't understand any of it. Did my favorite, Pirates of the Caribbean. Alien Encounter was next, but Joy and I decided to sit this one out. We waited in the gift shop and listened to the screams on the other side of the doors. It was fun watching the reactions on the faces as people exited this ride. After this, everybody decided they could use a little bite to eat but nothing was open except Cosmic Ray's. The food here was not great. Some of the food selections were not available, either. I think we all either got hot dogs or hamburgers with fries and it was yucky. Oh well. Outside, there was a little theater kind of thing where there was a dance going on with a DJ. That looked like fun so we watched that for a while. Our feet were pretty well raw after this day, so we headed on back to the hotel. All in all, I don't think I would do the Halloween party again. I guess I'm just not used to seeing the Magic Kingdom at night or something. On our bus back to ASMuR, our bus driver Carlos, put the finishing touch to the day for us. We sang all the way back to the hotel. Carlos must know every Disney song ever recorded! Every so often, he would sing "Who Let My Dogs Out" and the entire bus responded. (He said MY not THE but that's okay, we had fun anyway!) Thanks, Carlos! Wednesday, November 1 Today was Magic Kingdom day. We ate breakfast at the food court of the hotel this morning and it was very good. The omelets are great, but so is everything else. When we got to the MK, we just strolled down Main Street and people watched. I can't remember why, but I know we weren't all together this morning and we agreed to meet by Mickey and Walt at a certain time. I love those 2-way radios! I enjoyed just sitting and staring at the castle and taking pictures from different angles, but Bob was getting really antsy about sitting and waiting instead of going on rides. Michael had some things he wanted to do so we all split up for a while at this point. I remembered that going around the World clockwise (to the left) is sometimes faster and means less lines, so we headed off to Adventureland for the Jungle Cruise. No line and we went right on. Bob and I did Swiss Family Tree house after this. This was really neat. I was worried about all the stairs but it wasn't bad at all. Joy waited for us down below and Amy and Russ were bringing up the rear. They had gone off by themselves but thanks to the 2-ways, we could tell them exactly where Joy was and by the time Bob and I exited the Tree house, the three of them were waiting for us. Big Thunder Mountain Railroad was not working the week we visited so we didn't go on that. We didn't do the Tiki Room because I wouldn't be able to get everyone to sit through a show when there were rides to go on, but that was okay. We did Splash Mountain with a very brief wait. What a blast! I requested that we not be in the front because I didn't want to get wet and we were accommodated. We didn't get wet at all. Well okay, maybe just a few drops but nothing that didn't dry quickly in the sun. If you really want to get wet, skip the ride and watch from the bridge outside the ride. Warning: You will get wet! We went to the Hall of Presidents. I was anxious to see Bob's reaction to this and he was impressed! We had to do It's A Small World. There was a line for Pooh so we skipped that, since we had done it Halloween night. Somehow, we missed Peter Pan and Snow White. I wasn't being very organized. We totally skipped Mickey's Toontown. We did Timekeeper in Tomorrowland with Joy alternating watching and looking at the floor. We were all supposed to be meeting up soon so we only had time to do the Carousel of Progress. I like the old song better. I wanted Bob to be able to do Space Mountain but there was a line and we were running out of time so we couldn't do it. Next time! Since most of had had a chance to pick where we wanted to eat and Michael hadn't picked yet, Joy appointed him the meal planner for the day, although we didn't have PS's. This is what they told me, anyway. I suggested we go to the Crystal Palace. I didn't think we'd have a problem with waiting, even without PS's. Michael said he wanted to try the castle. So I said, well let's go try. We can at least ask if they have a table and, if they don't, we'll go to the Crystal Palace. We marched to the Castle and Michael said, "Mom, forget it. You have to make reservations months in advance." Before anyone could restrain me, I went to the desk and asked if they had a table for 9. The hostess asked if we wanted it right now and I said it didn't matter. Behind me, I could feel Russ gesturing and I noticed that the hostess was talking to me but she was not looking at me. She was looking at Russ. I kind of thought something was up at this point. I was ordered by my son to return to the group and that he would take care of things. He talked to the hostess who said that we couldn't eat here but they would let us go up the stairs of the castle just to look around. This was okay with me because I had never been upstairs in the castle before. We started up the stairs and had to wait for a few minutes. When we got to the top of the stairs we were escorted to our table where another birthday party started. I got a crown, which I wore during dinner, and everyone sang Happy Birthday (again). Way too cool! There was also a gift that Michael had arranged to be delivered. You can do this through the WDW florist (407-827-3505). There was a special package and balloons waiting for us at the table. The package was filled with little goodies and snacks. Our server was Christopher, a big, tall handsome fella, who addressed us all as M'Lady and M'Lord. The inside of the castle is beautiful and it was a great experience just to be there, but I gotta tell you - the food is not worth the money. I found the dinner menu very limited and for folks who like just plain cooking, you may be disappointed. The quality of the food was not great either. To be honest, the food at the All-Star was better. But, we were eating in the castle and that was a thrill in itself. I can at least say that I've been there and done that. When we left the castle, we decided to let Bob and Russ finally have their boat ride. Jim and Loretta decided to go back to their room to relax for the rest of the evening. The rest of us took the ferry to Boardwalk. Just before we docked, the fireworks started over the castle. Seeing them from across the lake with the castle in silhouette was just beautiful. This was one of those special moments that just happened and could not have been planned. We walked around Boardwalk a little bit. I went into the Sweet Shop and the biggest thrill for me was finding M&M's in any and every color you can imagine including gray, black, white (I've always wanted to get an albino M&M!), at least three different shades of blue, purple, lavender, pastel pink, hot pink - you name it and they had it! I bought a few of those and on the way out discovered the Rice Krispie treats. Had to buy some of those. I think they were $3 apiece, but they last forever! I even brought one home with me. Our feet were pretty tired but I did manage to walk by the windows where they have the model Boardwalk suite. Would love to have DVC points there. We then headed back to the hotel by hitching a bus from in front of the Boardwalk. This was the scenic route as it seems like the bus hit every resort along the way. The bus was crowded but I sat with a couple from Long Island whose children had sent them to WDW for their anniversary. We had quite a nice chat and I discovered that their daughter married someone from Albany and was living there. I recognized the name of the street and everything Small world! Time for bed. Thursday, November 2 Loretta had made an appointment for she Danielle to have a treatment at the spa at the Grand Floridian for this morning. Michael and Jim went along for haircuts and to return the van that Michael had rented earlier in the week. Russ, Bob, Amy, Joy, and I were heading to Downtown Disney for some shopping. Jim, Loretta, Michael, and Danielle were then going to head to MGM and then at some point in the afternoon, hook back up with Amy and Russ at MGM. Amy and Danielle had to go on RnRC some more. They couldn't get enough of that ride! The plan was to meet in Epcot at 9 p.m. for Illuminations and then, depending on how everyone felt, to hit Pleasure Island. Joy, Bob, and I were going to go to World Showcase for the afternoon. My plan was to eat my way around the World since we were in the middle of the Food and Wine Tasting Festival. I figured that would take care of dinner for me. Michael and his crew went on ahead and had breakfast themselves because the girls' appointment was at 9:30. Before the rest of us walked up to have breakfast at the food court, Russ mentioned that he had seen our housekeeper the day before and she mentioned that she had Friday off, so he suggested we leave our tip this day to make sure she got it. (We hadn't been leaving one every day, instead planning to leave it all at the end of the week.) We all put our tip money in the envelope and left it on the TV and off we went for breakfast. After breakfast, Bob and Russ volunteered to take our refillable mugs back to the rooms for us while Amy had her hair wrapped by the pool while we waited. When they got back, they said that the money envelopes were gone but the rooms hadn't been made up yet. This made us all a little nervous so we ended up wasting time trying to find out what happened. I felt a little uncomfortable knowing that someone had been in our room and had taken the money left for the housekeeper. We finally spoke to a supervisor and she said that this is a question that is asked a lot by guests, but what happens is a housekeeping supervisor checks the rooms to see which rooms need to have something done, and then the cleaning crews go in. She picks up the tip envelopes but we were assured that our housekeeper would, indeed, get the money we had left for her. This really gave us a late start and Bob, who hates shopping almost as much as waiting around, was not thrilled. We didn't spend a lot of time shopping at Downtown Disney but we did manage to drop just a few bucks. World of Disney is unbelievable. It seems like it goes on endlessly. You go through room after room of Disney stuff. It's unbelievable. One of the stores I wanted to hit was the chocolate store so I did that. We went to the book store where I bought a Cinderella Castle screen saver and wallpaper for my computer, and a calendar. I didn't see any cookbooks of recipes from WDW, though. The screen saver was my best purchase of the trip. The pictures are beautiful, there are 32 of them, and it cost only $10. We bought a few little Christmas presents for nieces and nephews, in-laws, and out-laws. Amy and I spent a lot of time in the Christmas shop. We ran into trouble trying to use our Magic Kingdom Club card. This program was being phased out sometime around the end of the year but I had been reassured that I could still use it. The sales clerk at the Christmas store looked at it like she didn't know what it was and said we couldn't use it. Joy had a Magic Kingdom Club Gold Card so we tried to use that, but were told you aren't supposed to use anyone else's card. Which is the opposite of what Joy had been told. She got her card because she is a stockholder and she was told to share the card with family and friends. Anyway, after a lot of rigmarole, we finally made our purchases with discounts and were on our way. The best part was that we sent everything back to our hotel and didn't have to cart all our bags around with us. The home furnishings store also had some cute things. I'm kicking myself for not getting the big white Mickey hand pillow. I want it! It was now about 1:30 and park time was dwindling so we decided to leave without checking out any more stores. Amy and Russ headed to MGM and Joy, Bob, and I went to World Showcase. When we arrived at Epcot, Joy wanted to got to a store where she had seen something the other day but didn't buy. It was a store near Test Track. I convinced Bob to go on the single line for Test Track while Joy was shopping and I would people watch. I had fun checking out people's reactions as they got off the ride. There was a wait in the regular line but Bob walked right on. I think I waited about 30 minutes for each of them. Bob was happy because he had finally gotten to go on a ride today! We then headed over to World Showcase. We went to Mexico and rode El Rio de Tiempo. I remembered it only as a dorky ride and not very long, but it was better than I recalled. We then went to Norway and Maelstrom. Joy didn't want to ride so she waited outside by the bakery for Bob and me. The line inside seemed pretty long but we waited anyway (probably about 20 minutes). Not waiting exactly, but zigzagging through the waiting area. We skipped the movie after the ride. Did I mention that Bob doesn't like shopping? We sort of breezed our way past the exhibits with no rides, which is quite a few. At China, I had to see what the food booth was offering. For $1 I got a really generous portion of some kind of noodles. Don't know what it was called but it was very good. Between China and Germany, there is a drawbridge. They were just closing that off to bring out the barges with the Illuminations fireworks on them. That was interesting. On into Germany and then - YEA! Italy! I was hoping to buy something for my mother here (we're Italian). Nothing really appealed to me so I just got her a couple of little doo-dads - a miniature Italian flag and a coffee mug. Joy wanted to get food samples at the Italian booth. They had polenta (a corn meal thing with tomato sauce on it that her mother makes), and pieces of chicken and mushrooms. That was $3, I think. I ate her mushrooms and had a piece of chicken. Yummy! She also sampled a glass of wine that she had wanted to try. We were missing all of the street performances, which I love. But that's okay. I knew I wasn't going to see everything this trip! After Italy, we headed for the American Adventure. I love this and I wanted to see Bob's reaction. We could sit wherever we wanted in the theater and really enjoyed this show. We all got a little misty. I had forgotten how beautiful the song Golden Dreams is. (Is that the name of it? It's the song at the end. You know which one I mean!) Bob needed to have some food so he had his favorite of hamburger and French fries. I got a sample of New England clam chowder for about $2. Nothing at the Japan food booth appealed to me but Chile had some artichokes. Joy and I split these. I think they were about $4. It was starting to get dark as we walked along and we were really scouting out a place where we could get a good view of Illuminations. We decided that the best place would be right by the funnel cake cart and that, once we met up with everyone, that's where we would go. We had arranged to meet at the turnstiles of Future World so we trekked back to meet. My feet were killing me. This was my theme for the week. My feet were desperately reminding me that they were 10 years younger the last time they had done this much walking! One of the things Michael had wanted to do was get one of the commemorative bricks but when he went to the booth to do this, the CM said they weren't selling them anymore. He did the Leave a Legacy thing instead. We then proceeded to World Showcase and, since none of the kids wanted to see anything here, we just booked over to where the funnel cake place was. While we were walking, the ToN parade began. This is really wonderful at night. We had seen a bit of it earlier and it didn't seem to have the same drama as it did at night. You can't get the music out of your head, either. Because the crowd seemed so big, we decided to keep going and try to find a spot to watch Illuminations closer to the exit. There is a little roped off area near Canada that was full but there was an empty park bench in front of it and it seemed to provide a good view of the lake. There were overhanging trees but I didn't think it would be a problem. Because we had some time to kill, we took turns guarding the bench while we found bathrooms and food. I went to see if the Canada booth had the cheese soup that I had read so much about and they did, so I got a sample of that. It was good and I bet it would have been better in a bread bowl. When the parade ended, it was time for Illuminations. Bob got nervous that some of the fireworks were misfiring because some of the flames were shooting sideways over the water near where we were standing. We had a good viewing spot and the trees didn't get in the way. When it was over, there was such a huge crush of people that we took our time and tried to walk where the fewest people were. Joy was looking for a CD of music from WDW to give Russ as his prize for having the fewest points for the week but she couldn't find the one she wanted. I think we were in kind of an open air shopping area sort of between World Showcase and Future World so we shopped in here. They had stuff here that I hadn't seen anywhere else. Most of us got sweatshirts here and I was talking to one of the sales clerks and mentioned that my family had all come to WDW to celebrate my 50th birthday. She wished me a happy birthday and then asked what my name was. I told her and she said that she had gotten a phone message for me earlier. She dialed a number on the phone, handed me the receiver, and on the other end of the line was Goofy wishing me a happy birthday! Unbelievable! Disney doesn't miss a trick! Spaceship Earth at night is one of my favorite sights. I took lots of pictures from different ankles, even lying down on a bench! The colorful fountain nearby is pretty at night too. Don't ask me why, but we did indeed go to Pleasure Island after all this. We entered right by the stage area and were just in time to see Frankie and the West End Boys. If you like rock 'n roll live in an open-air, concert-type setting, don't miss this show. This band is terrific! I got my picture taken with Frankie as he came out into the crowd during one of the songs. I could have stayed here for the rest of the evening. After the set, we strolled on to see what else was here. I wanted to dance at least once at the Wild Horse Saloon but we didn't make it. I forgot that Thursday is one of the cast nights at Pleasure Island. Everyone on the dance floor was obviously a professional dances and it was a little intimidating to go out and dance there. We went to a store where Joy found a watch she wanted. She has a tradition of buying a watch on each of her trips to WDW. The crowd was getting a little rowdy and we were pretty tired. Amy was in the beginning stages of a sinus infection and really just wanted to go to bed, so we decided to call it a night. But we had fun! Friday, November 3 Originally, I hadn't planned on going to Animal Kingdom at all this week but Michael and Danielle said they were going there today and we didn't really have anything else planned, so we all went. Michael's group had already eaten and went off ahead of us. We would use our radios to meet up with each other later. This was the only place Joy hadn't been to before, as it hadn't been built on her last trip, so this was all new to her too. The Tree of Life was awesome. We weren't really sure what we were doing but we followed the trail to It's Bug's Life. The waiting area was packed like Sardine City and it was very hot here. Just as I was about to suggest we leave and do something else, the theater doors opened and we went in. This was good and I definitely want to do it again. The end was a little shocking, though! The Safari ride always had a long wait time and we didn't get to do this. We missed Dinosaur but Michael and Danielle had done that as soon as they arrived and they said that was great. We did the jungle trek and saw the tigers. The bats were cool. They are huge and just hang there and there is nothing between you in the viewing area and them. I asked one of the CMs what keeps them from flying into this little area and she said that they don't like the smell of humans so they wouldn't bother us. There was a section of this trail that was an enclosed, screened-in trail that had birds in it. We bypassed this because of Joy's thing about birds. (She skipped the bats too, needless to say!) I wanted to do Kali River Rapids so we headed there next. I was seriously checking out people getting off the ride and they didn't look too wet so I thought it was okay to go on. This was the only day I had worn long pants, also. When we got into our raft, I took off my shoes and socks and put them in the center along with my fanny pack and camera. It's a good thing it was a hot day when we did this ride because I got soaked. Please believe me when I say SOAKED. You know how when you get your sneakers wet and you squish when you walk? I had protected my shoes, but my pants were so wet that I dripped where I walked. How embarrassing. And uncomfortable! We took a ciggy break for the fellas and I bought a frozen chocolate-covered banana. Yummy! I hadn't had one of those since I was a kid. Amy and I wanted to see Conservation Station so we took the train there. There wasn't too much to see there and we didn't check out the show. Oh well, we had a nice train ride. Animal Kingdom seemed to be pretty crowded for a day that was supposed to be an "off" day, it was very hot, and I was still very wet so we decided to call it a day and go back to the hotel. This was the only day that my super-plan did not work out. There were lines and it was crowded. But out of the whole week, this was my only blooper. I would do things differently next time. I have seen other reports that commented about the heat in Animal Kingdom and the trails and how narrow they are. This is definitely true. You definitely get the feel of being in the jungle here. We had PSs at Liberty Tree Tavern for about 4:30 and then we would be watching the Main Street Electrical Parade afterward. By the time we went back to the hotel, changed, and arrived at the Magic Kingdom we just about made it for our PSs. This was a character dinner and Chip, Dale, Pluto, Goofy, and Minnie came to our table. Pluto licked everybody on the top of the head. Chip or Dale (I still don't know which is which and I didn't even know they were different!) was insulted that I didn't know him from his twin. We had lots of fun with these characters. The food here is terrific, by the way. The flank steak melts in your mouth, if you can believe it, and it tastes delicious. Bob said that if we had eaten here the first day, he would have come back every night! After a nice, relaxing dinner, we went outside to get a spot to watch the MSEP. The rocking chairs were all occupied already but there was room by the curb and up on the porch. We all ended up at the curb, actually. Amy, Danielle, and I were fascinated by the light chasers that you can buy from the vendors that come around but we didn't get them (not then anyway but wish we had). Then the lights went down and we could see the tops of the trees lighting up where the parade was already passing by. This is the best parade at Disney and I was very sad to see that it would be ending. Little did I know at the time that it was probably the last time we would ever see it! We all loved this parade. This was one of the highlights for Bob, especially the eagle float. We left after the parade and we saw the fireworks as we were exiting via Main Street. This had been a great day! We headed back to our hotel for our last night at WDW. Sniff-sniff. Actually, I didn't get misty like I usually do when I know I'm leaving for the last time. I guess I had a feeling we would be coming back and that it would be in less than 10 years. Saturday, November 4 Now it's time to say goodbye To all our company.... Sadly, the day of departure arrived. We were still determined to keep one day on our park hoppers so we didn't go to any parks today. We did automatic room checkout. And I had settled up our phone bill the night before. One thing about making phone calls from your room - don't do it!!! Buy a calling card before you leave home. I had one for 60 minutes and it wasn't long enough. Due to the nature of Bob's business, he had to check our answering machine daily and then call his helper, Mike, with the messages. Mike, in turn, called the customers. Toward the end of the week, we just started making the phone calls directly from our room. I thought our phone bill would be $20 or $25 at most so before we went to bed on Friday night, I stopped at guest services to settle up. (We also had to pick our all our goodies that we had been having sent back to our room.) The bill came to about $85! There was no mistake. I can't find the receipt to tell you how many minutes this entailed but it wasn't the minutes that added up as much as the number of calls. So beware! I think there is also a fee for each phone call even if you bill it to a calling card. The only way to bypass all this is to use a pay phone. There is a bank of them in the lobby by the rest rooms but it's not quiet there. Anyway, Tiffany Town Car was picking us up at 4 p.m. to get us to the airport for our 6:10 p.m. flight back to Albany. After we ate, we stashed our luggage in the lobby and went to the pool. Amy had a serious sinus infection at this point and was feeling very poorly. Joy also had a sinus infection starting, as did Michael. So some of us were not happy campers. Amy slept by the pool while the rest of us watched a group across from us spend about 1-1/2 hours re-arranging all the pool furniture in their area of the pool. About 3 times. Don't know what that was all about! About 2:30 we changed our clothes and headed to the food court for a bite to eat. Russ's stomach was queasy so he wasn't too hungry. The rest of us ate and just relaxed. Tiffany arrived early and Russ decided he was ready to eat about 5 minutes before we were to leave. HELLO! Eating and running didn't do much for his stomach, I'm sure. We had a different driver this time and none of us can remember his name. We also had a much larger van. The air conditioning was super-cranked so it gave us just a small idea of what we were heading back to, temperature-wise. The flight was uneventful. There was a bit of turbulence but the pilot was nice enough to let us know what was going on. He explained that this was why he left the seatbelt signs on. Once we got above Atlanta, Georgia, the seat belt signs went off. The turbulence was minimal after that and before you know it, we were back in Albany. On the plane, we talked about when we would be going back. Amy, Russ, Bob, and I decided that two years would be good. Michael and Danielle decided to pass. Their feeling is, "We've been to Walt Disney World. Why would we want to go back?" DUH! Michael definitely does not take after me. So that was the plan - two years it is. Stay tuned. TIPS FOR THE TRIP:
There you have it. Not just the trip report but a little philosophy besides! My Disney Club membership packet arrived after we got home from the trip. One big difference from the Magic Kingdom Club was that there was now a 1-800 number to call Disney. I couldn't hold myself back and so I called less than two weeks after arriving home. I made plans for a hypothetical trip with hypothetical dates and got such terrific prices that I talked Amy and Bob into going back next year instead of two years from now! One of the benefits of the Discovery Magic package is $75 in Disney Dollars per couple. So our Disney Club membership has already paid for itself. We'll be staying at Port Orleans Riverside (Dixie Landings) this trip and it will be in early December, so we will be enjoying the Christmas decorations and, hopefully, doing some Christmas shopping as well. If anyone has any questions, please feel free to e-mail me. I never get enough of talking about Walt Disney World! Patty Thorpe pattybob2@juno.com Mail a Comment to Patty Thorpe |
|