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Chris Brown -- May 2001 -- Walt Disney World (PR)5/3-5/7 Background and Day 0 The Crew:
Background We had talked about going last year. I had a conference I was speaking at in early June at the Contemporary. The plan was for Dad to speak while Mom the kids and Dad's parents played. The family would go down early so Dad could play some too. Great plan until my cousin decided to get married the weekend before my conference, destroying our plans. I ended up going to the conference by myself, spending only one night on property. Miserable trip. My wife and I talked about going this year at Christmas. Her grandmother died right after and we decided to go, expecting some inheritance money to cover the costs. We are planning to have another child so are next family Disney trip is a ways off. We talked my parents and my in-laws in joining us at the Poly concierge. My parents had to back out when my mother had back surgery in late March. The trip was a true vacation, a chance to get away from the hustle of everyday and play. Dad especially went to playas hard as he could. We researched our trip via two books: Birnbaum's and Unofficial Guide. Mom liked Birnbaum's at first but we both quickly gravitated towards Unofficial. I got PassPorter right before the trip and I used it as an organizer. I wish we had gotten it sooner. Also, I used R.A.D.P, www.wdwinfo.com, and www.wdwig.com extensively. The plan: 5/2-5/7 4 nights,- five days Poly concierge. First night off property Frequent flyers for 3 tickets with one cheap US Airways flight for Dad. Leaving a day early, getting back late Monday night. Anna's 5th birthday on property on Friday. Day 0 5/2/01 Leave the house at 9:15am to head to the airport with my parents seeing of us. 11am flight from Charlotte to Orlando, no problems. My wife's aunt and uncle meet at us at the airport. They live in Winter Park along with another aunt in a retirement home. My wife's uncle is a retired architect and helped develop the Orlando airport and the master plan for the airport. My wife's uncle and aunt, our luggage and our whole crew cram into a Honda Accord wagon, with failing AC. It was a tad hot in the back. After a stop at McDonald's for lunch, off to visit the Aunts and spend the night. Day 1 5/3/01 Leisurely morning with my wife's aunt and uncle. Great breakfast. Her uncle rides us over to WDW on 417, at an excruciatingly slow pace for Dad. Hit and miss showers on the way over and overcast most of the day Arrive at Poly at 11AM, and our room is ready! We unpack and prepared to hit MGM. We stop by Captain Cooks for lunch. Kids have the Mickey Mouse premium bars for lunch (first of several). Rule on trip - all food is good food, although they do eat a lot of fruit at concierge. Grabbed a bus over to MGM. FastPassed Mermaid (not sure we needed this as theater is not full) and headed over to bear in the Big Blue House, making the first show with less than five minute wait. Bear was a lot of fun, although Ruth was upset because she wanted to actually touch Bear. Great show and great start to WDW. Next up Mermaid. The girls are quickly more interested in shopping than attractions. My wife later devised a plan that we buy stuff on the way out plus we begin penny pressing (more later). We hit Mermaid, which was fun. The kids really liked it but the adults are ok with it. We decide to head over to Honey I shrunk the kids. It was quite crowded and confusing. We stayed about ten minutes and left. We looked at the kids and decided to leave, skipping Muppets (more on Muppets later). We hit one store on the way out (LA Prop Cinema Storage) and bought each child a toy, Anna got a Mermaid mirror and comb set and Ruth got some really cool crayons with Pooh characters on the end. The rain started while we are in the store. We had packed our raincoats so we were fine. We finished shopping and headed to the buses. The girls wanted to go swimming in the new Poly pool and Mom needed some space, so Dad and the kids went swimming. The new pool was closed due to weather, so we went to the quiet pool for a swim in the rain. After the swim and playing with our new toys in our mansion (Anna's word for our Poly building), we got cleaned up for dinner at Chef Mickey's. Hopped the monorail to the Contemporary. We snacked a little on the concierge to stem our hunger, Orange Guava juice and gummy worms are a great snack. Plus the banana were also quite tasty. Wow, what a crowd and disorganization. I assume the rain drove everyone inside but the crowd was quite large at Chef Mickey's [Note: Our only real crowd issue of the stay and only time a PS was not followed by almost immediate seating]. I went to the front of the line since I had a PS for a 7pm and it was 6:55. I was rudely informed by the hostess to look at the long line! I was not happy. We finally were seated at 7:25. The kids were crazy and it was very noisy. The food was ok but the characters were good and I think the kids had fun. I was very disappointed in this meal and experience. We saw the shops at the Contemporary. Much larger and nicer than the Poly IMHO. We did our first penny presses that night. I had brought two rolls of quarters and a bunch of pennies. My wife thought I was weird until we did it the first night. The kids loved it, and would continue to do it the rest of the trip. Plus, I could divert them in the shops to the penny presses for a few minutes while Mom shopped. This ended up being a great thing; we almost filled one penny press book over the next few days. The kids really enjoyed the penny press and I had fun finding all the machines. My wife really got into this and it became an integral part of our trip. We headed home via a monorail and prepared for Anna's birthday Day 2 5/4/01 Anna's Birthday Wakeup call at 7:03 am. We rose excited for the day and sang Happy Birthday to Anna (for the first of three times). Of to 'Ohana for character breakfast at 8AM PS. Uncrowded and no trouble getting seated. Note: I tried for Cindy's castle but no luck. Breakfast was great. Mickey came and helped us sing Happy Birthday to Anna on her birthday. Food was real good as well. We left about 9:10. Much larger crowd waiting when we left. Chip and Dale were great BTW. My kids loved character breakfasts! Onto the monorail and MK. Anna, Ruth, and I got to ride in front to MK!! When we got there, we found out that our passes had become demagnetized. We got day passes and a birthday button for Anna. Note: sticking passes back to back will do this rather quickly. We use the little sleeves after this with no troubles. Headed to Adventureland and Fastpassed Pooh. We headed over to Dumbo and a 25 minute wait. Dumbo seems lame but the kids love it. After Dumbo, we headed towards Pooh and ran into Pluto. As the birthday girl, Anna with Ruth in tow lead the parade to the character greet area in the old 20000 League queue area. Great surprise and quality time with Pluto. Walked on to Pooh. Ruth loved it so we fastpassed for later. We headed over o Frontierland with Ruth stopping to see part of Belle's story. We got frozen raspberry lemonade to share. Great stuff. We decided to do Pirates because of the lack of a wait. Bad idea. Too dark for my kids. Bad decision on our part. We headed over and walked into the Country Bears, grabbing some cotton candy as a snack. Kids liked the bears but not as much as I thought they would. We did Pooh again and fastpassed again. One of our observations were people would did not use Fastpass. It was amazing. We use Fastpass as our anchors and worked around these times. Our goal was to do two or three attractions in the time we could have waited for one Fastpass attraction. . After Pooh, we headed back to Poly, stopping to shop on Main Street. Anna bought a Minnie Mouse while Ruth bought some Pooh art supplies (the trend line here is pretty obvious). We also pressed some pennies. We rode the boat back. Big debate: which is faster boat vs. monorail. Boat is more scenic. Back at Poly, we found a birthday cake from the concierge with balloons. Really nice. We went swimming in the new Poly pool. Great pool! Anna loved the slide and Ruth loved the zero depth. The concierge location is key being next new pool. Ruth had her hair "braided". Mom took the kids for a nap while Dad headed back to MK. I fastpassed Space Mountain and headed over to Splash. Mistake. Should have reversed it. Still, rode both and made dinner. We had a 6:50 PS at Whispering Canyon. I wanted to see the Lodge and we were meeting up with my in-laws for the first time. We had an awesome time. Our waiter, Jeff aka Dusty Britches, took time with our girls and mid way through the meal they were calling for Dusty. The waiters had the Dads race around the restaurant on hobby horses. Finally, Jeff had my father-in-law and Dad raise around the restaurant and hotel lobby singing happy birthday to Anna before the restaurant sang it to her (third time). The adults had the all you can eat BBQ. Ribs were great. I skipped lunch and had two racks. Bus back to Poly and off to bed. My wife and I were using Dr. Scholl's Peppermint Lotion on our feet and Sombra (www.sombrausa.com) for our calves. Sombra is amazing and made a big difference. The weather was awesome today. Day 3 5/5/01 EE Day at MK Another beautiful day My wife made a 7:45 PS at Crystal Palace. We got there by 8 and waited a few minutes. While we waited, we looked at our pennies. The girls started passing time on buses and such by looking at the pennies. Breakfast at Crystal Palace was great. Pooh, Tigger and Piglet came by but we missed Eeyore. We never met Eeyore the whole time. I loved the French Toast. We use two Flex features here. We left and headed to Adventureland; we fastpassed Peter Pan and rode Carousel twice. We hit the first Lion King show. It was a great show and we really enjoyed it. We rode Pan and Small World and then fastpassed Pooh; We next headed to Toontown. Ruth and Anna got their faces painted. We hit the houses but this was truly boring with no one home. We rode the train and then back to ride Pooh. Once again, we saw people waiting 50 minutes. We left MK at 12:30. I felt overwhelmed when we got Main Street as a wall of humanity was heading our way. We ducked onto the sidewalk Boat back to Poly and lunch at concierge. The kids ate some Nabs we brought and fruit while my wife and I snacked. Back to the pool where Anna got her hair "braided". We at early dinner at the concierge then we all headed to Downtown Disney. It was very crowded. I bought my new watch and then the kids and I headed back early to Poly for ice cream and fireworks on the beach. My wife and her parents stay at Downtown for a while. I put the kids down and went down early myself. Day 4 5/6/01 We had a relaxing morning, as we are all tired. We headed over AK after breakfast in concierge lounge. This is the day to lose things. I lose a contact, we lose our passes (and get them back) and leave a bag and get it back. We fastpass Safari and go see Pocahontas. It was lame. We greet Pooh and Tigger. Safari was really fun but the whole poacher story is weak. My wife prepared the kids so they were not weak. We head to Asia and fastpass the Rapids. I take the kids to the boneyard and my wife grabs us lunch. The kids liked the the boneyard. After lunch, we change into our bathing suits and ride the rapids. Rather lame ride, especially considering the sixty-minute wait for stand by. We penny press on our way out at two stores. We left AK by 4:30 and met Mickey on the way out; it was really hot because the lack of a breeze. We caught a bus back and hit the pool. Mom put the kids down for a nap and Dad hit MK with his father-in-law. I fastpassed Thunder and walked over to Haunted. I grabbed a snack and rode Thunder. Met up with my father-in-law and rode the boat back. Our family decided to hit MGM for Fantasmic; EPCOT was closed for a convention so everyone hit MGM. We got over there by 8 and the first show was full. We went shopping, looking for Bear in the Big Blue House. We ended up at the Muppet store; along the way we finished our penny press. After buying Ruth a Bear shirt and doll, we went to the Muppet movie. What fun!!! We think about hitting the next Fantasmic show but pass. Day 4 5/7/01 Heading home The kids and my in-laws go to 'Ohana while my wife and I pack. The kids use there flex feature here. We pack a day bag and leave it with concierge We say good-bye to my in-laws and hit Typhoon Lagoon. It took over a hour to get there from TTC. Ugh. We enjoyed Typhoon and my wife gets here hair done like the kids. It was a lot of fun, but too big for four tired folks. However, we agreed we should we should have gone to MK and spent time at the Poly pool instead of Typhoon. I noticed a lot of Germans in Typhoon? We head back to Poly, and take showers in the Poly pool bathroom. We eat at the concierge for the last time. Fact: my key still worked on my room. I guess it was empty for the night I had Tiffany Towncar pick us up and we are off to the airport. My wife agrees that Tiffany was a great thing. 7:55 flight back home and my parents take us home. Great vacation. Conclusions Wow, what a great trip. The concierge folks at Poly were great. They helped us tremendously along the way. The food was great and I most have had a dozen cokes. The desserts at night were great. The weather was great. Low 80s with a good breeze. The crowds were manageable with only wait for Dumbo that was unavoidable. We walked on most shows. I waited myself on my two solo MK trips but that was done on purpose. Pluses
Minuses
Things missed
Next Trip: 10th Anniversary Feb. 2004 Mom and Dad alone? Chris Brown chriskbrown@nc.prestige.net Mail a Comment to Chris Brown |
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