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Julie Lawrence -- June 2001 -- Walt Disney World (ASMoR)June 8, 2001-June 17, 2001
Method of Travel: Personal Vehicles Resort: All Star Movies I enjoy reading other people's trip reports so much that I thought I'd try writing one of my own. This report is about our trip in June 2001. We have since been there in June 2002, but I'll start on that one when I get this one finished. I constantly dream about being at Disney World and would love to work there some day. I have for as long as I can remember. The problem is, I don't know anybody who is as crazy about it as I am (except for maybe my sister-in-law). Even my kids aren't as crazy about it as I am! All of my trips there so far have been with other friends or family. My SO definitely isn't as crazy about it as me. I would love going there either by myself or with one other person, and getting the chance to do exactly what I want with nobody else tagging along and complaining. When my kids are all grown up I will make it. But for now, I have to be happy with the trips I've had so far. No matter what, I don't think I could have a bad time at Disney World. It's a place that makes me feel very happy. I was desperately wanting a trip to WDW. The last two times I was in Florida I didn't even make it to WDW! I hadn't been to WDW since 1996. My kids are getting older and I really wanted to go there with them again before they are entirely grown up. So, June of 2001 it was. I wanted to wait until my kids were out of school and I actually really like the nice hot weather! I also think the crowds are very manageable in early June, especially with FastPass. My SO had never been to the world and really didn't have any desire to go. In addition, he couldn't get off work at the time I wanted to go. Since we would be driving from Wisconsin, I really didn't want to go alone with two teenagers. Knowing how much my SIL and nephew love Disney World, I asked my brother, SIL and nephew if they would like to go. Then our parents expressed interest in going so they could spend time with their grandchildren. It had been five years since I had gone on vacation with them and some of those memories kind of faded over the years. The problem about traveling with them is that they still treat me like I'm about 12. Our vacationing styles are also not exactly the same and of course they think that their way is best and I am wrong. For example, they like to go go go all day every day. I like to take breaks in the middle of the day and take a day off from the parks during my vacation. They think I'm wasting time and boring my kids to death! They also desperately wanted one of my kids to stay in their room. My kids definitely did not want to do that! We all like to lay around in bed late at night and watch TV. For them, it's lights out so they can get up and go go go the next day. My mother is also the type that thinks she can barge in our room whenever she wants, make comments about what we having laying around the room, and adjust our room temperature so it's comfortable for her. She likes it ice cold. My kids and I like it a little warmer. It's OK to have different vacationing styles, so long as you respect what the other people like. There's nothing that says you can't do what you like, and then meet up with each other when it works out. A group traveling together does not have to spend every waking moment with each other. So, with that being said, I volunteered to make all the reservations. I reserved three rooms at All Star Movies. I requested that two of them be connecting and one of them be at least in a different building, preferably not too close to the building for the two connecting rooms (hee hee hee). I'll give you one guess which room was mine (and my kids)! I again faxed my room requests three days before we left. I had also made priority seatings at 'Ohana for our first night there and also for lunch at Prime Time Café on Monday. Now I just had to pack and wait. Friday June 8, 2001 Finally, the morning of our departure! We were planning on leaving about 10:30 a.m. after my nephew got out of his last day of school, and driving straight through to WDW. We had my parent's full size van and one of their cars. We had a CB in each vehicle to keep in contact. My two kids and I kind of took over the car while the rest of them mainly rode in the van. When I needed a relief driver, one of my kids would have to go in the van. We made it out of town right on time. The drive started out nice and smooth, but that would soon change. After we got past Nashville on I24, my SIL took a turn driving our car, I slept, and my daughter went to ride in the van. At roughly 11:00 p.m., my SIL woke me up and said "I lost them". We were supposed to be following them. She said that she had passed them at one point going down a big hill, and then she just kept going! She said, you know how it is. You get going down those hills and you just have to go. She was apparently out of range to use our CB's. The car we were driving was a silver park avenue that pretty much blends in with traffic and my mother, who was driving the van, never noticed that we passed them. My SIL said she was pretty sure we were ahead of them so I had her pull off the road by the entrance to a rest stop. We were off the road pretty well but I figured you could still see us. Well, we waited, tried the CB, waited and tried the CB some more. After sitting there for about an hour we started talking about what we should do. We had plenty of money on us to get down there and we all knew where we were going, so we talked about going on and hoping we met up OK later. Then I said that if we were going to do that, we should call someone like my SO to let him know what we were doing. I was figuring my parents might call him to see if we had been in contact. So I said, there must be a payphone in this rest stop. Then my SIL said, Oh, I have my cell phone with me. I'm like, you have what with you? She said yeah, and my parents had one in their van too, but hadn't turned it on. I said, gee (trying to stay calm), do you think that under the circumstances they might have turned it on? So, she tries to call them and lo and behold my mother answered crying. Apparently they had come to the conclusion that we had driven over a cliff and our car was hidden in the trees somewhere. They had six Tennessee state troopers searching a stretch of the interstate for us. We were actually 10 miles down the road from them. I just couldn't believe that nobody thought about those cell phones!!!! I didn't know they had them along, but the rest of them sure did!! So, I tried to keep myself under control and not get too upset about the whole thing. It was irritating then, but now it just seems funny to me. I just wanted to get back on the road. We took off again with my dad driving the van and me driving the car with both of my kids riding in the car with me. Things went smooth-for awhile. As we were approaching Atlanta on I75, we noticed a Ryder truck towing a car that was driving very erratically! It was veering across all lanes of traffic. We very carefully made our way around the truck, and then made it through the rest of Atlanta with no problems. After we got through Atlanta, I said we needed to stop and switch drivers because I was too tired to drive any longer. So, we pulled off, stopped at a gas station, took a little stretch break and switched drivers. Then back on I75 we went to continue our drive. When we got to the next exit off I75, they were routing all traffic off I75. The gas station by the exit was just jammed with cars. Everyone was sitting around wondering what to do. So, my dad walks across the street to talk to a policeman, and found out that a Ryder truck towing a car lost control, wiped out a few cars on their side of the interstate, then crossed the median and hit a few more cars going north. The policeman estimated that the interstate would be completely closed for at least four hours. I have now learned my lesson. If I ever see a vehicle driving that erratically, I am going to call and report it. We are guessing that the person driving was falling asleep. So, now what to do? Well, the policeman pointed out to my dad a bunch of truckers all heading in one direction. He told us, just follow the trucks and they'll get you back on the interstate on down the road. So, we followed the trucks, and eventually came out somewhere down by Macon. The rest of the drive was thankfully uneventful, and we pulled into the All Star Movies parking lot in the early afternoon. This was our first time staying here. There was a pretty long line at check in, but it moved at a reasonable pace and we were up to the check in desk in about twenty minutes. I was way down the counter from my mother, when all of a sudden she comes running down the line yelling hey, you're room isn't by ours! We've got to get that fixed. I quickly looked at the person checking us in and mouthed quietly, don't change my room location. Fortunately, she caught on quick. I just told my mom that it didn't matter if we weren't right by each other and that the reason we were in a different building was because I requested a building where smoking is permitted back when I made the reservations because my SO was thinking of possibly coming along at that point. Then I told her we wanted to keep our room location because it was closer to the pool. She wasn't very happy about that, grumbled a bit, but eventually let it go. Their rooms were in Toy Story, and ours was in Fantasia.I don't remember the building numbers off hand. Fortunately, our rooms were ready when we checked in. We unloaded our luggage and went to our rooms to rest for awhile before our 7:00 priority seating at 'Ohana. While the room was not large, the three of us were pretty comfortable for the week. The only way I would want to put more than two people in these rooms would be if they were immediate family. I also think we would have felt too crowded if my SO was along. But, for me and my two teenage kids, it was OK. I have also heard some people complain about noise. We were never bothered by any noise the week we were there. We were reasonably satisfied with the food court and went there several times during the week. It was convenient. We also bought three refillable mugs. I would buy them again. It was so convenient to be able to just walk in the food court and fill them up. We were able to each choose a different color so we didn't mix them up during the week. Saturday night June 9, 2001 We all met at the bus stop about 6:15. We took a bus to the Magic Kingdom and then the monorail to the Polynesian. We checked in and had about a 10-15 minute wait until our table was ready. This was the first time we had gone to 'Ohana. My brother had whined and complained about going there for dinner. He was sure he wouldn't like it. I kept telling him that he shouldn't go if he was sure he wouldn't like it, but I guess he preferred to whine and complain. Well, he absolutely loved it, as we all did! The wait was not a problem as it gave us some time to enjoy a nice tropical drink. One thing I would do different would be to request a table in the main dining room or one with a view of the water and castle. We were too far away from the coconut races and hula hoop contest to be able to see or hear anything. I was hoping my nephew would have been able to participate, but we really couldn't tell when something was going on. This was a great dinner and one that I will definitely repeat in the future. Even my brother, who is a very picky eater, loved this place. We loved the appetizers, and the skewers of grilled shrimp was my favorite of the grilled meat. We of course topped off our meal with the fresh pineapple and warm caramel dipping sauce. I had wanted to stay at the Poly and watch the fireworks from the Magic Kingdom and also the Electric Water Pageant, which I haven't seen since we were there in 1973. But, everyone was tired so we decided to head back to our rooms to get a good night's sleep before taking on the Magic Kingdom the next morning. Sunday June 10, 2001 My parents and my brother all said I was crazy for wanting to go to the Magic Kingdom on a weekend. I kept telling them that I had done lots of research before planning this trip and that Sunday would be a good day for the MK. I insisted that we get up and to the park by park opening. Once again, they all whined about getting up in the morning. However, once we got in the park all their whining stopped when they realized that I was right. We had a wonderful morning with fairly light crowds. Around noon, my brother said he couldn't believe how much we had done that morning. Our first ride of the day was Splash Mountain. What a great way to start the day! My daughter and nephew sat in front, my son and I behind them, my brother and his wife in the third row and my parents in the back. My dad (who doesn't like to get wet much) and I got soaked. He was a good sport. It got us all laughing and in the mood for the rest of our day. From there we went on Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, Pirates of the Carribean, The Disney Railroad, Space Mountain, Buzz Lightyear, the Tomorrowland Transit Authority, Carrousel of Progress, Peter Pan, Small World, and Haunted Mansion. Somewhere in there we got some hot dogs and fries at Cosmic Ray's Starlight Cafe, the place where they have that robot guy performing. It was early afternoon by then and my daughter and I wanted to have some pool time to work on our tans. This did NOT please my mother who thought we should stay in the park until we dropped. Why leave when we still have energy left? Well, my kids and I left everyone else in the park anyway, and went back to our room. Like I said before, they were perfectly free to do whatever made them happy! We just wanted to do the same. My son took a nap and my daughter and I went out by the main pool. It was pretty crowded, but we were able to snag a couple chairs. I also snagged myself one of those nice tropical drinks at the little bar by the pool. About 4:00 we decided it was time to get back to the park. The rest of our family had decided to come back and rest shortly after we did, so they were actually about ready to go back to the park too. After we got back we did Space Mountain, Buzz Lightyear, TTA, Jungle Cruise, Country Bear Jamboree, Haunted House and Aladins Magic Carpets and Hall of Presidents. We left the park before closing. We hadn't done everything in the park, but we still had an e-night coming! We have also seen the Spectro Magic parade several times and did not plan on seeing it this trip. We went back to ASMo, and had a snack in the food court. I got hooked on those mickey shaped rice krispie treats with chocolate ears. It was a fun filled first day! We rode the busses everywhere, and never had to wait more than 10-15 minutes. We also did not have any big waits for rides. We used Fastpass for a couple of the rides, like Space Mountain and Buzz Lightyear. We never waited more than 0-10 minutes for any attraction. We watched a little TV and I sent a few e-mails (I brought my laptop along), and then my kids of course had to check their e-mail! Monday June 11, 2001 Today was the day for Disney Studios. We once again made it to the park by opening. I didn't have quite so much trouble today convincing everyone to get up in the morning. As many people do, the first thing we did was head to Tower of Terror and Rock'n Rollercoaster. We got a Fastpass for RnR, and then got in line to ride. We were seated in our limos and ready for take off in 5-10 minutes. This was the first time any of us had been on this ride. Wow! That takeoff was intense! What a great ride! It was very smooth. We then went over and rode TOT. There was not much of a wait and we were seated in our elevator in a short time. I know that the drop sequence has changed since I first rode this, but it seemed like there were other changes that I can't quite put my finger on. It was probably my imagination. I just can't remember reading about any other changes being made to this attraction. I just thought the ride in the elevator car was longer before hitting the drops. After TOT, it was back to RnR for our Fastpass time. This time, my 8 year old nephew chickened out at the last minute. My mother went out the chicken exit with him. My father was waiting outside, because he didn't want to do this ride a second time. Of course, after we came out, he wanted to ride. But, it was time to move on to the Great Movie Ride! This is a classic that I love. Then we went to Who Wants to be a Millionaire. We all thought this was fun, but once was enough for the day. I don't remember much about the people who were in the Hot Seat. They didn't do a fastest finger because there was already somebody in the Hot Seat from the previous show. We then went on to The Little Mermaid Show. I had never seen this before either. I thought the show was cute, but it isn't something high on my (or my teenagers) list to do. However, I'm glad we at least went once. I had made a Priority Seating at the Prime Time Café which I really wanted to do, but had not done before. Once again my brother went into his whining mode. He's terrible about trying new things! I told him to knock it off or don't eat with us. I didn't really care. I wanted to go and I didn't want him ruining things! But, he did end up totally embarrassing me!!! We had to wait about 15 minutes after we checked in, but that just gave us a chance to sit up at the bar and have a cold drink. Our server was OK, but he had just gotten called into work for someone who had not shown up. He of course made us all go and wash our hands. I don't remember what everyone all had, but my kids and I each got the Fried Chicken. The portions were large and the food was good. My kids and I should have only got two orders for the three of us. Then the embarrassing part came in! Our waiter tried to feed my brother some green beans. My brother was a complete jerk, and absolutely refused to take even one bite! When our waiter (or rather cousin) persisted a little, my brother grabbed his wrist. I thought that was totally inappropriate!!! Our cousin just shook his head and walked away. I left him a really nice tip for putting up with that. My kids and I then decided it was time for us to take a break. The rest of the group stayed in the park a little longer. We wanted a little more pool and sun time! The pool always seemed pretty crowed, but once again we were able to find a couple of chairs. My son took a nap again. When we returned to the park later on, we did the backlot tour, Muppets, Star Tours, Sounds Dangerous and then another round of TOT and RR. This was also the first time we had gone to Sounds Dangerous. It was kind of boring, but OK for a little break. I kind of wanted to stay for Fantasmic, since we've never seen it before. But, my kids wanted to head back to our room to just chill out for awhile. So, I went with them. We just hung out by the pool, had something to eat in the food court, and then watched TV for awhile. Tuesday June 12 Today was Animal Kingdom Day! This was the first time any of us had been to this park. I really want to go back to this park again and relax and enjoy it more. My brother was getting in this "run" from attraction to attraction mode which made it hard for me to leisurely walk through the park. I was hoping to see the vine person but never did. That's because I probably didn't have enough time to look! When we first went through the entrance (we got there about 5 minutes after opening) there was a cast member with a big tarantula in a little cage. We got an up close look. My daughter and I kept falling behind everyone because we wanted to stop and look at all the birds. We eventually caught up and headed with the group to the Safari. The wait was under 10 minutes, so we just hopped in the standby line. We all enjoyed the Safari, but since we only did it once, I didn't have any others to compare it too. I would guess there are times when people see a lot more animals. We also didn't have any come up too close to our vehicle. We then went on Dinosaur which I thought was a pretty good ride. We then went to It's Tough to be a Bug, which I really loved! I really like those 4-D attractions. We then got Fastpasses for Kali River Rapids, and had an early lunch at Pizzafari. That was just OK. We then went to use our Fastpasses on Kali River Rapds. Let me just say, that it's not wise to wear thin white shorts on water rides. My side of the raft got completely soaked! I think most of the people on our raft got pretty wet. After we got off the ride, I was walking behind my sister-in-law, and just went oh no and started laughing! Her white shorts were completely transparent! I kept telling her it wasn't too bad so she wouldn't get completely embarrassed. But, I was walking behind her, and every once in awhile I couldn't help but laugh. She would just look back at me, and I would say I was laughing about something else. At that point we decided to leave the park because we were uncomfortably wet. I know there are many things we did not do at Animal Kingdom. I'm looking forward to going back and spending more time there. We also needed a nice break because tonight was E-Night! Once again we had some pool and nap time. Just my kids and I were going to E-Night. I don't know what everyone else did. This was one night when I was truly annoyed by some people at the resort, on the bus and in the park. Cheerleaders! Most of the girls were wearing short skirts or sundresses and high heeled sandals. They were pushy and cutting in line at the bus stop. Then, they all started chanting and clapping really loud. They kept that up all the way on the bus to the Magic Kingdom. Oh goody, they were going to E-night too. Bummer. We arrived at the start of the Spectro Magic parade. We got our wrist bands and then watched the parade standing behind some people because there was no way we were going to make it down Main Street with the parade going on. Of course, we also just missed the last train of the night. We first went to Alien Encounter because we hadn't done that yet. Wouldn't you know, that's where the clapping, chanting cheerleaders went too. The couple sitting next to us said that they had run into that group several times earlier in the day and they were quite sick of it too. They were really obnoxious during this attraction. The cast members were trying to control the situation but it was hopeless. They actually stopped the attraction before it was over. We were fortunate enough to avoid that group for the rest of the night. We rode Space Mountain and Buzz Lightyear. My kids aren't too thrilled with Buzz, which really surprised me! I liked it, although I wish it was still If You Had Wings or Delta Dreamflight. We then walked over to Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. It was so weird walking through the park with so few people in it. Once we got by Casey's, I don't think we saw another person until we got back near Splash Mountain! We then went back over to Tomorrowland for awhile, and called it a night. I think we left a little before e-night was over. It was from 10:00-1:00. We weren't trying to exhaust ourselves, after all this was vacation. Wednesday June 13th My kids and I wanted to take a day off from the parks to do some shopping and relaxing. There are a couple Flea Markets on 192 that my kids like to go to. I had promised my kids that we would do this. Well, my mother got it in her head that I was torturing my kids and forcing them to take a day off from the parks and spend it with me. Her and my brother just couldn't understand why we would want to WASTE an entire day shopping and relaxing. She thought my kids were just saying they wanted to do this to make me feel better. So, she starts trying to talk them into going to Universal Studios, offering to buy them stuff, etc. We've been there before and didn't have a desire to go there on this trip. She finally let up. We slept in, got up and had something to eat at the food court, and then headed out to the Flea Market. Just the three of us! What a nice day. We shopped and just bummed around. We went back to our resort late afternoon. We took a little break and then decided to head to Downtown Disney. As we were driving out of the parking lot, we saw them all just sitting in their van. We didn't stop to see what they were doing. My kids spotted Planet Hollywood and asked if we could eat there. We went to see how long of a wait it would be. It was about an hour and a half to two hours wait. That was fine since we were in no big rush and not overly hungry yet. So, we put our names in and then headed to the Virgin Mega Store. We spent quite a lot of time in there. We wandered around awhile and then went back to Planet Hollywood. We went upstairs to one of the bars and actually got a seat! We sat there and had something to drink (non-alcoholic for them of course) while waiting for our table. We thought the atmosphere was fun, but it was a little noisy in there. I had some shrimp dish that was just OK, and the kids had Fajitas which they loved. I'm glad we went there. It was just a really nice day for my kids and I. When we got back to the resort, I ran into my sister-in-law by the food court. I asked her what they had done that day. She says they first spent a lot of time trying to make up their minds about what they wanted to do, couldn't decide, and ended up going shopping. Ha. They ate at some Pizza place outside of WDW. When we saw them all sitting in their van earlier, they were trying to decide where to eat dinner. How do they ever decide what to do when I'm not along! I'm the one who decided which park we would go to each day and made our priority seating arrangements (at all two places). I told them that they did not have to follow my plan and that they could go anywhere they wanted. I just told them that my plan was what my kids and I were going to do. But, they kind of have the mindset that everyone should stick together all of the time. That drives me crazy! I need a little space. She said that they really didn't have a very good day. We just sat around and relaxed a little. I got a mudslide from the pool bar. My mother just about flipped when she found out I paid $6 for a drink. She would have probably really been in a tizzy if she knew I had more than one! We went up to our room and watched a little TV and fell asleep. The next day was Epcot which I was really looking forward to. Thursday June 14th We arrived at Epcot by opening. This was where I really started to get irritated with my brother. As I mentioned earlier, my brother gets into this "RUN" from attraction to attraction mode. Well, this morning he got off the bus, grabbed my nephews hand, and was racing to the entrance before we were even all off the bus! Then, he had the nerve to complain to us that we weren't keeping up and kept saying that we weren't going to get Fastpasses for test track because we were so slow. I told them all I didn't care if they raced from place to place, but that I wasn't going to do it. My kids and I didn't need to stay with them. Well, he slowed down a bit but still did quite a bit of complaining about our slower pace. Anyway, of course, we got our Fastpasses for test track. The return time was only a little over an hour away. So, we went to Ellen's Energy Adventure. I really like this attraction! I find it relaxing, informative and enjoyable. We then took a ride on Spaceship Earth and headed back to Test Track. This was the first time any of us had been on this. While I enjoyed the ride, I would not stand in a long line for it! It's just not that great. From there we walked over to the World Showcase because it was opening soon. We started on the Mexico side. We skipped Mexico and went on to Norway since most people were stopping in Mexico. We went on the Maelstrom with little wait. From there we went to China and decided to eat at their counter service restaurant. We all thought it was pretty good and we knew we'd be back. My kids loved it! That started my son eating Chinese food. My kids wanted to go back to our resort for awhile, so that's what we did. My parents and brother stayed in the park for most of the afternoon. We went back to our room for the usual pool and naptime. After our rest we decided to go back to Epcot. The rest of the family had just got back from Epcot and didn't want to go back there. So, they went back to MGM and we went to Epcot. We did the Living With The Land boat ride and Honey I Shrunk the Audience. The wait for Living With The Land was the longest we had all week! The line didn't look that long so we didn't get a Fastpass. We will get a Fastpass for this ride from now on. It took us close to 1/2 hour to get on our boat. We next decided to head back over to World Showcase to get something to eat. It started raining. We had some cheap ponchos, but they weren't the best. I'm one of those people who gets cold real easy, and I was now cold. So, we stopped in a shop and my daughter and I each bought a Disney World jacket. It's my absolute favorite jacket! Well, my son wanted some more Chinese food, but my daughter and I wanted something different. We decided at the Mexico counter service restaurant while he ran to get some Chinese food. He met us back at Mexico and we found a table there. It had stopped raining by then. We never did make it around the entire World Showcase, but we did continue on. We were mainly just walking and taking in the atmosphere. Of course we had to stop and get a funnel cake! Those are so yummy. We ended up leaving before Illuminations. I guess we didn't do to well seeing the night time shows. Friday June 15th Our last day in the parks. I can't remember exactly what we did! I think we went to Magic Kingdom and Disney Studios to hit our favorites. I remember seeing Indiana Jones because we missed it earlier in the week. We also went to Downtown Disney to hang out a little. Looking back, I wish we had gone to Blizzard Beach. Saturday June 16th It was time to pack up and head for home. I wanted to go out for a nice breakfast, but everyone else just wanted to get on the road. So, we just ate in the food court. We left around 10:00 and headed home. Fortunately, it was a pretty uneventful drive home. We got home around 8:30 Sunday morning. I told my SO we would be home by noon. He was still sleeping when we got home and his son, who stays with us every other weekend, was in the living room watching TV. So, I quietly snuck into our bedroom and then jumped on our bed screaming. He was surprised to see me! Final Thoughts
Thanks for reading! If you'd like you can e-mail me. Julie Lawrence Juli1706@aol.com Mail a Comment to Julie Lawrence |
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