Kathy Pursell -- December 2003 -- Walt Disney World (Offsite, CBR)
December 5-16, 2003The vacationers traveling from Clovis, CA:
- Kathy (me), 48, huge Disney fan, 1 previous visit to WDW (May ’00) and countless visits to Disneyland
- Gary (husband), 49, “puts up with my Disney infatuation”, 1 previous trip to WDW (May ’00), and also countless trips to Disneyland
- Beth (daughter), 23, 5th grade teacher, (didn’t want to visit WDW back in ’00…didn’t think it was “cool” to vacation with the family), also countless trips to Disneyland
- Cameron (son), 14, high school student, 1 previous trip to WDW (May ‘00), countless trips to Disneyland
The vacationers traveling from Cheyenne, WY:
- Robyn (sister), 47, 1 previous trip to WDW with daughter’s high school band in 2002, countless trips to Disneyland
- Tom (brother-in-law), 47, Air Force Sgt. – so he missed going on the band trip in 2002, countless trips to Disneyland
Already at WDW:
- Katriena (my niece, Robyn and Tom’s daughter), 19, working at WDW as part of the College Program until Jan. 2004, countless trips to Disneyland
Pre-trip info:
In March of 2003, my niece, Katriena, calls my daughter to ask her opinion about going to work at WDW under their College Program for at least 6 months. Beth talks with her for about an hour and when she hangs up, she tells me what is going on. Boy do I “perk up” when I hear she might be going to WDW to work. I immediately call my sister and tell her to let us know what Katriena decides to do. Fast forward to August, Katriena reports to work under the College Program on August 29 for 6 months. Once she was accepted, my sister and I start making plans to visit her during the first part of December. A lot of things really “fell into place” for this trip…1)Katriena would be there to show us around and she could share some of her Cast Member discounts, 2)Beth’s school would be out on their Christmas vacation for just about the whole month of Dec., so she would be able to go with us, and 3)Tom is active military and we could all get a great discount on our park tickets. Out lodging arrangements consisted of the first 5 nights with my sister’s family in their timeshare condo (not DVC, darn!). While staying in the condo, Katriena stayed with us, which was a lot of fun! Then our family of four moved onsite to the Caribbean Beach Resort for the remaining 5 days of our visit. On our previous visit back in 2000, we stayed at Dixie Landings (now Port Orleans-Riverside) and we wanted to experience a different resort this trip. (Looking back, I think I preferred POR for reasons I “can’t put my finger on”…) Travel dates - Dec. 5 - 16 (this report mostly pertains to my family of four) Dec. 5 - Friday (evening)
We drove to San Jose after work/school on Friday afternoon. Stayed at a Best Western and got a really good “park-n-fly” rate. Had a quick dinner and tried to relax and go to sleep early because we had a very early flight out and it would be a long day tomorrow!! I don’t think I slept much, I was too excited… Dec. 6 - Saturday
The hotel shuttled us over to the airport early and we took advantage of the curb-side check-in. We waited at the gate about one and a half hours and then we were on our way!! We changed planes in Dallas after a 90 minute layover. Arrived at MCO about 6PM. While waiting for our luggage to appear, Beth met Miss America and got her autograph. She was apparently on our flight to Orlando and was to take part in the Candlelight Processional at EPCOT in the next few days. Once we had our luggage, we headed over to get our rental car from National. The wait time wasn’t very long. We got a Chev Trailblazer (very roomy) and we were on our way to the timeshare condo. Amazingly we only got lost once on the way. I called Robyn on my cell phone to let her know where we were. We arrived and met up with everyone after a long day of travel. We stayed up visiting and planning our itinerary for the next few days. Finally it was time for bed and it sure felt good… Dec. 7 – Sunday
We ate breakfast in the condo. (Robyn had shopped after they arrived early on Saturday.) Eating breakfast in the condo everyday really helped with expenses and saved us a lot of time in the morning. We all drove over to the Animal Kingdom and arrived right before the opened. We purchased our park-hopper tickets, 5 days for $99 each using Tom’s military discount. Tom’s ticket was free. I purchased an Annual Pass for myself and Katriena was able to get me a discount on the price. By using the Pass, we didn’t have to pay for parking during the trip and I got a great discount on our room at CBR. We had a wonderful day at the Animal Kingdom and went to just about every attraction with the Kilimanjaro Safari as our favorite. We ate lunch at the Flame Tree BBQ and really enjoyed the “downtime” while eating. (I have to add here that about a year ago I had minor knee surgery, so we occasionally just sat, rested and “people-watched.” I would usually sit down while everyone else hit the shops.) After a full day, we headed out for dinner “offsite” and then to the condo for a quiet evening. Dec. 8 – Monday
Got up early again, ate and we were off! We headed out for the MGM Studios for the day. We again rode and saw lots. My favorites were, TOT, RNRC, and WWTBAM!! Beth even got to the “hot seat” on Millionaire and made it to the $32,000 level before answering wrong. She was very excited and really enjoyed the “show”. Later in the day, two ladies mentioned seeing her during the show and congratulated her on her performance. That evening we all ate at the Sci-Fi Drive In. Beth and I order one rib dinner to share and we each received a huge portion. At first I thought our waiter had mis-understood that we wanted to share. He said, with a smile, “No, I understood what you wanted…” Wow!! The meal was almost too much for us to eat. We arrived back at the condo tired and ready for bed! (**I should mention, Katriena, had asked to be scheduled to work later shifts during the time we were visiting. She also managed to get her two days off consecutively, so most days she spent with us and we would drop her off and pick her up for work each day.**) Dec. 9 – Tuesday
Today was our EPCOT day. This was the park I was really anticipating. All of the Christmas décor was so exciting to see. I was constantly taking pictures and the kids kept telling me, “No, you can’t decorate the yard like this!” We got to the park early enough to see the arrival of the Character Caravan. Beth took pictures with some of the characters in their holiday attire. While visiting each country, I had the kids try on hats and I took some really fun pictures! We traveled around the “world” starting with Mexico stopping for attraction rides, shops, and shows along the way. Some of us had lunch at the American Adventure counter service and others tried the Japanese counter service. Everyone seemed happy with their choice. We stopped for a “beaver-tail” in Canada for desert…yummy! Boy do you have to watch out for the birds while eating this…Beth was talking to us while eating and a bird (seagull, I think) “dive-bombed” her plate…whoa!! It was quite hilarious to everyone around!! We left the park shortly after and returned to the condo to rest for a few hours. Back to EPCOT later in the evening and everything was all lit up and beautiful!! The Christmas lights were fantastic. We did some shopping and then found a place to watch Illuminations. I was really anxious for Beth to see this display, as I knew she would be in “awe” of it all!! More shopping after the show to let the crowds thin-out and then we were back at the condo very tired. (**By the way, the weather was almost perfect for the entire trip. Only rained hard one day, on Sunday the 15th**) Dec. 10 – Wednesday
Today was the Magic Kingdom!! Since we live in California, we have been to Disneyland numerous times and it was nice to see the contrast in the two parks. Some things we thought we done better and some not… Beth’s favorite ride at Disneyland was the “PeopleMover” and she was happy to be able enjoy it again!! Cameron enjoyed everything since he’s not hard to please. Gary and I enjoyed the Carousel of Progress (another attraction no longer at Disneyland). It brought back memories for both of us. We stayed all day and rode everything with little crowds to deal with…how nice! The park closed around 7pm, so we headed out to do some resort-hopping. We went over to the Boardwalk and looked at all of the decorations and holiday displays of candy and gingerbread. The kids then wanted to head to DisneyQuest…so off we went! DisneyQuest was fun although a little too loud for me. After a while, Robyn and I left to do some window shopping and we met up with everyone later. Again back to the condo, late and tired! Dec. 11 - Thursday
This was the day our family moved “onsite” to the Caribbean Beach Resort for the next 5 days of vacation. We checked out of the condo in morning and headed over to WDW. Check-in at CBR went very smooth and my few requests had been met…a room on the first floor, non-smoking, and in Martinque Bldg 23. The room was great and we were close to the quiet pool. After checking in, I called Robyn and we (the girls) decided to do some shopping. The guys had a fishing excursion reserved leaving from the Wilderness Lodge for 3 hrs, so we agreed to pick them up after their fishing trip later in the afternoon. Shopping was lots of fun since we “hit” a couple of the outlets and Beth was really enjoying herself. Since she is now gainfully employed, she really likes to shop…go figure!! We headed over to the Wilderness Lodge a little early and relaxed on some beach chairs near the marina. We kept watching the different boats come in and finally spotted them. All three of them had a great time. They each caught at least 4-5 “nice size” bass. Cameron said the fishing was fun and having snacks on the boats was nice too!! (The snacks are included in the excursion cost). Gary commented that since Katriena had made the reservation for them, they got the trip for 50% off using her CM discount. Dinner that evening was at an Applebee’s near the condo. Dec. 12 – Friday
Since Katriena would be finishing the College Program in January, Robyn and Tom had planned to go to her apartment today to pack and ship a lot of her stuff home. They took off in the morning and we agreed to call them later that evening for dinner. Our family took off to visit the Animal Kingdom again. We went for another trip on the Kilimanjaro Safari and had a great time. We saw lots more animals this trip…saw the baby elephant, cheetahs, and a huge black rhino that got a little too up close and personal with our ride vehicle!! Wow, was Cameron excited!! Somehow we still didn’t get to see the Tarzan Rocks show. This was a really good day and it was nice to be “just the 4 of us.” Since Robyn and Tom were leaving for home on Saturday, and as a “thank you” to them and Katriena for all of the $$ we saved using their shared discounts, Gary and I bought dinner for everyone at the Cape May Buffet. We had a wonderful dinner with lots of choices and we all left “stuffed”. After dinner, we played miniature golf at the Winter/Summerland course. It was lots of fun and I got some great pictures of everyone. We went our separate ways after hugs and saying our goodbyes to Robyn and Tom. When we got back to the CBR, Cameron and I went for a swim in the quiet pool while I did a few loads of laundry. (The laundry room was right there at the pool). Dec. 13 - Saturday
We slept in late today and after we picked up Katriena, we went to breakfast at a Cracker Barrel in the area. Since we don’t have any Cracker Barrel restaurants in California, this was a real treat. After breakfast we went to a Nike outlet that Gary had spotted on the way to breakfast. I found a bench to just “people-watch” while Gary and Cameron shopped for about 2 hours. Gary kept apologizing for them spending about $100 for stuff…I told him not to worry. (If he only had a clue how much I had spent so far!!) Lunch was at a Sweet Tomatoes restaurant on International Drive. By now it was raining and we saw quite a few people waiting at shuttle stops and they were getting pretty wet. We dropped Katriena off for work around 4pm and we headed to CBR. We decided on fast food for dinner and just hung out in our room for the rest of the evening. Dec. 14 - Sunday
We woke up to lots of rain this morning. We went and picked up Katriena and she spent the day with us since she was off of work for the day. Since the weather was gloomy, we decided to “resort hop” today. We started off at the Contemporary Resort and rode the Monorail to both the Polynesian and the Grand Floridian. We got off at both resorts and enjoyed looking at all of the Christmas decorations. The kids all loved the “life-size” gingerbread house in the lobby of the Grand Floridian. Gary and I sat in the lobby relaxing and enjoying the live 5-piece orchestra playing Christmas carols. We were there for about an hour or so. On the way out, I got some of the fresh roasted chestnuts. Unfortunately none of us really cared for the taste of them. The next resort on our “tour” was the Animal Kingdom Lodge. We managed to get there before dark so we could see some of the animals out on the savannah. I loved the atmosphere and yes, the lobby is a little dark, but it’s so well designed and decorated. I especially liked sitting in a rocker by the large indoor fire-pit towards the back of the lobby. It was now getting close to dinner (I forget what we did for lunch!!) and we were getting tired. Gary and I decided we’d head back to our room at CBR and order a pizza delivered from a local Pizza Hut. We relaxed, had pizza and sodas, and watched TV in the room. Gary and I drove Katriena back to her apartment about 11pm. We hugged and said our goodbyes since Katriena had to attend meetings during the day and work an evening shift at the MGM Studios on Monday. We would not be able to see her again before we left on Tuesday. Dec. 15 - Monday
This was the day we planned to go to Universal Studios. The weather was lots better, sunny and clear. We rode just about every ride attraction and saw every show we could in that one day. On the way out of the park, we window-shopped. We rested for a bit when we got back to CBR and then we went to dinner at Beaches and Cream. The food was very good…Gary and I had the prime-rib sandwich and the kids both had burgers. We all shared 2 big ice cream sundaes for desert and Gary and Cameron were in heaven…ice cream is a very important part of their diet!!! We got to see one family of 4 “tackle” the famous Kitchen Sink desert. It was fun watching their reaction when it was set on their table!! After looking around the Beach Club resort, we walked over to the Boardwalk and looked around before heading “home” to CBR. Now the dreaded task of packing to go home. I still don’t know how I got everything to fit in the suitcases I brought. Of course, one of them was over the airline weight limit, but the skycap checking us in let it go through anyway!!! Dec. 16 - Tuesday
We checked out early and headed to the airport for our flight home. The flight was smooth but long. We landed in San Jose and then had a 3 hour drive home. Gary, bless him, drove home after the flight…even though I said we could get a room for the night. I know this report was very long and if you read it this far…thanks, I hope you enjoyed it!!! Kathy Pursell garkat@pacbell.net
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