Trip Reports

Time of Year: Fall
Travel Method: Plane, Shuttle Service
Resort: CR, DL
Accommodations
Ages Represented in Group: Elementary, Teen, Adult
WDW Experience Represented in Group: Infrequent
Comments: Ellen (no relation to the web master) has written a wonderfully-detailed account of her family's trip. In addition to great descriptions, Ellen has included daily expense information. The Bennett clan stayed at the Contemporary Resort for the first few days of the trip before moving over to Dixie Landings for the remainder.


Nov 14 – 22, 1998

The players:

Ellen (Me), 35, trip planner and one who obsesses about planning trips (and lots of other things)
Greg (Hubby) 44, one who goes along with most anything I plan
Keith 13, Greg’s son and my step-son, the quiet one, 8th grader
Mike 12 (now 13), my oldest son, second in command trip planner and obsessor, 7th grader
Scott 10, my younger son, doesn’t like things to be too well planned out, worrier, 5th grader
Pre-trip report and introduction

I wrote this portion about 2 weeks before the trip, but decided to wait and post it along with the other segments of the trip report.

I have been planning this trip for about a year. This will be our 2nd trip to Disney World as a family. The first was in Nov 1996, we stayed off-site at Howard Johnson’s Park Square Inn (in a suite). We all loved the trip, but agreed that if we got to go back we would like to stay on-site.

I am a thinker/planner/drive your spouse crazy kind of person. My son Mike is similar to me, so at least I have had someone to discuss all of this with. Hubby is much more laid back, happy to be going but doesn’t get too excited in advance, and can’t be bothered with all of the planning. Just tell him what we’re doing, and he’ll be happy to go along with it. Even appreciates that I do it, but can’t get into it himself. Rarely if ever will he offer any opinion about the trip even when asked. (As we get closer, he is showing signs of getting excited, even asked me what the plan/schedule for our first day is going to be.)

We will be staying on-site, at the Contemporary for the first 3 nights (14th - 17th) and then at Dixie Landings for the last 5 nights (17th -22nd). The Contemporary appeals to the boys because of the Monorail going through, and to me because of the size of the room and the location, but the price is a little too high to justify the whole trip there, even though we got some pretty good discounts. Also, I have heard so many good things about Dixie Landings that I am looking forward to staying there too, even if I am afraid we’ll be a little cramped. We probably won’t spend much time in the room anyway so it should be fine.

On our last trip we rented a car, stayed off-site, and did other non-Disney stuff like the Space Center and Sea World in addition to 4 day passes to Disney. This time we are not renting a car, and are doing only Disney stuff (we bought regular APs). We will be joined on day 6 by my parents who recently became Florida Residents and will be staying in their motor home at Fort Wilderness, and on day 8 by my sister and her family who will be staying with my parents at Fort Wilderness.

I have made pretty detailed plans at least as far as which days at which parks, and several priority seatings for meals. (Actually I have been obsessing over it for months.) I will try very hard to remain flexible once we get there, but will try to stick to the main idea of the plan. We are not planning to do the early entry parks since we don’t expect it to be too crowded, and should get to see most of what we want without it, but we can always change our minds once we get there and see how it’s going. Also we do not plan to do an E-ride night, since we have APs and can go into the parks all we want during the week. We don’t want to burn ourselves out by getting up early and staying out late every night. We also have to make sure there is time for relaxing, and swimming in the pools, since the boys enjoy that as much as anything else when we are on vacation.

We are also coming back to Disney Dec. 19 - 23 (Woo Hoo! I get to see the Christmas decorations and go to the Candlelight Processional), staying in my parent’s motor home at Fort Wilderness, and then staying at their house (in Lakeland, FL) for a week after that. And if I can talk hubby into it, we will be coming back again in ’99 before our annual passes expire. (He has to see the economic wisdom in getting maximum use out of the APs.) He says *we ’ll see* after we get done with these 2 trips. But I have a feeling he’ll agree to it. We all loved the trip last time.

Well that’s it for the intro. I will try to keep good notes and write a full trip report when we get back. I’ve never done this before, but I love reading other people’s reports and have really appreciated all of the great information and advice from this newsgroup.

Day 1, Saturday Nov. 14th

We had a 7am direct flight from Rochester, NY to Orlando. I got up at 4:30am, and got ready. Greg got up right after I did, and we woke the boys at about 5am. We had bagels that Greg had picked up the night before, and left home at about 5:25am, 5 minutes ahead of schedule. We drove to the Thrifty valet parking and someone got right in our van and went to the airport with us, gave us a claim ticket, took our return flight information, helped us with our bags at the curb and away he went with our van. It only took us about 20 mins and we were at the airport. We checked our bags at the curb with no wait, and we were at the gate by 5:55am. Noone was at the counter at the gate yet so we just had to wait there. On this new Metrojet service you have to wait to get seat assignments until the day of the flight. I was too nervous to eat much but I did want a coffee, so Greg, Mike and Keith went looking.

Everything went fine. I gave Scott a dramamine before we left home, so there wasn’t any excitement on the flight. The flight took off about 15 minutes late, but we landed in Orlando just about on time. The Tiffany Towncar driver was waiting for us as we got off the tram, and we waited a few minutes for the baggage. Everything I had read about Tiffany Towncar proved to be true, it was a great service and I will definitely use them again. We got to the Contemporary a little before 11am. There was a long line to check in but it moved fairly quickly. Greg and the boys walked around and checked out the place while I waited in line. The room wasn’t ready yet, which we had expected. We got our resort ids, and would have to come back later to get the keys activated. We went to the food and fun center and got our mugs while the boys checked out the arcade. I needed to eat something, because I had been too nervous to eat until we got there, so we had some snacks that I had brought along.

We looked around at the hotel and the shops some, (Michael started his quest for pressed pennies) and then we took off for Epcot. First we had to get our annual pass vouchers traded in for the real thing and activated at guest relations. That probably took about 10 – 15 minutes, and then we were in!!! We looked around Innoventions West and played a few games there. We considered going on Spaceship Earth, but the lines looked too long. We headed towards World Showcase to get some lunch, but first stopped at Ice Station Cool to check it out. We tried all of the drinks there. The kids hated the Beverly but Greg actually liked it, and I didn’t mind it too much. We must be weird. When we came out of Ice Station the dancing fountain was playing so we stayed and watched the rest of it. I don’t think I ever saw the fountain playing before, or at least I never paid attention. I really liked it and I think Scott did too. He usually likes music the most of any of us.

Eventually we made it to Mexico and had lunch at Cantina de San Angel. Greg and I split a combo meal and a Grande Margarita and the boys each had the kids meal. The only drinks they could supply for the kids were iced tea and some watermelon drink, I guess the sodas weren’t working. Oh well, they weren’t that thirsty after going to Ice Station Cool anyway. The food was pretty good. Next we went over to the Mexico Pavilion and rode El Rio del Tiempo, and looked at the shops in Mexico.

We walked back towards the entrance to head back and get our room. We rode Spaceship Earth this time, no wait at all and then left Epcot at about 3:00 to go back to the Contemporary and get our room. We got back at about 3:30 and went and got our keys activated at guest services. No wait this time. We went to our room and waited (impatiently) for our luggage to arrive. At a little after 4 our luggage arrived, and it was pool time. The room at the contemporary was nice, we had a garden wing room in the North wing. Nothing spectacular as far as rooms go, but there were 2 queen beds and a day bed. It seemed like a pretty good size.

We went down to the pool and swam for about an hour before going back and getting ready to go to the Magic Kingdom. We walked to the Magic Kingdom and got there a little before 6pm. On the way in Scott bought an Autograph Hound Pluto that he had seen and really wanted. (The boys each had some of their own money to spend so I won’t be including their purchases in my expenses.) It proved to be a good purchase for him, he carried it everyday for the rest of the trip, and got it signed by lots of characters in place of having an autograph book, and he loved it. That night we rode BTMRR, then Jungle Cruise. We went to dinner at Casey’s and had hot dogs and fries with cheese sauce. Then we went to Tomorrowland and rode TTA, then Space Mountain, then took the Skyway to Fantasyland. We waited near Dumbo to watch the fireworks. I must be dumb, I knew that the fireworks would go off over the castle so I was watching over the castle for them. But they are actually behind the castle so if you’re already behind it you have to look the other way. They were very pretty, but I missed the effect of seeing them over the castle.

After the fireworks which were at 9pm, we went and staked out a spot for the 10pm Spectromagic Parade. We waited on the curb of the hub near the bridge to where the parade crosses over to Frontierland. We got 2 bottles of water, a Mickey ice cream bar, and my first bottle strap of the trip (the MK one of course).

We went to MK that night because I really wanted to see Spectromagic and Saturdays were the only nights that I knew it would be going on. It was quite crowded that night. I think we waited half an hour each for BTMRR and Space Mountain. The rest of the rides weren’t too bad though. I’m glad we waited to see the parade, it was great and we had a great view. We were very tired by the time it was over since we had gotten up very early, and of course I hadn’t slept very well the night before either. We took the monorail back to the Contemporary, set up our call from Mickey for the next morning, and went right to bed.

Expenses for today:

Tips (Valet parking at home, curbside baggage, town car, bell services) $23.00
Tiffany town car (with $5.00 coupon) $65.00
5 Refillable mugs at Contemporary $45.00
Lunch @ Cantina de San Angel at Epcot $24.00
Dinner @ Casey’s at MK $26.00
Snacks $7.00
Bottle strap $3.00
Today’s Total $193.00
Day 2, Sunday Nov. 15th

I had set the alarm for 7am and the Mickey call for 7:25 so the boys could sleep in longer than me, and get the call. Mike and I went down to re-check-in since I had a separate reservation for the 1st night from the next 2 nights. (I got a better rate for the 2nd and 3rd nights but couldn’t get it for the 1st night.) Check-in went quickly this time, no wait at all. We got our mugs filled and went back up to the room to get everyone. We walked to MK to get there by 8:05 for our 8:10am priority seating at Crystal Palace. We got right into MK, and took a few pictures on our way to breakfast, while the park was fairly empty. We checked in at the podium and waited less than 5 mins to be taken to our table. Breakfast was great and the characters were fun. We missed Eeyore because he had just passed our table when we got there, and at the end we were anxious to get out by 9 for rope drop so we didn’t wait for him to make it back to our table. Scott got his first autographs on his Pluto (autograph hound) from Tigger, Pooh, and Piglet, and the other boys got autographs in little spiral notebooks I had gotten them, and I took pictures. I had Greg take pictures of me with the characters too. Tigger is one of my favorite characters in general, but Eeyore’s costume is one of my favorites at Disney World. Piglet was definitely pinker than expected. Crystal Palace is a great breakfast and lots of fun.

We left breakfast and waited for a couple of minutes at the ropes to Tomorrowland. We rode Buzz Lightyear first, 2 times in a row. I had trouble scoring much, and Scott got zero on one of the rides, but the other guys did okay. Next we went on Space Mountain again. Scott didn’t want to go on this time, so when we got to the loading area I asked about having him wait for us. They directed him where to go, and the rest of us went on. When we got off, he wasn’t there at the waiting spot and I started to get a little nervous. We all thought he had probably exited and waited for us outside so we decided to go out even though I was still a little worried. Thankfully he was there waiting in the arcade at the exit. No need to get too worried, he’s a pretty smart kid. But he didn’t become a worrier without some parental influence, and I think I know who he got it from.

Next we all rode the Tomorrowland speedway, then headed over towards Toontown. We saw Alice in Wonderland and Tweedle Dee by the Mad Tea Party. Scott and Mike got autographs from Tweedle Dee, but noone wanted to meet Alice. (Except me, but I guess that doesn’t count.) We went on Mad Tea Party and then went into Toontown. We went on Goofy’s Barnstormer, walked thru Minnie’s house and Mickey’s house, and then into the Judge’s tent to meet Mickey and get pictures. Scott wanted to go to the Toontown hall of fame and meet other characters, but Greg and the other boys just aren’t into it. So we took the Train to Frontierland and did Splash Mountain (Scott was nervous but he did it), then over to Adventureland for Pirates, the Tiki Room, and Swiss Family Treehouse. I asked about the Adventureland Challenge, but they said there wouldn’t be any that day.

Next we went to Liberty Square to do the Haunted Mansion. Last time we came here (in Nov. 96) Keith did Haunted Mansion once and then didn’t go on it again. Sure enough he elected to sit this one out. He waited for us out front. I don’t understand why Scott liked Space Mountain 2 years ago but doesn’t really like it now, and I don’t know why Keith doesn’t like Haunted Mansion, but we don’t feel any need to push anything on them if they don’t like it. I learned that lesson in ’96 when I talked Scott into going with us to see Alien Encounter (none of us had done it before) and he screamed through the whole thing. Neither one of us enjoyed it, and I won’t talk him into to going on anything he doesn’t want to anymore.

We stopped at Columbia Harbour House for lunch. Greg and I had clam chowder in bread bowls, Scott had fish with fries and milk, Mike had Chicken strips and fries, and Keith had chicken strips and grapes w/ a coke. After lunch we went over to Fantasyland and saw the Legend of the Lion King and rode Snow White. Then back to Tomorrowland to see the Carousel of Progress. I had never seen this before, and I still can’t get the song out of my head (There’s a great big beautiful tomorrow…and it’s just a dream away).

We decided it was time to go, so we stopped at the camera center and saw our picture from the Judge’s tent. Not bad, but we didn’t buy it. When we left it was almost parade time, but I was the only one who wanted to see it, so we decided to go at 3:00. We took the monorail back to the Contemporary. When we got back, Baloo and Liverlips were in the lobby so the boys got some autographs, and then we went up to the room. We gave the boys some quarters to go to the arcade and they took their mugs to get them filled. Greg and I took a short nap, (at least it sure felt short). Gone are the days when we needed to have time for the kids to nap, but what about us parents? We went to the pool for a little while and then back to get ready for dinner.

We had priority seatings at California Grill at 6pm, so we got cleaned up and headed up. We didn’t have to wait for a table, but we didn’t get one right by the window. Then again, we didn’t ask. We decided it didn ’t really matter that much. We ordered a sushi appetizer that we split, 2 glasses of wine and soda for the kids. For dinner I had the pork tenderloin, Greg had Salmon, Mike and Scott got medallions of beef and mashed potatos from the kid’s menu, and Keith got a kid’s pizza. Greg had a second glass of wine with dinner, and we ordered the chocolate souffle for dessert for all of us to split. The fireworks started just before the souffle came and the kids were out on the observation deck watching the fireworks. We got up to watch the fireworks from a better location, and then had the souffle when we all sat back down. Greg and I also got coffees with liqueur. All of the food was very good. This was definitely our fanciest and most expensive meal out, and although I’m glad we tried it and we all enjoyed it, I probably won’t go back any time soon. I can’t say anything bad about it though. After dinner we all walked back out to the observation deck since Greg and I hadn’t seen it yet. We saw that Minnie and Mickey were in the lounge near there, and as we were leaving, Scott and I ran into them while we were waiting for the others by the elevators. That was sort of cool.

After dinner we decided to take a tour of the other monorail resorts. We looked around the shops a little at each, and the boys bought a couple of small souvenirs with their own money. We saw the Electric Water Pagaent from the beach at the Grand Floridian. That is a gorgeous hotel. There was an orchestra playing inside, which Scott really liked. (He is a cello player himself.) We headed back to the hotel to try to get to bed at a reasonable time. Set up our Mickey call for the next day and went to bed.

Expenses for today:

Breakfast at Crystal Palace (w/ MKC discount) $ 61.00
Lunch at Columbia Harbour House $ 32.00
Dinner at California Grill $154.00
Today’s Total $247.00
Day 3, Monday Nov. 16th

We got up and ate breakfast in the room today. I took the boys down to get our mugs filled and brought them back up, and then ate cereal bars and pop-tarts that I had brought from home. We took the bus from the Contemporary to MGM and got there just a little after 9am. Goofy and Pluto were out front as we walked in, so the boys got autographs and I took pictures again. Pluto seems to be all 3 of their favorite character. And Scott was excited to get Pluto’s autograph on his Pluto autograph hound. When we got in we went to Tower of Terror first, with just a few minutes wait. When we got to the loading area, after the preshow, Scott decided to take the "chicken" exit. No problem. This is another ride that Scott did twice 2 years ago but does not want to do this time.

Next we headed over to Star Tours, which all of the boys love. We did this 2 times in a row with no waiting. We tried to do the Great Movie Ride, but it was closed due to technical difficulties until later in the day. We saw the Magic of Disney Animation, which I really liked, The Voyage of the Little Mermaid, Muppetvison 3D, the Studios Backlot Tour, and the Great Movie Ride (in the afternoon). We had snacks (pretzels, ice cream, and water) and I got an MGM bottle strap.

At around 2pm we headed out, and took a boat ride from MGM to the boardwalk. When we got there, there was a boat to Epcot waiting, so we transferred right onto it and rode to Epcot to the International Gateway entrance. I had read that the boats were slow, but we didn’t have to wait for either one, and I didn’t mind sitting down and taking it easy for a little bit. We went into Epcot through the International Gateway and started at the UK. Greg and I both got beer (or ale) of some sort, Keith got a Powerade. We walked around UK, and found Eeyore in the gardens. I got my pictures of Eeyore after all! We had priority seatings at Teppanyaki at Japan for 3:15, but went there at about 3:00pm. We sat at a table with a young couple and a single lady and enjoyed the meal quite a bit. Greg and I got the steak and shrimp combo, Mike and Scott got the kid’s shrimp, and Keith got the kid’s steak. One nice CM used a rubberband and the wrapper from their chopsticks to make pinchers out of the kid’s chopsticks to make them easier to use. I had never seen that before. The kid’s meals came with ice cream for dessert, and the drinks came in little Epcot souvenir cups.

After dinner, we walked around the countries for the rest of the evening. We bought a pastry in Norway, and a beaver tail in Canada, which we all shared. Greg and I tried some wine samples from France from the Food and Wine Festival. Greg bought me an Epcot bottle strap. We saw the Living Statues in France, and young acrobats in China. We went to Canada to catch a performance of Off Kilter since I head read so much about them. At first we sat on a bench quite a distance away, and when I suggested we get closer Greg said, "Well we don’t need to see them do we, they’re just a band right?" As it started to fill up we couldn’t see the stage, and when they started to play, Greg actually suggested that we move up closer. I think he ended up really liking them. We all did.

By about 8:15pm we staked out a spot to watch Illuminations and just sat and waited. We were all getting really tired, and we debated whether we should stay, but I really wanted to see it. As it turned out, we got to see it again later in the week and with a better view, so we probably shouldn’t have stayed. I just know that in ’96 when we came to Disney World we never stayed for any of the nighttime shows, and I didn’t want to miss them again.

After Illuminations we headed out with the crowds and took the monorails back to the Contemporary. We never had to wait long at all for a monorail the whole trip. That was nice since we were all so tired. Tomorrow morning we can sleep in a little and have a little more relaxed day. We also switch hotels tomorrow.

Expenses for today:

MGM bottle strap $ 3.00
Snacks at MGM(Pretzels, ice cream, water) $15.00
"Dinner" (at lunch prices) at Teppanyaki $ 75.00
Snacks at Epcot(Beer, powerade, wine, pastry, beaver tail) $ 20.00
Epcot bottle strap $ 3.00
Today’s Total $116.00
Day 4, Tuesday Nov. 17th

I got up at about 8:00am and let the boys sleep until about 8:30. We had to pack up to switch hotels today, and we had 9:15am priority seatings at Chef Mickey’s for breakfast. We packed up but decided to wait until after breakfast to call bell services. Mike and I were ready first, so we headed down to look at the shops and wait for the others before breakfast. Mike bought himself a Pluto t-shirt while we were waiting. We all went to breakfast and got right in with no waiting. The breakfast food was really good, and we got to see all of the characters. Mickey, Minnie, Chip and Dale all came to the table, and Goofy waited near the entrance. The atmosphere didn’t seem quite as fun as I had remembered from our dinner here 2 years ago, but this time we were seated in a smaller room behind the buffet area. Last time we had been in more of the main dining area. Also maybe there is just more singing and goofing around at dinner. Or maybe you just can’t go back and experience the exact same magic a 2nd time. But it was still lots of fun, and LOTS of food.

After breakfast we went back up to our room and called bell services to come and get our luggage to transfer to the Dixie Landings. Someone came up pretty quickly, and then we headed out. We took the monorail to the TTC, and then transferred to the Epcot monorail. From there we took a bus to Dixie Landings. It took us a few minutes and some help from a CM to find the bus stops, since we had never taken a bus from Epcot before. We got to Dixie Landings, and checked in with very little wait. We got building 17, which turned out to be very nice. I had asked for something close to the main building, and this turned out to be fine. They offered us a different building where we could get our room right away, but since we didn’t have any luggage with us yet anyway there was no point. We took the room in bldg 17 even though it wasn’t ready yet, and got our new resort Ids.

We went and found the marina, to take a boat ride to Downtown Disney. All of the boys had to use the bathroom, so I waited on a bench at the marina for them. Wouldn’t you know it the boat pulled up right after they all walked away. The captain CM said he couldn’t really wait, but if I saw them coming before he pulled away to let him know. Thankfully a woman with a child and a stroller came along to board a couple of minutes later, and they were pretty slow. The CM helped them board, and just as they were finished my crew showed up and we got on the boat and took off. I hadn’t really wanted to wait another 20 minutes for the next boat We got off at Downtown Disney Marketplace and proceeded to do some shopping. We told the kids we’d get them each a t-shirt or something of equivalent value. Scott picked a t-shirt that had a picture of Mickey hugging a stuffed pluto and Mike picked a Music of Walt Disney World CD, since he had just bought a t-shirt for himself that morning. Keith didn’t pick anything that day, but he found a t-shirt he liked later in the trip. Greg bought me a Mickey watch I liked that is going to be my Christmas present. Scott also bought himself a Mickey soccer keychain to hang from his soccer bag, and a small ceramic pluto, and Keith bought himself some small star wars figures.

We looked at all of the Lego sculptures and checked out the Lego store.

The kids built a few little cars in the outdoor Lego building play area. After the marketplace, we headed over to Disney Westside, cutting through pleasure island around 1pm to go to DisneyQuest.

I had heard that they recently changed the pricing to $20.00 for play all day instead of units, and we had planned to use our annual passes to get the buy 1 get 1 free deal. I was hoping they hadn’t changed that. As it turned out, not only did they give us buy 1 get 1 free, but the lady at the ticket counter said that since the special for AP holders also included free bonus units on the old pricing, we would only pay $15 per ticket instead of $20. So the 5 of us got in for a total of $45 plus tax, and we still have 1 ticket left. I was tempted to buy more while the special was going on to use on a later trip but I didn’t do it. Now the price has gone up to $25 per ticket since then so I probably should have. We got what I felt was a really good deal. We had planned to stay for a couple of hours and then go back to Dixie Landings before dinner. But we ended up having such a good time we stayed until after 5pm. It wasn’t crowded at all, we never waited for anything, except for some of the more popular midway games. We tried almost everything. The kids got a few little trinkets by trading in tickets at the midway games. There were only one or two attractions we didn’t try. We definitely got our money’s worth with the AP special!

We had 6:40 priority seatings at Whispering Canyon Café. We decided to head over there rather than try to go back to DxL, and we got there a little early but they took us right in. We had skipped lunch completely so we were starting to get pretty hungry. The dinner was pretty good, definitely plentiful. It wasn’t one of my favorite meals though. The food was a little greasy or something to me, and our CM did not do any antics whatsoever, and since we were seated in a small room near the back we really didn’t hear or see much else going on. We all ordered dessert though and completely stuffed ourselves, so we definitely did not leave hungry. After dinner we walked around the resort and looked at the pool before heading back to DxL. We took an Epcot bus, and then transferred to a DxL bus. We went and got our keys activated, and asked about our luggage. They said to go out to bell services, and they took us and our luggage to our room in a huge golf cart type of thing. The kids really liked that.

The room was nice. Smaller than the Contemporary but definitely adequate. I took the boys to the small pool near our room, but they said it was too cold. A lady there told us how to find the main pool so I took them there and they swam for a bit. Then we went back to the room. I had called earlier to get some extra towels and a blow dryer, and they finally came after we got back from the pool. I actually like Dixie Landings for it’s atmosphere a lot better than the Contemporary. It’s not as conveniently located, but for the atmosphere and the price, I would definitely pick DxL over the Contemporary next time.

Expenses for today:

Breakfast at Chef Mickey’s $ 70.00
Souvenirs for the kids (MKC discount) $ 37.00
Watch for me (Christmas present, MKC discount) $ 76.00
DisneyQuest(Total of 6 tickets,AP special) $ 48.00
Dinner at Whispering Canyon Café $115.00
Tips for bell services $ 7.00
Today’s Total $353.00
Day 5, Wednesday, Nov. 18th

I got up at 6am, and woke the boys at 6:30. Today was our first time ever to Animal Kingdom and I wanted to get there in time for opening at 8. We went to the foodcourt and bought Dixie Landings mugs, and ate cereal bars and Pop-tarts from home again. We took the bus to AK, and got there just few minutes after 8. The park was beautiful. My first reaction was that I would like to walk around and explore forever. But as the day wore on I came to reallize that they need to get rid of all those people. Boy was this park crowded!!

We went to the safari ride first. Pretty cool! We saw rhinos, hippos, a cheetah, a lion, giraffes, alligators, elephants, deer, antelope, gazelle, and probably a few other things I forgot to mention. Next we walked the Pangani exploration trail. We saw hippos again, meerkats, and the gorilla family. On the way through the park on the way to the safari we had seen an anteater. I don’t think I’ve ever seen one of those before.

We took the train ride to Conservation Station and we saw them doing surgery on a Possum to remove his eye. They had already removed it and were stitching it up. Interesting.

After the Safari Village we saw It’s Tough to be a Bug. Scott did not like this at all. He took off the glasses, and tried to keep his feet up off the floor. He definitely did not like not knowing what might happen next. I thought the effects were pretty good. Whenever I know Scott is scared though, I don’t enjoy the attraction as much because I’m too busy worrying about him. Regardless I thought it was a pretty good show. I really liked looking at the tree of life on the way into the movie, and kind of wished that the line wasn’t moving quite as fast in some spots. There were people behind us so we kept moving, but looking back I should have slowed down, and let people go by.

We went to lunch at Pizzafari (Pizza for me and Keith, Chicken Ceasar salad for Scott, sandwich for Mike and veggie calzone for Greg.) All of it was good. Next we went on Countdown to Extinction, (Scott was scared again). He definitely is more bothered by scary things this time at 10 than he was at 8. Very strange. We did the Jungle Book show and the Caravan Stage Bird show. We let the kids look at the boneyard dig site, but it was mostly younger kids there, so we didn’t stay long. It did seem very hot at AK as other people have mentioned. We got drinks, and I got an AK bottle strap.

I loved this park, but I was too hot and it was too crowded. The strange thing was that we never had to wait in any long lines (max was no more than 5 mins), and we never had any trouble getting right into shows, but walking around it was just packed. I couldn’t stand being so cramped and trying to walk around and keep track of everyone. Also my back started to bother me that afternoon. We left to go back to DxL by about 3. We would be going back on Sunday. I still wanted to see the Lion King show, and go on the safari again, and Mike and Keith wanted to do Countdown to Extinction again. They both liked that a lot. So all in all, although I loved the atmosphere of AK, I wish I could walk around without the crowds, or that they had made the walkways about 3 times wider. I hope that once they open Asia it will help to spread out the crowds some.

Back at DxL we swam until about 5:30 and then got our mugs filled at the food court. This was the night that we had a few options of what to do. The boys wanted to do E-Ride night at MK. I had been considering it, but by that afternoon I just felt too tired to want to walk around all night again. The day at AK had really wiped me out for some reason. We decided to keep the priority seatings I had made at the Cape May Café for 7:00. We got cleaned up, and took a bus to Epcot. We walked through Epcot from the front entrance to the International gateway, and then to the Beach Club for dinner. So much for being tired of walking. The dinner at the Cape May was excellent. Greg loved the clams, mussels, and oysters and ate tons of them. Mike and I ate quite a few clams as well. We all found plenty of food we liked, and there were awesome desserts. After dinner we walked all the way around the Boardwalk and back to the beach club (we needed to walk off some of that dinner). We caught a bus to Downtown Disney and then took the boat ride back to Dixie Landings, after about a 15 to 20 minute wait that felt a lot longer. We were all exhausted by the time we got back and my back was still bothering me whenever I walked a lot that night. I sure was hoping it would clear up. Tomorrow we should get to sleep in, maybe that would help.

Expenses for today:

Dixie Landings Mugs $ 48.00
Lunch at Pizzafari at AK $ 39.00
Drinks at AK $ 12.00
AK bottle strap $ 3.00
Alligator rental at the pool (1/2 hour) $ 2.00
Dinner at Cape May at the Beach Club $ 98.00
Today’s Total $202.00
Day 6, Thursday, Nov. 19th

It felt like we were getting closer to the end of the trip today. Boo hoo. I just need to try not to think about it. This was the day that my parents would be meeting us in the afternoon, and Greg would be doing his dive today. I got up at about 8:30, and everyone else slept in a little more, with Scott being the latest. We got breakfast at the food court. I let Scott stay in bed, and brought him a breakfast pizza back to the room. After breakfast it was homework time. The kids were missing 3 days of school this week for the trip, so we had gotten the work they would be missing, and now it was time to give them some time to get it done. Mike had finished his before we left, so he was all set, but Scott and Keith both had quite a bit yet to do. I was working on my trip notes, Mike was listening to his new CD, and Greg was taking a walk while the homework was being done. After Scott finished his math homework, he had a test to take that his teacher had given me. I gave him the test, and Greg was back, so I took Mike to the gift shop to look around. He bought himself a stuffed Pluto that he had his eye on.

When the boys had done as much homework as we could stand for one day, we left for Epcot at about noon. We were doing Futureworld today and then meeting my parents out front at 4:15 near guest relations, where Greg was supposed to go for the DiveQuest. We started at Horizons, and then went to the Wonders of Life pavillion. We did Bodywars first. Scott had never been on this before. He did fine, but didn’t really like it too well. The kids played around on some of the displays, and then we did Cranium Command which I thought was really cute. Could be because we have 3 boys near that pre-teen age, so I could relate. Then we went to the Making of Me.

After the Wonders of Life we went to lunch at the Electric Umbrella. Then we headed over to see Honey, I Shrunk the Audience. Since Greg and I both work for Kodak, we decided to try to find the VIP lounge. We had never tried to go there before. We asked at the entrance to the show, and they said to go to the camera store. We went over there, and they sent us to a side entrance to a plain door that didn’t look like you should go in. We went in there, and there was a big lounge area, with couches and chairs, dining information, lots of Kodak displays and books, free drinks (sodas, juices, water, coffee), a TV/VCR with Disney Videos playing and stuffed animals lying around. The kids watched part of a video and we looked around while we waited for the next showing. They let us into the preshow area from a door that enters near the screen to watch True Colors. The one thing I wasn’t too happy about this part was that the CMs here in the preshow area seemed almost rude in the way they shouted out the rules for standing in the preshow area. While we were there listening to how you should let your imagination run free, this area rudely demanded that you follow the most rules of any show we had been too. Very contradictory, and as a Kodak employee I was not impressed. I did like the show though. I think this is the best of the 3D shows at Disney.

After that we went to the Land to ride Living with the Land. While we were getting into our boat, I spotted my parents in the line for the ride, so when we were done we waited for them to get off. We were supposed to meet them out front at 4:15, but they had gotten there a little early and decided to get a ride in first, and we ran into them there. It is a small "World" after all.

It was about 4:00 by now, so we decided to head out to guest relations so Greg could wait for DiveQuest. They had said to be there by 4:15, but the dive/tour was scheduled to start at 4:30, and sure enough noone showed up to meet the divers until exactly 4:30. I guess they just want you there early so they don’t have to wait for anyone. One CM talked to the divers, while another took the families aside and explained what would be happening, and where and when we could see the divers dive. They said to be at the observation deck in the living seas by 5:15, Greg went off for the tour, and we headed back into the main entrance at Epcot. We decided to do Ice Station Cool again and the boys got a kick out of watching my parents faces as they tried the Beverly. They must be normal because they definitely did not like it.

We headed to the Living Seas and at the entrance told them we were there to see a family member do DiveQuest. They let us go onto the ride to Sea Base Alpha without seeing the movie and we went to the observation area. We waited for a little while, and then the divers came out at about 5:25pm. My parents watched for a little while and then told us they would meet us out front at 7:15, when Greg was supposed to be done. We watched his whole dive, and took pictures, and he stayed in the water until about 6:05. They took underwater video of his dive, which we purchased afterwards. I wasn’t sure how this would be. I had read about DiveQuest, and decided to buy it for Greg for his birthday (which was in June). He is an advanced diver, but hadn’t dove in about 8 years. He loves diving but just hasn’t had the opportunity in years. He sold most of his equipment earlier this year. But since Disney supplies all of the needed equipment I thought it might be a good way for him to get a chance to dive again. Well, he absolutely loved it. He said he didn’t want to leave the water when it was over, and now that he’s had a taste of it again, he wants to look into going on a dive when we are in Florida over Christmas.

After the dive they take the divers somewhere to get cleaned up and then watch their video, so we had to wait quite a while for him. We checked out all the displays at Sea Base Alpha, looked at the gift shop for a while, and sat for a while and Greg did finally come out at 7:15, right on schedule. We bought the video, and then headed up to meet my parents. I ended up being really glad I had gotten him the dive. They also gave him a DiveQuest t-shirt, a certificate, and they will stamp your dive log if you bring it with you. (He didn’t)

After the dive we met my parents, and we all headed for World Showcase for our night of eating and drinking around the World. We got beaver tails and beer in Canada, (Beaver tails for the kids, beer for the men), baked potatos in UK, wine a few times at the different Food and Wine festival booths, meat turnovers somewhere, pretzels, brats, and wine in Germany, sweet and sour chicken and egg rolls in China, churros in Mexico, and frozen yogurt at the outpost in Africa. At one point during the evening we lost Scott for a few minutes. I thought he was behind me with Greg, but he noticed that he wasn’ t around. We had not discussed where to meet that night if anyone got lost, and it was dark out and crowded. My mom dragged my dad out of line for some food or drink, and we all headed back the way we had come. Thankfully we found him within a couple of minutes. Thankfully he had stayed put where he was when he reallized he was lost. This is the second time this trip that I thought I might have lost him, and that feeling of panic that I try to control is not one of my favorite feelings.

We walked around right up until Illuminations started, and then we watched it from near the outpost at first, and then moved to a bridge towards China. We had a much better view this time than we had the first time, and I saw things I never noticed last time. I wished I had done it differently, or not at all the first time. This was good. We walked out with the crowds again, said goodnight to Mom and Dad, and waited for a bus. Big crowds were waiting, but busses came one right after the next and we were on our way back in no time.

Expenses for today:

Breakfast at DxL food court $24.00
Lunch at Electric Umbrella $24.00
Dive Video at the Living Seas $37.00
Beaver tails $ 9.00
Potatos $ 9.00
Pretzel $ 3.00
Chinese food at Lotus Blossum $10.00
Bratwurst and wine $ 7.00
Churros $ 2.00
Today’s Total $125.00
Day 7, Friday, Nov. 20th

We slept in again today, and then had breakfast together at the food court. It was to be another homework morning. After breakfast I went to the gift shop to try to find something for my Mom. Today was her birthday and I had gotten a Mickey Sorcerer beanie for her at home, but wanted to get something else too. I ended up getting her a Mickey face pin with little rhinestones all over it. I went back to the room to oversee the homework, and Greg and Mike took a walk. Today Scott had a social studies test and some other homework and Keith was reading a book. They got almost everything done today, and we left by about noon. We had priority seatings at Hollywood Brown Derby at MGM for lunch with my parents at 1:00.

We got to MGM by about 12:30. I stopped at the little gift shop just inside the entrance to buy a goofy key chain. I saw a hat there with the Disney logo I like and had been wanting to get, so Greg talked me in to going ahead and getting it. While I was at the gift shop, we noticed the Genie, and Donald Duck nearby. The boys went over to get his autograph, and I went to get pictures of them with the Genie. The genie was goofing around with Scott, and Scott ended up tripping over the Genie’s big foot and fell and skinned his knee and elbow. Noone (at least no Disney employees) seemed to really care, so we took him and put bandaids on his wounds. Right after we finished that, I noticed another bandaid in a wrapper laying on the ground. I know it wasn’t from us because it had the Little Mermaid on it. So either this isn’t the first time someone needed to be fixed up near here, or as Greg suggested it was Disney magic that had put it there for us. It’s a good thing too, because we ended up using it later in the day.

The tip board said there was no wait for Tower of Terror, so Greg, Mike and Keith decided to go on before lunch. Since I knew Scott didn’t want to go on it, I stayed with him and we looked around in the shops. I had mentioned to Greg that if they weren’t out by about 10 til 1, we would meet them at the Brown Derby. They hadn’t come out, so Scott and I went over to the Brown Derby and Grandma and Grandpa were there. I went in and told them we were there for our 1:00 seatings and were just waiting for the rest of our party. There was no problem, and a few minutes later the guys showed up and we went in for lunch. Keith got his T-shirt today, one from the Tower of Terror.

Lunch at the Brown Derby was pretty good. I had the Cobb salad and really liked it. Greg had some sort of seafood over linguine, and both my parents got Blackened steak ceasar salads. The kids got typical kids meal type stuff. I had asked ahead of time for them to bring my mom a small birthday cake, but they never did. And I didn’t ask again because I knew she wouldn’ t want me making a fuss for her birthday. We gave her the gifts though and she liked them. She is decorating one room in their new house with Disney stuff, so the Sorcerer beanie will go good there. She wore the pin every time we saw her for the rest of the trip.

After lunch we went to StarTours again. Then it was time for the Mulan parade. My parents had seen it recently and Greg, Mike and Keith weren’t interested, so Scott and I went to watch it, my parents sat on a bench, and the others went to ride Tower of Terror again (twice). We all met after the parade, and headed over to see Beauty and the Beast. My parents decided to do the Backlot tour instead, and Scott wanted to go with them, so Greg, Mike and I did Tower of Terror again while Keith waited, and then we went in to see Beauty and the Beast. I really loved that show. I have seen the Broadway type show in Toronto, so it wasn’t as good as that, but I do love the show. I especially like the doves at the end.

We all met up again and went to One Saturday Morning sound show. Greg got picked to play Jasper in the show so that was kind of fun. After that we just walked around until it was time to go to Fantasmic. We took pictures under the umbrella and got some snacks. The kids got ice cream, and the men got beer. At 5:30 we went to get in line for Fantasmic. We got perfect seats, exactly in the center in the Mickey section about 2/3rds of the way back. We got 2 popcorns and 2 caramel corns and waited and waited. When Mike went to get the popcorn, he bought me a Fantasmic bottle strap to complete my collection. (With my money, but it was still sweet.) I didn’t even know they sold those until we got there that night so I had thought my collection was complete before we got there. Now we have 5 bottle straps, so there’s enough for all of us on our next trip.

At one point when I went to go up to the bathroom I scraped my leg really badly on the corner of one of the benches. This was the 3rd bandaid session of the day. Keith had had the 2nd earlier when he had over-itched a mosquito bite. Fortunately this was the only day for any injuries, and none were all that serious, but it was strange that we used so many bandaids, and even stranger that between all of us we had enough with us.

Fantasmic was awesome, but the waiting was awful. I’m glad we did it once, it was worth it. But if we ever go again I won’t go in that early. There were still seats in the end sections at around 6:30 for the 7pm show. During the pre-show they asked who was having a birthday today and a few people raised their hands. They had the crowd sing happy birthday. That had special meaning since it was my Mom’s birthday. They probably do that every night. I’ve certainly never had that many people sing happy birthday to me. On the way out people around us wished her a happy birthday. Also on the way out we picked up 2 more Fantasmic caramel corn buckets that someone had left behind and I gave one to my mom, and with the 2 we had bought we had one for each of the boys. After the show we walked out with the crowds, said goodnight to my mom and dad again, and took the bus back.

Since it wasn’t too late, we took the kids to the pool and Greg and I got drinks and watched the kids. After that we went to the food court and got a pizza and nachos at around 10pm. My stomach woke me and thanked me for it at about 3 in the morning.

Expenses for today:

Breakfast at DxL food court $ 21.00
Mom’s birthday gift pin $ 15.00
Hat and goofy key chain for me $ 30.00
T-shirt for Keith $ 20.00
Lunch at Brown Derby(W/Florida resident discount)$ 60.00
Beer $ 9.00
Ice Cream $ 9.00
Snacks at Fantasmic(2 popcorn, 2 caramel corn) $ 16.00
Fantasmic bottle strap $ 3.00
Drinks by the pool at DxL $ 13.00
Pizza and Nachos at DxL food court $ 18.00
Today’s Total $214.00
Day 8, Saturday Nov. 21st

We decided to do early entry at MK today since we had not done the E-ride on Weds and we hadn’t been back to MK since the second day of our trip. We got up early and got coffee and HI-C at the food court, and then headed to MK. We got there about 5 mins before they opened the park at 7:30am. Greg and I wanted to do Alien Encounter, but none of the boys were interested, so they did Buzz Lightyear several times while we went on Alien Encounter. I was able to appreciate the effects this time, not having Scott next to me crying like I had 2 years ago. It was definitely creepy but I laughed too. I know nothing bad can really happen, but it still freaked me out a bit. After that we did Space Mountain, while Scott waited at the arcade/gift shop. Next we went to Fantasyland and rode Peter Pan and Small World. The kids complained about this last time, but Mike and Scott both wanted to see it again, so we talked Greg and Keith into going too. By then it was 9am, so we went through Liberty Square to Frontierland and rode Big Thunder Mountain and then Splash Mountain with very little waiting. While we were waiting for Splash Mountain, we saw Brer Bear and Brer Fox getting off the ride. Cute.

It was now going on 10, and the crowds were growing, so we decided it was time to go to breakfast. We were going to go to the Swan for breakfast, and this turned out to be the longest we ever waited for a bus our whole trip. It was the only time I ever felt like we waited longer than we should have. Apparently there had been some mixup and the bus hadn’t stopped at MK for quite awhile. We ended up going to the Garden Grove for a buffet breakfast at the Swan. Goofy was there at first, but we didn’t see any other characters, and Goofy didn’t stay long. The buffet was good. I had 2 eggs benedicts. We used our $50.00 coupon here with no problem. After breakfast we walked around outside the Swan and Dolphin and looked at the pools, and then took a bus to Downtown Disney to do a little more shopping. I got myself a t-shirt and one for Greg, and I bought Mike and Scott Pluto baseball caps that we found on sale for $7.99. (Keith didn’t want one.) We took the boat ride back to DxL and got ready for swimming. The room hadn’t been cleaned up yet. We got ready, and walked to Port Orleans to try out the pool there. The pictures of that Serpent slide there make it look really appealing to the kids, but they all said they like the slide at DxL much better. I walked around and checked out Port Orleans a little bit, and got a diet coke in my mug at the food court there. Port Orleans looked ok, but I liked Dixie Landings a lot better. The food court at Dixie Landings definitely had a lot more selection.

We walked back to DxL and went to the pool there. I got Greg a Margarita, and some nachos at the food court for me. I also just walked around a lot that afternoon. I just wanted to experience everything. I really like the atmosphere at DxL, and the landscaping is beautiful. I knew this was our last full day, and I didn’t want to let go of the feeling I had walking around there. After a total of about 3 hours in both pools for the kids, we decided it was time to go get cleaned up for dinner. The maids had arranged the stuffed animals on the bed in a cute array, and we all enjoyed that. We had priority seatings at ‘Ohanas at 7 with my parents, and my sister and her family who were supposed to have arrived that afternoon. We left DxL at 6 and took a bus to MK, and then the monorail to the Polynesian. We got there at about 6:45 and waited in the lounge outside ‘Ohanas for the others, and got a drink. They got there right about at 7, and our table was ready pretty quickly. We were seated at a long table right in front of the cooking pit, and the ukele player. For my nieces (5 and 8), this was their first trip to Disney World and their first night there. I think it was a little overwhelming at first having just gotten in and then rushing off to dinner. Early on in the dinner my 5 year old niece Lizzy said to me, "Ellen, I don’t really like this restaurant." We had a lot of fun at dinner. We saw the MK fireworks during dinner, and they dimmed the lights. The ukele player played and sang disney songs, they had hula hooping, and coconut sweeping races, and at the end they made my dad and several other people from other tables get up and apologize to the gods with a pineapple. By the end Lizzy said to me, "Ellen, I really do like this restaurant." It was our most fun meal of the trip. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that the food was great too, especially if you like shrimp, which we almost all stuffed ourselves with.

After dinner we all got on the monorail together and said our goodbyes. We got off at MK to get a bus back to DxL, while they all stayed on to transfer at the TTC to a Fort Wilderness bus. We’ll be seeing them all again in December at my parent’s house in Lakeland for Christmas, so it wasn’t too bad saying goodbye. But we only saw my sister for the one meal, and it went by really fast. We went back to our room to pack up and get ready to leave the next day. Boo Hoo!

Expenses for today:

Breakfast at Garden Grove at Swan(w/$50 coupon) $ 28.00
T-shirts and hats(MKC discount) $ 52.00
Drink by the pool at DxL $ 6.00 Nachos $ 3.00
Drinks before dinner $ 12.00
Dinner at ‘Ohanas(w/Florida resident discount) $100.00
Today’s Total $201.00
Day 9, Sunday, Nov. 22nd

This was my sad day. Going home day. At least our flight wasn’t until 5:20pm, so we still had some touring time left. We got up at about 8. We went to breakfast at the food court. Mike and Scott got meals from the food court and the rest of us ate cereal bars that were left. We went back to the room and called to have our luggage picked up. They said to just leave it by the door and they would pick it up, we didn’t have to wait there. We piled it by the door, left tips, and headed to the bus stop. This was our day to return to Animal Kingdom. We got there around 10am. It was already quite crowded, and there were long lines just to get through the turnstyles to get in. We knew this would probably happen. It was the Sunday leading into Thanksgiving week. Once we got in, Scott bought the little safari Pluto that he had been saving the rest of his money for at a gift shop near the entrance. We walked through a trail near the entrance and saw some different birds and a few animals. (I’ve forgotten what.)

We headed for the safari ride, and the wait was a half hour. We waited and this time we saw more animals than we had the first time. We didn’t see the lions at all this time, but we did see more variety of gazelle, and the wildebeest, some okapi, an orangutan, and more. I didn’t write it all down. When we exited the ride the line was all the way through safari village. It had to be an hour or more. The odd thing to me was that although there were obviously a lot more people here today than there had been on Weds, the walkways didn’t seem any more crowded. I’m not sure they could have been more crowded. But the lines were all obviously much much longer.

We went to get in line for the 12:00 Lion King show at about 11:30. We made it into the waiting area for the next show, but not by much. It filled up pretty quickly after that. We got in and saw the show. I liked it, but not as well as I like the MGM shows. Next we went to try to do Countdown to Extinction again, but the wait sign said 40 mins, and we didn’t want to wait. We decided to go to Restaurantasaurus for lunch which is really mostly a McDonald’s menu. I had been trying to avoid doing any McDonald’s, but the lines weren’t bad, and we were hungry. I got a hot dog, so at least it wasn’t typical McDonald’s except for the fries.

It was 1:30 or so, and time to go. We stopped at the gift shop outside the entrance and I got a safari Tigger keychain. We took the bus back to DxL and checked on our luggage. It was all there at bell services. We checked out the gift shop one more time and Greg bought me a pair of Mickey earrings. I think he knew I was feeling sad. We walked around for a bit outside, and then at 3:00 we got our luggage out of storage and I went to change into long pants. By the time I got back, the town car driver was there, loading our bags into the trunk of the car. He was a few minutes early but we were ready (I guess). I don’t know what time we got to the airport, but there were no delays. We used curbside baggage check-in again, and then headed to the gate. Scott finished the last little bit of homework he had while we waited for the plane.

The trip home was uneventful. Our baggage was there by the time we got to baggage claim, and the Thrifty shuttle came quickly and took us to our van, already warmed up. We were home before 9pm. Back to the real world, back to work and school, getting ready for Thanksgiving, laundry, no food in the house, pick up the dog…..Boy does that sound depressing.

But we’re going back in December. And Greg agreed we should try to go again next year before our passes expire. Woo Hoo!

Expenses for today:

Tips (Maids, Bell services) $15.00
Breakfast at DxL food court $ 8.00
Lunch at Restaurauntasaurus $33.00
Safari Tigger keychain $ 6.00
Mickey earrings $ 6.00
Today’s Total $68.00
Some final thoughts:

This was the best vacation I’ve ever had. The weather was perfect all week, mid-eighties for highs and not a drop of rain. Staying on-site was the best. You get the total Disney experience. I loved the Dixie Landings, I will probably stay there again next year if we do get to go. The room isn’t huge, but we just don’t spend a lot of time in the room, so that doesn’t matter much to me. The food was pretty good everywhere we went, although I definitely have my favorites. I stuffed myself and only gained about 2 pounds. All of the walking pays off.
In the future I will hopefully not feel a need to try to get everything in all at once like I did during the early part of the trip. I should take better pictures. I shouldn’t let the kids take so many pictures. I spent a fortune on processing. But then again we do work for Kodak, so we are supporting ourselves.
The Disney transportation was great. You do get a little tired of waiting in general on a trip like this, but other than one time we never felt like we waited an unreasonable amount of time for transportation. And you can’t beat it for the convenience.
In December we will be staying at Fort Wilderness in my parent’s motorhome for 4 nights, seeing the Christmas decorations, and going to the Candlelight processional. I can’t wait. It definitely helps to fight off any post trip depression.
Keeping notes and writing this trip report is a great way to remember the vacation. I think I’ll add pictures to my copy, and keep it in a scrap book.
Ellen Bennett

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