Dsnygirl
10-15-2007, 11:15 AM
:mickey: If any of you read my pre-trip report, you heard all about the trip and how it came about, and how special it was to be able to be going -- so I won't bore you with the details all over again!! Suffice it to say, this was a VERY special trip, for a variety of reasons. :)
The cast:
Dan - my DH and fellow Disney fan - also a non-Intercot person... for now... :D
Blythe - #1 Disney fan in the family, planner extraordinaire & birthday girl.
Our trip to the world this time was to celebrate many things - our 13th wedding anniversary, my upcoming 40th birthday, and of course, Intercot's anniversary bash!! Lots to make merry about, and we sure did that!!
Day One - Thursday, October 11th
Our day started very early - 3:40 am, to be exact. Yawn!! My MIL had come in to stay with our girls while we were gone, so she and the girls stayed happily asleep while we dragged ourselves out of bed and grabbed coffee as fast as we could. (Okay, truthfully, I jumped out of bed - but ONLY a Disney trip could do that at 3:40 am... :D) We were on the road and checked-in to our flight by 5:25, and tried not to embarass ourselves by falling asleep until they called our row # to board!!
After an uneventful flight and transfer @ JFK, we found ourselves in Orlando, jumping on the ME bus and being whisked off to our resort before we knew it!! Yeah!! Let the fun begin...
We were staying this trip @ All Star Sports... honestly, not our number one choice, but after looking at our own plans and then adding in the Intercot meets, we realized we'd probably be at our resort for oh, maybe 6 hours a night - if we were lucky. So - we chose to go a little less expensive, and boy were we glad we did!! Nothing to complain about at this resort - we had a great, quiet room in the Touchdown section overlooking palm trees and a little, secluded park... perfect!! 3rd floor, so no one above us - also perfect!! We'd sent our costumes ahead (and some wine, too... :blush:) as well as done a grocery order - and everything was delivered almost immediately after we got to our room - talk about service!! We'd also gotten some Pleasure Island tickets through one of Intercot's sponsors, and they were brought to us by a very nice man who also gave us a lot of other local information and was great. We'll definitely use them again!!
So - after a shower and a change of clothes, we were off to Downtown Disney for a little shopping, some margaritas along the water and our anniversary dinner @ Fulton's. Also, we were having an Intercot meet for the JQ thread I belong to later in the evening, so there was a lot to look forward to!!
We spent a little while shopping - some for us, definitely some for our wonderful DD's who were kindly staying at home (and at ages 6 and 9, that's saying something!! :blush:) and then we relaxed along the water with some WONDERFUL strawberry margaritas. It was warm, sunny, and perfect! We headed over to Fulton's right before our ADR time and were seated almost immediately - at a special section they were opening for the first time all season!! We got to sit down on the boat dock, right on the water... :cloud9: ... it was beautiful!! Swans came over and visited us while we ate, the waiter and service was impeccable, the food was wonderful and the chef even surprised us with a huge piece of chocolate cake, drizzled with chocolate sauce that said, "Congratulations" and circled with raspberry dipping sauce. Yummmm!!! And it was on the house.... what a nice surprise! Boy were we full when we left, too. Our waiter took a picture for us, (pic) (http://picasaweb.google.com/Blytheny/WDWIntercotPics/photo#5121560172746526914) and then we were off to shop a little more before our JQ meet @ Ghiradelli's. (We'd planned to have dessert there, but that cake changed our minds...)
Meeting everyone that I post w/ on the JQ thread that evening was so neat... to finally be able to put faces to names and talk in person was something I'd never really expected to be able to do. (pic) (http://picasaweb.google.com/Blytheny/WDWIntercotPics/photo#5121560198516330706) Everyone was so friendly and we all had a great time - you'd really think that we'd all met before, it was so easy to talk and "catch up". Even my DH, who isn't on Intercot but graciously listens to all my stories, thought it was a good time and really enjoyed meeting everyone -- suddenly, names took on a real personality, and it wasn't just posting in cyberspace anymore. We stayed there for quite awhile, and then some headed back for bed, others of us headed over the Pleasure Island to hit the Adventurer's Club!! My DH and I hadn't been there for 10 years, so we were REALLY looking forward to it... and it was just as fun as we remembered it. We saw quite a bit of improv going on just around the main room, and caught two of their "shows" - one in the Mask Room, the other in the Library, where Intercot got a "plug" when the woman doing the show picked one of us out b/c of his nametag, saw that about 10 of us had nametags and wanted to know who we were with!! Pretty funny!
Unfortunately, by this time (11:45) I had a raging headache and really wasn't up to closing the place like we'd planned. So, we left with another JQ'er about midnight and headed back to our resort for some much needed sleep. By the time we got back and got to sleep, it was almost 1:30... so, having been up for almost 21 hours, we changed our next-morning plans a little and set the alarm for a bit later than planned. Phew!! :blush:
The cast:
Dan - my DH and fellow Disney fan - also a non-Intercot person... for now... :D
Blythe - #1 Disney fan in the family, planner extraordinaire & birthday girl.
Our trip to the world this time was to celebrate many things - our 13th wedding anniversary, my upcoming 40th birthday, and of course, Intercot's anniversary bash!! Lots to make merry about, and we sure did that!!
Day One - Thursday, October 11th
Our day started very early - 3:40 am, to be exact. Yawn!! My MIL had come in to stay with our girls while we were gone, so she and the girls stayed happily asleep while we dragged ourselves out of bed and grabbed coffee as fast as we could. (Okay, truthfully, I jumped out of bed - but ONLY a Disney trip could do that at 3:40 am... :D) We were on the road and checked-in to our flight by 5:25, and tried not to embarass ourselves by falling asleep until they called our row # to board!!
After an uneventful flight and transfer @ JFK, we found ourselves in Orlando, jumping on the ME bus and being whisked off to our resort before we knew it!! Yeah!! Let the fun begin...
We were staying this trip @ All Star Sports... honestly, not our number one choice, but after looking at our own plans and then adding in the Intercot meets, we realized we'd probably be at our resort for oh, maybe 6 hours a night - if we were lucky. So - we chose to go a little less expensive, and boy were we glad we did!! Nothing to complain about at this resort - we had a great, quiet room in the Touchdown section overlooking palm trees and a little, secluded park... perfect!! 3rd floor, so no one above us - also perfect!! We'd sent our costumes ahead (and some wine, too... :blush:) as well as done a grocery order - and everything was delivered almost immediately after we got to our room - talk about service!! We'd also gotten some Pleasure Island tickets through one of Intercot's sponsors, and they were brought to us by a very nice man who also gave us a lot of other local information and was great. We'll definitely use them again!!
So - after a shower and a change of clothes, we were off to Downtown Disney for a little shopping, some margaritas along the water and our anniversary dinner @ Fulton's. Also, we were having an Intercot meet for the JQ thread I belong to later in the evening, so there was a lot to look forward to!!
We spent a little while shopping - some for us, definitely some for our wonderful DD's who were kindly staying at home (and at ages 6 and 9, that's saying something!! :blush:) and then we relaxed along the water with some WONDERFUL strawberry margaritas. It was warm, sunny, and perfect! We headed over to Fulton's right before our ADR time and were seated almost immediately - at a special section they were opening for the first time all season!! We got to sit down on the boat dock, right on the water... :cloud9: ... it was beautiful!! Swans came over and visited us while we ate, the waiter and service was impeccable, the food was wonderful and the chef even surprised us with a huge piece of chocolate cake, drizzled with chocolate sauce that said, "Congratulations" and circled with raspberry dipping sauce. Yummmm!!! And it was on the house.... what a nice surprise! Boy were we full when we left, too. Our waiter took a picture for us, (pic) (http://picasaweb.google.com/Blytheny/WDWIntercotPics/photo#5121560172746526914) and then we were off to shop a little more before our JQ meet @ Ghiradelli's. (We'd planned to have dessert there, but that cake changed our minds...)
Meeting everyone that I post w/ on the JQ thread that evening was so neat... to finally be able to put faces to names and talk in person was something I'd never really expected to be able to do. (pic) (http://picasaweb.google.com/Blytheny/WDWIntercotPics/photo#5121560198516330706) Everyone was so friendly and we all had a great time - you'd really think that we'd all met before, it was so easy to talk and "catch up". Even my DH, who isn't on Intercot but graciously listens to all my stories, thought it was a good time and really enjoyed meeting everyone -- suddenly, names took on a real personality, and it wasn't just posting in cyberspace anymore. We stayed there for quite awhile, and then some headed back for bed, others of us headed over the Pleasure Island to hit the Adventurer's Club!! My DH and I hadn't been there for 10 years, so we were REALLY looking forward to it... and it was just as fun as we remembered it. We saw quite a bit of improv going on just around the main room, and caught two of their "shows" - one in the Mask Room, the other in the Library, where Intercot got a "plug" when the woman doing the show picked one of us out b/c of his nametag, saw that about 10 of us had nametags and wanted to know who we were with!! Pretty funny!
Unfortunately, by this time (11:45) I had a raging headache and really wasn't up to closing the place like we'd planned. So, we left with another JQ'er about midnight and headed back to our resort for some much needed sleep. By the time we got back and got to sleep, it was almost 1:30... so, having been up for almost 21 hours, we changed our next-morning plans a little and set the alarm for a bit later than planned. Phew!! :blush: