AZ Disney
01-30-2008, 11:11 AM
January 24
The boys decided on HS again today. We missed Lighting McQueen the other day, so we figured we’d do that and TOT and see where the day took us. We arrived and DS4 and I did TOT while DH and DS9 did RNC. We hooked up again after each riding twice. DH and DS9 had weird grins on their face when we met back at the stroller -- My DS9 pulls out 2 Dream Fast Passes for HS. Then moments later DH pulls two more out for us and said we wouldn’t forget you. That was pretty cool. Fast passes really weren’t needed much that day, but it was still really neat to be apart of the YOMD’s. We head over to see Lightning McQueen and meet a very nice family in line. The woman’s camera battery wad DOA, so I offered to take pictures for them and email them to her. This was the highlight of their son’s trip. Now for the bad news, she wrote her email address down on the day to day park times guide and it’s gone. I feel soooooooo bad. If anyone knows a family from New Jersey with one DS around 3, please let me know. She had brown hair short bob type style and was tall and slim, the little one looked Asian, but I didn’t see that in either of the parents. The father was tall, dark and slim as well. They were staying off-site. I should have given her my contact information as well. Well, it’s about 2:30 and we have 4:50pm ressies at Chrystal Palace, so we head for the MK to see the parade, dinner, Spectro, and Wishes. We’re on the bus and I realize that I’m crashing and burning and cannot go on. We decide to go back to the resort and let the kids swim and play the rest of the night by ear. The kids had a blast, I did laundry, drank a Mai Tai, and we went to Boatman’s for dinner at POR. I was a little disappointed with the food, but we had a very good server and it was very low key. It had started to rain, so we scrapped our Downtown Disney plans and just went back to the room. Lights out around 9pm.
January 25th
The kids picked MK today, so off we went on a cold morning, but well rested. Back to hats, scarves and jackets. Okay, the food court is getting really old at this point. We spent the entire day at MK and crowds were very thin. We did everything that we wanted and head over to CA Grille for a 6pm ressie. We went to the 2nd floor for check-in at about 5:20 and they gave us the pager. We then went down to the 1st floor concierge to ask them to check us in for the flight the next day at 5:35pm. Well, I went to restroom and the pager goes off. DH takes the boys upstairs to say that we’ll be there in 9 minutes as we’re trying to check-in. The woman was not very nice and said that our window table would not be held. DH was not happy, but took the boys back up and I just left the itineraries with concierge in hopes that they would follow through. They did and we had our window table and A boarding passes. What a treat. We had a wonderful meal, fabulous server, a great view of MK, and then Wishes from the viewing deck. Our bill was $120 over and above the dining plan. Yikes, but I was so glad that we had eaten there. We head back to the resort and pack up. Lights out around 10:30pm.
January 26th
We’re up and out by 8am and another Cold morning. We have 9am ressies for Cape May and we decide to take a taxi today as there was no easy way to get to the Beach Club from POFQ. I really liked Beach Club atmosphere. We had a great character breakfast and had a really nice server. It was a really nice way to end our trip. From there we walked to Fantasia Gardens and enjoyed a round of golf using our voucher. The cost for each adult is $11.75, but the voucher is worth $15. They don’t take off the extra few dollars for another player. Don’t get why they even put a dollar figure on it. Whatever. DH had the low score for that day. We had planned to play the 2nd course, but it had started to rain a little. We decided to grab a cab and head to AKL to enjoy the animals and buy a few things from the gift shop. We were running out of cash, so my DH said we need to find an ATM. I said, no, I’ll just cash a check at concierge. I’d heard on the boards that this was pretty easy. I waited in line for an unbelievable amount of time only to get the rudest CM ever. I walked up and said hello and that I’d like to cash a check. I won’t go into all the details, but she treated me as if I was a criminal and of a lesser grade guest because I was not staying at AKL. In the end, my check was cashed and we were good to go. I really regret not talking to a manager or at least writing down her name, but was beginning to feel like we needed to get back to POFQ for DME, so I just let it go. We got back had lunch, played in the arcade, used up all our extra snack credits and headed to MCO. DME went very smoothly and this time we got the video and a friendly driver. We had plenty of time once at the airport, so we just browsed around before heading through security. We went through security just fine, but did not notice that once through security there are two sets of gates. Well, we just continued straight and got on the tram. We realized that something is wrong and learn that we took a wrong turn. We have to go through security again. Yikes! We are beginning to feel a little pressed for time. We get through and are on our way back to Phoenix. We all sleep for a good portion of the flight and were very happy to be home. We’re headed to Disneyland sometime in 2008.
Lessons Learned:
•2008 Dining Plan is not for us. We ate well at the TS restaurants, but spent far too much money over and above the plan. We had 15 snack credits left on the last day, but managed to purchase snacks from the gift shop to take home.
•Moderate not for us. If DH won’t spring for a Deluxe, then Pop would have been fine. They really need Queen beds.
•Value Season – don’t include MKL weekend. This was the first time we had ever taken our oldest out of school and I should have just taken him out for 5 days instead of 4 and gone a completely non-holiday week.
•We purchased the prepurchase photopass and the verdict is still out on this. I have about 200 pics on the card, but my personal pictures seem to be better then theirs and I definitely do not have a high end camera. We’ll see how this goes in the next week or so, as I begin to work with them.
The boys decided on HS again today. We missed Lighting McQueen the other day, so we figured we’d do that and TOT and see where the day took us. We arrived and DS4 and I did TOT while DH and DS9 did RNC. We hooked up again after each riding twice. DH and DS9 had weird grins on their face when we met back at the stroller -- My DS9 pulls out 2 Dream Fast Passes for HS. Then moments later DH pulls two more out for us and said we wouldn’t forget you. That was pretty cool. Fast passes really weren’t needed much that day, but it was still really neat to be apart of the YOMD’s. We head over to see Lightning McQueen and meet a very nice family in line. The woman’s camera battery wad DOA, so I offered to take pictures for them and email them to her. This was the highlight of their son’s trip. Now for the bad news, she wrote her email address down on the day to day park times guide and it’s gone. I feel soooooooo bad. If anyone knows a family from New Jersey with one DS around 3, please let me know. She had brown hair short bob type style and was tall and slim, the little one looked Asian, but I didn’t see that in either of the parents. The father was tall, dark and slim as well. They were staying off-site. I should have given her my contact information as well. Well, it’s about 2:30 and we have 4:50pm ressies at Chrystal Palace, so we head for the MK to see the parade, dinner, Spectro, and Wishes. We’re on the bus and I realize that I’m crashing and burning and cannot go on. We decide to go back to the resort and let the kids swim and play the rest of the night by ear. The kids had a blast, I did laundry, drank a Mai Tai, and we went to Boatman’s for dinner at POR. I was a little disappointed with the food, but we had a very good server and it was very low key. It had started to rain, so we scrapped our Downtown Disney plans and just went back to the room. Lights out around 9pm.
January 25th
The kids picked MK today, so off we went on a cold morning, but well rested. Back to hats, scarves and jackets. Okay, the food court is getting really old at this point. We spent the entire day at MK and crowds were very thin. We did everything that we wanted and head over to CA Grille for a 6pm ressie. We went to the 2nd floor for check-in at about 5:20 and they gave us the pager. We then went down to the 1st floor concierge to ask them to check us in for the flight the next day at 5:35pm. Well, I went to restroom and the pager goes off. DH takes the boys upstairs to say that we’ll be there in 9 minutes as we’re trying to check-in. The woman was not very nice and said that our window table would not be held. DH was not happy, but took the boys back up and I just left the itineraries with concierge in hopes that they would follow through. They did and we had our window table and A boarding passes. What a treat. We had a wonderful meal, fabulous server, a great view of MK, and then Wishes from the viewing deck. Our bill was $120 over and above the dining plan. Yikes, but I was so glad that we had eaten there. We head back to the resort and pack up. Lights out around 10:30pm.
January 26th
We’re up and out by 8am and another Cold morning. We have 9am ressies for Cape May and we decide to take a taxi today as there was no easy way to get to the Beach Club from POFQ. I really liked Beach Club atmosphere. We had a great character breakfast and had a really nice server. It was a really nice way to end our trip. From there we walked to Fantasia Gardens and enjoyed a round of golf using our voucher. The cost for each adult is $11.75, but the voucher is worth $15. They don’t take off the extra few dollars for another player. Don’t get why they even put a dollar figure on it. Whatever. DH had the low score for that day. We had planned to play the 2nd course, but it had started to rain a little. We decided to grab a cab and head to AKL to enjoy the animals and buy a few things from the gift shop. We were running out of cash, so my DH said we need to find an ATM. I said, no, I’ll just cash a check at concierge. I’d heard on the boards that this was pretty easy. I waited in line for an unbelievable amount of time only to get the rudest CM ever. I walked up and said hello and that I’d like to cash a check. I won’t go into all the details, but she treated me as if I was a criminal and of a lesser grade guest because I was not staying at AKL. In the end, my check was cashed and we were good to go. I really regret not talking to a manager or at least writing down her name, but was beginning to feel like we needed to get back to POFQ for DME, so I just let it go. We got back had lunch, played in the arcade, used up all our extra snack credits and headed to MCO. DME went very smoothly and this time we got the video and a friendly driver. We had plenty of time once at the airport, so we just browsed around before heading through security. We went through security just fine, but did not notice that once through security there are two sets of gates. Well, we just continued straight and got on the tram. We realized that something is wrong and learn that we took a wrong turn. We have to go through security again. Yikes! We are beginning to feel a little pressed for time. We get through and are on our way back to Phoenix. We all sleep for a good portion of the flight and were very happy to be home. We’re headed to Disneyland sometime in 2008.
Lessons Learned:
•2008 Dining Plan is not for us. We ate well at the TS restaurants, but spent far too much money over and above the plan. We had 15 snack credits left on the last day, but managed to purchase snacks from the gift shop to take home.
•Moderate not for us. If DH won’t spring for a Deluxe, then Pop would have been fine. They really need Queen beds.
•Value Season – don’t include MKL weekend. This was the first time we had ever taken our oldest out of school and I should have just taken him out for 5 days instead of 4 and gone a completely non-holiday week.
•We purchased the prepurchase photopass and the verdict is still out on this. I have about 200 pics on the card, but my personal pictures seem to be better then theirs and I definitely do not have a high end camera. We’ll see how this goes in the next week or so, as I begin to work with them.