buzznwoodysmom
06-20-2008, 02:24 PM
Ok, so I messed up really bad on my titles. I hope you all can follow which day goes where. Sorry!:blush:
Cast:
Me, Denise
DH, Kevin
DS, Collin 8
DS, Landon 6
DM, Sheila
Mon., June 16 - Today is our big park day. We were only going to do 3 of the 4 parks, but somewhere along the way we said why not just to all the way. :mickey:
We started our day very early. We were at the bus stop just minutes after 7! We had great luck with transportation this trip, our bus was there within a few minutes and this would repeat itself throughout the day (which is a great thing considering how much we traveled between parks). We arrived at Hollywood studios, went through security, entered the park and got a stroller and were waiting at the rope drop at 7:45! We first headed straight for ToT and RNRC. Since Collin is deathly afraid of ToT and Landon isn't tall enough for RNRC today us adults sacrificed. Kevin took Collin on RNRC while my mom and I took Landon on ToT. Keep in mind these are all of our favorite rides so missing one of them has been unheard of until now. Baby swap would have taken too long since we had soooo much to try to fit into today. After our thrilling adventures on that side of the park we headed for the new Toy Story Mania ride. We waited about 30 minutes, which wasn't too bad, there are tons of stuff to look at in line. We though the line was done extremely well except for the stairs. We had a great time and can see this easily becoming a family favorite and a must do on return trips. Then it was off to Star Tours. All three of my guys love, love, love starwars so a trip to WDW without at least one ride on Star Tours is forbidden!:yoda::darth::trooper: We had a great ride into space and shopped in the gift shop for a while then it was time to say goodbye to Hollywood studios for this trip.
We headed out the park and hopped a bus to AK. Once again we were in line for only a minute or two before the bus arrived. As soon as we entered AK we were all suddenly starving. I guess that's what happens when you get up and out so early you forget to eat breakfast. We decided to try the new Yak and Yeti. We opted for TS so that we could sit inside in the AC. I'll just say here that the weather was great for our entire trip. We visited in May of 06 and it was so hot, this year in June almost exactly one month later in the year than our last summer trip and it was much cooler. The only park we felt really hot in was AK, thus the need to sit in AC for our lunch. We all ordered appitizers or kids meals. The food was great. Everyone loved their meal and we were out of there in a very short amount of time considering it was TS. Our first ride at AK was Kali river rapids. We never do this ride when we visit in the winter months so this is only the second time we ride it. The line was painfully long, but was worth it in the end. We already had fastpasses for EE. Kevin had run over and got them while we were waiting to be seated at Yak and Yeti. Collin chickened out and would not ride EE, but that gave Landon the opportunity to ride it twice. This was Landon's first time riding, he barely made the height requirement and he loved it. He rode once with mom and dad and then again with grandma. By this time they were putting up the ropes for the parade so we decided to get out of there before it got too crowded. We stopped in a gift shop to look around and then headed to the bus stop.
The bus to the TTC was there when we walked up and we were off to our next adventure. We were originally headed for MK, then the boys asked "well, when are we going to Epcot?". That is when we decided we should just go ahead and get in a little bit of Epcot too, why not? When we arrived at Epcot Kevin and Collin went to Mission Space and Landon wanted to ride Test Tract. Landon was easily distracted by Mickey ice cream bars and a water fountain. So instead of Test Tract he had fun with his favorite snack in the whole world and got wet playing in the fountains. Kevin called a while later to tell me they were in Inoventions. We rarely go in there so we took this opportunity to do something we don't usually do. The boys had fun playing on the computers in there and we all went to the restrooms and changed since we were still a little damp from our Kali ride. We freshen up and headed to Soarin. Well, with a 110 minute wait we had to bypass Soarin. Instead we rode Spaceship earth. We hadn't been on it since the refurb. We really like it and the boys loved the exit attractions. This is also something we never do. We always get off the ride and try to bypass the exit stuff, but today we really enjoyed it. One look at the time and we knew it was time to head to MK if we wanted to get anything done before our Ohana ADR tonight, so it was off to the monorail.
We arrived at MK very quickly and were in the park in no time. I'll say this again, we had such great luck with our transportation. I wish every trip was as smooth. We went straight to Space Mountain since that was one of our main reasons for being here. Landon was finally tall enough to ride. The line was very long and we decided to get fastpasses instead. Since Landon was a bit disappointed to get out of line we let him pick the next attraction. Big Thunder Mountain was his ride of choice so off we went. We had a long and hot wait, but it is such a fun ride it didn't matter!! After that we walked back towards Fantasyland checking out the times on all the rides as we pasted. Splash Mt. was too long, Haunted Mansion was too long, and Peter Pan was too long. Mickey's Philharmagic was a short 10 minute wait so that is what we did next. I love this attraction. It never gets old for me. After Philharmagic we hurried to the TTA for a quick ride around tomorrowland before having to head over to the Poly for dinner. Since the parade would be starting soon we took the train from toontown to the front of the park. We hadn't riden the train since our children were babies. As a matter of fact they didn't remember ever riding the train so it was a nice treat for us all. We took the boat to the Poly and had to make a mad dash to get there in time for our ADR. We were only 6 minutes late! We were seated promptly, but didn't get a window table and this was our only chance to watch Wishes. We were able to hear it from our table, but I started wondering if we should have just not done Ohana so that we could have been in the park. We did go to the window for a while to watch, but I didn't feel comfortable standing with the kids by tables of people eating. I felt very in the way. Ohana is our family's favorite meal in WDW. We do it on every trip and it never disappoints. Tonight was no different. It was actually better than ever before. After dinner we took the monorail back to MK and headed straight for Space Mountain, which Landon loved!! It was now about 3 mintues to park closing so we ran to Buzz and were the last family to get on and take one last ride befoe having to leave. We took our time leaving the park and browsed through the shops on Main Street. It was very obvious that none of us wanted the night to end. Even DH who hates going into the shops was content and never once complained. We bussed back to SSR and were back in our room at after 1am, 18 hours from the time we left!
Up Next: Departure day and final thoughts
Cast:
Me, Denise
DH, Kevin
DS, Collin 8
DS, Landon 6
DM, Sheila
Mon., June 16 - Today is our big park day. We were only going to do 3 of the 4 parks, but somewhere along the way we said why not just to all the way. :mickey:
We started our day very early. We were at the bus stop just minutes after 7! We had great luck with transportation this trip, our bus was there within a few minutes and this would repeat itself throughout the day (which is a great thing considering how much we traveled between parks). We arrived at Hollywood studios, went through security, entered the park and got a stroller and were waiting at the rope drop at 7:45! We first headed straight for ToT and RNRC. Since Collin is deathly afraid of ToT and Landon isn't tall enough for RNRC today us adults sacrificed. Kevin took Collin on RNRC while my mom and I took Landon on ToT. Keep in mind these are all of our favorite rides so missing one of them has been unheard of until now. Baby swap would have taken too long since we had soooo much to try to fit into today. After our thrilling adventures on that side of the park we headed for the new Toy Story Mania ride. We waited about 30 minutes, which wasn't too bad, there are tons of stuff to look at in line. We though the line was done extremely well except for the stairs. We had a great time and can see this easily becoming a family favorite and a must do on return trips. Then it was off to Star Tours. All three of my guys love, love, love starwars so a trip to WDW without at least one ride on Star Tours is forbidden!:yoda::darth::trooper: We had a great ride into space and shopped in the gift shop for a while then it was time to say goodbye to Hollywood studios for this trip.
We headed out the park and hopped a bus to AK. Once again we were in line for only a minute or two before the bus arrived. As soon as we entered AK we were all suddenly starving. I guess that's what happens when you get up and out so early you forget to eat breakfast. We decided to try the new Yak and Yeti. We opted for TS so that we could sit inside in the AC. I'll just say here that the weather was great for our entire trip. We visited in May of 06 and it was so hot, this year in June almost exactly one month later in the year than our last summer trip and it was much cooler. The only park we felt really hot in was AK, thus the need to sit in AC for our lunch. We all ordered appitizers or kids meals. The food was great. Everyone loved their meal and we were out of there in a very short amount of time considering it was TS. Our first ride at AK was Kali river rapids. We never do this ride when we visit in the winter months so this is only the second time we ride it. The line was painfully long, but was worth it in the end. We already had fastpasses for EE. Kevin had run over and got them while we were waiting to be seated at Yak and Yeti. Collin chickened out and would not ride EE, but that gave Landon the opportunity to ride it twice. This was Landon's first time riding, he barely made the height requirement and he loved it. He rode once with mom and dad and then again with grandma. By this time they were putting up the ropes for the parade so we decided to get out of there before it got too crowded. We stopped in a gift shop to look around and then headed to the bus stop.
The bus to the TTC was there when we walked up and we were off to our next adventure. We were originally headed for MK, then the boys asked "well, when are we going to Epcot?". That is when we decided we should just go ahead and get in a little bit of Epcot too, why not? When we arrived at Epcot Kevin and Collin went to Mission Space and Landon wanted to ride Test Tract. Landon was easily distracted by Mickey ice cream bars and a water fountain. So instead of Test Tract he had fun with his favorite snack in the whole world and got wet playing in the fountains. Kevin called a while later to tell me they were in Inoventions. We rarely go in there so we took this opportunity to do something we don't usually do. The boys had fun playing on the computers in there and we all went to the restrooms and changed since we were still a little damp from our Kali ride. We freshen up and headed to Soarin. Well, with a 110 minute wait we had to bypass Soarin. Instead we rode Spaceship earth. We hadn't been on it since the refurb. We really like it and the boys loved the exit attractions. This is also something we never do. We always get off the ride and try to bypass the exit stuff, but today we really enjoyed it. One look at the time and we knew it was time to head to MK if we wanted to get anything done before our Ohana ADR tonight, so it was off to the monorail.
We arrived at MK very quickly and were in the park in no time. I'll say this again, we had such great luck with our transportation. I wish every trip was as smooth. We went straight to Space Mountain since that was one of our main reasons for being here. Landon was finally tall enough to ride. The line was very long and we decided to get fastpasses instead. Since Landon was a bit disappointed to get out of line we let him pick the next attraction. Big Thunder Mountain was his ride of choice so off we went. We had a long and hot wait, but it is such a fun ride it didn't matter!! After that we walked back towards Fantasyland checking out the times on all the rides as we pasted. Splash Mt. was too long, Haunted Mansion was too long, and Peter Pan was too long. Mickey's Philharmagic was a short 10 minute wait so that is what we did next. I love this attraction. It never gets old for me. After Philharmagic we hurried to the TTA for a quick ride around tomorrowland before having to head over to the Poly for dinner. Since the parade would be starting soon we took the train from toontown to the front of the park. We hadn't riden the train since our children were babies. As a matter of fact they didn't remember ever riding the train so it was a nice treat for us all. We took the boat to the Poly and had to make a mad dash to get there in time for our ADR. We were only 6 minutes late! We were seated promptly, but didn't get a window table and this was our only chance to watch Wishes. We were able to hear it from our table, but I started wondering if we should have just not done Ohana so that we could have been in the park. We did go to the window for a while to watch, but I didn't feel comfortable standing with the kids by tables of people eating. I felt very in the way. Ohana is our family's favorite meal in WDW. We do it on every trip and it never disappoints. Tonight was no different. It was actually better than ever before. After dinner we took the monorail back to MK and headed straight for Space Mountain, which Landon loved!! It was now about 3 mintues to park closing so we ran to Buzz and were the last family to get on and take one last ride befoe having to leave. We took our time leaving the park and browsed through the shops on Main Street. It was very obvious that none of us wanted the night to end. Even DH who hates going into the shops was content and never once complained. We bussed back to SSR and were back in our room at after 1am, 18 hours from the time we left!
Up Next: Departure day and final thoughts