mickeymousedabomb
01-07-2010, 07:51 PM
Our Cast consists of characters:
Me: Mickeymousedabomb (Marcy-30ish):mickey:
Grammie:Mickeydream (Linda-50something):secret:
DD#1: Katina (13):princess:
DD#2: AJ (7):princess:
Some final thoughts from our trip:
Amount of time……….Too much? Too little? I love the amount of time we had to spend in WDW. Many people are lucky to have a week, where we had 10 days of parks and a day and a ½ travel time each way. I did allow my children to miss a total of 7 school days, which in the end they made all work up in approx 1 week. I feel the memories we make as a family are worth the time away from school, knowing they can make a lot of it up. And besides, this trip was in the making for 15 months, no lie!
About the food…………..I talked Grammie into trying the deluxe dining plan this time around. WOW it was a lot of food! We like knowing where we’re eating each day and we like to take the time to sit and relax away from the hustle and bustle for a little while. We also enjoy resort hopping to the restaurants and trying different places too. Now, we had breakfast each morning at a table service with the exception of two mornings. I believe, we ate @ Everything Pop & MSB. Lunch was also for the majority, were table services and dinners, also table services. Grammie complained many different days about being uncomfortable to the point that she was feeling a bit like a stuffed Thanksgiving Day turkey:turkey:! LOL Where we went wrong with this was timing! We just know now from the experience, that we will use CS for lunches and eat our dinners later. We ate at fantastic places, lots of newbies and also repeat favs! If not on the plan we wouldn’t have gotten to go to the places we ate at. As for $$$.........it was money well spent. We saved the receipts from 7 breakfasts, 6 lunches, and 8 dinner table service restaurants that we ate at. For a total of $2470.40. That did not include 9 other places we don’t have receipts for, the 4 resort re-fillable mugs, and the 80 snacks between the 4 of us either!! Many of the snack credits we used on the last day to take on the ride home. When in reality, we paid a total of $1390 for the 4 of us on the dlx plan with the free dining upgrade. So we definitely got some good eating for a great price!! Even if it was not free dining, we figured we still would’ve saved money in the end. To us, yes the dlx plan was worth it! Loved eating at CRT for AJ’s b’day, a meal she will not forget.
About Pop………….. What a great & fun resort this was. There was never a line at the front desks, ever! Our room was right around the corner from the bowling pin pool on the ground floor looking out at the water and the other part of the unfinished resort. The walk was less than a 5 minutes to the buses and food court. Everything Pop food court was nicely spread out and lively with bright, bold colors. Bus service was not a problem at all. I think only one time we waited for a MK bus for 20-25 minutes but that was once over 10 days. Otherwise, buses were generally a 10 minute wait. We enjoyed the main pool here; the girls swam here more than the pool closest to us more for the action of other kids. The ping-pong table was also fun! Our room was perfect for us and our maid did a great job on our room. It was very clean when we arrived and we never had any issues. We left an $8 tip on the pillow everyday: $2 per person a day is what we figured. We got towel animals left for us and put them in our window. One night when we came back she had Stitch sitting at the end of the bed holding the remote to the TV he was watching (a basketball game was on) and had the Cracker Jacks box next to him! Another time Stitch was all wrapped up on the bed in toilet paper that was still attached to the roll in the bathroom! Too funny! The girls loved that and both were great photo ops! Overall we enjoyed staying here and would stay again in the future.
About the weather…….Usually we left the room in the early morning with a sweatshirt and shorts or capris on everyday. By mid morning it was low to high 70’s and the girls swam I think 6 out of the 10 days. So each time we came back after having lunch and then napped. One day at AK it rained most of the day, other than that no rain. I don’t remember any high temps but we were pleased with the weather as we are from upstate NY!
About the Parks…………Well we got a lot of ground covered over our 10 days! There were many firsts for us at each park. We got to do many rides more than once which is always a plus! AJ tried Splash Mt for the first time, and loved it! Toy Story Mania was worth waiting for and we did this twice at DHS in one day. A highlight for both my girls was when we were at the Laugh Floor. There were 4 out of 6 jokes that Katina texted that were chosen and AJ got asked questions and put up on the big screen. Katina got on the big screen too when the monster dedicated the jokes to the girl with the solar system on her head (she was wearing her Mickey sorcerer hat):smickey: We loved seeing the Osbourne Lights, a real treat. We enjoyed spending so much time in Epcot. We discovered so many new things in Future World at the various buildings. The Sum of All Thrills was a lot of fun (we did it twice) and surprisingly we enjoyed Waste Management enough to do it twice during our visits to Epcot also. We love seeing the parks during the Christmas season, every park and resort looked amazing! :tree:
About Hidden Mickeys……..We loved looking for Hidden Mickeys in the parks and resorts! It was so fun sharing this with people who never knew they existed. When we were at the Carpets of Aladdin, we saw 2 people looking at the ground (we thought they had lost something) and they told us that they were looking for a Hidden Mickey made of jewels on the ground. Katina found it right away. When we were in the Canadian pavilion, about a dozen people noticed us looking at the totem pole and were so excited when we pointed about the Hidden Mickey there. Our Hidden Mickey book got left on a ride, so we replaced it later that day. We were able to retrieve it a day later at Lost and Found and gave one of the books to a family with 4 children so that could enjoy looking for Hidden Mickeys too. They were thrilled!:wave:
Driving vs flying………In an effort to save a considerable amount of money, we chose to drive to WDW from NY rather than fly. If this had been a 7 day trip, this is not anything we would have considered though. With a DVD player and a variety of movies plus 2 drivers, we did not mind the driving at all. With a night on the road both ways it was a very workable thing to do. On the drive down we timed it so that everyone (except Grammie, who was driving) went back to sleep while she got us into the next state and ready for a potty break and bagels for breakfast. Coming home, we left MK about 11am, so the longest part of our drive was the second day. Flying would have cost us $1200 for 4 people and only $450 to drive…a no-brainer for us.
Disappointments……..We never got to ride Space Mt. The line was always VERY long for this ride, probably due to the recent reburb. AJ wasn’t so sure about this ride anyway and we had plenty of other things to do. We had to stand in the back for Fantasmic and due to the limited viewing nights, we did not get to see the show from a better location. After taking the time out to go to Coronado Springs (we wanted to check this resort out), we were disappointed. While a lot of people love this resort, we weren’t crazy about the layout and now know that it would not be a resort we would consider for an upgrade. Crazy as it seems, we did not get to see the daytime MK parade. We have seen this parade before and do love it, but the girls chose to do rides instead.
OVERALL, WE HAD A GREAT TIME AND KNOW FROM BEING 4TH TIME VETERANS...................THERE IS NO PLACE MORE MAGICAL THAN WDW!
Me: Mickeymousedabomb (Marcy-30ish):mickey:
Grammie:Mickeydream (Linda-50something):secret:
DD#1: Katina (13):princess:
DD#2: AJ (7):princess:
Some final thoughts from our trip:
Amount of time……….Too much? Too little? I love the amount of time we had to spend in WDW. Many people are lucky to have a week, where we had 10 days of parks and a day and a ½ travel time each way. I did allow my children to miss a total of 7 school days, which in the end they made all work up in approx 1 week. I feel the memories we make as a family are worth the time away from school, knowing they can make a lot of it up. And besides, this trip was in the making for 15 months, no lie!
About the food…………..I talked Grammie into trying the deluxe dining plan this time around. WOW it was a lot of food! We like knowing where we’re eating each day and we like to take the time to sit and relax away from the hustle and bustle for a little while. We also enjoy resort hopping to the restaurants and trying different places too. Now, we had breakfast each morning at a table service with the exception of two mornings. I believe, we ate @ Everything Pop & MSB. Lunch was also for the majority, were table services and dinners, also table services. Grammie complained many different days about being uncomfortable to the point that she was feeling a bit like a stuffed Thanksgiving Day turkey:turkey:! LOL Where we went wrong with this was timing! We just know now from the experience, that we will use CS for lunches and eat our dinners later. We ate at fantastic places, lots of newbies and also repeat favs! If not on the plan we wouldn’t have gotten to go to the places we ate at. As for $$$.........it was money well spent. We saved the receipts from 7 breakfasts, 6 lunches, and 8 dinner table service restaurants that we ate at. For a total of $2470.40. That did not include 9 other places we don’t have receipts for, the 4 resort re-fillable mugs, and the 80 snacks between the 4 of us either!! Many of the snack credits we used on the last day to take on the ride home. When in reality, we paid a total of $1390 for the 4 of us on the dlx plan with the free dining upgrade. So we definitely got some good eating for a great price!! Even if it was not free dining, we figured we still would’ve saved money in the end. To us, yes the dlx plan was worth it! Loved eating at CRT for AJ’s b’day, a meal she will not forget.
About Pop………….. What a great & fun resort this was. There was never a line at the front desks, ever! Our room was right around the corner from the bowling pin pool on the ground floor looking out at the water and the other part of the unfinished resort. The walk was less than a 5 minutes to the buses and food court. Everything Pop food court was nicely spread out and lively with bright, bold colors. Bus service was not a problem at all. I think only one time we waited for a MK bus for 20-25 minutes but that was once over 10 days. Otherwise, buses were generally a 10 minute wait. We enjoyed the main pool here; the girls swam here more than the pool closest to us more for the action of other kids. The ping-pong table was also fun! Our room was perfect for us and our maid did a great job on our room. It was very clean when we arrived and we never had any issues. We left an $8 tip on the pillow everyday: $2 per person a day is what we figured. We got towel animals left for us and put them in our window. One night when we came back she had Stitch sitting at the end of the bed holding the remote to the TV he was watching (a basketball game was on) and had the Cracker Jacks box next to him! Another time Stitch was all wrapped up on the bed in toilet paper that was still attached to the roll in the bathroom! Too funny! The girls loved that and both were great photo ops! Overall we enjoyed staying here and would stay again in the future.
About the weather…….Usually we left the room in the early morning with a sweatshirt and shorts or capris on everyday. By mid morning it was low to high 70’s and the girls swam I think 6 out of the 10 days. So each time we came back after having lunch and then napped. One day at AK it rained most of the day, other than that no rain. I don’t remember any high temps but we were pleased with the weather as we are from upstate NY!
About the Parks…………Well we got a lot of ground covered over our 10 days! There were many firsts for us at each park. We got to do many rides more than once which is always a plus! AJ tried Splash Mt for the first time, and loved it! Toy Story Mania was worth waiting for and we did this twice at DHS in one day. A highlight for both my girls was when we were at the Laugh Floor. There were 4 out of 6 jokes that Katina texted that were chosen and AJ got asked questions and put up on the big screen. Katina got on the big screen too when the monster dedicated the jokes to the girl with the solar system on her head (she was wearing her Mickey sorcerer hat):smickey: We loved seeing the Osbourne Lights, a real treat. We enjoyed spending so much time in Epcot. We discovered so many new things in Future World at the various buildings. The Sum of All Thrills was a lot of fun (we did it twice) and surprisingly we enjoyed Waste Management enough to do it twice during our visits to Epcot also. We love seeing the parks during the Christmas season, every park and resort looked amazing! :tree:
About Hidden Mickeys……..We loved looking for Hidden Mickeys in the parks and resorts! It was so fun sharing this with people who never knew they existed. When we were at the Carpets of Aladdin, we saw 2 people looking at the ground (we thought they had lost something) and they told us that they were looking for a Hidden Mickey made of jewels on the ground. Katina found it right away. When we were in the Canadian pavilion, about a dozen people noticed us looking at the totem pole and were so excited when we pointed about the Hidden Mickey there. Our Hidden Mickey book got left on a ride, so we replaced it later that day. We were able to retrieve it a day later at Lost and Found and gave one of the books to a family with 4 children so that could enjoy looking for Hidden Mickeys too. They were thrilled!:wave:
Driving vs flying………In an effort to save a considerable amount of money, we chose to drive to WDW from NY rather than fly. If this had been a 7 day trip, this is not anything we would have considered though. With a DVD player and a variety of movies plus 2 drivers, we did not mind the driving at all. With a night on the road both ways it was a very workable thing to do. On the drive down we timed it so that everyone (except Grammie, who was driving) went back to sleep while she got us into the next state and ready for a potty break and bagels for breakfast. Coming home, we left MK about 11am, so the longest part of our drive was the second day. Flying would have cost us $1200 for 4 people and only $450 to drive…a no-brainer for us.
Disappointments……..We never got to ride Space Mt. The line was always VERY long for this ride, probably due to the recent reburb. AJ wasn’t so sure about this ride anyway and we had plenty of other things to do. We had to stand in the back for Fantasmic and due to the limited viewing nights, we did not get to see the show from a better location. After taking the time out to go to Coronado Springs (we wanted to check this resort out), we were disappointed. While a lot of people love this resort, we weren’t crazy about the layout and now know that it would not be a resort we would consider for an upgrade. Crazy as it seems, we did not get to see the daytime MK parade. We have seen this parade before and do love it, but the girls chose to do rides instead.
OVERALL, WE HAD A GREAT TIME AND KNOW FROM BEING 4TH TIME VETERANS...................THERE IS NO PLACE MORE MAGICAL THAN WDW!