conan617
10-27-2011, 12:34 AM
Let me start off by apologizing for taking longer to get this out than originally planned. I had a trip report put together, but it was short and so many details were left out. Instead I am opting to post my detailed journal and hope you will excuse my weak writing style and the fact that some of the details contained within are very pedestrian to most of the readers on INTERCOT. Anyway, thanks for reading….here we go.
Cast
Me – the nervous Dad and narrator
Kelly – the Mother of my beautiful children
Matthew – age 11
Mara –age 7
Pretrip report link
http://www.intercot.com/discussion/s...d.php?t=184956
9/26/11
With nothing “scheduled”, we decided to sleep in today. Considering that this is our vacation, we sure have been working hard and it felt good to sleep late. We did get up around 10AM, headed out the door around 11:30, and jumped on a bus for Downtown Disney. Our reservations at T-rex are for 4PM so we have some time to shop and look around. The bus deposits us at DTD and Mara wants to pick up her Mickey Ears first thing. The shop has at least 25 different types of ears to choose from and the store we are at will embroider her name on them for her. Mara looks over all the different selections and finally decides to get pink and silver ears with a tiara and veil. The clerk embroiders Mara’s name on her ears and we left the store. We took a few pictures by the magic brooms from Fantasia and walked past the Rainforest Café. Outside of the Café were four parrots that were doing tricks like flying to the trainer’s arm and squawking very loudly. The parrots were so loud that we didn’t stay very long and went into Goofy’s Candy Company. One of the cast members named Maria noticed Matthew’s birthday button and asked if he would like a special cake for his Birthday. She took seven or eight little sample cups from the slushy machine and filled them up with different flavors and colors of slushies. She presented Matthew with his slushy cake and sang “Happy Birthday” to him while the rest of the store joined in. The kids found a little table and ate Matthew’s cake while I bought a giant cashew snappie. On our way out, Mara and I snapped a few pictures of ourselves in the fun house mirrors.
The ears that Matthew wanted to pick were at the ESPN store so we went in and while Matthew was picking up the baseball ears he wanted, I watched a demonstration on baseball bat making. Kelly had spotted a Mickey Mouse barrette that she was hoping to pick up. All the little girls that had been to the Bibbity Bobbity Boutique had this barrette, but Kelly couldn’t find it at any of the stores. As we were passing the BBB, Kelly ducked in to see if should could purchase the barrette. Unfortunately, due to high demand, they did not have any extra for sale, but the cast member offered to give Mara a pixie dust makeover. Mara went over and the cast member sprinkled pixie dust all over her head and the pixie dust was so magical that it stayed on her the entire rest of the trip. Matthew was excited to go to the Lego store and that was the next stop of our day. The kids posed for pictures with all the Lego sculptures and they made Lego mobiles and raced them down the race track in front of the store. Matthew searched around for a set or two that he wanted, but instead decided to fill a cup with random Legos and build three Lego people to take home.
It was now time for our reservation at T-rex. As we were checking in with the hostess, the skies opened up and I mean it poured. Luckily, we were inside and getting seated for our reservation. T-rex is of course dinosaur themed and really, really cool. There is a section of the restaurant that is themed like and ice cave and it changes colors periodically. The large animatronics dinosaurs and the meteor-shower kept us entertained while we ate our enormous plate of nacho appetizer. As we were finishing our dinner, our cast member server came to our table and told us that the couple at the table next to us had ordered a giant chocolate extinction dessert and there was no way they would even finish a quarter of it. They were asking if we would like to help them finish it. The couple took a small portion and gave the rest to us. That was a really nice thing to do and we made sure to thank them a couple of different times. The dessert was really good, but while we were finishing it up, our server brought Matthew a birthday ice cream sundae. We were sooo stuffed when we finished eating. The restaurant also has a dinosaur build a bear and the kids each made a dinosaur to take home. Mara picked out a multicolored, spotted dino and Matthew chose an ankylosaurus.
The rain had slowed, but it had not stopped by the time we finished up in T-rex. We did go into a magnet store that was advertising that it was closing up and I picked up a few magnets for my co workers back home. It was still sprinkling, but a large, black cloud was moving in so we decided to head back to AKL. We walked to the bus stop near Planet Hollywood and the rain started coming down hard again. The bus for AKL was pulling away as we got near the stop and we thought we were going to have to wait for awhile, but another pulled up shortly and we were on our way back home. The kids had been looking forward to swimming on our day off, but there was lightning in the sky and the pool was temporarily closed.
The resort offered many activities throughout our stay and since the pool was closed, we decided to attend a presentation that was put on by a native of Botswana. Junior had come from Botswana and worked as a guide on safari prior to coming to AKL. He spoke about the many animals and history of Botswana and shared what it was like on an actual safari. Junior was very friendly and answered all the questions asked of him. This was an unplanned activity, but it was very fun and educational.
At 8PM we walked down to the pool. The rain was still coming down, but we went swimming anyway. There were a few flashes of lightning in the distance but we kept swimming anyway. After an hour or so, we were walking back to our room and saw that the night vision goggles, savannah viewing was going on again. We stopped and looked again, but the animals must have gone undercover due to the rain. I did manage to see a lone giraffe and I took a picture of it through the goggles. Then we went back to the room and changed. We wanted to fill our mugs at the Mara and check out the arcade. Kelly, Matt and I tried to win a Nintendo 3Ds and Mara tried the claw machine a few times, but we didn’t have any luck tonight. I snapped a few pictures of the lobby and we headed back to our room for bed. Considering this was an “off-day” we sure did have a good time. I thought about all the really nice things that people had done for us today. Maria’s special cake for Matthew, the couple that we had never met that shared their dessert with strangers. I honestly think that some of Disney’s magic rubs off on people when they are at WDW and they feel the need to be nice to complete strangers.
Tomorrow is going to be a very long day as we are spending the morning at the Magic Kingdom and attending Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party in the evening.
Cast
Me – the nervous Dad and narrator
Kelly – the Mother of my beautiful children
Matthew – age 11
Mara –age 7
Pretrip report link
http://www.intercot.com/discussion/s...d.php?t=184956
9/26/11
With nothing “scheduled”, we decided to sleep in today. Considering that this is our vacation, we sure have been working hard and it felt good to sleep late. We did get up around 10AM, headed out the door around 11:30, and jumped on a bus for Downtown Disney. Our reservations at T-rex are for 4PM so we have some time to shop and look around. The bus deposits us at DTD and Mara wants to pick up her Mickey Ears first thing. The shop has at least 25 different types of ears to choose from and the store we are at will embroider her name on them for her. Mara looks over all the different selections and finally decides to get pink and silver ears with a tiara and veil. The clerk embroiders Mara’s name on her ears and we left the store. We took a few pictures by the magic brooms from Fantasia and walked past the Rainforest Café. Outside of the Café were four parrots that were doing tricks like flying to the trainer’s arm and squawking very loudly. The parrots were so loud that we didn’t stay very long and went into Goofy’s Candy Company. One of the cast members named Maria noticed Matthew’s birthday button and asked if he would like a special cake for his Birthday. She took seven or eight little sample cups from the slushy machine and filled them up with different flavors and colors of slushies. She presented Matthew with his slushy cake and sang “Happy Birthday” to him while the rest of the store joined in. The kids found a little table and ate Matthew’s cake while I bought a giant cashew snappie. On our way out, Mara and I snapped a few pictures of ourselves in the fun house mirrors.
The ears that Matthew wanted to pick were at the ESPN store so we went in and while Matthew was picking up the baseball ears he wanted, I watched a demonstration on baseball bat making. Kelly had spotted a Mickey Mouse barrette that she was hoping to pick up. All the little girls that had been to the Bibbity Bobbity Boutique had this barrette, but Kelly couldn’t find it at any of the stores. As we were passing the BBB, Kelly ducked in to see if should could purchase the barrette. Unfortunately, due to high demand, they did not have any extra for sale, but the cast member offered to give Mara a pixie dust makeover. Mara went over and the cast member sprinkled pixie dust all over her head and the pixie dust was so magical that it stayed on her the entire rest of the trip. Matthew was excited to go to the Lego store and that was the next stop of our day. The kids posed for pictures with all the Lego sculptures and they made Lego mobiles and raced them down the race track in front of the store. Matthew searched around for a set or two that he wanted, but instead decided to fill a cup with random Legos and build three Lego people to take home.
It was now time for our reservation at T-rex. As we were checking in with the hostess, the skies opened up and I mean it poured. Luckily, we were inside and getting seated for our reservation. T-rex is of course dinosaur themed and really, really cool. There is a section of the restaurant that is themed like and ice cave and it changes colors periodically. The large animatronics dinosaurs and the meteor-shower kept us entertained while we ate our enormous plate of nacho appetizer. As we were finishing our dinner, our cast member server came to our table and told us that the couple at the table next to us had ordered a giant chocolate extinction dessert and there was no way they would even finish a quarter of it. They were asking if we would like to help them finish it. The couple took a small portion and gave the rest to us. That was a really nice thing to do and we made sure to thank them a couple of different times. The dessert was really good, but while we were finishing it up, our server brought Matthew a birthday ice cream sundae. We were sooo stuffed when we finished eating. The restaurant also has a dinosaur build a bear and the kids each made a dinosaur to take home. Mara picked out a multicolored, spotted dino and Matthew chose an ankylosaurus.
The rain had slowed, but it had not stopped by the time we finished up in T-rex. We did go into a magnet store that was advertising that it was closing up and I picked up a few magnets for my co workers back home. It was still sprinkling, but a large, black cloud was moving in so we decided to head back to AKL. We walked to the bus stop near Planet Hollywood and the rain started coming down hard again. The bus for AKL was pulling away as we got near the stop and we thought we were going to have to wait for awhile, but another pulled up shortly and we were on our way back home. The kids had been looking forward to swimming on our day off, but there was lightning in the sky and the pool was temporarily closed.
The resort offered many activities throughout our stay and since the pool was closed, we decided to attend a presentation that was put on by a native of Botswana. Junior had come from Botswana and worked as a guide on safari prior to coming to AKL. He spoke about the many animals and history of Botswana and shared what it was like on an actual safari. Junior was very friendly and answered all the questions asked of him. This was an unplanned activity, but it was very fun and educational.
At 8PM we walked down to the pool. The rain was still coming down, but we went swimming anyway. There were a few flashes of lightning in the distance but we kept swimming anyway. After an hour or so, we were walking back to our room and saw that the night vision goggles, savannah viewing was going on again. We stopped and looked again, but the animals must have gone undercover due to the rain. I did manage to see a lone giraffe and I took a picture of it through the goggles. Then we went back to the room and changed. We wanted to fill our mugs at the Mara and check out the arcade. Kelly, Matt and I tried to win a Nintendo 3Ds and Mara tried the claw machine a few times, but we didn’t have any luck tonight. I snapped a few pictures of the lobby and we headed back to our room for bed. Considering this was an “off-day” we sure did have a good time. I thought about all the really nice things that people had done for us today. Maria’s special cake for Matthew, the couple that we had never met that shared their dessert with strangers. I honestly think that some of Disney’s magic rubs off on people when they are at WDW and they feel the need to be nice to complete strangers.
Tomorrow is going to be a very long day as we are spending the morning at the Magic Kingdom and attending Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party in the evening.