Jennifer_and_Chris
11-01-2011, 10:52 AM
This has never happened to me. I’ve never wanted to stay in bed while at Disney World. I always get up and get going. Too much to do and see. Chris gets up first and says to me, let’s just stay another day and we’ll drive all night. We had talked about this last night and I didn’t think he was really serious. We look at each other and we smile and get right up and ready. I just love that man! It’s about 6:30-6:45ish and it’s the latest we’ve gotten up all week. I know, we’re demented.
We pack like the wind. Another reason I love bins is that it seems so much easier to just pack a bin, jamming everything as quickly as I can. The kids get up and we tell them that if they take a shower quickly, we’ll give them a surprise. So, they get up and feverishly shower. We tell them that we’re going to stay one more day and drive all night long to get home. We’re going to DHS! Chris and the girls pack the car as I get the room emptied.
And we are checking out at 8:45am. Once we check out, take our final pictures of the resort (at least I think it’s the last pictures) and the car is all packed, we get to the bus stop and the DHS bus pulls up almost immediately.
10:00am – We walk through the gates of DHS. We go to Star Tours first and the wait time is 40 minutes. So, we grab a FP. We walk towards Backlot Tour to see if that’s walk on and it’s at 25 minutes. No thanks!! Too much time wasted in line… So, we pass by TSM hoping by some miracle that the ride is 30 minutes or less. Nope.. it’s 80 minutes. But, that’s ok because we can play TSM at home thanks to the Wii.
So, we watch VotLM again. And this is the first time I cry at the show. I cry because during the show, while Isabel is sitting on my lap so she can see. She turns to me and tells me that she loves this vacation and doesn’t want to leave. She tells me this just as we are going “underwater” and many people around us are oohhing and ahhhing for seeing the show for the first time. The emotion takes over me and I’m quietly sobbing.
As we exit the theatre, I pretend that nothing happened. It’s about 11:15ish at this point. And we’re all getting hungry. After consulting my WDWlines ap, we see that single riders for RNR wait is 10 mintues. Chris and I are hoping to ride our fav ride at least one time this trip. We head over towards that way for lunch. Isabel wants a hot dog and Natalie wants mac-n-cheese. Fairfax Fare and all those little huts have to have those items so, we go over there for lunch. Chris wants some stuff from Starring rolls so, we get all the food situated and park it on a covered picnic table right across the street from the Beauty and Beast Theater exit. (see food review coming soon for details….) And we eat and people watch. Everything is kind of surreal and feels like a dream. Why is everyone so excited? Don’t they know that w/ every passing minute, my heart is breaking a little? I’m trying to absorb the feelings, smells, textures and burn them into my memory. But, at the same time, I’m trying to do it quickly so we can explore a little more before leaving.
We look at the single rider wait time and it jumped from 10 mintues to 25 minutes. We’ll have to pass. Until next year Aerosmith. We meander through the shops on Sunset Blvd on our way to Star Tours to use our FP. It’s our last ride. We hope for the snow scene so Chris can see it (Natalie and I caught that scenario during our first day at DHS while Isabel was sleeping), but, we get the underwater one instead. That’s always a great one! Once we are out of that ride, we see that the standby line just went down to 10 minutes. Well, we can’t just walk pass that wait time and ignore it. So, we go for one last Star Tour. Really, this was the last ride!
We head over to Muppets, just in case the wait time is short. And it is. So, Muppets we will go. It’s about 1:40ish when we finally admit that we need to leave and get on the road. So, we drag our feet to the front of the park. I stop just one last time to get one last photopass picture. And Isabel is pouting in her stroller. Every year we have gotten our picture in front of the Sorcerer hat and every year, Isabel is pouting in her stroller. This year is no exception. After the last 3-4 snapshots, we go through the exit. Chris has to go to the bathroom so, I take the kids out to the dark side of the gates while Chris answers nature’s call. I actually have some business at the Ticket counter.
My mom found old tickets from the late 80’s when we went. I had 1 adult and 2 children passes with 1 day left on each. They are the old paper ones that say they are transferable and never expire. So, I ask the ticket counter CM about the tickets. The child tickets were for me but, obviously, I am no longer a child and the adult one was one of my parent’s tickets. And at the time there was only MK and EP so, what do I do now… would they be a park hopper 1 day ticket for adult or a one park one day ticket for adult and child ones/??? I don’t know. So, the manager comes over and she exchanges the paper tickets (but, not before I take pictures of the tickets for my scrapbook) for (3) 1 day park hopper tickets w/ no expiration and good for “anyone in the _our last name here_ family”. COOL! So, add that to the one day hopper that I still had from several years ago when passes didn’t expire and you didn’t have to pay for that option, and I have 4 days of hopper tickets already for our next trip! See, you just can’t leave your WDW vacation without already having some plans for the next one! That was time well spent while Chris was in the bathroom.
I just can leave without digging my heals a little in the imaginary WDW ground so, I start to take pictures of everything… Topiary Mater and McQueen, bus signs, flowers, benches, empty bus stops… everything to capture my last look (and to have for scrapbooking later). Our AKL bus comes much too quickly. We are 1 of 2 families on the bus. And we take our last bus ride. I’m trying to ignore this fact but, I find myself posting on Intercot that we are on our last bus ride in my live reporting trip report post. One more way to stay “connected” to the WDW magic.
We get to AKL way too quickly but, we’re home. For the last time. We get our refillable mugs from the car, clean them out (not like I didn’t just clean them out while we packed this morning) and fill them for the last time. Chris and I say that we need to shop to drag it out even more. Chris buys 4 pilsner glasses and I put a few little things here and there in the pile. I take the real last picture of the Savannah from the lobby and the observation deck to the right of the lobby area. Of course, all the animals are out and active. There’s a tour going on and the tour vehicle is almost right in front of the lobby windows. There’s a zebra so close I could imagine touching the animal. Of course, this would be the scene that I have to leave. Couldn’t be an empty savanna that would be easier to leave, could it Mickey???? I ask the kids for the millionth time if they need to go potty. It would be the last time we go potty at Disney. Now, that line is just desperation coming out of my mouth.
We walk the hallway to Timon elevators for the last time. Pass the window w/ the zebra print roof for the last time. Use the Timon elevator to the parking lot for the last time. The whole trip I LOVED how fast the elevators were. But, not loving the elevator response time in these last few moments. We get the kids in the car all situated, get everything where it needs to be…. And…
3:11 pm – 70 degrees – 1209 odometer before the reset to zero for the mileage counter for the way home – We pull out of the AKL Kidani Village parking garage for the last time. :(
We pack like the wind. Another reason I love bins is that it seems so much easier to just pack a bin, jamming everything as quickly as I can. The kids get up and we tell them that if they take a shower quickly, we’ll give them a surprise. So, they get up and feverishly shower. We tell them that we’re going to stay one more day and drive all night long to get home. We’re going to DHS! Chris and the girls pack the car as I get the room emptied.
And we are checking out at 8:45am. Once we check out, take our final pictures of the resort (at least I think it’s the last pictures) and the car is all packed, we get to the bus stop and the DHS bus pulls up almost immediately.
10:00am – We walk through the gates of DHS. We go to Star Tours first and the wait time is 40 minutes. So, we grab a FP. We walk towards Backlot Tour to see if that’s walk on and it’s at 25 minutes. No thanks!! Too much time wasted in line… So, we pass by TSM hoping by some miracle that the ride is 30 minutes or less. Nope.. it’s 80 minutes. But, that’s ok because we can play TSM at home thanks to the Wii.
So, we watch VotLM again. And this is the first time I cry at the show. I cry because during the show, while Isabel is sitting on my lap so she can see. She turns to me and tells me that she loves this vacation and doesn’t want to leave. She tells me this just as we are going “underwater” and many people around us are oohhing and ahhhing for seeing the show for the first time. The emotion takes over me and I’m quietly sobbing.
As we exit the theatre, I pretend that nothing happened. It’s about 11:15ish at this point. And we’re all getting hungry. After consulting my WDWlines ap, we see that single riders for RNR wait is 10 mintues. Chris and I are hoping to ride our fav ride at least one time this trip. We head over towards that way for lunch. Isabel wants a hot dog and Natalie wants mac-n-cheese. Fairfax Fare and all those little huts have to have those items so, we go over there for lunch. Chris wants some stuff from Starring rolls so, we get all the food situated and park it on a covered picnic table right across the street from the Beauty and Beast Theater exit. (see food review coming soon for details….) And we eat and people watch. Everything is kind of surreal and feels like a dream. Why is everyone so excited? Don’t they know that w/ every passing minute, my heart is breaking a little? I’m trying to absorb the feelings, smells, textures and burn them into my memory. But, at the same time, I’m trying to do it quickly so we can explore a little more before leaving.
We look at the single rider wait time and it jumped from 10 mintues to 25 minutes. We’ll have to pass. Until next year Aerosmith. We meander through the shops on Sunset Blvd on our way to Star Tours to use our FP. It’s our last ride. We hope for the snow scene so Chris can see it (Natalie and I caught that scenario during our first day at DHS while Isabel was sleeping), but, we get the underwater one instead. That’s always a great one! Once we are out of that ride, we see that the standby line just went down to 10 minutes. Well, we can’t just walk pass that wait time and ignore it. So, we go for one last Star Tour. Really, this was the last ride!
We head over to Muppets, just in case the wait time is short. And it is. So, Muppets we will go. It’s about 1:40ish when we finally admit that we need to leave and get on the road. So, we drag our feet to the front of the park. I stop just one last time to get one last photopass picture. And Isabel is pouting in her stroller. Every year we have gotten our picture in front of the Sorcerer hat and every year, Isabel is pouting in her stroller. This year is no exception. After the last 3-4 snapshots, we go through the exit. Chris has to go to the bathroom so, I take the kids out to the dark side of the gates while Chris answers nature’s call. I actually have some business at the Ticket counter.
My mom found old tickets from the late 80’s when we went. I had 1 adult and 2 children passes with 1 day left on each. They are the old paper ones that say they are transferable and never expire. So, I ask the ticket counter CM about the tickets. The child tickets were for me but, obviously, I am no longer a child and the adult one was one of my parent’s tickets. And at the time there was only MK and EP so, what do I do now… would they be a park hopper 1 day ticket for adult or a one park one day ticket for adult and child ones/??? I don’t know. So, the manager comes over and she exchanges the paper tickets (but, not before I take pictures of the tickets for my scrapbook) for (3) 1 day park hopper tickets w/ no expiration and good for “anyone in the _our last name here_ family”. COOL! So, add that to the one day hopper that I still had from several years ago when passes didn’t expire and you didn’t have to pay for that option, and I have 4 days of hopper tickets already for our next trip! See, you just can’t leave your WDW vacation without already having some plans for the next one! That was time well spent while Chris was in the bathroom.
I just can leave without digging my heals a little in the imaginary WDW ground so, I start to take pictures of everything… Topiary Mater and McQueen, bus signs, flowers, benches, empty bus stops… everything to capture my last look (and to have for scrapbooking later). Our AKL bus comes much too quickly. We are 1 of 2 families on the bus. And we take our last bus ride. I’m trying to ignore this fact but, I find myself posting on Intercot that we are on our last bus ride in my live reporting trip report post. One more way to stay “connected” to the WDW magic.
We get to AKL way too quickly but, we’re home. For the last time. We get our refillable mugs from the car, clean them out (not like I didn’t just clean them out while we packed this morning) and fill them for the last time. Chris and I say that we need to shop to drag it out even more. Chris buys 4 pilsner glasses and I put a few little things here and there in the pile. I take the real last picture of the Savannah from the lobby and the observation deck to the right of the lobby area. Of course, all the animals are out and active. There’s a tour going on and the tour vehicle is almost right in front of the lobby windows. There’s a zebra so close I could imagine touching the animal. Of course, this would be the scene that I have to leave. Couldn’t be an empty savanna that would be easier to leave, could it Mickey???? I ask the kids for the millionth time if they need to go potty. It would be the last time we go potty at Disney. Now, that line is just desperation coming out of my mouth.
We walk the hallway to Timon elevators for the last time. Pass the window w/ the zebra print roof for the last time. Use the Timon elevator to the parking lot for the last time. The whole trip I LOVED how fast the elevators were. But, not loving the elevator response time in these last few moments. We get the kids in the car all situated, get everything where it needs to be…. And…
3:11 pm – 70 degrees – 1209 odometer before the reset to zero for the mileage counter for the way home – We pull out of the AKL Kidani Village parking garage for the last time. :(