[brumcg]

We're back and almost recovered from our 8 days from Disney. Short version: had a great trip. Longer version? Here we go:

The family: Me (Bruce), My wife (Sandy), Daughter #1 (Maggie - Age 10), Daughter #2 (Maura - Age 2 - terrible variety)

Day 1 (Saturday June 1):

The alarm went off at 3:30 AM. No big deal, I wasn't sleeping much anyway. We were off by 4:30 to the Indianapolis airport - about a 1.5 hour drive. We live about 20 minutes from the Greater Cincinnati Airport, but it's a Delta hub and fares are outrageous. Grrrr. I got the directions from the Indy airport website (Mistake #1). I knew the general direction of the airport and wondered why the directions were taking us in the opposite direction. Well, because of construction, they took us the easiest and longest way to the airport - without a single sign along the way informing drivers that they were on the right track. I was going crazy! We were literally scanning the sky for planes... :weird:

We flew ATA - a smaller airline that I had read several not so nice things about. It was fine! I'd fly them again in a minute. They were the same as any other carrier at cheaper prices.

We rented a car which turned out to be mistake #2. I had planned on making 2-3 trips off property and will admit that I was slightly concerned about the on-property transportation. Needless to say, I was so exhausted that I didn't make any of the off-site trips, and we never used the car for transportation except on the last day of the trip. Lesson learned.

We got a surge of excitement as we drove into the Wilderness Lodge area. We just love the atmosphere. Our room wasn't ready, so we looked around a bit, ate at Roaring Forks (counter service at the resort - not bad), and caught the first bus we saw which was heading to Studios.

It seemed really crowded and it was HOT :devil HOT. We bought our annual passes (we're going back in March 2003) and decided to venture into the park. The ticket seller told us it was super crowded due to a large unofficial event that was taking place at MK (Gay Day) and the park was getting a ton of spillover. I told him that I knew about the event, he smiled, and said that everyone was being well behaved.

I'll make this statement about Gay Days and no more: We met several groups participating in the event, and in fact everyone we encountered WAS very nice and extremely well behaved.

We checked the tip board and headed straight to Tower of Terror (10 minute wait!) and Maggie and I rode it. It felt great to get the first ride of the trip in! ToT is different every trip...it tossed us around like a yo-yo! Awesome! It was very crowded, very hot, we were tired, so we headed back to the resort.

Our room at the Villas was a 2 bedroom since my parents were originally scheduled to be with us but had to cancel due to health reasons... :( We missed them. The room was great! I was sorry to see that we didn't get our 2nd room request (a location in the North part of the Villas). That was nothing, though, compared to what I found later. We kept smelling cigarette smoke in our room, and I couldn't figure it out. On the 3rd or 4th day, I found an ashtray in the room and realized that we didn't get our first room request - a non-smoking room! I was going to complain, but by that time our room was well-lived in. We just kept the fans on high the whole trip. That was disappointing.

At this point we made a trip out for groceries. The valets were great in giving us directions to a new Publix and steered us away from Goodings. Without their directions, we would have been quite lost! All of the staff at WL were fantastic!

We had PS that night for Artist Point. We worried about Maura at such a nice establishment, but they were great with her and she was great as well. I'll save most of the details for a review, but it was awesome. They have Copper River salmon on the menu, and it was the best salmon that I ever had. We had mussels for an appetiser, and they were also the best that I ever had. I would highly recommed getting the "wine flight" with your meal. The server asks about your wine favorites, checks the meal, and serves 3 glasses of wine that match. The meal was EASILY the most expensive of our trip, but worth it!!!

We spent some more time exploring the resort, but then headed back to the room for an early bedtime.

This was an excellent first day for us! Normally we would have been driving all day, but flying opened the day for us in WDW. Sandy does not like flying at all, but I think she can see the benefits now.

Tomorrow.... Animal Kingdom...

Bruce

[mickey]

Bruce, welcome home. I am glad you liked Artist's Point, definitely one of my hidden gems. I can't wait to hear the rest.

[spike]

Great to have you back, and great day one report, keep them coming.
:)

[Donna B]

Great report. I am looking forward to day 2 adventures.
:D

[ilvminnie]

Sorry it's over (for now), but enjoying your trip notes. Just confirms what I always tell people...don't bother with the car. If you're planning on doing WDW, just do it & don't ruin the magic with an off-property trip. Just getting in the car again brings all the outside stuff back in, like road rage, traffic, etc.

Can't wait to read tomorrow's installment.

[jgriff2388]

Hey Bruce, welcome back. Have you recovered from post Disney depression yet?

[wdwjeff]

Hey, Bruce,
Welcome back, and good move acing the car next time.:) :)

[brumcg]

Day 2: Animal Kingdom

I'll spend a little bit longer on this day - the first real day in the parks - than the rest as certain themes for the trip started to develop on this day.

Maura (2 year old) immediately wilted when confronted with the morning heat and humidity and this would be a constant for the week. In this state, her 2 favorite words became "Mommy, huggy" which translates to "Mommy, pick me up and carry me all day long." Most of the time, I wasn't allowed to even push the stroller... Mommy had to. Yikes. I'll give Sandy a ton of credit...she exhibited more endurance and patience than I did, and she had a 30 pound attachment to her body a great deal of the time. As soon as we would get back to the resort for quiet time, Maura would revive and start bouncing off the walls. Hmmm....

A second theme emerged while waiting for the park to open. Line management was horrible and people were getting very frustrated - especially the people who had PS for the Character Breakfast. Many people were rude to the cast members (inexcusable), but the odd part was that cast members were very indifferent to the situation and several offered conflicting reasons why the people with early PS wouldn't be let in. We made a mental note to be early for our PS later in the week and to go with the flow while in line.

We noticed this pattern (rude guests, indifferent cast members) often during the trip and maybe it's understandable considering the crowds and the heat - a bad combo. One of the big problems we noticed was smoking. People were lighting up wherever they wanted, people were complaining about it, and Cast Members were put in a bad situation (it's a policy that they hate to enforce). I don't have the answers - maybe they need more smoking areas, maybe they need to drop the policy - I'm not sure.

Gates opened about 8:45. While Sandy got the stroller, I took Maura to meet her first character of the trip - King Louie. Maura was absolutely terrorized. In retrospect, Louie is kinda scary...whoops.

The ropes dropped at EXACTLY 9:00 AM - a common theme in each of the parks for the week.

As everyone should, we hustled for Kilamanjaro Safari and hopped right on. The park seemed really crowded during the day, but we didn't use Fast Pass once! Sandy did Kali River for the first time and loved it. Maggie & I did Primeval Whirl; I don't like Wild Mouse style rides, but this was pretty good. Sandy and Maura did Triceratop Spin. In general, we like Chester & Hester's theme.

Tough To Be a Bug was great as usual, but Maura hated it. She really hates loud noises, so we learned to work around that. We also hit Dinosaur at some point; we like it, but I don't think we would need to ride it on every trip. Oh...baby swap rocks!

We had one PS for the day... Rainforest Cafe. Their check-in process is an absolute mess, and their employees don't seem to really care a bit. Once we were seated, though, things improved quite a bit. We were starving and it was our big meal for the day...so we did the appetizer sampler (pretty good!) and a full meal. I had Jambalaya which was pretty good - and a little bit different with Black Beans & Rice instead of regular rice. Maggie had World Pasta (Penne & Sausage) which was quite good. Sandy had Salmon (as always!) and really liked it. The atmosphere is pretty good, but we were seated in a bad location and didn't get to really experience it. Despite the positives outweighing the negatives, we left with a "been there, done that, don't need to do it again" attitude. It's just not very "Disney" in our opinion.

After...we tried Festival of the Lion King which we had never seen before - we're not big Lion King fans. Simply put...see it. It's fantastic. We let the kids do the Boneyard for awhile. They had fun. My wife, though, was heading up the stairs and a lovely 8-ish year old boy passed her and said "Move it, fatty." Yikes! We turned it into a positive though...it became the joke of the trip for us, and we were able to whip out that line about 100 times.

We've never been much for the parades and tried to make a special point of doing them on this trip (with mixed success). The AK parade, IMO, is very worth it! Very interesting and creative. Maura was waving to everyone and really got a good response. A great part came when the chameleon got within 4 feet of Maggie and let loose with the tongue; Maggie about died! It was hilarious.

That was enough for us for the day, and we headed back to the Villas. Maggie, Maura, and I did some swimming (nice pool at WL) and then back for a decent bedtime.

All in all, a very good first day! We accomplished quite a bit and didn't kill ourselves in the process. We noticed, however, that it was very difficult for us to take a break while at the AK. The 9-6 hours and the 12:30 PS really made it close to impossible. This, too, became a theme of sorts. I really need to plan a little bit better to get that afternoon break into our plans.

Tomorrow: Studios.

Bruce

[brumcg]

Thanks all for the welcome backs!

jgriff2388, yep, we're mostly recovered from post-Disney depression syndrome. Frankly, by the last day, we were exhausted and that helped.

When we got back, we made our reservations for next year and that helped too! Only 283+ days to go!

I should've listened to everyone about the rental car, but I had convinced myself that we needed it. Doh!

Bruce

[Cinderella]

A great part came when the chameleon got within 4 feet of Maggie and let loose with the tongue; Maggie about died! It was hilarious.

That is TOO Funny! That happened to my 2 year old and she wanted to catch it and my 5 year old started screaming

Great Report and it sounds like you guys are really having fun

Debbie

[Donna B]

Another great report. It sounds like you guys had a great time, even though there were a few bumps. Looking forward to day 3 at the studios. Quick question - Did your 2 year old enjoy AK? I am going in Oct. and have a 5 yr. old and 2 yr. old. I was just wondering if AK had alot for their ages.

[ilvminnie]

Another great report, Bruce. I agree with the smoking thing...people seem to ignore the policy & there's no enforcement. It's one of my pet peeves with WDW since my husband has severe allergies.

You didn't mention if you got to see Tarzan Rocks. Did you? Or did you save that for another day. We absolutely loved it!

Waiting for installment #3. Guess we have to live through you until our own trips come up!!

[wdisneyfan1]

Did you find the hidden Mickey t the Artist Point resturant?:weird:

[brumcg]

ilvminnie, we didn't get a chance to do Tarzan... it'll move to the top of the list next year. On surface, it doesn't sound like my cup of tea, but neither did Festival of the Lion King...

wdisneyfan1, we did terrible trying to find the hidden Mickeys on our own!!! Next year, we're cheating and getting the list!

Bruce

[shawnp0001]

I personally didn't care for Tarzan Rocks (my ex-girlfriend though enjoyed seeing the scantily-clad Tarzan dude). I don't find the AK shows to be all that good compared to other shows in WDW (except for Legend of the Lion King which is a blast).