A friend and I went to Orlando from Oct. 10-19 and had a blast! We started our vacation at Universal with the parks and Halloween Horror Nights, as is our tradition. Loved it this year!
It was hot during our trip, sometimes very. Most of the time it was bearable; we are from Louisiana, after all. Still, we were disappointed that the cool front didn't come through until our last night of vacation. It was cool and breezy for our drive home.
Anyone interested in pictures - including those from Universal and HHN - can find them here. I'm having trouble uploading into the reports as I have in the past. Hope you enjoy, and here's my trip report:
Friday, Oct. 10: A work day, actually, but a fun one. I'm a multimedia editor for a newspaper and some local folks were at Epcot manning the Louisiana exhibit. So, my friend (LeCrete, who is the features editor and also was working) and I lugged our photo and video equipment through Epcot. Very hot and humid, the kind where sweat is rolling down your face. Nice crowds, but not too crowded. Saw a Segway tour making its way back to base and smiled. We did that tour last October and I highly recommend it! After filming into late that morning, we left Epcot to grab lunch (Boston Market) and a firewire cable and then back to our Universal hotel (Portofino - very nice) to process and write. ran around to get fire wire cable and lunch at Boston Market before returning to Portofino to process stuff. Our friends Bob and Kim from Grand Prairie, Texas, fly into Orlando and meet us at the hotel around 10 p.m. I have just finished my work. Whew!
Monday, Oct. 13: Check out of Portofino. Our porter handles our luggage and gives us a show as his zipper is undone. He gets $5 from me. We caravan over to Contemporary so LeCrete and I can check in. That done, we go to our room and wait for luggage before heading off property to Tony Roma's for lunch and our last goodbyes as Kim and Bob get ready to fly back home to Texas. LeCrete and I return to our awesome room (we really loved Contemporary and the room decor. That said, the bathrooms are in desperate need of some storage shelves for toiletries.) and unpack before catching the monorail to Epcot for dinner. Just after leaving our hotel, it starts to rain. We left all rain jackets and ponchos at the hotel, so we buy two more and walk in the rain to the boat that takes us to Germany and the Biergarten. Buffet is good, lots of meat - true to my German people! - and a good show. This was my first time here and I liked it, but we really weren't too into the show. I think it was the rain, just checking in and all that stuff. Plus, we sat at a table with folks much older than us and they had much more in common to chat about. We had some pleasant chit-chat, but we didn't linger. so we chat just a bit, eat and leave. We head back to hotel for an early night and to watch Magic Kingdom fireworks from our balcony.
Tuesday, Oct. 14: We sleep in a bit to recover from HHN and then catch a bus over to Hollywood Studios because we have lunch at Sci-fi. Great, as always, and we enjoy Tower of Terror, the Muppets and Indiana Jones stunt show. We come back to the hotel for a nap mid-afternoon and then catch the monorail to Epcot for Illuminations and a turkey leg dinner. We sit at our favorite bench outside Japan and snap some great fireworks pictures, as well as nighttime Epcot pictures. Amazingly, I can do this despite the kids standing right behind me who keeps bumping into me. Kinda like the theme park version of kicking the back of your seat. :fork:
Wednesday, Oct. 15: Wake up around 8 a.m. and head to Magic Kingdom. I eat my French toast loaf from the Main Street Bakery for breakfast. :slurp: The crowds aren't too bad and we aim to keep a leisurely pace - so we ride the train around the park twice. We enjoy some rides and it's not too hot, but we sweat nonetheless. Around 2:30, we head back to Contemporary for lunch (cheese pizzas from Tempo Grab and Go; much, much better than Pop pizza) and a nap. We ditch our Boma ressie and decide to go to Animal Kingdom for EMH. My first time in AK at night. Beautiful, really. Expedition Everest is even more of a blast at night. Awesome sight as we climb up hill on the ride. To the left, a great view of Epcot area with a full moon. We ride twice and I take lots of pictures. Then we go to Dinosaur and walk right on. Crowds are very light. Waits for Everest about 10 minutes. Eat dinner at Flame Tree down by the water and we're the only ones there. The moon now is above Everest so we take more pictures. Rather than ride EE again (full stomaches, ya know), we head back to Contemporary. Watch some of debate coverage, but I sit out on the balcony and just enjoy the sights.
Thursday, Oct. 16: Slept in just a little and then went to Epcot. Finally rode some rides there on our third visit this trip. Rode SSE and enjoyed it much, laughed at our "future" selves. Had lunch at Coral Reef; wasn't too impressed. A letdown from past visits. Where's the cheesecake? I think the menu needs to be revamped. Spent the afternoon wandering around World Showcase, taking pictures. Shopped in Morococo and at The Land and rode stuff like Maelstrom. After that, we split up since I wanted to go see Fantasmic and LeCrete didn't. I took the boat from the International Gateway over to HS. It had been a few trips since I'd seen the show and I enjoyed it very much. I sat on the left side for the first time. Not a bad view. I could have done without the constant swarm of gnats though. Still, one woman nearby did provide some nice comic relief as she kept freaking out about them. Getting back to the hotel was a hassle, though made it in time to see Hallowishes from our balcony. Had a very expensive burger with cute little bottles of condiments from room service since I didn't want to wait in the super-long line for a quick bite at the amphitheater. I'll take convenience over saving $$ any day. I'm so lazy.
Friday, Oct. 17: Slept late and went to Studios again. Ate lunch at Toluca Legs and then hopped in line for ToT. Wait time said 50 minutes, but we didn't want to wait for FP return. Also, it had been awhile since I'd been through the queue and it was fun to take pictures. Ended up in line about 35 minutes; not too bad. The park was quite crowded so we hung around a bit longer and then left. Needed a break from park food and park food prices, so we hit the Olive Garden on International Drive for dinner. Much cheaper. After we got back, I headed alone to MK for the evening and had the most wonderful time despite the worst monorail driver ever (a trainee? Hopefully). Really, people walked up to the driver's cab after we arrived at MK to complain. I saw one kid in a stroller get shut in a door while they still were letting people load - no warning yet. Anyway, I had a blast riding TTA, Pirates and other rides, did some shopping and took many pictures of the castle before walking out with the crowds.
Saturday, Oct. 18: Ah, the last day.
Went to AK for the Safari and other animal-related trails. Had a great time. LeCrete and I both were snapping pictures like crazy and our guide asked if there was a model shoot going on. :ROFLOL:Hey! We have new cameras! Mom and baby giraffe were really close to the truck and that was great. The tigers were in good form and I got a great series of one of them yawning. Kinda funny. We did a little shopping and snacked on some fries before going back to the hotel mid-afternoon to rest for a few hours before heading to Downtown Disney for dinner at Fulton's Crab House. First time there. I had steak. I'm like that. FWIW, it was like budda! LeCrete is the crab legs woman, so she was happy. So, $130 later we left for a nice evening of shopping. The crowds were kinda heavy and there was lots of live music around. I guess this is to make up for the absence of the clubs. Don't know; haven't really kept up with that issue since I never was one for the clubs. However, we did see some people who obviously didn't know about the clubs closing. They would walk to the doors and pull, then shrug. We got back to Contemporary around 11 p.m. to pack up for the trip home on Sunday.
It was hot during our trip, sometimes very. Most of the time it was bearable; we are from Louisiana, after all. Still, we were disappointed that the cool front didn't come through until our last night of vacation. It was cool and breezy for our drive home.
Anyone interested in pictures - including those from Universal and HHN - can find them here. I'm having trouble uploading into the reports as I have in the past. Hope you enjoy, and here's my trip report:
Friday, Oct. 10: A work day, actually, but a fun one. I'm a multimedia editor for a newspaper and some local folks were at Epcot manning the Louisiana exhibit. So, my friend (LeCrete, who is the features editor and also was working) and I lugged our photo and video equipment through Epcot. Very hot and humid, the kind where sweat is rolling down your face. Nice crowds, but not too crowded. Saw a Segway tour making its way back to base and smiled. We did that tour last October and I highly recommend it! After filming into late that morning, we left Epcot to grab lunch (Boston Market) and a firewire cable and then back to our Universal hotel (Portofino - very nice) to process and write. ran around to get fire wire cable and lunch at Boston Market before returning to Portofino to process stuff. Our friends Bob and Kim from Grand Prairie, Texas, fly into Orlando and meet us at the hotel around 10 p.m. I have just finished my work. Whew!
Monday, Oct. 13: Check out of Portofino. Our porter handles our luggage and gives us a show as his zipper is undone. He gets $5 from me.
We caravan over to Contemporary so LeCrete and I can check in. That done, we go to our room and wait for luggage before heading off property to Tony Roma's for lunch and our last goodbyes as Kim and Bob get ready to fly back home to Texas. LeCrete and I return to our awesome room (we really loved Contemporary and the room decor. That said, the bathrooms are in desperate need of some storage shelves for toiletries.) and unpack before catching the monorail to Epcot for dinner. Just after leaving our hotel, it starts to rain. We left all rain jackets and ponchos at the hotel, so we buy two more and walk in the rain to the boat that takes us to Germany and the Biergarten. Buffet is good, lots of meat - true to my German people! - and a good show. This was my first time here and I liked it, but we really weren't too into the show. I think it was the rain, just checking in and all that stuff. Plus, we sat at a table with folks much older than us and they had much more in common to chat about. We had some pleasant chit-chat, but we didn't linger. so we chat just a bit, eat and leave. We head back to hotel for an early night and to watch Magic Kingdom fireworks from our balcony.Tuesday, Oct. 14: We sleep in a bit to recover from HHN and then catch a bus over to Hollywood Studios because we have lunch at Sci-fi. Great, as always, and we enjoy Tower of Terror, the Muppets and Indiana Jones stunt show. We come back to the hotel for a nap mid-afternoon and then catch the monorail to Epcot for Illuminations and a turkey leg dinner. We sit at our favorite bench outside Japan and snap some great fireworks pictures, as well as nighttime Epcot pictures. Amazingly, I can do this despite the kids standing right behind me who keeps bumping into me. Kinda like the theme park version of kicking the back of your seat. :fork:
Wednesday, Oct. 15: Wake up around 8 a.m. and head to Magic Kingdom. I eat my French toast loaf from the Main Street Bakery for breakfast. :slurp: The crowds aren't too bad and we aim to keep a leisurely pace - so we ride the train around the park twice. We enjoy some rides and it's not too hot, but we sweat nonetheless. Around 2:30, we head back to Contemporary for lunch (cheese pizzas from Tempo Grab and Go; much, much better than Pop pizza) and a nap. We ditch our Boma ressie and decide to go to Animal Kingdom for EMH. My first time in AK at night. Beautiful, really. Expedition Everest is even more of a blast at night. Awesome sight as we climb up hill on the ride. To the left, a great view of Epcot area with a full moon. We ride twice and I take lots of pictures. Then we go to Dinosaur and walk right on. Crowds are very light. Waits for Everest about 10 minutes. Eat dinner at Flame Tree down by the water and we're the only ones there. The moon now is above Everest so we take more pictures. Rather than ride EE again (full stomaches, ya know), we head back to Contemporary. Watch some of debate coverage, but I sit out on the balcony and just enjoy the sights.
Thursday, Oct. 16: Slept in just a little and then went to Epcot. Finally rode some rides there on our third visit this trip. Rode SSE and enjoyed it much, laughed at our "future" selves. Had lunch at Coral Reef; wasn't too impressed. A letdown from past visits. Where's the cheesecake? I think the menu needs to be revamped. Spent the afternoon wandering around World Showcase, taking pictures. Shopped in Morococo and at The Land and rode stuff like Maelstrom. After that, we split up since I wanted to go see Fantasmic and LeCrete didn't. I took the boat from the International Gateway over to HS. It had been a few trips since I'd seen the show and I enjoyed it very much. I sat on the left side for the first time. Not a bad view. I could have done without the constant swarm of gnats though. Still, one woman nearby did provide some nice comic relief as she kept freaking out about them. Getting back to the hotel was a hassle, though made it in time to see Hallowishes from our balcony. Had a very expensive burger with cute little bottles of condiments from room service since I didn't want to wait in the super-long line for a quick bite at the amphitheater. I'll take convenience over saving $$ any day. I'm so lazy.
Friday, Oct. 17: Slept late and went to Studios again. Ate lunch at Toluca Legs and then hopped in line for ToT. Wait time said 50 minutes, but we didn't want to wait for FP return. Also, it had been awhile since I'd been through the queue and it was fun to take pictures. Ended up in line about 35 minutes; not too bad. The park was quite crowded so we hung around a bit longer and then left. Needed a break from park food and park food prices, so we hit the Olive Garden on International Drive for dinner. Much cheaper. After we got back, I headed alone to MK for the evening and had the most wonderful time despite the worst monorail driver ever (a trainee? Hopefully). Really, people walked up to the driver's cab after we arrived at MK to complain. I saw one kid in a stroller get shut in a door while they still were letting people load - no warning yet. Anyway, I had a blast riding TTA, Pirates and other rides, did some shopping and took many pictures of the castle before walking out with the crowds.
Saturday, Oct. 18: Ah, the last day.
Went to AK for the Safari and other animal-related trails. Had a great time. LeCrete and I both were snapping pictures like crazy and our guide asked if there was a model shoot going on. :ROFLOL:Hey! We have new cameras! Mom and baby giraffe were really close to the truck and that was great. The tigers were in good form and I got a great series of one of them yawning. Kinda funny. We did a little shopping and snacked on some fries before going back to the hotel mid-afternoon to rest for a few hours before heading to Downtown Disney for dinner at Fulton's Crab House. First time there. I had steak. I'm like that. FWIW, it was like budda! LeCrete is the crab legs woman, so she was happy. So, $130 later we left for a nice evening of shopping. The crowds were kinda heavy and there was lots of live music around. I guess this is to make up for the absence of the clubs. Don't know; haven't really kept up with that issue since I never was one for the clubs. However, we did see some people who obviously didn't know about the clubs closing. They would walk to the doors and pull, then shrug. We got back to Contemporary around 11 p.m. to pack up for the trip home on Sunday.