Just Engaged: An August 2010 Trip Report!

As the title suggests, this was an especially exciting trip for us and I can’t wait to share all of the fun details. Seeing as how I am lucky enough to write one of these every few months or so, I’m going to forego the normal introductions. Instead, why don’t I share five non-Disney things you might not already know about the two of us? Let’s see... non-Disney stuff?! This might be hard!

1 – We love live music! Seriously, aside from Disney, this is what we spend money on. Some of our favorite artists we’ve seen live include David Gray, Ben Folds, Brandi Carlile, Ryan Adams and the Cardinals, KT Tunstall, She & Him, Jack Johnson, A Fine Frenzy, Counting Crows, Nickel Creek, and Jimmy Buffett to name a few.

2 – We name inanimate objects and refer to them as such... this is especially true for electronics, and oddly enough they really do take on personalities. No,seriously! For example, our laptops are Petunia (mine) and Frances (his); our Garmin’s are Neville and Navi; and my camera is more affectionately known as Ginger. Weird? Maybe just a little bit. :ROFLOL:

3 – As much as I hate to admit it, we are complete and utter TV junkies. We LOVE our TV. And if I had to pick the one show we are jointly most excited to see this fall season it would have to be Dexter. Bring on the creepy.

4 – We are totally one of those couples who met at a bar. It just so happened that we both worked there while in college. Ahhh... everyone loves a good cliché, right?! :lookaroun

5 – We have a standing tradition of buying one another a book to celebrate each holiday. And when I say holiday, I mean every holiday you can think of from St. Patrick’s Day to Christmas. Usually the only time we stray outside the lines is on birthdays. We’ve built quite an impressive collection so far ranging from popular fiction to non-fiction, children’s books to biographies and we throw in some Disney “coffee table” books and “Art of’s” for good measure every now and then. Amazon is our friend! As are the myriad of used book stores we come across in the different places we visit. We already have enough to fill our own library when we buy a house!

Of course, no introduction is complete without the requisite photo, but for the heck of it, let’s go “old school.” Here we are with the elusive Rescue Rangers in 2004:

We started planning this trip sometime after the Princess Half Marathon and eventually booked when the AP rates came out earlier in the summer. To be more precise, while I was in the midst of a quick weekend trip with my mom, Brett called and made the resort reservations, solidifying our stay at Caribbean Beach from August 13-August 17. And then, as per usual, we decided we would drive down after work on Thursday, so we booked a hotel through priceline for the night of the 12th.

Just the other day I realized that we haven’t repeated a resort since I began writing trip reports... so here’s a look back:
The Contemporary – September 2008
Old Key West – December 2008
Port Orleans Riverside – January 2009
Wilderness Lodge/Animal Kingdom Lodge – July 2009
The Beach Club – December 2009
Pop Century – March 2010
Coronado Springs – June 2010

We were both incredibly excited for this trip because we felt like it was our first truly “us” trip in a long while that spanned a decent amount of time and didn’t include some kind of endurance event to focus on. Okay, so I’m not gonna lie... I went into this trip “hoping” there’d be a little something special, but not really expecting it. There was one small detail that tipped me off ahead of time. I ALWAYS maintain the reservations and type up a minimal list of our dining plans/confirmation #s and before I could do it for this trip, Brett told me he typed it up at work one day when he had some free time. Hmmmm... interesting. I started wondering if he’d made some changes to the dining. And then I started thinking, why would he have any reason to mess with our dining?! I tried to dismiss this thought though, mostly because I didn’t want to be disappointed if it turned out he wasn’t planning on proposing. Thankfully, he did! So let’s get to it…

 

[HollyBelle]

After breakfast we still had a bit of time to kill… so, surprise, surprise, we ended up tracking down a few more characters. When Minnie saw my ring, she asked if I would please go visit Mickey and have a heart to heart with him, seeing as how she was STILL waiting for her own…

Meeko was chasing a squirrel in circles all around Camp Minnie Mickey, seriously, I wish I had video if it, it was that funny. :lol:

As is evident in the picture above, it was extremely hot and sticky out all morning. The humidity had pretty much just soaked my hair. So we stopped for water on our way back to Asia.

 

[jesemeca]

That is pretty awesome. If I get a new Garmin one day, I might steal this idea and name it either Zaphod Beeblebrox or Ford Prefect.

I absolutely love this movie. So does my dad, he said you must be pretty cool to wanna name your Garmin after them.

 

[HollyBelle]

Luckily when we got there, Expedition Everest was up and running. This really is such a great ride and it’s too bad the yeti hasn’t been returned to his former glory.

Over at the Dino Institute we were supposed to take a tour to the early cretaceous period, but instead we were sent dangerously close to the asteroid strike that destroyed most life forms on earth!

I will honestly admit that I love the kitschy theming in the roadside treasures store. Please don’t throw things at me!!

We wanted to spend some time at the pool that afternoon so we decided to head back to the Polynesian. But before we left we had to pick up Nala for our plush Christmas tree collection. We thought she was a perfect choice, considering the safari we’d had that morning. Plus, we like picking up the more random characters every now and then because you never know when they’ll disappear, what with all the homogeny of some Disney merchandise.

 

[mouselvrmom]

Love all the great AK pictures! I agree with Tammy about the light shining through trees picture! And the tree of life one is stunning as well!

And you know that I love those character pictures! I'm glad someone got to meet lots of them this time! :lol:

 

[KnK]

We women really do pay with regards to humidity. The men and their short hair just don't understand!

 

[HollyBelle]

Considering we’d had what amounts to a late breakfast for us, we weren’t super hungry for lunch, so we decided to pick up something small at Captain Cook’s. Brett had the pepperoni flatbread:

And I had the best thing known to man! That’s right; my lunch consisted of the most delicious dole whip EVER:

So I totally knew that the Poly had dole whips, what I didn’t know is that it is set up for you to serve yourself after purchasing the cup. It was so nice not to have to stand in the sweltering line at Aloha Isle in Adventureland.

We headed back to Tuvalu and then to the Nanea Volcano Pool.

Up next... some pool time and a trip over to Epcot!

 

[HollyBelle]

That last picture is gorgeous, Holly!

Thanks, Tammy, I was really happy with that one. I'm trying to learn how to use light to my advantage.

Love all the great AK pictures! I agree with Tammy about the light shining through trees picture! And the tree of life one is stunning as well!

And you know that I love those character pictures! I'm glad someone got to meet lots of them this time! :lol:

I love all the little details at the Animal Kingdom, especially in Harambe. You know, even though the kids weren't super interested in meeting characters, you still did well enough to make a great book. Looks like they didn't always have a choice. :lol:

We women really do pay with regards to humidity. The men and their short hair just don't understand!

You've got that right, Kris!! You'd think it wouldn't affect me too much with my curls, but combine the humidity with my hatred for the hard water at the resorts and it's just a mess.

 

[DisGal]

I love all of your Poly pictures and they're making me a little sad that we decided to switch it up and try another resort this year. Thankfully I'll get to visit when we have dinner at 'Ohana and breakfast for my every trip must - tonga toast :slurp:

 

[corey154]

Congrats!!! Everytime I read your trip reports I'm always wondering when he's finally going to ask you! Now I shall wonder no more!

As always, I'm enjoying reading this tr, it does look like the parks were hot though!

Come Christmas you should post a picture of your plush tree for those of us following your trip reports as you collect them! I'd love to see what it looks like!

Take care and Congrats again!

 

[Ariel484]

...Yeah, it's a rather common misconception that we're already married. We're kinda used to it. :lol: We've been together since 2004, so we won't be having a long engagement or anything... in fact, that report isn't going to be too far off.

Oh really...hooray! :sohappy: Very exciting!

And count me as another TR fan that would love to see a picture of your Disney plush Christmas tree...

 

[HollyBelle]

I love all of your Poly pictures and they're making me a little sad that we decided to switch it up and try another resort this year. Thankfully I'll get to visit when we have dinner at 'Ohana and breakfast for my every trip must - tonga toast :slurp:

Have you stayed at the Beach Club yet, Alissa? While it's not the Polynesian, it is still a fabulous resort. The convenience of walking right into World Showcase is perfect. And you'll get the best of both worlds because then you'll be headed over to the monorail loop. :sohappy: Have fun.

Congrats!!! Everytime I read your trip reports I'm always wondering when he's finally going to ask you! Now I shall wonder no more!

As always, I'm enjoying reading this tr, it does look like the parks were hot though!

Come Christmas you should post a picture of your plush tree for those of us following your trip reports as you collect them! I'd love to see what it looks like!

Take care and Congrats again!

Thanks so much, Corey! Finally... it happened.

I never thought to post a picture of this tree I always talk about, but I'll be sure to include that in my December trip report this year. Great idea! The problem this year is going to be getting them to all fit. :lol:

Oh really...hooray! :sohappy: Very exciting!

And count me as another TR fan that would love to see a picture of your Disney plush Christmas tree...

Yep... the plan is to get hitched this upcoming March! Oh dear, I've got some planning to do.

 

[Ariel484]

Yep... the plan is to get hitched this upcoming March! Oh dear, I've got some planning to do.

That's great!

A friend of mine got married at Disney in, I believe, 2001 (I am not sure of the specific location within Disney though) and she said that the wedding people there really helped a lot with everything...if your planning experience is anything like hers was it sounds like you'll have a small army behind you! (Of course that was 9 years ago so who knows what has changed since then.)

 

[HollyBelle]

Off to the Nanea Volcano pool...

Of course we started off our afternoon at the pool by trying out the slide… Brett’s on a mission to try all the ones on property. And while the Nanea Volcano slide was a lot of fun, it didn’t dethrone Brett’s current favorite over at Kidani.

Eventually we found ourselves over near the zero entry side of the pool, where they were playing a game of Disney music trivia. As we listened we were both kinda sad we didn’t get there early enough to sign up. Being the dorks that we are, and Disney dorks at that, we LOVE trivia. We made a mental note to check the activities schedule back in the room to see if they’d be playing trivia on another afternoon during our stay.

 

[HollyBelle]

After a couple relaxing hours at the pool we decided to spend the rest of the afternoon at Epcot. On our way to the monorail we stopped by guest services in the lobby to pick up an unknown package; it was a congratulatory gift card from my parents. Thanks, mom and dad!

We took our first walk to the TTC… let me tell you, this never got old!

Jenn (mouselvrmom) had texted me while we were at the pool, and I was excited to try and find a time to meet up. So while we were on the tronorail I texted her back (from my super cool not-smart phone). Looks like things were going to work out because they were on their way to Epcot as well!

As you can see, Brett had the camera at this point… and he just kept snapping away. I’ve already deleted the bazillion pictures of me texting Jenn! I think we should enter his photo montage in a contest, what do you think?!

 

[HollyBelle]

Brett titled this next one “Holly slowing us down!”

You see, pre-DSLR, Brett and I carried absolutely NO bags into the parks. Seriously, he carried all the money, cards, and passes in his wallet and my point & shoot (even in the case) was small enough to slip in a pocket, so we NEVER had to go through bag check. I kinda miss this sometimes, but then I realize carrying a bag is a small price to pay for having Ginger.

After Spaceship Earth, we hit up MouseGear for a bit before heading to World Showcase. We noticed this new sign along the way.

In Norway we grabbed fastpasses for Maelstrom and then grabbed a snack at Kringla. Having only a dole whip for lunch will catch up with you after awhile. Brett had the espresso cheesecake and I tried the school bread that everyone raves about. At first I just thought it was okay, but with every bite it started tasting better and better. It’s definitely something I’ll try again, but I’m not quite ready to categorize it with my top picks for crave-worthy Disney snacks.

I checked in with Jenn again after we finished our snack and she and the fam were in line for Test Track, so Brett and I rode the Gran Fiesta tour and then met up with Donald Duck. “Ole! Ole! Ole!”

Back in Norway we used our Maelstrom fastpasses to get on a ride that was practically walk-on at the time!

 

[HollyBelle]

We found ourselves over at the Seas when I received another text from Jenn, turns out Test Track had taken longer than expected and they were running late to dinner. Even when you’re in the same park as someone else it can still be hard to meet up. I was hoping we’d catch up at another park in the next day or two, but unfortunately it never happened. Hopefully, there’ll be a next time though!

Pearl is in need of some serious love. Poor thing, you rarely ever see her without a kid sitting on her head or mauling her in one way or another.

 

[HollyBelle]

I’m not sure what it is about it, but I always enjoy Living with the Land, it’s so relaxing.

We had 7pm dinner reservations over at the Grand Floridian, so we decided to head back to Tuvalu to get ready.

Even though we didn’t do any e-tickets, or really much of anything for that matter, we had a great afternoon at Epcot. For the last couple of trips we’ve kind of adopted a slower pace, and I have to say I’m really happy about that. The little moments here and there that have nothing to do with rides tend to be the most memorable for me from trip to trip.

 

[WDWmazprty]

I’m not sure what it is about it, but I always enjoy Living with the Land, it’s so relaxing.

We had 7pm dinner reservations over at the Grand Floridian, so we decided to head back to Tuvalu to get ready.

Even though we didn’t do any e-tickets, or really much of anything for that matter, we had a great afternoon at Epcot. For the last couple of trips we’ve kind of adopted a slower pace, and I have to say I’m really happy about that. The little moments here and there that have nothing to do with rides tend to be the most memorable for me from trip to trip.

Wait 'til you have kids! :lol:

Great TR!! More more!

 

[HollyBelle]

We left Epcot around 6pm; however, we didn’t make it back to the room until around 6:45 due to monorail issues. In fact, for a brief moment we thought we might have to walk over to the Grand Floridian to make it in time for our reservation. Thankfully, one came by and we made it to Citricos on time!

We do at least one signature restaurant on each trip, and I think at this point we’ve tried them all, with the exception of Victoria and Albert’s which is in a class all by itself. We’d eaten at Citricos before, but I can’t remember what either of us had for dinner or which trip it was (possibly October 2007?). And that’s a big sign. When I look back on my favorite signature meals I can tell you EVERYTHING. And we even still talk about some of the meals as if we’d indulged ourselves just a couple days ago. Therefore, I have to admit I wasn’t going into this meal with as much excitement as I have on return trips to, say, the Flying Fish, Jiko, or Narcoossee’s to name a few.

When we arrived, the hostess was super excited over our engagement and provided us with “special” take-home menus. We got a good laugh out of these simply because they were designed for “Just Married” couples, not those just engaged.

We decided, what the hell, and ordered ourselves a bottle of wine. After all, we were celebrating! And our plans for the evening consisted of a romantic dinner and fireworks from the beach. A bottle of wine was a necessity. I mean, really, why not get all drunked up!?

After ordering we enjoyed our wine and admired the views of the Grand Floridian. I love it when we aren’t rushed at dinner, whether it’s due to the service or our own self-imposed urgency to get back to a park. Seeing as how we decided to dedicate the whole evening to dinner and relaxation, it was even more enjoyable.

When our meals arrived we were in foodie heaven. Brett ordered the veal shank with potato-carrot puree and quickly surmised that it was the upscale version of good ‘ol fashioned pot roast with potatoes and carrots... like the pot roast put on it's fancy pants and came to dinner! The puree was silky delicious and the veal was so tender it just slid off the bone.

I debated over a few things, but eventually went with the chicken with mushroom risotto. Now, I usually don’t order chicken when we go out to eat, because, well, it’s chicken and not all too exciting. After polling our server and another that stopped by, I decided to go with it. Boy, am I glad I did. This chicken had so much flavor and was super moist. And let’s just say the mushroom risotto was so delicious our server brought me the recipe!

Throughout dinner (when we weren’t busy oohing and ahhing over how delicious our meals were) we talked a lot about when/where we wanted to get married. At this point we were really talking specifics because the ballpark answers had already been decided upon... sometime in the spring at Disney!! And really by this point we already knew it would be at the Polynesian, so we were just throwing around different ideas. Not only was this a fantastic meal, but the conversation was so much fun. Who doesn’t want to plan a wedding at Disney World?

Nothing on the dessert menu really jumped out at us, so we decided to skip it and just finish our last glasses of wine for "dessert." So that settles it, Citricos has now earned a spot on our Disney Foodie Best of the Best list. I know we’re only ranking meals on a scale of one to four NOMS, but I gotta say, Citricos gets a bonus NOM for being an all-around perfect meal from taste to ambiance to conversation. Very rarely do we have meals that we continue to talk about as time goes on, and I feel that this will definitely be one of them.

 

[HollyBelle]

After dinner we wandered about the Grand Floridian... romanticizing over how we’d like to stay here for part of our wedding trip. I’ll be on pins and needles until the AP rates come out, because it definitely won’t be happening without those.

Back at the Polynesian we headed back to Tuvalu to change into something more comfortable. On our way we heard the unmistakable sounds of the Electrical Water Pageant. Oh no! We were hoping to be down on the beach by the time it started, but didn’t realize it made its way by the Polynesian first, so due to all the lolly-gagging about at the Grand Floridian we almost missed it. Thankfully though, we caught it from the third floor stairway at Tuvalu. This turned out to be one of my favorite moments of the trip.

We quickly changed and poured a couple beers into plastic cups to take with us down to the beach. The beach was pretty packed; however, we didn’t have any trouble finding a great little spot to watch the final showing of Summer Nightastic. Over time we’ve caught the fireworks from various locations in the park, the California Grill, Narcoossee’s, Ohana, and now the beach at the Polynesian. I have to say, the perspective from the Poly beach may just well be my favorite! The perimeter fireworks looked great from this vantage point.

I’ve got to admit, as much as I hated to do it, it was kind of freeing to leave Ginger back in the room. It allowed me to just take in the show and enjoy the moment with my love. I’m sounding a bit lovestruck, aren’t I? Well, I blame it on all the beer and wine we consumed!!

We ended the evening with a dip in the quiet pool. I still can’t believe the Polynesian doesn’t have a hot tub... blasphemous. Overall it was a fabulous night. I’m really glad we made a conscious effort to enjoy our evening OUT of the parks and not constantly focus on what we may be missing in the parks. This evening, in particular, really made me appreciate our deluxe accommodations. There were so many moments throughout the trip where I kept telling myself to soak it all up and enjoy it because staying at the Polynesian wasn’t going to become a regular experience for us. This trip was special and I really wanted to make sure I savored all the good parts! Plus, the parks will still be there when we’re back to slumming it at the value resorts! :ROFLOL:


Up next... morning at the Magic Kingdom!