Trip Report Time for Flowers! Flower & Food (Garden) March 2017

Hello and welcome to my trip report! My hubby (Brad) and I returned a little over a week ago from a quick trip to the World to celebrate Flower and Garden, which we refer to sometimes as Flower and Food. It was my husband's first time at F&G, but I had gone a few times solo and we have done Food and Wine. So he was interested in how this festival would be.

So here's a little quick info:
Who: hubby (Brad) and myself (Amy)
When: March 3-March 6
Resort: All Star Movies (cheapest option, and all we need is a place to sleep)

Some tags to people who have read some of my other reports (I know I will forget someone, but everyone is welcome!): @figmentfan423 @Gabe1 @donaldtoo @betty rose @PacNWTigger @Tuvalu @fractal @JenniferS @bee @BuddyThomas @Mr Ferret 88 @MouseDreaming @PUSH @Wrangler-Rick @MOXOMUMD @MinnieM123 @Songbird76 @Cesar R M @prfctlyximprct @93boomer @Courtney6682 @MySmallWorldof4

Okay....Ready now....Here We GO......

So the vacation actually started on March 2, but late. I had parent-teacher conferences that night and our flight was early Friday morning so we decided to stay the night up in Minneapolis so we wouldn't have to get up so early. We only live about an hour- to hour 15 minutes away from the airport but we wanted to be close to the airport for that early flight. So when conferences got done at 8pm my husband was waiting outside the door ready to pick me up.

We spent the night in a Homewood Suites and connected to it was a Chevy's restaurant. All during conferences (which I only met with 8 parents that night in a span of 3 hours and I have 150 students) I was thinking about a margarita at Chevy's. So what did we do once we checked in? That's right headed over to Chevy's, it was a little after 9pm by then so at least we got late night happy hour! We also got their sampler platter which was pretty good.

With my margarita!
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After margaritas we went back to our room and watched the 10 pm news for a couple minutes and then headed to bed. Our flight was leaving a 6am so we were going to be up early!

Our journey to the airport was pretty uneventful (thank goodness) and security wasn't too bad, about a 15 minute wait. I had bought us mini-muffins from our grocery store at home so we had those and I had a coffee that was finally cool enough to drink once we started boarding!

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If you have flown Spirit before you'll know that they have their Big Seats Up Front for an extra charge. I think that charge is worth it for extra space, so I booked those seats for us. The flight was good we both slept a little, read magazines, and I listened to Disney podcasts.

Goodbye Minneapolis!
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Somewhere between Minnesota and Florida

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Hello Orlando! I was able to spot the Swan & Dolphin and Spaceship Earth this time from the air. I was pretty excited about it but I don't think it really shows up in my pictures.
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When we landed at MCO I saw a really big Air Force plane and I thought to myself "That's weird and so big. Hey wait I've seen that type of plane before when I saw..." and then I saw it....Air Force One. Our president was also visiting Florida. I'm not going to get political, but I think it is pretty cool seeing Air Force One. The only cooler Presidential experience I had was when I was near the Washington Monument and I was facing the White House and Marine One rose up off the lawn and flew right over my head. I saw AF1 before when we landed in Minneapolis a few years ago and it was exciting then (except for the 2 hour traffic jam we had because President Obama was touring the city) and I was excited this time too but now worried about the traffic. I had a fast pass to get to. Luckily this time we didn't have bad traffic as the president had already left the airport area.

Anyway, we got to our gate and because we were in the front we were off and to Magical Express pretty quick. I was a little nervous about the wait for ME especially after some people's recent experiences (@Tuvalu ) but as we arrived it wasn't bad at all. The total time of check-in, boarding, and leaving was about 10 minutes. Excellent!

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We have arrived HOME!
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Walt even welcomed us on the METV!
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Songbird76

Well-Known Member
You should! This year is the 25th anniversary. If I lived a couple hours train ride away I'd probably be there every weekend. Which it is probably a good thing I don't live that close to any Disney park. :joyfull:
Train transportation is ridiculously expensive though. If we were going to go, we'd either drive ourselves or we'd book a bus trip. I looked at prices yesterday, and it's not really doable this year. Not if we're going to Dublin in September.
 

betty rose

Well-Known Member
Yeah, I don't mind the values. They aren't the most posh, but the price allows me to get there often. And most of the time I spend in the room is with my eyes closed anyway!





Thanks for following along! It would be cool to see the Pope, I'm not Catholic either, but sometimes there are things in this world that are just cool to see and might be a once in a lifetime types of things.
Thanks for the tag. I'm loving the report and enjoy another margarita, for me!
 

betty rose

Well-Known Member
:hilarious:

Fly Jet Blue like I do. You can eat all the donuts you want, and they won't charge you extra for weight! :joyfull:

As for the comment @ajrwdwgirl shared about Delta, I also stopped flying them years ago for the same reason. They kept changing flight times if you booked a few months ahead. Found it really frustrating, and finally switched over to Jet Blue and like them much better.
United does the changing too. But, we do get a notice.
 

ajrwdwgirl

Premium Member
Original Poster
I agree with you re: sparkling water.

Enjoying all the topiary and floral photos!

Thanks!

Good for him, stopping to smell the ''roses''! Something I need to keep in mind for my August trip!

We have been making ourselves slow down on our most recent trips, to proverbially and literally stop and smell the roses. It is great.

Have caught up on your report. We just got back recently from Flower and Garden as well. Looking forward to more of your report and pictures!

Awesome! Thanks for following.

Thanks for the tag. I'm loving the report and enjoy another margarita, for me!

Thanks! I will, there will be a margarita coming up in the report soon!
 

ajrwdwgirl

Premium Member
Original Poster
United does the changing too. But, we do get a notice.

I have a trip coming up on Delta for April and they changed the departure time to 10 minutes later. It isn't that much of a difference but I never got an email about it I only found out because I logged in to see how many air miles I have. It wasn't a major difference and not one that I would need to change my flight over, but it is still annoying.
 

ajrwdwgirl

Premium Member
Original Poster
After our tour on Frozen we headed to China. Our goal was to wander through World Showcase to see the topiaries, but we were not going to eat any more at the F&G booths because we had a 5:30 pm ADR at Yachtsman Steakhouse.

There was a couple cute pandas but only this one will upload.
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And a dragon.
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I've been wanting to see the Chinese acrobats for some time now, but the timing just never worked so I was pretty happy when I heard the introduction for them. The Acrobats had quite a large crowd, but we managed to get a decent view point. The show was pretty neat, I recommend seeing it if you are in the area.
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These two were on skates, and did some crazy stuff. It moved pretty quick and I knew my camera wouldn't get a decent pic so I just watched.
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ajrwdwgirl

Premium Member
Original Poster
As we were leaving China we heard an announcement that the bridge between China and the African Outpost would be raised. We made it across before we had to wait for this to go by.
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Once in Germany we said hello to the Snow White & the 7 Dwarfs topiaries and did a fun photo pass.

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Once in Italy we saw some pups...Lady and the Tramp!
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Brad wanted to go see the Smokehouse, even though we weren't eating. He was pretty excited to eventually eat there.
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As we were walking to the International Gateway we had to walk through France, and we noticed that at the slushy stand there was no line just two people finishing their order. There is always a line there! So we decided to have a pre-dinner drink.

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Grand Marnier Slush? Yes please!
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ajrwdwgirl

Premium Member
Original Poster
We were a little early for our Yachtsman reservation but just by a few minutes so we checked in and soon we were seated.
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A look at the restaurant from my left.
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The ceiling nearby, I think it is lovely.
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Soon the sourdough rolls and the onion pull aparts arrived with salted butter and roasted garlic. Yum!
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The onion roll and my Sam Adams seasonal beer. Brad surprisingly had a Mai Tai but I don't think I have a picture of that. He strayed from his normal rum and coke!
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My steak: rib-eye with malt vinegar fries
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Brad's Kansas strip steak
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Brad wanted the caramelized onions and I wanted the truffle mac and cheese. The onions were fine, but they didn't add anything to our steaks. The truffle mac and cheese however.....is so divine. I could probably eat a vat of it. Maybe even a vat and another one after that!
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A close up of heaven....
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ajrwdwgirl

Premium Member
Original Poster
Dinner at the Yachtsman was expensive, but I figure when everything tasted that fantastic, it is worth it. We passed up dessert there because I wanted to try something else nearby.....

Ample Hills Creamery. With all the stuff @Tuvalu has shared, I just had to check it out. Plus being from the Dairy State I must have ice cream. I loved sampling the ice creams ahead of time. Two of the ice creams in this picture ended up as my favorite: Oatmeal Lace and the View.
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Very fun murals inside
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Of course we couldn't choose just one flavor so we got the sampler to share. As I said my favorite was the oatmeal lace, which totally surprised me as I usually like chocolate above anything else. Fortunately, hubby did not like it at all so I got all of it. He ended up liking the pecan one and I didn't so much, so he ate most of that one.
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I also got a little too much sun today, so ice cream was sure to cool me down.
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What a great view to enjoy sweets with my sweetie!
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ajrwdwgirl

Premium Member
Original Poster
After Ample Hills ice cream, we headed over to the Studios to see the Star Wars fireworks. We ended up walking. Both of us saw a boat at the Yacht Club but we decided not to wait to see if it was an Epcot or a Studios boat. It turned out to be a Studios boat, as it passed us when we had about 3 minutes left to walk. But we didn't want to chance waiting as we had another time and missed the fireworks.

Anyway, we found a decent spot for the show. And sure enough once the show started some kids went up on their parents shoulders. :mad: I don't mind if a parent holds their kid on their back so the kids head is even with their eyes but the shoulders thing is just insensitive. My dad never put us on his shoulders. I remember as a kid barely seeing anything of Illuminations because of all the tall people. Anyway...getting off track....

Here's a few shots of the Star Wars fireworks.
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And just a shot then as we left, kind of taken on the fly so a little blurry....
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So that is the end of our first day. Flight down, Epcot, Yachtsman and Star Wars fireworks. We packed a lot in and we were ready for bed but more importantly ready for more tomorrow!
 

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