Trip Report Finally Back in Our Happy Place. A Three Week Trip With a Cruise Included

We’ve been back for just over a week from what was a wonderful three weeks. There were a few hiccups, but for the most part Disney World was just as we remembered it.

This trip was me and my two youngest daughters, Alice (18) and Lexi (15)

We stayed at Pop Century from July 7th-20th, then sailed on the Disney Magic from July 20th-25th, then French Quarter for the last three nights, July 25th-28th. For the Pop Century part of the trip we had the UK 14 day park tickets which included the waterparks.

 

[MotherofaPrincessLover]

The Stormtrooper room is so amazing and everyone just rushes through it. I always try to linger in there a little bit but it seems like even the CMs just want you to head straight through it.

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Rise has truly become one of my favorite experiences! It's so immersive that it seems "different" every time to me. I'll never forget the first time I rode it, and when I realized what was happening in the escape pod, I freaked out I was geeking so bad.

The first time I rode I didn’t quite get what was happening with the escape pod part. I think I was just so overwhelmed by the whole experience and everything happens so quickly. I think you notice more details the more times you ride it

The Stormtrooper room is so amazing and everyone just rushes through it. I always try to linger in there a little bit but it seems like even the CMs just want you to head straight through it.

The sheer scale of the stormtrooper room just amazed me the first time, even though I’d seen photos it doesn’t quite prepare you for it. I was determined to get some photos this time after being so rushed before, I just let people go ahead of us so we could take our time a bit.

I’m taking my oldest daughter on this ride for the first time in November, I’m very excited to see her reaction.

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Saturday 12th July (cont)

After my nap and the girls relaxing in the room for a while we headed out to Magic Kingdom for the evening. I don’t have very good notes for this evening so I’m not quite sure of everything we did, I do remember that I was able to book more Lightning Lanes but they did involve some crisscrossing the park.

Through Adventureland towards our first LL, Pirates

We look thrilled to be on this ride , at least the lady behind us looks like she’s happy

Our next LL was for Buzz, so we crossed the park. The hub was quite quiet so I managed to get a quick photo

While crossing the hub I thought I saw someone I recognised from these forums, but I wasn’t quite sure so didn’t say anything

My spacegun was working properly this time so a slightly more respectable score

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Saturday 12th July (cont)

Then back across the park for our next LL, Haunted Mansion.

The walkway through the castle was open so we went that way.

Disney ducks

In the stretching room I saw the person that I thought I’d recognised when I’d walked through the hub earlier. I’m pretty sure that it was @tonystark, particularly as she was standing right by the exit door and was one of the first out of the room. It was definitely someone who knew the ride well

This time I did not try to take photos, still didn’t look in the right direction

Lexi did a bit better

Then Columbia Harbour House for dinner, but I only took this photo

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Saturday 12th July (cont)

I’d managed to get Lightning Lanes for Space Mountain for the girls and Little Mermaid for me, I’d wanted Pooh but there were none left and I didn’t want to wait 30 minutes.

So back across the park again.

While I was waiting for the girls, I managed to fiddle faddle a LL for Jungle Cruise after our Tiana’s one. I’d been trying for this earlier but there hadn’t been any availability.

As Tiana’s was completely the opposite side of the park to where we were, I then had the brilliant idea to take the train there. I don’t know why I thought to do this, it completely slipped my mind that the train was only going as far as Main Street. We’d already walked there before I realised, but we had time and it’s a nice journey so just decided to wait

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Saturday 12th July (cont)

I love Magic Kingdom when the sun starts to go down

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Saturday 12th July (cont)

The way Minnie looks at Roy

We were just taking our time getting to our next LL

Waved to Pooh and friends

I’m sure we’d already been this way (so much criss crossing)

One of our favourites, so a bit sad it was closed

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Saturday 12th July (cont)

Next up was Tiana’s

We were riding just as the sun was setting which made the outside part of the ride very pretty. Lexi noticed that one of the young women in front of us was taking photos of the sunset and being a little bit obsessed with sunset photos she asked her after the ride if she would airdrop the photos. So these are the photos of a nice stranger

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Saturday 12th July (cont)

After Tiana’s was our last LL, Jungle cruise, where we had one of the most enthusiastic skippers ever. There were lots of arm gestures and moving about but sadly her microphone wasn’t working and we were at the back of the boat so hardly heard anything

The girls wanted to watch Happily Ever After with a view of the projections which we’d never done before. None of us wanted to be in the crowds of the hub so we thought we’d try watching from Town Square, hopefully this would also mean we could make a quick exit afterwards.

On our way

We had a little while to wait so passed the time with a treat

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Saturday 12th July (cont)

We had quite a good view, and the people around us were quite spaced out so we really enjoyed watching from Town Square.

Most of my photos have this guy’s head in them, he was further away than it looks and I could see ok

About half way through a family of three arrived and stood between me and the people in front with a small child on the dad’s shoulders. I accept as a short person I’m not always going to have the best view of things but I wasn’t happy about this. They’d already tried to stand in front of the family next to us and been asked to move so I politely asked them to either take the child down or move. They moved.

We happily enjoyed the rest of the fireworks and were not quite so teary as a few nights earlier. We did sing along again as we were leaving.

I was right about being able to make a quick exit from our viewing spot, in fact I think this takes the record for the fastest park exit we’ve ever had. There was a bus loading as we arrived at our spot and we were the last three on board. The fireworks had started at 10 pm and I was in the room and showered by 11.

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Sunday 13th July

This was supposed to be our first park day without LLMP but I caved and bought it that morning. My justification was that we were going to Animal Kingdom first which was the cheapest, we were planning to hop to Epcot and we’d had quite good luck so far at getting extra LLs. I managed to get an early Expedition Everest, a 10.40 safari and a 2pm Na’vi. I also paid for LLSP for Guardians that evening, because I didn’t want to queue for an hour.

We were a bit later heading out than our earlier AK day but were still at the park just after 8am.

No park entrance photos so some old ones

We took our time on the way in

He is chonky

Disney ducklings

We took the main route in, not the secret passageway, this time

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Sunday 13th July (cont)

The girls were still interacting with the statues, they’d started playing the game on the Play Disney Parks app where you have to collect all the statues

We headed over to dinosaur which was a walk on

Then Expedition Everest which only had a short wait so we queued for it first

This is freaky

First time round, I can just see Lexi behind us but I can’t find her actual photo

Then we used our LL

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Sunday 13th July (cont)

A snack stop next

We’d planned on watching Festival of the Lion King later that morning, but as we finished our snacks we realised we might be able to make the 10am showing if there were still seats left.

We thought we’d be at the back, but they had just starting filling up the leftover ground level seats. I’d never been this close to the show before

I did have a few heads blocking some of my view, but I get that wherever I sit. Short people problems

The monkeys, the fire juggler, the birds, I can never decide which is my favourite part. I love this show so much, the cast are so incredibly talented

 

[littleroo]

I love The Festival of the Lion King, as well and all of the characters, but if I were forced to vote, I would say monkeys

 

[cgersic]

The whole Festival of the Lion King show is my favorite part Tears in my eyes the whole time because it's just soooo entertaining! Love the throwback AK photos too- the face behind the map

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Sunday 13th July (cont)

Next was our safari LL. Surprisingly the animals were more active than our previous visit when we were earlier in the morning

Except Alice’s favourite dogs, they were still taking it easy

The baby elephant was very playful

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Sunday 13th July (cont)

A few more safari photos

After the safari we attempted to animal watch around Gorilla Falls but it was far too busy so we just walked through quickly. From what I could see, the gorillas didn’t look very active

Lexi posing for her instagram photo

You could just about see a rainbow in the waterfall

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Sunday 13th July (cont)

We were very hot and sweaty at this point, really feeling the need for some ac, so decided on Rafiki’s Planet Watch next.

Hidden Mickey

Not so hidden Mickey

We spent some time wandering around, I do find it all very interesting

I sent my children ahead so they could warn me it there were any

I’m not scared of eight legged creatures though, I quite enjoy watching them

Spoiler: Photo of mr eight legs

 

[MinnieM123]

We were very hot and sweaty at this point, really feeling the need for some ac, so decided on Rafiki’s Planet Watch next.

Rafiki's is one of my favorite attractions, and yet one that doesn't get the crowds as some others in AK. I recall quite a few years ago, that I just happened to be there at a random time, to watch the vet and technicians remove something from a tiger's paw (tiger was under anesthesia on the table). The operating room was behind a glass wall, so that guests could observe the procedure. I was in awe of the mammoth size of him. It was fascinating watching the entire vet staff work their magic.

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Rafiki's is one of my favorite attractions, and yet one that doesn't get the crowds as some others in AK. I recall quite a few years ago, that I just happened to be there at a random time, to watch the vet and technicians remove something from a tiger's paw (tiger was under anesthesia on the table). The operating room was behind a glass wall, so that guests could observe the procedure. I was in awe of the mammoth size of him. It was fascinating watching the entire vet staff work their magic.

I would have loved to see something like that. We’ve been there a lot over the years but never seen any procedures being done