Trip Report A Full Moon March Disney Trip

Hi Everyone!!

If you can read this, thank the Phoenicians. We just returned from our Disney trip and I'm really feeling the Blues now. It was an amazing and very different trip than we've had in the past. Here we go!!

The Cast:
Mom
Alex
And me! (Donna)
Epcot trio.jpg


When: February 28-March 7
Where: The POLYNESIAN Villas (!!!!)

This trip starts with Alex and I getting to the airport around 2pm for our 5pm flight. Since we had so much time to kill, we decided to go get some food! I didn't take food photos, but I got this great shot of Alex with our beers (Bud Light for me, Sam Adams for Alex)

Airport beer.jpg


We actually took a long time eating (that plus the place was PACKED slowed us down). We finally get over to our gate at 4:30 and they're already almost done boarding! By the time we get on board and take off, we've left a good 15 minutes early. Woohoo! I'll take an extra 15 minutes in Florida :D. We had a nice and uneventful flight to Orlando, we landed around 7:15pm (almost 30 minutes early!) and then we just sat on the tarmac...:oops:. There went my extra 15 minutes :in pain:.

Next we went and grabbed our luggage (which took FOREVER) then went outside to try to find our ride.
Magical- not yet.jpg


Nope, not yet! But SOON!

After trekking around outside with our luggage for about 20 minutes, we finally found our shuttle. Glorious air-conditioned shuttle! Then we headed to our first hotel of the trip: Comfort Suites Orlando Airport. We did this since Mom isn't flying in until the next day and I found an amazing deal on flights for this night. Airport hotel with free shuttle it was! And even with the additional hotel expense, it was STILL cheaper than if we flew in the next day.

A 10 minute shuttle ride later, we arrived (photo borrowed from Google Images):
Comfort suites ext.jpg


We checked in quickly and went up to our room.
Comfort Suite couch.jpg


Obviously, there was more to the room, but I was tired from traveling and we were on a mission!

Once we dropped off our luggage and gave the room a once-over (it was nice, not anything fancy, but just fine for 1 night) we went back downstairs and called an Uber. Where did we go?! Walmart! We needed supplies and since we weren't going directly to Disney we opted out of the Garden Grocer option and went to Walmart instead. There we got beer, wine, snacks, and these babies (also another Google photo).
Entemanns.png


So apparently, the Walmart we chose to shop (was closest to our hotel) is kind of in a bad area. As mentioned in the title to this report, there was a full moon (or mostly full) for the entire length of our trip. Let's just say there were a lot of interesting people at this Walmart after dark. Our Uber driver back to the hotel helped us forget by being super bubbly and extremely chatty. Her name was Jessica and she was great, but never took a breath! :joyfull::hilarious:

We returned to our room where we ate a Walmart Deli dinner, had a beer (Bud Light), and went to bed. We're going to DISNEY tomorrow!
 

John Dulmage

Active Member
Are there ceiling fans in the villas? I'm thinking I may have to invest in a sound machine for my trip or I might have troubles sleeping.
We just downloaded a free "White Noise" app on our phone and used that to block out sounds - mainly for the kids. Depending on what you like, you can either have straight "white noise" or there are options for ambient sounds (like rain, or beach waves, etc.)
 

MotherofaPrincessLover

Well-Known Member
We just downloaded a free "White Noise" app on our phone and used that to block out sounds - mainly for the kids. Depending on what you like, you can either have straight "white noise" or there are options for ambient sounds (like rain, or beach waves, etc.)
Do you have a smart phone or an iPad or kindle? Tons of free sound machine apps!
Thanks for the idea.
 

DonnaOnTheRocks

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Are there ceiling fans in the villas? I'm thinking I may have to invest in a sound machine for my trip or I might have troubles sleeping.
We just downloaded a free "White Noise" app on our phone and used that to block out sounds - mainly for the kids. Depending on what you like, you can either have straight "white noise" or there are options for ambient sounds (like rain, or beach waves, etc.)
Do you have a smart phone or an iPad or kindle? Tons of free sound machine apps!
Thanks for the idea.
No ceiling fans in the Villas, we used a Youtube video with white noise. It was a 10 hour video and worked very well. And honestly, it wasn't That loud with the balcony door closed and the curtains closed. We usually kept the balcony doors open while we were up, which made it super loud in the room.
 

DonnaOnTheRocks

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Alright, I have time for 1 more quick update. Before I do, I forgot to mention that during our trip, Alex decided he would be the crowd navigator. Meaning he would make a path for my mom and I through the crowds to make it easier for us to stay together... this was fine and all, but Alex doesn't know where anything is in Disney :banghead:. So our first day in MK I would have to constantly yell to him which direction to go or he would just go the wrong way completely. Well by our Epcot day I was tired of yelling to him, so I just started letting him go :joyfull:. My mom followed me since she knew I knew where I was going, lol it made for a funny (for me and mom) time at Alex's expense.

Anyway, back to it!
Friday, March 2 Continued.

We made our way over to Italy for lunch! On the way to check in, Alex decided he wanted to be a model :joyfull:

Epcot model.jpg
Epcot alex.jpg


Soon we were checking in at.... Via Napoli! This was actually my first time here, so I was very excited to try it!

This was actually a last minute reservation. Originally I had booked Le Cellier (also new for us) but about a week out I double checked the menu and they got rid of the lunch prix fixe menu! :cautious::cautious::cautious:. We're paying out of pocket, and we're not big eaters, so there was no way we were going to go there without that special menu. So I was able to snag this late lunch, works for me!

We were seated fairly quickly in the back of the room towards the kitchen. This was our first drink around the world and I went with the Strawberry Limoncello
Epcot drink.jpg


:hungry::hungry::hungry::hungry::hungry: This was SO GOOD!

Mom had a glass of wine and Alex had a beer (I think). Our server was a little weird when ordering her wine. The one my mom had her eye on was German, so the server kept saying he couldn't recommend that one because it's not Italian... he insisted she try another (Italian) kind. She tried the Italian one.. and hated it, so he finally brought her the German wine, which she loved. It was just really weird. Besides that, our server was nice enough. Then it was time for pizza! I feel like we waited a really long time for these, but we were starving so that didn't help. We couldn't all agree on 1 kind, so we foolishly ordered 3 separate individual pizzas.

Epcot pizza.jpg

Mom ordered the margarita and Alex ordered the melon/proscutto one. I ordered the pepperoni

Epcot my pizza.jpg


This was SO GOOD! But I really should have split one with my mom. I ate 2 slices of this and my mom ate 2 slices of hers :hilarious:

Alex liked his, but he said the flavor combo was a little weird. But the proscuitto was very good! We ended up getting to-go boxes for our leftovers.

All-in-all, we all liked Via Napoli. That strawberry limoncello might have been my favorite drink of the trip and the pizza was very good. But I will not rush to get back. There are too many others I still need to try!

After lunch, I was on a mission to see my favorite Disney show... Voices of Liberty! So we booked it next door to the American pavilion and inside. Alex had a beer in his hand, so they wouldn't let him in. Mom found a seat on a bench and I found a spot on the floor with all the other kids. :joyfull:



I didn't film the whole thing, but they did weird songs this time. The last song they did was Old McDonald with all of the animal noises. It was cool (and the animal voices were dead on) but it was just more aimed towards kids I guess. I like it better when they sing classic Disney songs. Oh well, it was still a great show:inlove:

After this, we had no real plans for the rest of the day. So we wandered around World Showcase, my Favorite kind of Disney Wandering :cat:
We went right from the American pavilion and continued that way passing Italy again. Alex made some photogenic friends.

epcot ducks.jpg


And we stopped for another drink
Epcot beer.jpg


I'm pretty sure this is a mixed drink from Japan and a Sopporo Beer from Japan... but we had several more so who knows??

Before we got to Norway, I checked the MDE app and Frozen had a posted 45 minute wait! I haven't been on this yet and haven't wanted to use a precious FP on it. Of course, when we get up to the line the wait time changed to 60 minutes:banghead:. We decided to continue our wandering/window shopping instead.

Epcot troll.jpg


We got to Mexico and went on the ride, I love this ride and mom said it was almost like being on Small World so she was happy. I took a few super blurry and dark photos I won't bore you with :happy:

We then made a full loop back to Canada and wandered over to the UK where I found this!!!!!!
Epcot dumbo.jpg


THAT IS A DUMBO TEAPOT!!! I was SO close to buying this for myself, but I held back. Dumbo is my favorite :inlove::inlove::inlove::inlove::inlove::inlove:

I know we got beer from Canada and beer from UK, but I don't remember which kinds, they were all very good though :hilarious: Most helpful TR of all time :banghead:

Epcot at night.jpg


Next up- finishing up the night
 

slipperalwaysfits

Well-Known Member
We LOVE Via NApoli!!! Glad you enjoyed the pizza! I think sometimes it's hard to understand EPCOT WS staff. I love the internship program Epcot has for the students and the students are so friendly when I stop to talk to them!! I have a hearing loss, so I have to work really hard to understand native English speakers. Speaking a second language takes a lot of work and I commend them for it, even if it makes interacting more difficult sometimes.

I MUST TRY THE STRAWBERRY LEMONCELLO!!!!!!!!!:jawdrop::jawdrop::jawdrop::jawdrop:

Voices of Liberty with OLD MACDONALD???? Sounds hilarious!

Sorry about FROZEN, someday, the crowd will be down and it will be worth it. We waited about 45 minutes for it one day and it was cute to see.
 

amjt660

Well-Known Member
I might be in the minority but I do not need to know every type of drink you had
You had a nice leisurely walk and enjoyed a few refreshments
Sounds great to me!!

Max
 

DonnaOnTheRocks

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
We LOVE Via NApoli!!! Glad you enjoyed the pizza! I think sometimes it's hard to understand EPCOT WS staff. I love the internship program Epcot has for the students and the students are so friendly when I stop to talk to them!! I have a hearing loss, so I have to work really hard to understand native English speakers. Speaking a second language takes a lot of work and I commend them for it, even if it makes interacting more difficult sometimes.

I MUST TRY THE STRAWBERRY LEMONCELLO!!!!!!!!!:jawdrop::jawdrop::jawdrop::jawdrop:

Voices of Liberty with OLD MACDONALD???? Sounds hilarious!

Sorry about FROZEN, someday, the crowd will be down and it will be worth it. We waited about 45 minutes for it one day and it was cute to see.
I love the internship program too! And YES the strawberry lemoncello!!!! It's SO GOOD! My favorite drink of the trip! And I love Voices of Liberty, but I like it best when they sing Disney songs. I think they were just playing to the younger audience and it was definitely a different experience! We were going to wait 45 minute for Frozen, but we weren't up for 60, one day I'll get on it. Hopefully next trip!
 

DonnaOnTheRocks

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Friday, March 2 Continued

We ended up in Canada, looking for a spot for Illuminations. We found a spot just up the stairs of the Canada pavilion. I left mom and Alex and ran back over to the Refreshment Port for a.... CRONUT! Sorry, no photo. If you haven't had a cronut yet, I highly recommend them! So flaky and covered in cinnamon :hungry::hungry::hungry: Of course I shared with mom and Alex :cautious:. I sat on the ground in our spot and ate the remainder of my cronut while we watched this VERY intoxicated woman try to stay standing...and awake. She was leaning against the wall and looked like she was about to pass out, then she would snap her head back up at the last second and grab one of 2 beers in front of her. I'm sure she didn't feel great the next morning! It was entertaining to say the least.

After a rest, we decided we wanted to try to find a better spot to watch the show, possibly closer to the front of Epcot. It was crowded this evening and we didn't want to deal with the crowds. Some photos from our walk

Epcot at night.jpg
Epcot butterfly topiary.jpg
Epcot night.jpg


We walked over toward where the Illumination FP area usually is and there was a stage there :banghead:. It was also Really crowded, like more crowded than when we were walking around the countries. After a good 15 minutes of searching for a spot, we gave up. We were tired and decided we could try to watch some of the show from the Monorail platform. So we walked that way, and I realized we still had a FP for Spaceship Earth since it was down earlier. It had about a 15 minute standby, but we figured we might as well use the FP before we head out. So we scanned our bands, waited all of 5 minutes, and we were on!

I LOVE SE! It's one of my favorite rides, mostly because I memorized most of the narration. But this time, it stopped about 4 times and the 3rd time it was a good 15 minutes that we sat there. We watched employees running around too, so it took a lot of the fun out of it. Hopefully they do a refurb on this soon, looks like it needs it!

After our longer than necessary ride through time, we headed out. One last photo on the way :inlove::inlove::inlove:
Epcot SE.jpg


When we got to the top of the monorail platform, Illuminations started and we could see some of the higher fireworks. But this is NOT an ideal spot to watch it. I wish we stayed to watch as it's my favorite night time show, but I was happy to be sitting on the monorail without 50000 other people jostling.

We got off at the TTC and made the quick and easy walk back to Moorea. The Water Pageant was in full, loud swing. We each grabbed our beverage of choice and we relaxed and put our feet up on our balcony.
Poly view at night.jpg


I still can't get over this view.:inlove:

Next up- Saturday!
 

DonnaOnTheRocks

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Day 3- Saturday, March 3

So when planning this trip, I remembered that the last time my mom and I came to Disney (we did a Thursday to Monday then too) we were absolutely exhausted and worn out by Saturday. So I decided to give us a rest day this trip, especially staying in this amazing resort, I wanted to actually spend some time there. When I told my mom and Alex before the trip that this would be a rest day/no park day, they kind of balked at the idea. My mom was like, what would we do instead? Alex was fine with it, but he suggested we take the morning off and then go to a park at night. That way the day wasn't "wasted". So I conceded to a late lunch and an evening at a park.

We all slept in a bit this day, but we were all up by 8ish. I drank half a pot of coffee :hungry: and mostly just relaxed on the balcony, appreciating the view and our trip in general.
Poly view.jpg


We were planning on a pool day today, but the weather was not cooperating. The sun was nice and warm, but it was windy (from the Nor Easter going on up north) so this did not make the best day off. So we just lounged and relaxed until it was time for lunch. I was very much looking forward to this ADR and soon we were on our way!

We walked to the Great Ceremonial House and hopped on the monorail to...
GF ext.jpg

GF int.jpg


The Grand Floridian!

I really love visiting the GF, but Alex and I both agreed we wouldn't actually want to stay here. It just isn't our style and it feels stuffy. We much preferred the Poly and it's laid-back feel. Anyway, we were a bit early for lunch so we decided to take a quick walk around the grounds. We also saw 2 different bridal parties and their families, it must have been a busy day at the wedding pavilion. We walked down by the water and got a different angle to the view from our room.

GF view.jpg


Do you see that sky?! It was a Gorgeous, yet breezy day in Disney World.

After our walk, we were still pretty early for our lunch ADR. We checked in anyway and were seated almost immediately! We were about 30 minutes early, so I didn't expect that, but they were not very busy. Where did we go? Grand Floridian Café, of course! After so many rave reviews from @blgauger I just had to try this one. Since we were staying so close and took the morning off, this seemed the perfect spot for lunch.

Our server was very nice and helpful, sorry I cannot remember his name. Alex said he was weird, but I think he was just a little over the top. First we ordered drinks:
GF cafe drinks.jpg


Alex had a beer and I had a classic mimosa :hungry::hungry::hungry::hungry::hungry::hungry::hungry:
Mom passed on the alcohol this early in the day. Then I got my first course:

GF cafe soup.jpg

French onion soup. THIS WAS SO GOOD :hungry::hungry::hungry::hungry::hungry::hungry:

And since it was brunch, we all ordered breakfast for our meals. I know French onion soup and breakfast don't really go together, but I couldn't pass up the soup. And I'm glad I didn't!

Mom ordered a cheese omelet
GF Cafe mom.jpg


She said it was very good and kept her full most of the day!

Alex got the steak and eggs
GF Cafe Alex.jpg


He said it was ok, but then later on in the trip he said this was the meal he liked the least :confused:. He said the steak wasn't cooked or seasoned well at all.

And I ordered the French toast
GF Cafe toast.jpg


OMG! These were AMAZING! That little cup next to the syrup? That's "Madagascar Vanilla Bean-Butter"... that stuff alone was worth the price of the meal... if it wasn't butter based, I might have eaten it with a spoon :hilarious::hungry:. For some reason I only eat French toast when I'm on vacation, and this was definitely a good time to do so! If you ever get a chance to eat here, I highly suggest you try the French toast!

GF Cafe.jpg


Alex's full face :cat: BTW, that's my favorite shirt ever! Honestly, have you ever seen anything better than that??

After lunch we headed out, heading to our park for the night. I will update more tomorrow!
 

Register on WDWMAGIC. This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.

Back
Top Bottom