Siiiigggghhhhh, well I guess I waited long enough to do this mess. There were a few reasons for that. 1. We thought 2 of our friends were going to be able to go. I am pretty retentive so I would have wanted my exact plans to be up. They are not able to join now so I am just going to do it now. 2. Just did not want to do it way to early and change 239,398,365 things like I always do. 3. There is another couple that wants to come down for a few days but I am not focusing on that BS anymore. I just want to have a good time with my girl, my boo, my shorty, my fiancé…Colleen. Haha!
We are going August 26th through September 7th. We are staying at The All Star Sports Resort. This is our normal spot. We love it here. We tried POP Century last trip and hated pretty much everything about the place. The ONLY good thing was the large café…BUT what good is that large café when it’s all closed at like 8pm? I’m not gonna sit here and ramble about POP…but never again will I stay there unless it is free. We love to stay at Sports because it has everything we “need”. Bed, Shower, Pool, Toilet, Football Field. Don’t get me wrong would I love The Grand Floridian, or Port Orleans as well? Yes. Would I ever be there long enough to enjoy it and get my worth out of it? No. We get “home” anywhere from 11:00pm to 1:30am and we catch football, swim, shower and go to bed. Wake up, shower, and go to the parks around 11:00am. No need to spend an extra $100-$300 just for that. When we are older and not on the go every minute…that is when you will find us in the Mods, and Deluxes.
This is also the first time we will be in the parks beyond midnight. It’s only till 1:00am but an extra hour is better than no extra hour! Haha. We are both pretty pumped about that.
So with that said here is a look at your cast for this trip.
First there is Colleen.
A food eater. She eats anything, but hardly finishes it. She is in HR, went to Penn State. She is a mother of 1 Boxer Dog, Gracey (after Gracey Manor of course).
Then there is me, John.
The hockey player, the baseball player. The sarcastic one. The father to Gracey our Boxer. The one who warns you “Do not take me serious unless we are doing something competitive…then I will rip your head off.”
I got a new camera. Hopefully this hunk of junk that I am slowly but surely figuring out will improve on my photo taking abilities. Not really sure if I am going to bring a tripod with me. My friend down there has one and honestly I’d only want to use it like 3 or 4 days. There is NOOOOOO chance I want to carry around a ton of photo equipment everywhere I go. I don’t even want to carry the freaking camera around with me. I never really used a tri pod before so I figure I can use his, get my night shots I want and yeah…so long tripod. If I took one I would be out all day and night trying to capture the perfect pictures. I do not want to do that to myself or Colleen and just be running around wasting time messing with a camera and it’s settings.
Friday August 26th – Our leaving date. We have a later flight on Southwest at 6:05pm and lands at MCO at 8:05pm…god willing. I hate flying but I like it too. Like I hate the fact I have ZERO control over the plane and I can not see in front of me…but I appreciate the fact I am flying in the sky. I don’t know, I am an idiot and that is about as “deep” as I will probably get in this Trip Report. Our, well MY plan for that night is to hurry up and get straight to MK ASAP in hopes to catch Wishes. Plus MK is open till 1am so if we miss Wishes, we can enjoy some EMH at least. Wishes probably is not going to happen unless our flight lands MAD early, Southwest is usually good for that though. We shall see what happens though.
Saturday August 27th – The first full day!!!!!! Gonna go to Epcot. Yeah MK is magical and all that but that first day you get to Epcot and you feel the Orlando Heat as you step off the bus you get agitated. As you get closer to The Epcot Gates and hear The Parks Music all of that heat and agitation goes away for a bit. A BIT! When we are at Epcot we really do not ummm take our time? We sort of blow through everything. Now that is not saying that we go around the circle and leave but we do walk around that park a good 4-5 times a day if we are spending our day there. This trip…I really REALLY want to stop and kind of soak everything in. If there is 1 park in all of Disney World that I think you should do that it is certainly Epcot. With World Showcase, The Lagoon…it just seems like somewhere you should really just stop, sit on a bench and just stare…take some pictures, also relax and chill the F out for a bit. Hopefully that happens. We also have a dinner reservation too! You really thought I was not going to include that? Haha. 7:40pm at Le Cellier. We are gonna try the NEW dinner…I aint scared. Illuminations is at 9:00pm. After the park closes I hope to utilize the camera and get some good night shots of the countries. We will see how this day goes. If not we will probably end up back at Sports catch football, swimming, throwing a roll of toilet paper into the shower while she is in there, and going to bed.
Sunday August 28th – All day in The Magic Kingdom. Extra Magic Hours keep us there till midnight. Not like that is a problem or anything. Although it may have looked like I took a shot at MK in my first day at Epcot post above this…DO NOT get things twisted. There is NOTHING on earth like walking under the train tunnel out into Main Street and turning that right or that left and seeing the people, smelling The Confectionary, seeing The Balloons, and The Castle in the back of it all…almost looking down at you saying…”Welcome Back “ Nothing like it at all. Oddly Magic Kingdom is a park where we just kind of stroll around, hang out, and soak it up. We definitely never leave there saying “oh we didn’t ride this, or see that.” But we for sure take our time. We have to leave MK early though. Yeah stupid ADR at Narcoossee’s. Haha NOTHING is stupid about that. I can’t WAIT to eat here again! That Strawberry Shortcake…WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOO (Ric Flair Voice) In case anybody forgot about it, here…
We are gonna come right back to MK after we eat to see Wishes for HOPEFULLY the first of 6 times. Yeah we LOVE Wishes. It’s by far our favorite. After MK closes I hope to be around The Haunted Mansion. I want to get my good night shots in, and then end up in front of the Castle where I can get pictures of us, and The Castle…along with the entrance of Tomorrowland. I just wanna get these night shots on the tripod out of the way so that if they are really screwed up or not that good I can research them and then fix them on another day. After all that mess we will head back “home” catch some ball, swim, shower, and sleep!
Monday August 29th – Our first of many trips to Typhoon Lagoon. I don’t know about any of you jerks but Typhoon Lagoon is just as fun, as The Parks almost. We LOVE it here. So much so that we pretty much ignore Blizzard Beach to be here. The Slides, SHARK REEF, Crush n Gusher, and The Wave Pool…come on!!!! It’s just so much fun there. We normally only stay 2-3 hours though. That place REALLY kicks your ______. Once we shower and change we are gonna hit up Hollywood Studios. DHS is definitely a park that after like 2 hours we look at each other and ask “Are we really done here already” It is always really easy to do everything we want here pretty quick. We have NOT done Toy Story Mania since 2009 though. I would like to get on that again. I am not waiting 2 hours, nor am I waking up at 8:00am to get a fast pass either. REALLY excited to see Star Tours though. Hopefully the use some solid Star Wars stuff in this ride. No pod racing please!!! We have a 6:05pm ADR at 50’s Prime Time Café. LOVE that fried chicken and the brownie! No Fantasmic! Playing tonight…no surprise there but there are Extra Magic Hours until 10:00pm. Same deal here. I would like to get some pictures at night of Star Tours, Great Movie Ride, and Tower of Terror. This is also the last time I am going to post we will catch football, swim, and then sleep. Just know we do this every night.
Tuesday August 30th – We have another full day at Epcot scheduled. However we do want to head over and try Beaches and Cream. We wanted to do it last year and I don’t really know what happened but we did not. I want a burger, and I want a No Way Jose as well! We are going this time! We have a ADR at 8:30pm for Coral Reef. We will miss Illuminations, but I am okay with that. Epcot closes at 9:00pm so maybe we will head over to DTD after we eat? Don’t know yet. Maybe we will call it a night and go to bed early or something lame?
Wednesday August 31st – If we DO turn in early maybe we can get to Typhoon Lagoon today at opening. We usually stroll in around 11:00am or 12:00pm. We have an ADR at California Grill at 5:50pm so we should get a good days of swimming, getting pounded by waves, and telling children there are Bull Sharks in the Shark Reef before we have to leave. We will finish our night at MK. Wishes is at 9pm. Come to think of it…this would probably be the day to bring the tri pod to MK since it closes so early and I wont have to carry it around ALL day long. Never thought about that…guess writing these things ARE beneficial.
Thursday September 1st – We will start the day off at Epcot being that we have a 4:30pm ADR at Via Napoli. I’d like to get there by noon so that we can eat a huge lunch at Seasons Grill. I’m not gonna fill up on Pizza so we can eat closer to our ADR time without it really screwing with our appetite. After we eat we are going to head over to Hollywood Studios. They are running Fantasmic! Tonight at 10pm. Can’t wait to sit and dodge those weird ______ flying bugs that come out flying everywhere like 20 minutes before its totally dark. I wonder if they are aware how much they suck?
Friday September 2nd – TY-Phoon La-Goon! Haha see a theme? Yeah like every other day we start here. Well on the weekdays of course. Weekends, I am not trying to be near there. When idiot adults are off work, and ignorant kids are off school. Stupid people trying to ruin my life…After TL we are going to Epcot. We have a ADR at Teppan Edo at 7:00pm. Illuminations is at 9:00pm so we will more than likely catch that this time.
Saturday September 3rd – Busy day. Hopefully well worth it! We are going to start off over Epcot with an early Le Cellier lunch ADR at 11:45am. Then we will either stay in Epcot (which is probably the smart thing to do) and head to The Yachtsman Steakhouse from there for our 5:00pm ADR. Either way we will finish at MK. Spectromagic, or MSEP is at 9:00pm and Wishes is at 10:00pm.
Sunday September 4th – Our “first” Animal Kingdom visit. “First” because on that first full day at Epcot we may start at Animal Kingdom. We LOVE It’s Tough To Be A Bug, and Everest to death but the park itself always seems 20 degrees hotter than anywhere else in the world. So who knows. There are some other things we enjoy here but nothing that is going to make us come back 4 times per trip. After AK we are going to finish our night of in MK. Extra Magic Hours are until 1:00am. Wishes is at 9:00pm and we HAVE to see that. Now as far as ADR’s go we want to eat around 5:00pm-5:30pm and really have not decided between Kona Café, Tony’s or Grand Floridian café. We will decide on that soon though. No hurry as none of those places ever fill up.
Monday September 5th – Yeah, Typhoon Lagoon. Last time here on the trip. So sad. Definitely going to enjoy this last day here. Oh well. We have an ADR at Le Chefs De France at 6:00pm. We hope to head over to DHS after we eat. They have Extra Magic Hours until 10:00pm. We will get our last Star Tours, GMR, ToT, and RRC in tonight.
Tuesday September 6th – The last full day. Didn’t we JUST get here? It goes so fast! 11:30am ADR at Le Cellier. We will get everything in that we wanna want to do one last time at Epcot. We have our final ADR at Narccoossee’s at 5:30pm. It’s off to MK after that. Wishes is at 9:00pm and the park closes at 10:00pm. Leaving the park on the last full day is worse than leaving on the last half day to me. On the last half day you have probably come to terms it is over and being at the parks is basically like going to a hockey game and it goes into overtime. You got some extra time in so you are just happy about that. The last full day though…what a mess. You just know this is it, and think about that all day. You start pondering what you missed, what you did not see, what you did not eat, and all that other stuff that goes along with it…Packing, cleaning, getting that stupid ______ Magical Express Letter on your door. Ugh…I really hate this day! Haha at least I jammed us with Le Cellier and Narccoossee’s.
Wednesday September 7th – The end. We will probably go to MK? We always finish our trip there. It has our favorite rides/attractions there so we head there even though it is further away the Epcot or DHS. No ADR’s today. We will probably just crush some Casey’s hot dogs, and keep it moving. Our flight is at 7:30pm so we will be safe till 3:00pm – 3:30pm at MK. UGH!!!!!
We are going August 26th through September 7th. We are staying at The All Star Sports Resort. This is our normal spot. We love it here. We tried POP Century last trip and hated pretty much everything about the place. The ONLY good thing was the large café…BUT what good is that large café when it’s all closed at like 8pm? I’m not gonna sit here and ramble about POP…but never again will I stay there unless it is free. We love to stay at Sports because it has everything we “need”. Bed, Shower, Pool, Toilet, Football Field. Don’t get me wrong would I love The Grand Floridian, or Port Orleans as well? Yes. Would I ever be there long enough to enjoy it and get my worth out of it? No. We get “home” anywhere from 11:00pm to 1:30am and we catch football, swim, shower and go to bed. Wake up, shower, and go to the parks around 11:00am. No need to spend an extra $100-$300 just for that. When we are older and not on the go every minute…that is when you will find us in the Mods, and Deluxes.
This is also the first time we will be in the parks beyond midnight. It’s only till 1:00am but an extra hour is better than no extra hour! Haha. We are both pretty pumped about that.
So with that said here is a look at your cast for this trip.
First there is Colleen.
A food eater. She eats anything, but hardly finishes it. She is in HR, went to Penn State. She is a mother of 1 Boxer Dog, Gracey (after Gracey Manor of course).
Then there is me, John.
The hockey player, the baseball player. The sarcastic one. The father to Gracey our Boxer. The one who warns you “Do not take me serious unless we are doing something competitive…then I will rip your head off.”
I got a new camera. Hopefully this hunk of junk that I am slowly but surely figuring out will improve on my photo taking abilities. Not really sure if I am going to bring a tripod with me. My friend down there has one and honestly I’d only want to use it like 3 or 4 days. There is NOOOOOO chance I want to carry around a ton of photo equipment everywhere I go. I don’t even want to carry the freaking camera around with me. I never really used a tri pod before so I figure I can use his, get my night shots I want and yeah…so long tripod. If I took one I would be out all day and night trying to capture the perfect pictures. I do not want to do that to myself or Colleen and just be running around wasting time messing with a camera and it’s settings.
Friday August 26th – Our leaving date. We have a later flight on Southwest at 6:05pm and lands at MCO at 8:05pm…god willing. I hate flying but I like it too. Like I hate the fact I have ZERO control over the plane and I can not see in front of me…but I appreciate the fact I am flying in the sky. I don’t know, I am an idiot and that is about as “deep” as I will probably get in this Trip Report. Our, well MY plan for that night is to hurry up and get straight to MK ASAP in hopes to catch Wishes. Plus MK is open till 1am so if we miss Wishes, we can enjoy some EMH at least. Wishes probably is not going to happen unless our flight lands MAD early, Southwest is usually good for that though. We shall see what happens though.
Saturday August 27th – The first full day!!!!!! Gonna go to Epcot. Yeah MK is magical and all that but that first day you get to Epcot and you feel the Orlando Heat as you step off the bus you get agitated. As you get closer to The Epcot Gates and hear The Parks Music all of that heat and agitation goes away for a bit. A BIT! When we are at Epcot we really do not ummm take our time? We sort of blow through everything. Now that is not saying that we go around the circle and leave but we do walk around that park a good 4-5 times a day if we are spending our day there. This trip…I really REALLY want to stop and kind of soak everything in. If there is 1 park in all of Disney World that I think you should do that it is certainly Epcot. With World Showcase, The Lagoon…it just seems like somewhere you should really just stop, sit on a bench and just stare…take some pictures, also relax and chill the F out for a bit. Hopefully that happens. We also have a dinner reservation too! You really thought I was not going to include that? Haha. 7:40pm at Le Cellier. We are gonna try the NEW dinner…I aint scared. Illuminations is at 9:00pm. After the park closes I hope to utilize the camera and get some good night shots of the countries. We will see how this day goes. If not we will probably end up back at Sports catch football, swimming, throwing a roll of toilet paper into the shower while she is in there, and going to bed.
Sunday August 28th – All day in The Magic Kingdom. Extra Magic Hours keep us there till midnight. Not like that is a problem or anything. Although it may have looked like I took a shot at MK in my first day at Epcot post above this…DO NOT get things twisted. There is NOTHING on earth like walking under the train tunnel out into Main Street and turning that right or that left and seeing the people, smelling The Confectionary, seeing The Balloons, and The Castle in the back of it all…almost looking down at you saying…”Welcome Back “ Nothing like it at all. Oddly Magic Kingdom is a park where we just kind of stroll around, hang out, and soak it up. We definitely never leave there saying “oh we didn’t ride this, or see that.” But we for sure take our time. We have to leave MK early though. Yeah stupid ADR at Narcoossee’s. Haha NOTHING is stupid about that. I can’t WAIT to eat here again! That Strawberry Shortcake…WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOO (Ric Flair Voice) In case anybody forgot about it, here…
We are gonna come right back to MK after we eat to see Wishes for HOPEFULLY the first of 6 times. Yeah we LOVE Wishes. It’s by far our favorite. After MK closes I hope to be around The Haunted Mansion. I want to get my good night shots in, and then end up in front of the Castle where I can get pictures of us, and The Castle…along with the entrance of Tomorrowland. I just wanna get these night shots on the tripod out of the way so that if they are really screwed up or not that good I can research them and then fix them on another day. After all that mess we will head back “home” catch some ball, swim, shower, and sleep!
Monday August 29th – Our first of many trips to Typhoon Lagoon. I don’t know about any of you jerks but Typhoon Lagoon is just as fun, as The Parks almost. We LOVE it here. So much so that we pretty much ignore Blizzard Beach to be here. The Slides, SHARK REEF, Crush n Gusher, and The Wave Pool…come on!!!! It’s just so much fun there. We normally only stay 2-3 hours though. That place REALLY kicks your ______. Once we shower and change we are gonna hit up Hollywood Studios. DHS is definitely a park that after like 2 hours we look at each other and ask “Are we really done here already” It is always really easy to do everything we want here pretty quick. We have NOT done Toy Story Mania since 2009 though. I would like to get on that again. I am not waiting 2 hours, nor am I waking up at 8:00am to get a fast pass either. REALLY excited to see Star Tours though. Hopefully the use some solid Star Wars stuff in this ride. No pod racing please!!! We have a 6:05pm ADR at 50’s Prime Time Café. LOVE that fried chicken and the brownie! No Fantasmic! Playing tonight…no surprise there but there are Extra Magic Hours until 10:00pm. Same deal here. I would like to get some pictures at night of Star Tours, Great Movie Ride, and Tower of Terror. This is also the last time I am going to post we will catch football, swim, and then sleep. Just know we do this every night.
Tuesday August 30th – We have another full day at Epcot scheduled. However we do want to head over and try Beaches and Cream. We wanted to do it last year and I don’t really know what happened but we did not. I want a burger, and I want a No Way Jose as well! We are going this time! We have a ADR at 8:30pm for Coral Reef. We will miss Illuminations, but I am okay with that. Epcot closes at 9:00pm so maybe we will head over to DTD after we eat? Don’t know yet. Maybe we will call it a night and go to bed early or something lame?
Wednesday August 31st – If we DO turn in early maybe we can get to Typhoon Lagoon today at opening. We usually stroll in around 11:00am or 12:00pm. We have an ADR at California Grill at 5:50pm so we should get a good days of swimming, getting pounded by waves, and telling children there are Bull Sharks in the Shark Reef before we have to leave. We will finish our night at MK. Wishes is at 9pm. Come to think of it…this would probably be the day to bring the tri pod to MK since it closes so early and I wont have to carry it around ALL day long. Never thought about that…guess writing these things ARE beneficial.
Thursday September 1st – We will start the day off at Epcot being that we have a 4:30pm ADR at Via Napoli. I’d like to get there by noon so that we can eat a huge lunch at Seasons Grill. I’m not gonna fill up on Pizza so we can eat closer to our ADR time without it really screwing with our appetite. After we eat we are going to head over to Hollywood Studios. They are running Fantasmic! Tonight at 10pm. Can’t wait to sit and dodge those weird ______ flying bugs that come out flying everywhere like 20 minutes before its totally dark. I wonder if they are aware how much they suck?
Friday September 2nd – TY-Phoon La-Goon! Haha see a theme? Yeah like every other day we start here. Well on the weekdays of course. Weekends, I am not trying to be near there. When idiot adults are off work, and ignorant kids are off school. Stupid people trying to ruin my life…After TL we are going to Epcot. We have a ADR at Teppan Edo at 7:00pm. Illuminations is at 9:00pm so we will more than likely catch that this time.
Saturday September 3rd – Busy day. Hopefully well worth it! We are going to start off over Epcot with an early Le Cellier lunch ADR at 11:45am. Then we will either stay in Epcot (which is probably the smart thing to do) and head to The Yachtsman Steakhouse from there for our 5:00pm ADR. Either way we will finish at MK. Spectromagic, or MSEP is at 9:00pm and Wishes is at 10:00pm.
Sunday September 4th – Our “first” Animal Kingdom visit. “First” because on that first full day at Epcot we may start at Animal Kingdom. We LOVE It’s Tough To Be A Bug, and Everest to death but the park itself always seems 20 degrees hotter than anywhere else in the world. So who knows. There are some other things we enjoy here but nothing that is going to make us come back 4 times per trip. After AK we are going to finish our night of in MK. Extra Magic Hours are until 1:00am. Wishes is at 9:00pm and we HAVE to see that. Now as far as ADR’s go we want to eat around 5:00pm-5:30pm and really have not decided between Kona Café, Tony’s or Grand Floridian café. We will decide on that soon though. No hurry as none of those places ever fill up.
Monday September 5th – Yeah, Typhoon Lagoon. Last time here on the trip. So sad. Definitely going to enjoy this last day here. Oh well. We have an ADR at Le Chefs De France at 6:00pm. We hope to head over to DHS after we eat. They have Extra Magic Hours until 10:00pm. We will get our last Star Tours, GMR, ToT, and RRC in tonight.
Tuesday September 6th – The last full day. Didn’t we JUST get here? It goes so fast! 11:30am ADR at Le Cellier. We will get everything in that we wanna want to do one last time at Epcot. We have our final ADR at Narccoossee’s at 5:30pm. It’s off to MK after that. Wishes is at 9:00pm and the park closes at 10:00pm. Leaving the park on the last full day is worse than leaving on the last half day to me. On the last half day you have probably come to terms it is over and being at the parks is basically like going to a hockey game and it goes into overtime. You got some extra time in so you are just happy about that. The last full day though…what a mess. You just know this is it, and think about that all day. You start pondering what you missed, what you did not see, what you did not eat, and all that other stuff that goes along with it…Packing, cleaning, getting that stupid ______ Magical Express Letter on your door. Ugh…I really hate this day! Haha at least I jammed us with Le Cellier and Narccoossee’s.
Wednesday September 7th – The end. We will probably go to MK? We always finish our trip there. It has our favorite rides/attractions there so we head there even though it is further away the Epcot or DHS. No ADR’s today. We will probably just crush some Casey’s hot dogs, and keep it moving. Our flight is at 7:30pm so we will be safe till 3:00pm – 3:30pm at MK. UGH!!!!!
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