Pre-Trip A Not so scary food & wine Trip

Greetings. This is my first pre-trip report, or any type of trip report, so please keep that in mind at all times. That being said, it will be our first trip of 2015, which is way over do. Our last trip was last June for Star Wars weekends. We usually go in January each year, but could not this year for a couple of reasons. So we decided to go for Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween and the Food and Wine Festival. Personally this is my favorite time to go. Our last fall trip was mid September 2013. We did Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party that trip, but it was the week before F&W. So that will actually be a first for us. Now that we have a little back history out of the way, let's get to the details:

When: September 23rd- Oct 3rd 2015
Where: Port Orleans French Quarter

So since I'm new here, I'll give you a little background on who will be going. It will be myself, Nick

My Beautiful Wife Sophia,

and our daughter, Trinity

So that makes up the three of us:

Also joining us on this trip, will be my parents. Two of our friends will be joining us a couple of days into our trip as well. I've started to put together our plans for each day, so I'll be posting that shortly.

 

[Mickey81]

This will be our 7th trip to WDW together. As of today, we are still 223 days out from our arrival day. Our 180 day mark won't be until March 27th, which is still a ways away, but since planning is almost as much fun as going, well maybe almost. We've already started getting it all planned. I'm the planner of the family, we all come up with ideas of what we want to do, and then I put it all together. As I've been planning this trip, I've started to research information for our first trip to Disneyland in December/January. Now that I've got that booked, and we've decided on the dates for sure. I'm putting my focus back on this trip. I'm going to go ahead with an overview of our plans for each day. Any opinions are certainly welcome.

 

[Mickey81]

ARRIVAL DAY-September 23rd 2015

Our first flight leaves at 5:42 AM. We usually do early morning flights and after a short stop in DC we should be on the ground in Orlando shortly after 11 AM. After we collect our luggage, we will board the DME and be on our way to French Quarter. I'll probably go with the direct to room check in, since we are so familiar with the resort. Once we get to our rooms, and everything is put away, we'll probably grab a snack at the food court. I'm shooting for reservations at 'Ohana that night. We'll take the bus to MK, then the ferry to the Poly. It will be the second time dining here for the three of us, and the first for my parents. The food was ok overall, but I really think my parents will enjoy it, so we are repeating it for them. Well the Pineapple bread and bread pudding rocks, so we're pretty excited about that. After dinner we'll roam around the Poly for a bit, take the monorail back to MK. We'll take spend a couple ours here, with whatever fast passes we decide on, and do a few other things. I'll expand on these plans once it gets a little closer. Then we'll take the bus back, and get ready for our first full day in the parks.

 

[FlaggNL]

Great start! Nice to see the persons behind the messages And please leave something behind for us when you leave POFQ Just 13 days later it will be our time And I see that you were there during the Star Wars weekends, that's on our wishlist as well Love to see more details of the upcomming trip, although it is 200+ days away

 

[Mickey81]

Yeah, it's a still a long time to go, but I really enjoy the planning part of it. Star wars weekends are so much fun. It really wasn't that crowded, busy, but manageable. We're thinking of maybe doing it next year again, after episode 7 comes out. Great character interactions.

 

[Mickey81]

Day Two- Animal Kingdom & Epcot

We'll probably spend our first full day in the park, by starting out at AK. It's should be the slowest park for the day, and while it's not our favorite park, we do enjoy it a lot. We will probably have a quick breakfast at POFQ (I'm thinking of you Mickey Waffles, you little mickey shaped golden pieces of pure awesomeness) or we will do Tusker House before the park opens. We always like to be at the parks before opening, so we can get a good spot for rope drop. We will often book a breakfast for the earliest slot to get in before opening, eat and be ready to go. If we do Tusker House, we will probably go directly to the safari from there, and if we come in from rope drop, we will start with Everest. Then on to which other one we didn't do first. We've done Tusker House one other time, so we know what to expect. It was okay. Here's a picture from that breakfast:

So the rest of the day at animal kingdom will be split between, doing Everest, Kali, Primeval Whirl (Trin enjoys this ride, not really sure why...It's probably the worst themed ride I can think of in all of Disney, and narrowly beats out Space Mountain for giving that wonderful sensation that your body has just been in a car accident) but she likes it so we'll do it a couple of times, the safari again, and dinosaur. We'll also spend time doing the trails, and taking in the beauty of this park. We'll do festival of the Lion King, maybe Nemo (its been a couple years) and hopefully flights of wonder (its one of the few things we've never done) and It's a bugs life (always fun). The only part of the park we won't probably do is Rafiki's planet watch. We've done it enough times, that its just not worth the time devoted to it for us. We might do lunch here, if we do, it will be Yaki and Yeti or Flame Tree...depending on what time it is, and what we feel like. We will be returning to Animal Kingdom later in the week, so we will probably do lunch at Yak and Yeti that day. Hopefully the new Starbucks will be open in AK, and we will grab something iced on the way out to refuel, and head back to POFQ for a little pool time, ( I will probably run over to Epcot to set up fast passes for later, depending on the time of day and if I think there is a chance I can still get one for Test Track or soarin) before heading over to Epcot for Dinner. Here's a couple more pics from one of our recent trips to AK:

After taking an afternoon pool break, we'll head over to Epcot, for dinner at Teppan Edo. This is the one place my parents requested to eat this trip, so we'll be doing it this night. The food is okay, but when you get a good chief it can be a very entertaining dinner. We'll do a few rides, enjoy world showcase and watch illuminations before heading back for the night. We might hit Club Cool on the way out, and I will try to resist the cronut calling for me.

 

[HouCuseChickie]

Sounds like great plans so far. And in reality, you're not that far off from your 180 mark. This is usually the time when I've decided on all of my must do ADRs, but filling in gaps with things I "might" want to do. Of course, I've been known to change my dining 100+ times before trip time. I also totally agree on pre-park opening dining. Can't wait to see more of the plans

 

[Sudcaro- Sudcaro]

Sounds like a lot of fun!

 

[Mickey81]

Sounds like great plans so far. And in reality, you're not that far off from your 180 mark. This is usually the time when I've decided on all of my must do ADRs, but filling in gaps with things I "might" want to do. Of course, I've been known to change my dining 100+ times before trip time. I also totally agree on pre-park opening dining. Can't wait to see more of the plans

Thanks, I usually start making a list of where we would like to dine, as soon as we end a trip. Then change things numerous times myself. I think I've got a pretty good idea of what we're going to be doing for this trip, the only thing that might change is adding something new at Disney Springs. I'm going to try to add some more plans the next few days.

 

[Mickey81]

Sounds like a lot of fun!

Thanks!! We are looking very forward to it, it's been way to long.

 

[Mickey81]

Day 2 Magic Kingdom & 1st Party Night

So we'll start our second full day in the parks by visiting our favorite park, MK. Again, I'll probably book an early breakfast at Crystal Palace. Food is decent for what it is, we enjoy the atmosphere, and really it's all about getting into the park a little early and getting to walk down Main Street when its not full.

It will still be the three of us, and my parents at this point in the trip. Our friends will be arriving later in the day, and will probably hit up Disney Springs that evening. After we have breakfast, we'll probably head to 7DMC, and then just head to tomorrowland or in liberty square direction. Possibly hit Pan. I'm not going to speculate on Fast Passes at this point, and will go over them a lot closer to the 60 day mark. The idea will be just to take in as much of the park as we can. We'll head back in the early afternoon to get cooled off, and change into our costumes. (Which we are working on planning), and head back around 4-5. We'll probably get in line for Jack and Sally upon our return. After that, just enjoy all the decorations, characters and rides. Haunted Mansion will be a must of course, and if the pumpkin spice waffle at Sleepy Hollow returns this year, that will be a must. We'll catch one of the Boo to You parades, and Hallowishes. We all love MNSSHP, and are doing multiple ones again this trip. That being said there wont be any major plans and we'll just enjoy it as we go. The plan will be to stay until it ends. One thing that must be done is People Mover. It was closed on our last trip in June, and was greatly missed. We'll probably grab caramel apples at the confectionery on our way out, mainly because this family is obsessed with both caramel apples and standing in line at the confectionery after the park is closed and we are all tired. Okay, so we are only really obsessed with the apples, and it just so happens that we never take the time to get them, or carry them around before all that.

 

[HouCuseChickie]

Thanks, I usually start making a list of where we would like to dine, as soon as we end a trip. Then change things numerous times myself. I think I've got a pretty good idea of what we're going to be doing for this trip, the only thing that might change is adding something new at Disney Springs. I'm going to try to add some more plans the next few days.

That's a good point with Disney Springs. So much to consider there once the DTD to DS transition progresses.

 

[Kosmo1986]

Your trip looks great!!! We are planning a short weekend getaway to food and wine and mnsshp. It will be my bf first time for both.

 

[Mickey81]

Your trip looks great!!! We are planning a short weekend getaway to food and wine and mnsshp. It will be my bf first time for both.

MNSSHP is so much fun! Our last September trip was probably the most fun we've had overall on a trip, and that's saying a lot. September is such a great time to go. We're looking forward to our first F&W as well. Have a wonderful trip! Thanks for reading.

 

[Mickey81]

Day 3 Blizzard Beach and Hollywood Studios

Our first Saturday we'll be hitting Blizzard Beach. Our first time there actually. We have done Typhoon Lagoon before, and enjoyed it. Our daughter has been pushing for Blizzard Beach for a long time now, so she can do Summit Plummit. It just hasn't worked out in our visits before, so we're going to take the time for it this visit for sure. This is predicted to be the busiest day of our visit (first weekend of F&W) so we'll just avoid the parks this morning and go to BB. I look forward to this, something different. We was pretty happy with TL, of course we just happened to go on a fairly hot day in January (which you just never know what your going to get) and Trin was selected as the Big Kahuna for the day. The park was pretty empty, and the wave pool was awesome. We'll probably hang out here until noon or 1. I found Typhoon Lagoon to be more exhausting than a day at the parks. We'll head back to the room, change, and go to Hollywood studios for the evening. I'll make sure we have fastpasses for Tower and Star Tours, and either Rocking or Toy story. We'll probably hit tower first, and try to time it with the character meet outside of it. Then dinner at Mama Melrose (which we've never done, mostly because I love the Sci-fi, and we always end up doing that.) As long as it's not Pizza Planet, I'm happy.....is there a worst place anywhere in Disney? We're probably going to do the Fantasmic Package....just because that's the one thing I hate waiting in line for. I don't mind waiting and line up, or staking out a spot far in advance for anything else, but this always seems like a poorly executed and chaotic mess. So I want to give this a shot. The rest of the time will just be taken in doing stuff and taking in Hollywood Studios, which I really enjoy at night.

 

[FlaggNL]

Yeah, it's a still a long time to go, but I really enjoy the planning part of it. Star wars weekends are so much fun. It really wasn't that crowded, busy, but manageable. We're thinking of maybe doing it next year again, after episode 7 comes out. Great character interactions.

I hear a lot of people about the SW weekends! But the May period is not a really good period as long as Sacha is studying! Maybe someday in the future after one of the new episodes! In the mean time we will be 'stuck' to the October period

 

[mrdrift]

Loving the plans so far. The pictures from part trip are a great addition to the pre trip report. Looks like the family is alwys a wonderful time at Disney World. Will be watching for more details and the report itself.

 

[Mickey81]

Loving the plans so far. The pictures from part trip are a great addition to the pre trip report. Looks like the family is alwys a wonderful time at Disney World. Will be watching for more details and the report itself.

Thanks for reading. We can't wait!

 

[StephK]

We'll be there at this time too, probably PORS at this stage! So excited! You are so much more organized then I am so far, although I do have a list of restaurants I want to book ADR'S at

 

[Mickey81]

We'll be there at this time too, probably PORS at this stage! So excited! You are so much more organized then I am so far, although I do have a list of restaurants I want to book ADR'S at

That's awesome. I can't wait. PORS is really nice. You've still got time to plan it all out. Although it won't be to long before its time to book ADR's. Let me know if you do a pretrip report, I'd love to read it. I'm hoping to add more to mine soon. Thanks for reading.