Pre-Trip A Well Fed Trip to Walt Disney World - October 2014

This will be my first attempt at any sort of pre-trip and post trip reports, so go easy on me...

The details-
Who's coming along: Myself (WellFedDave) and my lovely Disney-convert gf Katie
When are we going: October 18 - 28th
Where are we staying: Animal Kingdom Lodge - Jambo House 1 bedroom - Savanna View

A little background:
We live together in frosty and snowy Minnesota and have been together for a few years now. We love to cook together and enjoy spending time outdoors playing golf, kayaking, and spending time "up north" at my family cabin. We both work in IT as Systems Administrators. I also co-host a podcast called, "The Well Fed Guide to Life" which focuses on the Minneapolis and St. Paul Restaurant scene.
I've had a long standing love for all things Walt Disney World that was spurned by a few trips as a kid and now as an adult has grown into a full blown all encompassing fascination. Luckily for me, some of this obsession has begun to wear off on my gf...albeit it took some time!
We lasted visited WDW in October 2012 for 7 nights at POFQ with the specific focus being on the Epcot Food and Wine Festival, Party for the Senses, and MNSSHP. While that was great and we had a blast...we really went "all out" and left no downtime. This trip we've actually devoted some down days to stay at AKL and just enjoy the resort.

What's next:
We're both foodies (I really hate that term) so we've got a list a mile long of things we're looking to eat and experiences we'll be trying. I'll update this thread as we go with questions and pictures and maybe post a poll or two to get everyone's input on where we should go or maybe something I've overlooked.

Only 271 days to go...

 

[Betsyboo]

A friend of a friend just moved to Minneapolis, I'll pass along your podcast info. Sounds like a great trip. I'm hoping to explore AKL on our visit in February. We'll be staying at POFQ.

Following along!

 

[FlaggNL]

hej we're there in the same time Oct 17- Oct 24 '14

 

[WellFedDave]

Alrighty, it's been nearly 40 days since my last update so I'm feeling compelled to post today since I have some free time this morning. Trip planning is slowly coming together and I keep dropping hints to my D-GF of ADR suggestions and input. I've been patiently waiting for park hours to be released so we can work up some sort of preliminary schedule of days...hoping once the calendar turns to March we'll be in business to plan this phase. Ideally, I'd go commando to the parks every-day all-day while were there, but I promised the gf some "down days" at the resort, sitting by the pool, maybe going to DTD for the afternoon (err, Disney Springs), golfing; basically out of park days. I'm not sure how I'm going to handle that, but after nearly exhausting her to death the last trip in Oct '12, it might be a nice change. I don't think we'll be doing anything outside the Disney bubble, at most we would drive to Cocoa Beach or take in Kennedy Space Center. There's not a whole lot of push from either of us on that front so probably not this trip.
Logistics wise, our rooms and flights are booked. I don't know if I'm like everyone else but I always try to get the earliest flight out of Minneapolis on our flight down to WDW and the absolute latest flight out of Orlando on our way back home...it's crazy, but we did it last trip when we stayed at POFQ and spent part of the afternoon just walking the Sassagoula River between POFQ and Riverside. Really tranquil and a peaceful way to end the trip, no rushing to the airport.
Our magic bands have been picked out, I went Mickey mouse RED and my DGF went Pink. Both of us received Magic Band "bling" from my mom for Christmas. I'm excited to give this a whirl.
We'll be buying our park tickets soon, once park hours and touringplans.com post hours and crowd levels. I think we'll probably do 8 day park hoppers. We're not big waterpark people, even though I used to love River Country as a kid, I don't think either one of us has a real desire to head to Blizzard Beach or Typhoon Lagoon.

Our ADR wish list is slowly coming together as well. Our first night there we'll be dining with some friends that will be leaving on the 19th so we decided to do dinner together that night (not sure where we'll end up). All other days are still to be decided.

Right now we have 3 absolute must-do's
1. Victoria and Albert's
2. California Grill
3. Jiko
We dined at Jiko last visit and it completely blew us away, I can't wait to go back.

Other restaurants high on our list are:
Citricos
Flying Fish Cafe
Kimono's
Artist Point
Monsieur Paul
Sanaa
Kouzzina (for brunch, I've done dinner there)

So that's what we have so far. I'm going to try to stagger these posts out a little just so I don't go into complete Disney-crazy mode waiting for another 233 days.

 

[WellFedDave]

Our ADR's are booked and our park schedule is finalized. Here's what we've got:

10/18 - Arrival Day - Dinner at Sanaa
10/19 - Epcot Day - Dinner at Flying Fish
10/20 - Animal Kingdom Day - Dinner at Artist Point
10/21 - Magic Kingdom Day - Lunch at Kona Cafe and Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party
10/22 - Day at the Resort - Dinner at Victoria and Albert's (Queen Victoria Room)
10/23 - Hollywood Studios Day - No ADRs
10/24 - Epcot Day - No ADRs
10/25 - Down Day - Wanyama Safari and Jiko Dinner
10/26 - Magic Kingdom Day - Dinner at California Grill (during Hallowishes!)
10/27 - Epcot Day - Dinner at Rose and Crown (during Illuminations!)
10/28 - Departure Day

How'd we do??!!??

177 Days to Go!

 

[Zipadeelady]

Let me know if you ever need another girlfriend !!

I'm just kidding! I would love to hear about your trip when you get back so please do a trip report! Especially Victoria and Albert's. I always try to plan for down days but then it's just so hard to stay away from the parks when your there.

Happy Planning!!

 

[Allym146]

Looks great! You will certainly be well fed.

 

[WellFedDave]

Well, I'm sitting here at my desk at work, listening to the Main Street channel on Subsonic Radio. We're 92 days out and I'm happy to report we just ordered all of our tickets!

We ordered 7 day theme park tickets. We debated adding the park hopper option, but since we follow Touring Plans crowd calendar last trip, we didn't feel the need to pay the upcharge since we prefer going to the parks with the lowest predictive attendance for the day.

We're also going to Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party on Tuesday, October 21st. This will be our 2nd time doing this. Last time we did a full day in Magic Kingdom, plus the party...it was just too much. This time we'll head to MK in the morning and then leave for a few hours, take a nap, then hit it hard at the party later that night.

We also ordered the Memory Maker package. We did the same thing our last trip, when it was called PhotoPass+. Since it's only the two of us, it just makes sense so we're actually able to be in all the pictures.

That's the latest update. If anyone has costume ideas for MNSSHP party, let me know!

 

[WellFedDave]

It's been a while since I've done an update and now is as good of a time as any. We're only 16 days out from departure and literally everything has come together.

I'll be honest, I was hoping to write more post prior to leaving for WDW, but I'm happy to announce that my girlfriend and I just bought our first house together at the end of August. Needless to say, the new place has taken up a lot of our time. The bright side is it feels like this trip is a bit of a surprise since it all seems to be coming up so quickly.

About 2 weeks ago our Magic Bands and luggage tags arrived. I completely geeked out. It's all starting to become real.

About the same time I started playing around with the Fastpass+ system. It's an interesting concept and I'm not sure how much we'll leverage it other than booking times for attractions we absolutely will need them for (Test Track, Soarin, Tower of Terror, Rock-n-Roller Coaster, Toy Story Midway Mania, etc). Like our last trip to the World in 2012, we're following Touring Plans crowd calendar. I can't tell you how much of a difference this made. We went in the same time frame and very rarely had to use the old Fastpasses.

We did end up picking out our MNSSHP costumes...Peter Pan and Tinkerbell!!
Peter Pan is my absolute favorite old school Disney movie, so getting my gf to agree to these was a massive win for me.

We were talking last night as we were hanging old WDW photos in our new home and discussed how much we've changed over the past 2 years. Not only have we grown closer and our relationship stronger...we're very excited to go to our favorite place in the world again; but we're doing so much much lighter.
You see, since our last trip I've dropped about 90 lbs and my gf 20 lbs. Our energy level is through the roof and our quality of life has improved ten-fold. Our big thing is to get a lot of "after" photos using Photopass.

Don't get me wrong, we're still going to eat our way around the world. Just a little more responsibly

I think I'll try and post again as we get even closer. Can't wait!!!

 

[mrdrift]

Sounds like a wonderful vacation is in your future. Will be watching for the trip report and pictures. Have fun at the party.

 

[Zipadeelady]

@WellFedDave Congrats to you and your GF with your weight loss!! Your trip is so close. Make sure you tag me if you write a trip report. I won't get to go back for a few years....Unless I win the lotto and I'm sure my chances are really good.