Trip Report Ah yeah, Dray is back and ready to rumble. A live attempt...

So we were supposed to be here Saturday but we just got here two hours ago. Let's just say so far the trip so far has been like Oregon trail. We went to our hotel and got checked in and then we went to grab something to eat at Wendy's.

We were sitting at the red light in front of the machine gun place on 192 and some lady decided she was going to head over in front of me from the emergency lane. Nah, don't think so, brah.

Anyways, right now we are at Disney Springs, so if you're down there feel free to say hello. I'm wearing the Polamalu Jersey.

 

[Gabe1]

We're gluttons for punishment, so we're coming back in September for two weeks. Not for Star Wars but for MNSSHP and HHN. Should be interesting.

We will be 'little gluttons for punishment' for a few weeks in September too. I'm just kidding myself into believing die heart Star Wars fans are going to pass on September with only one attraction.

I'm holding onto that delusion.

 

[Gabe1]

So far, status quo. We had lunch at McDonald's and headed to the TTC. Went through baggage check and the guy checking our diaper bag was looking for forensic clues or something because he dropped one of our baby bottles and busted the Iid. Down one bottle. Total accident but it does lower our bottle count by one.

Moved on to the ticket booth to turn in the renewal cards and that took way longer than it should. The lady was nice though, so that helped. Now we're on the platform waiting on the next Epcot monorail.

View attachment 361101

Dang! so cute. Did security give you a voucher for a replacement bottle at the baby care center?

 

[Gabe1]

Good luck Amy!

 

[draybook]

We went to Dinosaur and used 3 of our fastpasses and then child swap for Amy and the kids to ride after that. Is it just me or did they crank up the roughness of that ride? Good times! And we actually got our photo from it.

After that, the gals went to take a couple of trips to the Forbidden Mountain while us boys rode the Triceratops Spin and then took the little guys over to the little dino dig play area. They had a blast running through that place.

From there, we zipped on over to Kilimanjaro Safari. We picked a good time to go because I don't think there was a single animal that wasn't out. Not even those lazy lions.

It was time to leave Africa, and the Animal Kingdom. We drove on over to the Magic Kingdom to close out the night. That's become our routine over the past 2 years. We always close out at the Magic Kingdom with HEA and a few rides.

I was able to grab an 8:15 Pirates, so Pirates it was! Chris has definitely come to dislike this ride because of the drop. Jace isn't fond of the drop but not to the extent as Chris. After our swashbuckling adventure, we went and grabbed a seat at the tables at Gaston's for HEA. I loved Wishes but HEA clubs Wishes over the head like Negan did to Glenn and Abraham, imo.

The boys absolutely love it and tonight was really nice. The photo pass fella took some good photos of Jace and Amy without them knowing it. Such an awesome job by him. CMs like him are what the Disney name is all about.

After that, we headed over to the Haunted Mansion to end the night. I enjoy this ride so much more since we stopped going during the day and only at the end of the night. Plus, we stay back and let everyone else go, seems to do wonders for my nerves. I'm really digging the photo spot for this ride.

I totally forgot that it was an after hours night, so we decided to just head out since it was still packed and Amy has to get up early for her run.

The ferry line was an absolute nightmare. It was almost back to the turnstiles and for some reason, they were only running one dock with 3 boats. We made a few friends in line and all but Disney is really lacking in their decision process regarding transportation at the end of the night.

We finally made it our after an hour and grabbed some chow off site and headed to the hotel. Everyone else is sleeping while I type this out. With that, I bid you all adieu. Thanks for following along even though my photo count and detailed reports have been diminishing.

 

[draybook]

Dang! so cute. Did security give you a voucher for a replacement bottle at the baby care center?

Nope, I keep forgetting to talk to guest relations. The officer that did it was extremely apologetic but what tickled me was what I assume was one of the leads. An officer in one of those white straw hats came over after he saw what happened. He didn't say anything at all and never communicated with me. I just shrugged it off.

 

[Gabe1]

We went to Dinosaur and used 3 of our fastpasses and then child swap for Amy and the kids to ride after that. Is it just me or did they crank up the roughness of that ride? Good times! And we actually got our photo from it.

View attachment 361724
View attachment 361725

After that, the gals went to take a couple of trips to the Forbidden Mountain while us boys rode the Triceratops Spin and then took the little guys over to the little dino dig play area. They had a blast running through that place.

View attachment 361758

From there, we zipped on over to Kilimanjaro Safari. We picked a good time to go because I don't think there was a single animal that wasn't out. Not even those lazy lions.

View attachment 361760

It was time to leave Africa, and the Animal Kingdom. We drove on over to the Magic Kingdom to close out the night. That's become our routine over the past 2 years. We always close out at the Magic Kingdom with HEA and a few rides.

I was able to grab an 8:15 Pirates, so Pirates it was! Chris has definitely come to dislike this ride because of the drop. Jace isn't fond of the drop but not to the extent as Chris. After our swashbuckling adventure, we went and grabbed a seat at the tables at Gaston's for HEA. I loved Wishes but HEA clubs Wishes over the head like Negan did to Glenn and Abraham, imo.

The boys absolutely love it and tonight was really nice. The photo pass fella took some good photos of Jace and Amy without them knowing it. Such an awesome job by him. CMs like him are what the Disney name is all about.

View attachment 361765

After that, we headed over to the Haunted Mansion to end the night. I enjoy this ride so much more since we stopped going during the day and only at the end of the night. Plus, we stay back and let everyone else go, seems to do wonders for my nerves. I'm really digging the photo spot for this ride.

View attachment 361766

I totally forgot that it was an after hours night, so we decided to just head out since it was still packed and Amy has to get up early for her run.

The ferry line was an absolute nightmare. It was almost back to the turnstiles and for some reason, they were only running one dock with 3 boats. We made a few friends in line and all but Disney is really lacking in their decision process regarding transportation at the end of the night.

We finally made it our after an hour and grabbed some chow off site and headed to the hotel. Everyone else is sleeping while I type this out. With that, I bid you all adieu. Thanks for following along even though my photo count and detailed reports have been diminishing.

I so love these photos. When anyone demeans someone for taking little kids to Disney like your family does as did ours, how can you discount the bonding and family time Disney brings. Who cares if they don't remember. It is the intense family time that counts with our kids not their recollections of if they had nuggets or a cheeseburger.

Priceless family time, bonding with the family.

 

[draybook]

I so love these photos. When anyone demeans someone for taking little kids to Disney like your family does as did ours, how can you discount the bonding and family time Disney brings. Who cares if they don't remember. It is the intense family time that counts with our kids not their recollections of if they had nuggets or a cheeseburger.

Priceless family time, bonding with the family.

Absolutely. Nothing in the world I'd trade for these memories.

 

[MinnieM123]

After that, we headed over to the Haunted Mansion to end the night. I enjoy this ride so much more since we stopped going during the day and only at the end of the night. Plus, we stay back and let everyone else go, seems to do wonders for my nerves. I'm really digging the photo spot for this ride.

Fun photo! Question: Since this is a new feature, just wondering where the location is of the photo spot -- is it at the beginning of the attraction or at the end? (Just wondering if it's any distraction to the dark ride atmosphere, or if it's done quickly and in a more subtle way, perhaps toward the end, and with no flash?)

 

[draybook]

Fun photo! Question: Since this is a new feature, just wondering where the location is of the photo spot -- is it at the beginning of the attraction or at the end? (Just wondering if it's any distraction to the dark ride atmosphere, or if it's done quickly and in a more subtle way, perhaps toward the end, and with no flash?)

It's the last of the changing portraits, the Medusa lady. It's not so much a picture flash, it's a lightning flash that's just a smidge brighter than the normal lightning strikes. Most people probably don't even know it's a picture spot.

 

[fractal]

We went to Dinosaur and used 3 of our fastpasses and then child swap for Amy and the kids to ride after that. Is it just me or did they crank up the roughness of that ride? Good times! And we actually got our photo from it.

View attachment 361724
View attachment 361725

After that, the gals went to take a couple of trips to the Forbidden Mountain while us boys rode the Triceratops Spin and then took the little guys over to the little dino dig play area. They had a blast running through that place.

View attachment 361758

From there, we zipped on over to Kilimanjaro Safari. We picked a good time to go because I don't think there was a single animal that wasn't out. Not even those lazy lions.

View attachment 361760

It was time to leave Africa, and the Animal Kingdom. We drove on over to the Magic Kingdom to close out the night. That's become our routine over the past 2 years. We always close out at the Magic Kingdom with HEA and a few rides.

I was able to grab an 8:15 Pirates, so Pirates it was! Chris has definitely come to dislike this ride because of the drop. Jace isn't fond of the drop but not to the extent as Chris. After our swashbuckling adventure, we went and grabbed a seat at the tables at Gaston's for HEA. I loved Wishes but HEA clubs Wishes over the head like Negan did to Glenn and Abraham, imo.

The boys absolutely love it and tonight was really nice. The photo pass fella took some good photos of Jace and Amy without them knowing it. Such an awesome job by him. CMs like him are what the Disney name is all about.

View attachment 361765

After that, we headed over to the Haunted Mansion to end the night. I enjoy this ride so much more since we stopped going during the day and only at the end of the night. Plus, we stay back and let everyone else go, seems to do wonders for my nerves. I'm really digging the photo spot for this ride.

View attachment 361766

I totally forgot that it was an after hours night, so we decided to just head out since it was still packed and Amy has to get up early for her run.

The ferry line was an absolute nightmare. It was almost back to the turnstiles and for some reason, they were only running one dock with 3 boats. We made a few friends in line and all but Disney is really lacking in their decision process regarding transportation at the end of the night.

We finally made it our after an hour and grabbed some chow off site and headed to the hotel. Everyone else is sleeping while I type this out. With that, I bid you all adieu. Thanks for following along even though my photo count and detailed reports have been diminishing.

Haunted Mansion is definitely better at night! I'm also a fan of HEA.

 

[draybook]

It's hard to get an early jump on the parks when you have lazy bums like this laying around:

We got a little lunch and headed to Epcot.
I won't go into too much detail, but I absolutely hate bag check, especially at the TTC. I'll just say that I had a 10 minute talk with a "manager" and he ended up being the guy who dropped our baby's bottle the other day.

Made our way over to Epcot and on to Frozen via FP. Love that ride, just wish it was longer. After that, we headed over to the Gran Fiesta your with everyone's favorite three caballeros. Again, love the ride just wish it was longer. Next was our FPs on Living with the Land. This is tied for my favorite ride in the park. So relaxing and cool.

After that we hit Nemo and Figment for the little ones. Chris especially has fun running around the imagination play area. We hit Spaceship Earth and now we're about to catch the monorail back to the Magic Kingdom.

 

[draybook]

The evening was very interesting. We grabbed some cinnamon rolls over at Gaston's. Man, those things are a delight, aren't they? After that, we headed over to Tommorowland to catch HEA and hit our Buzz fastpasses. I'll keep repeating this, HEA is the greatest thing going.

After maxing out on Buzz, like always, we jumped over to the Peoplemover. Man, is it just us or does the Peoplemover desperately need a refurb? Always stopping and the other day about half of the cars had cones in them.

Anyways, as soon as we rounded the first corner leaving the platform, it started raining. We normally park our strollers in front of Buzz or over by CoP but this time we had them right next to the Launching Pad exit, next to some other strollers. Well, the problem with that is that one of them wasn't there when we made our way through the poncho wearing shelter seekers.

I found it over at the CoP area, drenched. To say that Amy and I were ticked would be an understatement. I found the area lead and he said they had moved them before the rain hit. I asked him why they moved them all the way over there as it wasn't even busy in that area. I also asked him how they seemed to randomly move some of them seeing as how they were both next to each other yet one was left, along with a double stroller to the left and some other strollers to the right. I explained to him that their tablets and diaper bag were soaked, including Jace's formula canisters. After wasting a couple of minutes back and forthing with him, I asked for his manager.

His manager, Brad, was an absolutely nice guy. He apologized and gave us two ponchos to cover the stroller and a claims card in case any of the items started having issues. Very nice fella and we definitely weren't asking for any type of compensation just frustrated with the odd selection of one stroller which happened to have all of the stuff in it.

Anyways, from there we went to the Tea Cups, which they all rode once and then Justin and Amy went a second time. I always have a blast watching them all enjoying themselves. I think that every father enjoys things like that. It makes you feel like you're doing your job as a man.

After that, we cruised into the Haunted Mansion gift store and the gals grabbed a couple of the Haunted Mansion spirit jerseys. The girl working the counter was telling us about someone who bought a Dooney and Burke HM purse. It was like 317 before AP discount and about 253 after. Yikes, too rich for my blood.

Anywho, we took our final ride of the night on Haunted Mansion, as if there were anything else worthy of closing out on. Definitely digging the new photo op and trying to think of new and semi-original poses to do.

Luckily, the rain had sent a lot of folks home early. So, it only took us about 30 minutes to be in the car and heading back to the hotel. Quite the relief, given the previous two nights. By 12:30, everyone else was asleep and I'll be joining them soon. We were supposed to leave tomorrow but we decided to stay until Sunday. So nice to have 32 vacation days available, makes flexibility possible.

Here's a little shot of Amy's medal from the 5k. She's wishing she had done the 10k instead but she didn't want to overdo it since it was her first official race event. I'm hoping that we can get her parents to come with the next time so I can join her.

Thanks for hanging in there and stayed tuned for tomorrow's adventures.

 

[MinnieM123]

The evening was very interesting. We grabbed some cinnamon rolls over at Gaston's. Man, those things are a delight, aren't they? After that, we headed over to Tommorowland to catch HEA and hit our Buzz fastpasses. I'll keep repeating this, HEA is the greatest thing going.

After maxing out on Buzz, like always, we jumped over to the Peoplemover. Man, is it just us or does the Peoplemover desperately need a refurb? Always stopping and the other day about half of the cars had cones in them.

Anyways, as soon as we rounded the first corner leaving the platform, it started raining. We normally park our strollers in front of Buzz or over by CoP but this time we had them right next to the Launching Pad exit, next to some other strollers. Well, the problem with that is that one of them wasn't there when we made our way through the poncho wearing shelter seekers.

I found it over at the CoP area, drenched. To say that Amy and I were ticked would be an understatement. I found the area lead and he said they had moved them before the rain hit. I asked him why they moved them all the way over there as it wasn't even busy in that area. I also asked him how they seemed to randomly move some of them seeing as how they were both next to each other yet one was left, along with a double stroller to the left and some other strollers to the right. I explained to him that their tablets and diaper bag were soaked, including Jace's formula canisters. After wasting a couple of minutes back and forthing with him, I asked for his manager.

His manager, Brad, was an absolutely nice guy. He apologized and gave us two ponchos to cover the stroller and a claims card in case any of the items started having issues. Very nice fella and we definitely weren't asking for any type of compensation just frustrated with the odd selection of one stroller which happened to have all of the stuff in it.

Anyways, from there we went to the Tea Cups, which they all rode once and then Justin and Amy went a second time. I always have a blast watching them all enjoying themselves. I think that every father enjoys things like that. It makes you feel like you're doing your job as a man.

After that, we cruised into the Haunted Mansion gift store and the gals grabbed a couple of the Haunted Mansion spirit jerseys. The girl working the counter was telling us about someone who bought a Dooney and Burke HM purse. It was like 317 before AP discount and about 253 after. Yikes, too rich for my blood.

Anywho, we took our final ride of the night on Haunted Mansion, as if there were anything else worthy of closing out on. Definitely digging the new photo op and trying to think of new and semi-original poses to do.

Luckily, the rain had sent a lot of folks home early. So, it only took us about 30 minutes to be in the car and heading back to the hotel. Quite the relief, given the previous two nights. By 12:30, everyone else was asleep and I'll be joining them soon. We were supposed to leave tomorrow but we decided to stay until Sunday. So nice to have 32 vacation days available, makes flexibility possible.

Here's a little shot of Amy's medal from the 5k. She's wishing she had done the 10k instead but she didn't want to overdo it since it was her first official race event. I'm hoping that we can get her parents to come with the next time so I can join her.
View attachment 362046

Thanks for hanging in there and stayed tuned for tomorrow's adventures.

First of all, congrats to Amy on finishing her 5K!!

As for the PeopleMover, that's one of my all-time favorite rides, so I was dismayed to hear that it needs some TLC. It seemed o.k. when I was there last year, so maybe it's just at the point where they should do more than basic maintenance, and really overhaul the ride.

Oh, on my bucket list will be the cinnamon rolls at Gaston's!

As for the stroller issue, it was kinda odd that they moved it. I can only imagine other parents in a panic as well, when they couldn't find theirs either.

Overall, your vacation sounds very enjoyable, and glad to hear that (aside of a few glitches), you're all having a good time. Have fun today, and thanks for sharing your updates!!

 

[draybook]

We got to the Magic Kingdom around 3. Right now it is crazy crowded and crazy hot. We started on the Peoplemover and so far that's it. the ladies are going to Big thunder Mountain for fast passes and we are waiting in this long 40 minute line for it's a Small World.

I think at this point I reached the part of the trip where I'm almost ready to go home. not that we're not having a good time but it's super crowded and the heat is killer.

 

[draybook]

Just a couple of dudes waiting on the steamboat...

Peter Pan is down so now we have some open use fastpasses.

 

[draybook]

Had a good time on the steamboat. The gals went to use their Space Mountain fastpasses but it went down while they were in line. So I guess now we have two sets of open use fast passes. Me and the boys came to the Dumbo water play area but the water is off. Good thing it's not in the 80's or anything...

So for anybody keeping score at home we've been here for three and a half hours and have done two rides. However, we're still having a blast.

Amy and the the two teenagers went to go ride goofy's barnstormer. When they get done we're going to go over to gastons and get a cinnamon roll.

Look at this lazy guy:

 

[MinnieM123]

Me and the boys came to the Dumbo water play area but the water is off. Good thing it's not in the 80's or anything...

(Not a good temperature day for the water play area to be down.)

Surprised to hear how hot it was down there yesterday. I've never been in April before -- is this heat unusual for early springtime?

 

[draybook]

We took a journey under the sea after that. Space and Pan were both down so we the gals used one set of free FPs for Splash while us boys watched HEA(delayed due to weather). After that, we hit Pooh and the kids loved it. We rushed over to the Tea Cups for a couple of spins and then over to the Haunted Mansion for our last ride. Also, I forgot that we actually rode Pirates the little Mermaid but you know how bad I'm getting at this report stuff.

Chris definitely doesn't like the drop in Pirates.

The rain definitely had people leaving early because we walked right onto the ferry. It's surely sad that we're leaving but maybe you feel like I do. I reach a point where I'm tired, it's too hot and I'm ready to go back home. You know the saying: nothing in excess.

Now we're packing up and heading to Disney Springs before we start our lovely 14 hour trek home.

Before you know it, September will be here and we'll be back "home" again.

 

[draybook]

(Not a good temperature day for the water play area to be down.)

Surprised to hear how hot it was down there yesterday. I've never been in April before -- is this heat unusual for early springtime?

Good question. We've never been here in April before but whoooaaa boy is it hot for this time of year. I think there might have been a problem with their water system because the Space Mountain bathrooms and the bathroom next to Cosmic Ray's were both down.

 

[MinnieM123]

Now we're packing up and heading to Disney Springs before we start our lovely 14 hour trek home.

Hope you and your family have a safe drive home -- 14 hours is quite a distance!! At least it will probably be cooler once you arrive home, so that's something to look forward to.