Another LONG Birthday, Dining and Pictures Trip Report 4/29-5/6

Well, it’s about time for me to get working on my trip report. I’m sad to be back, and thanks to a work overload, I’ve been tardy on writing this.

As I did last time, I will focus a bit on the food, since for me, and especially DH, Disney is half about the wonderful food! :slurp:

Here we go!


Saturday 4/29

How typical that we should start out our trip with "life imitating art." We were "too excited to sleep", and were up all night. So therefore we did get out to the airport early, and arrived in plenty of time for the security guys to hassle us. :brick:

On the flight down, we set up DH’s laptop and just for fun hooked up his GPS device to see if it would work while we were in mid-air. It did! I was surprised, and would never have even thought of using it if we hadn’t seen it listed in the approved electronic devices list in the plane magazine. After a few seconds of searching for a satellite, we could easily track our progress on our way down, and had a lot of fun picking out large highways on the ground below. It was a little intimidating to know exactly how fast and how high we were flying at each moment ( 637 mph, and 30,800 feet! ) but it was a neat diversion on the way down.

We arrived in Orlando safely, after a thankfully uneventful flight. Off we headed to the Dollar Rental Car desk to pick up our car. I was a bit hesitant about spending a lot of cash on a rental car when you could ride the Disney Busses for free, but DH insisted on getting a car this go-round. Oh, well. It was his birthday trip, and if he wanted to drive, then so be it. We passed by a ginormous line for the Magical Express on our way to the rental counter, and I silently thanked DH for not having to spend much time in that huge line.

We picked up our car, an ugly green Chrysler Pacifica, and head out of the airport with DH’s GPS device telling us where to go. As we’re leaving the airport, DH exclaims that he’s not sure if the car is calibrated correctly. I look over in worry to see that the car thought we were doing 60 on a very sharp turn. It was then that we took a closer look at the dashboard and realized that the entire speedometer was listed only in kilometers! Not even a tiny MPH underneath, just KPH. We also saw that the A/C was listed in Celsius! So the entire trip we were a bit anxious about what was and wasn’t “speeding.” We did see several cops while on the road, and seeing how we never got pulled over, I assume we stayed in an acceptable range of speed. It was still bizarre to see a car in all metric!

 

[DisneyBunny]

Day 4

Tuesday 5/2

This morning I was determined to get up early and see the opening ceremony of the Magic Kingdom, so we were up and out of the door pretty early.

We made it to the front gate security line just as they were counting down to open it up, so we missed all the fun. But we got through pretty quickly and headed right for Splash Mountain. We had a log to ourselves, and narrowly missed being drenched by the water cannon. The effects were all working on the ride – from the water that leaps over your log in the laughing place, to the hopping Brer Rabbit.

From there, we made a beeline to Fantasyland to hit Peter Pan’s flight, Snow White, It’s a Small World and Philharmagic. After getting our fantasy fill, we headed to Tomorrowland for a spin on the Carousel of Progress, and a few rides on Buzz Lightyear. Once again, DH was miffed that I was “cheating” because I knew where a couple 100,000 point targets were. We rode a second time and I pointed a few out to him to even the playing field. I still beat him. He was kinda frustrated about that as we were leaving Tomorrowland.

But who should we run into across from the Speedway? PUSH! :sohappy:
I was so excited to see him after reading so much about him online. I broke out the video camera and took some footage of him asking people if they had any cheeseburgers. Then he spotted Mr. Grumpy-pants DH, and made a beeline for him. He got DH to give him a hug (much to DH’s continuing embarrassment). I told PUSH that it was DH’s birthday trip, and he made the entire group sing happy birthday to DH.
:drevil:
Then to further embarrass DH (PUSH asked me if I would record this) he had DH lead the group in the morning calisthenics. He told him to put his arms in the air. DH grumblingly agreed. Then he was told to put his hands on his head. Then lean to the left. Then touch his hands in the air above his head. Then PUSH turned on the music, and the whole crowd was doing the YMCA. DH was nearly dying of embarrassment. He’s not the “center of attention” kinda guy. He wasn’t laughing then, but we sure had a riot watching the tape of it when we got home. :lol:

 

[DisneyBunny]

Fresh from that embarrassment, we stopped for lunch at Pinocchio’s Village Haus again, with DH getting the same panini I got before. This time I tried the veggie pizza, and found it to be good. I was very pleased with the side salad that came with the pizza. It was nice to eat a salad that wasn't entirely made up of iceberg lettuce. We both got milkshakes for our desserts – chocolate for myself, and vanilla for DH. They were very very good, and took us such a long time to finish.

At this point, the heat of the mid-day sun was getting to be a bit much for us, so we headed back to the hotel for a nice relaxing nap, :snore: and a dip in the pool and the hot tub. But soon enough it was time to head out to eat again!

We parked at the Yacht and Beach Club for our dinner at Spoodles because DH was absolutely convinced that it would be quicker to get out of at night than if we parked at the Boardwalk. :veryconfu It was a nice walk, but I do think it would have been easier to just park at the Boardwalk. Anyway, we had no wait for our table and were seated after I got out of the ladies room. It was rather noisy inside, but no more so than any other place on property.

 

[DisneyBunny]

Our server was attentive and seemed very keen on getting us to order the more expensive things on the menu. For our appetizers, we both ordered the garlic shrimp. It was rather pricey for what you got ($10.29 for three shrimp!) But man, was it good. I really had to resist the temptation to lick the plate after I was done. (if there weren’t so many people around, I think I would have! ) So much garlic-y goodness. :slurp:

For our main courses, I was torn between the Seafood Portugese stew and the Fettucine Alfredo. My decision was made even more difficult by our server telling me that I could add on the shrimp with the dining plan! But I figured I could always get Alfredo at home, and this stew was a Spoodles-only dish, so I ended up with the stew.
Bad decision. When it arrived, I was surprised to find little octopuses in it!

Yes, I know the menu says that octopus is in the stew, and I’ve had it before, but never served like this. I was expecting little rings of octopus, or calamari-like strips. I wasn’t expecting 10-12 tiny whole octopi!

The stew was yummy, and well seasoned. Everything was tasty, but I couldn’t get more than 3 or 4 of the octopi down. The tentacles kinda made me gag. So most of them were left in the bowl.

 

[DisneyBunny]

DH was encouraged to get the add-on skewers of seafood to his New York Strip. I was surprised to see that that included a skewer each of shrimp and scallops. That brought the grand total for his entrée alone to almost $35! I helped him finish off some of his scallops, and they were very tasty.

We didn’t have much room for dessert, but we ordered it anyways. DH got the crème brulee and I got the gelato. He said his crème brulee was good, but not as good as I make it. My gelato was nice, and refreshing.

After dinner, we wanted to head back to Epcot to see some of the things we’ve been missing. As we headed up to the International gateway, we were stopped by a gentleman and his wife who asked us if we had ridden Soarin yet. We told them we hadn’t, and they gave us their Fastpasses! They explained that they were tired and wanted to just head back to their hotel, so they wanted to give them to someone else. We thanked them profusely, and then made like the wind to get over to the Land. The line was at 80 min, and we just walked up and handed off our Fastpasses. We hadn’t ridden Soarin at all on this trip because of the wait, and the long Fastpass return time. So this was a treat!
:sohappy:

We requested to sit in B1, and I must say that I am now a believer. I will only sit in the top row. The ride seemed so much more immersive from the top, with no shoes or feet dangling above you.

From Soarin, we meandered back through the World Showcase, did some shopping, and finally decided to call it a day.

 

[ClemsonTigger]

Kinda like a good novel, can't wait for the next chapter. This is a bad report to read before lunch however...and my lunch is NOT going to look like any of your pictures!

Did DH have a birthday button for the trip, or did you just tip off CM's as to the event?

 

[DisneyBunny]

Kinda like a good novel, can't wait for the next chapter. This is a bad report to read before lunch however...and my lunch is NOT going to look like any of your pictures!

Did DH have a birthday button for the trip, or did you just tip off CM's as to the event?

Glad you're enjoying it! It's hard to write this up before my lunch too... :lol:

DH refused to wear a button for most of the trip. He really hates special attention. But I made a note on all the dining reservations that we were celebrating, and made sure to tell the servers when we checked in. That, and I told just about every CM we ran into, much to his chagrin.

 

[MommytoMJM]

That's awsome! Now I want to meet the Power Rangers.

Oh, you'll get to....every week!!! :hammer:

 

[DisneyBunny]

Day 5

I’ve been tardy on getting the rest of this report up because my camera mysteriously ATE large chunks of my pictures. I was able to recover most of them, but some are still MIA.

Wednesday 5/3

Got another early start this morning for our day at MGM. Arrived at the turnstiles before opening, for once! We were soon admitted, and were promptly trampled by one of several field trip groups on our way down the boulevard. We hung back and took our time while walking down Sunset, so we could go on whichever ride those kids were NOT going on. Turns out we headed for ToT, then over to the RnRC. While waiting in the 40 min line for our turn, a man taps me on the shoulder and asks us if it was just the two of us in our party. We told him it was, and he handed us two fastpasses that his group was not using. We got to skip the last 10 minutes of line! We thanked him profusely and joined him in the FP line. :sohappy:

From there we headed up to see Star Tours, and we waited in the longest line I’ve ever waited in! 20 min! For Star Tours. Huh. We then headed over to Muppetvision, and I finally did get to find the key! I had to look for it, and even had to backtrack down the hallway, but I was rewarded!

After that, we tried to get in for the next showing of VotLM, but were passed over for those with Fastpasses for two showings, so we bailed out of line and headed over to get a snack. I was really really happy with the expanded snack offerings this trip.

"Look, ma! It's all included!"

We both enjoyed a spicy-cheese-filled pretzel. SO good.

 

[DisneyBunny]

We wandered in the shops for a while, but the heat was starting to get to me, so we headed back to the hotel for a nap, and a swim. While back there, I picked up lunch at the food court. It looked yummy, but I was only halfway through it before my stomach started doing flips. Something in it did not agree with me, and I spent most of the afternoon in bed, watching TV.

I did manage to drag myself out of bed for dinner though. I was a bit nervous about dinner at the Coral Reef. After reading so many bad, fair, and middling reviews, I was convinced that I should have cancelled and tried to find somewhere else to eat. But I did want to make up my own mind on the matter, and food is a highly subjective topic.

So we waited with our pager for a while, and were seated at a little table in the front row of tables, right next to the tank. It made for some great views. Plus, waiting at our table was a little commemorative menu with DH’s name personalized on it! Another great item for the scrapbook.

We started off with the Lobster Bisque for DH, and a very strange salad for myself. DH loved his soup, and asked me to remind him to get it again, since I guess he thought he wouldn't remember that he liked it. I think he was surprised about how much he like it, especially since he's not a soup fan.

I was talked into my appetizer by the server ( who was one of the best of our trip) because he said I could add on fried scallops. ( a $10.99 value) with the plan. I was sold. When it arrived I wasn’t so sure. The greens and dressing were very good, as were the scallops. I just don’t think the two of them really worked well together. On their own, they were yummy, but the salad dressing and the scallops especially clashed.

 

[DisneyBunny]

DH ordered the NY Strip. (Is anyone seeing a pattern here?) Unfortunately that picture seems to have been a casualty of my camera. If it turns up, I’ll edit it in later. I ordered the pan seared Flounder, and it came in a yummy soy glaze. I did feel a bit odd eating fish, watching the fish, then eating the fish some more. But I got over it.

Dessert came for DH with a little decorative chocolate piece wishing him a happy birthday. He ordered the butterscotch brulee, and was very happy with it.

I got the Chocolate Wave, and was honestly a bit disappointed in it. It was a bit too overcooked, and didn’t have much of a warm liquid center. But I was too full to finish it anyways.

 

[DisneyBunny]

After dinner, we headed back to MGM for Fantasmic. We arrived in plenty of time, and got really good seats, but unfortunately a plague had settled over most of the ampitheater. HUGE swarms of gnats were circling around many people on the entire center and right half of the theater. Many kids were crying, people had gotten them in their eyes ( myself included) and they were being swallowed at an alarming rate. It was truly a Biblical problem. People started to get the wave going, but it died out quickly as everyone was too busy swatting gnats. Sales of those flashy-blinky toys were up, as most were using them to shoo the bugs away. :lol:

They dissipated by the time 8:30 rolled around, either from just moving on, or because the crowd had managed to kill half of them. It was about time to start, when we got a delay notification. I wondered what that was for, since there wasn’t a cloud in the sky, and there wasn’t a wisp of wind all evening (which, I’m sure, helped the gnat situation) It started about 15 minutes late. All went well, up till the Jafar/snake sequence. The snake didn’t move at all, and poor Mickey was reduced to running back and forth in circles. It did look kinda silly. I guess that might have been the technical difficulty? :veryconfu

Anyways, Fantasmic finished up, and as we all trouped up the stairs for the exit, Illuminations could be seen over the trees. Of course everyone in front of us had to stop and turn to look at the fireworks, effectively grinding the flow of traffic to a halt. People were shoving us from behind… it was a nightmare. I was starting to get cranky with people. I started telling them to just keep their eyes on where they were going, not at the fireworks, or someone is likely to be trampled. I just thank goodness we didn’t have any kids with us, or I would have had a heart attack. :brick:

We finally made it back to the car, only to get lost getting back to our hotel. We had never driven home from MGM in the dark before, and it took us another 20 min. We were very tired by the time we got back.

 

[dandaman]

Best TR ever. Why? The food reviews, of course.

Especially thanks for telling of your experience at the Coral Reef... I believe we already have reservations there. Already planned on getting the steak and Chocolate Wave. Certainly looks good online. :slurp:

 

[Uponastar]

Well I'm hungry!
Great report and great pics, Bunny!

 

[sandyvillacis]

Ok so i got back a couple of weeks ago, but i needed the rest.

So here is my trip report, keep in mind my husband and I LOVED DisneyWorld, we went together the first time for our honeymoon and fell in love with the place, we've been back almost yearly, and in 2005 we brough back our princess, our daughter Natalie, for her 1st birthday, our families all though we were crazy because "she will never remember it". Well i have news for you, she did, and she had awsome time.

We have just become DVC members (yeah we know we should have done it years ago) and we are excited for the next visit. Right now we are thinking of going back for Natalie's 3rd B-day, Feb 2007. So we will see how that goes.

Anyway, here is the scoop on our most recent trip.

This was our first time traveling with other family members, in our group 6 Adults, 1 11 year old, my toddler 2 years old, and an infant of 10 months.

Day 1 (Wednesday May 3rd)
We flew down on JetBlue on a Wed out in the early am, best choice i think, i brought my car seat for Natalie, and she slept in in almost the whole ride, she behaved very well.

We used Disney's Magical Express, it was pretty quick, i think a little quicker than Mears used to be, we got to our Resort, All Star Movies, at around 1pm, not bad at all, we checked in to 2 adjacent rooms, with 1 fridge, got our passes and we were ready to go. We relaxed by the pool for a few hours, we also grabbed food and drinks, it was a relaxing couple of hours.

After, we headed to MK, it was a fun nite, first thing we rode was Space Mountain (why dont they take pictures there???) we were all excited to the next thing to do. We were eager to watch "Wishes", i couldn't wait, there was no line to get on to SM, so that was really fast, the kids wanted to drive so we headed for the Highway of tomorrow, spend a few moments there, i decided that we had to go see "The Carousel of Progress". Since its been rumored to close all together, i wanted the family to get a chance to see it.
then it was close to Wishes time so we headed to the Electrical Umbrella to get something to eat, I didn't calculate this al that all well (ordering the food took too long), cuz before we knew it Wishes started and we had to run out to watch it. And as I ran with my cheese burger it happend, I saw Tinkerbelle ...i had waited for that moment...it was truly magical. I got teary eyed, but i wasn't alone, my mother couldn't believe how beautiful the castle looked, and the fireworks, everyone agreed the best fireworks ever, that is Disney for you, i was excited cuz we were coming back in to MK the next day to see and do more, and for me it was to watch the Electrical Parade.

Day 2 (May 4th Magic Kingdom)
Keep in mind how hot it was this week (a bit of a heat wave, we got no rain and it was sunny the whole time).
We tried to get everyone up as ealry as possible, we had reservations at the Crystal Palace, reservations for 10:40am, one of the people in our party had a problem with his park pass, for some reason the hotel didn't attach the park hopper ticket on it, it was only a hotel key, well this almost ruined everyone's day. DH decided to help his brother in law with this problem as the rest of us ran to our breakfast reservation, i let the CP know about the problem and i almost let our reservation go, but my nephew Darren was on top of it and said lets wait 10 minutes, so we did, and thank God we did, cuz the problem was resolved and we were able to all be together, of course we waited a long time to get seated (so much for me trying to be early). We waited like 20 minutes or more to get our table but once we did, it was awsome, we ate, and the characters came over to our table and did their thing, Natalie was excited to see Pooh and the gang.

Our day continued on to Adventureland, i was bumbed we couldn't ride Pirates (rehab) and there was a super long wait to ride Jungle Cruise, so we headed to the Enchated Tiki Room and did that instead. Everyone got to relax in the coolness of that theather for bit. Then headed to Frontierland, DH and the boys rode Splash Mountain while we took pictures by Big Thurder RailRoad, it was hot, then we walked over and saw Woody and Jessie and went over to take pictures with them, it was one of my must for Natalie, she loves Toy Story.
After, since it was really hot, everyone decide to go back to the hotel to relax by the pool, i dediced i would stay behing with my mom, and then DH decided to stay as well, so while everyone left, we did Snow White Scary Adventures, Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, Peter Pan's Flight, Small World, we fast pass Philharmagic, and saw the Sword in the Stone show. After we had some ice cream and since i wanted to see the Electrical Parade we headed down to Main Street and the entrance of the park so after words we could just leave. We got a great spot and I had a great time watching the parade. There is so much to do at this park, and we happen to be there for "Grad Nite" which mean there were a bunch of teenagers running about the park, i don't think i could ever go back during this time, it was a little more packed and stressful. The next 2 days the park would close at 7pm for special grad nite. I was sad about that too, my mother would have like to have seen more of the clastle etc.
Ok tomorrow i will do day 3 and 4.

 

[Jerm]

Ok so i got back a couple of weeks ago, but i needed the rest.

So here is my trip report.....

Sandy while we all love trip reports you are kinda steping on toes by adding yours to the middle of someone elses.

J

 

[DisneyBunny]

Sandy while we all love trip reports you are kinda steping on toes by adding yours to the middle of someone elses.

J

:lol: It's OK. It's funny actually! It can be easily copied and pasted in it's own thread. :wave:

 

[MSTINKHERBELL01]

Bunny are you two different people:lol:

It's okay Sandy, I'm sure you didnt know.

I
:lol:
STILL
CANT STOP
:lol:
Laughing

 

[disneyjesus]

very nice trip report. fortunately, I also dislike gnats, but love food. Are there pictures of the gnats? I tried to take a picture of gnats once, but they move too fast. Needless to say, I have pictures of several blurry black flying dots.

As far as people causing walkway traffic in order to watch fireworks, I too give them a thumbs down.

I would imagine that eating fish while watching fish swim around would be like having a hamburger at a cattle ranch. I like fish. I also like ice cream. But I don't really like the two together. go figure!

In conclusion, nice trip report!

 

[DisneyBunny]

Day 6

Thursday 5/4

Off to another lazy start this morning. We strolled into Epcot around 10:30 and got Fastpasses for Soarin right away, then enjoyed a leisurely lunch while waiting for the return window to open. DH got his favorite sandwich – the Ham and Samami grinder, while I tried something I’ve never had before – Seared Tuna. I rather enjoyed it. It really didn’t taste very fishy at all. The greens it was served on needed more salad dressing though. We got a slice of Butterfinger cheesecake, and strawberry shortcake for dessert. Both were yummy!

After lunch, we rode Imagination, again, while we still waited for our return window to open up. Finally it did, and we headed back for a ride on Soarin. We asked extra nicely, and got row B1 again, and it was just as awesome as before. I think after this we headed over for our first ride on M:S, and were glad to find the line wasn’t too bad at all. The announcement about the less-intense version had just been on the local news the day before, and I asked one of the CM’s when it would be up and running. He confidently told me not till the end of summer…. Well, so much for that!

From there, we headed back out the park and took the monorail to the MK. I was hoping to snag seats with the driver, but alas, missed them by mere moments. Although we did have an entire section to ourselves, and we enjoyed the sights along the way. I was just so glad to get out of the heat. It had been nice during the first few days of the trip, but each successive day only got hotter.

 

[DisneyBunny]

As we entered the MK, I had a brainstorm. Wouldn’t it be neat for DH to get his hair cut in the barbershop? He had been complaining that it was too long, and commented that he needed to make an appointment as soon as we got home. Well, now was his chance! After a little persuading, I marched him straight for the little shop, tucked into the corner. It was easy to see why I’ve never been in there before – it’s kinda off the beaten path.

The line wasn’t too long, and while we waited we chatted with an adorable 4 year old who had just gotten pixie dust in her hair. I told her that I wanted DH to get pixie dust in his hair too, and DH loudly protested. The hair cut was fine, but there was no way he was getting dusted! Well, when it was his turn to get cut, I had the entire shop backing me and we all persuaded him to get dusted.

Once she was done with him, I got dusted a little too! We thanked her, left, and we weren’t 10 steps from the barbershop, when DH flipped his head down, ran both hands through his hair, and managed to remove almost all of the pixie dust! Oh well, he was at least a good enough sport to get them in the first place.

The heat of the day was in full force by now, and I just had to try my first-ever Dole Whip Float (In honor of someone’s birthday :wave I was rather pleased to see that they too now counted as snacks. DH treated himself to a Coke Float. My Float was yummy, but I think next time I’ll just stick with the Dole Whip… and plenty of them. :slurp: