Trip Report C'mon Pop Pop!

We got back recently from another quick trip to the world and I thought I would share our adventures with you all!

Back story is my husband Gary who usually has to be dragged to Disney had been saying for a few weeks, "we need to get a Disney trip together."
My response was, where's Gary and what did you do with him?!

Gary hasn't been feeling too well and our daughter Aleisha decided to bring herself and our oldest grandbaby, Una to where we live, near Pittsburgh to visit. The youngest granddaughter was in the process of sleep training and they didn't want to throw the time change into the mix. I told Aleisha she could explain to Lana when she asks as a teen why she wasn't on the trip!!
Seth our son who lives in Orlando now (see recent TR about his Orlando move if interested), was going to fly up to see all of the family.
I got a crazy idea and asked these 2 what they would think about doing a run to Disney while Aleisha and Una were on the east coast. They live in Sacramento.

They thought it was a great idea and in one weeks time we pulled together a mini trip in the middle of the big one. Seth ended up staying in Orlando to meet us there and to be our chauffeur.

Aleisha and Una flew to Pittsburgh on Wed. the 6th and then we all flew to Orlando on Sat. the 9th. to meet up with Seth. Seth's partner Jake met up with us the next day as he is a CP CM and had to work on the first day. We then flew home Tues. the 12th.

Who all partied:
Gary, Me Cindy, Seth, Jake, Aleisha and Una.

While I have sympathy it annoys me when people complain about the heat in Florida. You kind of know this going in.
BUT, it was freakin hot as the surface of the sun! Who knew a human body could actually melt, Olaf style?!
I say that to explain the red melted look we all have in the pic, at 10 am! This was actually our last day at MK.

Anyway, to continue with the particulars, we stayed for 2 nights club level at the Contemporary and then 1 night at Baylake. We have DVC but I could only get one night using points. Club level was insanely wonderful but I did feel a little ill at the price tag.

Follow along if you want to read about Una dragging Gary all around Disney. C'mon Pop Pop!!

 

[MickeyCB]

Happy Anniversary!

Happy (Belated) Anniversary!!

How sweet, thank you!

 

[MickeyCB]

Happy Anniversary! I hope it was as fantastic as it sounded

Ty, it was a very sweet not too exciting day.

Happy Anniversary!! Loving the report and the beautiful photos!

Thank you very much!

 

[MickeyCB]

HAPPY ANIVERSARY!

Happy Anniversary!

Ohh bubbly! Thank you!

 

[MickeyCB]

DAY 2-LET'S GO MEET DONDALD!!
Sorry for the delay in posting the kids were in town visiting with Gary.

Day 2 was AK day. We had a 10ish reservation for Tusker House. We've never eaten here before and as all character meals, I felt we could kill 2 birds, breakfast and a character meet!

We headed out at about 9:15 and there was an AK bus there within a few minutes.
As we headed into AK Una leaned over again from her stroller and yelled, com'on Pop Pop!
No formal Tree of Life pics for us, this was it!

We got there and were seated fairly promptly.
They send you right up to the buffet after drink orders are taken and it was a good thing as we were all pretty hungry.
Una making her food choices.

A few of their offerings.

No day at Disney is complete without a Mickey waffle in my opinion.

Dondald happened to be the first character through and at first Una wasn't quite on board. It was her first time to meet costumed characters I believe.

Then fairly rapidly she warmed up to him.

After that Daisy came for a visit. And we've clearly got over our shyness!

Next post, a few more character visits and let's go see a show!

 

[MickeyCB]

TUSKER HOUSE CONT'S.

Next up in the character parade. She loves Goofy and it was funny to see her reaction to his height!

But again quickly warmed up to him.

He gave her a card that she was absolutely delighted with! Her thanking him.

Then of course, grandma's favorite.

That was fun!!
While we were eating we got a DAS reservation for the Lion King show right next door. The timing was tight, would we make it? I wanted so badly for Una to see the show and in particular the monkeys!

 

[MickeyCB]

AK DAY CONT'S

We had about 5 minutes to spare exiting the restaurant. We hustled around the corner and thought we had made it but the CM at the entrance said the doors had closed. Then she started pushing a bunch of buttons on her electronic device and I thought, oh she's going to let us in. But we stood there for a fairly long time and she looked up with a smile and said I got you in for the next show. She hadn't asked if we wanted to wait just did it. It was a little weird.
But we decided to just stay and within a few minutes she opened the rope and we were allowed into the slightly more shaded area to wait.

It was of course completely worth the wait to see this!

I didn't realize how much on this trip that I watched her and her reactions more than I watched things myself.
She loved the show and pretty much kept singing Hakuna Matata for the rest of the trip.

Next up was a refreshment stop as we headed over to Pandora.

Our second day and second Olaf bar! Cheers!

Gary Seth Jake and Aleisha headed for FOP, it is Gary's absolute favorite in all of Disney. Una and I hung out checking out the sites.

And because we were having a silly moment sharing one of our favorite snack items, we did this.
I'll warn you it's gross. I don't know how to put a spoiler alert thing on here!

We also needed some AC so I talked her into going into the store. She is interesting in that she doesn't constantly want things from the stores, but she was very enamored of the necklace making area and I may have indulged her.
One thing that is annoying here is they have all of these cool beads and things to pick from to make a necklace but the bins are too high up for someone her height to look in. So she stepped on the small raised area and a CM came over and said she wasn't allowed. Per the CM they are raised so little ones don't choke on beads and that's ok, but it keeps someone like Una from seeing the choices.
So the CM held in her hand choices for Una to pick from.

You get to pick a certain number when you buy the necklace but she wanted 2 more and you are able to buy them individually so we got a few more to add onto the necklace.

The rest of the gang caught up with us in the store and I was sad to find out Gary decided not to ride after getting to the ride area. He was afraid he might get sick. Interestingly the kids said they got a little woozy and they didn't remember that happening before so it was probably best he didn't ride.

After this we split up. Gary was getting tired and the kids found out there was only a 10 minute wait for the safari so they headed that way and Gary and I headed to the bus stop to go back to the hotel. He would not have been able to do the safari with all of the jostling around anyway.

I saw this on the way out of Pandora and thought it was neat.

We headed back to the resort to rest and figure out what we were going to eat for dinner.

 

[MickeyCB]

Completely random and out of sequence, these are from out first night at MK, but I found these photos and thought they were so neat.

Cinderella running from the ball!

A nice moment.

 

[sheriffwoody]

Happy belated anniversary!! 40 years is incredible I always love your reports so much. Gary reminds me of my dad who passed several years ago, so I kind of have a soft spot for him (hopefully that's not a weird thing to say since I've never actually met y'all! ). I'm so glad you all got to have a trip together and with such amazing accommodations! Una is adorable and I can definitely relate to the princess dress obsession. LP has a drawer-full!

 

[riverside]

I haven’t ate at Tusker House in years!! Your pictures made me remember how much I love their tater tots!!
The pictures of Una by the castle are beautiful!!

 

[MickeyCB]

Happy belated anniversary!! 40 years is incredible I always love your reports so much. Gary reminds me of my dad who passed several years ago, so I kind of have a soft spot for him (hopefully that's not a weird thing to say since I've never actually met y'all! ). I'm so glad you all got to have a trip together and with such amazing accommodations! Una is adorable and I can definitely relate to the princess dress obsession. LP has a drawer-full!

Thank you for your kind comments.
Gary is a sweet, give you the shirt off of his back kind of guy and I'm sorry to hear about your dad passing but glad Gary reminds you of him.
They were very nice digs! And those princess dresses do accumulate! (But as you know cheaper when bought at home/Amazon, etc. than at the parks!)

 

[MickeyCB]

I haven’t ate at Tusker House in years!! Your pictures made me remember how much I love their tater tots!!
The pictures of Una by the castle are beautiful!!

It was our first time there and I'm sad to say I don't think I ate any of the tater tots!
Love that whole blue thing they did with the castle.

 

[Katiekitten]

Happy belated 40th Wedding anniversary!

 

[MickeyCB]

Happy belated 40th Wedding anniversary!

Ty very much!

 

[MickeyCB]

DAY 2-cont's

Gary and I got back a little before the kids and he decided to take a rest in the living room.

Aleisha sent me this pic from earlier at AK, saucy girl.

And these from the safari. Not the most exciting but proof they were there!

Seth sent this one. Nice selfie!

And on the bus home. Might explain why she wasn't super hungry for dinner, but hey, we're on vacation!

When the kids came back we perused the offerings of the lounge and were able to put together a nice little meal combined with some flat bread leftovers. (Gary ate m&m's again).

Between having the wonderful space of the suite, the lounge for food and Gary and Una needing to take it a little slower, it was a different way to "Disney" but it was very nice and while we probably only hit 15-20% of the rides and attractions this trip, I didn't feel like we were missing things, (too much!)

 

[MickeyCB]

DAY 2-LET'S SWIM! (Well they can, I detest swimming!)

After dinner the kids decided they wanted to swim a little. I went along to photograph the moment.
Great oggilie moogilies! Trying to get 4 people to all look at the same time is exhausting!
These are the best of about 15 photos.

I dipped my toes in and that was about it. I took Una over to the splash area but there were a few bigger kids playing a little rough and I think it intimidated her. I took her back to my kids and headed over to Baylake. I wanted to try to make our transition over there the next day as smooth as possible. Spoiler alert, it didn't help.

I walked over taking a few photos along the way.

See that poor innocent bunny right there? Some kid, 8-ish, old enough to know better comes running right at it. I don't know if he was going to step on it, grab it or what. But I put the kibosh on whatever his nefarious plans were. His parents basically didn't know or care what he was doing.

Anyway I went to the front desk at BLT and talked with the CM there and explained the small kid, big kid needs for tomorrow afternoon and wanted to let them know we would take absolutely the first room available even if it was facing a trash bin. We had reserved a 2 bedroom lake view. At first she thought there was a room already empty but apparently it was on hold for a maintenance problem. She talked with whoever the magic room assigner person was an they said they would make a note of this and try to get us a room as early as possible. Okey dokey.

 

[MickeyCB]

DAY 2-CONT'S

I left Baylake via the bridge and caught a nice sunset.

I stopped in the store, because why not?
I would like to find this at my local flea market!!

When I got off of the elevator the concierge was there and I explained where I had been and how I was trying to make a smooth transition over to BLT and hopefully have a room ready in the afternoon for a rest I anticipated was going to need to occur.
He assured me they would put a note in on this end and I was to call in the am for bell services and they would move our stuff over there to eliminate one issue. He also told me that we were allowed to access the lounge till midnight the next day if something went awry.
I remembered that there was no fanfare as mentioned at the beginning of this report and what the travel agent said would occur.
So I mentioned our upcoming anniversary and he pulled up something on the computer and said the only note in there was this was out first trip. Umm, nope it isn't. It was at that point that he gave us the 2 pins I posted above.
Proper communication is a powerful thing.

I think he felt a little bad because I asked if I could have a beer for Gary and he said wait a minute and got a 6 pack of beer and walked me back to the room to give it to Gary!

When I got back to the room some silliness was going on!

After all of this we started packing up because we were going to call bell services in the morning as instructed to take all of our gear before we headed over to Epcot.

 

[rshell68]

 

[littleroo]

 

[MickeyCB]

Annnddd you would be correct!

 

[MickeyCB]

DAY 3-EPCOT DAY!
I finally got to have a few minutes on the balcony with a morning coffee, both because I had packed up most of our gear the night before and it wasn't hot as the surface of the sun yet.
And what I find very sad is I actually do not remember this quiet moment and if it weren't for these pictures it would have been forgotten.
I've said it in prior trip reports, but sitting on the balcony with morning coffee and watching the world go by, where ever we are staying, is my jam!

And an absolute favorite is the sound of the horns on the boats! It is a sound I will always associate with Disney.

After we all got ready we called bell services and they came for our mountain of stuff and we headed downstairs to the monorail to make our way to Epcot.

Una, "what do you want now Grandma?!"

We got to the big round ball by about 10:30 am. If this site doesn't do something for you, you are too jaded to continue to go to Disney, in my opinion.

The kids realized that the Japanese drummers that Gary absolutely adores would be starting in a few minutes so we did another forced march (we seem to do this every time we get to Epcot), but made it on time.
I was so excited for him, because I don't know if you remember in my Oct. 21 report, Gary sat through the entire show thinking he had recorded them on his phone but hadn't pushed record.
This time Seth set him up and made sure it was recording!
Great viewing spot and he really enjoyed it!

After this we have royalty to meet!