Coast-to-Coast Disney 2011 Trip Report: Mme. & M. Bricker's Zany Holiday

WDWFigment · Jul 25, 2011

Alright - that concludes this leg of the report!

Question: is anyone still reading the report? I know WDWMagic skews towards WDW (it's in the name, after all!), so I'm not surprised that many people wouldn't care about a Disneyland trip report. I think I'll probably start a new thread for Part II, but just wanted to see if people had already subscribed to this thread.

Anyway, I've already started the WDW leg on my website, and will start posting it on WDWMagic tomorrow. You can read it a day early here: http://www.disneytouristblog.com/disney-trip-report-may-2011-10/

catnrob · Jul 25, 2011

WDWFigment said:
Alright - that concludes this leg of the report!

Question: is anyone still reading the report? I know WDWMagic skews towards WDW (it's in the name, after all!), so I'm not surprised that many people wouldn't care about a Disneyland trip report. I think I'll probably start a new thread for Part II, but just wanted to see if people had already subscribed to this thread.

Anyway, I've already started the WDW leg on my website, and will start posting it on WDWMagic tomorrow. You can read it a day early here: http://www.disneytouristblog.com/disney-trip-report-may-2011-10/

(as I peak thru the oodles of WDWMagic readers who have come and gone while reading this TR - I wave my little hand and say.....) I am still reading your report! I love your sick photo skills and of course your wife's choice of hats.

Disneyfalcon · Jul 25, 2011

I am definitely still reading! I can't wait for the WDW section!

mouselvrmom · Jul 25, 2011

I'm still reading. I love seeing all those DL shots!!

fractal · Jul 25, 2011

Still reading. The photos are A+!

PartOfYourWorld · Jul 25, 2011

Still here :wave:

I have never been to Disneyland so it was great reading a trip report about it! I hope to get there one day!

Great pictures as always as well!

TakeMeThere81 · Jul 26, 2011

Great trip report (so far) ! I've stopped at the part where you are making your mad dash to John Wayne Airport.

I love IASM at Disneyland too...I remember it as a kid (West-Coaster here), and I remember our first visit to the one in the MK was a bit disappointing, just because the backdrop was so lame! The one in Disneyland is so beautiful! And yes, you will LOVE it at Christmas! I saw it during our last trip and it literally took my breath away!

Big Thunder BBQ, yes, a really fun place to eat! I love that it is sort of tucked away too. At Christmas, they had Santa's Reindeer over there instead of the goats, very fun!

I loved your photos and commentary from the morning you were power walking in the front of the pack. The one of the castle is especially beautiful!

Sweetpee~ I totally get your "hair flying" post! Actually when I saw those pictures, that is exactly what I was thinking! You can feel her joy in those photos

Patrick_Ears · Jul 26, 2011

Tom your pictures are like WOW!!!

:lol:

switts · Jul 26, 2011

Now only if i can ever master a camera and have such a good report like this one, keep it coming Tom....even though i sneakily read it all beforehand over on your blog. :ROFLOL:

faw286570 · Jul 26, 2011

I have been reading your report. It's one of the better ones, if not best I have read.

plaz10 · Jul 26, 2011

Are people still reading? Are you kidding? This forum loves them some Tom and Sarah TR...regardless of destination!

I am reading this one over again because the fiance and I are planning our very first Disneyland trip next year. So i'm sure i'll be filling your facebook/wdwmagic inboxes with questions in a few months!

silver1113 · Jul 26, 2011

I am still reading. Not sure I will ever be going to DL. I also love all of your photography. I am envious and wish I could do 1/4 as well.

WDWFigment · Jul 26, 2011

Thanks for all of the feedback, everyone. It looks like plenty of people are already subscribed here, so I'm just going to keep it going in this thread!

switts said:
Now only if i can ever master a camera and have such a good report like this one, keep it coming Tom....even though i sneakily read it all beforehand over on your blog. :ROFLOL:

That's fine by me, and is actually the reason I post over there first. I'd rather have more people read it there, as my site does make a small amount of money that way. It may not be much, but if it even pays for one meal at a Disney restaurant per year, that's better than nothing. I'd be writing the trip reports regardless and I have fun with the site, so anything above nothing is a nice bonus!

WDWFigment · Jul 26, 2011

Now is the scene in the trip report, were this a movie, where the pages would start to fall off the calendar, and the seasons would change in a series of frames dissolved through the frame. You wouldn’t have many calendar pages fall or much of a season change, though, as we were home for a week before leaving again for Walt Disney World.

Given that it was only a week, I’ve decided to treat this as one trip report. Well, one trip report in two parts. Sort of like the Godfather (although as the Michael Corlene figure, I won’t be killing any politicians in this installment, nor will I be seeking refuge in the Italy pavilion). I know a week is a long “layover,” but convincing myself this was only one vacation justifies additional future vacations! When we booked our Disneyland trip, we did not plan on taking this trip to Walt Disney World. In fact, we booked Disneyland for the dates we did after making the definite decision not to go to Destination D.

About 3 days after we booked our flight for Disneyland, we were convinced to go to Destination D, too, and we booked the trip. I was a little weary of taking two trips so close together, especially since we had just moved into our new house and had plenty of things to get done with it. (As I sit here typing this trip report, we still have plenty of things to get done...most of which should probably be prioritized above writing a trip report, but then again, they’re not nearly as fun!)

The second leg started much like the first, with packing (Yossarian the Cat even helped!), and with us going to work before leaving for the airport midday. We both typically work from 6:45 a.m. until 3:30 p.m., but on this day, we left at 2:45 p.m.. When you’ve got Disney on your brain all day long, that’s not nearly early enough. For our next trip, I’m suggesting we book a flight that departs at 3:30, so we can be out of there even earlier!

Once we got to the airport, we both changed clothes into our “Disney clothes” and headed to the...AirTran...counter to check-in our luggage. I almost feel ashamed that we betrayed Southwest, but as frugal consumers, we book the cheapest flights, and AirTran had a cheaper flight than Southwest that was also direct. Southwest’s cheapest flight was still more expensive, and had one stop. In any case, our airfare was still going to Southwest, as it had already acquired AirTran, so what’s the difference? I just hope Southwest doesn’t cease offering low fares because it doesn’t have as great of an incentive to do so (with a competitor out of the market).

After we checked our bag, we saw a beautiful German Shepherd who was with a TSA agent. I wanted to take its photo, but again, I worried about getting in trouble taking photos of “the wrong things” at the airport. Disney Security had told me in October 2009 that me and a few photographer buddies were taking photos in a “suspicious way,” so I figured if taking photos of Spaceship Earth is suspicious, taking photos of airport security dogs really would raise some red flags. Oh well, I thought.

We went on our way to the food court, where I got, you guessed it, some fine McDonald’s cuisine. Everywhere else, Big Macs were 2 for $4. Obviously, this promotion wasn’t going on at the airport. However, the airport had just added a dollar menu (sometime since December), and a cheeseburger was only $1. By contrast, the Big Mac (my holy grail of lunch and dinner McDonald’s cuisine) was $3.59. I figured 3 cheeseburgers would fill me up, and would only cost $3. Versus 2 Big Macs, which would cost $7.18. (These are the things that I spend the bulk of my time pondering.) Just as I was about to order the cheeseburgers, I exclaimed, “to heck with it, I’m on vacation!!!” and ordered the Big Macs. Okay, I didn’t really say this out loud, but I certainly thought it. As you have probably surmised, I am very passionate about Big Macs. Like much of the rest of the civilized world, Sarah thinks my enjoyment of McDonald’s, and its “fake” products is disgusting. I think her love for disgusting tasting organic foods is disgusting. I suppose we balance one another out well.

Consuming a Big Mac, if done properly, is a heavenly experience. The bun, like a sesame freckled breast of an angel, resting gently on the ketchup and mustard below, flavors mingling in a seductive pas de deux. Two patties of ground beef so exquisite, swirling in your mouth, breaking apart, and combining again in a fugue of sweets and savor so delightful. This is no mere sandwich of grilled meat and toasted bread. This is God, speaking to us in food.

The How I Met Your Mother fans out there probably aren’t impressed by “my” eloquent words above, but I certainly think they apply to the Big Mac just as much as that storied “Best Burger In New York.”

After my taste buds finished dancing with delight, my mind returned to the German Shepherd I saw earlier. Empowered by the delicious burgers, I decided to ask the (human) security guard if I could take a photo of the (canine) security guard. He obliged, and I snapped a couple of frames before running off. I probably got myself high-scrutiny surveillance by the FBI, CIA, and the rest of the alphabet soup of intelligence agencies thanks to that little move. If you’re out there monitoring me around the clock and reading this, security-dudes, sorry that my life is so oddly boring!

We then made our way to the AirTran gates. This was like entering bizarro-airport, as the gate was on the exact opposite side of the airport from Southwest’s, the men’s and women’s restrooms are all on the opposite side of one another, and all of the airport staff walks around backwards. Well, maybe not the latter two, but it was odd finally venturing to the other side of the airport.

Boarding began almost as soon as we arrived over there, and Sarah and I assumed we’d board first since we were near the front of the plane. As we watched 6 other groups board in front of us, I began to second guess our seat selection. I also began thinking about how boarding an airplane “for real” isn’t nearly as cool as boarding Soarin’. For one thing, the experience just isn’t as fun, there’s no awesome score, and you can’t see as much; for another thing no Puddy (you may know him as Patrick Warburton) to guide you through the experience. I wish all of my flights had Soarin’s score and Puddy as a flight attendant. Now that would truly be flying first class!

Finally, we boarded, and found that, sure enough, we were near the front. In hindsight, it does make sense to board the rear of the plane first, but it did have us a little worried (even though it would ultimately make only like a 5 minute difference in getting off the plane).

Upon finally getting off the plane, we debated whether to pick up our checked bag (we checked only one bag because of AirTran’s $20 fee per bag) or just let DME try to find it. Due to an aggravating mix-up between our travel agent and DME (I don’t know which party was to blame, and in case it was not our travel agent’s fault, I don’t want to slander their name, but suffice to say, we will be booking our own reservations from here on out barring some extraordinary circumstances) our DME luggage tags were sent to New York instead of Indianapolis.

We didn’t realize we hadn’t received our DME materials until 3 days before the trip, and by then, it was too late. DME reassured us that their agents would get our bag if we identified it, but we were a little incredulous. Ultimately, we decided to just take the risk, and let DME get the bags. It was more Sarah’s decision than anything, as I had barely anything that I couldn’t replace easily in the bag.

WDWFigment · Jul 26, 2011

Even though there was absolutely no way we’d make it to the park by 9 pm for the park’s closing, and probably only a slim chance we’d even make it by 10 pm, a small part of me hoped that record crowds had descended upon the Magic Kingdom, and its hours had been extended until 11 pm. We’ve seen the park hours extended by an hour on the same day on several occasions, so was two hours really out of the question? I hoped not.

This is what Sarah and I call the "Cross Over." It's actually the no re-entry point in the airport when you head towards baggage claim. When we cross that threshold, it signifies to us that we're actually "in" Florida. (Weird, I know.)

As soon as we got in line for DME, our bus was ready. We didn’t even stop moving once we got in the line. I don’t think we ever had that short of a wait prior to then for DME. Great sign thus far! Unfortunately, the cosmos didn’t align for us that evening. All Star Movies was the last stop the DME bus made, and we didn’t arrive at the resort until around 10 pm. Worse yet, once there we discovered that the operating hours of the Magic Kingdom hadn’t been extended until 11 pm.

As we pondered just calling it an early night, it felt like our vacation was one of those commercials you see on tv stating, “It’s 10 o’clock, do you know where you children are?” Except in this case, the commercial was snidely remarking: “It’s 10 o’clock. Do you know where your sense of fun is? It’s your first night of vacation, lame-os!” If there’s one thing by which I won’t be insulted, it’s a fake tv commercial airing inside my head! I sneered at this thought, and prepared to head out of our room and do something. Anything.

Sarah was torn on what to do. She was really tired and generally requires more sleep than me, but it was the first night of our vacation. She teetered back and forth a few times, before ultimately opting for doing the responsible thing: going to sleep. With her decision made, I headed out, on my way to do some shooting at the monorail resorts.

I like Disney bus transportation. I like it because it allows me to kick back and relax, without worrying about renting a car, navigating on foreign roadways, or breaking the “Disney bubble” and transporting me back to reality. Those are about the only positive things I can say about the bus system. On the negative side, there are two few buses, they are inefficient, they aren’t exactly the paramount of futuristic or cutting edge transportation methods, have poor and too few routes--anyway, I’m sure you get the idea. I could go on and on.

Anyway, the reason I bring this up is because I had to rely on Disney buses to get me from All Star Movies to the Contemporary, and back home on that particular evening. Upon arriving at the bus stop for Downtown Disney, I noticed there was a Magic Kingdom bus dropping people off. Great, I thought, I’ll just take that bus and catch the resort monorail. Quick and painless! No, unfortunately this bus driver was only dropping people off, as the park had closed. I said that I was going to the monorail, which didn’t matter, he was only doing loops to pick up people from the Magic Kingdom and drop them off. I figured he had no say in the matter and couldn’t pick me up without getting in trouble, so I thanked him and let it go. But I think it’s a stupid policy, nonetheless.

Ten minutes later, a bus bound for Downtown Disney stopped. Excellent, I thought! However, as it was unloading, a father informed the bus driver that his daughter had a protein spill on the bus (unfortunately those aren’t the words he actually used!). The bus driver told me and the other guests waiting for the bus that we “didn’t want to ride that bus” and that another bus would be there shortly. I thought to myself, “oh, you don’t know what I’ll tolerate to get to my photo-destination earlier!” but kept that to myself. Finally, after about another 10 minutes, another Downtown Disney bus arrived.

Once we arrived at Downtown Disney, I got in line for the Contemporary/Polynesian Resort bus. You pay $400/night for a room, and you get the luxury of sharing a bus with another resort. Now that’s swanky! Downtown Disney was hoppin’ that night! Well, there were a lot of people leaving, at least. Maybe they arrived, said, “this is it?! I can buy this same crap at any gift shop on property! Where is the nighttime entertainment?!” and left. In any case, it was a mass exodus. I felt sorry for the Cast Members trying to get guests into lines at the cramped bus stops. Luckily, my bus came fairly quickly. Off we were, to...Pleasure Island!

I guess it has been a while since I have taken a bus to Downtown Disney (every time we had been there since 2007, we had walked from Saratoga Springs Resort), but I had totally forgotten about the separate stop for Pleasure Island. A quick stop there, and we were finally off for the Contemporary. I’ve read a lot about people cheating the system by parking at Downtown Disney to avoid paying for parking at one of the parks, but after this experience, I have to say that those people are truly idiots. (I myself was an idiot for not just taking a taxi, but I didn’t think of that at the time.) It took me an hour and ten minutes from the time I arrived at the All Star bus stop until the time I got off the bus at the Contemporary, and each of my buses was reasonably efficient. I could see that same voyage taking an hour and a half or longer on a bad day. Is an hour and a half of your time on vacation really only worth $12 (or whatever parking costs these days)?

When I got to the Contemporary, I began taking photos immediately. I figured the monorail would probably not be operating for much longer, and to get to the Grand Floridian and Polynesian before it stopped, I’d need to be quick. I spent about 10 minutes taking photos, then headed up to the monorail. It was closed already.

At that moment, I paused, and was overcome with the feeling I had made a huge mistake. If the monorail wasn’t running, did that mean buses back to Downtown Disney weren’t running? Would I be stranded there (a taxi hadn’t crossed my mind at this point)?! I thought I had heard that the last bus to Pleasure Island leaves the resorts at 1 am, and the last bus from Pleasure Island to the resorts leaves at 2 am, but now I was doubting that. I walked briskly (something that would become a common theme of this trip) to the concierge desk, and asked about the buses. Sure enough, I was right about the 1 am time. Phew. Then, I realized I had no way to get to the Polynesian besides going back to Pleasure Island and repeating the previous steps! Wait a second, I thought, the bus that dropped me off also made a stop at the Polynesian, and the Contemporary was the first stop on that loop. It thus stood to reason that if I boarded the Downtown Disney bus, it would stop at the Polynesian before the Contemporary. At least I thought that was right, I was so tired at this point that I was basically moving around on auto-pilot.

When the Downtown Disney bus arrived, I asked the bus driver if he stopped at the Polynesian before returning to Downtown Disney. I’d like to claim this was a rhetorical question, but it wasn’t. When he said, “I will for you!” I responded, “REALLY?! Thanks!” To which he laughed and said that he always stopped at the Polynesian after the Contemporary. I immediately turned and saw a bus half-full of people and realized that should have been a pretty good indicator of this. Like I said, I was really tired.

I didn’t even really know what I might photograph at the Polynesian. I just really wanted to visit the place on our first night. Even though we’ve never stayed there, and probably won’t be able to afford to do so anytime in the foreseeable future, it is without question my favorite resort.

WDWmazprty · Jul 26, 2011

Great pics! :sohappy:

blackthidot · Jul 26, 2011

I wish I could have been with you while you were all nervous and on the verge of a breakdown...

Also I warned you about the buses when you stay at Movies.

switts · Jul 27, 2011

WDWFigment said:
Thanks for all of the feedback, everyone. It looks like plenty of people are already subscribed here, so I'm just going to keep it going in this thread!

That's fine by me, and is actually the reason I post over there first. I'd rather have more people read it there, as my site does make a small amount of money that way. It may not be much, but if it even pays for one meal at a Disney restaurant per year, that's better than nothing. I'd be writing the trip reports regardless and I have fun with the site, so anything above nothing is a nice bonus!

Well if thats the case i can spend just as much time surfing over there as i do here....alot of free time at work. I'll just charge in camera tips when i actually can get my camera

WDWFigment · Jul 27, 2011

WDWmazprty said:
Great pics! :sohappy:

Thanks!

blackthidot said:
I wish I could have been with you while you were all nervous and on the verge of a breakdown...

Also I warned you about the buses when you stay at Movies.

My too, I could have used a shoulder to cry on!

switts said:
Well if thats the case i can spend just as much time surfing over there as i do here....alot of free time at work. I'll just charge in camera tips when i actually can get my camera

Hopefully they help!

The next section is up; I'll post it here tomorrow (and I'll finish posting the first section here later today!): http://www.disneytouristblog.com/disney-trip-report-may-2011-11/

SleepingMonk · Jul 27, 2011

Looks like you caught grandma doing the one cheek sneak!

Must have been the airline food.

Coast-to-Coast Disney 2011 Trip Report: Mme. & M. Bricker's Zany Holiday

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