Trip Report COMPLETED - After 2 1/2 years we finally made it back to WDW

So as the title suggests we finally got back to WDW.
It was every bit as magical as I expected and was much needed after years away due to Covid.
We had such a great time. I’m not going to lie it was a different experience which I’ll explain more of but this holiday was so needed.
I’ve thought long and hard about a TR as the honest truth is I kept no notes as I just wanted to live in the moment but I’ll share with you some of it the best I can.

So let’s rewind slightly here. We already have a trip booked for Sept this year but in early November the US borders opened for us UK folk and myself and Chris watched live on u tube as the Virgin and British airways planes took off together and we both got a bit emotional. After take off we both looked at each other and the words came out of my mouth “I don’t think I can wait till Sept , if Covid has taught us anything it’s to do what you want. Can we book another trip for March?” Without hesitation Chris said yes - he is a keeper! And so the planning started. I checked out various bits of data and found the lowest weeks in terms of spring break crowds, I prepared myself for a busy trip knowing full well that there is a lot of pent up demand and just considered myself lucky to finally be able to plan a trip.

We decided to plan 10 days from 26th Feb. Disney was so expensive that we decided as this was an additional trip we would book elsewhere and settled on Sheraton Vistana Resort as it was close to Disney with no resort fees or parking costs. Our trip was still just over £4000 but money well spent in my books (and as we’ve been stuck at home for 2 1/2 years we’ve hardly spent anything!)

I’ll get into more of the detail over the next few days and I’ll try to get some pictures posted rather than it being text heavy but for now I’m back………. Hello again Disney friends

 

[lindawdw]

Such a lovely last day at MK and how fun that you got to do a few things in AK too before the rain hit. You can tell just how special this trip was for you both. The tripod pics in front of the castle are adorable!

 

[amjt660]

Great pictures on your last day - your taking time to smell the roses day

I don't care what Steve Rogers thinks...

This is America's A$$...

Max

 

[Longers]

Tuesday 8th March
We woke with mixed feelings. Grateful to have come back sad to be going back to the Uk. Also when writing a TR it is somewhat final as the reliving of the holiday is nearly over too. But I can hold off no more so it’s time to finish the final day.
We had park passes for Epcot but had decided we wouldn’t have much time so would just be taking things easy.

In all the years we’ve been coming to Disney we always do a park on the last day.(normally MK and we leave after the 3pm parade) but for some reason our flight home was earlier than usual and it would mean we would have to leave at approx 1pm so we made the decision to extend our room until 12 noon to at least mean we could wake up and leave in our own time.
Whilst not a requirement we did a Covid test before leaving - negative!

We had a walk around our resort to stretch our legs before leaving our bags and heading to Disney springs. The rain from last night was still evident in places but it was a lovely sunny and warm morning.

 

[Minnesota disney fan]

Tracey, Loved, Loved your trip report. Thank you for taking the time to do it. The pictures were all beautiful. I know I have been kind of down on disney lately with all the changes, but it makes me want to go back after your report
I also took out the 2018 photo album of our Disney trip to POFQ and it was beautiful there. We had a lot of fun too. Maybe one day things will change for the better and we will be back. So glad you had a great time

 

[Swissmiss]

Thanks so much for your TR - really loved it

 

[Longers]

I don’t have any pictures from Disney springs and I only remember spending ages in a spice shop but before we knew it time had ran away with us and we were left trying to get back to our resort to pick our bags up quickly.

Chris pulled up and I jumped out to try to speed things up,
Still stopped for a photo in reception though

And of this little turtle soaking up the sun.

suitcases in the car we had to stop for petrol. We opted to take back full so we had no choice bt the clock was ticking. We knew we would make it but we weren’t leaving ourselves as much time as we would normally.

Once at the airport we left the hire car - remember the scratch they didn’t even care. I guess years of getting fully inclusive insurance paid off. We had thought we might have issues but not a word was said.

We dashed upstairs to drop the bags off but they wanted to see our arrival form confirmation which wouldn’t load on the phone - we sorted within around 10 mins and then headed to get something to eat (which was a little rushed!) and then straight through security - when I say straight through it was 40 mins!

This is not a fun ride going in this direction!,,

 

[Longers]

We arrived at the gate as boarding started.

It had been a rush but to be fair we always leave too much time and end up getting bored. Although I did say to Chris I’d like a compromise to maybe just be half hour earlier than this time for future trips.

As the flight was ready to leave the heavens opened again - Disney was definitely sad we were going. We had seen no rain other than last night and tonight. We had a fab 10 days weather wise.

The flight back was ok. I watched Encanto and then tried to sleep.

We got back on time, picked up the car and drove home - thankfully on the right side of the road as you always have to remember after driving on the other side for 10 days

I normally get back and my friends know to give me a wide berth as I get really down but this trip left me full in my heart and happy I had been able to finally get back to Disney.
That’s the first time in 25:years I have ever felt that way so I guess Covid has made me less miserable after a trip so that’s a good thing (unles it’s because another trip is already booked!) 156 days till I get to do it all over again. I just can’t wait.

Today we’ve been listening to the millennium celebration Cd and have already been talking about our upcoming trip.

Our March trip was over but the memories will live in our hearts forever.

If you got to the end thank you for reading and I hope you can all enjoy a Disney trip soon.

 

[Longers]

Lovely timing for the PPP at the end of your day at MK and to see the friends on the way out. I think I would be having a wobble at that too. Beautiful memories for you til next time (September?).

It was a definite wobble and yes September we get to do it all again!

Great pictures on your last day - your taking time to smell the roses day

I don't care what Steve Rogers thinks...

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This is America's A$$...

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Max

Thanks Max

Tracey, Loved, Loved your trip report. Thank you for taking the time to do it. The pictures were all beautiful. I know I have been kind of down on disney lately with all the changes, but it makes me want to go back after your report
I also took out the 2018 photo album of our Disney trip to POFQ and it was beautiful there. We had a lot of fun too. Maybe one day things will change for the better and we will be back. So glad you had a great time

Thanks Ruth. It looks like things are getting back to normal slowly so fingers crossed. Hopefully we can meet again and eat ice cream and ride BTMRR together.

Thanks so much for your TR - really loved it

Thank you so much. They take so much time it’s good to know someone is reading.

 

[rshell68]

Thank you so much for sharing! Thankfully no one at work saw my tears as I read

 

[Longers]

Final thoughts

We had waited so long for this trip it was truly magical.
We hadn’t been on a plane for over 2 years so I guess it was always going to be emotional but this was more emotional than I expected.
Just being in Disney was enough to set me off

I loved how quick it was to get through security and to be honest I also loved things not being as planned as they used to be with Fast passes. (Although paying for them is not the answer). We took more time out than we would normally do as we didn’t feel like we were missing out.

Seeing Megan again was a trip highlight and was totally unplanned which probably made it extra special.

Riding BTMRR and eating ice cream was amazing and something I had dreamed of for years.

I missed riding Everest, (but it shouldn’t be closed in Sept) I was grateful to ride Splash again before any changes and I was proud of myself for riding TOT and didn’t think much of the fireworks but maybe I need to give them another go.

We didn’t get to Universal as we just wanted to stay in Disney to make up for lost time but that is on the agenda for September.

Disney for me is magical no matter what, we never felt unsafe and just lived in the moment. It truly makes me so happy to make memories and relive them. Even today’s CD just took me back to standing in Epcot and I was just grinning from ear to ear.

Disney trips are back and that makes me so happy - normal business has been resumed.

 

[fractal]

Great report @Longers !

I know I'm not that only was that was happy you and Chris made it back! Loved all the smiles and photos! Thanks for sharing!

 

[Longers]

Thank you so much for sharing! Thankfully no one at work saw my tears as I read

You are welcome

And when I wrote the first bits of this TR as I relieved being in MK for the first time I was crying all over again.
I am pleased those feelings came through enough for you to feel how I felt but sorry they made you cry at work!

I am taking that as a huge compliment though….

 

[Longers]

Great report @Longers !

I know I'm not that only was that was happy you and Chris made it back! Loved all the smiles and photos! Thanks for sharing!

The photos weren’t the normal quality (and would never match yours anyway) but glad you enjoyed it we were truly grateful to finally get back home

 

[amjt660]

Great TR - a lot of raw emotions - thank you for sharing all the feelings you were having.

Looking forward to your next trip


Max

 

[Longers]

Such a lovely last day at MK and how fun that you got to do a few things in AK too before the rain hit. You can tell just how special this trip was for you both. The tripod pics in front of the castle are adorable!

Yes we managed to just miss that rain and we like the pictures in front of the castle too. Some of my favourites and they certa8nky sun up how happy we were to be home.

 

[Longers]

Great TR - a lot of raw emotions - thank you for sharing all the feelings you were having.

Looking forward to your next trip


Max

Thank Max

And I can’t wait for my next trip either! Hopefully our paths will meet.

 

[MinnieM123]

@Longers , thank you so much for sharing your fun TR. I was interested in reading all of your impressions of the attractions, food, entertainment, etc. Your photos were excellent. So happy that you and your husband had such a nice vacation!!!!

 

[Tuvalu]

This was worth waiting for.

 

[donaldtoo]

We headed off for ice cream. I sent this picture to someone I work with saying that this picture was reality of the non sleep due to the work announcements with the bags under my eyes.

The ice cream was yummy. We were sat again in the warm evening as the sun was setting eating ice cream - dies life get any better?..

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I had never done smugglers run so Chris asked if we could go together so off we went.

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I think we were engineers. I was so busy pressing buttons I don’t think I fully embraced the ride or the context of it.

Our final stop of the night was queuing SDD - I can’t be sure but I think the front of this ride is better? I think we were placed around 4 rows from the front. We screamed and laughed our way around that ride like 5 year olds on their first roller coaster.


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After our ride the park was closing down so we headed out.
I think there was a show on the Chinese theatre which we had totall6 forgotten about but we just headed out and home to bed as we were knackered!

Today we had walked 11.8 miles and I had done 27,322 steps - the most of our whole trip so there must have been a lot of walking between rides!

I was still convinced we could do more and hoped I could reach 30k but that never happened.

This prop still cracks me up…”Roz of the Resistance”…!!!!!

 

[donaldtoo]

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The show finished and normally with illuminations I would be crying and to be honest I expected (and so did Chris) for this to happen again after all I had cried loads this holiday but I was disappointed.
Not with the fireworks as no one does fireworks like Disney but this is the kind of show I expect for Magic Kingdom. Epcot is a different park and all previous fireworks have kind of represented what you would expect with nods to countries or the world in general. But this was very MK like if that makes any sense at all?

I just hope that they don’t try to change Epcot to another MK - and I love MK I just think the parks need to keep their own identity.

In years gone by myself and Chris would just drive to Epcot to see the fireworks and that’s all. We have even driven the car to the car park when we’ve been too late and sat there singing to ourselves with the windows open watching what we can’t over spaceship Earth but I’m not sure that will be happening again unless we just need to give it another go but at this point we were left with no emotions like we would normally be and agreed we wouldn’t be rushing back any other night to watch it again.

We headed out of the park and saw this beautiful sight.

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SE was so pretty at night. I had said to Chris we needed to watch the little show I think they do now but we never got back.

We walked out of the park singing the hailer shailer music to ourselves - well I may have been singing out loud. I used to love watching the fireworks and leaving to that music it set you up for the night - I don’t even think any music was playing but I could be wrong!

We reached the front of the park and had to stop for some pictures

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We’d been out all day (to be honest that’s what we normally do). But we were tired and ready for bed so we left the park still singing hailer shailer music (for this of you wondering it was from the tapestry of nations parade they used to have around world showcase)

Another day done we needed our rest for tomorrow.

Just in case you haven’t seen the Spaceship Earth show on video (I apologize in advance…don’t click if you haven’t and don’t want a spoiler)…IMHO, I think it’s the BEST thing Walt Disney World has rolled out for the 50th…!!!