Trip Report **COMPLETED** Haven't We Already Done Everything? *Gasp* Say What?

Hi everyone! This is my first trip report, and I'm a bit nervous. Perhaps that's why I've procrastinated in getting this done. Reading some trip reports (@Tuvalu @Doc Disney @samantha788 to name some awesome reports), I realized just how little pictures I did take. And I thought I took a bunch (both with my phone and camera)!

But, seeing as how I am home all week due to damage from Hurricane Matthew (I was lucky, no damage or loss of power), this may be a time to start it.

View media item 1385

A little background:

Who: Me, celebrating turning 40 earlier this year. My niece, LaLa, who is 28 and celebrating her first Disney trip. Pic to come, as I haven't uploaded those yet. Oops!

When: September 3 - 9, with MNSSHP on the 8th

Resort: Port Orleans Riverside

Day 1: Saturday, September 3rd
So the day before, there was a list tropical storm Hermione that came through NC dropping wind and rain. I became a Weather junkie that entire week and checked the airlines for updates. Saturday morning, it was all clear and my niece and I made out way to the airport.

This was her fist flight as well. Even though I had tried to prepare her for how to use a carry-on ("How am I to get all my clothes into one bag?") and to pack her 3-1-1 liquids, she didn't put the liquids into a clear bag. Luckily I had packed extra Ziploc bags, shoved all we could in the bag, and we were on our way.

Flight went off pretty much on-time and we landed in CLT and grabbed lunch. This was probably this first time I've landed in Charlotte and not had to run to my next connection.

View media item 1945Ready for the next leg of our trip!

We boarded the flight to MCO and arrived around 4:30. I though we were making good time. Then we hit the waiting for DME. This was my first time taking DME and I thought we had plenty of time. Once we got loaded (we sat in the front), it was onto Disney!

I was so excited to sit in the front, because I wanted my own picture of the entrance sign.....
View media item 1947Yeah, not so much.

The DME dropped off at Saratoga Springs, Old Key West, POFQ and finally Riverside. I had already received the text for the room - Alligator Bayou Building 36. I went to the front desk anyway, so I can see where it was. Yeah, it was a bit of a hike. I believe that we got into the resort, made it to the room, and quickly dropped off our bags by 6:35. Dinner reservations were at 6:45 at Raglan Road. Um, I think we're going to be late.

Next Up: A boat, A walk, and An Irish Party

Thanks for ready thus far. Come back now, ya hear!

 

[prfctlyximprct]

Nice dining view right there

 

[LadyBelle]

Wednesday Cont'd

Disclaimer: This is the part where things get a bit fuzzy (and why I should have either done this TR live, or immediately after returning). I think we roamed a bit around MK and why my niece said towards the end of the Day: "Haven't we done everything already?" I was willing to walk and ride things again. LaLa....well, she's not used to the walking. And this was the day she decided to wear her flip flops.

We were going to try 7DMT right after breakfast, but wait times were already upwards of 45 - 50 minutes. LaLa wasn't interested in waiting that long, plus I had a FP for Thursday.

So highlights for Wednesday:

My ride for the morning. An adorable little girl was on the horse next to me and proceeded to tell me that my horse was really, really high. Too cute.

My first ride on the remodeled Dumbo ride. I didn't get the chance to ride it on my last visit and curiously, only one section was operational at the time and the inside waiting queue wasn't open.

I saw a peanut stand, heard a rubber band,
And seen a needle wink its eye
But I be done seen about everything
When I see an elephant fly
When I see an elephant fly

LaLa's favorite color is orange, so we picked out this elephant to take us around Storybook Circus.

We mulled around Storybook Circus for a bit before our next FP, Space Mountain. Again, I am not a big fan of this coaster, but I did it for LaLa.

I've been a big chicken with all these rides and my glasses. Not being a fan of contacts (or having a spare pair of glasses), I took them off for most of these types of rides. I adore the look on my niece's face. She enjoyed this so much.

Buzz Lightyear was next as we had plenty of time. So we took a chance and waited in the standby line. Yeesh. Getting spoiled by the FP+ lines surely makes it hard to do standby - especially when the standby line is outside.

Winner of this rematch! Although I much prefer TSMM - those targets are much easier to hit.

We stopped by Carousel of Progress for a little A/C relief. It definitely is a great, big, beautiful tomorrow when you're at Disney!

Funny story behind this picture. When we used to go a few Thanksgivings when I was young, my dad always took me to the Hall of Presidents. Now, I wasn't so into this back then, because I wanted to go on all the rides and see characters. My last visit in 2004 I subconsciously avoided this area with my BFF and didn't realize it until she mentioned it at the airport. So I took this picture and texted it to my mom and said "Tell Dad I made it back!!" We all had a good laugh at this.

Lunch at Columbia Harbor House:

This was as delicious as others have said. LaLa had the chicken pot pie.

After lunch we went to Peter Pan with our FP. I *gasp* must be showing my age because I can't for the life of me wonder why someone would wait upwards of 70+ minutes in standby for a 10 minute ride. I loved the flying ship and wished my pics turned out better, but I wanted something a bit more. Was that wrong?

It's a Small World was still closed for refurbishment (but I swear you can still get that earworm just walking by it) and so we headed back to Fantasyland and Gaston's Tavern for a Lefou's Brew (which was delicious!!)

Oh, Gaston? Where are you???

This area is so beautifully done. And I'm seriously thinking of either getting a Lumiere lamp or a Cogsworth clock for myself. Lumiere is one of my favorites from Beauty and the Beast (and Jerry Orbach as well). I have a pin of him that I bought from the Disney Store oh, so long ago that I wear on occasion.

Next, we go (20,000 Leagues) Under the Sea with Ariel!

 

[Tuvalu]

Flip flops = rookie mistake

 

[LadyBelle]

Flip flops = rookie mistake

Oh yes. I tried to warn her well before we went. I had to find some band aids for her at the park to help finish the day. Oh, youth!

 

[Longers]

Wednesday Cont'd

Disclaimer: This is the part where things get a bit fuzzy (and why I should have either done this TR live, or immediately after returning). I think we roamed a bit around MK and why my niece said towards the end of the Day: "Haven't we done everything already?" I was willing to walk and ride things again. LaLa....well, she's not used to the walking. And this was the day she decided to wear her flip flops.

We were going to try 7DMT right after breakfast, but wait times were already upwards of 45 - 50 minutes. LaLa wasn't interested in waiting that long, plus I had a FP for Thursday.

So highlights for Wednesday:

View attachment 176386
My ride for the morning. An adorable little girl was on the horse next to me and proceeded to tell me that my horse was really, really high. Too cute.

View attachment 176387 My first ride on the remodeled Dumbo ride. I didn't get the chance to ride it on my last visit and curiously, only one section was operational at the time and the inside waiting queue wasn't open.

View attachment 176388
I saw a peanut stand, heard a rubber band,
And seen a needle wink its eye
But I be done seen about everything
When I see an elephant fly
When I see an elephant fly

LaLa's favorite color is orange, so we picked out this elephant to take us around Storybook Circus.

We mulled around Storybook Circus for a bit before our next FP, Space Mountain. Again, I am not a big fan of this coaster, but I did it for LaLa.

View attachment 176389I've been a big chicken with all these rides and my glasses. Not being a fan of contacts (or having a spare pair of glasses), I took them off for most of these types of rides. I adore the look on my niece's face. She enjoyed this so much.

Buzz Lightyear was next as we had plenty of time. So we took a chance and waited in the standby line. Yeesh. Getting spoiled by the FP+ lines surely makes it hard to do standby - especially when the standby line is outside.
View attachment 176391Winner of this rematch! Although I much prefer TSMM - those targets are much easier to hit.

We stopped by Carousel of Progress for a little A/C relief. It definitely is a great, big, beautiful tomorrow when you're at Disney!

View attachment 176392 Funny story behind this picture. When we used to go a few Thanksgivings when I was young, my dad always took me to the Hall of Presidents. Now, I wasn't so into this back then, because I wanted to go on all the rides and see characters. My last visit in 2004 I subconsciously avoided this area with my BFF and didn't realize it until she mentioned it at the airport. So I took this picture and texted it to my mom and said "Tell Dad I made it back!!" We all had a good laugh at this.

Lunch at Columbia Harbor House:
View attachment 176393 This was as delicious as others have said. LaLa had the chicken pot pie.

After lunch we went to Peter Pan with our FP. I *gasp* must be showing my age because I can't for the life of me wonder why someone would wait upwards of 70+ minutes in standby for a 10 minute ride. I loved the flying ship and wished my pics turned out better, but I wanted something a bit more. Was that wrong?

It's a Small World was still closed for refurbishment (but I swear you can still get that earworm just walking by it) and so we headed back to Fantasyland and Gaston's Tavern for a Lefou's Brew (which was delicious!!)

View attachment 176394
Oh, Gaston? Where are you???

This area is so beautifully done. And I'm seriously thinking of either getting a Lumiere lamp or a Cogsworth clock for myself. Lumiere is one of my favorites from Beauty and the Beast (and Jerry Orbach as well). I have a pin of him that I bought from the Disney Store oh, so long ago that I wear on occasion.

Next, we go (20,000 Leagues) Under the Sea with Ariel!

I am a big beauty and the beast fan and have both cogsworth and lumiere on my mantle - they look perfect and a must buy in my books

 

[prfctlyximprct]

I love the Hall of Presidents! Your shot is beautiful!!

 

[LadyBelle]

After our snack (and unsuccessful search for Gaston), we popped on over to The Little Mermaid.

Next in my camera's timeline was the Festival of Fantasy Parade:

This was our viewing spot

Then onto another classic favorite of mine - The Country Bears Jamboree!

Everybody sing along!!

It was about this time, when I asked LaLa if she'd like to see anything else in the area (or even wait in the standby queue) is when she said "I don't know. Haven't we done everything already??"

I think she was a bit tired from walking for four days straight and she had blisters from her flip flops. We grabbed her a soda and I made a mental note to grab a dole whip on Thursday (keep a note on that...) when we were back this way.

 

[LadyBelle]

Next Up - Dinner time!!

Lady and the Tramp is my all time favorite movie. I loved it before I ever saw it completely. I had seen parts of it from other Disney specials when I was young and it stuck with me ever since.

LaLa said that this bread was better than Carrabba's

I bet you're thinking that LaLa had the Steak again, this being her Great Steak Tour of 2016.

Nope, *I* had the steak this time. She had Chicken Parmigiana

I have no idea what possessed me to eat steak in this restaurant. It was delicious, though.

Another outside decor:

Serious, Disney, if you ever feel the need to get rid of any decor, I'd be happy to take this (and a mickey wreath) off your hands - for a reasonable price.

Since LaLa couldn't hang until 11:00, we headed back to the room after perusing the Main Street Shops again. She still hadn't found gifts for people yet. I told her that since we didn't have our FP start until 11:00 am, she could sleep in.

 

[LadyBelle]

Thursday

As I let LaLa sleep in, I decided to get something at the food court.

The information for the Tragical Express. I don't think I'm still over that part.

Along the way too the food court, I took some pics:

The Garden View from my room

The other "Garden View" from my room

Alligator Bayou should be renamed Gecko Gardens, because we saw a ton of these little guys.

After texting my mom while at the food court, I walked back to the room to find LaLa up and getting ready. Off to MK for the morning!

 

[LadyBelle]

LaLa wanted to look around the Emporium again, so I browsed the stores and came upon some performers:

LaLa and I then made our way to Fantasyland.

I was checking on wait times and noticed that 7DMT had a wait time long enough that when we got through, it would be time to use our FP and go right back on again. LaLa liked that idea. But first....

Found him! Gaston was great. Before it was my turn, he left the people he was talking to and went over to a woman to turn her souvenir mug so that his face was facing out. Loved it. He was wonderful with the little kids in front as well. When we were talking, I asked him if he liked older women. Sadly, no, as his heart belonged to 17-year old (per the CM) Belle. Oh, darn.

We then hit the standby queue for 7DMT

On our first trip, we were seated in the first car. While in line, LaLa found where the cameras were.

She was obviously going for the staged pose. I, however, was actually having fun on a roller coaster and didn't care.



Our second ride through, LaLa was "tired" of riding:

We then headed to the Friar's Nook, as LaLa found something delicious on their menu:

Pot Roast Mac & Cheese. I'm salivating just looking at it. OMG that was delicious!

 

[LadyBelle]

After lunch, it was onto the final (operating) mountain to conquer - Splash Mountain. LaLa decided that she'd rather walk through the standby queue than wait for our FP, which wasn't for another hour. We were stuck behind a foreign tourist who let the gap in the line widen because she "didn't want to wait in the sun." Um....

When we got up to the boats, we were assigned to the front. This time, I wasn't quite as excited as I was for the 7DMT. As we floated along we got stuck several times. Once while we were climbing towards the top for the drop.

Oddly enough, we did not get soaked. Barely splashed. Once we rounded the bend, we stopped. We were stopped long enough for about 3 boats to catch up. I looked around and contemplated just how we were going to be evacuated from the ride, but we then moved along and came back to the loading dock.

Since it would be a while before our ADR, we headed back over to Disney Springs for additional shopping.

This is so beautiful. I love what Disney has done to remodel the old Downtown Disney.

After we shopped ourselves out, we headed back to the room for a little bit of R&R before heading back out to MK.

 

[LadyBelle]

After our room break, it was back to MK for dinner.

Back again! I was thrilled to get a dinner ADR. I believe the only reason I was able to snag one was due to MNSSHP, but that's okay, because we were headed there after dinner.

We were seated in the ballroom - oh so close to the West Wing!

@Doc Disney is right - Disney does beautiful lighting. I'll be sure to look up in the future.

Seafood again for me (the sauce was a bit too spicy for my taste) and LaLa round out her Great Steak Tour of 2016 with another steak. She was perturbed by the CM telling her what the steak would look like the way she ordered it (Rare or Medium Rare was her preference), but I told her that they have to inform them just in case.

Lumiere was correct - the Grey Stuff is delicious!

We toured the ballroom and West Wing before making our way out.

Oh @Longers & @prfctlyximprct - Look who I ran into!! Such a gentleman, too!http://forums.wdwmagic.com/members/prfctlyximprct.84657/

 

[LadyBelle]

After dinner, we were going to look around for some treat locations. For some reason, we missed getting our treat bags. That worked out okay, because LaLa wasn't in the mood for it. I asked a CM if Jack and Sally were going to be out for pictures, as The Nightmare Before Christmas is LaLa's favorite. The CM thought they would be over by the HM, but LaLa didn't want to walk all the way to Liberty Square. So, we headed towards the hub and luckily got there just in time for the Hocus Pocus Villain Spectaular. I thought it was an hour later, but LaLa looked at the guide and it was at 8:00 for this day only.

This was probably LaLa's favorite part of the whole trip. I glanced over to see her head bopping to the music and she was taking a lot of pictures.

We then headed down Main Street to try to get a spot for the parade.

The not so nice CM in this blurry picture must have forgotten to take her happy juice that day because in no uncertain terms did she tell us to move from that spot. Boo!

We managed to stake out a spot in front of the confectionery. LaLa ran in quick to pick up some last minute treats for her family back home.

 

[LadyBelle]

And just like that, it's over. We mulled around a bit before heading towards the exit. The party was still going on, but we had to get up early for our DME ride back to the airport. Plus, we wanted to watch some of the Panthers vs Broncos game (ugh! We need a healthy O-Line stat!)

I hope so, Disney World. I certainly hope so.

 

[LadyBelle]

We woke up around 6:30 am and headed towards the pick up spot for the Tragical Express. We talked with a lovely CM named Bertie, who gave us both a Mickey sticker, because "everyone needs a little Mickey to take home with them." I adored Bertie. If you're ever at POR, talk with Bertie. You'll be glad you did. He made it leaving a bit easier.

And just like that, the trip was over. About a week after, Disney sent this as a thank you for staying:

It came with a lovely note, thanking me for my visit and for me to enjoy this sketch as I dream of my next visit. Believe me, I haven't stopped dreaming of a next visit since I got home.

All in all, I had a great time. Having some time to think it over, I know that I should try not to overplan the next time, to be sure to get a Dole Whip, and to stop worrying if LaLa had a good time. I actually did enjoy my stay at POR, but I may want to try and stay at another resort next time - it would depend on cost.

Hopefully, I'll be back next year. I have a travel buddy in mind - I just need to convince her to go sooner!

Thanks for reading everyone. I promise to do better on my next TR and not wait so long!!

 

[prfctlyximprct]

That pot roast mac and cheese has got me over here drooling on my keyboard... YUM! That is going on my must try list for next time LOL! And hey, you and @Longers better watch out! THE BEAST IS MINE. Don't you know the end of the story? It's that Ariel (me) runs away with the beast!

 

[LadyBelle]

That pot roast mac and cheese has got me over here drooling on my keyboard... YUM! That is going on my must try list for next time LOL! And hey, you and @Longers better watch out! THE BEAST IS MINE. Don't you know the end of the story? It's that Ariel (me) runs away with the beast!

LOL! Hmm...we must plot to find Belle another guy - you take the Beast, and I'll take Gaston!

The Pot Roast Mac and Cheese is definitely drool worthy. There wasn't too much food that I didn't like while there. The dining plan was a definite plus for me.

 

[Longers]

LOL! Hmm...we must plot to find Belle another guy - you take the Beast, and I'll take Gaston!

The Pot Roast Mac and Cheese is definitely drool worthy. There wasn't too much food that I didn't like while there. The dining plan was a definite plus for me.

The beast is mine - take no notice of @prfctlyximprct - he was mine before he was hers!
And that was lovely for you to get the Mickey sketch - I didn't get one
Great report - thanks for sharing

 

[Doc Disney]

Flip flops = rookie mistake

Hey now @Tuvalu my Mom and I only wear flip flops and we definitely aren't rookies

@Doc Disney is right - Disney does beautiful lighting. I'll be sure to look up in the future.

Loved your report! I eat steak all the time in Disney too so I can understand why there was so much steak eaten The lights for some reason caught my eye this last trip, Disney puts so much detail into everything!

 

[MinnieM123]

Enjoyed your photos and your trip report! Thank you for sharing. We don't care if it's on time or not when people post these--no matter what, you'll still have a captive, appreciative audience here! Best wishes to you.