Trip Report **completed**Our not so perfect, but good enough July 2021 trip

Hi, all! It took me much longer to get this started than I wanted, but my computer decided it didn't have room for any more of my photos and I had to get an external hard drive and transfer some in order to start! We've also been a little busy getting everything ready for Logan to leave for Iowa in 2 weeks!

So, if you didn't follow along with my PTR, we were supposed to be on a cruise to celebrate Logan's HS graduation, but instead had to switch gears and decided to spend a few days at WDW.

Now, the specifics:
Who: Me (Amy), my husband Brian, Logan (18), Lily (16), and Owen (13)
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Where: Cabana Bay Beach Resort and Pop Century

When: July 11-20, 2021

Why: as I previously mentioned, this trip was to celebrate Logan's HS graduation. He asked for a cruise, so I do have another one scheduled for next June and we quickly threw together the Disney portion of this trip (so I guess we can call this his preliminary graduation trip!!)


We had some truly magical moments on this trip and some definitively un-magical moments as well! Unfortunately, our first day held one of the most un-magical moments.

We drove from Ohio and always try to leave very early to try to avoid as much traffic as possible. We set an alarm for midnight and our goal was to leave the house between 1 and 1:30 am. We were spot on!
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We made a quick stop at McDonald's for Cokes and were on our way. It was smooth sailing all the way to northern Florida. We even made it through Atlanta with no drama or slow downs!!
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Florida was stop and go the whole way, but we still made decent time and were pulling in to Cabana Bay Beach Resort about 4:00 which was about 1-1.5 hours later than we had anticipated, so not too bad! However, that is official check in time, and the parking area was a mess, as was the lobby!
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Luckily, they had sent me an email that allowed me to check in prior to arrival and that line was fairly short! The regular line was wrapped all the way around the lobby and was said to be 2 hours long! Brian dropped me off and found a parking spot that he probably shouldn't have been in to wait for me and sent Logan in to the lobby to guide me back to the car!

Now for the most un-magical moment of our trip! I had booked a 2 bedroom volcano view suite as a surprise for Logan since it was his celebration trip and I thought it would be cool to see the volcano lit up at night and watch all the activity in the park from our room. I paid way more than I normally would for a room, but felt it was a reasonable splurge. Well, we get to our room which happened to be on the second floor and this was our view:
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Yes, that is the back of a service building and the very tip of the volcano!! I don't understand how they can charge the same amount of money for this view as they can for the higher floor rooms (which I did request)! They need a lower partial or obstructed view charge for the rooms on this floor. I did say something and no one cared at all and basically told me to stuff it! Needless to say, we won't be back there any time soon!
 

TheMouseFan

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Brian was really starting to fade at this point, so we changed up our plans and decided to head to Pop and get settled in our rooms. The original plan was to go to All Star Movies to recreate some photos of the kids from their first trips before heading to Pop, but we'll hopefully have time to do that next year when we are in Florida.

We had to hit Goofy's before leaving so we would have snacks for the rest of the trip and for the ride home. However, we has a little crisis in that they did not have any of the sour gummy worms that Lily wanted!! You would have thought that the world was ending! (and to make matters worse, we couldn't find them anywhere that we looked the next four days, and we looked EVERYWHERE!) They also didn't have my Mickey shaped licorice, but I was just a little disappointed and not crushed like Lily was!
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We made it back to Pop and moved the car to the 70's section.
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We took a first load from the car to the rooms. We had only gotten one room is ready text, but since she had already told us we had connecting rooms, we were easily able to figure out which second room was ours. But, nobody could get in a room except for Logan! So, Owen and I took everyone's MagicBands and headed to the lobby while Brian and Logan went to get more luggage and Lily stayed in the room to be sure they could get back in! It was easily fixed, but a pain to have to deal with.
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TheMouseFan

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
When we got back, we made sure everyone could get into a room and I took a few room pics. I felt that the changes to the bathroom were fantastic and I loved all of the new storage there and in the main area as well as having the large table available, but I hate how they took all of the "character" out of the rooms.
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Logan and I made one more trip to the car to grab a few last items.
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Tiggerish

Resident Redhead
Premium Member
When we got back, we made sure everyone could get into a room and I took a few room pics. I felt that the changes to the bathroom were fantastic and I loved all of the new storage there and in the main area as well as having the large table available, but I hate how they took all of the "character" out of the rooms.
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Logan and I made one more trip to the car to grab a few last items.
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Wow,those rooms look stark!
 

Back!Elbow!Shoulders!

Omnia mutantur, nihil interit
Premium Member
Wow,those rooms look stark!

They really were! Like I said, the layout and storage were great, but I really missed the personality of the old Pop rooms! Not sure why they are renovating the deluxe rooms with Disney characters and left the value ones so boring!
And although decoration-wise it is stark, I’ve come to appreciate it. I’m usually only in the room to nap/sleep so it’s nice to have a break from the Disney stuff/ over- visual stimulation while trying to rest.
 

joshsprincess921

Well-Known Member
Volcano Bay looks amazing. We were just down in Florida a couple weeks ago visiting family and we tried to take the kids, but they were sold out the day we wanted to go. We ended up going to Aquatica. It was fun, but doesn't look nearly as impressive as Volcano Bay.
 

TheMouseFan

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Volcano Bay looks amazing. We were just down in Florida a couple weeks ago visiting family and we tried to take the kids, but they were sold out the day we wanted to go. We ended up going to Aquatica. It was fun, but doesn't look nearly as impressive as Volcano Bay.
We've never been to Aquatica to compare, but we absolutely love Volcano Bay, and I don't generally like water parks.
 

ajrwdwgirl

Premium Member
I'm a little late to your report but it looks like you were having a good time. Interesting to see the Volcano Bay pictures, it does look like a nice water park, and I would splurge and get the cabana too. We got a cabana on Castaway Cay once and it was the best money for an extra experience that I spent on that whole trip!
 

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