Trip Report **Completed** The Wine and Dine Half Marathon and we are never changing hotels again!

Hello everyone! I have been (sadly) back for over a week now so I suppose its time to start my TR. I have been in a moderate Disney depression since I have been back, so hopefully this cheers me up. Its probably the freezing cold weather here in Buffalo, but I am longing for Disney and sunny weather (I know its only like 55 there right now, but its 25 here ). I suppose this is the true sign of a Disney addict! Anyway, on with the TR!

Who?:
From left to right:
My Dad (Jeff), Me (Megan), Mickey , My sister Betta (her name is Elizabeth, we call her Betta), my nephew Max, my Mom (Mary) my sister Jill and Betta's friend Deanna

Deanna came with my sister to help with Max She has been to Disney before, but not for several years. This is Max's first trip! The rest of us have been to Disney (several times...)

When?
My Mom and I: November 3 - 12
My Dad and Jill: Nov 5 -12
Betta, Deanna and Max Nov 7 - 12

Where?
We moved hotels 3 times, I will introduce them as we go

Why?
Jill and I really wanted to run the Wine and Dine Half Marathon so we planned a trip around it! Plus, Betta wanted to bring Max to Disney the first time!

The Title?
Well, its pretty obvious! We ran the Wine and Dine Half Marathon Also, we were not keen on moving hotels during the trip. It is incredibly disruptive and takes up a decent amount of free time. I will comment more as we go.

T-5 days
As my Mom and I were driving to help my sister and Max pack for the trip we were getting a little bit Disney crazy and really did not want to stay at All Star Sports. We have nothing against people who like the values (or can only afford them), but we really don't enjoy them. When I was a kid we only stayed at values and we loved them, but we definitely have gotten spoiled lately. Knowing we booked All Stars to save us money I did not think a hotel move would be possible. However, the huge AP discount was still a thing so we started looking into other hotels. While at my sister's house I kept trying to change the hotel, but it was not working. Eventually I gave up and finally called Disney. I had the sweetest CM ever on the phone and we chatted for quite a bit about all sorts of things. In the end I decided on moving to the Wilderness Lodge because we love it so much! The CM also added a bit of magic and upgraded us to Concierge level for free. Woohoo!!! The only downside is this would mean we would have to pick up our luggage in the airport for Magical Express. Annoying, but no big deal overall

November 3, 2016
We got up around 5 am and got ready to go to the airport. It was a gross and rainy day in Buffalo so we were happy to be heading to sunny Florida! While my Mom and I were finishing up last minute things and taking pictures my Dad started grabbing our suitcases and bringing them to the car. Only, we weren't done with them yet so he had to bring them back in. Because it was rainy he really looked the part of a grumpy airport worker

We had a quick ride to the airport and we got there by 6 am. We had the same Southwest worker check us in that we had in October. Thats when you know you travel too much? haha
We both had TSA pre-check and for once I did not set off the metal detector! We were through security by 6:08 am. You have got to love TSA pre-check
For breakfast we had some bagels and water

Petey and Drake were ready

Since we had a crazy amount of time to kill we sat down at our gate and I already started working on my notes haha

Then we took some selfies...

Finally it was time to get on the plane. We ended up in row 4! I love sitting in the front, takes less time to get off the plane!
Magic Bands ready

Purple Magic Bands for the win! The woman sitting next to me also had a purple Magic Band

Next up: Arriving in MCO!

 

[Brian & Jill]

Loving the trip report so far!!!!!!! I know what you mean as far as being able to do a lot of things during a party in MK. We were able to do everything after we got back from our cruise in the end of October. We were only able to spend one night at POR and did the Halloween party. We pretty much did everything!!!!! Jill and I were reading your report and saw the pic of you and Jill with Tom and Sophie.My wife Jill was like who are they???? So I looked on you tube,and now we are big fans of them as well as your you tube channel. We watched all of their October trip(as much as they have out)on Monday and we are now watching their trip from May. We love watching them and how they get so "shattered" from everything they are doing!!!!!!! Well,enough of my rambling......looking forward to the rest of your trip report and possibly a pre-trip report.

 

[DimpledDevil18]

I totally get you on the just giving up on your hair while in Disney part. I didn't even try with mine. I have VERY thick wavy/curly hair and not only would I die with it down, but the humidity would not be too kind to it. Plus it takes like 45 minutes to straighten and forget about trying to blow dry it! Plus it would probably only curl back up in the heat. So I just wound up throwing it up all the time even though I don't love how I look with it up. I'm not a hat person either. Minnie ears definitely helped!

I also had the "Is that you Tigger?" shirt. I feel like I only even threw I out recently too. I probably bought in like 2000 I think.

 

[myhappyplace]

Day 8
This morning we got up around 7 am again. My Mom and I were always ready first so we headed down to grab us some croissants to eat. We had still been using old cups to get water and coffee for my Dad and we totally got caught No one cared really but the CM was suspiciously looking at our old cups
Max was all ready for AK with his AK themed shirt. I used to also own this shirt when I was younger. Wish I still had it! It is one of my favorites
View attachment 183064

Aw, I got this shirt for my baby brother years ago too!! And my dad had one to match! "Baby" brother is 13 now, so I have that shirt saved.

 

[Doc Disney]

Ha! They were probably like "Look at me, I'm just like Megan *click**click**click* This is easy *click**click**click* I dont see what all the fuss is abo..oh dang she's coming back..."

Haha I would imagine this is the exact conversation that they had

 

[Doc Disney]

View attachment 183141
I knew what you were talking about

Yep those are the ladies

I love Jill's black Chucks with the floral dress (with skulls???)!!

I will tell her. Yes it has skulls on it Left over from her roller derby days !

Awesome trip report!!

Thank you!!!

 

[Doc Disney]

Both of Jill's safari pics have animals in them! The bottom one is of the gators (or crocs.. whichever they are )!

Oh wow totally missed that!

Aw, I got this shirt for my baby brother years ago too!! And my dad had one to match! "Baby" brother is 13 now, so I have that shirt saved.

I wish I saved mine I loved that shirt

 

[Doc Disney]

Loving the trip report so far!!!!!!! I know what you mean as far as being able to do a lot of things during a party in MK. We were able to do everything after we got back from our cruise in the end of October. We were only able to spend one night at POR and did the Halloween party. We pretty much did everything!!!!! Jill and I were reading your report and saw the pic of you and Jill with Tom and Sophie.My wife Jill was like who are they???? So I looked on you tube,and now we are big fans of them as well as your you tube channel. We watched all of their October trip(as much as they have out)on Monday and we are now watching their trip from May. We love watching them and how they get so "shattered" from everything they are doing!!!!!!! Well,enough of my rambling......looking forward to the rest of your trip report and possibly a pre-trip report.

Tom and Sophie are great ! Their accents and phrases make me laugh. I watch them on youtube all the time but was not expecting them to have an accent in real like I have no idea why! haha It seems like they are slowly making a transition to move to Florida!

 

[Doc Disney]

I totally get you on the just giving up on your hair while in Disney part. I didn't even try with mine. I have VERY thick wavy/curly hair and not only would I die with it down, but the humidity would not be too kind to it. Plus it takes like 45 minutes to straighten and forget about trying to blow dry it! Plus it would probably only curl back up in the heat. So I just wound up throwing it up all the time even though I don't love how I look with it up. I'm not a hat person either. Minnie ears definitely helped!

I also had the "Is that you Tigger?" shirt. I feel like I only even threw I out recently too. I probably bought in like 2000 I think.

I got my shirt around 2000 as well I think ! My hair used to be so great in humidity but ever since I started getting highlights it dies in the heat. I used to put all this product in at night and straighten it in the morning and literally would make it like an hour before putting it up anyway. Huge waste of time I could be better spending in the parks

 

[Doc Disney]

Day 8 continued
As usual we spent our afternoon at the pool
The water was cold so Jill was the only one in the pool for awhile
For whatever reason Jill decided she would pretend to be a reporter and would come over and report about things she saw at the pool. It was ridiculous, but hilarious !
Here she is out grabbing stories

Underwater selfie

All of a sudden I noticed this toy shark floating around the pool ....

Here is a fun selfie of the shark with my Dad and I in the background

I couldn't pass up some shark fun so I hopped in the pool

When I eventually get my act together and catch up on our youtube videos I will post the video we took of the shark attacking us. We are so weird
After our pool time we headed back to the room and got ready for the evening. We would split up into three groups for the evening. I will start with Betta and Deanna since I don't have any pictures, but they went to Morimoto Asia for dinner. Betta said they really enjoyed it.
My Mom and Dad took Max and also went to Disney Springs and ate at Rainforest Cafe

Next up: evenings continued

 

[Doc Disney]

Day 8 continued

After they ate they walked around DS a little before they met back up with Betta. This picture melts my heart. So cute!

Moving onto Jill and I! We headed to Animal Kingdom! It took us about 40 minutes to get there by bus for some reason
Our first order of business was to get Jill a spiked Dole Whip so we headed towards Africa to grab one. I did not take a picture for some reason, but we sat in the warmth and listened to the music while Jill enjoyed her drink.
We decided to head to It's Tough to Be a Bug so walked around one of the side paths to head there. I have never actually explored these paths before and it was so cool to look at them and feel the peace since no one else was around

For some reason this sign made me laugh!

The line was short so we quickly made it to the theatre

I always forget how horrifying this show is! Jill and I screamed through the whole thing
After this we headed toward the Tree of Life because our sole intention of being in AK was to see the Tree of Life awakening
As we walked towards the front of the tree we were able to see how alive the park is at night! There was music everywhere! It was an incredible atmosphere and even more so because it was not crowded at all!
We stopped to get a Photopass picture....we thought it would be quick but some woman cut in front of us with a family of like 15 and each family wanted their own pictures and then group shots and then kid shots
Then when we got up there the CM didn't know how to adjust the camera for night so that took a bit

We stood around for awhile to see if we could see the Tree of Life awakens, but despite seeing one animal move we never got to see a full show We would have stayed longer but we were already pushing closer to our reservation time so we had to keep moving. Maybe someday!

Next up: dinner!

 

[Doc Disney]

Day 8 continued
Jill and I headed to the bus stop after this figuring we would have no issue making it to Animal Kingdom Lodge since its so close. Only, the line was insanely long!! Ooops! A bus did pull up, but we knew there was no way we would make it on. All of a sudden another bus half pulled up for AKL and we rushed over there and got on. A family with a scooter tried to get on, but he could not take them since he was not in an actual spot. They were really upset, but for safety reasons he really could not take them even though they had a dining reservation coming up.
Kidani was the second stop on our bus so we got to see a bit of the outside lodge since I had never been there before!
Our final destination was a first for us! It was my birthday present from Jill because she knew I always wanted to try this!

We checked in and had a short wait so we checked out some....
lights!

We got called to our table and we were amazed by how cool is was in there! It was a dark so we couldn't see outside, so that was a bummer, but otherwise the atmosphere was amazing. On a side note the family with the scooter was sitting in the same area so they made it to their reservation on time
More lights

Its pretty dark in there so hard to get a picture
Jill and I both ordered wine. I didn't write down what kind they were....but I know they weren't African haha

We stared off with the bread service!
Since its literally like a $3 difference in price we went with the whole bread service instead of choosing three

OMG. Pictures nor words can do this justice. We love bread as it is, and dips, so this was delightful. We seriously liked every accompaniment. My favorites were the Red Chile Sambal and the Spicy Jalapeño-Lime Pickle. I think Jill said she liked the Mango Chutney the best...but I could totally be lying. For the naan bread we both loved them all, but the Onion Kucha was our favorite. Oddly enough I'm just looking at the menu now and it looks like you can't order it all anymore?! I hope this isn't true!!!

Next up: dinner

 

[Doc Disney]

Day 8 continued
Honestly, we were already pretty full from the bread service that we probably should have split dinner, but we never learn so we didn't
For dinner we both got the Potjie Inspired. We both ordered the buttered chicken. I got the Chickpea Wat with mine. I loved the rice and the buttered chicken, but wasn't super into the Chickpea Wat

Jill had the Lentil Dhal with her rice and chicken and she liked it !

I felt bad because we really loved our food (for the most part) but we could not even made a dent in it.
With bellies completely full we checked out the gift shop and headed out to the bus stop. Originally I was thinking that we would have to grab a DS bus to get home, but Epcot pulled up and Epcot was still open so we grabbed that bus. When we pulled up to Epcot we noticed the POFQ bus and even though we were on the complete other side of the parking lot we sprinted to the bus

When we got back to the hotel we stopped in the gift shop and because I didn't eat enough I grabbed some pretzels

It wasn't until I got back to the room that I noticed it was dark chocolate . I don't hate dark chocolate, but I would have preferred milk chocolate
After eating some pretzels we went off to sleep and sadly had our last full day to look forward to.

Next up: MK!

 

[Longers]

Tom and Sophie are great ! Their accents and phrases make me laugh. I watch them on youtube all the time but was not expecting them to have an accent in real like I have no idea why! haha It seems like they are slowly making a transition to move to Florida!

Were their accents like mine? - lol...
How are they going to move to Florida? - let me know!!!!!

 

[Doc Disney]

Day 9
We got up before 7 this day and I thought just maybe we would make it to the Opening Show, but I realized that the park opened for EMH early that day and we wouldn't make it. I'm extra sad thinking about it now that I know that the Opening Show as we know it is going away

Anyway as usual my Mom and I went to the cafe and grabbed some croissants and illegal coffee

We made it to the MK pretty quickly and headed into the park. We noticed fairly quickly that it was going to be packed based on the security lines and realized when we got in it was because they were doing a good chunk of the Christmas filming that day. Jill also lost her pin I just bought for her so she was cranky
We made our way towards Adventureland so we could go on POTC

Only POTC was closed
Instead we headed over to the HM

After HM we met up with Betta, Max and Deanna who did not come to the park with us

This was actually the only time we saw this crew until the very end of the day because we had different plans for the day

Next up: more pictures

 

[Doc Disney]

Were their accents like mine? - lol...
How are they going to move to Florida? - let me know!!!!!

Haha yes it was just like yours! Especially since I also forgot you would have an accent It seems like Tom's job works a lot out of Florida and they seems to imply that may permanently move there!

 

[Longers]

Haha yes it was just like yours! Especially since I also forgot you would have an accent It seems like Tom's job works a lot out of Florida and they seems to imply that may permanently move there!

They are always there anyway - well if I could I would do good on them! Also just seen your bit about the welcome show and missing it I've just seen the video of the new opening show in front of the castle and I don't like it I know why they've done it but it was magical before maybe I need to see first hand and it could change a bit before I am there - let's see

 

[Doc Disney]

Day 9 continued
We had a FP for 7DMT after this so headed there

Then, because of the insane crowds, we decided to head out of the park. Well not before we took a million pictures of us in front of the Christmas special stage

So as we left the park a CM saw us running towards a bus that actually wasn't ours and called out to us to ask where we were going. We told him POFQ and next thing we know this van pulls up and picks us and few other guests up!!! I'm not even kidding when I say I made a joke about a man picking us up in a van and it actually happened. It was seriously the weirdest thing. The van was actually rather filthy but I was not going to let that stop me from enjoying this random ride
We were in the van with some people going to All Star Sports as well. One women told us that she talked to a few girls who waited for the Christmas filming last year and ended up getting cut out because they were wet from it raining all day and apparently Disney crops out wet people and crops in sunny skies. Anyway, luckily for us POFQ was the first stop!
We headed down to the water so we could take a boat to Disney Springs

Next up: Disney Springs!

 

[Doc Disney]

They are always there anyway - well if I could I would do good on them! Also just seen your bit about the welcome show and missing it I've just seen the video of the new opening show in front of the castle and I don't like it I know why they've done it but it was magical before maybe I need to see first hand and it could change a bit before I am there - let's see

I haven't seen the new one yet and I don't want to. I totally get why they are doing it too, but the train was the best part

 

[Doc Disney]

Day 9 continued
I'm sure I say this all the time, but I just love the boat ride to Disney Springs. Its so peaceful

I really wanted to check out the new area so we headed over there

The whole area was very pretty, but I really didn't like the whole new shopping part with all the fancy stores. I mean I guess its more for the locals so that makes sense

Next up: lunch time

 

[Doc Disney]

Day 9 continued
We got a little lost looking at the new area and we were all getting hungry so we deiced to try out some of the new places. We actually used a GPS to get there It was rather confusing
I know I wanted to eat at either Blaze or D-Luxe burger and both Jill and my Dad wanted to eat at D-Luxe burger so I chose to go to Blaze with my Mom since she doesn't eat burgers

I typically don't like pizza but I checked out the sauce and it looked like something I would eat so I was happy to try it out
My Mom ordered a signature pizza - the BBQ chicken

I built my own pizza and picked spicy red sauce, mozzarella cheese, banana peppers, olives and pepperoni.

I was so happy that they had coke in a bottle!

I was a wee bit skeptical of the pizza since its cooked so fast, but it was delicious ! I would definitely recommend it and the price was fairly cheap as well which was nice!
I asked Jill to take a picture of their food and she did, just not how I expected it No individual pictures haha

They had a classic cheeseburger and bacon and blue burger with fries with a blue cheese/ buffalo sauce on the side. They said their meal was good as well!
After eating we did some shopping. For once in my life I wasn't into shopping so I just looked around and took some pictures
I also watched the stage show of this young girls team dancing and singing, it was neat to watch

My Mom and Jill decided they wanted dessert so they stopped at Ghirardelli and got a hot fudge sundae and a sea salted caramel sundae

I grabbed a popcorn snack. I don't know if its just me, but I think DS popcorn is subpar to park popcorn. I still ate some anyway

Next up: hotel and pool time