Trip Report Finally Back in Our Happy Place. A Three Week Trip With a Cruise Included

We’ve been back for just over a week from what was a wonderful three weeks. There were a few hiccups, but for the most part Disney World was just as we remembered it.

This trip was me and my two youngest daughters, Alice (18) and Lexi (15)

We stayed at Pop Century from July 7th-20th, then sailed on the Disney Magic from July 20th-25th, then French Quarter for the last three nights, July 25th-28th. For the Pop Century part of the trip we had the UK 14 day park tickets which included the waterparks.

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Thursday 10th July (cont)

Still on our way

Still taking photos of waterfalls

Frozen was already showing as a 40 minute wait, we were regretting not making more of an effort to get out early, but we still had quite a while before our first LL so got in the queue

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Thursday 10th July (cont)

The lantern reminded me more of Tangled than Frozen

So much detail in the queue, I think we’ve only waited once before, we used to always get FP+ for it

The queue was moving pretty quickly and we ended up waiting closer to 20 minutes

Then a snack, Chocolate Kringla, this was delicious

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Thursday 10th July (cont)

Next was our first LL, Guardians of the Galaxy. We were so excited for this but I was also a bit nervous because I do get some motion sickness. I can’t ride the teacups without feeling ill but I can ride
Mission: SPACE orange, bit weird.

We were almost at the loading area and the just loaded vehicle was held for about ten minutes. We speculated that there might be a cleanup at the other end, not helping my nervousness.

Then our turn

This was the most fun ride ever, it’s definitely my favourite ride now, I laughed all the way round. We got One Way Or Another as our song and it was just perfect. And not the slightest bit queasy, I could have ridden it again.

Straight over to our next LL

Definitely tall enough now

 

[littleroo]

I am so glad that you loved Guardians. I also love the ride! I think it gets a bad reputation for motion sickness. I always try to encourage people to give it a go at least once.

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

I am so glad that you loved Guardians. I also love the ride! I think it gets a bad reputation for motion sickness. I always try to encourage people to give it a go at least once.

I may have spent far too much on more Lightning Lanes for it

 

[littleroo]

I may have spent far too much on more Lightning Lanes for it

Trust me, I get it!! I really have never been interested in an after hours party. I am more of an early bird than a night owl. However, I may do an Epcot after hours party just to ride Guardians over and over again!

 

[cgersic]

I'm thinking I'll have to give Guardians another try. It made me so motion sick the first time I've never tried it again. And I don't get motion sick on anything other than Ratatouille (if I go more than once).

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

I'm thinking I'll have to give Guardians another try. It made me so motion sick the first time I've never tried it again. And I don't get motion sick on anything other than Ratatouille (if I go more than once).

I hope you do get to ride it without feeling ill, I’m so glad I tried it. Strangely after being fine on Guardians, I did feel a bit off on Ratatouille. I think it was that there was so much on screens

 

[littleroo]

I hope you do get to ride it without feeling ill, I’m so glad I tried it. Strangely after being fine on Guardians, I did feel a bit off on Ratatouille. I think it was that there was so much on screens

I feel off on Ratatouille, too. I liked it a little more this time but I wore a motion patch behind my ear which I really liked. Usually, I just take the 3D glasses off.

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Thursday 10th July (cont)

Our next LL was for Soarin’, but it wasn’t quite time so we stopped for lunch in Sunshine Seasons first

Lexi had the Stir-fried Chicken which she liked

I went with the cheese flatbread, it was fine

Alice had the salmon which she enjoyed but forgot to take a photo

Lexi and I both had the Tropical Boba Juice which was a bit on the sweet side for me, I think a ‘grown-up’ version of this would be good

We were very happy to be in the middle on Soarin’, no bendy Eiffel Tower

Time for Living with the Land before our next LL

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Thursday 10th July (cont)

Tiny waterfall

Our next LL was Spaceship Earth

I was headless

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Thursday 10th July (cont)

As someone who loves waterfalls and fountains I was looking forward to Journey of Water

It’s so pretty, we all loved it. It was so hot by this time though and very crowded so we didn’t stay too long, we were looking forward to coming back at night

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Thursday 10th July (cont)

We had a LL for Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure next so took a slow wander over to World Showcase

I love the fountain

And the cute wallpaper

We all thought this was a really cute, fun ride. But, as I mentioned before, it did make me feel slightly off. Not enough that I wouldn’t ride it again, but I definitely wouldn’t be able to do back to back rides.

We had planned to spend some time in World Showcase but we were melting, it was just too hot to be outside for long. A shower and a nap seemed like a much better idea, then we could return later that evening.

As we got to the skyliner, we were informed that it was currently down. Luckily we didn’t have to walk all the way to the front of the park for a bus but were directed to a backstage area where we boarded a bus going to all the skyliner resorts.

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Thursday 10th July (cont)

I thought it would be nice to have a table service meal before returning to Epcot for the evening. I checked online and managed to get a reservation at Trattoria al Forno

Wildlife as we walked towards the skyliner

Towards the Boardwalk

I would like a wine rack like this

The bread with garlic was so good

We find it hard to resist calamari when it is on the menu, so shared between us

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Thursday 10th July (cont)

The sun had started to set, Lexi went outside to get some photos

Beef short rib for me, I think with polenta. I didn’t write it down and can’t find it online

Truffle Gnocchi for Lexi

Lasagne for Alice

All our food was very good, we thoroughly enjoyed our meal at Trattoria.

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Thursday 10th July (cont)

It was a beautiful evening

Lexi wanted a photo for her Instagram

We’d dawdled a bit over our dinner and it was 8.50 before we tapped back into Epcot. We wanted to watch Luminous so hurried to try to find a spot, there wasn’t much space left and the only spot we could find was partially blocked by a tree.

We were huge fans of Illuminations, we watched it many times over the years and still watch YouTube videos of it. The last fireworks show we’d seen was Epcot Forever which was a bit meh, so we went in with low expectations of Luminous, but we loved it. We didn’t have the best view (our fault for getting there so late) and we definitely planned to watch again.

Leaving the park, it did look like a huge queue for the skyliner but it moved very quickly

We’d had such a good day back in Epcot with lots of familiar things and lots of new to us ones (Guardians, Ratatouille, Moana, Luminous)

The only bad part for me was that I had been struggling with discomfort from the insect bites I’d got two nights earlier. I’d been using bite cream on them and had ended up taking antihistamines as well, but it hadn’t seemed to help. By the end of the day the bites were very swollen and warm to touch, I knew if they weren’t any better by the morning I would have to get some medical attention. I covered them in antiseptic cream before going to bed and hoped for the best

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Friday 11th July

A bit of a later start to this day as we planned a water park day. Luckily for me my insect bites were looking a bit better and didn’t feel warm anymore. They did take a few days more to go completely but I was in much less discomfort. They were some of the worst I’ve had and I still have marks left from them.

We hadn’t decided which park we were going to, just planning to get the first bus that came. We thought we would have to change buses for either park but found out that there was a direct bus to Blizzard Beach and only waited a few minutes for it

We arrived just after 10, this is the only photo I have before lunch

We found some loungers and headed straight for the chairlift to take us to Teamboat Springs, normally I would be fine with walking up the stairs but it was already very hot. I think everyone else in the park was also queueing for the lift and we ended up waiting about 30 minutes.

I do love this raft ride but as a small person with very short legs, I do not like getting out of the raft at the end. In the back of my mind was Tuvalu’s story from a while ago about falling back in and I was trying to get out without that happening. It had to happen though, and I fell back in with my back on the floor of the raft and my short legs hanging over the sides. My children had to pull me out of the raft while laughing hysterically at me. So embarrassing

 

[Tuvalu]

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Friday 11th July (cont)

Next up was Lottawotta Lodge for lunch, we’d seen on the way in that it didn’t have much seating so wanted to be there early. I’d looked at menus online and it seemed to have some good options including rice bowls with chicken or shrimp which I had planned to order. But when I got there I decided to just have a burger and fries thinking it would be simple to deal with my allergies - bit of a mistake on my part. I spoke with a supervisor and read the ingredients only to find that the brioche bun for the burger had pea protein in it. No problem, they could substitute the gluten free bun. Then I waited and waited, the girls food came out so they went to sit down to eat. I’d ordered a Pina Colava as my drink and was almost half way through it when the supervisor came out. She’d had another look through the ingredients and seen that there was also pea protein listed as an ingredient for the fries, maybe they had some sort of seasoned coating, so I couldn’t have those either. I ended up with a bag of potato chips as my side, I didn’t think of it at the time but I wish I’d asked for the mandarin that came with the kids meals. By the time I sat down the girls had finished their food. I ate most of my burger but the gluten free bun was very chewy, I feel bad for gluten free people if that is the bread option they get. Not the most successful lunch, although I am very grateful that the food supervisor checked everything and kept me safe.

After lunch we had a float around Cross Country Creek, where I managed to get on one of the floats without making a fool of myself. It was very busy, we were just in a big float jam in some parts, but it was relaxing

 

[Piglet_the_brave]

Friday 11th July (cont)

I’m not much of a water park person, I dislike anything that dunks me under water so don’t really like slides. I prefer just lounging by the pool with the occasional dip in the water. So the girls went off on their own while I went for a little walk. I thought about a dip in the big pool but it was too crowded for me

After my walk I tried to sit and read my book but I couldn’t concentrate on it, there was a lot of noise and the chairs weren’t comfortable and I was being a grump . So I was glad when the girls didn’t want to stay too long. They’d been on most of the slides they’d wanted to, including Summit Plummet which they said was once and done for them, and it was too crowded for them as well.

Back at the resort I needed to do a very exciting job - laundry. I already had quite a few loads and luckily there were lots of empty machines so I could get it all done at once. I had planned to sit by the pool near the laundry and read but every shady lounger was occupied by people’s stuff (no people) and it was far too hot to sit out in the sun. I was being grumpy again . So I left the girls to finish the laundry (definitely a benefit of having older children now) and went for a nap.