Trip Report Hey Elsa...the cold really bothers the rest of us! A Christmas Time Report

LeighM · Mar 9, 2018

mlegerto said:
HAHA, trust me packing and cleaning so late in the game is completely out of the ordinary for me; with the holidays and work, there was just way to much going on. I don't think we will ever schedule another trip to leave on December 26th (unless I go crazy OR it's a trip the whole family is taking). Hopefully we both learn to love HEA; maybe once we start having specific memories tied to it like Wishes had? Who knows!

Remember how I mentioned that today was my cleaning day - laundry, cleaning bathrooms, etc? Well I got one load in the washer, cleaned one countertop in the bathroom, when my husband called and said he got a message from the County alerting us that we would be losing water at some point due to a water main break and emergency repair. I tested the water and we had none. I still have two more loads of laundry and 2 bathrooms to clean once the water (hopefully!!) comes back on in a few more hours. It's already been 2+ hours. I hope things go better tomorrow because I don't want a travel day like the one you had LOL. I have an Ohana dinner reservation at 5pm!

Rista1313 · Mar 9, 2018

LeighM said:
Remember how I mentioned that today was my cleaning day - laundry, cleaning bathrooms, etc? Well I got one load in the washer, cleaned one countertop in the bathroom, when my husband called and said he got a message from the County alerting us that we would be losing water at some point due to a water main break and emergency repair. I tested the water and we had none. I still have two more loads of laundry and 2 bathrooms to clean once the water (hopefully!!) comes back on in a few more hours. It's already been 2+ hours. I hope things go better tomorrow because I don't want a travel day like the one you had LOL. I have an Ohana dinner reservation at 5pm!

DOH!

mlegerto · Mar 9, 2018

LeighM said:
Remember how I mentioned that today was my cleaning day - laundry, cleaning bathrooms, etc? Well I got one load in the washer, cleaned one countertop in the bathroom, when my husband called and said he got a message from the County alerting us that we would be losing water at some point due to a water main break and emergency repair. I tested the water and we had none. I still have two more loads of laundry and 2 bathrooms to clean once the water (hopefully!!) comes back on in a few more hours. It's already been 2+ hours. I hope things go better tomorrow because I don't want a travel day like the one you had LOL. I have an Ohana dinner reservation at 5pm!

Oh man, sounds like you jinked yourself a little bit. Stay positive and do what you can now and focus on everything water related tomorrow! I hate when things are out of my control like this. Good luck!

mlegerto · Mar 9, 2018

amjt660 said:
One of my favourite fw shows is remember
We saw it in Disneyland for the 50th in 2005

Everthing wonderful about Wishes + a virtual tour of Walt’s park through fw and projections

And add in Julie Andrews and you have the best

IMHO of course

Max

This sounds amazing! I'm going to go try and find it on youtube now!

LeighM · Mar 9, 2018

mlegerto said:
Oh man, sounds like you jinked yourself a little bit. Stay positive and do what you can now and focus on everything water related tomorrow! I hate when things are out of my control like this. Good luck!

Luckily, it's back on now! It was only out for 4 hours. Which I'm so thankful for because we have to leave the house tomorrow morning at 8:30 to catch our flight. If it didn't come back on until tonight or tomorrow then there would've been no time to finish what was sitting in the washing machine and I would've hated to leave that for the house sitter to deal with. Not only do I have to leave a clean house but I don't like anyone else doing my laundry either LOL.

Did you experience any changes with 'Ohana? I've been seeing more people complain about them not being as good as they were. I'm concerned because my in-laws are joining us for the trip and this is their first time eating there.

mlegerto · Mar 13, 2018

I'll be back to update soon I promise (I just need to get access to my photos from my nice camera AKA not my iphone), but had some VERY exciting news to share!

We've (and by we I mean me and I now need to find the right time to tell Ryan) just booked our next trip home! Just a short one (we are planning a big trip to Italy this summer), but heading back to the world September 1 - 4 staying at Saratoga Springs in a deluxe studio; we've wait listed ourselves at the Grand Floridian, Beach Club and Polynesian, but as of right now SS was the ONLY DVC resort with studio availability.

More on this trip to come; I just booked it like 2 hours ago, but wanted to drop it in!

Fankle · Mar 13, 2018

mlegerto said:
I just booked it like 2 hours ago, but wanted to drop it in!

That's great. Following along. Looks like you had a great spot for HEA and your drink at the Poly looked awesome!

gsrjedi · Mar 14, 2018

That plane delay in Toronto sounds super frustrating. Glad things picked up for you guys.

Also, enjoy Italy. I’ve got a couple recommendations if you’re gonna be in Rome.

mlegerto · Mar 18, 2018

gsrjedi said:
That plane delay in Toronto sounds super frustrating. Glad things picked up for you guys.

Also, enjoy Italy. I’ve got a couple recommendations if you’re gonna be in Rome.

It was an awful start to the trip, but looking back now I guess it could have been a lot worse - we could have been stuck in Toronto and never arrived in Florida I guess LOL!

Oh awesome! We are planning on spending a full 2 weeks in Italy, flying in to the North (Milan or Venice) and working our way south ending in Catania Sicily. So I will be sure to reach out to you for your suggestions in Rome!

mlegerto · Mar 18, 2018

Day 2 - Wednesday December 27, 2017 - Hollywood Studios

The original plan for today was to wake up and spend the early morning at Magic Kingdom, but when we woke up to the sound of our alarm at 6 am it was clear that we weren't up for it; we were still exhausted from the previous days travel and excitement.

We set a new alarm for 9 am and went back to sleep,but we naturally woke up around 8 am. We took the morning slow and laid in bed for a bit watching some classic Stacey!

We got up, got dressed and has some breakfast in the room; I think just toasted english muffins with peanut butter. Around 9:30 we made our way over to the bus stop to catch the bus to Hollywood Studios.

The wait was short and we passed the time taking some photos of the beautiful resort.

Before we knew it, we were walking the red carpet down Hollywood Blvd. The Christmas decorations were beautiful and plentiful.

We had some time before our first fastpass of the day, so we took a walk around to take in our surroundings. One of our goals for this trip was to take things slower - no commando park planning this time. We also wanted to take some additional time taking in the details and working on our photography skills; we are no @sheriffwoody , but we wanted to get some practice in as it's something we've been really into lately.

We paid a visit to Gertie who was looking sharp in his Christmas finest.

We all know that there is no such thing as calories when on a Disney vacation, so we headed over to treat our sweet tooth with something delicious from Sweet Spells and a drink from Starbucks.

In this moment, I couldn't have been much happier, Mickey Krispy treat and iced passion tea lemonade in hand!

Before we knew it, our first fastpass for Tower of Terror had opened so we headed down Sunset Blvd. to check in at the Hollywood Tower Hotel.

mlegerto · Mar 18, 2018

We had our first fastpass of for Tower of Terror at 11:35 am.

You unlock this door with the key of imagination. Beyond it is another dimension. A dimension of sound. A dimension of sight. A dimension of mind. You’re moving into a land of both shadow and substance, of things and ideas. You’ve just crossed over into…The Twilight Zone.

It was dark and scary, but we tried our best to be brave as we awaited our elevator into the fifth dimension.

Phew...we made it back. Remind me to leave a review on TripAdvisor to warn future guests of the terrible elevator service they will likely experience if they choose to check in to this hotel, geeze!

We took a quick turn to see if we could hail a limo to the hottest concert in town, but sadly there was a 90 minute wait so we decided to pass for now; unfortunately we didn't get a chance to head back, so no ride on the wild side for us on this trip.

We had to come up with a new plan of action, but all standby lines were extremely long so we took a quick break to regroup.

We decided to take a walk through the park and see if we could find one of our favourite things about this park, some streetmospere. I was so excited when I saw Betty Shambles out and about interacting with guests.

mlegerto · Mar 18, 2018

The ladies of Hollywood had a bell out and were encouraging guests to ring it. When you did, they asked you some basic questions about yourself; name, where you from, celebrating anything special. I told them a bit about me and they (as always) had a hilarious response. They focused on the fact that I was from Canada-eh' LOL.

They ended our interaction with a special gift because they wanted to embrace their Canadian side by being extra polite, so they gave me a globe and told me they "hoped Canada was on it because it was such an exotic place".

By now our next fastpass for Toy Story Mania was about to open up, so we headed over that way. We had just enough time to stop in for a very special visit, to a very special person and see what was going on at Walt Disney Presents.

Afterwards we headed over to Toy Story Mania to meet with our favourite toys!

As usual..I kicked Ryan's butt with a score of 181,000 to 151,000 and ALSO scored BEST IN VEHICLE!!!

We hadn't yet had a chance to check out Launch Bay, so we headed over in that direction.

We enjoyed ourselves, but the lines to meet Chewbacca and Kylo Ren were nearly an hour each so we passed.

It was 12:30 by now and we wanted to see the Beauty & The Beast show at 2:00 pm. We decided to check out the Brown Derby Lounge and take a mid day break for a drink; hey, I swear it was 5:00 pm somewhere!

On the way over, we ran into some member of the first order. Don't worry though, I was able to keep my cover - they had no idea that they ALMOST captured the rebel spy. Phew, close call!

mlegerto · Mar 18, 2018

We grabbed a seat outside in the lounge of the Brown Derby and looked over the drink menu.

It was beautiful day out, so I chose something light and refreshing. I ordered a Schofferhofer grapefruit beer ($9.25) and Ryan decided on a Martini Flight ($14.25).

Ryan's martini flight included Classic Gin, Citrus Vodka, and Derby Cosmo. He didn't like the cosmo one at all and preferred the classic gin one most. We realized that we hadn't had anything real substantial to eat since english muffins earlier that morning and the drinks were quite strong so we felt a bit tipsy.

It was around 1:20 by now, so we decided to head over to the Beauty & The Beast theatre for the 2:00 pm showing. Unfortunately, they were already turning guests away as they had reach capacity; this would become a trend over the next few days sadly.

We didn't really know what to do next; crowds were heavy and lines were long. We decided to stay on the path we've been on and head over to Baseline Tap House.

We decided to create our own flight; with a split of pilsner/lagers (my choice) and more IPA (Ryan's choice) beers. We also added a charcuterie board as something to snack on and grabbed a seat outside under an umbrella.

We really enjoyed everything we got, thought the atmosphere was wonderful and found it to be really well priced.

Next on our list was the Indiana Jones stunt show at 3:15 pm, so we started heading over around 2:20 pm. Again, they had already closed the standby line due to capacity; they did say we could wait around and see if there was additional room once the fastpass window had closed, but there was a lot of people who decided to wait for this so we didn't bother.

sheriffwoody · Mar 19, 2018

mlegerto said:
we are no @sheriffwoody , but we wanted to get some practice in as it's something we've been really into lately.

Your photos look great!! I love the one of you with the Mickey treat. Makes me wish I was there :cry:

ScarletBegonias · Mar 19, 2018

I'm in!! I think you deserved a drink after that travel day! My god, I would have lost it! Of course, we always drive, so luckily we don't have to deal with airports.

mlegerto · Mar 20, 2018

sheriffwoody said:
Your photos look great!! I love the one of you with the Mickey treat. Makes me wish I was there

HAHA...hopefully most of my photos turned out better than @prfctlyximprct 's photos. JOKING NICOLE!!!! As you've said before, we can't all be professional photographer.

Oh man, tell me about it. My sister in law returning home recently from running the Disney Marathon in February and I INSISTED that she bring me home a Mickey Krispy Treat LOL. To my surprise...she brought me back 4. There's still one in the cupboard that I am trying to save for a "special occasion"...like Tuesday LOL

When is your next trip booked?? We just booked the Labor Day long weekend in September; it'll be a VERY short trip, but we've got Halloween tickets!!

ScarletBegonias said:
I'm in!! I think you deserved a drink after that travel day! My god, I would have lost it! Of course, we always drive, so luckily we don't have to deal with airports.

Thanks for following along. Geeze, I know...that was a VERY well deserved drink on a regular day, never mind that crazy one! We've driven a few times, but when you are only going for a week or so, it feels like so much of your trip is "wasted" driving. We will drive when we go for long trips like 10+ days, otherwise flying is the best option!

ScarletBegonias · Mar 20, 2018

We drive because I cannot afford to fly, to be honest. We still get 6 days in the parks, but we have FOUR travel days. It's a 16 hour drive for us. I honestly don't mind the drive though, It's part of the trip! We know we have nowhere to be but in Disney!

Rista1313 · Mar 20, 2018

ScarletBegonias said:
We drive because I cannot afford to fly, to be honest. We still get 6 days in the parks, but we have FOUR travel days. It's a 16 hour drive for us. I honestly don't mind the drive though, It's part of the trip! We know we have nowhere to be but in Disney!

And now you have to pay for parking =(

ScarletBegonias · Mar 20, 2018

Rista1313 said:
And now you have to pay for parking =(

Seriously. What a bummer!!

mlegerto · Mar 20, 2018

After missing another show opportunity, we wandered over to Muppet 3D. The standby time was 30 minutes, which is a lot longer than we've ever waited, but figured it was do-able considering all of the other standby lines were 90+ minutes.

After 35 minutes of waiting we were still in the outside queue, so it was obviously going to be a MUCH longer wait than 30 minutes. Our next fastpass was now opened, so we decided to hop out of line and head over to Star Tours.

We got a new scene that we hadn't seen before, but I didn't note which one LOL :banghead:

Soon after it was time for our 4:10 dinner reservation at Sci-Fi Dine In theatre, so we made our way over.

We waited a few minutes and were then taken to car and began watching the loop of retro sci-fi movies.

Ryan decided to go with the speciality burger, a southwest burger topped with a fried green tomato ($19) and I decided on the classic American burger ($19).

Food was good and our waitress was very sweet. While we dined we checked the app and were able to grab a 4th fastpass for Fantasmic! later that night.

From here we headed out and got in the standby line for the 5:30 showing of Frozen Ever After.

This was our first time seeing this show and it was hilarious. The historians really made the show! If you haven't seen this yet, or thought it's just something for kids, do yourself a favour and take in a show.

After singing our hearts out, we headed towards the Chinese Theatre and watched the Movie Magic projection show. It was only okay in my opinion, but there was an amazing cast member working in the area name Jeff. His laughter and happiness was infectious - he was keeping the crowd entertained with Disney facts and trivia and holiday themed jokes. Jeff is EXACTLY what a Disney Cast Member should be!

From the show, we ran over to our Fantasmic! fastpass...we were cutting it quite close!

Fantasmic! was good, but they had a momentary "black out" or something. All the lights went out mid show, but it was quickly back up and running.

Trip Report Hey Elsa...the cold really bothers the rest of us! A Christmas Time Report

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