Pre-Trip I look at you, and I'm home - September 2020 (LIVE)

Hello everyone! This is going to be my first ever trip report and I'm pretty nervous to be honest haha. I debated for days on whether I would write it or not, and I finally decided, why not?

So welcome to my first trip report! We will be heading back to Disney World for Labor Day weekend, a tradition of ours seeing as it always falls on our anniversary. Fun fact: This will be our last dating anniversary before we get married on our 5 year anniversary next year on Labor Day weekend (totally trying to convince the future hubs we need a DisneyMoon!)

A little back story: My fiance and I both grew up in Miami, FL and grew up going to Disney World plenty of times a year seeing as we were so close and school trips here tend to be to Disney. We met 4 years ago and bonded over our love of Disney and went on our first trip to Disney together in August of 2016. We have been on 14 trips together in the last 4 years and this will be trip 15. On our 10th trip together, March 2019, my fiance proposed and we became DVC Members.

So lets get into the trip!

Who: Me, Marlene & my fiance, Stephan

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When: September 3rd- September 7th

Our anniversary is September 3 so we will be arriving on Thursday and spending Labor Day weekend at the World and heading back on Labor Day. We will be driving up Thursday morning since we live in Miami and it is only about a 3.5 hour drive for us.

Where: Grand Floridian Villas

We were originally booked to stay at our home resort, Copper Creek Villas, but somehow we were able to find a studio at the Grand Floridian Villas which is my absolute dream resort. We were a little hesitant since the NBA is there and I've heard their security is a tad intense and that their bubble takes a way from the experience, but we don't know when we'll get another chance to stay here so we're just going for it and we'll make the best out of it!

Why: We will be celebrating 4 years of dating and more specifically our last dating anniversary before we tie the knot next year on our 5 year anniversary. We love Disney and have made it a tradition to spend our anniversary in our favorite place, even if that means masks, park reservations, and low crowds (which when is that ever bad?) We are curious to see if the magic is still there without all the extras and the large crowds because we have been hearing different things.

I will be sharing our daily plans with you all soon! I hope you decide to stay tuned as we continue our countdown and start gearing up and getting ready to head home. 25 more days!
 

k8einwdw

Well-Known Member
Either way, I am getting so excited to head back home, still doesn't feel real to me. Idk if anyone else who has a trip planned feels this way but I haven't wanted to feel like we are actually going out of fear they will close the parks again and it will be another cancelled trip in the book.
I feel the same way! Between COVID and Hurricane Season, it won't feel real until we are actually there!
 

Ariel_x33

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Hello everyone! We are officially a day away from heading home! We have started packing and getting things ready to head out tomorrow. The plan is to head out around 8 or 9 am and hopefully be getting to the Grand at around 12-1.

Slight change of plans: we were supposed to go to Topolino's Terrace tomorrow for dinner but we have decided to cancel this reservation seeing as there is a limited menu and we have been so excited to go. Hopefully they will have their full menu again soon so we can go!

Our new plans: we have made a reservation at Ravello at the Four Seasons Resort at Walt Disney World for tomorrow night. I have heard amazing reviews so I am excited to try it out. If anyone has been and has any recommendations on what to get, I am all ears!
 

Ariel_x33

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Hello everyone! Here for a recap of day 1 so far, I'm going to try and report more live tomorrow but today was a test day to see how it would go with all the new changes. We arrived at the Grand Floridian around 1 PM and went straight to our room seeing as we got our room ready text at around 11:30 AM! We immediately went to Epcot and we were able to ride Soarin, Test Track, and Frozen Ever After as well as visit the DVC Members lounge all in 2 hours. The park was pretty empty and the waits were not bad at all. Oh! We also tried Regal Eagle Smokehouse for the first time and it was really good! I will take more pictures as the trip progresses.

Right now we are getting ready for our dinner at Ravello!
 

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Ariel_x33

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Alright everyone, the jury is in. Ravello was incredible! The Disney service was there and even went beyond that. The food, let's just say we are in food comas 😂 We tried the meatballs (no pictures cause we devoured them before I remembered), focaccia, the veal, spinach and ricotta stuffed ravioli, the prosciutto and burrata pizza, and finally we ended with the chocolate cake. Everything was superb, but the pizza was the star of the show. We are getting ready to get some rest and start tomorrow at Animal Kingdom!
 

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Ariel_x33

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Good morning everyone! We are on our way to animal kingdom and I had to share this picture of an empty bus and Grand Floridian 😂 Very strange to see these two empty, but not complaining!
 

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Zipadeelady

Well-Known Member
Alright everyone, the jury is in. Ravello was incredible! The Disney service was there and even went beyond that. The food, let's just say we are in food comas 😂 We tried the meatballs (no pictures cause we devoured them before I remembered), focaccia, the veal, spinach and ricotta stuffed ravioli, the prosciutto and burrata pizza, and finally we ended with the chocolate cake. Everything was superb, but the pizza was the star of the show. We are getting ready to get some rest and start tomorrow at Animal Kingdom!
O.M.G. Where is this!!? The food looks incredible.
 

Ariel_x33

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
We had an amazing day at Animal Kingdom today, but decided to call it a day because the rain was about to come down and real feel temperature was 106 and you could definitely feel it in those masks. We were able to ride Kali twice and every thing else once so that's a pretty successful day in my books! We are back at the Grand now and are just relaxing before heading to Disney Springs tonight.
 

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Ariel_x33

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Hello again! We just arrived back at the Grand Floridian after a night at Disney Springs and it's safe to say, we will not be back for a while. It felt like a regular day at Disney Springs, no one was social distancing and mask compliance was at an all time low. We had dinner at D-Luxe Burger which was new for us and it was pretty good. We tried going to World of Disney but it had a wait of 70 minutes so we walked away from that. After trying to browse through "emptier" stores we decided to just come back to the hotel because we just didn't feel comfortable being at Disney Springs. Kind of a bummer because we love the ambiance but until they do something about crowd control, we won't be back. I'm attaching some pictures I took while we were there but there's not many, it was hard to take pictures with so many people there.
 

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Ariel_x33

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Hello again everyone! I think today was the hottest day of the trip. It's funny how before you come you have this whole trip planned in your head and then you get here and everything changes 😂 today we went to magic kingdom and our original plan was to try and rid every ride...suffice to say that did not happen 😂 Most of the wait times were between 30 minutes to an hour and with the heat it was unbearable. We were able to ride Seven Dwarves, Ariel's Undersea Adventure, Splash Mountain, Big Thunder Mountain, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Space Mountain. We had lunch at Pinocchio's, a quick slushy break at Cosmic Rays and now we are back at the Grand waiting to have dinner from Gasparillas! We were able to see a few of the calvacades today as well and they're so cute I love them. I think today was when we saw the least amount of mask compliance, not many people were not wearing them or not wearing them correctly. Also, not many people were following the markings on the floor. I'm pretty sure all of this has to do with the fact that it is labor day weekend though. Next up I will share room pictures and our dinner at Gasparillas!
 

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MickeyCB

Well-Known Member
Enjoying following along with you, but not at all excited to hear about the mask non-compliance, and people were not distancing in some of those photos!
That bums me out as we are planning an Oct trip and was hopeful the crowds and compliance would be similar to what I have been reading on peoples recent trip reports.
 

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