Trip Report It's NOT a solo world, after all.

Hey... it's me... It's been over a month since my last confession, er, Disney Trip. But between graduate school papers and an unhealthy work/school/life balance that makes me want to play video games when I get home, I've been too exhausted to write about my trip. But, I have a week between the graduate school course I just finished and my new one starting, so I'm gonna get this trip report done.

Who:
I, aka Lyssa, am a nerd from New Jersey who, unfortunately, lives in Texas and works as a special education teacher. My goal is to get into a Ph.D. program for the 2025-2026 school year and leave Texas forever. I have seven cats (they find me!). I enjoy playing stupid JRPGs on my computer or my Nintendo Switch and coloring in adult coloring books when I am not forced to write graduate school papers. My favorite Disney characters are the Cheshire Cat and Figment. I enjoy progressive rock music and reading. My other interests include taking horrible selfies and vacation pictures on my cell phone. Normally, I bring my DSLR for vacations, but I didn't feel like lugging it around this time.

Sandra, aka Wifey, is my work wife. She was my TA in the 2021-2022 school year and is now one of my best friends. She gets me. For example, when I'm mad or ed off, she knows that if I send her 100+ text messages (okay, perhaps that's an over-exaggeration) to vent, it's all I need to do to get over something. I can tell her anything and everything without fear of judgment. She's never been to Disney. This was her first-ever trip into the Disney Universe. She loves Princess movies and is one of the biggest Star Wars nerds I have ever met, although you would never guess that from talking to her.

(She's on the left, and I am on the right)

PS- if ANYONE can tell me how to post my Flickr pictures properly, I'd greatly appreciate it, so there isn't that extra HTML stuff

Featuring:

Brenda, Sandra's older sister and the AP at the school we both work at. She was always invited on the trip but did not decide to join until the last minute, which led to tons of anxiety when the trip first started for me. Her favorite characters are Baby Yoda and Baby Groot.

Maria, Brenda's best friend, whom Brenda invited because she was afraid she would be the third wheel if she joined my wife and me.

I have no pictures of them. We barely saw them. They did their own thing, and Sandra and I did our thing. We didn't even take any pictures together. We only saw them when we went back to the hotel to sleep, not that we did much sleeping.

When:

January 2nd through January 5th, 2024.

Where:

The Beach Club Villas, Epcot, The Magic Kingdom, and Hollywood Studios.

 

[Tuvalu]

 

[Lyssa]

Day One:

Disney: Day One

My Disney trip started with a lot of anxiety. Part of it was that I hate flying, and trips make me anxious until I see all my plans come to fruition. The other part was that Brenda and her friend Maria decided to crash our Disney trip. I mean, it wasn’t exactly like they invited themselves. I had extended the trip invite to Brenda in September, but she was so indecisive that she didn’t decide to go until the very last minute. By then, it was too late to add her to my reservation, and she could not find a hotel. I had messaged the travel agent, who helped me plan the trip, to see if I could add them to the reservation. She didn’t think it would be a problem to add them to only the hotel room, but I had to talk to the receptionist at the hotel to make it happen, and worrying about that caused my anxiety to skyrocket.

Anyhow, aside from the anxiety clouding my mind, the trip started fine. I got to the airport super early since my flight left at seven am. The only downside to that was that NOTHING was open to get breakfast. Dunkin Donuts was being refurbished, and the line for Starbucks was insane. Likewise, the candy place wasn’t open, so I could not get my personalized mix of jelly beans. I did buy some Gatorade since I am more likely to be thirsty than hungry, and then I sat at the gate and read my Kindle until I boarded the plane. I also used Disney Genie Plus and Lighting Lane and booked Frozen: Ever After and Guardians of the Galaxy for my wife and me. The flight from Houston to Orlando is insanely short. It was barely 90 minutes. I read on the plane, finished a book, and then we landed. MCO wasn’t the most confusing airport in the world. I think the Atlanta airport is far worse. I got my luggage quickly enough, got a cold brew and sandwich from Starbucks in the baggage claim, and then went to try to find the Mears Connect shuttle. When I looked for it, I was on the wrong side of the airport, but some nice dude told me where it was. I found it, scanned my ticket, and waited maybe 15 minutes for the shuttle, which wasn’t bad.

I listened to music on my phone en route to The Beach Club. I got to the hotel around 11 or so. There was no line to check in, so I could get to a receptionist immediately. What the travel agent said wasn’t true since I had booked Sandra and me through a trip package, and since Brenda and Maria had different park tickets, the receptionist could not add them to the room. But in the end, it worked out. She spoke to somebody, who talked to somebody, and I could add them as day guests for the trip, which meant they could stay at the hotel but would not have access to extra hours or the hotel facilities like Stormalong Bay. That was fine with me. All they wanted was a bed to sleep in. I thanked the receptionist profusely and pixie-dusted her with some Disney-themed beaded bracelets I had made for pixie-dusting people. After the whole Brenda/Maria thing got resolved, my anxiety levels plummeted, which was good.

The room happened to be ready, so I dropped my bag off. It was a nice room, nothing special. The location was great. We were in the first room in the Beach Club Villas, on the first floor, and near the doors. We got a handicapped room for some reason. It wasn’t much different than a regular room, except the shower had a bench and two shower heads. I am not going to lie. I enjoyed sitting on the bench and showering with both showerheads on simultaneously. It reminded me of a spa. There was a queen-sized bed, which I slept in myself. There was a couch with a pull-out queen-sized bed where Brenda and Maria slept. There was also a single pull-out bed where Sandra slept, so the rooming arrangement worked perfectly. Their flight did not land until 1 pm or something, so I decided to go to Epcot by myself since I had several hours to spare.

The Yacht and Beach Club are walkable to Epcot and Hollywood Studios (it’s still MGM to me!). You can also take a boat to Hollywood Studios. I started walking to Epcot, only to realize I was walking towards Hollywood Studios, and I had to turn around and backtrack to Epcot since my park tickets for Epcot that day. Regardless, it was maybe a 10-minute walk until I got to the International Gateway at Epcot.

The Christmas decorations were still up at the start of our trip. They started taking them down towards the end of our trip. But I enjoyed looking at them. There were also a lot of decorations celebrating 100 years of Disney. I checked the app on my phone and saw Spaceship Earth only had a twenty-minute wait, so I decided to head towards that.

I read my Kindle, listened to music with my earbuds, and rolled my eyes at all the people making TikTok videos while I waited. I rode it with a girl from Brazil who was also a single rider. It’s still one of my favorite rides.

(picture limit reached, onto another entry)

 

[Lyssa]

I saw Test Track was not down for once, so next, I headed towards Test Track, which I’d never rode before. I was on the ride in less than 10 minutes because I went to the single-rider lane. It was okay. I think it was slightly overrated compared to all the hype about it. At least I finally got to ride it after all of my other visits when it was closed.

After Test Track, I went to Journey into Imagination, which was just as cheesy and corny as I remembered, but I have a special place in my heart for Figment. When I was in line for Journey Into Imagination, Sandra called and told me she was at the hotel. After I finished the ride, I bought too many Figment-themed souvenirs, including a doll, which currently resides in my classroom, pins, and Figment ears. I walked back to the hotel to see Wifey.

I dropped my stuff off in the hotel room and Wifey and headed back to Epcot. Sandra had NEVER been to Disney before, so this trip was her first Disney trip ever. She was super excited. We toured the World Showcase, which Sandra thought was cool.

Our first ride was at the Mexican Pavilion, where we rode The Grand Fiesta Tour (Starring the Three Caballeros). It was cheesy, as always, but Sandra enjoyed the scenery and animatronics.

We decided to get Starbucks because we needed coffee. She got an iced latte, and I got a dragonfruit refresher. We decided to ride Spaceship Earth next, and we both somehow managed to chug our giant drinks down before we got to the ride. Wifey and I had a lovely future involving vacationing, visiting underwater, and robot pet sitters.

 

[Lyssa]

We had a lighting lane for Guardians of the Galaxy, but it broke down. This continued to be a pattern we saw throughout our trip. We waited for a little while but didn’t think the ride was going to start working anytime soon. And then Frozen: Ever After broke down and didn’t work for the rest of the day. So, on our first day, in particular, Lighting Lane and Genie Plus were not helpful.

Instead, we decided to ride Nemo, Journey Into Imagination, and The Land before our dinner reservations because they had no wait. Sandra liked all of them, and then we headed to Italy for our dinner at Trattoria al Forno.

Our food was delicious. We shared the calamari, I had gnocchi, and Sandra had pasta with meatballs. However, we had the worst server. He completely ignored us while we were there and barely checked on us. What should’ve been an hour tops turned into like a two-hour meal. He couldn’t figure out how to split our check, and by the time we finally finished our meal, Epcot was closing. Our experience there turned us off from dining, and we canceled all of our existing dining plans because we wanted to spend more time in the parks.

We decided to catch the monorail to the Magic Kingdom since it was open for two more hours.

 

[Lyssa]

The first ride I dragged Sandra on was It’s a Small World because she had to experience it at least once. I’m pretty sure I was singing that song for the entire night afterward. Sandra said it was NOT her favorite ride, but she was happy that she got to have that experience. (so she claims....)

(my name appeared again, although "Jamie" is a pretty common name, and I go by my middle name, "Lyssa")



We decided to ride The Haunted Mansion next, which is one of my all-time favorite rides. There was about a thirty-minute wait for it, which wasn’t that bad. It was NOTHING compared to the 190-minute wait we had the next day at Hollywood Studios, where I made Sandra wait to ride Slinky Dog Dash with me. Sandra enjoyed Haunted Mansion.

 

[Lyssa]

We had time for one more ride before the park closed, and we decided to ride Pirates of the Caribbean. We got lost en route to Pirates and got there with 5 minutes to spare before the park closed. We ended up having the last ride of the night and even had the boat to ourselves. It was awesome. Sandra also managed to get soaked during the ride, which was impressive since we were the only two on the ride.

After Pirates, we needed to head back to the hotel because the park was closing.

We found the bus back to the resort easily enough and headed back to our room. Brenda and Maria were there. They rented a car and did their own thing and only had two-day park tickets, so they were not at the parks that day. I am usually not much of a night-shower person, but I was so sweaty from walking around the parks all day and traveling to Florida that I took a quick shower. We all watched some TV before eventually falling asleep around 1 am or so.



For day one, when we didn’t have an entire day in any park, I think we did a pretty good job hitting up attractions.



Day Two consisted of visiting Hollywood Studios and after-hours at the Magic Kingdom.



This will be continued… when I eventually write part two, which will hopefully be soon.


For the record, this was all one document, but since I had a hard pic limit, it became several entries. If anyone knows how to get my Flickr to work, please let me know.

Thanks for following along