I guess I can't really claim that this is live from the parks, because I will posting from our room, but it's close enough!
We have just arrived this morning for a 12 night, 13 day visit to the World! After an exhaustive, but also quite fun, 24 hours of driving, stopping to rest and eat, meeting up with old friends, we found ourselves pulling into the parking lot of Bay Lake Tower at about 6:30am. If you want to know our full plans, check out the Pre-Trip Report: http://forums.wdwmagic.com/threads/2-weeks-in-the-summer-heat-ptr.867381/
So, we got checking in at the Contemporary. We didn't get that amazing moment of luck when your room is already ready at 6:30am, but we never expect that to happen! So, a little after 7am we found ourselves walking up to Guest Services at Magic Kingdom to pick up our annual passes. We were lucky enough to score the Premium Annual Passes back at the beginning of the year when they offered the great DVC sale.
Anyway, APs in hand, we tapped to enter early and get to our 8:35am ADR for Crystal Palace. Took a few pictures around the hub (which will be posted later, computer is still working on communication with new camera). We checking in at CP and got seated at 8am - there's some luck working for us! An excellent breakfast and nice visits with Tigger, Piglet, Eeyore, and Pooh (again, pics to come). From our seats it looked like the opened the gates about 10 minutes early. We left the restaurant at about 9:15am and went back to Town Square for some Long Lost Friends - first we met with Dr. Facilier and Louis and then the Brer crew. DD9 didn't really want to wait in the lines for the Robin Hood or Chicken Little characters, so we headed back to Adventureland.
In Adventureland about 9:45am, we met with the Fairies, rode Pirates, did one of the new Pirates Adventures, rode Jungle Cruise (with FPs I had picked up while the girls were in line for the Fairies), visited the Tiki Tiki Tiki Tiki Tiki room (sing it, you know you want to!) and made a quick dash to Splash to pick up FPs for later. All of that added up to a little under 2 hours of touring, so we picked up some frozen drinks at Sunshine Terrace and a Mickey pretzel and sat for a few minutes in Frontierland and relaxed and ate.
It was about 12:15pm, so it was off to the mountains. As we went to enter Splash Mountain, we got FPs for Big Thunder (for 1pm). Splash was quite enjoyable - most of the animatronics were working great, but a few effects were not on (noticeably the jumping waters which did not jump over the ride). After that, we were going to meet Woody and Jessie, but the line was a bit long and we had just gotten a text that our room was ready, so we decided to do BTM and then head out for a little rest. Obviously the almighty lords of room check-in were pleased with us since the text came at 12:45pm and after BTM and a train ride to the front, we were in room getting that rest by 2pm.
The room is very nice - officially a standard view studio in Bay Lake Tower, but we do have a partial MK view which is excellent (although we may not be able to take advantage during this stay since we have fireworks plans for both nights already). DD watched "Secret of the Wings" and rested, while DW and I both slept for between half and hour and an hour. Now we are all cleaned up and changed and getting ready to head to 1900 Park Fare for our dinner reservations!
We have just arrived this morning for a 12 night, 13 day visit to the World! After an exhaustive, but also quite fun, 24 hours of driving, stopping to rest and eat, meeting up with old friends, we found ourselves pulling into the parking lot of Bay Lake Tower at about 6:30am. If you want to know our full plans, check out the Pre-Trip Report: http://forums.wdwmagic.com/threads/2-weeks-in-the-summer-heat-ptr.867381/
So, we got checking in at the Contemporary. We didn't get that amazing moment of luck when your room is already ready at 6:30am, but we never expect that to happen! So, a little after 7am we found ourselves walking up to Guest Services at Magic Kingdom to pick up our annual passes. We were lucky enough to score the Premium Annual Passes back at the beginning of the year when they offered the great DVC sale.
Anyway, APs in hand, we tapped to enter early and get to our 8:35am ADR for Crystal Palace. Took a few pictures around the hub (which will be posted later, computer is still working on communication with new camera). We checking in at CP and got seated at 8am - there's some luck working for us! An excellent breakfast and nice visits with Tigger, Piglet, Eeyore, and Pooh (again, pics to come). From our seats it looked like the opened the gates about 10 minutes early. We left the restaurant at about 9:15am and went back to Town Square for some Long Lost Friends - first we met with Dr. Facilier and Louis and then the Brer crew. DD9 didn't really want to wait in the lines for the Robin Hood or Chicken Little characters, so we headed back to Adventureland.
In Adventureland about 9:45am, we met with the Fairies, rode Pirates, did one of the new Pirates Adventures, rode Jungle Cruise (with FPs I had picked up while the girls were in line for the Fairies), visited the Tiki Tiki Tiki Tiki Tiki room (sing it, you know you want to!) and made a quick dash to Splash to pick up FPs for later. All of that added up to a little under 2 hours of touring, so we picked up some frozen drinks at Sunshine Terrace and a Mickey pretzel and sat for a few minutes in Frontierland and relaxed and ate.
It was about 12:15pm, so it was off to the mountains. As we went to enter Splash Mountain, we got FPs for Big Thunder (for 1pm). Splash was quite enjoyable - most of the animatronics were working great, but a few effects were not on (noticeably the jumping waters which did not jump over the ride). After that, we were going to meet Woody and Jessie, but the line was a bit long and we had just gotten a text that our room was ready, so we decided to do BTM and then head out for a little rest. Obviously the almighty lords of room check-in were pleased with us since the text came at 12:45pm and after BTM and a train ride to the front, we were in room getting that rest by 2pm.
The room is very nice - officially a standard view studio in Bay Lake Tower, but we do have a partial MK view which is excellent (although we may not be able to take advantage during this stay since we have fireworks plans for both nights already). DD watched "Secret of the Wings" and rested, while DW and I both slept for between half and hour and an hour. Now we are all cleaned up and changed and getting ready to head to 1900 Park Fare for our dinner reservations!
