Trip Report Magical Moments with Blue Skies and Sunshine...Guaranteed!

This trip was to take place in early Feb ’14, but in August when Disney released a “Free Dining” offer for dates Sept thru late October, I got the hair-brained idea that we should go in October.
I remember the day clearly…Thursday August 1st. I was off work that day and spent the entire day crunching numbers, figuring the best days to go and texting my wife LeAnn and my aunt Sally (who would we be going with us this time) many times throughout the day. They thought I was crazy! After all, we would be well past the 180 day mark for ADR’s, and what would be the chances that anything we want would still be available?
My aunt and uncle were on board to go this fall, but LeAnn was a little hesitant. It didn’t take much to convince her to go in October. The only stipulation was that if we could not get dinner ADR’s at ‘OHana, we weren’t going! Will we get the elusive ‘OHana ADR??? Stay tuned!

Here’s the cast:
Me(aka Mousefreak) 43, LeAnn (aka SweetEvangelene) 42, Grace 11.
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Uncle Walt and Aunt Sally (yes, we have a real “Uncle Walt”). This would be our third trip with Walt and Sally. They are seasoned Disney guests as this was their 22nd trip!
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mousefreak

mousefreak

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
This will be our home for the next 7 days...

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This is our second stay at Pop. We've stayed at Movies and Music, but we like the fact that buses don't pick up or drop off at any other resort. It's clean, well kept and quiet around the resort.
 
mousefreak

mousefreak

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Our trip started Thursday October 24 with our alarms waking us 2:50 AM. Yes, that’s AM! Walt and Sally stayed at our house as they live about an hour away. I packed the van the night before, so just throw in the overnight bags and away we go. The goal was to be on the road by 4am. Mission accomplished as we were on the road by 3:51.
Look who’s wide awake at 4am…
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After three hours on the road and a quick breakfast stop at McDonalds and refueling, we were back on the road. With a full belly, it’s time for a mid-morning nap.
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The drive was uneventful. The reason for leaving at 4am is to get through Atlanta before afternoon rush. After sailing through downtown Atlanta, our next stop is a Hampton Inn in Valdosta. We stayed here back in 2011 and liked that it was a nice, clean hotel with a pool and hot tub. After driving for 12 hours, nothing is better than a swim…
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Grace LOVES to swim! We'll do lots of swimming at Disney this trip.



Time for the hot tub…
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Needless to say we were HIGHLY ANNOYED that the hot tub was filled with dirt and plants. Their website even still clearly listed a hot tub. I desperately needed that hot tub to loosen my sore body. Oh well. It was time to clean up, get some dinner at Sonny’s BBQ (our favorite bbq in the south) and get to bed…we’re going to be at Disney tomorrow!!!
 
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Raven66

Raven66

Well-Known Member
I'm already hooked! If I can't be at Disney I love looking at other's pictures. Fills a little void. You know someday Grace will hate you for that sleeping picture. haha I do it to my 16 yr old all the time.:D
 
mousefreak

mousefreak

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
RMicheal21 said:
I'm so excited for this! Great start! :)
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Thanks for following along.


TheMouseFan said:
11 more days and we will be seeing that in person!!! Can't wait to read more!
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Your trip will be here soon! Glad you want to read more, but don't forget to get packing. :)


fractal said:
Great start Dennis! Looking forward to reading about your adventures !
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Thanks for following along, Chris!


Raven66 said:
I'm already hooked! If I can't be at Disney I love looking at other's pictures. Fills a little void. You know someday Grace will hate you for that sleeping picture. haha I do it to my 16 yr old all the time.:D
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Thanks, Raven66. I too love to read other trip reports and look at pictures. Your are right, Grace will hate us for posting the sleeping picture. LOL


disneygirl76 said:
WOO HOO! Okay - I'm ready for more! :)
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Thanks!! You really did make our day when we saw your PTR revealing you are expecting!


donaldtoo said:
Oh my!
Y'all should have just layed down in the "hot tub" for a few minutes anyway, and then went and rinsed off in the pool...! :D ;) :)
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LOL! We were not too happy about the hot tub situation. When we checked in, we told them that we were planning on going swimming and hit the hot tub. They just kind of looked at us with a blank stare, after all, it was just 72 outside.


ginadee said:
Im on board!
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Thanks for following along.
 
TheMouseFan

TheMouseFan

Well-Known Member
mousefreak said:
Your trip will be here soon! Glad you want to read more, but don't forget to get packing. :)
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We happen to be in Atlanta right now for the Falcons game, but I'll definitely start packing as soon as we get home tomorrow and unpack from this trip! I'll keep reading as well to keep myself occupied until we leave (as if I don't have enough other things to do:D).
 
mousefreak

mousefreak

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
After a great dinner at Sonny’s BBQ, we were trying to figure out what time to set the alarm and what time to leave. I had it set in my mind that we should be on the road by 5 am. Being on the road at 5am would get us to Pop Century by 9am. Others thought getting on the road by 6am would be early enough. I was ready to get on the road and get to the parks ASAP!!
Day 1 – October 25
It turns out that we were all up earlier than expected and we would be back on I75 south bound right at 5am sharp. Me = Happy!! After all, I was hoping that we would be able to get checked in and maybe get into our rooms and unload the van before heading to Epcot.

This was taken at 8:33 am. What a beautiful sight! Welcome home!
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Check in went smooth as usual. We have always done on line check in and have never experienced any problems. Walt and Sally’s room was ready, but ours was not. No big deal. We just unloaded all our stuff into their room since our rooms were connected. We had requested a room close to the main building and above ground level. We got both! We didn’t pay for a “Preferred” location, but we were thrilled with the location we got (60’s section near the big Mickey phone). It was quiet location that when you walked out of our room, you could see Art of Animation from across Hourglass Lake. AOA is AMAZING! More on that later.


Unloading the van and heading to our room. Plenty of smiles!
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After the daunting task of unloading all our crap from the van, we decided it was time to head to Epcot. Due to vision and mobility issues, we had rented a wheelchair for Grace (as we always do) and the company was to have it delivered to Pop by 9am. I went to the bellhop to get the wheelchair while everyone else waited in the lobby. After about 3 cast members went to look for it in a span of about 20 minutes, they said they couldn’t find it. I was starting to get ticked as this was the first time we used this company. I called them and said they had our reservation, but that we were supposed to call two days earlier and give them our credit card. I had called and confirmed several days before that and they never said anything about not having a credit card number. They said they called and sent an email, but I was home both days and received no such notification.
I was becoming really upset about the situation, but kept my cool. They were able to track down a truck that had a wheelchair and would be able to be at Pop within 20 minutes. OK. I can live with that. We decided to get a quick breakfast type snack at the food court, pick up our refillable mugs and 20 minutes later, we got the wheelchair. Off to Epcot we go!!

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The line at the bus stop for Epcot was super long, probably 2 full buses worth. There was no line for Magic Kingdom and a bus was there and ready, so we decided to take the bus to MK and catch the monorail to Epcot.
I love how the monorail goes around Spaceship Earth.
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fractal

fractal

Well-Known Member
It has to be cool to travel to Disney World with somebody named Walt! :D

I'm glad you got the wheelchair situation straighten out. I just hate having things like that hold you up on vacation - especially when you first get there. Nice pic of SSE!
 
mousefreak

mousefreak

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
fractal said:
It has to be cool to travel to Disney World with somebody named Walt! :D

I'm glad you got the wheelchair situation straighten out. I just hate having things like that hold you up on vacation - especially when you first get there. Nice pic of SSE!
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Walt loves Disney World...which is pretty neat for someone who's in their late 70's. There's a sentimental connection with Walt and Sally to Disney that I'll touch later in the report. In short, their only daughter had Cystic Fibrosis and passed away in her mid 20's. They took her to Disney about every other year. I think going back reconnects them to some wonderful, happy memories.

In regards to Grace's wheelchair, it was just a minor bump in the road that didn't really delay us at all. I'm going explain Grace's situation a little later, but she has extremely poor night vision. She's almost blind in the dark. So imagine walking outside in the bright sun then walking into all the dark buildings with steps and navigating those queues. She just stops dead in her tracks and won't move.

Thanks! The pict of SSE was taken with our iPhones (as we're all of our pictures this year) on a moving monorail. I couldn't believe how well they turned out.
 
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mousefreak

mousefreak

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Back in September, we got an invitation from Disney to participate in the trial of the new MagicBands. We were really excited to give these a try. I know there’s been some uproar and discomfort on the boards about the MagicBands, but we were pumped to give them a try.
Booking our Fastpasses in advance was kind of a double edge sword. I don’t like the thought of having everything planned out and having to be at an attraction at a certain time, its fun to just do things spontaneously, especially while on vacation. While Disney still has some bugs to work with doing advanced Fastpass reservations, I do think there are some advantages. We did book Fastpasses for each day, but only used the ones we were interested in doing. This did save us some time not having to wait say 90 minutes for Soarin’.
During our entire trip, we experienced absolutely no problems at all with the MagicBands. I fact, we preferred the ease of use of the bands much more than the Key to the World card. No more fishing around in purses or wallets to find your KTTW card. Using the band for FastPass+, dining plan, purchases and such was a breeze. I look forward to what Disney will do in future to further enhance our experiences utilizing the bands.
 
mousefreak

mousefreak

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Day 1 continued…
Once we got to Epcot from our nice relaxing ride on the monorail, we headed right to Soarin to use our first ever Fastpass+. IT was so cool just to walk right up to the Fastpass line, scan our MagicBand and away you go!
I LOVE The Land pavilion. There’s just something about the smells, music and atmosphere that gets me every time.
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After Soarin’, we nearly had to run over to Italy to meet our 12:45 ADR for Via Napoli. This was our first time at Via Napoli. We’ve heard so many good reviews that we had to give it a try. Grace is a pizza fanatic. She would eat pizza for every meal if we’d let her. Grace and I shared a medium pepperoni which was so stinkin’ good. LeAnn loved the proscuitto and melon pizza and Walt and Sally loved theirs as well.


Deserts! NOMNOMNOMNOM
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And more desserts...
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Love the pizza ovens. Very cool!
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The food and service was excellent, but it was so d*mn loud in there that we didn’t enjoy it that much. We’ll go back again, but it won’t make our Disney “must do” list.
 
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