Trip Report Moderate Crowds, Good Weather and a Hurricane – a September/24 trip report.

Moderate Crowds, Good Weather and a Hurricane – a September/24 trip report.



Intro

Hello again everyone. We’re back from Disney and I’m finally getting around to starting this trip report. Before I jump in, I’ll just warn you that this will probably be a bit drawn out. I have just started writing now, and have about 9 days to cover and things are really busy right now. I’ll get it done, but it probably won’t be quick (fortunately, Netflix has conditioned us now to waiting extremely long times for things (looking at you Stanger Things and Cobra Kai)). LOL.



Quick recap of the trip

If you didn’t read the constantly-changing pre-trip report, here’s a quick summary

Who – This time we’re a different party of 4 than normal. There’s my wife and I (Tammy and Graham), and our daughter with her husband (Steph and Calvin - @S&CVDZ ). Our son Liam didn’t make this trip with us this time.

When - Sept 19-28

Where – Animal Kingdom Lodge – Kidani village in a 1 bedroom

Tickets - 5 day with park hopper and waterparks (we bought this using the Canadian deal they had). We also did a Not-So-Scary on the 22nd.


OK, let’s jump in



Let’s start with some pre-trip stuff

This was our first “long” trip in about 6 years (Thanks Covid). Tammy and I had been back at WDW twice in the past year for a few days (September 2023 at Wilderness Lodge for two days before our 25th anniversary cruise, and April 2024 for three days (that I tacked on to the end of a work trip to Tampa).
Those trip reports are here if you want to catch up:

Trip Report - Surprise - We went to Disney again

Surprise…we went to Disney for a few days High Level Details Who - Tammy and I When - April 17th-20th Resort – Saratoga Springs - Studio Preamble So like the title says, we did a kind-of last minute trip to Disney in mid-April. I was going to be on a course in Tampa from April...

forums.wdwmagic.com

Trip Report - *COMPLETED* How Much Magic Can We Cram Into 2 Days???....Allllll the Magic (if you know you know)

As the quote goes “Just when I thought I was out they pull me back in”. Welcome to my first trip report in 6 years. I honestly didn’t think I’d ever write a trip report again, but here we are. Maybe I’ll do more of these in the future. If you’re interested in the pre-trip report, here’s the...

forums.wdwmagic.com

The lead-up to the trip had us making a lot of changes to the original plan (here’s the link to the pre-trip if you want to catch up):

Pre-Trip - The warmup is over - a September Pre-trip report

The warmup is over - a September Pre-trip report Some preamble stuff If you’ve read my last two mini trip reports, you know that we’ve been dipping our feet back into all things WDW (links to the past two mini-trip reports are here if you’re interested...

forums.wdwmagic.com

We finally nailed all the plans down a few days before we were schedule to leave.

One thing we did this year was pack a “park survival” case. Ok, confession time…getting older kind of sucks when it comes to Disney Parks. Tammy and I mentioned a few time during this trip that we have no idea how we used to do our trips back when we started in 2008. Back then we’d do 10 day park hoppers and were pretty much doing rope drop to the kiss good night almost every day (never mind the physical toll of that for a second, how crazy is it that 10 days with park hopper and waterparks back then cost less than 5 days now). With this trip we found that we needed more breaks than we used to…. Thus the “park survival” case. Things in this case included:

• Cooling towels (just wet them and they stay cool for hours)
• Neck fans (I was on the fence about these, I got them off Temu but wasn’t sure if we’d use them or not (spoiler – we really didn’t))
• Waterproof phone cases (these were great for the waterparks)
• Ponchos (didn’t want to spend $12/poncho when we can get similar quality ones for $3 at home)
• Spray water bottles (these are kind of cool – it’s a water bottle, but they also have a trigger built into them (like a water gun) that will spray a fine mist)
• I also found a really cool Haunted Mansion sling bag

We also had to bring our Magic Bands along.

I’ll point out how many charge ports you need for your trip now. We had 4 magic bands and 4 phones that needed to be charged every day, as well as tablets and headphones/earbuds (for the flights), so it would be possible to have 10-12 things that needed charged at any one time.



Tammy went and got her nails done the day before we left. When she told them she was going to Disney they added some Disney “flair” to the nails.

Tammy and Steph also brought our cat Lylla to my brother’s house on the 18th

That's it for the preamble stuff. More to come shortly.

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 21 continued

With a bit of sugar in our systems we headed out of the Land and over to the Imagination Pavilion. Steph loves Figment, so this is a must-do for her. It’s a fun ride, but I think they need to do more with the Pavilion itself.

And a few pics outside the pavilion

It was now getting close to our Guardians boarding group, so we started to make our way over to the old Universe of Energy. On the way we passed Club Cool, so we headed in for a drink, as well as to initiate Calvin into the world of Beverly.

This is like a rite of passage when you travel with us. We were all trying the various drinks from around the world, all the while watching for when Calvin would fill his cup with Beverly…and finally it happened….”Just drink it in one gulp” Steph told him. Which he did….He was not happy…. I don’t think he believed me when I told him this is a well-known thing that people do to new comers…Thankfully, a few minutes later, just outside Guardians, a guy walked by with a shirt that said “Try the Beverly”… Calvin was fine after that.

So it was almost our boarding time (they were on Group 57 and we were 58). There was a photopass photographer out in front of the building so we decided to spend the last few minutes before our group was called getting some more pictures done. He was an older guy who was quite chatty with everyone so it took a bit longer than some do. Finally it was our turn so we get set in position and he starts taking pictures. A few pictures in he asks if any of us have a phone. I pull mine out and he tells me to point over there (pointing to an imaginary spot to my left) so I do…. I really wish he had told me to point the camera higher than I was…Because a few minutes later Steph is on her phone looking at the pics and starts laughing…”what’s so funny” I ask….Ummm….”it looks like you’re taking a picture of Groot’s crotch”…Huh?….Oh….

LOL

To be continued

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 21 continued
By the time our pictures were done our boarding group had been called, so we headed in.

I can tell the hype machine has worked well for this one, as even Tammy was excited about riding (she really doesn’t like coasters) It is amazing what they’ve done with this whole ride. Everything from the que to the pre-show was great.

And the ride itself? WOW!!! Absolutely amazing. It was so smooth and so fast. We all loved it.

We'll definitely try to get on this again before our trip is done.

After Guardians, we had a bit of a conundrum. We were kind of done with EPCOT, but we had dining reservations at Teppan Edo at 6 (it’s about 1 at this time). No one felt like hanging around any longer but I also didn’t fell like leaving then coming back later. That’s when I had an idea (in several parts)

• We have Liberty Tree booked for tomorrow (before the MNSSHP). However, that is a heavy meal to have before the party and all the rides and walking, etc
• I checked the app, and Liberty Tree had availability tonight (around 4:30pm)
• So I cancelled Teppan Edo, and booked Liberty Tree for tonight, and then cancelled Liberty Tree for tomorrow

With that finalized, we made our way out of the park, back to the car, and drove over to the ticket and transportation center.

To be continued

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 21 continued
We made it safely to the TTC, parked the car and took the tram over to the security check-points. I was the one holding our back-pack which, for some reason set off the metal detectors, so I was sent for additional screening (it turns out, if you have a case for your glasses that has a magnetic clip, that will trip the metal detector. Security told us that the next time we go through to take the case out and hold it in front of us and it will be fine (and it turns out he was correct)). The line at security for the bag check was quite long so I told Steph and Calvin to head into the parks and we’d meet them at Liberty Tree. I told Tammy to go too, but she wanted to wait for me.

After finally getting my backpack checked, Tammy and I headed over to the ferry (and stopped for a Pumpkin Game Changer from the Joffrey’s cart).

Just as we stepped on the ferry, the skies opened up and it started pouring. This was totally unexpected. Thankfully, by the time we crossed the 7 seas lagoon the rain had completely stopped again. Just a little 5 minute shower.

We scanned our bands and made our way into Magic Kingdom.

I texted Steph to see where they were. Calvin was in line for Astro Orbiter, and we really have no interest in that one, so Tammy and I headed into Adventureland to ride Pirates (the last time we were here it was down).

Pirates is such a good ride.

to be continued

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 21 continued
After Pirates we headed through Fronteriland to Liberty Square where we met up with Steph and Calvin (with a few pics along the way).

I did the mobile check-in at Liberty Tree, and before long our name was called.

We were in the Betsy Ross room. Liberty Tree dinner is always so good and so filling (I totally forgot to take a picture of the dessert).

To be continued

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 21 continued

With extremely full stomachs, we made our way back into Fronteirland, and got in line for the “Wildest Ride in the Wilderness” .

Tammy has always loved Big Thunder (and I’m glad we rode it this trip since it’s going to be closed for all of 2025 by the sounds of it). What a great ride.

After that we called it a night. The first day was kind of exhausting for everyone, and we wanted to just relax for the rest of the night.

Tomorrow the plan is to go to Typhoon Lagoon in the morning, then we have the Mickey’s Not So Scary Hallowe’en Party in the evening.

End of Sept 21

 

[pkkurz]

Sept 21 continued
By the time our pictures were done our boarding group had been called, so we headed in.
View attachment 822778View attachment 822779
I can tell the hype machine has worked well for this one, as even Tammy was excited about riding (she really doesn’t like coasters) It is amazing what they’ve done with this whole ride. Everything from the que to the pre-show was great.
View attachment 822780
View attachment 822781
View attachment 822782
View attachment 822783
View attachment 822784
And the ride itself? WOW!!! Absolutely amazing. It was so smooth and so fast. We all loved it.
View attachment 822785
We'll definitely try to get on this again before our trip is done.

After Guardians, we had a bit of a conundrum. We were kind of done with EPCOT, but we had dining reservations at Teppan Edo at 6 (it’s about 1 at this time). No one felt like hanging around any longer but I also didn’t fell like leaving then coming back later. That’s when I had an idea (in several parts)

• We have Liberty Tree booked for tomorrow (before the MNSSHP). However, that is a heavy meal to have before the party and all the rides and walking, etc
• I checked the app, and Liberty Tree had availability tonight (around 4:30pm)
• So I cancelled Teppan Edo, and booked Liberty Tree for tonight, and then cancelled Liberty Tree for tomorrow

With that finalized, we made our way out of the park, back to the car, and drove over to the ticket and transportation center.

To be continued

What song did you get? (That’s almost as big a deal as Beverly)

 

[gwhb75]

What song did you get? (That’s almost as big a deal as Beverly)

It was Sep 21, so they had a one day thing where they played September by Earth, Wind and Fire for the entire day

 

[S&CVDZ]

@gwhb75
Really have nothing to add. We pretty much spent our entire time at Disney springs that first day, at Gideon's. Was about a 20 min wait from when we got in line to when we got into the place.

If I remember correctly, we got 2 peanut butter cookies, a cookies and cream cookie, a classic chocolate chip cookie, and a double chocolate cookie.

Pro tip - warm the cookies up before eating them!! (I did like 15-20 seconds in the microwave in our room)

 

[Zipadeelady]

It was Sep 21, so they had a one day thing where they played September 21st by Earth, Wind and Fire for the entire day

The song is very important here! You have to say which song you get every time you post about riding Guardians.

 

[Bullseye1967]

I ate at Boatwrights for the first time last week (having stayed at PO Riverside and French Quarter 5 times!) and would agree - the food was delicious We had Prime Rib followed by Pecan Pie and Bread Pudding. Server was brilliant and also hsd a cast compliment. I don't know we haven't eaten there previously.
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That prime rib looks perfect!!!! What was the second dessert?

 

[Tiggertoo56]

That prime rib looks perfect!!!! What was the second dessert?

First one was bread pudding and second one was pecan pie - both yummy but my other half says my Pecan Pie is better.

 

[gwhb75]

September 22 – Typhoon Lagoon and Mickey’s Not-So-Scary

The one thing I like about waterpark days is that they don’t open until 10, so “rope-dropping” a waterpark doesn’t involve having to wake up while it’s still dark out.

We woke up at a more reasonable time (8ish). We did watch the news for a few minutes, and of course the main topic of interest is this hurricane forming in the Gulf of Mexico that could be headed our way. I’ve heard Disney is the safest place to be during a hurricane (I don’t agree…I think Canada would be the safest place to be….but I guess they mean the safest place in the Orlando area…LOL). I don’t really get bothered by things like this, so we’ll just play it all by ear.

Coffee and breakfast in the room were had, and we were out of the room by 9:15, and at the front gates of Typhoon Lagoon by 9:40.

Notice the matching bathing suit bottoms? Steph really got into outfit coordination while planning the trip, so you’ll notice she is usually matching with someone (usually me) almost every day. Matching lobster bathing suit bottoms was all her.

We made our way through the front gate and into the “hub” area. We did a few things while we waited for the park to officially open:

• We reactivated our refillable mug – Tammy and I bought the mug when we were at Disney in April, and I actually remembered to bring it with us.
• We got a small locker
• We bought a refillable popcorn bucket – we talked about this before the trip and decided that the cheap re-fill price, as well as the fact that Tammy really likes popcorn, made this a no-brainer for us.

Not long after all this was done the park opened. Travelling with someone who isn’t part of the OG family is a bit different. For example, if it was just us we would get seats up as close to the wave pool as possible. However….Calvin lead the way on to the beach area, and picked seats closer to the middle of the beach. LOL

This was the view from our chairs...normally we'd be up by the fence.

After we got our seats selected (and sun tan lotion applied) we made our way over to some of the more popular slides to get those done before things got busy.

First up was Miss Adventure Falls.

I had to represent my Leafs...

There was no line for it which was nice. The not-nice thing is that they make you ride in groups of 3 or more now. For most people this may not be a problem, but we are not a small family. I’m 6’4, 250lbs, Calvin is 6’5 and around the same weight, and then you have to add in Tammy and Steph.

Needless to say, we were crammed in pretty tight (and don’t get me started on how awkward it is to try to get out of the tubes at the end of the ride).
Here's a picture of the mess of legs in the raft as we all tried to get comfy

Despite the close quarters, we did have a good ride (so much so that we did it twice).

To be continued

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 22 continued

After Miss Adventure Falls we headed over to Crush ‘N Gusher. Again, hardly any wait (and, again, Tammy didn't know I had stopped to take a picture).

We rode all three slides.

and Tammy intentionally getting into my picture LOL

After this we split up. Calvin is not a “sit and relax” kind of guy, so he wanted to do every slide in the park. Steph, Tammy and I are more the “let’s do 4 laps of the lazy river” types so we agreed to go our separate ways for a while.

Steph also had to represent our Leafs (like I said, she was big on matching this trip).

Steph went with the more traditional round tube, while Tammy and I went with the half seat tubes….and we floated….and floated….and floated. I wasn’t joking when I said we did 4 laps. It was nice to relax and chat (and people watch).
Ummmm....

To be continued

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 22 continued
After 4 laps we decided we should grab something to eat (it was around 12:30). We ended up at Leaning palms. Tammy and I split the pulled pork nachos (and then Steph decided to get one too), and Calvin got the bbq burger.

All were good (as theme park food goes).

I was on my way to use my refillable mug when I passed the Happy Landings ice cream shop.

The one thing that caught my eye was the Pineapple Upside-Down Cone. Tammy and I both like pineapple, so I brought one back for us to share. It was good (although soft-serve ice cream does melt fast in the Florida sun).

After lunch we decided to call it a day for Typhoon Lagoon. Tammy and I had a DVC thing we signed up for (basically an “update” on all things DVC – but really just a presentation to try to get us to add more points (they were pushing Animal Kingdom, Poly and the new cabins at Ft. Wilderness).

We signed up for a tour of the cabins on Monday. The other thing they do, as a way to get people to go to these things, is offer some kind of incentive – this time it was a sling bag. It was pretty nice.

After the presentation we got in our car and made our way back to Animal Kingdom Lodge. We were just out of the parking lot when I noticed something...

poor little guy's life is about to change. He hopped on at Saratoga Springs and will end up at Animal Kingdom Lodge. I was actually surprised he held on for the entire trip...

to be continued

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 22 continued

After the DVC thing we headed back to the room to get ready for the MNSSHP. We’re not really costume people, but we did get matching shirts (and Tammy even found matching earrings (OK…I found the matching earrings and ordered them for Tammy).

I also found some Haunted Mansion socks that I thought were fitting for the evening.

One other thing we had to figure out was what to do for dinner. We thought about doing a quick-service place, but I decided to check the MDE app to see if there was anything that looked interesting. I saw that the Plaza had a 4:30 reservation so I booked it (we’ve never eaten at the Plaza before, and the price isn’t really much different than a QS, so we decided to give it a try).

We made our way to the MK and got there just after 4pm, which meant that we could go directly into the park. We got our wrist bands, our candy bags and then made our way to the Plaza.

To be continued

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 22 continued

The Plaza was…OK…It is good if you want something kind of quick. Since it was the MNSSHP they had a few special party-only items on the menu.

There was the “Ghoulishly Gourmet Burger” (Calvin got this one)

and the Hallowe’en Turkey Club (I got that one).

Tammy got the Crispy Chicken Sandwich

, and Steph got the Mac and Cheese side dish.

Like I said, it was OK. The food was good, but it is just sandwiches so it’s not like it’s going to knock your socks off, but we all enjoyed it.

With dinner out of the way we headed out to the party (and guess who didn't know I had stopped to take a picture...)

to be continued.

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 22 continued
The first thing we wanted to do was TRON.

Two reasons we wanted to do it first:

• It’s a standby now, and the wait time was really short (around 30 minutes)
• Tammy said she would try it once, and wanted to get it out of the way ASAP so she didn’t have to think about it all night (I had tried to get her to ride the year before when we were at the MNSSHP back in September 2023, but she wouldn’t).

As mentioned, the line was short and soon we were on our light cycles and racing through the grid.

Tammy didn’t hate it, but also said this was a one-and-done for her.

to be continued

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 22 continued
After Tron we decided to knock out its neighbor, so we made our way to Space Mountain.

During the party all the lights are turned off inside Space Mountain, so it is really dark. I guess that’s kind of cool if you are younger and your body can handle getting tossed around with no visual cues of what is coming. For me (a few months away from 50), this total darkness sucks. During the regular ride I can see which way the track is turning so I can lean into it. Not in the dark. Man it was a rough ride. Fun, but rough.

After the ride Steph stopped by the gift shop and picked up the Start Wars Loungefly Ears she had been planning on buying (they were on her pre-trip list of things she wanted to get).

They were cool.

to be continued

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 22 continued
With Space out of the way, we decided to wander through the park a bit. It’s fun seeing the characters in their Hallowe’en costumes.

We also picked up some candy at a few of the Trick-or-Treat locations.

One kind of cool trick-or-treat location was inside the building where they normally do the princess meet-and-greets in FantasyLand. It looks like a normal candy spot, but they had Maleficent and the Evil Queen in the que.

It was fun seeing them up close.

Of course we also had to ride Haunted Mansion tonight.

to be continued

 

[gwhb75]

Sept 22 continued

After riding HM we went over to Sleepy Hollow to try the only-available-at-the-party Séance Candle push pop cake.

It was really good.

After the sweet treat we headed over to Tiana’s Bayou Adventure (which also is standby only during the party) but we stopped for a minute to listen to the cadaver Dan’s first.

The line was about 45 minutes when we got there, but we decided we wanted to ride this at least once so we got in line.

I was a big Splash Mountain fan, but I really thought they did a good job with this. The end scene is really good and, IMHO, an upgrade from SM (although I did find myself humming the old song at certain points in the ride).

After floating through the Bayou we made our way back to Frontierland to get a spot for the 11pm parade.

We got a really good spot in front of the Diamond Horseshoe Review building. We were pretty early, so Steph and Calvin went back towards Tomorrowland to try and get on another ride or two before the parade started.

It turns out the location also wasn't a bad spot to catch the fireworks.

to be continued