My Tr nov. 29th-Dec 6th......

Hello all. Got home last night and wanted to say a quick hello. We had a really great time and ill start my Full Tr after we get the Tree up and Clothes washed.

A few quick notes:

Jet Blue is by far the Best airline we have ever flown with.

POfq is really great, loved the pool and the Mango Margaritas at the bar.

Dme is great.

Disney buses not so great.

Rode in the front of the Monorail (very cool tip I picked up here)

Mvmcp was okay at best. I have NEVER seen so many people in the Mk and not everyone was in the christmas spirit.

Found out what the term Disney commando means. I cant get over how many people would walk right over you to gain an inch

The BEST meal of my entire life- Crown and Rose on the back patio overlooking Illuminations. I have never enjoyed a meal as much as this.
Even with the screwed up reservation system and getting to our seats 45 minutes late.

Worst rain I have ever seen Sunday the 30th. My entire family got soaked and had to wait 45 minute for a bus. Later found out there was a tornado in the area.

Mk really slow on Thursday. Perfect weather, little to no wait on any ride. My favorite day by far.

Loved downtown Disney. Spent $150 in the Xmas store.

Trex cafe was cute but over priced and the food was okay at best.

Osbourne Lights were really cool.

Tsmm was 80 minute wait on the standby line. Got fast passes at 10:30 a.m. with a return time of 5:35-6:35 on a really slow day. Fast passes gone by noonish .

Got to be the Special guest Family At playhouse Disney.

Ds3 got to be the Honarary Conductor on the Disney r.r.

95 pics. on the Photo pass

so much more to tell and ill get to it a.s.a.p.

 

[CAPTAIN HOOK]

Brief but informative - thanks

 

[DormaNesbit]

Thank you for the juicy tid bits, can't wait for the rest and pictures!:wave:

 

[Todd L]

Introductions...........

Lets try this again. Let me introduce you to my family .

This is me Todd 42 y/o kid at heart and the leader of this band of misfits.

Next to me is my DD14 Amanda. Sweet kid with a heart of gold.great sense of humor and adventure

Then we have my Dw Dianna 39. The love of my life. Met fell in love and got married in 18 months time. We Honeymooned in Wdw.

And My Ds3 Jake. Jake is the main reason for the trip. big fan of all the Disney cartoons. Independant and Stubborn but sweet and loving too.

 

[Todd L]

Okay that looks better. Im working on it now and will get it updated in the next few hours.

 

[HollyBelle]

Great start...looking forward to the rest of it!

 

[Todd L]

My in laws Stephen and Dianna. Nice people, caring parents attentive Grandparents. I have to admit i was a little worried about His health. he had a hip replaced and has a really bad knee.

And My Niece (from here on refered to as Dn) Justene 18. Great kid. Ive know her since she was 3 and she has always been a big part of our lives.

 

[Todd L]

Day 1........

Day after thanksgiving we spend packing and doing all the last minute stuff. My in-laws and niece are spending the night because we live closer to Jfk and as it is we are getting picked up at 2:15 am for a 6:00 am flight.

We eat Pizza , have a few drinks and watch a little T.v.

The alarm goes off at 1:15 and my wife gets everyone up except ds.
We all manage to get it together and when the Car service shows we put Ds in his pj's right into the car seat and we are off.

Im so jealous my Dd and Dn were smart enough to claim the rear seat and bring pillows and a blanket they get an extra hour and 30 minutes sleep.

We get there early because we are nervous about the potential crowds due to the fact that Its The saturday after thanksgiving and a lot of people are going home.

We get on the plane and of course theres a problem with the a.c. unit so we take off over an hour late. The stewardess is great and goes out of her way to make sure everyone is comfortable.
I am growing more anxoius because we have a 1:55 adr for Crt.

Flight goes well . I watch Tropic thunder and its really funny.

Hop off the plane, make our way to Dme counter and wait maybe 20 mins. By the time I get done the line Grows to probably 150-200 people.
I get nervous because ive been getting a ton of conflicting reports about how busy Wdw will be this week.

Dme was great. Driver tells funny storys and we are all thru the roof with excitment. After a few stops we finally arrive at Pofq. Fall in love with all the great Christmas decorations immediatley.

We are greeted by Chris at the front door and over the course of the week grow to really like this guy. He was just a ton of fun and My kids looked forward to seeing him every morning.

Problem is now we are running really late for our adrs. We tell the in-laws to call when they get to the park but weve gotta go.

Find the bus stop, sit and wait,wait,wait. We have less than 30 minutes now to get there. I run and grab the yellow cab parked in front of the hotel and pay 12.50 plus tip to run the 5 of us to the Mk.

Run to the Monorail , Catch one quickly. Run thru the bag check and gates Main street usa goes by in a blur.
Park had a lot of people in it but we are moving quickly. Get to the front of The castle and the show is going on out front. Its now that I realize that you can no longer go thru the castle (when did that start?) make a hard right ,run up the side by Cosmic rays and take the path up to the rear of the castle run in the rear door and we just made it with one minute to spare. Whew. Or so I thought.

Wait in line to meet Cinderella take the pics and wait another 40 minutes for our table.

Get the Focaccia Sandwich. really good. Dw has the beef stroganoff and loves it. Cant recall what the kids had.

Then we meet the "girls"

she was digging me Big time. Yes I have a thing for Jasmine.

Dn and Dd with Belle who was really great.

Dw, Ds, Dn and Dd with Snow white.

Laughing at me for talking to Jasmine. The table next to us was really funny. They said come here for the kids or for you?

We are all already shot because its 3:30 in the afternoon and weve been up for 14 hours already . We meet up with the in-laws and go on a bunch of rides -Potc 2x(no davy jones), Hm 2x(love the new stuff always a favorite) Peter pan, Pooh bear, and decide at 9:00 that weve had enough.
We go to the hotel and sleep the sleep of the dead.


Day 2 coming soon............

 

[Todd L]

Day 2.........

I wake up Go get coffee for dw and I . We put on the news and sip the Disney mud. Calling for really unstable weather in the area for the day.

My Dw is a huge fan of those shows like “Storm Chasers” and the movie “Twister” . She wants to go on one of those Vacations where you chase Tornados for a week in hopes of seeing one. She however does not want to see one today with most of her immediate family with us. We hash it out and decide to give Ak a try.

We all meet at the Food court and while eating omlettes and mickey waffles My Fil informs us that he didn’t bring any sneakers with him and his leg is really starting to feel it. My mil is less than happy with him. “youre 67 years old with a fake hip and 2 bad knees what were you thinking” Fil decides we should all accompany him to downtown to buy sneakers. 7 people including 3 kids should travel to Dd because you forgot Sneakers?
I pull my wife to the side and tell her he can take care of himself we should go to Ak and get some rides in. Dw decides she will take ds with her and make sure her parents get to where they need to be and get back to ak without too much trouble. I think it’s a bad idea.

So Dd, Dn and I wait and wait for The bus to Ak while Dw, ds and the in-laws wait for a bus to Downtown.

We manage to get there and get right on line for Ee. It’s the first time anyones been to Ak so its all new to us. Wait 15 minutes and have a great ride. We get back on the single rider line 2 or 3 times and the phone rings. Dw and crew just got to Dd and are looking for a place that sells sneakers. 1.5 hours have gone by and still no sneakers.
We run around and see some of the animals at 11:45 the phone rings its Dw and they are at the front gate. 2 hours 45 minutes gone by for a pair of sneakers. Dw is not happy. Neither am I.

I tell everyone that ill run for fp’s for the safari and as im leaving I here my Fil say hell take the walk with me. I explain that its clear across the park and I don’t know the park at all so maybe I should go by myself to be sure and get fp’s a.s.a.p.

He stays behind and I boogie over the bridge into Africa and when I get to Ks there is no wait. Call dw and she now gets everyone moving that way. I head back and meet them to help my dw.

Theres a really light rain at this point but the skies are not looking too promising.
Dark gray clouds roll in and Little black fast moving clouds are coming in and dropping a little rain from time to time.

We walk right on safari and its maybe ½ full. A few of the Animals get really close and its really nice. The Driver is funny and seems to really love his job. We see a baby elephant running full speed towards its mother and if its not the cutest thing ive ever seen than I don’t know what is. All the while the rain is coming and going no big deal.

We hop off and head out to find a quick lunch and then it happened.

The skies just opened up on us. I have never seen rain like this. It was torrential and lasted for a good solid 25 minutes. Then the wind picked up and with it the temperature dropped a good 10 degrees in 30 seconds. Thunder, lightning the wind. It was downright biblical. Branches were coming down everywhere and some of the drains clogged making huge puddles.

In the midst of this I run to the stroller to try to keep it dry. I wind up off the trail under a huge tree trying to stay dry. DW and the rest of them are holed up on a Covered bridge.
Theres no room to move and a Loud Cm comes over and yells That people are trying to get thru so some of them would have to leave to make space for others. I hear a really loud ”yeah good luck with that buddy” come from somewhere and everyone laughs. Nobody moves.

I decided that being under a tree in a thunderstorm is a pretty bad idea so I move down the trail to the first shelter I can find. Its a huge gift shop and its still pretty empty.
Well Dw saw me make a break for it and decided we should all be together . Here come the lot of em down the hill, soaked with the wind blowing and Thunder clapping.

I tell dw that she should have stayed dry so we could stay and enjoy the park when this thing blew over. Shes done for the day anyway and wants to head to the room.

We make our way thru the rain and floods to the buses. We have at least 100 people in front of us waiting to get on and they are all pretty upset. The people in front of me tell me that they were waiting for a long time for a bus and they hadn’t seen one in at least a half hour. By now there is another 100 people behind us. The rain is pouring and the wind is blowing it right in on us. We are all cold and tired. All the other resorts seem to be moving along like clockwork. When our bus finally shows the poor driver has a hard time getting a few people in wheel chairs loaded up.

Some people behind me get into it with some people ahead of me because they are motioning to some friends at the end of the line to come ahead and cut the line. They think better of it and decide to stay put.

A Cm who was standing there decides she didn’t want to answer anymore questions about why the busses are so screwed up. She starts saying “A bus comes every 20 minutes” until shes red in the face. Not too nice.

A Cm stops 2 kids and tells them they need to put their shoes back on. They don’t.


2 buses later and we get on. We are all tired, wet, cold and aggrevated. The worlds longest bus ride follows. We decide we may as well go to the pool because hey were wet anyway.We go to the room to change and the news confirms that a Tornado has touched down and damaged some homes in the area. Kinda scary

The pool is great. The water is nice and warm and The mango margaritas are really good.
The sun pops out from time to time and it warms up a little.

Back to the room for showers and warm clothes. We have adrs for Capt. Jacks Downtown.

We take the boat over and it’s a great ride. We get to see the new tree house style villas they are building and we all think it would be a really cool place to stay.

We get to Downtown with plenty of time to spare. Its chilly and a little wet but , we are all wearing dry warm clothes so it dosent bother us much.

We hit the Christmas shop to the tune of $150 and I think my in-laws spent more.
Goofys candy company was a hit with the kids. Ds take a few rides on the Trains.

We get seated within 15 minutes of my reservation and the waitress goes over the dining plan with us. She didn’t seem thrilled to be explaining the plan for the 1,000,000th time.
I orderd the Crab Cakes and a Corona. Dw and the girls get the shrimp and pasta. Ds gets chicken Nuggets . It’s a nice meal and we sit back and enjoy the warmth and the view.

We walk around for another hour or so and head back to the boat for a nice ride home and a good nights sleep.

 

[Todd L]

Wow...I cant remember why I never finished this ...