Myhappyplace's Magical 30th Birthday Trip (October 19-25, 2008)

Well, here goes!

Background Info
I usually get to go to WDW every year, year-and-a-half. Having just gone in January, I didn't really plan on getting to go again this year. Until I realized that-holy crap-I'll be turning 30 in October! Little get togethers with family and friends are nice for your birthday, but not your 30th, plus I didn't know how I'd do with that big milestone, so I realized I had to be in my happy place for the big day.

I originally planned on going solo, but my co-worker, who, bless her heart, has had to put up with me talking non-stop before and after my last 6 trips to WDW, asked if she could come too. She had never been to WDW, and wants to bring her family someday.

So on this trip it was just me, Amber and my friend Danielle.

It was going to be interesting because although Danielle and I get along well, we are complete opposites in almost every way, so I was anxious about seeing how she liked this place I talk non-stop about!


Sunday, October 19th (Arrival/ Resort Hopping/ DTD)
Danielle arrived at my house the evening before after working parking at that day's Penn State game. We then left my house at 2 am for the 3 hour drive to Pittsburgh airport. Danielle had never flown before, either, but everything went fairly smoothly and we were on our way to Cincinnati, then Orlando.
It took very little time, maybe 10 minutes to get loaded onto the DME bus and headed to our resort for the week, Pop Century.

Some pics of POP:

We checked in, got a First Visit button for Danielle, and our room was ready! After dropping our stuff off in the room, we headed down to the food court for a small lunch. I had the Caesar Chicken Salad which I love!
Then, it was off to some of the other resorts to look around. Danielle was really excited to see the other resorts, and I had never actually looked around some of them myself.
We headed to MK to pick up our tickets, then got on the resort monorail to visit the Contemporary, Grand Floridian, and Polynesian. How beautiful they were! My favorite from those three is the Poly. Here are some pics:

Contemp-I bought a really cute purse here that I used for the rest of the week, too.

GF-someone was getting married that day and we watched the bride getting pics taken on the staircase. My sister also got engaged here last spring, so I bought her a beautiful GF glass ball ornament for Christmas ( I got a lot of Christmas shopping done this week)

and the Poly:

 

[myhappyplace]

While waiting for the afternoon parade in Frontierland, this CM from the Jungle Cruise was setting up the masking tape walking lanes. He was cracking me up-he went through at least 2 rolls of tape while we watched. He had some goal in mind; I don't know if this was it, but he made the time pass quickly until the parade started. It was hilarious, but you might have had to be there:

Here you can see his designs in the background of the parade pics I took. Its little things like this that make me love WDW.

And, I swear, WDW must do something to attract these birds to Frontierland...its the only place I see them:

We went on the Jungle Cruise and had an amazing skipper, Todd. If you are on here, or anyone knows him, he was wonderfully hilarious! We laughed for the rest of the day, repeating some of the jokes to each other.

 

[myhappyplace]

After that I had my very first. Dole Whip, that is! Sheesh, what were you thinking?

While waiting in line, Rafiki came out and started picking leaves and branches from a tree nearby.

Then, we found a spot on Main Street USA,

with a Casey's hot dog

and watched the parade and fireworks! What could be better-I ask you??

(ok, so this is actually from the last stage show, but you get the idea)

 

[myhappyplace]

Thursday, October 23rd (Epcot)
My very first Food & Wine Festival! Well, later in the day. We got there very close to park opening and headed straight for Soarin', where we pretty much walked on. Love Soarin', as did Danielle.

After that, we went over to FP Test Track. On the way, I was very pleased to discover that the fountain was operational. On my last trip in January, it was drained. So we paused to watch for a bit.

We decided to do the Seas next, where I had to visit my dolphin buddies. (If you read my TR from Jan, you will remember that I did Dolphins in Depth). How I had missed them!! I also noticed this in the aquarium:

We rode TT then, and headed to Mission Space. Danielle has an issue with spinning rides. She had done the Teacups, but only because it was a classic and she felt she had to try everything once. She informed me it would be her one and only time. Admirable, but try as I could, I couldn't convince her to do Green. I love the Orange Side, but was willing to go Green if it saved her from being sick, especially with me beside her!! We did Orange, and she was a little shaky and pale afterwards, but a couple of minutes later, she was okay. Did I mention she was also very stubborn??

Noticed this on TT:

We backtracked to SSE. For once, the pictures worked for me!!

We watched HISTA and went on JII. Also rode Living with the Land for the first time in years-I had forgotten how much I enjoyed it!

One last thing we needed to do in Future World; Yankspy, I believe you commented on how fun it was to take a first-timer...

hee hee, I'm evil!!

 

[OhioDisneyLover]

Hi Amber,

Great trip report! Love your pictures! Looks like you had a fabulous 30th birthday trip!!

Sophia

 

[Coree]

Lovin' the TR, Amber! It was so great to meet you guys. Glad you had a great birthday trip!

 

[myhappyplace]

okay, sorry it has taken me so long to catch up with this...I'll try to get back into it where I left off...


I believe we had just fininshed Future World, Epcot, and were headed to World Showcase, which meant my first ever trip to Food & Wine. First rule: no laughing at how much I ate, or, Rule 2: no laughing that I took pictures of most of the food! I had researched extensively the offerings at each city beforehand, so I knew I wanted to start off with:

Cheddar Cheese Soup

then, some mushroom soup, which I ate too fast to even get a pic of! Then, dessert:

Then, spaetzle with mushrooms:

then, beef goulash ( I think ??) with a bacon dumpling (that was delish)

Can you tell I like to eat??

Of course, it wasn't all directly back-to-back; we did stop in each pavilion, watch performances and shows, ride rides, etc. but overall, I loved Food & Wine!!

 

[myhappyplace]

Some random WS pics:
watched Off Kilter for the first time ever! We really enjoyed them, so we bought a cd.

found a Hidden Mickey in France:

watched this storytelling lady in Japan:

Love Voices of Liberty!!

After we had stuffed ourselves and settled in our spot for Illuminations, it started raining. We tried to tough it out, but we ended up having to run for cover in the Morroccan pavilion. Finally, we got to watch Illuminations and that ended our day in Epcot!

When we got back to the resort, I found this in my room (I found out later a friend of mine had it sent there) since my birthday was the next day.

 

[firedog31]

great report and pics, looks like you had a great time!

 

[spectrodanny]

Oh no! it's the 24th of November will this trip report end up w/ the same fate that Jungle Skipper's had where we never heard the end of it?

 

[myhappyplace]

haha...oops! You're right-I'll finish it! Sorry!

 

[myhappyplace]

Sorry about the delay, folks...I didn't think anyone was reading it anymore!! Anyway,

Friday, October, 24th (my 30th birthday!!)
The day started out gray and rainy, but that didn't get us down...we were in Disney World!
We had every intention of going back to the Studios to ride Toy Story one more time, but then decided to go back to Animal Kingdom because Danielle had yet to see It's Tough to be a Bug, and we wanted to reride Everest.

After that, we decided we would spend our last day in MK, mostly because that's where I imagined spending my birthday.

It was still sprinkling, but it added a spooky feel to the Fall/ Halloween decorations

There was not much left that we had to ride, so we just meandered down Main Street, taking it all in for the last time. I got to see all of the Main Street characters for the first time, and she sang "Happy Birthday" to me...very loudly. It was very special. (oh, yeah, I forgot to tell you that I proudly wore my birthday badge and everyone had something nice to day to me all day)

After Main Street, we went towards Adventureland and Frontierland. WE decided to reride Big Thunder and Splash.

While we were loading onto the train on Big Thunder, the CM said,"Amber, Its Your Birthday" and broke down into quite the dance for me!! After the ride, when we pulled back in and started to unload from the train, he said,"Amber-one more time!" and danced again. Maybe you had to be there, but it was hilarious-the whole queue was laughing!

Self-portrait on BTMR:

Danielle was excited to find the Hidden Tink at the end of the ride:

See what I mean about these birds and Frontierland?!

I don't remember what order we did everything, but we did Jungle Cruise again, Pirates, Splash, Railroad.

I attempted to get a pic of the Hidden Mickey at the top of the drop on Splash:

 

[myhappyplace]

Then we decided to go to Tomorrowland and ride the TTA, do Monsters Inc, and yes, even Stitch (for the 2nd and final time of my life), Buzz, and AstroOrbiters.

on TTA:

Danielle on Astro Orbitors

The rain had stopped for the majority of the middle of the day, but toward evening, it started to look iffy again.

We headed to Casey's for what we thought was a farewell hot dog. We got to chatting about how much money we had left, and so doing, realized that it was payday that day! So what did we do??? Went to Guest Relations and bought Halloween tickets for the party that night! We just couldn't bear to leave at 7!!

OUr goal this time was to scope out a good spot for the parade to see the Headless Horseman.

We rode HM again, and met some more characters:

While waiting for the parade, we saw the Cadaver Dans:

Well, then it decided to start to rain. Just as we'd pull our ponchos on, 5 mins later it would stop. Then, it would start again, then stop. Since the roads were so wet, we knew they wouldn't be sending the Horseman, and they didn't. Oh, well. The parade started, but halfway through, it absolutely poured! When it was over, we decided we better calll it a night as we had a 5:15am pickup time the next morning.

On the way out, we decided to meet Tarzan

While I was sad to go, I was very glad we decided to stay later, even if the rain cut our extra time short. I would make the same decision in a heartbeat.

So that's my trip! Sorry it took me so long to finish.
I enjoyed going at this time of the year so much, I think I'm going back next October. Might as well get in free next year on #31!!

 

[HollyBelle]

Great report, Amber. Thanks for finishing it! I love your birthday stories... and think it's great that you got a picture of the Main Street character singing to you! That'll make for a great scrapbook page :sohappy:.

 

[bobjl527]

What a great trip report! We were at EPCOT the same day you were. That rain and wind right before IllumiNations was something wasn't it? Have a great day!

 

[myhappyplace]

Great report, Amber. Thanks for finishing it! I love your birthday stories... and think it's great that you got a picture of the Main Street character singing to you! That'll make for a great scrapbook page :sohappy:.

thanks, Holly! I'll be starting it soon!

What a great trip report! We were at EPCOT the same day you were. That rain and wind right before IllumiNations was something wasn't it? Have a great day!

Thanks! Yes, it was guite the rainy weather we had! We had to duck for cover twice.

 

[Disneyfalcon]

I'm so glad you came back to this report, because I totally missed it the first time, Amber!! I love your report!! I really liked the resort hopping in the beginning! Love all the pictures! Lots to scrapbook!

 

[sweetpee_1993]

Thanks for finishing up your report. I love to live thru everyone else's reports. Wow, I wouldn't know what to do with myself with no kids or hubby on a trip. Hhmmm...how could I talk my way into that???? LOL! And, Happy 30th!