Trip Report Oh, the Places We go, The People We See

Welcome to my newest Trip Report. For those who don’t know me, I am Jen.

That’s my Daughter Claire with me.



We just got back from an amazing vacation with several family members.

We traveled Nov. 1st thru the 15th, 2012. We rested our headed at 6 different places on this trip, and though it wasn’t always easy to keep moving from place to place, I am happy to have tried some new resorts out and stayed at some familiar ones as well.



This trip came about over a year ago. My Mom’s cousin Vicki wanted to take a trip with her and my Aunt Mary. Her Daughter Katie also wanted to come along.

After some talking and planning it became a group of 16 traveling. I was elected ring leader since I have quite a bit of Disney experience.

Plans were made, some were changed, and some were a little slower at making decisions than others.

My husband Skip is what is known in the Disney groups as a resistor and he decided NOT to come along. He was not so happy about the amount of time I was going to be gone.



The dates for the cruise were set first, Nov 4 through the 8th on the Disney Dream. We all planned to arrive a day early and stay at the Residence Inn near the port. Soon I decided that I must add a few Disney days, and so did everyone else eventually. I thin decide…heck lets add some more, and Claire and I ended up staying 3 more days after the rest left.

Then after doing some research and with a heads up from my good Dis-friend Carey, I was alerted to the fact that the last Halloween party was on Nov. 2nd. How could I pass that chance up? So Claire and I decided to fly in a day earlier than everyone else to hit that party. Claire and I also decided to fly out of Columbus. My family lives near the Toledo, OH area, and the best direct flights are out of Detroit. My youngest sister, who was not going on the cruise, lives in Columbus, and I was able to get a decent priced direct flight from there, so Claire and I drove down Nov. 1 and spent the night before our early flight.



Plans were finally all set in stone and we just had to wait for our time to arrive. Not an easy task, but we all managed.



Let me introduce you to the crew. This is a picture of a picture. My sister has the CD with the actual digital copy, but hasn’t yet loaded it to the computer, so I had to go with this for now till I can get a copy.

In the back row, left to right, we have my parents, Joe and Paula, next to them is my Uncle Geoff. Next to Geoff is cousin Vicki and her son in law Thad. Next to Thad is Pete, Vicki’s husband and then me. Aunt Mary is on the end, she is married to Uncle Geoff and my Mother’s sister.

Down towards the front, left to right, is my nieces Alexis and Abby with their parents Rob and Gail. Gail is my sister. Front and center is Claire. Behind Claire are Jude, and Katie. Katie is married to Thad and is Pete and Vicki’s Daughter. And then we have baby Luke in the stroller. He is only about 9 months old and what a cutie he is.



This trip had the usual ups and downs that most every family will have, but I have to admit things went much smoother than I planned. We never felt the need to kill each other for the most part. LOL

We had several cruise newbies and several Disney World newbies as well.



Please join me in reliving a very magical trip with all the places we traveled and all the people we met along the way!

 

[jenseib]

Claire and I were just so excited to be able to tour it. Claire kept saying how special we were because this part wasn’t even officially open yet. I have taught her well.

And then we headed over to Gaston’s. We were really hoping he would be out …and he WAS!!!!!

 

[Bethany M]

More please! It looks like you all had a blast!

 

[jenseib]

More please! It looks like you all had a blast!

Thanks. We did have a good time. Slowly but surely working on more/

 

[jenseib]

I asked where the line was for Gaston and the CM said there are no lines for Gaston, he just picks who he wants to see next. I did not like this idea and Gaston was moving all over the place. Claire did NOT want to see him, but I told her she had too. I don’t usually force her to do many things, but sometimes you just know when they need that push. I told her I would be with her. So she reluctantly followed around as he kept walking and finally he chose her. This guy did the character well. He is so funny and arrogant.

Again, this area is so dark that pictures are awful and even the photopass are not good.

Mother knows best! Claire was so happy we did this meet. She was talking a mile a minute again about this and how special and lucky we are. As we left he said "so glad you could meet me" and she thought that was pretty funny.

We headed over to the new Ariel ride; this was a must for us.

Unfortunately they had some technical problems and the ride wasn’t up right now. They had some cute saying, but I forget what it was now.

 

[jenseib]

So we headed over to the Ariel meet and greet next and again the line was not too bad. I really think not many people knew this area was even opened.

You went into a cave and it was pretty darn dark in there.

A view of the waterfall from the backside.

Stephanie had still been texting back and forth and she was now back in the new Fantasyland as well and she said she would just wait at the exit of the meet and greet for us.

Isn’t this little cave bug creature so cute?

Soon it was our turn to meet the Fish Princess.

I think I am getting eyed here, making sure I am taking pictures.

 

[jenseib]

Claire just LOVES Ariel, so this was another wonderful thing.

And you must hug before you leave.

 

[jenseib]

And we exited and Stephanie and her son Jack were waiting for us. It was so nice to meet up with her finally. Jack was the complete opposite of Kadence. He NEVER stopped talking. He was just too cute. Claire kept talking about him too the rest of the trip and kept forgetting his name, so she would call him pirate boy, since he was dressed as a pirate for the party.

I got a couple of shots of the kids.

And then I let Claire take a picture of us. I was a bit nervous, as this was my good camera and made sure Claire had a good hold of it. Not too bad!

Jack also wanted to use my camera, but I passed on that offer. LOL

We headed over towards the Little Mermaid ride once again, but it was still not running. BUMMER!

At this point in time I was starving. I was to the point of getting a headache and I knew I would become grouchy if I didn’t eat some real food soon, so we headed towards Gaston’s to see if we could scrounge up something there.

We all got in line and they seemed to be moving super slow. Stephanie was just going to get one of the brews for Jack.

Our line was moving very slow, so I went over to the next one. BIG mistake. Stephanie got served and others did too and I was still waiting behind the same people. They didn’t understand the dining plan and also had some cash in the transaction and lots of money was going back and forth. I seriously was about to flip out. I think part of the problem was the cashier too, as she seemed to be a bit clueless when we finally had our turn.

Claire and I got the pork shank and a drink to share.

We found Stephanie and Jack and had a seat and we just totally dug into the food. Poor Stephanie probably thought we were savages. LOL

I didn’t even think to take a picture till it was almost gone. Sorry for the devoured picture.

I had heard from others that had gotten to try it during sneak previews that this was very good and a big portion. It was very good, but we must’ve drawn the short straw as ours was really small. I think we could’ve easily eaten another, but for the price, and the long wait, I wasn’t about to order more.

I tried to get a few pictures before we left, but people were in my way and the place isn’t very big, so I only got a few.

There was a big chair that I wanted to take a picture of, but these teen kids kept switching and taking photos and I just decided my patience wouldn’t last long enough to wait them out. Obviously they didn’t see me standing there with my camera.

We left and I got this shot of the restroom area really quickly.

 

[jenseib]

And one last try at the statue in the dark.

We decided to head out of the new Fantasyland for now and trick or treat. We were talking away and Jack was REALLY talking away. He was so funny and he just cracked me up. As we were walking out, guess who we ran into? ….Carey, John and Kadence! We all decided to trick or treat at a few places and then head to the dance party.
I think Stephanie decided to go on her own at this point. Jack wanted to change out of his costume. We told her the area we had planned to be at for the parade and told her she was welcome to join us then too. She never did make it though. I think they were about to leave when the parade was on and they just watched it near the front if I remember right.

If you are keeping track, meeting up with Stephanie was now meet number 4. Oh the People We See!




So the plan was to trick or treat and then head off to a dance party. Carey said that was a big highlight for Kadence the year before, and I knew Claire was one who liked to dance too.

One trick or treat area was by the River boats, but this one seems to be connected to the dock with its decorations. I guess it wasn’t up and running.

We got quite a bit of candy in just the few stops we made and then off to the dance party.
At first Claire was shy again. UGH. I know she loves to dance, but she seemed like it might be embarrassing to do it now. I tried to dance a bit with her, but that was even more embarrassing.

Finally the 2 got their groove going, yet, they weren’t about to get too close!

As time went on, they started getting a bit closer to each other.

I have no clue why Claire is making such a face.

And finally success. They now were dancing officially together and they were talking!

 

[jenseib]

You will notice I did a really good job at getting the back side of them. I swear no matter how I tired, I couldn’t get their faces in the pictures. And the few I did were blurry blobs.

Every time I tried to do a little sideline dancing, I got a dirty look. The DJ started playing Hammer Time. I didn’t pay attention to what he was saying, and when you are supposed to yell out “hammer time” I did so, and was the only one. I think it was partly because many kids had no clue, and then I think the other part was we were supposed to wait for his cue to do so. LOL. Yet I couldn’t seem to catch on to that and kept yelling it. Oops.

Finally we decided it was time to pull the kids away from dancing and do some more party fun. We headed over towards Splash Mountain/BTMRR area. I think the plan was to trick or treat there and then ride the ride, but the ride itself was not running.

The queue was decorated so cute.

It actually had a pretty long line that split at one point to have 2 lines for the same station. It moved fairly fast though. We did notice that the Dwarves were NOT out this evening. I was hoping to get a glimpse of them, but it wasn’t meant to be.

After we got another large handful of candy we continued one and Hallow Wishes had just started. Another thing I had forgotten about. I tried to take a couple of pictures as we walk.

 

[jenseib]

We saw this guy dressed as Jack Sparrow as we were walking. He looked AMAZING! Honestly we were questioning whether he was the real one or not, he was that good. Perfect mannerisms and everything! Some people were stopping off and asking him to take a picture with him. But he ended up joining a scary looking bride eventually, so we knew it was a guy in costume, but Wow! He was great!

We made another pit stop at the same trick or treat station we had been to earlier and then over towards the Haunted Mansion for some Magic shots.

Holy cow! Look fireworks are going off right behind the Mansion! How cool is that?

While we waited in line Carey and I just kept shooting.

It was just GORGEOUS!!!!

Soon it was our turn for the Magic shot. Claire was a little iffy about this, but I told her we would be fine and no ghosts were going to show up at the moment. Carey and family went first, and then it was our turn.

We moved on. We saw this girl a couple of times. We loved her braid.

She was with a guy dressed as Flynn and he was pretty much dead on too. And they had a friend dressed as Jasmine. I really liked how they went all out. It makes me a bit jealous that I am not so talented.

We headed back to the New Fantasyland. We had to check on the Little Mermaid ride once again.

It’s really hard to get a picture of Eric’s castle in the dark.

 

[jenseib]

It was open! Score! I think it listed the wait as 5 or 10 minutes, but basically it was walk on. BUT that queue is REALLY long. Extremely long. I would hate to wait in that! And I have heard since it has opened, the wait times have been just awful.

 

[jenseib]

Carey and I were snapping away as we walked through the queue.

We finally got up to the omnimovers.

It stopped for a second and we panicked that it might be broke down again, but it quickly restarted.

 

[PolynesianPrincess]

I think it's weird that gaston doesn't have a line. I remember when characters all used to just roam free but then they all started to have dedicated locations.

Love the pics of the fireworks going off behind the mansion!

Isn't it so awesome meeting your online friends in person? I met a bunch of WDWMagic'ers on my trip in Sept. And Ill see a bunch more o my trip in May.

We didn't do a lot of trick or treating at the party when we went and I wish we had. We were trying to get all the chracters in their costumes so it was a lot of meet and greets and we watched the parade and fireworks too. We actually went the day after we ran the 10 miler and ended up leaving by 10:30 cause we were just so tired

Can't wait to read more!!!

 

[jenseib]

I think it's weird that gaston doesn't have a line. I remember when characters all used to just roam free but then they all started to have dedicated locations.

Love the pics of the fireworks going off behind the mansion!

Isn't it so awesome meeting your online friends in person? I met a bunch of WDWMagic'ers on my trip in Sept. And Ill see a bunch more o my trip in May.

We didn't do a lot of trick or treating at the party when we went and I wish we had. We were trying to get all the chracters in their costumes so it was a lot of meet and greets and we watched the parade and fireworks too. We actually went the day after we ran the 10 miler and ended up leaving by 10:30 cause we were just so tired

Can't wait to read more!!!

I have heard he does now have a line. I think it got to be too hectic. Especially for a new character.

We didn't do many characters, and i am sad. I tried to get Claire to do so at the end of the night, but she said no. After seeing Carey's pictures of Kadence with characters, she does regret it now.
I met so many people this trip. Some were just a quick hi and others more elaborate with pictures. It was really fun.
We were pretty tired by the end of the night too. It was a long day with an early flight and no nap. But we sure had fun.

 

[jenseib]

Our turn on the “new” Little Mermaid ride! Woohoo!

Our omnimovers moved us left and right, front and back and even titled at times. We started out on land and then it gave us the feeling we were going under water.

Carey and family are in this car!

We were tilted back and looking up you see Ariel swimming above you.

At some point the ride stopped. We panicked a bit again. As nice as it is to be on the ride, we were not stopped in front of anything great. In fact my view was the back of Carey’s car.
And we still had a lot we wanted to do yet, including the parade. Luckily after a few minutes we got moving again.

 

[jenseib]

Under the Sea!

 

[jenseib]

Poor Unfortunate Souls!

Sha la la la la la la laaaaaa! Kiss the Girl! That’s my favorite song from the Little Mermaid.

 

[jenseib]

Everything works out Great for the happy couple!

That was a big hit with us. We really enjoyed this ride. Now I wouldn’t wait for a long period of time to ride it, but I don’t like to wait long for ANY ride. It is worth riding and checking out though. Probably the best dark ride in the park right now in my opinion.

We headed out once again.

It was time to go find a spot for the parade. I like Liberty Square area, as it is usually less crowded there, so that’s the way we headed.

As we were walking a noticed a Photopass photographer doing nothing, but clearly had something set up. I asked Carey and she wasn’t sure what it was, but we figured magic shot so we made a quick stop.
Claire and I went first.

 

[jenseib]

I love these shots!!!

Carey’s family was next!

And then we quickly made our way to Liberty Square, where it was a mad house! I was surprised how busy it was. I always go by the rule the 2nd parade is less busy. In fact for Spectro and MSEP many times we walk up about 15 minutes prior and find a spot to sit with barely anyone around. This WAS not true for tonight.
Carey noticed a spot that was a walk through and we positioned ourselves to stand near there and throw the kids there when the rope went up. A lot of people had this same idea though, unfortunately. Luckily the CM kept telling people to back away, but we were at a spot that we should be OK to make the dash.
Soon they roped it off and the Headless Horseman came through. The kids sat and had a perfect spot.

Unfortunately after he went by, they unroped the walkway again and they had to stand back up and move out of the way. UGH! We got separated, and Claire stood with Carey’s family. I trusted Carey to get them in position though. She was eyeing people and letting them know not to mess with her. LOL!

This CM was out there dancing away and just having a great time. I really think she loves her job!

 

[jenseib]

Parade time! The rope went back up and Carey threw them girls right to the ground! They squished right in and let a few others in next to them and we stood behind them. Thank goodness for Carey!!!!

And on to the parade!!!!!

I can hear the music as I post these pictures!