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!
The Grave Diggers were just so cool! They were making sparks with the shovels and they just look really neat. I didn’t get too many good pictures though.
And the cowboys! Um ,they looked REALLY good …….So much so that I only took a couple of pictures. I might’ve been wiping drool off my chin in the meantime.
This parade was absolutely awesome! I am so glad that I finally got to see this in person. If you EVER get a chance to see it, do so. It has great music and is just a lot of fun!
After the parade, I believe we headed over near the jungle cruise and hit the jack pot of trick or treating. They had 2 lines and they were competing on how much candy each side would give the kids. The girls were happy about that.
At this point, I think Carey’s family decided to head up front and try to see the princesses, but Claire and I weren’t quite ready to leave, so we said good bye and headed off on our own.
My favorite ride is Pirates of the Caribbean, so I convinced Claire to head that way.
It looked like it was on fire with an orange glow around it.
I took some pictures on the ride, but most came out just too dark.
We did see the new mermaid additions and that was exciting to us.
We had pretty much had it after this. The lack of sleep was catching up to both of us, so we headed to the front. This is Claire’s treat bag. My wonderful Dis friend Lisa (mickeystoontown) made one for Claire and Kadence and sent them to us right before the trip. It was a huge hit with both girls.
As we approached Main Street, we noticed it was lit up for the party as well.
As we walked by the town hall I asked Claire if she wanted to see the princesses and she said no. I really wish I would’ve insisted on doing so. After seeing Carey’s photopass pictures, I am very jealous of the shots she got.
I tried to get a picture of the “See Ya Real Soon” pumpkins, but it didn’t turn out too great.
We had been carrying “Flat Ben” all night and just plain forgot to pull him out for a picture, so we did get one shot before leaving.
We went to the locker and retrieved our things and then back to turn in the key. We were thirsty, so we pulled out 2 pops to purchase which basically came to the same price as what the locker deposit refund was.
Out to the bus stop and our legs were starting to hurt. We did get a seat, but the bus was pretty crowded. It made a stop at Kidani first and then to Jambo where we got off. Claire was dead tired at this point. She was wishing I would either carry her, or that she would sprout wings so she could fly back to the room. Neither of those things happened!
I guess I had enough energy to take a shot of the lobby.
And then the long hallway to our room.
It did not take us long to get ready for bed and go out. It had been such a long day, but a very fun one too. We made new memories and new friends and we couldn’t have asked for better weather either.
I laid my head on the 2nd pillow of the trip so far. In 2 days I had slept in 2 different spots. “Oh the Places We go”.
A new day! I think I woke up somewhere around 6:30 and 7. Claire was out like a light though. I checked my email and facebook then I showered and got ready for the day.
I took a look out on the balcony and WOW! We had a bunch of animals out there this morning.
This guy was pacing all over and squawking so loudly. I think he wanted to be on the other side of the fence.
I fooled around a bit and took a few pictures of Flat Ben for my fellow Diser Dee. And I got this one that was so cute. Claire never saw it till we got home and she was surprised to see it.
I decided that maybe I would try to do laundry. I know that staying on DVC points you get free laundry services. I headed out for a bit too look. Just so you know, Claire knows that if she wakes up and I am not there she is NOT to leave the room or answer the door. I only leave for a few minutes at a time and come back to check on her frequently if I walk out. So I went in search and found a room not too far away. Now we didn’t have much laundry dirty, but I thought it would be nice to stay ahead of things. Well this was not for DVC members as you had to pay to use it. I went back to the room and looked at the resort map and still couldn’t find it. I wasn’t going to pay to do a few pieces of clothing, but I would do it for free. LOL I think I snuck out a couple of times and never could find it. In the meantime, while out searching, I was texting my Dis/Cruise Critic friend Ellen (podsnel). She had arrived yesterday as well and was staying in some fancy shmancy suite at AKL. She invited me to her room , but they were going to be leaving soon. I told her I was going to run and get Claire dressed and we would be right over. I got Claire up and she was a little slow, well VERY slow. I put her dress on and told her we would skip brushing the rats nest and her teeth and just head over so we didn’t miss them. She could do those things when we got back.
She grumbled a bit, but was a little curious to see the room. We headed out and I realized that Ellen’s room was about as far down the hall as ours was, but on the other wing. I believe this is when, as we were walking a lady came out of her room and started walking as well and then asked me if I posted on the Disboards. I told her yes and she said she read my reports. We said hellos and she told me her name …Jedijill! It was so nice to meet her!
We continued on our long journey to Ellen’s room with the clock ticking. We arrived and knocked and she answered. It was a bit chaotic in her room too, as they were getting ready to leave and some of the family was walking out the door.
This was such an awesome fun meet though. I have been following Ellen’s reports for about a year now. She is married to Pods and has 3 boys, Sean, Tyler and Timmy. I believe her brother in-laws family was staying with them too. I got to meet them all! It was so unreal to be saying hi to Timmy and Tyler. They were just as she writes about them. Super cute boys, btw! I bet they are breaking hearts all over. After saying hi, all of them left except for Ellen and Sean, who was sleeping on the couch. Sean is Autistic and so is my nephew. After reading some of Ellen’s reports, it’s so funny how similar they are. I give Ellen a lot of credit, because I do know how hard it can be to raise a child like that. My nephew is wonderful too, but stubborn at times. I believe Ellen once had to take one of Sean’s favorite books ransom in order for him to get on a plane to fly to Florida one year. These are things my SIL has to do at times too. We left Sean sleeping and Ellen gave us a tour of the place. I am going to say I was really bad and not on my game as I mostly gawked at the beauty of this place rather than taking pictures. I think it had like 4 bedrooms and a pool table room, a living room and kitchen too, if I remember right and several bathrooms. Ellen was beaming. She said it was the best place she had ever stayed at. Here are the few pictures I did take.
They had a walk in closet that was the size of some people’s bedrooms. It was massive!
We headed out to see her view.
They had 3 huge balconies! It was just amazing.
We settled in for a bit and chatted. She was telling me how they had to cancel their annual girls cruise, as one of the girls now had to work. That was a bummer, as I love reading their reports about them. They really have a good time. She also started talking about a Diser who lived in her town and was a school teacher, but also did side work in the same industry as I. I asked her the name and she told me. Well what a small world …that girl is my co-worker Nikki! Soon we needed to wrap things up. WE needed to check out of our room yet and have our bags taken and go to our morning ADR and she needed to get Sean going and off to meet the rest of the family.
Claire was a tiny bit bored too. (love the wild hair)
We had Claire take pictures of us. She brightened up when we asked her to do that.
And this was the one she took with Ellen’s camera.
As we headed out, Ellen showed me one other bathroom we had missed.
Then we said good byes. She was going to be here for several more days too and we talked about possibly meeting up later in the trip, but I was so busy, as I am sure she was too, that it never happened.
We rushed back the long journey to our room. Claire brushed her teeth and I made a call to bell services to pick up our bags. I then had the task of brushing rat city out of Claire’s hair. And guess what, the darn brush broke in it! UGH! I got it kind of put back together to finish the task and then I called my mother. They were on their way to my sisters, (where most of the family was meeting to go to the airport) and her and my Dad were stopping off at the pharmacy first. PERFECT! I asked if she would buy a new hairbrush for Claire and bring it down and she said no problem. Thinking back, I am sure the gift shop probably had something, but I was in a small panic mode thinking that I wouldn’t have a brush for the rest of the trip. Soon we had a knock on our door and a lady was there to take our bags. She was so nice and so funny. She asked if I normally stay at Grand Floridian, and I told her no, (I wish) and she said there is a lady who had my same hair that stays there all the time and she always recognizes her by the unusual hair. So there you have it folks. I am NOT the only one who has this crazy color, as my Mom would say. I told her I never got a voucher for Magical Express on my door and she told me just to go to Bell services later and they will be able to write one for me. Claire and I were using Magical Express today to get back to the airport where we would meet up with the rest of the family and then rent cars to head over to Port Canaveral. I had called a few days prior, as told by ME and had it arranged and given a time to leave. Since we weren’t catching a flight, we only had to leave about an hour before their flight arrived.
Well there was no time to take a breath and relax. We had an ADR to get to …..Boma! We headed down and checked right in.
We only had to wait for a few minutes.
We were led to a table for 2 next to a window. I will state right now, that almost all my pictures are fuzzy or blurry. I guess I didn’t have my “game” on this morning.
We finished up our meal at Boma. We really enjoyed it. The juice is pretty darn good too! I paid the bill and we gathered our belongings and headed out. Once again, we no longer had a room, so we had to carry with us what we needed for the day till it was time to leave.
We made a stop to take a couple of pictures of Claire.
And a stop off at the bathroom.
MEANWHILE! …………
My family was preparing to head to the airport. My Mom had arranged for a bus to take 10 of them to the airport in Detroit. That left Katie, Thad and their boys to go up there on their own.
Mom said they came across a bad accident on the way up and quickly called Katie to tell her to avoid it.
They arrived at the airport and settled in till it was time to board the plane. They were flying Delta.
Abby is always happy if she has a good snack.
Mom said they boarded on time, but Katie and family were practically running to the plane. I guess they had run into the accident after all and were running extremely late. I do think the flight time actually might’ve been changed to a bit later of a time. I had made the arrangements for everyone and I had it all written down in my planner so I knew when to get to the airport to meet them, but they ended up landing about 10 minutes later than I had written down. Mom said it was all “on time” and she wasn’t sure if the time changed or not. LOL
Claire wasn’t as into the animals today as I was. She wanted to swim. She did however find a hidden Mickey.
I made her stay a little longer though. I just really enjoyed looking at the animals out there. She did too, but she had enough and was worried about how much time she would have for swimming before we had to leave.
Finally I relented and we headed back towards the pool area.
And we went over to the pool area bathroom to change.
We usually used this shower stall for changing. It was bigger than the other 2. It also had a stool in there to set our bags on. I noticed the other 2 didn’t and I don’t think they had hooks either, if I remember right. I thought that was dumb, as the floor was wet and there wasn’t a way to keep your things dry if you showered. The shower had a changing area then stall with curtain, but you really needed a stool to keep things dry. The bigger one also seemed to be dryer since it was bigger.
