Hey y’all!!! Remember me?? It’s been awhile since I’ve posted! A LONG while!! But my pal @ShookieJones mentioned WDWMagic to me this morning and I decided to come on over and see what’s going on here! And while I’m at it, I’ll write a pre-trip report!!
For those who don’t remember me, or those who never read any of my previous trip reports, I’m Darolyn! I used to live in Maine for the first 33 years of my life but now I live in Houston, Texas! I’ve been to WDW 30+ times, Disneyland 5 times and on 3 Disney cruises. I am a Disney FANATIC!!!
My two travel partners always are my Mom Terryn and my sister Ashley. Both are also big Disney fans! Here we are during marathon weekend earlier this year. L to R - Mom, Ashley and me.
The reason for the trip report title... it seems like the last few Disney trips we have taken we have been participating in at least one RunDisney event. Out of our last 5 trips (4 to WDW and 1 to DL) only one didn’t involve running and that was our spur of the moment trip last March to say farewell to Wishes. So to say we are excited to not have to get up early and run is an understament! We love the RunDisney events, don’t get me wrong but sometimes it’s nice to not have to worry about getting to be early to get up early and being super tired the whole trip.
So, onto the good stuff!!
Friday September 7 - I’m flying in from Houston and my mom and sister are flying in from Portland, Maine. My schedule is pretty flexible but my sisters isn’t so we have to take a late flight. We always try and land around the same time each time we travel so we can meet at the airport and so far we have been pretty lucky and our flights arrive within a half hour of each other. This time is no different with Mom and Sister arriving at 10:20pm and me arriving at 10:50pm. We will have to grab our luggage since it’s past 10pm and then it’s off to the Magical Express and All Star Music for one night. Whenever we arrive relatively late, we usually grab a cheap value room. Doesn’t make sense to us to pay for a more expensive room if we’re arriving so late.
Saturday September 8 - check out of All Star Music and into Animal Kingdom Kidani Villas. We managed to score a Savannah view studio for the fall discount and are SO excited! We always said we wouldn’t stay at Animal Kingdom Lodge or Villas unless it was Savannah view and it’s always been too pricey for us but with this discount we just couldn’t pass it up! We will leave our bags will bell services to get transferred over to Kidani and it’s off to Hollywood Studios for rope drop! We have FP for Toy Story Mania, Rock N roller coaster and Tower of Terror. Despite getting on right as our dates went live I still didn’t manage to get a Slinky Dog Dash FP
oh well! We will try and head right to TSL at rope drop and if there are too many people, we will try for it in the afternoon. As of lately the lines haven’t been TOO bad for it, usually around 60 minutes whenever I check and we’re going at a much slower time so we shall see!
We have dinner at Sci Fi Dine in at 4:10pm. Usually we do 50s Prime Time Cafe but we decided to change things up a bit this time around. We haven’t been to Sci Fi since 2013 so the new (to us) menu looks pretty good. We plan to stay the full day at DHS and end the night with Fantasmic. Afterwards I might hop over to Epcot to see Illuminations. It’s one of my favorite shows on property and since it’s been around awhile, I wouldn’t be surprised to see it go away in the near future. I’ll be trying to get as many viewings in as I can this trip!
Sunday September 9 - Today we will be at Epcot and then Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party! We will rope drop Soarin and then we have a breakfast ressie at Garden Grill at 9:50am. GG is one of our favorite if not our most favorite character meal. The food is always awesome and we’ve had the BEST character interactions there! We have FP that day for Soarin, Living With the Land and Spaceship Earth. Most of the day will be spent snacking our way around World Showcase as the Food and Wine Festival will be in full swing! Around 3pm we will head over to Magic Kingdom for the Halloween party. MNSSHP is our favorite between the Halloween and Christmas parties. Even my sister who hates Halloween loves the Halloween party. We don’t do a ton of rides during the party as we would rather do the character meet and greets in their costumes, watch both parades and the fireworks. Rides come last but we always make sure to ride Haunted Mansion at least once!
Monday September 10 - Today we rope drop Hollywood Studios and do Epcot in the afternoon / evening. Again, no FP for Slinky Dog. We have FP for Tower of Terror, Muppet Vision and then my sister and I have FP for Rock n Roller coaster and Mom has a FP for Toy Story Mania. Around 2ish we will head over to Epcot to finish Food and Wine and watch Illuminations.
Tuesday September 11 - Today is Animal Kingdom Day!! Ashley and I are going to be at the park at 7:30 for a 9am opening so we can hopefully beat the super long lines for Flight of Passage. We have FP that day for Dinosaur, Kilimanjaro Safari and Flight of Passage. Lunch that day is at Yak n Yeti. This is our first time dining there and we are really excited! We might stay for Rivers of Light or we may go over to Epcot and have some extra magic hours.
Wednesday September 12 - Today is Magic Kingdom day!! We have a 9:50am breakfast at Crystal Palace so we’re going to try and rope drop Mine Train and possibly Space Mountain. We have FP for Big Thunder Mountain, Peter Pans Flight and Mine Train. EMH that night so we will probably stay and enjoy those.
Thursday September 13 - Animal Kingdom for a few hours in the morning. FP for Flight of Passage and Kilimanjaro Safari. Flights are at 4:25pm for me and 4:50 for Mom and Sister so we will probably head back to Kidani around noon and wait for the unmagical express to the airport.
So there’s our plans! I’m sure some of them will go awry, they sometimes do. But we will be in our favorite place so everything will be ok!
For those who don’t remember me, or those who never read any of my previous trip reports, I’m Darolyn! I used to live in Maine for the first 33 years of my life but now I live in Houston, Texas! I’ve been to WDW 30+ times, Disneyland 5 times and on 3 Disney cruises. I am a Disney FANATIC!!!
My two travel partners always are my Mom Terryn and my sister Ashley. Both are also big Disney fans! Here we are during marathon weekend earlier this year. L to R - Mom, Ashley and me.
The reason for the trip report title... it seems like the last few Disney trips we have taken we have been participating in at least one RunDisney event. Out of our last 5 trips (4 to WDW and 1 to DL) only one didn’t involve running and that was our spur of the moment trip last March to say farewell to Wishes. So to say we are excited to not have to get up early and run is an understament! We love the RunDisney events, don’t get me wrong but sometimes it’s nice to not have to worry about getting to be early to get up early and being super tired the whole trip.
So, onto the good stuff!!
Friday September 7 - I’m flying in from Houston and my mom and sister are flying in from Portland, Maine. My schedule is pretty flexible but my sisters isn’t so we have to take a late flight. We always try and land around the same time each time we travel so we can meet at the airport and so far we have been pretty lucky and our flights arrive within a half hour of each other. This time is no different with Mom and Sister arriving at 10:20pm and me arriving at 10:50pm. We will have to grab our luggage since it’s past 10pm and then it’s off to the Magical Express and All Star Music for one night. Whenever we arrive relatively late, we usually grab a cheap value room. Doesn’t make sense to us to pay for a more expensive room if we’re arriving so late.
Saturday September 8 - check out of All Star Music and into Animal Kingdom Kidani Villas. We managed to score a Savannah view studio for the fall discount and are SO excited! We always said we wouldn’t stay at Animal Kingdom Lodge or Villas unless it was Savannah view and it’s always been too pricey for us but with this discount we just couldn’t pass it up! We will leave our bags will bell services to get transferred over to Kidani and it’s off to Hollywood Studios for rope drop! We have FP for Toy Story Mania, Rock N roller coaster and Tower of Terror. Despite getting on right as our dates went live I still didn’t manage to get a Slinky Dog Dash FP
oh well! We will try and head right to TSL at rope drop and if there are too many people, we will try for it in the afternoon. As of lately the lines haven’t been TOO bad for it, usually around 60 minutes whenever I check and we’re going at a much slower time so we shall see! We have dinner at Sci Fi Dine in at 4:10pm. Usually we do 50s Prime Time Cafe but we decided to change things up a bit this time around. We haven’t been to Sci Fi since 2013 so the new (to us) menu looks pretty good. We plan to stay the full day at DHS and end the night with Fantasmic. Afterwards I might hop over to Epcot to see Illuminations. It’s one of my favorite shows on property and since it’s been around awhile, I wouldn’t be surprised to see it go away in the near future. I’ll be trying to get as many viewings in as I can this trip!
Sunday September 9 - Today we will be at Epcot and then Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party! We will rope drop Soarin and then we have a breakfast ressie at Garden Grill at 9:50am. GG is one of our favorite if not our most favorite character meal. The food is always awesome and we’ve had the BEST character interactions there! We have FP that day for Soarin, Living With the Land and Spaceship Earth. Most of the day will be spent snacking our way around World Showcase as the Food and Wine Festival will be in full swing! Around 3pm we will head over to Magic Kingdom for the Halloween party. MNSSHP is our favorite between the Halloween and Christmas parties. Even my sister who hates Halloween loves the Halloween party. We don’t do a ton of rides during the party as we would rather do the character meet and greets in their costumes, watch both parades and the fireworks. Rides come last but we always make sure to ride Haunted Mansion at least once!
Monday September 10 - Today we rope drop Hollywood Studios and do Epcot in the afternoon / evening. Again, no FP for Slinky Dog. We have FP for Tower of Terror, Muppet Vision and then my sister and I have FP for Rock n Roller coaster and Mom has a FP for Toy Story Mania. Around 2ish we will head over to Epcot to finish Food and Wine and watch Illuminations.
Tuesday September 11 - Today is Animal Kingdom Day!! Ashley and I are going to be at the park at 7:30 for a 9am opening so we can hopefully beat the super long lines for Flight of Passage. We have FP that day for Dinosaur, Kilimanjaro Safari and Flight of Passage. Lunch that day is at Yak n Yeti. This is our first time dining there and we are really excited! We might stay for Rivers of Light or we may go over to Epcot and have some extra magic hours.
Wednesday September 12 - Today is Magic Kingdom day!! We have a 9:50am breakfast at Crystal Palace so we’re going to try and rope drop Mine Train and possibly Space Mountain. We have FP for Big Thunder Mountain, Peter Pans Flight and Mine Train. EMH that night so we will probably stay and enjoy those.
Thursday September 13 - Animal Kingdom for a few hours in the morning. FP for Flight of Passage and Kilimanjaro Safari. Flights are at 4:25pm for me and 4:50 for Mom and Sister so we will probably head back to Kidani around noon and wait for the unmagical express to the airport.
So there’s our plans! I’m sure some of them will go awry, they sometimes do. But we will be in our favorite place so everything will be ok!
