I spent two weeks at Pop (June 28-July 11) with my 15-year-old son, D.J., and his friend Curtis, 14. My son and I have visited WDW repeatedly, but this was Curtis' first visit. We did non-WDW first - two days at Universal, one at Seaworld and one at Discovery Cove - before plunging into Disney parks. I've included photos here, but I have more here. Here's a report on our trip:
June 28
Curtis' excitement level was going up the farther we drove off the turnpike down Western Way, but he exploded when he saw this:
Arrived at Pop and used the online check-in. I just gave my name and the CM went into the back and retrieved my info packet. Everything was ready for us, so he just went over our keys info and showed us where our building was and we were on our way. Since it was already evening, we decided to grab some dinner at the food court. I had the fettuccine alfredo with chicken, which was really good :slurp:. The boys had pizza, the first of many they ate from Pop's food court. We headed to our room, unpacked and then went to sleep so we could start early in the morning.
June 29-July 2
On these days, we did non-WDW stuff. On June 29-30, we visited Universal. I'm a passholder and Uni was having passholder specials through the 30th. I got killer deals on tickets for the boys, and for Blue Man Group tickets. Check out this video of Curtis riding Dr. Doom's Fearfall for the first time
The crowds at Universal were non-existent, which was a shocker for me. Really. On our first day, we walked into Richter's at noon for lunch and cruised right up to the counter - no waiting. It was like that during our entire lunch. Waits for lines were no more than 30 minutes, and most of the time were 10 minutes or less.
Richter's from our table upstairs:
Shot of the street outside Richter's:
Looking down toward The Mummy (with Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit on the horizon :sohappy
:
We attended a late BMG show on Thursday that had rows of empty seats. It was hard not to notice how the economy was hurting Uni's attendance.
Both nights, we ate dinners back at WDW - Boma on the 29th and Whispering Canyon (first time) on 30th. Both were excellent and definitely will revisit (in fact, already have an October ressie at Boma). I laughed when Curtis suggested to our server that the chefs at Boma use a certain type of milk in their macaroni-and-cheese. He's an expert on that, apparently. Really enjoyed the Canyon Skillet at Whispering Canyon, and it was perfect for the boys. Our server was a riot. We got to do the Hokey-Pokey, but didn't need to ask for ketchup. After dinner, we enjoyed the boat ride over to Fort Wilderness and then to Contemporary. We hit it at sunset, so it was beautiful.
More to come ...
June 28
Curtis' excitement level was going up the farther we drove off the turnpike down Western Way, but he exploded when he saw this:
Arrived at Pop and used the online check-in. I just gave my name and the CM went into the back and retrieved my info packet. Everything was ready for us, so he just went over our keys info and showed us where our building was and we were on our way. Since it was already evening, we decided to grab some dinner at the food court. I had the fettuccine alfredo with chicken, which was really good :slurp:. The boys had pizza, the first of many they ate from Pop's food court. We headed to our room, unpacked and then went to sleep so we could start early in the morning.
June 29-July 2
On these days, we did non-WDW stuff. On June 29-30, we visited Universal. I'm a passholder and Uni was having passholder specials through the 30th. I got killer deals on tickets for the boys, and for Blue Man Group tickets. Check out this video of Curtis riding Dr. Doom's Fearfall for the first time
The crowds at Universal were non-existent, which was a shocker for me. Really. On our first day, we walked into Richter's at noon for lunch and cruised right up to the counter - no waiting. It was like that during our entire lunch. Waits for lines were no more than 30 minutes, and most of the time were 10 minutes or less.
Richter's from our table upstairs:
Shot of the street outside Richter's:
Looking down toward The Mummy (with Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit on the horizon :sohappy
:
We attended a late BMG show on Thursday that had rows of empty seats. It was hard not to notice how the economy was hurting Uni's attendance.
Both nights, we ate dinners back at WDW - Boma on the 29th and Whispering Canyon (first time) on 30th. Both were excellent and definitely will revisit (in fact, already have an October ressie at Boma). I laughed when Curtis suggested to our server that the chefs at Boma use a certain type of milk in their macaroni-and-cheese. He's an expert on that, apparently.
Really enjoyed the Canyon Skillet at Whispering Canyon, and it was perfect for the boys. Our server was a riot. We got to do the Hokey-Pokey, but didn't need to ask for ketchup. After dinner, we enjoyed the boat ride over to Fort Wilderness and then to Contemporary. We hit it at sunset, so it was beautiful.
More to come ...
