Very old Trip Report (Dec-Jan) Long Read

Sorry for the extremely late trip report as after I returned home, I didn’t want to be on any Disney related sites, and have since forgot about this. However, after revisiting the site I have decided to write a trip report. So please forgive anytime that I forget small details. I do remember most of it though. I (18) traveled with my mom (50), dad (49), brother (14), and sister (17). The trip spans from Wednesday, December 28th, 2005 until Tuesday, January 3rd, 2006. We have been to Disney as a family over 15 times. I hope to make this an interesting trip report and not one of the wall-of-text ones with lack of grammar or sense. WARNING, RIDE SPOILERS MAY FOLLOW

Wednesday December 28th 2005
Flight, Fiasco, Drive, Check-In, Boardwalk​

We left our hose for our 12:30 PM flight at 9:00 and were at the airport, which was an hour away, checked in by 10:30, and were through Security, at our gate by 11:15. After getting a bite to eat around 11:45, we returned to our gate and boarded our plane. We flew Song, a Delta-operated company featuring touch-screen TV’s with trivia, music, and 25 channels of Satellite. On the way down, me, my brother, and my sister played trivia against the rest of the plane. I won 4 games , my brother 1 :hammer: and my sister 2 before we stopped when they needed to reset the TV’s. So out of the 10 games played, seats in one row won 7 of them :lol: . When the TV’s came back on, I simply watched ESPN until we landed. Flying into Tampa, for some reason, meant that we would have to endure a 3 hour car ride after a 3 hour plane ride. :snore:
We got off the plane and made our way towards the airport. Ok, funny and/or scary moment here, living in New York, we have realized that there are some types of people who can not drive (not going to mention who as to not offend anyone.) Well as we were walking, we saw a man pushing his baby in a stroller. For whatever reason, he was randomly speeding up and slowing down, until he just ran into the lady in front of him. The kid started falling forward and another guy had to catch him. The man said something to the guy with the kid about being more careful and the one with the kid didn’t say anything and just ran.:brick: So we then made it to Baggage Claim, and of course, waited a good while for our bags to come. However, after waiting for several minutes we realized my bag wasn’t there. We went to the customer-service type thing and they realized they forgot to put my bag on the plane. They said that either tomorrow or Friday the bag would be back in. Oh Wonderful.
We then started our drive and eventually stopped at an Applebee’s about halfway to Orlando. We ate there without a problem, except that they brought my burger to a different table and I needed to wait for them to re-cook it. I was extremely worried that this would be a running theme throughout my vacation, others forgetting about my stuff. So we then needed to go to the stores to buy clothes for the next couple of days. After an hour more of sleeping, we made our way onto Disney property and eventually to our hotel, The Swan. When we went to check in, they told us that contrary to our belief, we only booked one room. We had a verification of our booking of 2 rooms and they got us a pair of different rooms. The staff was very friendly about the procedure and thankfully, we did not have to wait long . One of the rooms ended up having an enormous conference table with 12 seats on it. That, along with a mattress was now my bed, as I did not want to share with anyone else. And while you would not think, it was extremely comfortable:lol: . After freshening up in our rooms, we made our way to the Boardwalk to eat.
We made our way down towards the ESPN Club watching some shows along the way. There was one extremely good magician who I felt was very good about involving the younger kids and many times made some good jokes. We then went into one of the Disney stores and brought some items, including bobble-heads at extremely reduced prices . After checking out all the performers and stores, we went to the ESPN Club where I had a Bacon Cheeseburger. After eating, we got an ice-cream from the place on the Boardwalk and walked to EPCOT to watch Illuminations. After the show, we went to the room to eat, watch TV and relax for our day at Animal Kingdom and EPCOT.
DAY 1 SUMMARY: Got up, went on plane, absolutely owned the plane in trivia, saw a baby almost get killed, realize my luggage was left in New York, ate, shopped, made it to Disney, checked-in, got giant conference table, went to Boardwalk, had the best burger/ice cream ever, watched Illumination, ate Funyuns.
Summary of Summary: Plane (no snakes) , NO BAGZ!, Food, Clothes, Food, Fireworks, Food


K So that's day one. Which is just a plane ride and getting there. Several more pages and wasted hours of mine to come.

 

[WheresHorizons]

Thursday December 29th 2006
Animal Kingdom, Bus Ride, EPCOT
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We woke up a little before 7:00 and after getting ready, made our way to the Dolphin for a sentimental favorite, Tubby’s Buffateria for breakfast. We went to the bus-station and after waiting about 5 minutes, boarded the bus to Animal Kingdom. I guess we got there at about 5 to 8:00 and after waiting on security lines and at the ticket-line, we made our way into the park.
****SIDE NOTE**** I feel that the ticket-system using the two fingers is kind of ridiculous as there were some *smart* people who weren’t able to finger out which fingers to use, and some people’s fingers didn’t reach far enough in for it to work.****
Being our first time at Animal Kingdom, we knew that we needed to get what we had to get done fast. We quickly (mind you, we walked and were polite to others, not like some people trying to rush around) made our way through the surprisingly empty park to Dinosaur, where we got a Fastpass and then walked right onto the ride. Dinosaur is a great ride, with great effects, however the one flying dinosaur where a plastic figure just lit up was relatively lame. The ride was wonderful overall though, one of my favorites, and when the large dinosaur came out and misted they took the picture, it almost scared the **** out of me . We then went right back on with no wait once again, and the last dinosaur’s roar is deafening :lookaroun . After, we rode Primeval Whirl, another good ride, just got elbowed in the ribs when it was spinning. Pretty unique, rode that another time before we left. Seeing the park was still relatively empty, we went back on Dinosaur, and then used our Fastpass to go on again before riding Primeval Whirl again. By that point it was a little after 9, doing pretty good so-far I would say. :sohappy:
After leaving Dinoland, we went over to the Tree of Life to see “It’s Tough to Be a Bug”. Another great Disney 3-D show, I liked the extra elements added in, such as the scents and movements in the benches. I would rank the 3-D rides 1. Philharmagic 2. It’s Tough to Be A Bug 3. MuppetVision 4. HISTA. After getting out of that, we made our way to Africa to go on Kilimanjaro Safaris. Waited about 5 minutes for this, and got on. We intentionally went early, hoping to see the animals before they went in from the heat. Saw most of the animals, just no gorillas. One of the giraffes came up to the car and stuck his head right in. Got a really nice picture in the “Rides” Photo Challenge. After going through Maharajah Jungle Trek, we made our way towards the park exit, going through all possible detours and headed towards the bus to EPCOT. Oh yeah, we didn’t just do the rides and rush out, we strolled along a lot just admiring the beauty of the park and how great of a job Disney did. So, don’t get the wrong idea. Ok, so after getting a drink, we went out towards the bus.
As we were exiting, we see the EPCOT bus leaving. So we figure, you know maybe 20-30 minutes at most, but no, this is Disney transportation. We waited over an hour and 15 minutes before we left :fork: . There was one person there who collected money and went and bought food for people. If by any chance, he is here. THANK YOU!!! Eventually, we left and went to Animal Kingdom Lodge, which had busses every 5 minutes and then took a bus to EPCOT. Later in the day, we saw someone who was waiting on line with us, they said it took them another 30 minutes for the bus to come. Completely outrageous.


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[WheresHorizons]

Well, when we got there, we immediately went on the line to get Fastpasses for Soarin’. As we were getting there, we see people walking away, saying all them were gone . So we waited on the line for quite a while as we watched people walking up the lines over and over again, “Oh, my friends up there”. Ok, I can understand if it’s a little kid who they needed to get to use the bathroom or rest, but when 3 20 year olds are running up the line, something is wrong. So after a while, the people we had been talking to on the line with just went off on some guy, good for them.:sohappy: The ride was wonderful though, another amazing ride made by Disney. Definitely worth the wait, especially having the EMH that night. We then went and got Fastpasses for Test Track, and made our way to Mission Space. We went on the Singles line, got on in about 15-20 minutes, and of course, there were those who went on the singles line and tried to then hop aboard the regular line. They were kicked off :hammer: . Once again, it was well worth it, no feelings of Nausea or anything for anyone. So we decided to go on again, same thing, little wait (surprising for Christmas break) and feeling good still. We then went to the most underrated restaurant ever, The Electric Umbrella, I had a burger (sense a theme of my meals yet), and some of my mom’s wrap, both were surprisingly good for counter service at Disney.
We then went to Spaceship Earth, same ride as always, just as good. Except there was an annoying clacking noise which prevented my brother from sleeping :snore: . We then went over to the Imagination Pavilion for HISTA and Journey into Imagination, or whatever name it has now. Both were good as always, no real problems, just missing Dreamfinder though . We then went around World Showcase going on El Rio Del Tiempo and Maelstrom along with just admiring the other showcases and listening to some holiday story-tellers. Another funny moment here, at Mexico one of the guys was talking about ore, when someone yells “ORE! WHAT IS IT GOOD FOR? ABSOLUTLEY NOTHING”. The story teller was just like :lol: . We got something to eat from the American Adventure. Take a guess what I got. Walked around towards the Living Seas, went in there for a bit and then into Innoventions. We then got some ice cream and got our spot for Illuminations. Wonderful show. So then the park started emptying and we got our bracelet for the EMH. Got on Soarin’ and Mission Space again and then used our Fastpass for Test Track (it had been closed so our pass was valid anytime), got on and off that and took a walk back to our hotel. Oh yeah, my luggage was there too!


SUMMARY OF DAY 2: Woke up, got out of bed, dragged a come across my head. Oh sorry. Went to AK, got a lot done, Dinosaur a few times, Primeval Whil twice. Safaris, Jungle Trek, ITTBAB, and admired the scenery. Waited forever for a bus, got a lot done at EPCOT, 3X Mission Space, 2X Soarin', Innoventions, World Showcase. My luggage returned.

Summary of Summary: Went to 2 parks, did a lot, got luggage, and saw some annoying guests get kicked off lines! :sohappy: