WDW - Rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated. – My August 2011 Trip Report

WDW - Rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated. – An August 2011 Trip Report

Welcome to my trip report! First, about the title. Reading the WDW boards lately one would think that Disney World was coming apart at the seams; Overrun by vicious gangs of Brazilian tour groups, Pop Warner boys and cheerleaders. Filled with broken down, outdated rides run by snarly cast members. The resorts infested by bedbugs, nasty housekeepers, and moldy shower curtains. The Restaurants serving up Dogfood burgers and steaks served with the leather hides still attached. The fireworks shows reduced to open fire pits and a few boxes of sparklers.

To be totally honest and sarcasm aside (kinda), I was really getting concerned about this trip. I had gone to great lengths and compromise ( see my Pre-trip report) to make this trip a reality. Now I was worried that once my family would see first hand the crumbling vestige that was once our favorite place on earth; this would seal this trip’s fate as our last one to the World. Well, I’m happy to say, with photos as proof – the rumors of Walt Disney World’s demise have been greatly exaggerated.

First Day and intro to our family;

Our countdown was over. The paper chain in Toni’s room that started at day 178 was now down to day zero. It was 4 in the morning on August 6th and I woke up Toni and we tore up that last chain and started to get ready for our trip. By 4:30, Toni and her brother Sterg, were ready and waiting.

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I have a good friend that happens to own a limo business, so we hired him to drive us to Philadelphia International. The limo came at 5:00am. This is my wife Val and my oldest child, Alexandra, getting spoiled in the limo.

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Sterg and I on the other seat…

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While Toni caught a few z’s.

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Everything was going fine. We were making great time on the Turnpike until we were detoured off of it an exit too soon. Unfortunately, this was only the first of our several delays that morning.
 
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fractal

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Disappointed to see that the pictures are no longer here. I started reading this trip report earlier this year and just came back to finish reading through it. Oh well, I'll just have to wait till your next one.

Sorry my friend. I shut down my photobucket account and moved my photos over to smugmug. I haven't taken the effort to replace them in the report.

But the good news is that I do have a new trip report up...

http://forums.wdwmagic.com/threads/ill-stop-the-world-and-melt-with-you.870250/
 
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fractal

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Disappointed to see that the pictures are no longer here. I started reading this trip report earlier this year and just came back to finish reading through it. Oh well, I'll just have to wait till your next one.

meyeet, I'm happy to say that the pictures are back up! I was finally motivated by my daughter Toni.

She was talking to me about our last trip to WDW ( 2013 ) and I asked her how she would compare staying at the Poly vs. the Beach Club. She said she liked the Volcano pool at the Poly but doesn't remember much about the Beach Club pool.
As I started to describe Storm-along-bay it started to come back to her but I realized much of the trip was a foggy memory to her. I was quite sadden by this as I wanted her to remember everything. That led me back to this trip report.

A few years ago I shut down my photobucket account and migrated my photos to Smugmug. Unfortunately the photos to this trip report were linked to photobucket. Since my conversation with Toni I've spent several evenings painstakingly putting in the new links to the erased photos. I've managed to "link" about 95% of the photos with some Iphone ones still missing. I will now send a link to this report to Alex, Sterg and Toni so they can relive a great trip we took almost four years ago. As much as this was a pain in the toosh to "recreate" I thoroughly enjoyed going back in time and remembering things I forgot. I must say it is great to have WDWMagic keep this older reports around and I am very appreciative of it. In fact, after a year off I will become a subscribing member again.
 

DisSplash

Well-Known Member
Fractal - do you have a new trip planned? Just wondering if there will be other great trip reports from you to look forward to ... :)
 

DisSplash

Well-Known Member
I will be looking forward to it! We were hoping to get Disney in this year, but I made a snap judgment on a snow day to book a Star Wars Disney cruise for next January!! So, I will once again be getting my Disney fix this summer through your "brewing" report as well as all the rest!!!
 

cfry06

Well-Known Member
Great to hear a trip might be brewing! Always love your reports, and it was fun to page back through this one. Debating on resorts for December and great to get reacquainted with Beach Club! Esp with it going through a room refurb right now (I think!)

Ok- so completely random, but by any chance was Sterg on a flight to Miami from Philly end of January? I could have sworn I saw him ( or his doppelgänger!) on our flight as we headed there for our cruise on the Wonder. Probably it was just Disney and the boards on my brain :D.
 

fractal

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Great to hear a trip might be brewing! Always love your reports, and it was fun to page back through this one. Debating on resorts for December and great to get reacquainted with Beach Club! Esp with it going through a room refurb right now (I think!)

Ok- so completely random, but by any chance was Sterg on a flight to Miami from Philly end of January? I could have sworn I saw him ( or his doppelgänger!) on our flight as we headed there for our cruise on the Wonder. Probably it was just Disney and the boards on my brain :D.

The biggest challenge for a trip this Summer will be coordinating everybody's schedule - not going so well right now. BC is wonderful!

LOL! Yes that was Sterg! He was coming home from a trip with some classmates. Too funny! I hope he behaved well on the plane. It would have been great if you went up to him and asked if he were Fractal's son!
 

cfry06

Well-Known Member
[\QUOTE] LOL! Yes that was Sterg! He was coming home from a trip with some classmates. Too funny! I hope he behaved well on the plane. It would have been great if you went up to him and asked if he were Fractal's son![/QUOTE]

So small world!! I didn't place him right away but I knew he looked familiar, and it dawned on me! They were all well behaved on the plane :D. Pretty large group! We had our 3 yr old with us and I think some of the group were a little nervous about being seated near us with a toddler. Luckily Wes was a quiet kiddo, happy with his iPad :). I thought about saying something to him but he was with all his friends and I didn't want to bother him. Hope he had a great trip!
 

blreinsel

Well-Known Member
I'm so glad that somebody commented on this and made it possible for me to find it! Loved your TR.. Can't wait to read the others that you've done. :)
 

FlaggNL

Well-Known Member
Totally agree with above msg :) Off course I saw more recentr TR's from yuo Fractal, but this is, as always, a great one! A couple of years ago, butr a lot is similar :) Thanks for sharing!! Enjoyed reading it!!
 

P_Radden

Well-Known Member
Just read all 23 pages. Great report Fractal!! Great pics and looks like you guys had a awesome time! This makes me want to try Flying Fish cafe next trip. Also, California Grill is one of our favorite WDW restaurants, glad you guys enjoyed it too!

I look forward to reading up on the other trip reports next :)
 

fractal

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Just read all 23 pages. Great report Fractal!! Great pics and looks like you guys had a awesome time! This makes me want to try Flying Fish cafe next trip. Also, California Grill is one of our favorite WDW restaurants, glad you guys enjoyed it too!

I look forward to reading up on the other trip reports next :)

Thanks @P_Radden ! Flying Fish was wonderful. We're due for Calif Grill on our next trip. Thanks for reading - I also reread much of this after your post and brought back some great memories!

Surprise alert. Forgot this thread was on watch.

This was the first TR I read, very entertaining.
I'll have to dig up your TR for some chuckles!
 

officialtom

Well-Known Member
I've spent a couple of days reading pieces of this report and absolutely loved it. You have an incredible family, despite the teenage angst. It's unavoidable, and you obviously had some moments where it was completely forgotten about anyway. Reading reports like this one is keeping me sane waiting for our next trip on January 27th. 110 days...
 

Uncle Lupe

Well-Known Member
Thanks @P_Radden ! Flying Fish was wonderful. We're due for Calif Grill on our next trip. Thanks for reading - I also reread much of this after your post and brought back some great memories!

I'll have to dig up your TR for some chuckles!

You got me reliving mine now. It looks like f.a.n.n.y pack is a bad word and is crossed out and some emoticons are not working but still fun to read. Looking back I can see the weight I've lost over the past year. I'll have to give you a proper shout out in my TR. Also want to get your opinion on an item in another thread I started.
 
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