Pre-Trip We are family...I got all my cousins with me

Songbird76 · May 15, 2018

figmentfan423 said:
I keep forgetting you get different deals on your side of the pond.

Yep, that's why I have to make the booking, because he can't get that deal. So I did it yesterday. Happy birthday to her!! I actually tried the whole weekend to get through, but the first time I called, they said the expected wait was 7 minutes....I hung up after about 35 minutes because we had somewhere to be. I tried again the next day, and it said the expected wait was 5 minutes....after 11 minutes, I gave up. So then I tried again later, and it said 5 minutes again, so I just hung up right away. We were at my in-laws' house and it's a toll free number in Ireland, but not in the Netherlands, so I didn't want to run up their phone bill trying to do the booking. So I called when I got home from work yesterday, and it said 5 minutes....it was pretty close. I think it was actually 6, but certainly better than 35! So it's all booked, and I had them note all the special days we'll be celebrating there, so hopefully Disney will sprinkle some pixie dust on my brother's family. I'm so excited! DD has started a list of all the things she thinks N will LOVE, that she wants to share with her.

Songbird76 · May 15, 2018

Ok, so now that at least my brother's family and mine are booked, it's time to actually PLAN stuff. My DD is SUPER excited that her little cousin is finally going to Disney, and she can't wait to show her EVERYTHING. DD is kind of a little mother...she loves little kids and is really good with them. Her Musical Theater music teacher gushes about how great she was with the kids from the younger group as they did a joint production this year. She wishes so much that she had a little sister, but loves her cousin and misses her terribly. So, we're making lists....it's what we do. But, my brother said he thinks N is going to love AK, which is our least favorite park and to be honest, I really don't like it at all and I'd be quite happy skipping it entirely if it weren't for rivers of light and pandora, which I have yet to see. So, I know I've read TRs from a few people here who LOVE AK....I'm asking....no BEGGING you to help me. Tell me what I did wrong? What did we miss? What is it that you love about it? Dinosaur was closed when we went, so I've never done that, and I can't do coasters, though hubby enjoyed EE. DS had to be taken out of It's Tough to be a Bug....he was screaming bloody murder. Tusker House was awful....no selection, everything was cold, including the hot chocolate...which tasted like luke warm water, the bathrooms were dirty, it was FREEZING...so we refuse to return there. I'm at a loss to see what people love about AK, but I don't want to ruin it for my niece....so, I need some suggestions of what people love about it to see if we just did the wrong things. I want to like it so I can make it magical for my niece, and change my views about it and help my kids to have a good time, too. We did Nemo, which we loved, FotLK was underwhelming....I fell asleep. We did the safari, which was decent, and gorilla falls was ok, but not much to see. And I loved Kali River, but my son hated it. They enjoyed doing the Wilderness Explorer thing with the stickers, but I don't think they managed to complete all of the things. If we did anything else, I can't remember it. So what SHOULD we have done? What's something that shouldn't be missed? And where can we get fries besides Restaurantosaurus? I don't want to have to walk across the park every time we eat and DS won't eat anything adventurous.

Figgy1 · May 15, 2018

Break AK up and do not spend a whole day there at a time. Sorry about your TH experience. My suggestion is do an AK morning and split up into groups who want to do the same things. Then go to a resort for a nice late sit down lunch during the heat of the day. Then go someplace else at later in the day. It's not my cup of tea but I'm sure your ds will find something he'll eat in RFC. Put the petting area on the top of your list. Now do AK another day for the after dark activities.

Figgy1 · May 15, 2018

Almost forgot Finding Nemo the Musical

Songbird76 · May 16, 2018

figmentfan423 said:
Break AK up and do not spend a whole day there at a time. Sorry about your TH experience. My suggestion is do an AK morning and split up into groups who want to do the same things. Then go to a resort for a nice late sit down lunch during the heat of the day. Then go someplace else at later in the day. It's not my cup of tea but I'm sure your ds will find something he'll eat in RFC. Put the petting area on the top of your list. Now do AK another day for the after dark activities.

Oh, breaking it up would be a great idea!! Those might be good times to do water parks, too...do AK one morning, water park in the afternoon, then water park for rope drop another day and catch the evening stuff at AK! I hadn't thought about that, but that might be awesome. And where is the petting area?? And are there sheep? If there are sheep, DS will want to live there. I don't think we saw that last time. We LOVED the Nemo Musical. We had a fast pass for it, so we got to sit right up front and it was soooo good. I think N will love that, and the petting area. She has chickens at home, and they are looking at buying some land so my BIL can have some goats and such, so she's used to animals, which is why my brother thinks she's going to love AK so much. RFC...is that in AK itself? For some reason, I was picturing it in DS.

Figgy1 · May 16, 2018

Songbird76 said:
Oh, breaking it up would be a great idea!! Those might be good times to do water parks, too...do AK one morning, water park in the afternoon, then water park for rope drop another day and catch the evening stuff at AK! I hadn't thought about that, but that might be awesome. And where is the petting area?? And are there sheep? If there are sheep, DS will want to live there. I don't think we saw that last time. We LOVED the Nemo Musical. We had a fast pass for it, so we got to sit right up front and it was soooo good. I think N will love that, and the petting area. She has chickens at home, and they are looking at buying some land so my BIL can have some goats and such, so she's used to animals, which is why my brother thinks she's going to love AK so much. RFC...is that in AK itself? For some reason, I was picturing it in DS.

Calm down. Last I checked there were sheep. It's outside the conservation station which you take the train to. If you split it into a couple of part days you should have time to do all the badges. They also added Up characters to Flights of Wonder. Make sure to get a DAS added to the magic bands. It can be used to up to 6 members of your family. One part of your family can do ITTBAB while part does something your ds would like.

Figgy1 · May 16, 2018

Just another bit of info. You may not be able to make all your ADRS online under one account and may have to be called in. Your niece may want to do a princess meal and that's something else you may want to split up for. Askerhaus is one credit but your ds may not eat the food there. Maybe have part of the group eat there and the rest maybe Beaches and Cream, Coral Reef(they have a few basics) or Les Chefs

Songbird76 · May 17, 2018

figmentfan423 said:
Just another bit of info. You may not be able to make all your ADRS online under one account and may have to be called in. Your niece may want to do a princess meal and that's something else you may want to split up for. Askerhaus is one credit but your ds may not eat the food there. Maybe have part of the group eat there and the rest maybe Beaches and Cream, Coral Reef(they have a few basics) or Les Chefs

Oh, DS definitely won't eat the food there. We've done Akershus both times we took the kids. The first time, DH ended up having to go back to the car to get doritos. Last time, we got him a pizza, but he wouldn't eat it, but I had a bag of chips in my bag for him. I don't know if we'll be doing all our meals together, but we have time to work that all out. My niece is pretty sassy, though....I think if we have to choose ONE princess meal, 1900 Park Fare may be the way to go with that one. But they are both on my list. As is Whispering Canyon, but I just read that the antics there have been stopped, at least temporarily. So if that doesn't come back, we may change that one. I didn't have any problems with ADRs last time, but we were only making them for 6 people, not 10. I'll see how it goes and if I have to call, I have to call.

Figgy1 · May 17, 2018

Songbird76 said:
Oh, DS definitely won't eat the food there. We've done Akershus both times we took the kids. The first time, DH ended up having to go back to the car to get doritos. Last time, we got him a pizza, but he wouldn't eat it, but I had a bag of chips in my bag for him. I don't know if we'll be doing all our meals together, but we have time to work that all out. My niece is pretty sassy, though....I think if we have to choose ONE princess meal, 1900 Park Fare may be the way to go with that one. But they are both on my list. As is Whispering Canyon, but I just read that the antics there have been stopped, at least temporarily. So if that doesn't come back, we may change that one. I didn't have any problems with ADRs last time, but we were only making them for 6 people, not 10. I'll see how it goes and if I have to call, I have to call.

6 seems to be the magic number where MDE can handle without issues. Have your brother get a copy of the Unofficial Guide to Disney or at least go to touringplans and read about the restaurants. With any group you really should split up for a few things. I'm sure your dd and dh will want to do more adventurous rides. Are you going to UNI?

Songbird76 · May 17, 2018

figmentfan423 said:
6 seems to be the magic number where MDE can handle without issues. Have your brother get a copy of the Unofficial Guide to Disney or at least go to touringplans and read about the restaurants. With any group you really should split up for a few things. I'm sure your dd and dh will want to do more adventurous rides. Are you going to UNI?

Well, we'll have to split up for some things. We did last time, too. And I'm glad that DD is getting older and more adventurous, so she'll go on some of the bigger stuff with DH now, which will make him feel better about going. Last time, I tried to encourage him to do stuff like Rockin' Roller Coaster, but he had this stubborn view that it was a FAMILY vacation and we had to do everything together, DS kind of cured him of that somewhat, because he didn't want to do ANYTHING after TOT, and if we didn't split up, no one would get to do anything. This time, I'm really hoping that my cousins come, because then there will be 8 kids total? I think? My two, my brother's 1, C's daughter, B's 2 boys, and M's 2 girls...so with that many kids, I'm sure he'll just go along with the group without thinking about it. The kids will get excited about doing something, and their excitement will get HIM excited. And, there will be enough kids to split up and do different things if the boys want to do Star Wars stuff and the girls want to do something else. (None of the girls are star wars fans as I understood it....I asked because of Jedi training.) But with that big of a group, we wouldn't be able to sit together at a restaurant anyway, so we won't be able to do everything together...we'll have to pick and choose. But, my brother only has 1 week where we have two, so anything they don't want to do, we'll try to put into our 2nd week so we can do the stuff they DO want to do, together, to the extent that it's possible. I'm also thinking that I will offer to take N with us for at least on meal and let my brother and his husband have a date night. My BIL's birthday falls duing our trip and their anniversary is just a couple of days after they leave. It would be really nice for them to have night out for themselves....get to go where they want to go, go to a nicer restaurant, etc. If there's something N will like that they are really not keen on doing with us, we'll use that time to do it.
I'll be getting the Unofficial guide, the Food blog guide, and probably birnbaums and I will subscribe to touring plans closer to our trip, too. Probably this October.....it's a year long membership, so when the 2019 book comes out, I'll get the discount and can use that to help plan with the crowd calendar. But I think I might get a copy of the Unofficial guide for my brother for christmas, too....just have it sent to him. Then he has no excuse not to read it.
And yes, we're doing Universal, but my brother is not, as far as I know. I can't book at Universal yet as they have not released the WWoHP packages for 2019 yet. I looked online, and tried to check the price on the HP package for our dates, but got an error. So I called and they said they don't release the next year's packages until the end of the promotion for that year...so he said to try at the end of the Summer this year and then they'd probably have announced the promotion for the next year. I'll keep looking in between.

King Racoon 77 · May 17, 2018

Makes me sooo thankful our travelling party is 2 .
Will be patiently waiting on the TR.

Figgy1 · May 17, 2018

Songbird76 said:
Well, we'll have to split up for some things. We did last time, too. And I'm glad that DD is getting older and more adventurous, so she'll go on some of the bigger stuff with DH now, which will make him feel better about going. Last time, I tried to encourage him to do stuff like Rockin' Roller Coaster, but he had this stubborn view that it was a FAMILY vacation and we had to do everything together, DS kind of cured him of that somewhat, because he didn't want to do ANYTHING after TOT, and if we didn't split up, no one would get to do anything. This time, I'm really hoping that my cousins come, because then there will be 8 kids total? I think? My two, my brother's 1, C's daughter, B's 2 boys, and M's 2 girls...so with that many kids, I'm sure he'll just go along with the group without thinking about it. The kids will get excited about doing something, and their excitement will get HIM excited. And, there will be enough kids to split up and do different things if the boys want to do Star Wars stuff and the girls want to do something else. (None of the girls are star wars fans as I understood it....I asked because of Jedi training.) But with that big of a group, we wouldn't be able to sit together at a restaurant anyway, so we won't be able to do everything together...we'll have to pick and choose. But, my brother only has 1 week where we have two, so anything they don't want to do, we'll try to put into our 2nd week so we can do the stuff they DO want to do, together, to the extent that it's possible. I'm also thinking that I will offer to take N with us for at least on meal and let my brother and his husband have a date night. My BIL's birthday falls duing our trip and their anniversary is just a couple of days after they leave. It would be really nice for them to have night out for themselves....get to go where they want to go, go to a nicer restaurant, etc. If there's something N will like that they are really not keen on doing with us, we'll use that time to do it.
I'll be getting the Unofficial guide, the Food blog guide, and probably birnbaums and I will subscribe to touring plans closer to our trip, too. Probably this October.....it's a year long membership, so when the 2019 book comes out, I'll get the discount and can use that to help plan with the crowd calendar. But I think I might get a copy of the Unofficial guide for my brother for christmas, too....just have it sent to him. Then he has no excuse not to read it.
And yes, we're doing Universal, but my brother is not, as far as I know. I can't book at Universal yet as they have not released the WWoHP packages for 2019 yet. I looked online, and tried to check the price on the HP package for our dates, but got an error. So I called and they said they don't release the next year's packages until the end of the promotion for that year...so he said to try at the end of the Summer this year and then they'd probably have announced the promotion for the next year. I'll keep looking in between.

Now, are you going to transfer to UNI or commute from your Disney hotel? I wouldn't worry about unlimited EP their because you'll have the DAS which works the same as Disney's. If you're staying on property there all the hotels have early entry. The packages are a bit of a gimmick there. Find out if what you want to do makes sense money wise. All that being said UNI takes MUCH less planning as you can show up with almost no plan at all and get what you want done, even meals

Songbird76 · May 17, 2018

figmentfan423 said:
Now, are you going to transfer to UNI or commute from your Disney hotel? I wouldn't worry about unlimited EP their because you'll have the DAS which works the same as Disney's. If you're staying on property there all the hotels have early entry. The packages are a bit of a gimmick there. Find out if what you want to do makes sense money wise. All that being said UNI takes MUCH less planning as you can show up with almost no plan at all and get what you want done, even meals

The hotel I want to stay at there has the Unlimited EP included there, so we'd have that anyway. But good to know they also have a DAS pas!! I think that's going to be a life saver for DS. Our plan is to to DME from MCO to CBR, do our 14 days, then hop over to the Swolphin to rent a car. We'll drive from Disney to the Universal resort, do our 4 days there, then probably transfer to a hotel somewhere in Orlando to do the stuff like Silver Springs and Kennedy Space Center, but we still need to research that. Then we'll bring the car back to Swolphin and we'll stay 1 night at the Poly, because that's on my bucket list, and then we can do the Ohanna breakfast and we'll have DME transfer back to the airport. We won't have park tickets, so we'll resort hop.

Figgy1 · May 17, 2018

Songbird76 said:
The hotel I want to stay at there has the Unlimited EP included there, so we'd have that anyway. But good to know they also have a DAS pas!! I think that's going to be a life saver for DS. Our plan is to to DME from MCO to CBR, do our 14 days, then hop over to the Swolphin to rent a car. We'll drive from Disney to the Universal resort, do our 4 days there, then probably transfer to a hotel somewhere in Orlando to do the stuff like Silver Springs and Kennedy Space Center, but we still need to research that. Then we'll bring the car back to Swolphin and we'll stay 1 night at the Poly, because that's on my bucket list, and then we can do the Ohanna breakfast and we'll have DME transfer back to the airport. We won't have park tickets, so we'll resort hop.

Kennedy is a full day open to close. Do the outdoor attractions at opening and the indoor ones once it gets too hot. Haven't done Silver Springs. You may want to look at the new Endless Summer hotels at UNI, still a Lowes Hotel with all the UNI perks except EP and family suites start at 100 a night and regular rooms start at 80, that way you have a nice room without having to worry about the neighborhood.

Figgy1 · May 17, 2018

IMHO maybe you should do the other Orlando area things before doing UNI. That way you get a break between parks to quiet down and take a "break". Going from Disney to UNI without some "breathing time" can be a bit much

Songbird76 · May 18, 2018

figmentfan423 said:
IMHO maybe you should do the other Orlando area things before doing UNI. That way you get a break between parks to quiet down and take a "break". Going from Disney to UNI without some "breathing time" can be a bit much

That's good advice. That also means we have a full day at Disney on our check out day to do what we want to do rather than spending a half a day at Universal and wasting tickets. Thanks!

Figgy1 · May 18, 2018

Songbird76 said:
That's good advice. That also means we have a full day at Disney on our check out day to do what we want to do rather than spending a half a day at Universal and wasting tickets. Thanks!

That also a good day to check out the outlets and maybe a local restaurant between Disney and UNI.

93boomer · May 19, 2018

Here -waiting for your trip!

Songbird76 · May 19, 2018

93boomer said:
Here -waiting for your trip!

Ha!!! Well, you've got a really long wait!! More than a year! But, I have tons to plan, so hopefully it won't be too boring of a wait.

93boomer · May 19, 2018

Songbird76 said:
Ha!!! Well, you've got a really long wait!! More than a year! But, I have tons to plan, so hopefully it won't be too boring of a wait.

I can wait-patiently!

Pre-Trip We are family...I got all my cousins with me

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King Racoon 77

Thank you sir. You were an inspiration.

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