Day 11

Today was the day of the mountain triple.

Jake and I were up and out at 7.15, over to MK, parked in Aladdin 203, on the ferryboat, down Main Street and into Space Mountain by a few minutes past eight o'clock. There were a fair number of people who had the same idea as us, and so we didn't get onto the ride for about twenty minutes or so. Despite, this, when we did get aboard, we still hadn't quite woken up.


Off Space, it being EMH, most of the park was still to open, and certainly the other two mountains on our list were off limits, so we headed in to Buzz to do some Zurg-blasting. Turned out that we were still struggling to keep our eyes open.


Two rides down, and time for a drink before waiting for the rope drop / walk through Liberty square and Frontierland. We headed to Big Thunder, and pretty much walked straight on there, before heading across to Splash where the wait had only got up to five minutes according to the posted time.

By the time the big drop came around, we'd pretty much woken up this time.


So, three mountains, plus Buzz all done, and it was only half past nine. A quick walk through to the back of Adventureland and we went on Pirates. Advertised at 10 minutes, but the queue was 20. I can't help but think that the Imagineers have a tricky one here. So they updated the ride by putting a few Jack Sparrow figures into the old scenes, and it is a much loved traditional ride. And hey, it was even the inspiration for the hugely successful movie franchise so surely they have to keep it, but it feels a bit tired to me. Tricky one.

Anyway, once we'd Pirated, I put in a request for the Hall of Presidents which Jake agreed to. As always when I get my way with this one, I think it is just great. I think Jake even enjoyed looking at the exhibits whilst we waited to go in.

Once we'd listed to the stirring and patriotic stuff, I declared that we needed to do something in Fanstasyland, and the only ride with an acceptable queue was Small World, so in we went. It was worth it for the personalised goodbye at the end if nothing else. Another sneaky bit of smart Magic Band technology.

Final stops before departing were more photos of the castle as we headed down Main Street (I'd been taking them every time we passed it during the morning) and as a special treat, a photo with Roy on his bench in Town Square.


And that was a pretty good morning in the Magic Kingdom.

As for the rest of the day, we went to the Studios in the afternoon. Made Jake go to the Voyage of the Little Mermaid and sit through the whole show for the first time ever, went and used more fast passes on TSM - Jake keeps winning, I watched the current show in One Man's Dream, which is a trailer for the upcoming Pete's Dragon movie - looks OK but I can't see it doing great business, and we went to see the Beauty and the Beast show. First time we'd seen it in ages and great as ever.

It started raining whilst we were in the show and was chucking it down when we came out. No buses back to Boardwalk and boats not running due to storm risk. We walked back and got soaked.

In the evening J&G had dinner at Artist's Point (about which they gave a good report). I gave them a lift, and when I got back, Nicky and I walked over to the Yacht Club. Plan had been to eat in the steakhouse, but they couldn't seat us straight away, so we went into the Crew's Cup bar next door for a drink. Ended up ordering appetisers in there. Then more drinks. Then more appetisers.

Somehow never made it to the steakhouse, but had a very nice evening!

Day 10

It seems I have some catching up to do!

As tomorrow is planned to be Extra Magic morning at MK, and so an early start, I am going to keep this to an update about today, and hopefully catch up some more another time.

Working backwards through the day (for reasons that will become obvious), this evening we went on the new Frozen ride in Norway at Epcot. The actual ride itself is the same as the old Maelstrom, but the new characters and scenes from Frozen are lots of fun.

We had dashed back from our shopping trip to make sure that we were back in time for our fast pass window, which we made with a few minutes to spare. We had enjoyed a 'productive' time at Florida Mall followed by a trip to Barnes and Noble.

However, the main event of the day was this morning, when we had parasailing at the Contemporary Resort planned. It was only available for groups of three, so I had agreed to be the official photographer so that the others could enjoy the ride. However, once we were out on the boat it turned out that there was time and space for us all to go, and after the glowing report from our first flyer (Nicky), I could hardly say no.

The pictures really don't do it justice. It was truly amazing. But here are a few to give you an idea.

Day 4

First stop MK today, and despite the fact that we were only out the door with about 10 minutes to go until our fast pass time for Big Thunder, we didn't have to wait too long for the bus, and so were there in plenty of time to make it onto the ride in our hour-long window.

As there was a gap before our next one, we were able to fit in three more things - Haunted Mansion, the Carousel, and Philharmagic - before heading onto the Mine Train, which thanks to the fast pass we were on with only a five minute wait.

By this stage it was getting pretty hot, and so we wandered through the castle, back along Main Street, and to Tony's Town Square restaurant, which we had booked for lunch (a first I think). N was saying that apparently the Americans give the restaurant some bad reviews due to small portion sizes, but J was the only one to finish his main course. (J&G both had steak, N had chicken and I had cannelloni.)

After lunch we headed out of the park. I made the mistake of suggesting a boat plus monorail plus Epcot walk home, rather than the direct bus. It was too hot to walk, and the rest of the party decided they'd get the bus from the Epcot monorail station back to Boardwalk, but it turns out that there isn't one, and so the walk was endured, including a drink stop at Starbucks.

By the time we were back at the room, we all enjoyed a long relax and cool down before heading for an evening at Disney Springs. It was N and my first visit of the trip. We were impressed by some of the new facilities - liked the Coca Cola store, enjoyed some of the other stores. It was Uniqlo's opening day so pretty busy. We had to endure another downpour but thankfully it didn't last too long. Some of Town Center was shut off for a private event for much of the evening which was pretty annoying. Jake got to say hello to Marcus Jordan which may well have made his holiday. We may well pop back to Springs tomorrow morning when hopefully it will be fully open, dry, and quieter!

In other news from today, Georgie has been giving out free eyebrow treatments, and everyone has been getting excited about Pokemon Go!

Days 2 and 3

Already behind with the blogging!

Picking up where I left off, we headed out on the bus to MK, and decided that we had different plans for our remaining 'Julien' fast pass of the day, and so Nicky and I headed for the mine train whilst J&G made their way to Space Mountain.

Looking back on it, the youngsters made the better decision. Their ride was inside! Just as we were approaching the queue for the mine train, it was being emptied because a storm was on its way. We decided to head over to Adventureland for some Dole Whip and come back in a little while. Unfortunately a little while turned into a long while, and not long after getting our ice cream the heavens opened, and we took shelter near the ice cream counter and watched the torrential rain and lightening for what must have been more than an hour.

Thankfully by this time J&G had been on Space Mountain and had made it on a bus to Springs and so whilst it was chucking it down there as well, they were able to dodge from shop to shop.

Eventually we decided that it had stopped enough for us to make a dash for it, and whilst none of the outside rides were up and running we decided to make sure that the trip wasn't a wash out (and we had enjoyed a passing parade on Main Street when we entered the park!) and went over to use our fast passes on Buzz.

Having done that it was definitely time to head back home on the bus (along with the sing-a-long family!) and we had bagels from the Boardwalk store for tea whilst the teenagers in the party were enjoying dinner at the House of Blues!

And so to day 2, for which we had Studio plans, as we had fast passes for TSM, plus three more bonus fast passes to enjoy. We used the walkway along to the Studios, and as we were in the park before our appointed TSM time, J&G and I went on Tower of Terror, using bonus fast pass no.1. As it was Jake's first go on the ride, I'll leave him to let you know how much he enjoyed it.

Next stop was Starring Roles for breakfast before heading to TSM (using our actual pre-booked fast pass) where Jake was the winner (170k score) much to Nicky's annoyance, and then on to Star Tours to use bonus fast pass no.2.

At this point we split up to use up bonus fast pass no.3, and Georgie and I went to the Rock 'n' Roller coaster whilst N&J went for another ride on TSM. Apparently Jake won again, scoring a few more thousand than the first time, but Nicky was claiming a wonky gun. At least I think that's what they said, everything was a bit hazy to me after being turned upside-down at high speed!

The plan had been to have lunch at the park, but it was getting pretty busy, so we came home, and after a little while headed over to Mall at Millennia and had lunch at the Cheesecake Factory. The finer details elude me, but I had a particularly rich Godiva chocolate cheesecake, and certainly didn't need to eat again for quite some time.

We split up for shopping, and whilst the teenage contingent enjoyed the mall, N and I snuck off for a bit of Old Navy therapy. I got three new tops and Nicky got one. I was barred from a fourth, despite trying to drum up support from random strangers in the changing rooms when Nicky was telling me it was no good!

Once mall shopping was complete, we stopped off at Publix to stock up (having established that we wouldn't be moving from our one bed unit at all, even if we were losing the studio next door for a night) before coming home for a while prior to the DVC pool party.

The Typhoon Lagoon pool party was good fun, although it turned out that we stayed longer than J&G. We all enjoyed the lazy river and the wave pool (I think we were all a little surprised by the strength of the wave!) and it ended up being quite a late finish.

Today has been a quieter day - quite a late start and some time around the pool including playing some pool and table tennis, then lunch at Denny's. Off to Premium Outlets for a look around the shops, although we didn't stay all that long, as it was just too hot.

This evening we went into Epcot for dinner followed by Illuminations, which was lovely if a little emotional. Plus it was a particularly special evening for what was left behind.

Day 1

And so the return to blogging is prompted by the best of things - a trip to Florida. Lots more to blog about as everybody knows, but those are subjects to be tackled another time. For now, let's just enjoy the simple pleasure of what we know and love - a trip report.

Uncle Martin picked us up at Boxley Road just after 6am, and after hugs (with possibly a tear or two) with Mum, we were on the road to Gatwick in his spacious Discovery. The M25 was a bit busy - and I haven't particularly missed it over the last couple of months of commutes - but we were at the airport not very much after seven. We were checked in already, so just needed to drop off bags, which was pretty straightforward. Virgin seem to have stopped the snaking queue approach at drop off, and it was a case of picking a line, and so we went almost as far from the entrance as we could meaning that there was only one group in front of us before our turn. Bag weights were all in the 9-13kg range so plenty of shopping capacity.

Upstairs and straight through security, which again would have been very quick apart from me being a plunker. I remembered to take my laptop out of my bag but not my iPad, which meant that my stuff ended up going through the scanners three times. N, J and G ended up sitting and waiting for me! By the time I had finally been cleared to fly, the consensus was that breakfast should be next. However, the South Terminal dining facilities were going through a bit of an overhaul - no food court at all - meaning that the remaining choices were pretty busy. We went for the one without a queue, which alarmingly turned out to be Nando's. Whilst I can't comment on their dinners (and J and G were keen to point out that they still rate them) their breakfasts were pretty rubbish.

Once we'd endured watery porridge and bendy french toast, there was still plenty of time for some duty free shopping. I think that the main purchase was some new Gucci perfume for Nicky. I avoided the temptation of a new camera, deciding that my existing one plus the iPhone would do fine for now. Before too long it was time to head to gate 13 and board "Hot Lips" for our flight, which was pretty uneventful. Between us we managed to watch a good number of films - I watched "Spotlight" on Jake's recommendation, and very good it was too, plus finished off my new Ian McEwan book.

Orlando airport was a bit of a disaster. We landed at around 3.30pm local time, and it wasn't far short of 6pm by the time we made it out in the car. We seemed to go from one queue to another. Firstly what can only be called a 'pre queue' for immigration, then the main event, then a crazy snaking queue around the luggage area to hand in our customs forms, before finally getting the sky train to the main terminal and the queue for the hire car. Most disappointing MCO!

Things started to look up a little in the Alamo garage. There weren't very many 'full-size' cars left, and they were all locked. Getting a little frustrated, we pointed this out to a member of staff, and he suggested we took a car from the other side of the lot, and so we made off with a Jeep. Seemed to be fine with the guy checking the paperwork at the exit, so a free upgrade.

I dropped people and luggage off at reception before heading to park the car at Boardwalk, and by the time I got back check-in was nearly complete, albeit with various discussions underway with staff, about our one day move, and about our country's longer term move out of Europe. We were commiserating with a French member of staff called Julien, and out of nowhere he decided to give us some bonus fast passes for the first two days of our holiday, so he is our new best friend!

Our villa seems very nice. Not too far from the front desk, with a view of the quiet pool (and we can keep an eye on whether the table tennis and pool tables are busy which should be handy). We wonder whether we might be the first inhabitants since a refurb because everything is pretty spic and span. We did point out what appeared to be a little leak in the shower when they brought our bags up, but the guy from bell services said he would get it checked but it shouldn't be anything to worry about.

By this point we were pretty tired, but in need of some food before bed. There was some talk of a quick trip into Epcot for quick service Japanese, but we didn't want to waste a day's worth of tickets, so we went along the Boardwalk and ended up in the Big River Grill. Inside was really loud, so we asked to sit outside, where it was still hot, but much quieter.

Thus refreshed and refuelled, J&G picked up some essentials for us on the way back up to our room (water, cookies ...) before we called it a day.

This morning we were all up at a decent time, what with the time adjusting and all, and true to his word, Jake was off to the gym at about 7.30, so we sent him with instructions to pick up pastries on his way back! The rest of us took our time about getting up, and enjoyed the pastries once the healthy one returned.

With the bonus fast passes, we decided that we would head out to Epcot in time to do Test Track prior to our appointed Soarin' time, and so we were in the park through the international gateway just after 9am, wandering through the quiet and closed UK and Canadian pavilions. We were pretty much straight on to Test Track, and Nicky and I designed a smart-car-ish vehicle compared to J&G's muscle car (which did beat ours in all the tests). We were done and off the ride with lots of time to spare so had a good look around Mouse Gear (including trying on of silly hats!) and a drink from Fountain View Starbucks before going in to Soarin'.

Unfortunately we made it down the slope of Concourse B, and then the fire alarm went off, and the whole building had to be evacuated. We did a full circuit of the exterior before being led back 'onstage' near to the Imagination pavilion, so we went in there and to the new DVC lounge (not bad - expect we'll use the free drinks / snacks / exclusive spot for a sit down opportunity again) for a drink. By this point our Spaceship Earth time had come around so that was our next destination which was good as always (although Epcot was clearly having a glitchy day - the photos at the beginning didn't work and so our faces didn't pop up in the animation at the end).

Heading back through Future World we stopped off at Club Cool - Jake persuaded Georgie to try Beverley - it wasn't met with approval! - before heading to the World Showcase, starting at the Mexico end, including a stop in to that pavilion for a quick boat ride. J&G checked the menu for the restaurant in there in case they wanted to go back some time, but it was deemed to have too many peppers and onions!

We ended up arriving at Teppan Edo earlier than our reservation time, but they didn't mind, and we were seated in less than five minutes. Whilst it is just the same, and just as fantastic, there were a few differences to report from today's visit - a little bowl of salad at the start, only two sauces (but still including yum yum), and even some changes to the menu (choices of steak, no scallops, no swordfish, opportunities to add extras ...).

After lunch we took the Morocco to Canada boat, and gave Soarin' another go. We were able to explain that we'd missed out earlier in the day, and so go into the fast pass line without using up one of our bonus fast pass privileges. The new ride is much the same as the old one, just with updated scenery to admire. And when I say it is much the same, that of course means that it is still fantastic.

Having been successful with Soarin' it was time to return to our rooms for some chill out time, given the temperature, plus this still being day one. When we got back, we discovered that we'd been left some Welcome Home cookies and milk by the lovely DVC Boardwalk staff.

More to follow in next post of rest of day trip including a very wet trip to MK and tomorrow I might get around to uploading some pictures.