How to Do Disney Really Fast...

I must admit that on this latest Disney adventure, I was too tired to blog our trip at the end of each day.  If you’ve ever followed one of our trips, you know we vacation long and hard, but with a little bit of rest to catch up.  We only had a week to work with this time, so we just never stopped running (although we did fall asleep on a few attractions, true story…)

 

I started out thinking I would give only the statistics… a real “just the facts” rundown of our trip, and that’s mostly what follows, but I guess I can’t post something entirely without narrative, so there are a few gems of moments detailed below.  It’s mostly just the facts, though…. The numbers in parentheses are the wait times, in minutes, because clearly every sane Disney loving vacationer should know exactly how long they waited for everything…

 

Travel Day

Phil drove to Disney from MA, and the kids and I dropped Theo off in MI and then flew.  After we almost missed the connecting flight, things were pretty smooth…. It was Ian’s first time flying, so that was fun.

 

 

Park Day 1: Hollywood Studios

7:30am-10:30pm

17,919 Steps, 7.3 miles

 

3 Shows: Walt Disney One Man’s Dream, Mickey’s Vacation Fun, Fantasmic

The films were both great, in different ways, of course.  The reimagination of Fantasmic is phenomenal!

 

7 Rides: Slinky Dog Dash (27) – So fun!  We started out with an elaborate plan to split up for Rockin’ Roller Coaster and lightsaber building, but by the time we reached the entrance, we were all on board to just rope drop Slinky Dog!  I’m glad we did:

 

 

Toy Story Mania (19) – Caleb destroyed us all with his high score!, Alien Swirling Saucers (78) – not worth that long a line, but a fun ride, Smuggler’s Run (70) – a simulator… I wasn’t overly impressed, but the kids loved it, Star Tours (26) – Caleb was the spy!, Mikey and Minnie’s Runaway Railway (90) – I really loved it, but the wait was too long and our feet were so sore by that point!, Rockin’ Roller Coaster (18) – The ride had a long line and was down for part of the evening, we got on very shortly after it reopened (run, don’t walk). Ian loved it, Caleb thought it was better than he remembered, Miah did not like it, which is odd, because she tends to love coasters.

 

Food:

Breakfast: Riverside Mill (standard food court fare)

Lunch: Woody’s Lunchbox (grilled cheese, tomato soup, potato barrels, cuties oranges, lunchbox tarts) - The raspberry tarts were delicious!  The grilled cheese and tomato soup was average to good.  The potato barrels were not great, kind of stale.  I am convinced it is a better deal to buy kids meals at Disney counter service, if for nothing else but the drinks.

Drinks: Oga’s Cantina (Blue Bantha for me and Cay, Carbon Freeze for Ian and Miah – neither was too great) – weird “seating” as in no seats, just a hightop, shared with two other parties. 

 

9 lightsabers built (Even I got sucked right in…):

 

 

Funniest moments: A first order lady tried to recruit Caleb when he and Ian were lightsaber battling.  She offered him air conditioning.  Lol.  I wasn’t sure what this was all about, and I wanted to make sure they weren’t in trouble with their lightsabers, so I walked over and asked them if they were in real trouble or fake trouble.  This got a laugh out of a lady standing nearby.  They were in fake trouble.  A storm trooper told Phil he wasn’t worth the paperwork.  Another storm trooper made a “talks too much” hand gesture at me when I told him Miah was not the jedi he was looking for…    

 

Park Day 2: Epcot

8:00am-10:00pm

22,073 steps, 9.8 miles

 

7 Shows: Beauty and The Beast Sing Along, Reflections of China, Voices of Liberty (Astounding!), The American Adventure (I slept through this.), Canada Far and Wide (The song is still the best part.), Turtle Talk with Crush (Always hysterical, even when your own kids are too old to be part of the show anymore.), Harmonious (This was an excellent show, but it’s hard to make a case that it fully replaces Illuminations.)

 

7 Rides: Frozen Ever After (10) – Really fun!  I’m glad we rope dropped it, because the line gets crazy within minutes of park opening, Three Caballeros (12), The Seas with Nemo (31), Living with the Land (4) – Note to self, we’d like to do the tour of this… which is pretty funny, because it used to be one of those “boring” attractions the kids weren’t interested in, Soarin’ (41), Spaceship Earth (33), Imagination (walk on) – I could ride this multiple times for Figment, but the family thinks once per trip is enough.  Also, we did manage to cram ourselves into the photo booth afterward…

 

 

Food:

Breakfast: Miah and I had baklava and an almond cookie (Caleb and Ian tried it) from the Morocco stand, because the French bakery line was long.

Lunch: Biergarten (Some of the best food ever, amazing entertainment, the kids say we have to come back here every time we go to Disney.)

 

Funniest Moments: “I’m pretty sure we just toasted to sausage and meatballs” - Caleb (we did). Cast Member at Figment when Miah and I got behind, taking a picture, “Come on Disney Princesses!  Holy Cow!”

 

Maybe my favorite part of the entire trip was just exploring the World Showcase in the morning, when basically nobody else was there:

 

 

Park Day 3: Animal Kingdom/Epcot/Disney Springs

26,455 steps, 11.6 miles

 

7:00am-2:00pm AK

2 Shows: Finding Nemo: The Big Blue and Beyond (Good, but not as good as the old show.), Festival of the Lion King (We were the second to last family in for the 1:00 show, which saved us some time in the afternoon.  Again… running…)

 

8 Rides: Dinosaur - Ian mentioned that he had a dream to be the first person on a ride in the morning.  We made this happen by rope dropping Dinosaur, which was his absolute favorite when he was little.  It helps that Animal Kingdom has Pandora now, and that’s what everyone else in the park was rope dropping (walk on), Triceratops Spin (walk on), Expedition Everest (2, 5) - I rode the first time with the kids and they waited five minutes for a second ride.  We saw the Yeti!  What a great way to spend the morning in Animal Kingdom, Kilimanjaro Safari (21) – The best safari we have been on, to date.  Kwaherini – Go Well, Wildlife Express Train (8 there, 4 back) – We got a picture with the elephants, which is what really matters, Kali River Rapids (walk on)  

 

    

Food: Did we eat?  I don’t think we ate anything at Animal Kingdom.  We got coffee at Starbucks.  Maybe Caleb grabbed a breakfast sandwich.  This is a testament to the fact that we vacationed too quickly…

 

Funniest Moments:

Ian: “You shouldn’t have allowed me to get a venti coffee…”

Me: “It’s out of my hands at this point.”

Other children: “I’m pretty sure it’s not.”

 

 

After the mad dash to finish Animal Kingdom in under seven hours, Phil dropped the rest of us off at Epcot and went back to the hotel. 

 

2:30pm-7:00pm Epcot

 

No Shows

 

3 Rides: Mission Space Orange (CM) (2), Green (LI) (7), Test Track (LM) (18 – single rider line)

 

My main motivation for returning to Epcot was that I didn’t get to eat Fish and Chips at Yorkshire Co. Fish Shop the day before, because I was way too full to eat another thing, but the fish n chips stop is just about nonnegotiable for me, so it seemed like a pretty good time for it, since… see above… we had not yet eaten on this day… lol.  We had decided not to eat around the world on this trip, but as we entered the World Showcase and the snacking began with churros in Mexico, I knew this was a lie.  By the time Miah had added egg rolls and kakigori and Caleb had consumed a soft pretzel that was literally as big as his head, I knew we were in trouble for our late night dinner reservation.  We rounded it out with more pastries purchased in Morocco (which I didn’t even open until days later when we got home) and a stop by the French bakery for a chocolate croissant, strawberry tart (maybe the best dessert I’ve ever had), and a baguette… because Ian and Miah are obsessed with baguettes.  It was only then that we reached the UK and I finally got my fish n chips (which weren’t as good as I remember them, go figure).  At this point, it was clear to me that we should go ahead and finish out the rides we’d missed the day before, so Caleb and Miah got on the intense version of Mission Space, while Ian and I did the mild version.  None of us felt too good when we got off.  I am noting this here, so hopefully I’ll remember someday, that I should never ride Mission Space again, because it makes me sick, and I also had a panic attack (which I covered well) due to the tightly enclosed ride vehicle and the delayed ride start.  Neither Caleb nor Ian cared about Test Track, and the line was long, but Miah really wanted to ride it, so she and I waited in the single rider line and it worked out well, because I was in the car right behind her.  We were going to catch a bus back to the hotel, but we were staying at Port Orleans Riverside (which is close to Epcot), so Phil came back and picked us up.

 

We took short naps until it was time for our 10:40pm dinner reservation at Chef Art Smith’s Homecomin’.  To be clear, I didn’t make a reservation for that time because I wanted to eat that late.  I made it because it was the only available time I could find that worked with our schedule!              

 

I cannot believe my children were hungry enough to order full meals and to eat extra sides.  I came back to the hotel with leftovers.  Homecomin’ was delicious, but survey says my mac and cheese is better…

 

Park Day 4: HS/Magic Kingdom

24,455 steps, 11 miles

 

7:30am-1:30pm HS

 

2 Shows: For the First Time in Forever Frozen Sing Along, Beauty and the Beast Live on Stage

 

3 Rides: Rise of the Resistance (26) – We roped dropped this, and I can’t imagine waiting for it any other way.  It was a great ride, but not three-hour wait great, Smuggler’s Run (15) – Caleb, Ian, and Miah enjoyed a second ride on this, with a short wait time, Star Tours (?) – I’m unsure on the wait time here, but it was a huge plus that we met up with our long-time (almost lifelong for Ian and actually lifelong for Miah) friends and fellow Disney enthusiasts, the Newmans, and Matt got to join Caleb, Ian, and Miah on this ride!

 

1 more Lightsaber built… because we needed an even 10, I guess…

 

 

Food:

I once again cannot remember if there was food involved.  Knowing that we had only so many specific reservations, I did make sure my children had Disney gift cards for snacks, and I think this is the day they ate ice cream.

 

Funniest moments: Caleb: “Mom, you’re going to meet Olaf by yourself?”  Yes… Yes I did…. Nobody else wanted to meet him, and I was on Star Wars overload…

 

We never made it on Tower of Terror.

 

2:30pm-11:00pm MK

 

1 Show: Enchantment (This show is fine, but it’s not Wishes…)

 

16 Rides: Magic Carpets (12), Jungle Cruise (10) – WHAT?  Turns out parade time is the time to go, Pirates of the Caribbean (23), Tom Sawyer Island Raft (x2) (walk on both ways), Big Thunder Mountain (75 – felt like three days), Carousel of Progress (1), Space Mountain (7), Tomorrowland Speedway (7), Teacups (walk on) – I do not know what possessed me to get in a teacup with Caleb, Ian, and Miah, who all love to spin things.  Heck, I can’t even believe we fit.  But we did, Dumbo (4), Goofy’s Barnstormer (1), The Little Mermaid (walk on), It’s a Small World (1), The Haunted Mansion (11) – I hate The Haunted Mansion… always have… (and it’s not that I hate haunted stuff…. See: trip to the Wizarding World last summer), but Miah insisted that she had to ride it.  When we got off, she was like, “That was awful!  I remember it being a roller coaster.”  It is safe to say we do not have to ride The Haunted Mansion again, Splash Mountain (walk on)  

 

We basically ran to everything with a five-minute wait time listed, because we knew it was going to be difficult to get on everything at The Magic Kingdom in a day and a half.  There were plusses and minuses to this.  It was pretty fun to run from ride to ride, but it was also so rushed I almost don’t feel like we were there!

 

Food:

Dinner: Cosmic Rays (It was just terrible, and Sonny Eclipse was missing!)

 

Great Quotes: Caleb (on Tom Sawyer’s Island): “I wish this was what life is like, exploring places you know are safe, but there’s lots of places to go…” Me… too…

Also Caleb: “I remember this being an infinite, dark abyss, but clearly there’s light in it.”

 

Park Day 5 Magic Kingdom

20,636 steps, 9.4 miles

8:00am-10:30pm

 

3 Shows: Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor (5) – How do you get to be “that guy,” that is the question…. Ian and I were the two-headed monster once, when he was a baby, Philharmagic (again with the sleeping), Enchantment

 

11 Rides: Seven Dwarves Mine Train (31) – Rope drop is the only way to do this, Prince Charming’s Carousel (walk on), Astro Orbiter (25) – WHY?  Why do we wait for this in the blazing sun, only to remember it is Dumbo after an elevator ride?  Why?, Walt Disney World Railroad (20-ish) – Whew… the railroad has been closed for years.  Thank goodness it came back up last week, Splash Mountain (109) – Is this an insane wait time?  Yes.  But, the final splash… and all those memories.  Did I cry through the ride?  Also yes, The Many Adventures of Winnie-the-Pooh (47, ride broke down, got complimentary fast passes for later, waited 10), River Boat (18) – Caleb and I both fell asleep… like, really asleep, Space Ranger Spin (10), Peoplemover (10) – Forever a favorite… go ahead and judge me, Peter Pan (9) – Cast member insisted it was a 60-70 minute wait.  We were like, “OK… but there is no line,” Space Mountain (?) – Not sure on exact wait time, but Caleb and Ian ran and took turns carrying Miah to get there just barely before park close.  Phil and I missed a second ride on the Peoplemover by seconds…

  

Food:

Breakfast: The Crystal Palace – We have always loved breakfast at The Crystal Palace.  It is delicious, but I think it’s also nostalgic.

Dinner: Be Our Guest – How many years did it take me to get a reservation here?  Beautiful atmosphere, really good food, Beast runs through the dining room way too fast to make it a worthwhile character greeting, price tag is too big to make it a regular stop.  But the grey stuff?  It’s delicious… 

 

Best Quotes: “You can’t run away from trouble, ain’t no place that far.” -Splash Mountain

 

 

Travel Day

We finished out at Disney Springs with Gideon’s (cookies and cold brew) – never thought I’d wait 40 minutes for cookies, but…. Lego Store, World of Disney (where I finally snagged a Loungefly bag… here’s to the next trip), Wetzels, and a variety of other souvenir shopping.  Our flights and drives home were uneventful.  Theo was really happy to see us.

 

And that’s it for how to do almost everything we actually care about at the four main Disney World parks, in a week… 

 

 

           

Doing Disney On A Dime, Part 1...

Here's the truth, friends.  Disney is not cheap!  However, there are ways to make it much more economical than you might imagine.  Whenever I plan a trip, I am looking for the best value for the most amazing experience.  I have had a great deal of success helping other people to plan their vacations, and to date no one has ever come back and told me that they had a miserable time.  But there are a couple of things you need to know.

1.  There are some dreams that are as unreasonable as Miah's assumption that a real live unicorn was going to appear, simply because she dreamed it at Disney.  I once had someone ask me to find a deal for their family of four that would include staying on property for a week... with magic your way water park fun and more park hopper tickets... over Christmas... for less than $1000.00.  And if I could throw in the dining plan, that would be great, too.  Uh... not going to happen.  Probably not going to happen in 1983.  Some things are unrealistic.

2.  The other thing is, vacation budgeting has to be a priority in your life if you want to do Disney well and as cheap as possible.  We spent the same amount on our first three Disney trips, combined, that we would have spent on cable TV if we'd had it for all those years.  This doesn't make us any better with money than anyone else.  It just means that it was more important to us to meet the Disney Junior characters in real life than to watch them on a screen for years and years and years.  Granted, neither cable TV nor a Disney vacation fall into the "needs" category, but I'm just saying that you might have to prioritize to make it happen.

Today, I'd like to offer some thoughts on the Disney Dining Plan...

We have used the DDP before.  We will probably use it again.  But only if it's free.  These are my initial thoughts after 12 nights on Disney property.

Earlier this week, I sat down with all of our receipts to figure out exactly how much the free DDP that came with our package was worth.  As it turns out, our family of seven consumed approximately $3,591.20 retail value in DDP meals, snacks, and refillable mugs.  It would have cost us $4,099.82 to purchase the DDP for our entire family for the length of stay.  It's not too difficult to look at the numbers and realize that purchasing the DDP would have been an error that cost us a little over $500.00.  Getting the DDP for free was a good move.  Paying for it would never be worth it for us, even though 3/5 of our children are really good eaters.  Seriously, we all ate so much we thought we would puke.  You can only pack away so much food.

We also made some choices that actually decreased the value of our meal plan, allowing for less table service meals (I will explain this in more detail below).  We did this knowingly, and a case could be made for the potential to eat more food had we made different choices, but again, we couldn't eat any more food!  We were stuffed all the time!  In addition, choosing less table service meals, overall, should (at least in theory) have cut down on our tip total.  It probably didn't though.  We ate expensive food.

There are several things to consider while dining at Disney, and let's face it, when you're dining with kids, characters trump quality.  Here are some specifics on our character meals:

Hollywood and Vine -   This allowed Miah to meet some of the Disney Junior characters without waiting in line.  If I had it to do all over again, I think we would just wait in the lines, because the characters did not take much time with her (this was odd considering our previous character meal experiences on other trips).  I thought the food was awful, which was also a disappointment having eaten at Hollywood and Vine previously.  And by awful, I don't just mean that I was being picky.  I was sick to my stomach after eating for the entire rest of the day.  The kids mostly filled up on stuff they could have gotten at a counter service restaurant and bread... lots of bread...  I don't even know what Phil ate, because the other issue we had was that our reservation was split, so Ian, Miah, and I were at one table and everyone else was across the room.  My teenagers just loved hanging out at the Disney Junior character lunch.  This was not anyone's fault...  just part of traveling with kids of various ages... 

Princess Storybook Dining Breakfast at Akershus, in Norway - Here we found princesses that were clearly acting out of character.  As an example, when you are Cinderella, you must never, ever talk down to a cast member who is trying to tell you something when in front of small Disney guests.  Thankfully, this was lost on Miah, as were the eye rolls between Cinderella and Ariel during the princess parade.  Look, maybe it stinks to be a Disney princess day in and day out.  Who knows?  But if it's your job, you have to be magical... all the time.  Again, the princesses seemed to be in a rush, but in Cinderella's defense, she did come back to our table to make sure we had taken all of the pictures we wanted, so I think she realized things were a little off.  The breakfast at Akershus is fabulous, though.  They even brought us an extra bowl of bacon that was so overflowing we couldn't eat it all.  That's saying something.  The other perk at Akershus is that you meet Cinderella, Snow White, Ariel, Aurora, and Belle, and it only costs one table service credit per person.  We would eat there again.  I would caution, however, that you should be careful about your reservation time.  Because we ate close to the end of breakfast time, they were switching the buffet part of the menu over to lunch.  That might be a perk for some people.  We like our breakfast.  Eat early.

Cinderella's Royal Table - What?  We had breakfast with the princesses twice?  Well, this one is more about the experience than anything else.  I think it's a really big deal to eat in the castle.  I love that the kids get wands and wishing stars and swords (even though they're cheap, and let's face it, your boys are going to break their swords within days if not minutes).  We found the princesses to take much more time here, conversing with everyone, definitely in character.  Here you trade Belle for Jasmine, which I don't really think is a perk, but to each his (ahem) own...  The drawbacks are that this meal costs 2 table service credits per person, and the food is not as good as Akershus.  It's the kind of thing that I don't feel like we need to do every single trip.  When you have a five year old princess, you do it.

The Crystal Palace - This one is pretty much non-negotiable for us.  We can eat breakfast at the Crystal Palace and not eat again all day.  We can.  I didn't say we did.  Even if it was just the puffed french toast (which is so amazing I found a recipe for it after our first trip to The Crystal Palace in 2006), we would find this meal worthwhile.  But it's not just the puffed french toast.  It's the Mickey waffles... and the fruit... and the scrambled eggs... and the omelet station... and the bacon... and the sausage... and the cinnamon rolls... and the cheese danishes...  Need I go on?  Because I could.  There is just so... much... food... and it's all good.  On top of this, you get to meet Pooh, Piglet, Tigger, and Eeyore.  You might think this is only fun for little kids.  I actually think my big kids had more fun with these characters than any others (at meals).  Of course, Eeyore is my all time favorite, so I might be biased...

Chef Mickey's - We chose Chef Mickey's for dinner one night.  Here you meet Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Pluto, and Donald.  We were there so long that Mickey came by twice.  That has something to do with the fact that we kept eating... and eating... and eating.  Chef Mickey's offers what I would call "real" food.  I don't know about anyone else, but I can only eat so many chicken nuggets and theme park pizzas before I feel sick.  Here we found eggplant parmesan, lasagna, turkey, roast beef, vegetables, etc.  Some of the people in our family mostly ate breads and desserts, but whatever.  Everyone left full.  There are two things that I don't love about Chef Mickey's.  One is the photo they take when you get there.  I just don't get it.  The other is that I think some of the characters look a little silly in their chef costumes.  This is probably just me.  I think Donald looks ridiculous.  It's OK.  The kids don't care, and it saves a lot of time not having to wait in line for these guys elsewhere.  We would definitely eat at Chef Mickey's again.

We had three other (non-character) table service meals:

Rainforest Cafe - I have always wanted to eat at Rainforest Cafe.  We were not disappointed.  Phil and I both had the chicken parmesan, which, quite frankly, we could have shared.  Actually, I did share a lot of mine... with the kids... who wanted to share everything at this meal.  So, large portion sizes and really excellent food?  Yes, please.  All of the kids ordered pasta of some kind.  Several of them got mashed potatoes with their meals.  Grace didn't like her pasta (Italian sausage and cavatappi), but that was OK, because Caleb loved it, and none of the other kids liked their mashed potatoes, so Grace just ate them all... and some of my chicken parm...  The volcano dessert was incredible.  And, who doesn't love an indoor thunderstorm... or two... or, let's face it, we stopped counting and just enjoyed them...

T-Rex - After our excellent experience at Rainforest Cafe, we were pretty excited about T-rex, which is owned and operated by the same company.  Our mistake.  I'm really glad we went, because the dinosaurs were awesome, and Ian loves dinosaurs.  The food, though?  Not so much.  Phil, Seth, and Caleb all ordered steak, which they thought was just OK.  Grace had chicken, which she said tasted weird.  I had fish.  I'm not sure I can recall another time when I have ordered fish and not finished it all.  I really like fish.  This fish was awful.  Everybody loved the dessert.  Perhaps if you really want to dine with the dinosuars, dessert will do...  We wouldn't eat there again.

Le Cellier -  Somehow, I have had it in my mind for years that eating at Le Cellier, in Canada, is the mark of a true Disney foodie.  And... well... I like a good steak.  We're talking $50.00 a plate here, friends, so by the time you add in drinks, dessert, and a tip, that's well over $400.00 for our family!  Are you kidding me?  Just... no.  But on the DDP, it's 2 table service credits per person.  That we could do.  Once.  Here's the deal.  Pretzel rolls are awesome, and that was one of the best New York strip steaks I have ever had.  Something about the price tag is still disturbing to me, though.  I make some pretty awesome homemade pretzel rolls.  Phil grills a mean steak.  There's just no way I could ever walk in there and pay the price to eat.  I think if you're on the free DDP and you don't feel the need to have table service every night, it's worth a trip to Le Cellier.  If not, maybe not.

Now, the whole counter service thing blew my mind this time around.  Remember how I said we ate over $3500.00 worth of food?  Yeah, that would never have happened had we not had the free DDP.  The massive amounts of food that come with a counter service credit are just crazy!  To begin with, when we're paying out of pocket, we order ice water.  That, alone, would have saved $21.00 per counter service meal.  And, when we're paying out of pocket there is no way we order dessert every time through the line.  In fact, we probably don't order dessert, at all, save a Mickey mouse ice cream bar or frozen lemonade here or there.  On average, I'd say the desserts came to about $31.50 per meal.  Still, the retail value of the food, alone, was totaling $60.00 or more every time we ate.  We can sometimes do a meal at a sit down restaurant (think Texas Roadhouse) for that price, and here we were eating bacon cheeseburgers and fries.  It's Disney.  It's going to cost more than fast food.  I completely get that.  Considering, though, I'm not sure we can ever afford to do Disney without a free DDP again!

If you're paying out of pocket, I would definitely suggest sharing meals.  It's enough.  There were a few times when we shared meals, even though we had plenty of credits for everyone to have their own meal.  The kids complained about this when I ordered, because they thought they wouldn't get enough to eat.  They changed their tune when I was shoving food down their throats at the end of the meal in order to not waste anything.  And, honestly, by the end of the trip we were still wasting a lot of food.  I am absolutely not OK with this.  There must be a better way.

Well, this sounds like a lot of complaining, but there were definitely some bright spots in the counter service experience.

Epcot World Showcase...  We like to eat around the world.  Since the lines were really reasonable at all of the counter service restaurants and food and wine festival booths, we got to try all kinds of things from different countries/cultures.  The UK fish & chips are the best (everyone gasps, I know... I know...) and the French bakery...  let's just say I wish we hadn't already eaten so much by the time we got there.  Just to be clear, though.  Don't try to order meals for everyone as you eat around the world.  It occurred to me that I might not have been clear about this while I was blogging our vacation.  One counter service meal at each country, per family, will do.  A couple of bites here, a couple of bites there.  Eat responsibly...

Some other counter service favorites include Pizza Planet (at Hollywood studios) - It's not really that great, as far as the food goes, but...  it's Pizza Planet...

And Cosmic Ray's Starlight Cafe (at the Magic Kingdom) - Because, come on...  you know you want to hear Sonny Eclipse sing about gravity... and grilled chicken is reasonably healthy... and they will give you a slushy for both your drink and dessert if you ask them to...

And the Electric Umbrella (at Epcot) - Actually, I don't get this at all.  My family loves the Electric Umbrella.  It's kind of like how they feel about Tom Sawyer's Island.  Maybe I just have a vendetta against umbrellas.  I don't know.  But, you can refill your own drinks here, so I guess there's that...

We discovered Casey's Corner (at the Magic Kingdom) on this trip.  I am not a huge hot dog fan, but Miah had a dream to eat a hot dog at Disney World.  Actually Casey's Corner was pretty good, and they serve frozen lemonade, so there are no complaints here.  When paying out of pocket, it's a little cheaper there than other counter service places, as well.

We also discovered Starring Rolls Cafe (at Hollywood Studios).  We just used snack credits there for breakfast.  The assortment of pastries was overwhelming, which is probably why I ended up eating a Reese's peanut butter cupcake for breakfast one day.  There is nothing acceptable about this.  I have no excuse.  It was delicious...  My family liked the cinnamon rolls.

And, if you happen to love turkey legs, you should definitely eat one at Toluca Legs Turkey Co. (Hollywood Studios).  I do not like turkey legs, but Seth does.  I'm telling you, I think maybe they served him an ostrich leg.  It was huge.  He was happy.

We had so many counter service and snack credits left over at the end of our trip that we ended up with pounds upon pounds of fudge, Mickey Mouse cookies, and rice crispy treats to bring home.  There is no exaggeration here.  The fudge has been frozen for Thanksgiving.  We could have better utilized these credits if we had not been sick for part of the trip.  Because we had a couple of days where we stayed at the cabin and did next to nothing, we also ate there, seeing as we had a full kitchen and plenty of frozen food.  Also, I think the counter service credits are better utilized at other resorts.  We loved staying at Fort Wilderness.  We had always wanted to stay there, and it was fabulous to have our own private space (more so than a hotel room).  However, the amenities are really spread out, and you pretty much have to take a bus everywhere.  The value resorts, for example, have counter service options right in the same building as the lobby.  If counter service food had been more conveniently located, I think we would have eaten more.  Which may or may not have been a good thing.

Well...  that's a lot of words...  I hope they're helpful to someone as they meal plan their Disney vacation!

L.

Oh, To Travel By Car...

Our 18 hour travel day started like this:

And ended like this:

Serious traffic backups cost us about 4 hours, making this day 20 and day 21 of our trip.

Some random thoughts...

Exegeting Revelation is hard enough.  Doing this in the car is nearly impossible.  I did it anyway.

I really hate flying, but I would have taken a plane today if I could have.

87 minutes of sleep is enough if that's all you can squeeze in.  Sometimes it's hard to do what I need to do, but it's OK.  I can do hard things.

Next time we vacation, I'm intentionally planning some rest days.

When someone stops to tell you how well behaved your children are and especially how impressed they are with your boys, it feels good. 

I still love driving... especially at night... in the rain...

That might have been too much coffee.

L.

Pictures Taken Today: 3

See Ya Real Soon...

Our typical Florida vacations usually end in the mid afternoon, often at Downtown Disney/Disney Springs, sometimes after a short trip to finish things up at a park or parks.  Today was not typical...

Since Disney Quest is closing... forever... we really wanted to get back there, because the only time we had ever visited was in 2008, and Disney Quest is not stroller/baby friendly at all, so it was difficult, to say the least.

We started out the day with lunch at T-Rex and then our Disney Springs shopping, which was very fun/productive. 

My best buy of the trip was a Lego photo frame

featuring this sea serpent... $0.98

I am eventually going to make a complete post about what I thought of all of the dining options, how the dining plan worked for us this time around, etc.  However, I will give a little preview here and say that we had a ridiculous number of snack credits left as well as some counter service credits that we simply could not use up.  Had we not had to alter several of our days due to illness, we would have used all of our credits, but because things got a little crazy, we ended up with 47 snack credits to spare.

This is just a sampling of what we brought home:

Disney Quest, itself, ended up being something of a disappointment, and I can see that it really is time for it to close.  It is essentially the technological dream of the 90s.  And I am simply too old for simulators.  When the magic carpets make you sick, it's time to throw in the towel.  I'm really glad we went, though, because I think it's the kind of thing where if we hadn't gone we would always be wishing we had, wondering what we missed, etc.

We left Disney Springs at 9:15pm, which is far too late any way you look at it.  We only made it as far as Valdosta, and that was really pushing it, because I could not keep my eyes open, so Phil had to drive without any intelligible conversation, and it's safe to say that we are both too tired for that at this point.  Tomorrow will be a very long travel day.  

L.

Pictures Taken Today: 116

One More Gasp...

... of magic.

The last full day at Disney is always a little sad, even if you've been vacationing for a ridiculously long time!  We had some really fun adventures today, though, to finish up.  Traditionally, we like to spend our last day in the Magic Kingdom.

The Crystal Palace is one of our all time favorite places to eat breakfast at Disney, both because the food is incredible and this is where you meet the characters from Winnie-the-Pooh.  You can't do much better than that!  We may have "struck again" when Eeyore came by.  For those who have never heard the story, Caleb was terrified of the characters when we went to Disney when he was two.  When Eeyore visited our table on that trip, Caleb smacked him with a waffle, leaving butter all over Eeyore's nose.  Miah might have accidentally gotten permanent marker all over Eeyore's belly, today... 

 

One of the best character photos ever...

Poor Seth...

Because we have spent so much time at the Magic Kingdom on this trip, we only had a few things that absolutely had to get done.  Most of the day was consumed with re-riding everything we love after we knocked out the last few things we hadn't done yet, in the morning.

Liberty Square River Boat:

Exploring Tom Sawyer Island is one of my family's favorite things to do.  You would think, as a literary enthusiast, that I would love it, too, but it has never ranked very high on my list.  However, I enjoyed playing a game of checkers with Phil at the fort (even though I lost badly), and even though I ran camera lens first into a wall in the mines, at least I didn't get hurt... which has been known to happen on the island...

Reading the Map: 

Raft Ride Back to Civilization:

It was super hot and crowded during the day.  At this point, I have no idea how many cups of frozen lemonade we have consumed.  I am feeling pretty thankful for snack credits, both because they keep that frozen lemonade coming and because that led to this moment when you can see that Caleb and Ian do love each other, near constant picking at each other aside:

We don't always make it to the daytime parades, because we are usually so caught up in riding, and have I mentioned it's hot?  However, I was super impressed with the Festival of Fantasy parade and am glad we decided to take it in, even though it was a bit of a challenge when tall people decided to stand up in front of our kids... again.  I think Disney needs a parade watching etiquette guide or something.  I am quite certain that this was the last time that I am ever going to be able to throw one of my children up on my shoulders in the blazing heat for a parade.  In case you're wondering, Miah is super heavy... and wiggly... and again...  it was hot...  It was worth every second, though...

Well, hello there Maleficent:

Minnie is blowing a kiss to Miah here:

Over the course of this vacation, we have done 36 character greetings!  That has to be a record for us.  Tinkerbell was our last greeting, and she was super excited to be in Miah's hair:

Speaking of Tink, here she is flying across the Magic Kingdom during Wishes:

After some ice cream, which sort of revitalized us, we spent our extra magic hours riding Thunder Mountain and the Seven Dwarves Mine Train again.  If you need proof that it was a long day, this is the first time we have ever seen both the park opening and closing shows!

 It's been magical:

L.

Pictures Taken Today: 364

P.S.  Ian keeps saying that this will be our last Disney trip, because now all of the children in our family have had their magical trip.  This is cracking me up.