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John and Donna Gross "The Full Mickey - At a Discount!" The Wall Street Journal
Cena visited WDW in October, 2005: "Me, my husband and 2 children went to Florida October 2005 for my daughter's 8th Birthday. We spent 1 day at Magic Kingdom, which was not enough. We managed to see only half of the park, so I strongly advise people to spend at least 2 days there. We were exhausted by the afternoon and were staying at Pop Century. Our room cost $116 per night which I thought was a decent price. And we were able to shuttle back to our hotel for a quick rest and went back for the fireworks in the evening. I have friends that stayed at another moderate disney resort and they had to share shuttle buses with other resort. Pop Century has their own separate buses that go to each resort. Which is probably a real time saver. If I may add the lady we originally reserved our room through was more than helpful at trying to put us in the closest building to the food court. Our youngest child was 2yr 5mnths and that helped a lot. We then followed with a 4 night cruise on the Disney Cruise line. It being our first cruise we were a little nervous about it. But had a great time. my husband loved that experience so much he wanted to book another while we were on board. There is so much to do on the ship, that you do miss some things and wish you hadn't. We are taking a cruise without the children this year or we would be back on Disney again. I am afraid I will be overwhelmed with guilt without the children. Everything is so clean and well taken care of on the ship. And the lady that cleaned our room was so friendly. The children enjoyed it just as much as we did. We hope to do it again with the kids in 2007. Thank You." |
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Suzan visited WDW August 22-26, 2005. Here is her trip report: "Day 1: Arrived at the Coronado Springs to check in around 3:30 pm. A lot of rooms had already been taken. We had a reservation and got a room a bit further out than I would have liked, but all the rooms are nice, and ours was convenient to one of the 'quiet pools.' We walked around the grounds, swam a bit, and got ready for dinner at the Mayan Grill (using our Dining Plan). Although a bit of an upscale restaurant, they were very accommodating to children. The meal was exceptional!! The appetizers, entrée, and dessert were all perfect. We had salmon, mahi-mahi/filet combo, and our son had plain pasta with sauce on the side. After dinner we headed to the Magic Kingdom for a look around. We were able to get in quite a few rides before the parade and fireworks. It was crowded, but we still found nice places to stand for all the action. Day 2: MGM here we come!! This is my favorite park. They didn't have extended magic hours, so we tried to get there as soon as we could. We planned to eat all of our breakfasts in the room, to save on time and money. And that worked out extremely nicely. My son didn't have to sit still in a restaurant and we could still get things together without rushing out. (We bought yogurts, granola bars, cheese, grapes, and crackers at the local grocery store.) We grabbed a map and schedule to make certain we caught as many shows as possible. We also began our search for characters to autograph my son's book and take photos. It didn't take us long before we found Woody, Buzz, and friends. My son's eyes were huge!! We saw the Disney Playhouse show-very kid friendly and involved the audience. The Muppet 3-D was awesome! We also caught Ariel's show. We didn't get to Beauty and the Beast which I heard was fantastic. The stunt show we caught was 'Indiana Jones.' That was terrific. We sat right in front, had no problem in any line. It was really rather fascinating. It does take awhile to get from one show to another, so make certain you account for that time. We had lunch at 'Pizza Planet' using our meal plan. It was very crowded so we sat with another family. (Everyone was doing this.) It does have stairs to the main seating area. There is an elevator, but it is very slow and busy with strollers. We caught many more characters at this park and they were all visible for long periods of time. We spent a bit of time in the 'Honey I Shrunk the Kids' park. My son really enjoyed that, but we didn't want to take too much time there. So much to see! We had 4:30 dinner reservations at Hollywood and Vine for the Fastasmic Dinner package (not included in the dining plan). This was worth it. The meal was good (buffet with Flank steak, peel and eat shrimp, stew, ice cream bar, kids selections, etc.) and we were provided a different entrance to the Fantasmic area. They request that you arrive between 6:30 an 8:00. However, much before 7:30 is too early. You run out of things to do while you wait. And the kids just want to buy light-up toys. We kept busy with the bucket of green army men we bought earlier in the day. Fantasmic was FANTASTIC. Unless you have a great camera, don't waste time taking pictures, they don't come out great - and we were in the front row. The show is amazing. Leaving the show takes awhile and the park is now closed so you really can't stop to do anything on the way out. Day 3: This was going to be a big day for us. We scheduled breakfast with Pooh and his friends and dinner with Mickey and the gang. Breakfast was in the Magic Kingdom at 10:30. So we got to the park a bit early to get some pictures and watch the Cinderellabration at the Castle. What a fabulous show. We also had time to plot out a few more things to do after breakfast. The breakfast was covered under our meal plan. We saw Pooh, Piglet, Eeyore, and Tigger. They each came around to the table, spent time signing autographs and taking photos. After breakfast we headed to Frontierland. We took the Liberty Boat around Tom Sawyer's island. That was a nice way to scoop out our next adventure-The Haunted Mansion. There was no line whatsoever. My son was a bit scared at first, but really enjoyed the 'ghosts' hopping into our car at the end. We also rode the tea cups and got a few more autographs of Tweedle Dee and Dum and White Rabbit. We saw the Hall of Presidents and then headed for 'It's a Small World' as it looked like rain. We waited in line for about 15 minutes and it was indeed raining after we left. We knew it would be over soon. We had an umbrella (preferred over the hot poncho). By the time we got to the castle (to head out for our afternoon swim) the rain had stopped. We got back to our resort and swam for awhile. We had dinner with Mickey (Chef Mickey's) at the Contemporary at 7:10 pm. We had to plan our travel out as we had to take a bus to Magic Kingdom and then the monorail to the Contemporary. We were on time, but still waited for about 25 minutes. They take your picture there. However, it's not with any character and the package was over $25. Again, this was a buffet with a variety of food. We were visited by Chip, Dale, Goofy, Minnie, and Mickey. Donald stood around and signed autographs and posed for photos near the buffet area. This was nice, but took a bit longer than we would have liked. We saw the Magic Kingdom fireworks from the monorail as we were heading back to the Kingdom for the extra magic hours. We went right to the new Stitch ride. The line was extremely long and they were not accepting Fast Passes at this point. We waited for approximately 1 1/2 hours. The ride was relatively short and not worth the time it took. My son enjoyed Stitch's burps; but that still wasn't worth that wait. We headed to Mickey's Philharmagic where there was NO line whatsoever. This was another fantastic 3-D show. We all really enjoyed this one. We then went to learn how to fly with Peter Pan. This line was quite long (although they were taking Fast Pass-we didn't know that). We waited for about 45 minutes, but the ride is really quite nice. After that we ran to catch the Country Bears and then headed back to the resort. It was definitely a long day-and my son's legs were feeling the affects. "Day 4: We're ready for EPCOT. They have extended Magic hours, so this is another long day for us. We started in the Land of Tomorrow at EPCOT after eating breakfast in our room and arriving by bus. We headed for The Living Sea, which we found was closed for renovations. We went into the Living with the Land and got a fast pass for the ride. We then went over to Innovation to see 'Honey, I Shrunk the Audience.' It was really good, but is getting a bit dated. The other 3-D adventures were much better productions. We then went back for our fast pass for the ride in Living with the Land. It was a nice smooth boat ride and quite informative. It showed some of the projects being worked on by the scientists in EPCOT. After that we headed for the World Market. We took a ferry over to Morocco where we noticed it was about to rain. We ate a fantastic lunch at the 'Tangerine Café.' The rain had slowed by the time we were done, so we started looking around Morocco. We met up with Aladdin and Jasmine. Being five, my son was not very interested in meeting Jasmine, but wanted her autograph. So, I was elected to get this and a picture of them as well. We then headed toward France to work our way out of the park for our afternoon break. We saw Princess Aurora (Sleeping Beauty) and later the Beast (from 'Beauty and the Beast'). We got a few more photos and signature (Beast doesn't sign and Belle was busy in the 'castle.') From there were headed to United Kingdom and Canada. We caught the band 'Off Kilter' as they were about to start. A great rock-n-roll band that plays the bag pipes and wears Kilts!! They were terrific. We headed out of EPCOT after Canada and headed back to the hotel for some pool time and relaxation. This scheduled worked out very well. Although it does take longer to get out of the parks then we had anticipated. After our swim we took a short nap, got ready, and headed back to EPCOT. We tried to catch the ferry again to take us to Morocco, but it had just left. We had reservations for dinner at 'Teppanyaki' in Japan for 7:10pm. They still honored our reservation although we arrived a bit late. We were seated with four other people. Our meal was great-and another great opportunity for the Dining Plan. We had Filet Mignon, Chicken, and Sirloin along with fabulous Sushi appetizers and a nice fruit plate for dessert (our choices). We were just in time for the fireworks show on the lake. We had a great view from the balcony just outside the restaurant. It was incredible. Afterwards, we headed out of the park in the other direction catching the USA, Germany, China, ending in Mexico. We got to see the drawbridge raised for the boats on our way through as well. We took a little boat ride through Mexico and then started a quicker paced journey out of the park. It was around 11:30pm by the time we got to the bus area. We got back to the room and began to pack for tomorrow. Day 5: Our last day. We only have time for a half day at Animal Kingdom. We finished packing and had the bell service take our luggage to the holding area for our departure. We did express check-out so didn't have to worry about that aspect. We got to Animal Kingdom and walked a far way to Africa to catch the Safari. It was really wonderful. There was absolutely NO LINE-they were waiting for us. After that we wanted to make certain to catch the Lion King show so we ran down toward Mickey and Minnie's area where the show was about to begin. Again, we got right in with absolutely no waiting. The show was really spectacular. It was about 20 minutes long. We caught a few more autographs right outside the Lion King of Donald Duck, Mickey, Minnie, etc. (We had some of these already, but my son wanted them again.) We took the train to Rafiki's Planet. This was a nice relaxing way to travel. We took photos with Rafiki and Stanley (getting their autographs as well). They have a Kid activity to do at a variety of locations throughout the park (They did at EPCOT too). The kids get a card (at EPCOT it was a mask) and they do an activity at every station and get a stamp, an attachment, etc. on their cards/mask etc. This keeps the kids busy, but got a bit tiresome for us. After visiting the nature building there, we headed back on the train to Africa. We didn't have time for Asia, or any of the other areas, as we were limited on time. We did a bit of shopping and headed back to the Coronado Springs for lunch in the Pepper Market. Again, a great meal on the dining plan and we had time to do some picture taking around the resort and a bit more shopping. The Magical Express Bus came a few minutes late to get us-but got us to the airport with plenty of time to spare. The bus was extremely comfortable-my son even took a short nap. The airport had another store to check out the Disney merchandise. We looked around there, headed to our gate, and our plane boarded about 20 minutes later. We're home now. We took a few days off before actually getting back to work and school-which was a great idea!!! Our pictures are developed and put into the album. We've looked at our Disney Photo Pass Pictures, but haven't yet decided if we want any or not. We do only have 30 days to look at them, so we will decide soon. They are about $14 a print, but are all very nice!" I asked Suzan if she was a member. She replied: "I am indeed a member. As a matter-of-fact, I recommended the site to several friends. One has already been in touch with Beth and has been using the site quite a bit over the last few weeks. It's terrific and help tremendously!" Thank you, Suzan, for the great trip report and your kind comments!
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