A seed was planted and here’s what grew....Magical Memories About This Page:

[Pinkyt177]

subscribing, love it so far but I'm only on page 4, I can't wait to read more. I laughed when you said DH was being grumpy, I have one of those too!

[Pinkyt177]

All caught up, I'm so glad you called about your stomach problems it sounds as if you are getting some awesome chef interaction to help. Abby seems to be having a magical trip. I love your sun hat, I'm needing a new one and yours is awesome. Great signature pic, (I love cropping the pics too!) Can't wait for more!

[sc507]

Great AK pics! I love all the Tree of Life ones. You really accomplished a lot that day!

[Dale_Loves_Mickey]

Guess I'm all caught up for now. Can't wait for another instalment!

[KMB733]

What a wonderful day at AK!! Abby did a wonderful job taking pictures on the safari!

[CinderAbby]

Thanks Darlene, and you're welcome for the compliment. Whether your hat and shades were on, I still would have made the same compliment, as you do look youg and fantastic. Abby certainly looks like she's grown a lot since your last TR. Thank you for the advice and the luck with Skyler. That's exactly how we are at home is go with his body language and mood and just take it one day at a time. I truely do enjoy your TRs though. More please Darlene.

Thanks again Becki for everything. Abby has grown. I should post the picture of her when she first went to Disney - what a difference from then until now. If you ever have any questions or just want to vent about Skyler just PM me as I can always lend an ear and understand where you're coming from. As for more, I'm trying to do that today.

What a great day at AK! We have never seen the Nemo show, and I've decided to make it a must for our upcoming trip. Can't wait to hear more.

It was and Nemo is definitely a must do for us. It's much more enjoyable than the movie IMO.

What a fantastic day at AK you had. Glad to hear your breakfast at Tusker House was great, even if it wasn't much that you all ate. How wonderful that you got to see a lot of animals on the Safari(Abby's pictures from the Safari came out great)., as well as see the Parade, as well as Nemo, & FOTLK all in one day. Love all of your pictures. Sosorry to hear Lenny wasn't feeling well that day. Sounds like a nice and uiet evening in your room, with dinner. More please Darlene!

Thanks again Becki. The day was fantastic and that's the beauty of Disney IMO - the overall experience is what makes the restaurant worth it, not the amount of food we eat. Of course that's why I do buffets too - if we only want a little, that's all we have to take. If we want more, we can go and get some more. The safari was a surprise to me as we've seen lots of animals and other times we've seen next to none. That day we just happen to hit the jackpot. For seeing everthing, that was just a matter of planning ahead (and you all know how much I plan) and paying attention to the time and the times guide. Of course not hitting the big rides helped too. The only rides we hit were the Safari, Primeval whirl (which only had a 15 or 20 minute wait by the time we got to it) and Triceratop Spin (which had next to no line so it was maybe a 5 minute wait). Being in the park for 12 hours didn't hurt either. It was a long day hour wise but we did what we wanted and didn't rush to do any of it. Lenny did eventually feel better but it wasn't that day.

Just getting to your trip report and I am so glad to hear this year's start was waaaay better than the trip last year. It sounds like y'all had a fabulous time! Can't wait to hear more!

Thanks Dora. I would have to say as a whole, this entire vacation was better than last year. I'm not saying last year was bad but this year definitely has way more high moments.

Another great day Darlene!! Love the pictures!

Thanks Marnie. I'm glad you're enjoying it.

I just found your trip report and I am all caught up. Sounds like you guys had a good couple of days. The autotrain sounds neat. I have never heard of it until now. I will have to check it out.

How awesome about CRT. We just went there and the place was full. We had a great time but it was definitiely not empty like on your day.

I was hoping for some pics of the parade at AK as that is something we never were able to see on our last trip.

Thanks for sharing your trip with us. More please!!

Thanks. I'm glad you're enjoying my TR. I never used to know about the Auto Train but I learned about it from the first Passporter book I bought and the rest is history as they say. I don't know why I didn't take pictures of the parade this year. I should have a bunch in last year's TR if you want to look. You could also YouTube it as I'm sure people have put it there. It's definitely a fun parade and worth seeing but it's just such an odd time (3:45) and unless you plan out your time really, really well, it is easy to miss that due to another show.

Sounds like a great day at Animal Kingdom! Glad Abby enjoyed Prime evil twirl and stayed through the entire ITTBAB show (hopefully we can do the same next time)

I was surprised she enjoyed it so much. I was afraid she'd get off saying it made her dizzy but maybe as she's gotten older it's not so much of an issue as it was when she did EE 2 years ago. Hopefully you can make it through ITTBAB

Sounds like a fun day at AK! And it's great that you were able to find breakfast options that agreed with you.

It was really fun. And as for the food, I have the chef to thank - he's the one that made the eggs and potatoes without oils and stuff and it really was the best breakfast I had all week.

[CinderAbby]

What a fun day at AK! I had a great time reading your TR. I love Nemo too! I think they do such a great job with it. Abby has a talent taking pictures, for sure, and I too think she is VERY brave that she wanted to ride Primeval Whirl more than once makes me think that even more. Those sharp turns on that ride SCARE me (my kiddos laugh b/c I'm truly scared. lol). I bet Lady Divine loved having someone acknowledge her by saying, "Good Morning." We have seen her and it never occurred to me to ever speak to her. Way to go Lenny! I can't wait to hear more!

Thanks for all the comments. Abby loves taking pictures but I don't know where she gets it from. I take pictures but they don't always come out that good. I never thought to say good morning either - I was too busy watching her but yeah, I would think she would like to be acknowledged by someone. I wonder if it bothers her when people walk by and don't even notice her

The photos of Abby dressed up and with the drums are just TOO CUTE for words. You all look so happy in these photos. Glad you had a great time.

What didn't you like about It's Tough to be a Bug?? This is one of the few shows we're planning to do in AK during our December trip, so I am just curious for personal reasons.

Really enjoying this TR

Thanks, I'm glad you're enjoying it. As for ITTBAB, I was disappointed in the length of the show (I think it was only 5 minutes long). It showcased the defense system of a couple of bugs but that took maybe 5 or 10 seconds tops for each and it just wasn't very interesting. I watch a lot of Discovery channel programs that show a lot more so maybe that's why I found it so boring. Then once Hopper came out (that was cool to see) the only thing going on was flashing lights and smoke, there wasn't even anything on the screen that I saw. So it wasn't really any one thing in particular - it was the show as a whole.

Darlene I just love the picture of the three of you "holding" the balloons. It is such a great family picture.
Once again it is like being there in the park with you. The TR is great as well as all the pictures. AK is not my favorite park but you have made me want to try it again.
Can't wait for "tomorrow".

Thanks again Olive. I'm really glad you guys are enjoying my TR so much. And I'm glad that you'll give AK another try. For us, the AK just really works (even more so this year) because its a "low key" park. It's not all rides and lines. Yes, it's people everywhere but we can wander and just stop to look at things when we want and if Abby wants to sit in Dinoland and daydream instead of dig for the dino bones, she can. The other parks just don't have that much hands on, less overwhelming sections for Abby that here does. That could be why she likes Nemo at Epcot so much.

Your AK day was a great success! I love those early morning ADR's - it gives you such a nice early, uncrowded start to the day! Abby's safari pictures were great - loved the baby elephant! You all got alot accomplished but still seemed able to follow your own pace! We've never managed to see the parade at AK - I want to make that a priority for our next trip. Glad you're all having such a magical trip

Thanks - and you're right about the early start. I really, really enjoyed it and what made it extra special this year for us is that Wednesday was NOT an EMH like it has been in the past. When could actually see what the park is like with nobody around And then being there for 12 hours really helped with getting done what we did. The parade is good and like I said, it gets tough trying to get to it with the times of the other shows unless you really take the time to plan out all the shows. Good luck with seeing it though.

What a great day at AK, Darlene! You all got a lot done and it doesn't appear you were rushed at all! Love all the pictures!

Thanks Cam, we weren't rushed. We just did what we wanted but just kept our eyes on the time and the times guide.

I love your details about AK. That is the one park I've never been too, and I'm excited to go when we head down in February. I was thinking we'd make it a shorter day, but now I'm thinking we might want to be there earlier than we planned. It looks like a ton of fun!

Thanks. AK is a fun park depending upon what you want to get out of it. The 4 things we wanted to make sure we did was Nemo, the Parade, Dinoland and FOLK. Outside of that, we did what we felt like and just took our time so all the other stuff was a "bonus" (playing Mancala, seeing DiVine, etc)

Sounds like a great AK day! My daughter (8) got scared to death on ITTBAB and screamed bloody murder when she got "stung" I spent the rest of the movie calming her down so that everyone else in the theater could enjoy the movie. She's on the fence about doing it again, so I will have to tell her how brave Abby was to help sway her into seeing it again (since the rest of the family would like to).

Sorry about Lenny being sick - no fun, especially on vacation. On the other hand, it sounds like you got your breakfast problem under control, I hope it stayed that way your whole trip!

It was fun. If it makes any difference, Abby was so brave partly because she was sitting on Lenny's scooter so she got none of the 4D seat effects. Lenny and I both sat forward on the seats instead of sitting back so we didn't feel them either if that might help your daughter try it again. We don't know what happened with Lenny. We don't know if it was something he ate or what but we both seem to remember it happening last year as well but as for my breakfast issues, I will admit yes, it was much better this year but you'll have to stay tuned though to find out anything else.

Hi Darlene,
I just found your trip report and have been enjoying it. It sounds like you and your family are having a great vacation! FYI - they do sell the NEMO soundtrack. We bought it a couple years ago. I think we picked it up at a store in AK, but it's been awhile so I'm not sure.

I have to say I went back and read your prior trip reports (I feel like I know you now) because we take the Auto Train to WDW too, so it was interesting to read about your experiences on it. We really enjoy it. Our next trip is in mid October and we're taking it then. In one of your TR's or PTR's you were considering taking another route to Lorton. We're from Central CT and usually head over the Tappan Zee to the Garden State, the NJ Turnpike, then 95 and it takes us about 6 hours to get to Lorton. The traffic through the big cities isn't bad (I don't like to sit in traffic either), although we try to avoid traveling during the busiest times of day.

I'm looking forward to reading about the rest of your trip!

Tracey

Hi Tracy. Thanks so much - I'm glad you're enjoying my TR. I now wish I had taken the time to look in the stores at AK for the music. I didn't think to look for it until a couple of days later and I never found it - but we weren't at AK either (I would think the music they might sell at all the parks but then again, maybe not.)

Yeah, it was this year we were considering a different route to the Auto Train but stuck with what we knew. For the next trip though (whenever that is) we ARE going to go a different route. I obviously won't decide until it's closer but it's between doing the Garden State parkway or 287. We typically travel on the weekends so I would hope the traffic wouldn't be that bad but like I said, I can't decide until we actually will be going again (and for those hoping for another TR soon, it's not going to be until Fantasyland is done - I mean it this time).

[Katie]

Great pics! Sounds like you really covered a lot of stuff, giving hope to me that 1 day in AK is ok. We usually do a day and a half but are going to try for 1 day next trip. Looking forward to more.

[CinderAbby]

Just got all caught up with your report. You have some wonderful pictures, and it looks like a wonderful trip! We had a similar experience in the Castle ourselves. Cinderella was so personable, it made my best friend cry (in a good way). I like to tease her about it, but it was really magical. Can't wait to read more.

Thanks, I'm glad you enjoy it and it's nice to hear others have a nice experience like we did too. I'll hopefully post the next day tonight

I'm all caught up and it sounds like you guys are having a wonderful trip! The experience at CRT sounds great! It also sounds like you guys had a great day at AK!

We did and thanks for reading along.

subscribing, love it so far but I'm only on page 4, I can't wait to read more. I laughed when you said DH was being grumpy, I have one of those too!

I think we all have one of those at times, whether it's a hubby, a parent or a kid

All caught up, I'm so glad you called about your stomach problems it sounds as if you are getting some awesome chef interaction to help. Abby seems to be having a magical trip. I love your sun hat, I'm needing a new one and yours is awesome. Great signature pic, (I love cropping the pics too!) Can't wait for more

Glad you got caught up now. And I can't tell you how glad I was too that I said something. It really made for a nicer trip being able to eat in the mornings and not feel sick after. And other than 1 chef, the rest were all great. Abby really has a great time when we're at Disney and she so looks forward to the trips that I'm glad this year really was so fantastic. I got my hat at Walmart years ago. It has seen the last 4 trips to Disney and Lenny has even had to repair it once or twice. Now it's getting to the point I may have to break down and replace it though.

Great AK pics! I love all the Tree of Life ones. You really accomplished a lot that day!

Thanks. I guess we did but like I said, we were there for 12 hours but I don't regret staying that long.

Wow, a hotel bed that is too soft? I don't think I've ever witnessed that before. haha. How old is Abby now? She has grown and looks so much bigger than in your sig pic

Trust me, it was too soft (when I sat, I didn't think I was going to stop it was so soft) and since we sleep on firm/extra firm beds at home, pretty much all hotel mattresses are too soft for us. Just normally they're not that bad but this one was definitely an exception to the rule.

Abby's 10 and she takes after her father. She's always been at or over the 100 percentile mark for height, even back when she was born. And which picture are you refering to - the old sig picture or the new one? And if you think she's grown since whatever pictures your comparing, you should see her when she was at Disney the first time. She's really, really grown since then.

I thought the same thing but it was the newspaper font I was having to squint at. Today 12:06 PM

I thought the same thing but it was the newspaper font I was having to squint at.

I got that all fixed so you should be all set now. Hopefully no more squinting for anyone.

Guess I'm all caught up for now. Can't wait for another instalment!

I'm trying to get it in for tonight. It's just taking a while though with all the things going on around the house today.

What a wonderful day at AK!! Abby did a wonderful job taking pictures on the safari!

Thanks. She really enjoys taking them and I don't know where she gets it from. Maybe she'll grow up to be a professional photographer (at Disney Lenny is hoping).

[CinderAbby]

Great pics! Sounds like you really covered a lot of stuff, giving hope to me that 1 day in AK is ok. We usually do a day and a half but are going to try for 1 day next trip. Looking forward to more.

Thanks Kate but when you do AK for yourself, please keep in mind we did a 12 hour day. We were at the AK parking lot at 7:30 and then we had our 8:15 ADR. The park hours that day were 9 to 7 but we were there at 7:30 for our 8:15 breakfast. So in essence, when we got out of the Tusker House, we were already in Africa while a lot of people were probably still just trying to get through security and the turnstiles. And in Disney, sometimes that 10 or 15 minutes really can make a difference.

[CinderAbby]

Thursday August 12th

I was up early again to do laundry this day. With no one else using the machines, I was able to get everything done quickly. Once everything was folded and put away, I laid back down because I was tired. Besides, with Lenny and Abby sleeping in, there was no reason for me to miss out on the extra sleep myself. When my alarm went off at 9, Lenny was up and still not feeling well. He was going to go to Walmart for some Kaopectate but I told him not to. Even though Disney can be expensive for items like that, I told Lenny it was well worth the price just for the time saved. He agreed and I ran to the gift shop for him. All they had was Pepto Bismol and hoping it would do the trick, I bought it for him.

Unfortunately when I left the room, I didn’t realize I had hit snooze on the alarm so when I got back, Abby was awake. Once Lenny took his Pepto and we were ready for the day, we headed to Epcot where we had a lunch ADR at Akershus. We were at Epcot about 10:45

but by the time we got the scooter out of the van and through security and the turnstiles, there wasn’t a lot of time to do much. We had a couple of pictures taken then headed to WS.

Because we know Mexico never has a line, we hit that before lunch. After we found Donald, we headed to Norway and even though we were a few minutes early, we didn’t wait long before we were called in. Just like at CRT, we saw Belle, Cindy, Snow White, Aurora and Ariel.

It also wasn’t busy - there were lots of empty takes in there. There was no notation of my intolerance here but I didn’t care. I’ve eaten here before and I knew what I could eat. For the hot food, Abby got the grilled chicken and ate it well. Lenny got the venison sausage and liked it. I tried it and thought it was gross. I ordered the chicken sandwich and it was very good. It had bacon that I took off right away. It also had lingonberry sauce which was good - it tasted like 1000 Island dressing - but that had to go too. I was afraid I might have problems eating it because of the heaviness of it. Overall, it was another excellent experience at Akershus. The food was really good, the interaction was really good and I wouldn’t hesitate to go back again.

After lunch, Abby wanted to ride Imagination so we headed back to FW.

Unfortunately, there were some technical difficulties and the ride kept stopping which upset Abby. when we finally got off the ride, we started heading out of the park to go to TL. As we passed under the geosphere, we felt a few rain drops and then a CM asked if we had eaten at a TS restaurant that day. I said we had and he asked if I would take a short survey about it. I agreed because I thought he would stand there and ask questions. I was surprised when he told me that it’s done by computer in an area behind the camera store. I wasn’t thrilled with that news as Abby wanted to get to TL but I agreed so I did what I said I would. A few minutes later I was really glad though that I had agreed to the survey. After I started it, the barely there sprinkle turned into a downpour. Because we were under a roof, we were nice and dry and Abby didn’t complain about the rain at all. She could watch Stitch too while I was doing it which might have helped.

By the time I was done, so was the rain. Once I told the CM we were done, we headed back to the van to go to TL.

We were at TL in only a few minutes and whatever clouds that were over Epcot definitely were not over us at TL. Instead of heading right to the changing rooms though we went right to the gift shop for (are you ready??) - some pressed pennies. The machine wasn’t there last year when we tried for them but I had read the machine was put back and we wanted to try for them. It was there and as Abby was pressing all the coins, I got to talking with one of the CM’s standing there at the lost children section. She asked if we had ever been there before and when I told her I had been but Lenny and Abby hadn’t been, she told us to wait for her to get back. She went away and came back and gave us some 1st visit pins that I put onto our beach bag. We continued to talk for another minute and then I thanked her and we made our way to the changing room. It was hot and sunny enough at TL (unlike at Epcot) that I decided to wear my t-shirt so my back wouldn’t burn to a crisp. Then Lenny mentioned getting a locker. I didn’t really want to spend the money but he said his hip was hurting enough that he didn’t want to do a lot of walking. I went and got our key and after about 10 minutes of searching, we finally found our locker. We then made our way to the lazy river. We got in and we saw a Photopass photographer right away so we got some shots from him.

We stayed in there a while and then we went over to the wave pool. I didn’t want to as the last time I was at TL, it knocked me down and scraped me pretty good but seeing a Photopass Photographer in the water, I braved it for the shot.

Just like I expected, I went down again, as did Abby but she got up laughing. After that, I told Lenny I was getting out, I didn’t like the wave pool but I wasn’t fast enough - it knocked me down again. I finally made my way over to the edge were you can sit and get hit by the waves that way but I was kind of nervous the whole time. I really couldn’t see where Lenny and Abby were and I was concerned. Those are big waves and if they can knock me down, I was worried about what it might do to Abby.

After a while, Lenny wasn’t feeling good again because of the waves and he and Abby got out. We decided to try and find the family raft ride. Despite all the ups and downs of the walkway, we finally got there and thankfully there weren’t too many stairs. Lenny was able to do them (with a few stops along the way) and between the two of us, we got the raft up the stairs. All I can say about this family raft ride is it was totally wimpy compared to the one at BB. We got off unimpressed with it and Abby wanted the wave pool again.

After the family raft we stopped to watch the wave pool for a few minutes

I didn’t want it nor did Lenny but this time, we were on the left of the wave pool in that little section that has a couple of slides. The minute Abby saw the slides, she wanted them so even though the sign said 60 inches or under, we went up the stairs. Abby was just a little bit taller than that but the lifeguard allowed it. I thanked him for that and asked if Abby could keep going down the slide. He said as long as he was there, he would allow it but since he wasn’t going to be there much longer (someone else was coming to relieve him), he couldn’t guarantee anything after he left. I thanked him again saying that wasn’t a problem as we were on our way out soon too.

Abby went down those slides quite a few times and then she decided she wanted to go into the wave pool again. Instead of listening to me (like the well behaved child she is) she went around that little wall protecting the slides just as one of the big waves was coming. I told her to grab onto the end post there so the wave wouldn’t knock her down but she was too late. The wave not only knocked her over, it also washed her into 2 people - an older lady and another kid according to Lenny. I was holding on for dear life and only caught people going down out of the corner of my eye and while it brought a smile to my face (I had a funniest home video moment) it wasn’t funny as someone could have gotten hurt. Everyone got up and no one was hurt thankfully but since I wasn’t entirely sure of which people she took out (I was still holding on), I didn’t apologize to anyone. We left the wave pool after that and I left thinking that if you’re in a wave pool with waves like that, you can’t get mad if something like that happens. Am I sorry it happened? Yes, but it is still a wave pool and if you don’t want something like that happening then you shouldn’t be in it.

So we left the wave pool after that. Even though Abby didn’t say she scared or anything because of the wave, she willingly left the wave pool. I was hoping to leave the water park and head to DHS for maybe a ride or two on TSM then Fantasmic that night but Abby wasn’t ready to leave yet. She wanted a little bit more time at TL so we went back to the lazy river. It was really nice because there were so few people in it at that time (it was probably 6:30 or so) and we stayed in and went around twice. When we got back to Lenny’s wheelchair, we got out because we were getting hungry. Abby wanted the AS Sports food court for dinner so that’s where we headed. We did stop real quick to get a TL refillable mug but then we continued on our way.

On the way back to the hotel, we threw around some ideas of what we wanted to do after dinner. It was still early - not even 8 PM yet - and the only choices we had were MK or Epcot. I was thinking Epcot because it had PM EMH and would be open until midnight and everyone seemed to like that idea. Once we got to the hotel and showered though, Abby put on her pajamas. I was okay with that. The more I thought about it, the less I wanted to leave the room that late at night. I know it wasn’t overly late (probably only 8:30ish or so) but we still hadn’t gotten dinner and I was getting tired. Besides, when I thought back to our last PM EMH at Epcot, we didn’t enjoy it that much so there wasn’t much incentive to try again IMO. So we just got our dinners, watched some tv and called it a day.

[Colexis Mom]

Another great day! Glad you had at great time at Akershus and at TL! Love the pictures!

[B.M.]

Sounds like a great meal at Akershus and a great time at Typhoon Lagoon

[Cam22]

Sounds like Abby had a most wonderful time at TL in spite of getting knocked over by the waves. Stefanie and I always stay way back at the edge of the wave pool as there is no way either one of us can stand up against the waves.

[WeRDisneyFanatics]

Sounds like another great day! Sorry Lenny wasn't feeling well.