Food & Wine Festival/1st Anniversary and Mousetacular Holiday PTRs (UPDATED 6/13) - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
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You may remember our Dream Disneymoon back in December 2010. It was our first trip to Disney as a couple, and we got bit—HARD—by the Disney bug. It’s our happy place, and we can’t WAIT to go back. (We only wish we could take our three-year-old cavapoo, George, with us! It’s just not home without him. )
What: Our first stay as DVC members! I told you we were bit hard. We joined the best club on earth during our honeymoon, and this will be our first trip as members. SO EXCITING!
When: October 15-18, 2010
Where: Currently, we’re booked in a Standard Deluxe Studio in Bay Lake Tower (our home resort), but I plan to get on the waiting list for the Boardwalk as soon as the seven month window opens.
Why: Two awesome reasons, and they’re both in the title of this PTR!
First, we’re sort of huge foodie dorks, and we’ve wanted to go to the Food and Wine Festival forever. We actually signed up for the Grape Getaway last year, but then canceled at the last minute because the price was just too darn steep for us.
Second, it’s our first anniversary gift to us! If you don’t give yourself the gift of Disney, who will?
The Tickets
One sticking point: we’re not sure what kind of tickets we’re going to buy.
You see, this is only the first of two trips we plan to take in 2011 AND we’re in the very early stages of planning a trip in mid-2012. If we are going on three trips (totaling 14 days) in one year, it totally makes sense to buy APs … but if we don’t go into the parks every day or if one of the trips becomes shorter for any reason … well, then we wasted money!
Do we really need APs? If we don’t buy them, should we get park hoppers? How much hopping are we really going to do during F&W?? Honestly. We could easily spend all four of our days only in Epcot. But maybe we’d better plan on at least one of those days for other parks?
We’ve put that decision on the backburner for now (we really don’t have to make a decision until October, right?) but if you have any advice, I’d love it hear it!
The Dining
Right off the bat, I knew I didn’t want to do ANY ADRs before we left for this trip.
I know. That sounds insane. But here’s the thing …
I was totally inspired by Erin Foster’s experiences “stuck” at Disney World with no ADRs at an extremely busy time. If she could do it at Christmastime with a party of five, certainly Rob and I could do it with just the two of us!
Plus, with Food and Wine in full swing during our visit, certainly we won’t be eating many, if any, sit down meals during our four days!
So no meal reservations … except ONE. We are definitely going to do dinner at Narcoossee’s for our first anniversary dinner. So, we’ll have that ADR. But that’s it! No other ADRs. We’ll plan it all on the fly, relying on last-minute visits to the Internet or Guest Services.
The Travel
We were “lucky” in that our flight out of JFK was delayed and then canceled on our way home from our Disneymoon.
“Lucky.” Ha.
What I mean by that is that we had to rent a car to drive home, but JetBlue graciously refunded our tickets AND offered us tons of True Blue Points. As a result, we have enough money in our JetBlue account to book 5 flights (two round trip flights and one extra flight), so this trip’s travel is almost paid for!
That’s where I stand right now. I haven’t thought about WHAT we’re going to do other than spend a LOT of time at Epcot. This trip will sort of be a learning experience for us because we’ve never traveled as DVC members before. I recently ordered a copy of the Passporter DVC book, and I'm hoping that'll help me figure some things out.
I’ll be updating with more information as it develops ...
Rob and I are gearing up for our planning by reading Trip Reports from Food and Wine Festival! We’ve read one a night so far … if you’ve written a F&W Trip Report (or have a favorite), please share!!
And a funny story: yesterday, I was talking with Rob about our “no-ADR” plan, and he tweaked a bit. We’d talked about it before, but for some reason, it sent him into a panic. NO ADRs!! WHAT WILL WE EAT?!?!
We went over the plan again, and he agreed, but it was so funny.
Not much new to report. We’ve decided to get Annual Passes for the trips, so I’ve been researching that as well as the Tables in Wonderland card. I think we can make it work for us (instead of the dining plan), but I have been working with a couple of different spread sheets.
And we’ve been doing a lot of research into the different foods available during the last two F&W Festivals. We’re super psyched, and are starting to develop a game plan by reading other people’s TRs.
Our Preliminary Plans for October We’ll arrive as early as possible on Saturday, October 15, and spend the evening in a park—NOT Epcot. We’ll be tired from traveling, and I know I won’t do well with the Saturday night F&WF crowds. So it’ll probably be Magic Kingdom for the afternoon, Anniversary Dinner at Narcoossee’s, then back to our room for an early night.
Sunday, Monday and Tuesday will begin bright and early with breakfast in the room, followed by rope drop at whichever park has morning hours that day. We’ll head out of that park and get over to Epcot by 11am for lunch around the world.
After a break for digestion, our afternoons/evenings will be determined on the fly. We’re still committed to the no-advance dining reservations scheme (except for our anniversary dinner), so we’ll decide whether to go back to Epcot to graze for dinner OR make a last-minute ADR at whatever is available near the park we want to be at.
We’re also fully booked for Mousetacular during our December trip … I think I might just use this same Trip Report for both trips. Seems less messy that way. So, here’s the info on that trip:
MOUSTACULAR HOLIDAY TRIP What: Our second stay as DVC members, our second Christmastime at Disney and our first Mousetacular event.
When: December 8-11, 2011
Where: Currently, we’re booked in a Deluxe Studio Lake View in Bay Lake Tower (our home resort). Initially, we were thinking about calling at 7 months out to try to get into Wilderness Lodge (where the other Mousetacular folks are staying), but after seeing the events, we’re thinking we might try to stay at the Boardwalk or Beach Club.
Why: Both Judi and Sandy from Instant Impressions (the company behind Mousetacular) have been very, very kind to Robert and I, and we can’t wait to meet them. Plus, it’s an awesome excuse to meet other Disney fans and see The World decorated for the holidays again!
The Dining: As of now, we’re planning to go dining-plan-free, especially if we go with AP and Tables in Wonderland. Either way, I’d like to have tea at the Grand Floridian. I also want to try Fresh at the Dolphin because I’ve read such great things about it. I also think I want to have a special honeymoon-iversary dinner. (Is honeymoon-iversary a thing??)
Our Preliminary Plans for December:
We’ll arrive early on Thursday, December 8, and spend the first afternoon and evening in one of the parks—probably either Magic Kingdom or Animal Kingdom (or maybe both). We may attend the Disney Vacation Club Condominium Association Meeting (our first), but maybe not.
On Friday, December 9, who knows what we’ll get up to?!
Saturday, December 10, we’ll have breakfast at Kouzinna or Cape May, spend the morning in Epcot and then head over to Hollywood Studios. Lunch will be at 50s Prime Time, then a few hours of rides (and hopefully a Phineas and Ferb meet) before we hook up with the Mousetacular folks for dinner and some evening entertainment. Then we’ll hit the hay early because we have an early morning on Sunday …
When we’re meeting the Mousetacular gang in Epcot at 7:45 a.m. for a full morning of fun. Then it’ll be lunch (probably Via Napoli) and heading home. Sad!!
Some More Plans for October – Food and Wine and First Anniversary After reading lots of TRs (we still have several bookmarked, and looking for more all the time), there are several things we’re really looking forward to:
A Marketplace Discovery Passport: What a great memento!
A wristlet gift card
Tequila tasting in Mexico
Sweet Sunday brunch
We wanted to try the 3D Dessert Discovery, but unfortunately, we won’t be there on a Thursday or Friday. Maybe it’ll be different days this year. Or something to save for next time!
Some General Plans for October or December I’ve also been keeping a list of some things we’d like to try in general, either in October or December. If you have any suggestions or advice about any of them, please share!
Peter Pan’s Flight
Behind the Seeds Tour
Meet Phineas and Ferb in Hollywood Studios
Collect Transportation Cards
Get a mini-cupcake sampler at DHS
Bread pudding at Main Street Bakery
Tea at the Grand Floridian
Lunch at Fresh
Breakfast at Cape May
Tuesday morning, I call DVC MS to get on the waitlist for BWV (or BCV, if I can’t get BWV) for our October trip. I’ll be back Tuesday to report back on that!
Edited to add: Not sure how the thumbs down got in the title there ... weird.
Booked our flights this afternoon for the October trip! Airfare is out of control right now, and once I confirmed that SW wasn't going to save us money over JetBlue, I booked before prices could go up any higher!
We usually fly out of Rochester, but this time, it made more sense to fly out of Syracuse because the flights were timed better. On our way down, we have a direct flight, delivering us to MCO before 10am. On our way back, we have a 30 minute layover at JFK, but our return flight doesn't leave MCO until 7:40 pm, which is incredible! We won't have to leave WDW until 4:30/5pm!
Tomorrow morning is our seven month window. I'll let you know how it goes!
He rough chopped the macadamia nuts, then toasted them on the stove top until they started to brown a little bit (he said he knew they were done when they smelled toasty). Then, in the food processor, he whipped some stick butter until it was smooth, then he stirred in the nuts (by hand, although he said you could just throw them in the processor).
They were so yummy. I think next time, I may request that he whip a little bit of pineapple juice in there as well so we get the full effect of the Kona breakfast!!
He rough chopped the macadamia nuts, then toasted them on the stove top until they started to brown a little bit (he said he knew they were done when they smelled toasty). Then, in the food processor, he whipped some stick butter until it was smooth, then he stirred in the nuts (by hand, although he said you could just throw them in the processor).
They were so yummy. I think next time, I may request that he whip a little bit of pineapple juice in there as well so we get the full effect of the Kona breakfast!!
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We’d talked about it before, but for some reason, it sent him into a panic. NO ADRs!! WHAT WILL WE EAT?!?! 
Some General Plans
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