Mom's buying so we're flying TR About This Page:

[lazanya]

Glad to hear that your meal at OHana's was much better this time around!
Sorry about Lenny!
What a wonderful meal at CRT! And glad you had a great time at MK!

[Nyreak]

I love the pictures of Abby with the princesses, but I like the ones with the wand even better! We've never done CRT because Joc hasn't been all that interested in princesses yet. I look forward to the day she is, though, so I have an excuse to go.

Originally Posted by Ceara's mawmaw

I am the same way with my Dh....lol I have told my Dh the same exact thing! I am up before everyone too....and have to play drill sargent getting them all up and moving, saying we are at Disney and they are getting up and having fun if it kills them....lol Not really but you know what I mean....lol

I'm beginning to think this is most men (but not my Dad, so clearly not all). It's the same deal in our family with my husband and my FIL. I'm always the last to bed, because I like to get things prepped for the next day. I'm always the first out of bed, because if I'm not awake to get Ken and Joc up then they'll never get up.

[CinderAbby]

Originally Posted by buzzspal2

I haven't been to CRT. Next time for sure. I'm glad you are having a good time.

Thanks Tammy. Hopefully you get to try CRT

Originally Posted by shnewell

Glad you enjoyed CRT! We have always liked it as well, though it's been a few years since we ate there. My boys are old enough now that it's hard to convince them to go.

Love all the photos of Abby with the princesses and with Mickey & Minnie. Sounds like you got quite a bit done. The rain does help chase away some folks, which makes it easier for us die hard Disney people!

Thanks - I can see having trouble getting boys to go to CRT. Lenny enjoys it though - but more I think because he always gets called "my lord" than becauase we have a girl who enjoys the meal . I like when the rain chases lots of people away but not enough left that day IMO

Originally Posted by omd

I love the pictures of Abby with the princesses! She looks like she really enjoyed herself. Kudos to you and Abby for dealing with the rain. When it rains at Disney you just need to make the best of it. Hope things went better after a good night's sleep.

Thanks Olive. Abby really does enjoy the meals. Although I did notice this year she didn't want to look at them. I mean she's been like that in the past but for some reason it seemed like she was going backwards with the character interactions. I don't remember her turning away from the characters as much as she did this year - including the "real" characters. You'll just have to stay tuned to see if the vacation got any better.

Originally Posted by B.M.

Sounds like you got a lot done in the Magic Kingdom despite the rain!

We did. I had hoped for a few more things but with the rain, a few things we wanted were down - namely Splash Mountain and the carousel (not sure if that was due to the rain though)

Originally Posted by Ceara's mawmaw

I am the same way with my Dh....lol I have told my Dh the same exact thing! I am up before everyone too....and have to play drill sargent getting them all up and moving, saying we are at Disney and they are getting up and having fun if it kills them....lol Not really but you know what I mean....lol

Great TR thus far, I can't wait to continue reading about it.....

Thanks, I'm glad you're enjoying my TR. And I think a lot of us wives and mothers are the same way - "get up NOW, please and thank you

Originally Posted by Connieq288

Loving the TR. I hope the rest of your trip is better than the first 2 days although you sound like it didnt get you down. As for CRT, we went in 09 and Im going with DD in Dec and then DH and I are going in May. I love CRT.

Thanks I'm glad you enjoy it. You'll have to stay tuned to see if things get any better. I'm glad someone else likes CRT. I've read some not so good reviews of it but thankfully we all like something different - and I'm glad when someone else sees the magic in going there instead of giving another negative review.

[Jenny Pot Pie]

I love all your pictures! It seems you had such great character interactions and a lovely meal at CRT. I'm glad you were able to get so much done despite the rain. And I also have a husband that can turn into Grumpy too!

[CinderAbby]

Originally Posted by Cam22

So glad that you all ended up enjoying CRT! So sorry about all the rain this day, but it's obvious you didn't let it stop you all!

Thanks Cam. I gave Abby fair warning this year I wasn't going to leave the parks AT ALL because of rain. We could hop if she wanted but I wasn't going to leave them completely. I'm glad Abby didn't let the rain get to her this year like it did last year as she would really be the only thing stopping us from getting things done.

Originally Posted by coffeechef

CRT sounded like a lot of fun and I am glad that Abby enjoyed it. SHe looked so cute getting her picture taken with the Princesses and that some were more favorites than others. Your food sounded good,even with no pictures. Funny how some people just try to hide out from the rain. I duck into a place long enough to put on the Poncho. Lenny is right though, i will give him this one I too notice when we get a Jungle cruise pilot with good timing and have a sense of humor to go with their speil. Theymake it much more funny than the ones that just give out the lines.
an early night sounds like it was in order

Yes, Abby definitely has her favorite Princesses but sometimes I wonder if she picks up on something from them because some she'll really hug and others it's like okay, if I must give you a hug I will but lets make it quick . For us and the rain, if it isn't raining too bad, we won't even find cover for putting on the ponchos, we'll just stop where we're at and do it. OMG - please, whatever you do, don't let Lenny see the words "he's right " If you do, it'll go to his head as he's almost never right about anything at all .

Originally Posted by mcc0313

Sorry for the rain, we are the same way, unless it is a typhoon going on it is just rain. We hit it a few times on our trip, grabbed the umbrella and moved on while everyone else stayed huddled in doorways.

So glad that you had such a wonderful meal at CRT, love all the photos of Abby with the chracters. Love her choices of baby plushes as well, Angel likes them and has the Simba and just got the Dumbo for her birthday.

And Lenny sometimes thinks I'm crazy for staying in the rain. With the exception of coffeechef's "he's right" comment I need to show Lenny these posts so he sees I'm not crazy for wanting to stick around in the rain. I mean he'll stay but sometimes he'll question why we do. And thanks for the comments. Abby absolutely loves her Disney Babies and while we didn't see him in the parks (we didn't go crazy in all the gift shops this year) I found a baby Dumbo at the airport that I bought and tried to hide for maybe a Christmas gift but Abby found it one me and I had to give it to her.

Originally Posted by tinker_me_happy

I had a couple of great experiences in the rain at Disney! Cleared the parks right out! Once at Epcot I was alone because my family wanted to sleep in so I just skipped merrily along - no umbrella, splashing in the puddles and getting soaked! People thought I was nuts, but hey, I was having fun! And another time at MK there was literally NO ONE except me, my sister and little Evan in Fantasyland! After about 20 minutes a mom, 2 little princesses and their grandma showed up! It was great!
Never let the rain slow you down! Hopefully we'll hear about the sun shining for the rest of your trip though!

I probably would have thought you were kind of nuts too but it would have had me smiling and having fun. I wish I could have that kind of experience but I don't think it ever will happen. That's okay though. I don't mention weather too much in my report but you'll have to stay tuned to see if we did get any more rain or not.

Originally Posted by lazanya

Glad to hear that your meal at OHana's was much better this time around!
Sorry about Lenny!
What a wonderful meal at CRT! And glad you had a great time at MK!

Thanks so much Jodi

Originally Posted by Nyreak

I love the pictures of Abby with the princesses, but I like the ones with the wand even better! We've never done CRT because Joc hasn't been all that interested in princesses yet. I look forward to the day she is, though, so I have an excuse to go. .

You never know, she might like it. The kids get wands (or swords for boys) and wishing stars and there's a little ceremony where you hear the FGmother's voice and lights twinkle. It's cute and when the kids don't know it's going to happen, they just get this look on their faces like "Wow!!" It's priceless IMO.

[CinderAbby]

Originally Posted by Jenny Pot Pie

I love all your pictures! It seems you had such great character interactions and a lovely meal at CRT. I'm glad you were able to get so much done despite the rain. And I also have a husband that can turn into Grumpy too!

Thanks. Lenny, at any moment, can turn into any one of the 7 Dwarfes. More often than not he's Grumpy. After Grumpy, he's almost as often Sleepy. When Abby breaks something he's Doc. As a male, he has times that he's Dopey. I hate it when he's Sneezy as he's so loud. He can be Happy - but not often . He's rarely Bashful but I'm pretty sure I've seen it a time or two.

[CinderAbby]

Saturday July 23 Part 1

With an early ADR for TH and the knowledge that starting at 6 am it’s hard to get washers, I was up nice and early at 5 am on Saturday morning. I went and started our laundry and then I headed back to the room to actually get ready for the day. When I was done doing that, I went back to the laundry room to throw our stuff in the dryers. When I got back to the room the second time, I washed up our mugs and started putting stuff on the scooter we’d need for the day (our water mugs, clean towels etc) Around 6, I took our refillable mugs to the food court and filled them with coffee and soda and then I popped into the laundry room to take out whatever clothes were already dry. I then headed back to the room again to wake Lenny up. He got up and ready while I finished the laundry and then at 6:45 it was time to wake Abby up. We were finally out of the hotel about 7:30 and on our way to the AK.

When we got to the parking lot and Lenny started putting the scooter back together, we noticed a tour group heading into the park . We weren’t thrilled as that meant one thing - they were going to TH. Lenny wanted to rush and get ahead of them but I told him to take his time - we had plenty of time to get to our ADR.

We finally headed into the park but I don’t know what time it was. IMO it’s really nice to have a really early ADR and get into the park before it’s officially open. There’s nobody around and it’s nice and quiet. And because Lenny took his time with the scooter, we didn’t even see the tour group anywhere . However, unlike last year, we didn’t see any Photopass people and I was disappointed by that. I enjoyed being able to get our photos last year with very few - if any - people in the background.

　
So with no Photopass person to be seen, we just continued on to TH. We arrived there and checked in and after maybe a minute, our name was called. We went and got our photos taken with Donald and then were shown to our table. We liked the table we got - it was in the front corner (nearest the buffet) of what I’ll call the main room (the room on the right of where everyone enters the restaurant). And because they were nice and quiet (for a change), we didn’t let the fact that the tour group was seated in the same section bother us. As soon as our server offered us drinks and told me the Chef would come talk to me, Lenny and Abby were off checking out the buffet. A minute later the Chef was at the table . Just like last year, he went up the buffet line with me but unlike last year, a good majority of the offerings I was able to eat right off the line . I thanked him for his time and help and went back to the table to see if Lenny was there so I could put our bags down. He was so I went up to get myself some breakfast. I have no idea what everyone had that morning but I know it all disappeared and whatever it was I took was really good and didn’t bother me at all.

And during breakfast, despite Lenny’s earlier comment in the parking lot ("I want to get ahead of the tour group"), he now said "I’m glad they got here before us. At least we didn’t have to deal with them up at the buffet line." I have to agree with that because any time you get 30 to 40 people (tour group or not) at a buffet line at the same time it’s just a pain to get anything. And all during breakfast, they were actually fine. Once they were done eating they started getting loud but I didn’t think they were any louder than any other restaurant that has a room full of people. I can’t even say if they left before or after us.

After breakfast (which we got out of at exactly 9:02) we headed with the mass of people that were in that section of the park already to the Safari ride. As usual, Abby took over the camera for it but unlike in past years, it didn’t seem like we saw as many animals. I don’t know if it was due to it being hot and sticky already or if Disney is feeding them in different areas because of the Wild Africa Tour.

Whatever the reason, it was still enjoyable and once we were done with our Safari, we headed down the Pangani Walking trail. Here we had some better animal sightings than in past years of doing the trail. The Okapi wasn’t hiding this time and we finally saw a hippo up close - and I can’t believe how huge it was.

We also saw some gorillas but I have to laugh about this. I’m not sure what the huge attraction was in the female section (the section behind the glass) because there had to have been at least 25 people all squished into one corner of the exhibit looking at something. I don’t know what, we couldn’t get close, so we just continued on and enjoyed the fact that everybody was behind us. We did see a couple of male gorillas but we didn’t stay long to watch them.

This is The End of Part 1 of our AK day

[Colexis Mom]

Great pictures from AK! Glad it was a good start to the day!

[JKnott17]

Sounds like a great start to the day! Maybe those people in the Gorilla section were looking at Lilly, the baby gorilla?

[shnewell]

Great morning at AK! We are eating at TH for the first time in December, and hearing your review has me even more excited for it.

Abby got some good photos, especially the one of the giraffe having a snack. And that hippo really is huge!

Too bad there were no Photopass photographers to be found. I have found that the morning sunlight on the Tree of Life makes for a lovely photo, and even more so if there aren't 100 other people in the background!

[WeRDisneyFanatics]

Sounds like a great start to the day at AK. I'm bummed that we had to cancel our TH breakfast in January but hoping to do it next time.

[Nyreak]

Originally Posted by CinderAbby

You never know, she might like it. The kids get wands (or swords for boys) and wishing stars and there's a little ceremony where you hear the FGmother's voice and lights twinkle. It's cute and when the kids don't know it's going to happen, they just get this look on their faces like "Wow!!" It's priceless IMO.

Oh, I don't doubt she'd enjoy it either way. My reasoning is that if she isn't into the princesses yet there isn't much point in fussing to try to get a reservation when there is some other little girl that would do back flips in order to get in. Once Jocelyn has more interest in them, I'll be with the other folks praying for a reservation!

[jimmymac]

Just caught up on your TR. I'm glad about the sunglasses and I','m just loving it

[Luvsun]

I love eating at Tusker House! And I agree with you about getting in to park early due to breakfast ressies! I love walking back to TH with hardly anyone else going down the path!
Your pictures of the the safari are great!

[CinderAbby]

Originally Posted by Colexis Mom

Great pictures from AK! Glad it was a good start to the day!

Thanks Marnie. It was a really good start to the day

Originally Posted by JKnott17

Sounds like a great start to the day! Maybe those people in the Gorilla section were looking at Lilly, the baby gorilla?

Thanks, it was. As for what they were looking at, I have no idea. We couldn't get close and I wasn't about to stop and ask. They way they were all smushed in the one corner, nobody seemed friendly enough to ask.

Originally Posted by shnewell

Great morning at AK! We are eating at TH for the first time in December, and hearing your review has me even more excited for it.

Abby got some good photos, especially the one of the giraffe having a snack. And that hippo really is huge!

Too bad there were no Photopass photographers to be found. I have found that the morning sunlight on the Tree of Life makes for a lovely photo, and even more so if there aren't 100 other people in the background!

I'm glad you're going to give it a try. I think it's worth it and enjoyable - there are so many things to choose from that if you go hungry, it's your own fault. And the characters are good and I know I didn't mention it but they do a parade just like Ohana's. Abby does really well with photos. I'm not sure where she gets it from because I try but half the time I don't do nearly so well. And I agree about the morning sun on the tree - it does make for nice photos.

Originally Posted by WeRDisneyFanatics

Sounds like a great start to the day at AK. I'm bummed that we had to cancel our TH breakfast in January but hoping to do it next time.

- Sorry you had to cancel. Hopefully you get to go there. We did have a great start to the day (for a change).

Originally Posted by Nyreak

Oh, I don't doubt she'd enjoy it either way. My reasoning is that if she isn't into the princesses yet there isn't much point in fussing to try to get a reservation when there is some other little girl that would do back flips in order to get in. Once Jocelyn has more interest in them, I'll be with the other folks praying for a reservation!

I hear you on that but we all know Disney, they can and do change things from time to time. I hope you get to go there before it changes (if it ever does).

Originally Posted by jimmymac

Just caught up on your TR. I'm glad about the sunglasses and I','m just loving it

Thanks Jimmy. I'm glad you're enjoying my TR.

Originally Posted by Luvsun

I love eating at Tusker House! And I agree with you about getting in to park early due to breakfast ressies! I love walking back to TH with hardly anyone else going down the path!
Your pictures of the the safari are great!

This is one of the meals I don't hear complaints about needing to get up early for, believe it or not. Maybe because it's so quiet in the park and we know it doesn't stay that way for long. I'm glad you enjoy the pictures. I'll let Abby know as she's the one who took them