The Galavanting Graduates--November 2013 PTR - UPDATED 10/8 - Page 2 - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
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Brief interruption of this pre-trip report because we have suffered a death in the family. It wasn't a shock as my grandmother has been several months on hospice care, but my parents had moved her into their home in May and we have all been very involved in care-taking.
She is much better off as she was bed bound, suffering from Alzheimers, and her body just finally gave out; but we are sad and have a lot of arrangements to take care of this week.
My next update is almost ready, so we'll be continuing on here soon.
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for the support! We are all doing well. One uncle tends to be more emotional than the others (my grandma only had 3 boys) and so some of the funeral arrangements are getting a little sticky. The other 2 sons (including my dad, who has gotten an earful from we grandkids ) are tending to just let him have his way, but the things he is wanting to do are strange...like give her funeral talk himself and send an odd ball obituary to the newspaper.
My dad is finally stepping up to calm some of the things that are going to cause hurt feelings, but I worry that it is too little and too late. Only blessing is my other uncle isn't here yet, and if things get fixed, there may be some things he never needs to know.
SOOO anyway.........thanks for listening to the vent and we will get back to the final plans!!
So I believe we are finally at the final big change. My mom didn't think we still had enough time scheduled in Florida. Remember this was to be a quick 3 nights on property to get Kara’s nagging taken care of and to keep costs down as much as possible since this was an unexpected expense this year.
The setup for this change: Last anniversary Eric and I drove the more than 700 miles to the Outer Banks. Now all Passporter readers know that Jennifer and Dave recommend stopping for anything over 500 miles. My family has never really abided by this *rule*. Firstly because growing up, we had very little hotel money and families who lived very far away, so we just drove through the night most times. Secondly, my dad’s family plays a game with each other called “let’s-see-in-how-few-hours-I-can-make-the-22-hour-drive-between-us”. If you also have a player of this game in your family, you have my sympathies.
The rules basically go like this…….you put your family in the car where your wife has thoughtfully provided them with “treasure bags” of snacks because she wants to make the trip special and also because she knows there are no unnecessary stops allowed. You stay in this car driving vigorously toward your destination through all requests for stops, walks, drinks, and bathrooms. You get food at the same time you stop for bathrooms and you only stop for bathrooms when you get gas.
Anyone else ever played this *game*? Ahhh so it is just us……..I always suspected.
There are 4 kids in my family, there are 2 in my uncle’s family, and 0 in my youngest uncle’s family. You would not suspect that my family holds the record for the 1100 mile drive to his family home, would you? Welcome to my world! My middle uncle has a wife with intestinal disorders….he always bows his head in shame as he shares his time with the family. No I am not joking…..
All this to say that we never stop on the way to Disney because it is only a little over 600 miles, and if you were to stop any of us 100 miles shy of Disney, you better have a badge and a gun, or someone is getting hurt
BUT my husband is the easiest and most fun person to travel with in the world. On our honeymoon when I would OOOH over a beautiful vista (which was every 5 seconds as we went to Ireland) he would PULL THE CAR OVER I actually asked why we were stopping the first time
All that to say my traveling life has improved greatly with adulthood and marriage and not having every vacation be to visit family. I definitely my family—every crazy one of them--, but I had no idea why some people got SOO excited by vacation until the first time my parents took us on a Disney land and see vacation instead !!! There is a whole other world out there!!! Yeah I know….the rest of you already knew that!!
ANYWAY almost back to Disney--last year Eric and I realized that he was working until 7am the day before we checked into our beach condo, but we had nothing at all to do for the rest of the day. I got on the internets and found us a fabulous suite in Raleigh including hot breakfast for like $50 So for the first time we experienced the joys of stopping after 500 miles of travel…….AWESOME.
I have apparently gushed over this quite a bit, so much so that my mother and sister did the same on their way home from taking care of a sick great aunt 800 miles away. My mother is now addicted. SOOOO
Since we were all free after 3pm on Sunday, we are heading out then. We are staying overnight about 300 miles away near the half way point for us in Perry, Georgia. After breakfast at the hotel, we will have an easy 5 or so hour drive into the bubble Monday morning. We are planning to get our Outlet shopping done on this day, and possibly get a reservation for this night for a meal on property. I am considering EVERYTHING so feel free to make suggestions.
There is something to be said for a local Cracker Barrel or something too because it is cheap and good and all that jazz, but I cannot get over the fact that Eric and I have had not spent one dollar OOP for this trip so far…….maybe that is why I am feeling wealthy
My mom is paying for our rooms all except for $50 per night……..I have owed:
$200 for POR (my 3 nights plus 1 for Miss Kara) which I paid by paying for our package deposit with Disney Dollars from our Premier Visa.
$50 for the AKL night, which I paid with a gift card from our bank for having $1000 in a savings account.
$100 for my night safari tour (as well as 1/3 of Kara’s), which I paid using the $100 Disney Gift Card that we got for signing up for the Premier Visa in the World last year.
We have free dining, so basically I owe around $250 for my 2 day tickets and my share of Kara’s. I paid $150 of that in Disney Dollars just before final payment went onto my Premier Visa.
Basically we'll be OOP right at $100 for both the package and the tiny amount I am paying on our room only reservation--the 2 one night reservations (the new one in Perry, GA and the original one for our first night at the Swan) are both *free* because they are booked with my mom's hotel rewards.
AND I already have almost another $100 in Disney Dollars between the Premier and Regular Disney Visas (my husband puts all his work gas on the card and then pays it off and the end of the month--and he drives A LOT for work). I expect that money to handle most of the food and souveniers that I *need* this trip, so I am pretty sure this is going to be the least expensive Disney trip……….EVAH!
I am very excited about this!
Ok so our basic plan by date—and feel free to share suggestions:
Sunday—leave no later than 4pm and drive 300 or so miles. We will lose an hour, so we are planning to check into our ½ way hotel (as opposed to a ½ way house which we may also need )between 10-11pm EST
Monday—No need to rush this morning, but if anyone is still in bed by 8, I will be stunned. We will need a little time to spruce up since we’ll be checking into the Swan, and my mom has laid down the law that we WILL be looking like humans who are not handing over the vehicle we live in to the valets. We have been lectured on her previous humiliation at the condition of the cars we've exhaustedly handed over to their valets when we arrive around 0 dark thirty on our regular travels :
I won't be shocked if we have to stop and wash the van and vacuum it out on our way in
After a leisurely breakfast, there is no reason on the planet that we should leave later than 10am. We should be in Orlando between 3-4pm. This should be a great day to do our Outlet Mall shopping, and do dinner off site or to try somewhere new in the boardwalk area………not sure of this yet. IF I were to make an ADR it would have to be for very late, as we stop whenever we want (a luxury of daddy not coming with us LOL ) and my mom hates to have pressure to get there for an ADR first night. Actually if I make one, I might just keep it in my back pocket and spring it as a surprise if all our timing goes well.
We also want to have some time to check out the Swan and Dolphin area, which Kat and I did last year on our first morning of my nephew Evan’s special trip , but Mom and Kara have never seen except at the aforementioned 0 dark thirty. I am considering hitting the hot tub after several days of travel.
:breakingnews: My father has bought us a van for our trip. We not FOR our trip exactly, but it is the vehicle that we are going to take so as to service Kat’s need to bring everything she owns, and needs of the rest of us to have somewhere to sit. That should make the trip comfy at least. All captain’s chairs, so there should be no “She’s touching me!” issues, and yes I am unfortunately referring to Kat and me :embarrassed:—Kara is by no means above it but being sibling-less on this trip will make it less likely for her to have a problem.
Tuesday—Epcot Day--This is EMH morning, and our only sticky time of the trip. We have to get to POR to check in and get our KTTW which will have our dining plan before getting to EPCOT for rope drop. We have done online checkin and we've customized our magic bands, so we are hoping we've done everything we can to make early checkin go smoothly for us. The hotel has said as long as we are there by 7am to checkin, it should work out.
We are going to do a little snacking on the run between hotels (Granola bars, yogurt, etc) and then hit Future World rides till well after EMH has passed (I can’t stand losing out on those precious riding hours).
I ended up getting us a reservation for close to 10am at Akershus so that will be kind of a brunch both designed not to interfere with the EMH and also hoping that I will be hungry enough to do some justice to the food. I really enjoy this breakfast for its uniqueness and also for the character interaction (don’t feel as crushed in as I do in the castle), but I find that as a hater of breakfast, I find these meals to be somewhat a waste of money/meal credit. The thing is that I don't hate breakfast FOOD, I hate eating at breakfast TIME, so this is an experiment to see if we can make it more enjoyable for us all.
Lunch and Dinner are up in the air here as we will just get quick service wherever we happen to be when we get hungry. Suggestions for your favorite QS in the World Showcase are welcome. For the last I don’t know how many years, we’ve timed our trips during the F&WF and so we eat our way around the world for lunch and dinner. QS will be fairly new for us………in years past I have had so/so meals in China, Japan, and America. Our go to Epcot QS is Electric Umbrella, but I don’t expect to be in Future World at dinner time. We shall see.
Wednesday—Still working on this day a bit. Our package includes 2 tickets to Quest. Mom and I have many tickets on our Water Parks and More options from previous years, so instead of doing Kara’s beloved water parks, we have gotten her excited about Quest. She also will be the first in her family to get to go there, so she is very excited to have info that the rest of them don’t. Score 1 for sibling rivalry! I have been several times with Eric, but I think it will be a new experience for everyone else.
If we get there at opening, I am hoping we’ll be able to do all anyone wants to do by the time we have to leave for our ADR at the GF for tea.
We have an evening reservation around 7pm for dinner at ‘Ohana, and I am hoping afterwards it will be a good night to watch wishes from the beach (believe it is at 9pm this night so we’ll have plenty of time to eat leisurely and still get a good view) and maybe the Electric Water Pageant too.
Thursday—MK at rope drop for early EMH. The park closes early tonight due to the MVMCP which does not interest us, but we are hoping with the early EMH times we'll be able to do whatever we want. We'll probably focus the morning between fav rides in Tomorrowland (SM and Buzz) and checking out what is new in Fantasyland since last year. We also have FP+ set up for this day and we'll get to check out how it works. Not sure I am going to love FP+ but we have it set for both here and EPCOT. We have never had a hard time doing everything we want at MK this time of year, so I am not going to be a touring Nazi
I'd been planning Main Street Bakery for breakfast even after I heard it was a Starbucks (I thought that would only affect the drinks), but I checked out the menu on All Ears and there almost no food there I LOVED that place Absolutely no idea what we'll do for food now in the morn.
Lunch will be at Be Our Guest which is exciting for us all. I really wanted to be able to see all the rooms, so I've gotten over my disappointment that none of us could make dinner happen!
Dinner will be Liberty Tree Tavern—we’ve told Kara that she is going to be Gluten free this meal because her brother actually is and that gravy was The chef told him it was better than the regular, and she was not kidding!
Friday--We'll move this morning for the last time.......4th hotel ....into Club Level at AKL. Other times we've stayed here, my mom has always felt that we tried to do too many other things and she didn't get the time she wanted to just spend gazing on the animals and enjoying the Lodge. As a concession, we have absolutely NO plans today : We are going to checkout from POR whenever we are ready, and move into the Lodge. We'll explore and gaze at animals from the porch or our balcony (whichever is ready). All food will be eaten here--my mom loves the QS so I am hoping if we do that for lunch, we may try Boma for dinner, but I know she wants to make better use of the offerings in the Lounge this trip also.
This night we have the BIG SUPRISE.....we are going on the Night Vision Safari tour around the Lodge, and like all the other surprises on this trip, Kara has no idea
Saturday--We'll eat in the Lounge for a light breakfast and when we checkout we'll probably head to DTD for a final lunch at EoS--kind of a family tradition if we can still be in the World for lunch. After lunch we have to head toward home, but mom has gotten everyone to agree to stop for the night on the way home if we just aren't ready to be back yet.
So there are the plans! I am happy with them, but it is definitely no 3 night trip!
Up Next: How many presents can one person buy!??!
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Last edited by Courtney892; 10-08-2013 at 08:59 AM..
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My family's vacation were either to visit other family or historical momuments when I was growing up, and I totally get the non-stop trips as my Dad a major in the National Guard felt that bathroom breaks had to coincide with gassing up the vehicle. All your plans look great!
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Liz 
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for the support! We are all doing well. One uncle tends to be more emotional than the others (my grandma only had 3 boys) and so some of the funeral arrangements are getting a little sticky. The other 2 sons (including my dad, who has gotten an earful from we grandkids 
) are tending to just let him have his way, but the things he is wanting to do are strange...like give her funeral talk himself and send an odd ball obituary to the newspaper.
I actually asked why we were stopping the first time 
my family—every crazy one of them--, but I had no idea why some people got SOO excited by vacation until the first time my parents took us on a Disney land and see vacation instead !!! 
So for the first time we experienced the joys of stopping after 500 miles of travel…….AWESOME. 
)between 10-11pm EST
I LOVED that place 
Absolutely no idea what we'll do for food now in the morn.
The chef told him it was better than the regular, and she was not kidding! 
: We are going to checkout from POR whenever we are ready, and move into the Lodge. We'll explore and gaze at animals from the porch or our balcony (whichever is ready). All food will be eaten here--my mom loves the QS so I am hoping if we do that for lunch, we may try Boma for dinner, but I know she wants to make better use of the offerings in the Lounge this trip also.
Deb
All your plans look great!
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