The Stone Family's Magical Adventure including food photos - Page 8 - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
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Ragland Road:
The kids didn't have anything special. Both had chicken fingers one with fries one with mashed...pretty boring pictures not worth posting. On to dessert.
Dunbrody Kiss....verrrrrry chocolaty
Kids chocolate chip cookies
and the reason we came here in the first place:
Ger's Bread and Butter pudding. I wanted to try this ever since seeing pictures of it on the food thread. It was well worth the wait, couldn't finish it though....it was enormous!.
Dinner total: $150.76 --5 deluxe credits plus $35 cash tip. oh yeah, and $9.50 charged to the room for my soothing beverage.
After dinner the girls were pooped in fact Gelsey dozed off in the stroller. She had been almost asleep in RR on Grandy's lap
We didn't spend much time looking in any shops on the way back to the boat launch , though I would have liked to but the girls were so sleepy and I knew I had to get us packed up for check out in the morning. I had arranged for Carlos to pick us up at 9am for our ride over to the GF. Back at the room we put the girls to bed and quickly got our things together for the next day. When I finally got into bed it finally hit just how exhausted I was. Jeff and I chatted for a few minutes about our next trip and how much we enjoyed POR and all the things we want to try there next time. Blissful sleep finally over took me.
Things to try next time at POR:
Boatwrights for dinner
Surrey bike
Cane pole fishing
night time horse drawn carriage.
We woke to a slightly cloudy day with pinches of sun here and there. The forcast was for rain so we held our breath! We had three days with no rain yet so we had been really lucky. So, I figured if it rained today...so be it. Actually as it turned out it tried to rain all day but it never ended up happening !
Got the girls up and dressed and got all our luggage together. Called for pick up and the baggage valet was there in less than 10 minutes! We had it all put in storage and did a final sweep of the room then headed over to the food court to get some drinks. MIL had a coffee, while Jeff had some soda, me and the girls just got a few bottles of water. We still had something like 12 snack credits left! Oh well, I figured we'd use 'em before the day was over. If not, I still felt I got my money's worth! We were early again (WOW) so we stopped over to look at the spot where they had the cane pole fishing. MIL took a break in the nice area out front of the lobby with her coffee and book. Sge said it was getting good. Actually, she finished it and gave it to me. I am reading it now and it is pretty good! Over at the fishing hole we met the CM who works there. Very nice gentleman who was telling us about the otter that lives in the water there. We had just missed him but the CM had a snapped a picture of him on his phone and was kind enough to share it with the girls.
Carlos arrived promptly at 9am. We had our luggage waiting with us when he pulled up and this time I remembered to get the girls picture with him.
Off we went to the grand Floridian. Here, I need to give you a little background. We had booked a magic your way Platinum plan package which includes nearly everything you could possibly imagine doing while in WDW. All the tours, all the recreation including lessons, (golf, tennis) spa treatments, fishing, fireworks cruise, name it...it's in the plan. It is, of course, not cheap, but if you want to do it all and not have to be constantly pulling out your wallet...it's the way to go. Probably the best feature of the plan is the Platinum Planner. There is a designated platinum planner at every deluxe hotel and they plan the vacations of platinum guests...what a great job, I want that job! The planner at the GF is named Stephanie, and I couldn't possibly express to you how great she is. Obviously I am an obsessive planner with a tendency to change my mind. I peppered Stephanie with calls, emails and questions and she came right back at me with suggestions and enthusiasm. When I originally talked to her a few weeks prior to my 90 day mark, (the ADR point at the time), we spent a very long time going over all the ADRs I wanted. We planned whivh day we'd do MVMMCP and the BBB and The Perfectly Princess Tea Party. Stephanie would book all of these things for me. She offered helpful suggestions as to places to go when I needed to change things and when times just wouldn't work as far as getting place to place. She assured me she would do her best to get me as close to what I wanted as she could. At my 90 day mark, I had to work but when I had given Stephanie my work email address. When I arrived there was an email from Stephanie that she was able to get everything I wanted and that she would email me a full itinerary in the next day or so. I was totally excited! Over the next few weeks, I made many a change and Stephanie was there to do it without complaint. At one point I remarked to her that I promised I was done and wouldn't bother her again and she told me she thoroughly expected to hear from me once a week and not to worry it was a job she loved! We had many a conversation, she and I, and some of them were just for fun! Stephanie has a great personality and is loads of fun to chat with. One of the chats that we had was about a 10 year anniverssry trip that Jeff and I are thinking about for 2011. I told her that we hoped to save up enough to get a castle view Royal Palm room. I told her it's my dream to watch the fireworks over the castle from my room. Jeff and I thought maybe on a trip that's just the two of us and shorter we might be able to swing it. I just really enjoyed chatting with her. This trip we had booked a Sugar Loaf Lodge concierge room which we had stayed in last time and enjoyed. I was so pleased with all Stephanie's help Jeff and I sent her a basket from Wolferman's. They make these fantastic muffins! Alright, background info done back to the report:
It took us only 10-15 minutes to get to the GF. Stopping at the gate I hear Carlos tell them: "I have the Stone party checking in" Ohhhhh, I'm so excited. My favorite hotel in the world! We pull up and Carlos and the bell hop get all our luggage and we start to walk to the doors. "Good morning Mr & Mrs. Stone" I hear. I'm not quite sure how this young man knew us but he did! He introduced himself as Ryan from the concierge staff and told us he'd be checking us in. He was a very nice young gentleman and pointed out the new marble floor on our way in. It was really beautiful...the pictures of it that I have seen online do not do it justice. He led us over to the elevators in the main building chatting with us the whole time. In the elevator Jeff whispers to me "why are we in here?" I shrugged but I assumed they were just going to check us in and then walk us over to Sugar Loaf or maybe not even do that since our room probably wouldn't be ready. We get to the lounge and Ryan starts going over our file with us: tickets, itinerary, etc. He tells us our room is on the forth floor and that we can just walk right down to the lounge. I must have looked so confused when I asked him if they moved the lounge from Sugar Loaf to the forth floor of THAT building. Smiling, he told me, "oh no, you're not in Sugar Loaf, you're here on this floor, and it gets better but I'm not going to tell you yet." I'm already in tears. We get throught the rest of the check in process and he tells me that Stephanie really wanted to be there when we checked in but that it was her day off. He tells us that our room will be ready shortly after 11am that people were checking out of
it today. Then he says: "A little bird told me that it's your dream to see the castle from your balcony....and that's what you'll be looking at" Now I was really crying. Oh, that Stephanie. Just making all our dreams come true! I was overwhelmed. I told Jeff and MIL to sit and have a little breakfast with the girls while I took a little walk. I walked out into the driveway and found a bench. I was still teary because I just wanted my Mom there. This was so magical and special and Mom more than anyone else would have appreciated it. So I called Mom who started crying as soon as I told her. She told me she just missed us all so! I talked to Mom a few more minutes and got myself back together and headed back up to the lounge. I had a piece or two of cheese and a croissant but I was too excited to eat! Our plan was to head over to the MK after check in so I got the group together and we went over to get on the monorail.
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We hoped the monorail over to the MK. I had an 11:55 ADR at Liberty Tree Tavern so we decided not to venture to far from Liberty Square. As we walked up Main Street, Remy saw the castle and got a little misty, saying "there it is, we're here!" and I had to laugh because she IS her Mother! I figured we could only get Haunted Mansion done before lunch so we went that a way. So here it was, 10-1o:30 in the morning and there was no line whatsoever for HM. We literally walked right on. Gelsey decided to get a little nervous even though she had rode this before and rode ToT! She was fine but did not want to ride it again. We headed over to Fantasyland to Small World and walked right onto that too. The sign said 10minutes but that's how long it takes you to walk through the maze . After that, we were all hungry since we only had a small snack in the lounge and no breakfast prior to that so we thought we'd see if we could get into LTT a little early. That's right, the people who are late for everything were early again! We checked in at the LTT and this was the first time we used our new Key to the World card. The hostess asks me if we are a dining plan and I say yes and hand her my card. She says "that's your room key, I need your dining plan card". Now for four days I have been using my KTTW card from POR that has our dining plan on it so I have no idea what's up with this CM. I say it's on the card. She tells me it doesn't say ddp or dlxddp or whatever it's supposed to say. I look at the card and it says Platinum where the dining plan is listed. I tell her that is the dining plan we're on and she tells me she has never heard of this and we'd have to pay or get a card that has our plan on it . Ok so, now I'm slightly frustrated. I'm not worried though, we have had this problem in the past with the plat plan and we just charge it to the room and the planners fix it. But, just to be sure I ask her if there is another hostess or manager. She grabs someone else and I ask her to look at my card and tell me if there's a dining plan on it. She looks and says "yes, you're on the platinum plan" whew! She told me not to worry, some of the CM haven't seen it before but the server will know what to do. We waited about 10 minutes for a table and then were seated. I had not packed the play doh in my backpack...so we were winging it. Fortunately there were crayons. Theresa was our server.
Isn't it nice to have a CM who knows what they are doing? Glad someone was able to put your mind at ease about the dining situation with the platinum plan.
Hope you are able to keep warm this weekend. It's so cold!
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Now you've got me wanting to go to Raglan Road! That food all looks so and Stefanie would be in heaven with chicken fingers and mashed potatoes. Then what an awesome surprise that Stephanie engineered for you all at GF! Disney at its Best!
I'm trying to post pictures from LTT but the message keeps coming up that I'll exceed limits. Can anyone tell me how to fix this?
I will be back online next Thursday and will pick up trip report then though it will be admittedly very boring with out photos!
Since I haven't seen the message, I could be wrong. But the first thing I would check is to see that your pictures do not exceed the 640 x 480 maximum size. If this doesn't help send me a copy of the message in a PM, and I'll see what I can figure out because we really want to see those pictures. BTW -- I resize and upload all mine directly from Photobucket.
Great updates and pictures. It could be your exceeding the limits for your account. Apply for the TR group, and I will give you more space (another 5 MB) and we'll see if that fixes it)! http://www.passporterboards.com/foru...ad-limits.html
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, though I would have liked to but the girls were so sleepy and I knew I had to get us packed up for check out in the morning. I had arranged for Carlos to pick us up at 9am for our ride over to the GF. Back at the room we put the girls to bed and quickly got our things together for the next day. When I finally got into bed it finally hit just how exhausted I was. Jeff and I chatted for a few minutes about our next trip and how much we enjoyed POR and all the things we want to try there next time. Blissful sleep finally over took me.
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! Oh well, I figured we'd use 'em before the day was over. If not, I still felt I got my money's worth! We were early again (WOW) so we stopped over to look at the spot where they had the cane pole fishing. MIL took a break in the nice area out front of the lobby with her coffee and book. Sge said it was getting good. Actually, she finished it and gave it to me. I am reading it now and it is pretty good! Over at the fishing hole we met the CM who works there. Very nice gentleman who was telling us about the otter that lives in the water there. We had just missed him but the CM had a snapped a picture of him on his phone and was kind enough to share it with the girls.
. Ok so, now I'm slightly frustrated. I'm not worried though, we have had this problem in the past with the plat plan and we just charge it to the room and the planners fix it. But, just to be sure I ask her if there is another hostess or manager. She grabs someone else and I ask her to look at my card and tell me if there's a dining plan on it. She looks and says "yes, you're on the platinum plan" whew! She told me not to worry, some of the CM haven't seen it before but the server will know what to do. We waited about 10 minutes for a table and then were seated. I had not packed the play doh in my backpack...so we were winging it. Fortunately there were crayons. Theresa was our server.
and Stefanie would be in heaven with chicken fingers and mashed potatoes. Then what an awesome surprise that Stephanie engineered for you all at GF! 
Disney at its Best!
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