COMPLETED - We're Visiting Our Laughing Place - Trip Report

[izzie-wizzie]

I found that with all the restaurants I want to go to - and that's with only a handful of ADRs!

Haha I know its so true, right?!

I've had so many other reservations made and changed etc - Ohana Dinner, Kona, Teppan Edo, Flying Fish, Biergarten!!! I'd need an extra week!

 

[Rachey_101]

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[izzie-wizzie]

8 DAAAYS!

I just read your 2009 trippie! Oh it was lovely, making me super excited for my trip in October with nearly the exact same dates as your trip in 2009!

Im rather jealous you are staying at SSR, it looks fabby . Disney transport for you this year .

Bet you will have a fantastic trip and make sure you do a trippie when you come back!

Awww I glad you enjoyed it - I read it back a couple of weeks ago and they are a great way to remember the little silly details you forget about a couple of years later

I am quite excited that we won't have to drive too much - cocktails for us!

Not long til your trip then if it's next month!!! October really is a great time to be there - I love the halloween atmosphere and then when you do have to go home its nearly Christmas time! hehe

 

[BlueGoose]

Love your Pre-Trip Report, sounds like you have everything covered!

Have fun! - I look forward to reading about your trip when you get back!

 

[buddles norfolk uk]

Hey, great PTR, I hope you have a really fabulous time and I can't wait for your trip report! It's great to see what other young couples get up to out there.
I'm going to go catch up on your old one instead of doing uni work now....

 

[izzie-wizzie]

Hey, great PTR, I hope you have a really fabulous time and I can't wait for your trip report! It's great to see what other young couples get up to out there.
I'm going to go catch up on your old one instead of doing uni work now....

Oooh good excuse to escape uni work

 

[izzie-wizzie]

Ohh woowwww we go tomorrow!!!!!

We're all packed (apart from the last few bits and bobs we will need when we're getting ready to go to the airport), and just an hour left at work til holiday mode

We have a family party tonight then early at the airport tomorrow!!

Eeeeeee I am too excited - tomorrow night we will actually be in Downtown Disney and then on Sunday at the Magic Kingdom

 

[jtlover]

Have a great time - we are in SSR in 5 weeks time

 

[Linda67]

I'm subbing so I don't miss your trip report when you get home

 

[izzie-wizzie]

Sooooo I'm back home now... Well I have been home for about 3 weeks now - but everything has just been soo busy since we got back I've not had a chance to start my trip report!

Before I start, I have to let you all know my amazing news that my boyfriend, Scott - proposed!!!!!! So, so, so exciting and lovely I will go into the whole 'proposal story' further into the trip report - but it was really the most romantic way I could have ever imagined and I was thrilled... I still am thrilled!! I have the most amazing Fiance ever and feel so lucky!

Here's a picture of my engagement ring (we picked this out when we were back home - he had made an appointment at Tiffany's in London to look at engagement rings!!!) I've always dreamed of having a Tiffany engagement ring so I was soooo happy - I feel so spoiled and lucky that it almost doesn't feel real

Soo - on to Trip Reporting!!

Day 1 - Saturday 24th September 2011 - Travel Day

We had a really early start for our travel day, so were up at about 4.00am - I never mind waking up early when I'm away on holiday though - that excited feeling is just priceless So we headed to the airport which is really quite close to where we stay for a short flight from Aberdeen to Paris. We had a couple of hours wait at Charles de Gaulle before we boarded our flight for Orlando.

We were clearly in the Disney spirit when we found this in the airport shop:

When we were going through Charles de Gaulle airport - the queue skipping that was going on was quite rediculous! I was too exited to let it bother me so I just laughed it off - but it was just sooo blatantly obvious they were skipping the queue, in bag scan security line, in the coffee line, in the boarding line - even in the toilet line!! There must be some kind of 'queue skipping course 101' that I have never heard of!

Anyway - we got on the plane and I was relieved to find we had our personal entertainment systems - we were flying Air France and I had heard horror stories they didn't have the personal systems. So I settled in my seat and watched "Just not that into you" with Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston (funny film - I caught myself laughing out loud which is always funny when your plugged into your own film on a plane) and then I watched a few episdodes of Sex and the City and Modern Family. I started watching Avatar - but just couldn't get into it.

Scott watched Bridesmaids on my recommendation - think its more of a girly film though

We landed on time but then had the lovely customs / security check to get through - we were waiting in line for about an hour and a half - eeek. It was really warm and stuffy in there too - a girl a few people in front of us even fainted! Always a bit scary when that happens . Then we grabbed our bags and headed to find Magic Express

When we got there it was great to feel so 'Disney' all of a sudden! As they have mickeys everywhere, and the cast members have the mickey hands. It didn't take long til we were on the bus on the way to Saratoga Springs Resort!!!

The rain was coming down really strong when we arrived in Orlando, but cleared up when we were on the bus - however the lightning lasted most of the night - which was crazy to see such bad lightening without it raining.

We arrived at Saratoga Springs Resort, and went through the online-check-in desk and were sooooo pleased to see our room request had been honoured

We had a fabulous room - we were in the block closest to the Downtown Disney walk-way, with a 3rd floor room overlooking Downtown Disney. I was soo excited - and it was a closer walk for us to Downtown Disney than it was to reception!! But we were still really close to the bus stop for getting busses to the parks - win-win!

So we unpacked a little - then decided to head to Downtown Disney for some dinner and to start using our Dining Plan!! I have tried to take some food pics this trip - as I know how much I loved looking at dining reports during holiday planning! I had planned we go to Earl of Sandwich or Wolfgang Puck Express - since we weren't overly hungry (and had that sluggishy feeling you get after a long journey) we headed to EOS! This place was amazing!

It had a little bit of a wait in line and we were both a little confused about what we were / weren't allowed with our dining plan - even reading up on it so much before! I think we pretty much learned you can have ANYTHING as long as it's not alcoholic haha. Anyway we got our food, and grabbed a table.
So I had the:

Hawaiin BBQ Sandwich, this was amazing - the sauce with it was just sooo num!!! I think I expected it to be bland, but it had a so much flavour. I had high expectations for this place - and I can confidently say the taste of this sandwich STILL exceeded these expectations - as far as sandwiches go - Earl of Sandwich is worth the hype.

Scott had the Cannonballs! sandwich - which is a meatball sub. I can say that this was just as tasty as my sandwich, probably more 'meaty' if you like that sort of thing - but I really enjoyed it, the only real comparison I had to this was a Subway meatball sub - but this isn't even in the same league! You can even see how meaty the meatballs are in the picture (does that sound weird saying a meaty meatball? It makes sense in my head anyway!!)

Anyway - I think as far as sandwiches go, if you can't tell I thought this was super impressive and tasty!

We just had diet cokes for our drinks and picked up a cupcake / brownie as our desserts - although we were stuffed by the time we got through these sandwiches so we ate them for breakfast the next day! They were tasty enough - pretty average but nice

Anyway, once we had ate dinner, we went in to a couple of shops (Days of Christmas!!) heading back to our hotel and then crashed out watching Stacey's Must Do's!!

The whole night just had that lovely feeling that we had arrived and had the whole holiday in front of us - that lovely, happy feeling you get in your tummy that is just soo WOW

 

[wickesy]

Congratulations Izzie!! What a great way to start a trip report. Looking forward to reading more.

 

[Sapper383]

Congratulations

 

[strawberry blonde]

Congratulations on your engagement Can't wait to get to the bit where Scott proposes.

 

[kirstinemma]

Congratulations! Looking forward to reading more about your trip, especially your proposal story!

 

[Lucille1963]

Great start! I can't wait to hear about the proposal!

 

[Chilly]

COngratulations on the engagement!

I love Cannonballs, I went to EoS in London on Sunday and was soooo disappointed that they'd run out.

 

[izzie-wizzie]

Congratulations Izzie!! What a great way to start a trip report. Looking forward to reading more.

Thanks!! Will hopefully post the next couple of days this weekend

Congratulations

Thank you so much!

Congratulations on your engagement Can't wait to get to the bit where Scott proposes.

Thank you - I know - I love telling 'our story' about the proposal!

Congratulations! Looking forward to reading more about your trip, especially your proposal story!

Thank you so much

Great start! I can't wait to hear about the proposal!

COngratulations on the engagement!

I love Cannonballs, I went to EoS in London on Sunday and was soooo disappointed that they'd run out.

Thank you - I definately will be checking out EOS next time I'm down in London!! Hopefully they haven't run out of my hawaiin bbq!

 

[izzie-wizzie]

Oh dear, this has taken me far, far too long to get Day 2 written up and posted! So without further ado...

Day 2 - Sunday 25th September 2011 - Magic Kingdom (All Day)

I don't think it's that difficult to explain just how exciting it is to wake up on your first day of a Disney trip!! Excited almost seems like an understatement! The plan was to be in Magic Kingdom all day! It was open from 9.00am until 1.00am with EMH. I think if you have the energy to do a park all day, it's probably best on the first day when you are so excited!

We definately had to start the trip with the Magic Kingdom - I couldn't imagine it being anywhere else as after the last trip we left visiting The Magic Kingdom til the 4th day and our holiday didn't really feel 'Disney' until we had seen the Castle - so Magic Kingdom it simply had to be!

We got the bus really quick and easy - it was our first time using the resort bus at Saratoga Springs and I really have only the best things to say about it - busses were really frequent and although the odd bus was busy, it never felt overcrowded and uncomfortable. Top Marks

We were outside the Magic Kingdom by about 8.30am, and got our spot at centre to watch the opening show. Whilst we waited we had our hearty breakfast from the previous evenings Earl of Sandwich Desserts - Cupcake / Brownies - so unhealthy but so, so good (although I think everything on holiday seems even better as I'm usually just off of a diet/gym routine!!!)!

The rope drop music started and I swear it was so embarrassing but the tears just started running down my cheeks - we were here!! I tried pulling myself together but it was pretty difficult I have to say - I just giggled it off

For some reason though - it was a shortened version of the whole show - the train came straight away with all the characters? Not sure what happened there but about a half-hour later all the singers and dancers did the whole song on Main Street anyway so we stopped to watch this so we still got to see it all

So we got in to the park - and went straight to Town Square Theatre to meet Mickey and Minnie and let them know we had arrived! We only waited about 5 minutes and we were in and I loved the whole themeing of the meet and greet - however we went back to this near the end of the trip and had an amazing experience here which was even better than this day!

As we walked down main street, we had a few photopass pictures taken and headed straight through to Tomorrowland.

I was wearing my Stitch Ears I got from Disneyland Paris and Scott had a Stitch TShirt he got from when his parents went to Disneyland Honk Kong (jealous!....). We had so so so so many compliments from cast members about our Stitch get up which was pretty awesome!

So we got to Tomorrowland and I think the first ride we went on to was Space Mountain - as this was closed last time we were here. It was so much faster than I had expected! I knew it was entirely different from the Paris version, and I suppose I had presumed that it would be really tame. Ok it wasn't quite 'The Hulk' coaster - but it was still fab!

We then went on Buzz / TTA / Speedway / Stitch / Space Mountain a couple more times! We saw Stitch too and had to go say hello!

We then headed across to Frontierland, only to see that Splash was broken down! This is my favourite ride in all of Disney - but I was pretty confident it would be back up and running later and knowing we had all day I wasn't too bothered - we were still able to pick up fast passes for this for later on anyway.

Instead, we went on Big Thunder Mountain, the Steam Boat and Haunted Mansion. We really took our time through looking at everything in Haunted Mansion and I think I have a much bigger appreciation for the whole ride - it's amazing! The last bit that has been updated when a ghost comes and hitch-hikes your doom buggy is amazing - no idea how they do it!

So by this point it was lunch time, and we decided to go to Pecos Bill in Frontierland. In fairness we did go at peak lunch time - but trying to find a seat in a counter service was pretty impossible! I think at that point of the trip we were maybe being too well mannered and walking around with our trays and noticing that at least half the tables were taken up by people waiting on other members of their party! We did eventually get a seat though.

We both had the delux cheeseburgers - that had onion rings in them with fries. Very tasty burger here. I had a carrot cake desert and Scott had the chocolate dessert. I didn't even eat half of my meal as we had a dinner reservation that day and there was A LOT of food - but it was really tasty theme park food! It wasn't anything different - it was typical theme park food, just done really well. You want a burger and dessert that is amazing in an obviously-really-bad-for-you way? Then seriously - go to Pecos Bill!

After lunch, we went across to Fantasy Land, to see Philharmagic! Ahhh beautiful show - I believe the tears came a little bit at The Little Mermaid. I think I always watch this show and realise that I'm not just in a cinema - as right outside is the Magic Kingdom! That's always an exciting thought I think!

We went on It's a Small World, then maybe Haunted Mansion again. Looked through a few different shops - Before heading across and riding the re-opened Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain a few times each.

It was getting a big later by this point, so we got the train from Fantasyland across to the main entrance for our Dinner ADR at Tony's Town Square Restaurant.

As a big Lady and the Tramp fan - I noticed this restaurant in our last trip and really wanted to go but we couldn't get a reservation. However the more I read about it when I got back I realised that the reviews were really, really mixed - some said it was great, some said it was completely awful. Like everything though, it is probably worth trying it for yourselves.

Our waitress was absolutely lovely here, and really helpful. We got a seat near the back of the restaurant and it was nice seeing all of the pictures and other small references to the film.

We started with the bread - which was standard bread! Nothing I can really say about that:

Then for main courses, we split Spaghetti and Meatballs:

and the Chicken Parmigiana:

Both dishes were good - I probably preferred the Chicken Parmigiana, but at the same time I think for a first time visit I couldn't pass up the classic Meatballs! The flavour of both dishes was a little bland - but that's the only bad thing I would have to say.

Quite randomly - the tables in this restaurant were really big - it felt like me and Scott were sitting really far apart!! The only reason we probably noticed this though is because I had asked him to nudge across a meatball to me with his nose - a la Lady and the Tramp! It didn't really work but he did it all the same - bless

For dessert, I had the Tiramasu :

This was ok - the little chocolate lady and the tramp was the best bit of the dessert, it had a lot of the mascarpone flavour - maybe i would have just liked a bit more chocolate / coffee flavour to be really impressed with it.

Scott had the Spumoni:

It didn't sound all the great on the menu and it wasn't exactly exciting when it came either. I didn't even bother trying this and Scott said it really wasn't anything to rave about. It did make the Tiramasu look amazing in comparison though.

So overall - Tony's was nice, it is definately not in any way as bad as some of the reviews on disboards - and its great that its in the Magic Kingdom and it was quite a chilled out atmosphere too - which is great for long park days as a chance to recharge your batteries. It's also not the best meal we had in Disney. As a comparison it's maybe about the same quality as a Frankie and Bennies with a nicer atmosphere?

Anyway, after dinner we went to see a comedy show. Mike from Monsters Inc's Laugh Floor - hehe this was really cute and good fun We then went on Space Mountain and then went to Main Street to watch Wishes

And so came at least the third time I cried that day! pretty much from the start to the finish - I just think this is the most amazing show ever. I had no idea at this point as well how exciting and special the next time I would watch Wishes would be - only a few nights later

At this point the park was closed, and was only open for EMH. I believe we went to Pirates, back to Splash and Big Thunder Mountain and then Philharmagic, Peter Pans Flight and Winnie the Pooh. By the time we were in the queue for Winnie the Pooh we were both flagging a little bit. It was about midnight and the queues were still pretty heavy so we decided to start heading back to the hotel after the ride.

We went out , stopping in at Main Street Bakery for tomorrow's breakfast and by the time we got out and on the bus we were probably back in the hotel just a little after 1.00am.

After such an exciting busy first day, we were both out like a light as soon as we got back to the hotel!!

 

[izzie-wizzie]

Some more Photopass Pics from Magic Kingdom Day

 

[Linda67]

Firstly, Congratulations

What a wonderful first day, I can totally feel your excitement and it's just lovely.

I am so excited to read about your proposal