Opryland 2018
For this year’s trip to Opryland, we wanted to go back at Christmastime. Last year we visited in the summer, and while it was far less crowded, it wasn’t as festive. They did have events going on, but nothing can compare to Opryland at Christmas. We loved our visit in 2016 at Christmas, so we decided to do it again!
Our dates were fairly limited this trip. We didn’t want to go over a weekend, but with Melody in school two days a week, it made picking dates very slim. We hated for her to miss school, so we ended up going with a Sunday-Tuesday trip. And on Tuesday we planned to leave early enough we could have her back to school on time. There are only so many Sunday-Tuesday dates in December, so we picked the cheapest and the one where Brad would already be off work. So December 16-18 it was!
We wanted to get to Nashville as early as possibly on Sunday since we knew we would not get any time on Tuesday. We typically do all of our shopping on our arrival day. Then we literally do not have to leave the hotel again until checking out.
We were packed and ready on Saturday night. I am currently on a health/exercise kick, so I got up around 7 on Sunday to workout. After my workout, everyone got up and we all got ready to go. We made it to Brentwood, TN around 11:30 am. We wanted to go to the American Girl store, so naturally I had to have Cheesecake Factory. We had about a 20 minute wait, then we were seated.
We ordered Melody the kid’s chicken fingers and fries (which she barely touched). I tried the chicken, and it was really good. They are smaller pieces of chicken which was easier for Melody to eat (the two bites she did have). And that meant that every bite had the right amount of crispiness to it.
Brad ordered the cheese pizza. Neither of us have ever ordered the pizza before so this was completely new. It was actually really good. It was thin crust which helps with the carb count, ha! The flavor was really great too. It didn’t taste like cheap pizza (which I love me some cheap pizza). The only downfall is it didn't seem too filling. Brad easily devoured the entire pizza (minus one slice I had). I didn’t care for the crust though. It had absolutely no flavor. But the pizza itself was good. I am certain Brad will order it again.
I had the Asian Chicken Salad. It is one of the salads on the SkinnyLicious menu. I feel like I have had it before, but I wasn’t 100% sure. For a fairly low calorie salad, it had a lot of flavor. I could taste the dressing with every single bite. The chicken was mixed in very well which I loved. And the salad was HUGE. I only finished maybe 2/3 of it. I will be getting this every time I go back!
We couldn’t go to there without getting some cheesecake of course! Brad decided to try the tiramisu cheesecake per our waitress’ recommendation. He wanted to try the tiramisu but was hesitant since they did not make it in house. The waitress said her favorite dessert was the cheesecake variety. So Brad went out of his comfort zone and got it. He loved it. He said it was tiramisu taste but with cheesecake texture. His only complaint was there wasn’t enough cocoa topping.
I went simple and just got the strawberry cheesecake. I was fairly confident Melody would eat it since it was basic (she didn’t), and it was one of the lower calorie ones. It was good as always. The strawberries tasted more artificial this time, but they were still good.
After lunch, we headed to the American Girl store. I had a reward to spend, so we let Melody pick out anything she wanted. She looked at quite a few things, and we narrowed it down to an outfit or a diaper bag. She ultimately picked the diaper bag then picked 4 things. She struggled at first narrowing it down to 4, but she did. And she has loved that thing! It is actually quite cute. It has a changing pad and bottle holders.
After the mall, we drove to the Nashville Flea Market. Brad wanted to visit some vintage toy stores but most were closed since it was Sunday. But one happened to be set up there. We literally picked a random door and building, and there the vendor was! Brad bought two GI Joes, then we walked around. We didn’t find anything else so we headed on. I should note it does cost to park there. We paid $5.
Next up was OpryMills. That was a madhouse! We came in from the North, so we luckily didn’t have as MUCH traffic. Unfortunately we were directed in the opposite direction of where we wanted to park, but we easily drove around the mall to get there. We only visited the Lego Store and the Disney Store. We haven’t really ever found much anywhere else, and it was too crowded. It was also 3, and we were nearing our room being ready. We didn’t find anything at The Lego Store, but Melody was able to play for a bit. I found some cute pajamas at the Disney Store, but Melody was super fussy, so we didn’t look long there. She went the whole day without a nap. So we didn’t have the best version of her.
I received a text our room was ready, so we headed to the hotel. It is within walking distance to the mall. We parked and unloaded and went straight to mobile check in. Usually this is a quick process but not on this day. Only two people were working this desk. One was having issues with the person checkin in. The other was helping someone who wasn’t even checking in. After about 5 minutes of being next in line, a woman opens up, and a man behind me tries to skip ahead. I quickly began walking since it was my turn to make sure he knew he wasn’t skipping me. I never looked back to see his reaction though…
Below is some of the information given to us at check in.
Our room was located in Magnolia. This happens to be our favorite location. We have stayed in all of the atriums and the Delta atrium is a favorite (and the Magnolia atriums overlook the Delta). We also really like the Garden Observatory. It is really quite and beautifully decorated too. But what I love about the Delta is you don’t hear all of the forks and glasses clanking together. In Cascades and Garden Observatory their are restaurants near the balconies we’ve stayed in. And the tables and chairs on the Magnolia balconies are the best! Oh and there are tubs for the little ones!
Our room was just as requested. A king bed with the usual setup.
We did have to call to get a crib, and it came supplied with baby toiletries which was too cute!
After the crib was delivered, we freshened up and headed to dinner. Since it was a Sunday, it was fairly crowded. We knew most people would go to the cheaper fast-food type places so those would be really crowded. So we opted to go to the Fuse Sports Bar. We have eaten there before so we also knew what to expect.
We were seated immediately. When our waitress arrived we also went ahead and ordered. Based on past experience, the serving staff isn’t the best. So we wanted to get ahead of the game. First off, they were out of milk. And this was all that Melody wanted. So after we ordered, Brad went to a shop and bought her some milk.
Anyhow, we again ordered Melody chicken fingers and fries. And she didn’t have a single bite of chicken. To her defense it didn’t look super amazing, but she didn’t even try it (that also meant no dessert for her).
Brad ordered the same as last time, grilled cheese. He got fries instead of chips though. He loved the grilled cheese just as much as before. And the fries were really great too.
They didn’t have the nachos like they had the last time which was sad. They had a nacho dip, but it was not the same. So instead I ordered the wings. The waitress wasn’t very helpful when picking a sauce, so I did the traditional buffalo. They were pretty good but super spicy. I was very thankful for the ranch dressing to offset the spice. But their ranch was amazing! I did order a side of fries, but they never brought them. We didn’t complain because Brad had plenty enough for the two of us. And thankfully we weren’t charged. The biggest issue with this was our waitress. Had I actually wanted those fries, I would have never received them. I was almost done before she even returned to our table.
After dinner, we did a lot of walking around the resort. We know the resort really well, but I wanted Melody to burn off all the energy she could for a decent night sleep. They have also changed a few things up.
One of the new things is the Delta Marketplace. It replaced a home store, and it is a nice store to have since it is open 24 hours. Before it was simply a Starbucks. Now it is much more as you can see below. My only complaint with this is if you want to buy say a bottled coke, you have to wait in the long, long, long Starbucks line. I feel like they need a check out for grab and go that is separate.
Melody wandered through the toy store, and then she wanted to take a picture by the fountain outside.
We went to Holiday Halls which is new compared to 2016. They had something similar but not quite like this. It was really neat. They had a Build-A-Bear, gingerbread house making station, ice skating rink, Cinnabon, a bar, a train, and spinning cups. We didn’t partake in any of the fun on this night, but we did look around at it all.
Then we decided to head back to the room. It was 7:30 and Melody still needed a bath. And if you have a Disney lover like we do, bring it with you! They don’t have Disney on the TVs here!
After Melody went to bed, we sat out on the balcony and people watched, snacked, and played on our computers. This is a highlight to these trips. Disney is way too busy for us to not pass out after a day there. But here, we have enough energy to just sit out there just the two of us. It’s really a nice end to the day.
So our second day was pretty much our last day. We knew we had to leave early our actual last day in order to get Melody to school on time. So we were sure to accomplish everything we wanted on this day. What we didn’t plan for was to sleep in…until 9:30. For some people that isn’t sleeping in, but for our family, it is. Melody is typically up between 7 and 8, and when staying in a hotel, we both get up with her. Well the darkening curtains sure did their job because we were clueless on what time it was! Even at 9:30 when I woke up, Brad thought it was just 2 am, ha!
Since we slept in a bit more than expected, Brad and I opted to skip breakfast and just eat lunch at 11. Melody still needed to eat, so while she ate, Brad and I got ready. She loved getting to eat on the balcony.
Then we got her dressed, and we headed for a day of fun. We made our way over to the Delta Island. We wanted to eat lunch over there, and since we had about 20 minutes to kill, we took some pictures along the way. The first picture we took was a recreation of our first visit with Melody. Hopefully they will continue to do this tree so we can recreate this picture each year we come.
As we were taking the picture of Melody below, a nice couple offered to take a picture of the three of us. I think this is the only picture I have of all three of us with my nice camera. This is kind of a bummer because it totally slipped my mind to have Emily and Justin take some pictures for us that evening since they happened to be there at the same time.
Next up was a picture by the fountain.
Then we headed to the quiet area by a waterfall where we like to eat lunch. Most people go for the area by the fountain, but we like this nook of an area. You can watch the boats pass by and have a decent view otherwise.
We ate lunch at Paisano’s Pizzeria. It is really sad how much of a hit or miss this place really is. When we first visited we LOVED it. It was our favorite place. On a weekday it is not crowded and really a nice visit. We always get the pizza combo with a side salad (this time Brad got an extra slice of pizza instead of the salad though). Our visit last August had greasy food. This visit the food was great but the service was awful. It may not always seem like it, especially when I am doing a review, but I had to give bad reviews. Really, I do. I want every experience to be great. And maybe that is my problem. I have expectations that are too high. Regardless, this visit wasn’t stellar.
First, they opened 15 minutes late. And their staff didn’t seem to have any urgency about opening.
Second, after Brad got our food and went to order our drinks, he asked what kind of cup the water comes in [I won’t drink water from a paper cup]. He told Brad it was a paper one, so Brad went ordered a fountain drink for me. I am trying to cut calories and drinks are one of the easiest ways to do this. Well Brad got me Pepsi. And that was fine except it wasn’t Pepsi. It was cherry Pepsi. I couldn’t handle it so I tried another machine. Yep, both machines had Pepsi that tasted like cherry Pepsi. They had weird tea dispensers, so I finally just gave up and got Mountain Dew. Well the next frustrating thing to this story, after about 15 minutes, a family walks out of the restaurant with plastic cups filled with water [Insert eye roll emoji].
Third, I needed a fork to eat my salad. Brad went looking for the fork, but he couldn’t find any. So he just asked an employee. The employee told Brad they were out…uh how am I supposed to eat the salad you just sold me?!? When Brad asked this question, the guy finally went and found some from another restaurant. By the time I went in to fix my drink situation, they had found a supply of them and stocked them.
So while the food was still great, the experience was frustrating. I get having one issue, but three big issues and employees who could careless, that’s big. Anyhow, you can see our food below. The pizza was great. It wasn’t greasy and the flavor was great as always. I liked when I picked it up it didn’t fold over. It was sturdy but not hard as a rock. The salad was good too, but it took two tries to get the ranch dressing. The first dressing we got was actually caesar dressing. Part of me wished they chopped up the veggies, but it is also nice to dip them in the dressing separately.
After lunch, we continued to hang around the area. There is a fountain right below where we ate lunch, so Melody enjoyed playing around that and watching it. There were stairs that she enjoyed getting to just run up and down without many people around.
Next we ventured back through the hotel and into the Cascades Atrium.
Then back into the Garden Observatory.
We spoke to a lady the night before about SoundWaves and a new area called The Basement. The Basement is open to the public and you can catch a glimpse of SoundWaves here too. Well we didn’t want to visit it the first night because it was so crowded in general. So we decided to go get a glimpse of it and look around in general.
There is a fairly decent arcade with a rock climbing wall in it too. You can play pool, and they have multiple rooms you can host parties in. There is a wall full of windows where you can see inside of SoundWaves too. It looks really neat and fun.
Brad asked the lady at the entrance of SoundWaves about a day pass cost. I read online that day passes would be available on occasion when it was not at capacity. She told Brad that it is $51.99 per day assuming there is availability. At this point in our trip it didn’t make sense to spend the money with what little time we would have, but I am hoping we can visit on our next trip.
We decided to go spend some time in our room and let Melody rest for a little bit. She was getting a bit fussy so she needed a break for sure. We sat on the balcony for a bit and had a snack. Melody started to get super fussy when things wouldn’t go her way, so I asked her to simply just crawl in my lap and sit for a bit. Next thing I know, she is asleep.
We just sat and talked while she slept. After she woke up, we took a few selfies, then we decide to get situated and walk some more.
We love to just walk around the resort in general. Melody loves it because she has so much freedom, and we love it because she burns SO much energy! I took lots of pictures around the resort as well as of Melody!
We made our way back to the fountain and ultimately decided to get Starbucks at the Delta Marketplace. Unlike the day before, there was no one there today! We walked right up and placed our order. After ordering drinks for Brad and me, Melody decided she wanted something. Mom guilt set in, so I got her a white chocolate creme frappuccino. We’ve never given her caffeine aside from what is in ordinary chocolate, and we were not starting today, ha! Melody did seem to enjoy hers and finished half which was more than I expected.
We went back down to the fountain and sat for a bit. Melody really loved the fountain. She found it very entertaining.
Our friends Emily and Justin happened to be at Opryland at the same time, and their room was right outside of the fountain. We were able to see Justin from the fountain while he was working on the balcony.
We met them at the fountain a bit later and let the girls burn a bit of energy before heading to dinner around 5.
We decided to go to Finley’s Pub (Frosty’s Pub during the holidays). We were one of four tables when we arrived. The sign said seat yourself, so we picked a booth style table that had a couch and 2 chairs (we pulled up a third one from another table). It was on their faux balcony area. They had a lot of Christmas lights all throughout the restaurant.
Not long after we sat down, our waiter brought us our menus. They were just paper menus that were likely printed just to incorporate the holiday overlay. As you can see, everything has a holiday ring to it. They also had children menus, but they are the same as the ones from The Fuse.
We didn’t order the girls any food. Instead we gave them peanut butter crackers and goldfish. We did give them each some of our French fries though. We attempted to order them milk, but yet again, they were still out. This surprised me since one of their desserts was milk and cookies. So Brad and Justin ran back to the ice cream shop to get a container of milk for each of the girls.
So not only were they out of milk, the waiter said they were out of lemons for water. He offered limes, but that sounds horrid, ha. So no biggie. I would have rather them have milk anyhow.
So I ordered the festive fish and chips for dinner, as did Justin. First off, the most ironic part of this meal…the two lemons sitting on our fries. I wasn’t going to say anything, and both Justin and I moved lemons to our water. The waiter noticed and said to us “I didn’t think to check the kitchen for lemons”. Uh, really? Second, there wasn’t anything “festive” about it. I wasn’t sure what would be festive about it, but I though maybe something, ha. So about the food. Generally it was really good. They had really great hand cut fries. And the tartar sauce was great to go with both the fries and the fish. I was slightly irritated that they placed the fish on the fries without really draining any of the grease. By doing this half of the breading came off and stuck to the fries making them super greasy too. The breading also didn’t have a lot of flavor. Overall the meal wasn’t awful, and I would order it again if we ever went back.
Brad ordered the pub burger, plain. When the burger first came out, it was fully loaded. It wasn’t our waiter who brought it out, but Brad still sent it back with him. The employee seemed somewhat irritated but did it. It came back out appearing to be correct. The burger did not look appetizing though. He ate it, but after a few bites, he could taste pickles. So it appears they just reused the bun and removed everything else. Near the end of eating, he bit into parts that were much more undercooked than he requested, and he even found a piece of lettuce. He said the burger was ok aside from that, and the fries were great.
Emily ordered the crab dip. I didn’t get a picture of it, but she did let me try a bite. First, the crackers are just Ritz crackers. We expected something a little nicer for the price she was paying. The crab dip was also hot which was unexpected. For some reason we both expected a cold dip. It was decent. It was a little rich, and it would be hard to finish.
The girls loved being around each other, and it made finishing dinner a little bit easier since they talked and entertained each other.
After we finished eating and were waiting to pay, live music started inside of the restaurant. Melody went with Brad inside and watched them perform. They even played Itsy Bitsy Spider for her which was really cute.
Once we finished paying for dinner, we headed to the Magnolia Lobby while Emily went to their room and got jackets for Lydia and Justin.
We walked outside and viewed the gorgeous Nativity Scene.
Once we came back inside, we headed to Holiday Halls. The girls wanted to ride the train and the teacups. We bought tickets before heading inside. Technically the girls are free, but only with a paid person.
First we did the train. Melody loved the train. Right now she is obsessed with trains, so that made her even more excited. I expected it to only go around once, but I think it went around four times.
Next was the teacups. Brad decided he would ride with Melody (I volunteered but he said he could do it). Emily received a free ticket from a lady who said she wasn’t going to use hers. So she was able to ride with Justin and Lydia. Well Brad thought it was going well, so he decided to spin the cup faster. He came off of it quite sick…
We went back down to The Basement to play in the arcade. Brad and Justin wanted to play for a bit. They bought a $10 pass, and it came with a free $3. They played quite a few games, and we let the girls run around while they played. They liked to pretend they were playing. An employee even gave us a free game credit too.
Emily wanted something sweet, so we headed over to the ice cream shop. It was closest, and we were unsure if the yogurt shop was opened. There were quite a few people in line, but it moved pretty quick. I ordered a kid’s white chocolate gelato. It tasted like a much sweeter vanilla. Melody really liked it, and so did I.
Justin ordered a blueberry cake/cheesecake thing. He really liked it. Then Emily ordered a brownie sundae. The brownies looked amazing and super fudgy. She really liked it too.
We did one more walk through of the Garden Observatory, then we headed back to the fountain for the fountain show at 9 pm.
We showed up a few minutes until 9, and we got a really great seat near the front of the fountain. The girls loved being so close and really got into the music and show. Melody loves when the fountain goes “really high”.
After the show, we headed back to the room since it was 9:30 and well past bedtimes. After baths and some packing, we finally got Melody down for bed. Brad and I hung out on the balcony until around midnight, then finally threw in the towel. We hated to leave our little balcony, but we knew we would struggle if we didn’t.
Our last day was super short, ha! We got up around 6 and started getting ready. Brad went to our car with the first load of luggage around 6:30.
I waited until around 6:45 to wake Melody. She was not happy about the light, ha!
We checked out and left at 7. We were only a few minutes late for drop off, but her sweet teacher left carline open for us. So mission accomplished on the return!
We really enjoyed this trip to Opryland. We love every trip we take, but this one was super relaxing. Well all of our Opryland trips are really relaxing. I wish more trips were this way, but that’s near impossible. Opryland just has so many things set up to make staying there super convenient. It is expensive, but we are ok with the splurge once a year. Going at Christmas is really special because all of the decorations make it so gorgeous to walk around. They also have things set up for the kids and a special boat ride just for the occasion. I can’t wait for us to go back next year! Oh, and here is a little gem from Melody’s first trip to Opryland and this year. Two years apart, same location! Man time flies!
