All tagged Disney
You may this post a little backwards than my usual trip report posts. Normally I post about what we did each day, THEN I get into all the details on individual posts about all the specific things we did on our trip. Well I am starting with a very specific thing we did on our early September trip because it is the Halloween party! It ends on November 1st, so I wanted to share our experience as soon as I could!
During our Disney World trip in March 2023, we got to cross a fun experience off our Disney Bucket List…Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique! Prior to COVID, Melody wasn’t old enough. We only went once when she was 3, and it was a quick trip. Then on our trips post COVID, they were not open. But they were finally open for our Spring Break trip, and after a lot of research and stalking, I found an ideal time for us during our trip.
During our trip to Disney World in March 2023, we took advantage of the Facebook group “Ear for Each Other”. It is where castmembers who were laid off during COVID could post different business ventures. One properly option is where different people deliver various goodies to your resort. After looking around on the page, we decided to reach out to Storybook Treats. We were uncertain if they could deliver to Shades of Green (they can!), and once we received confirmation, we decided to order some treats for the trip.
When we went to Disney World in March 2023, we decided to drive. We had the time, and it would actually be dramatically cheaper AND we could add two nights to our trip. With this we knew we would be asked a million times “are we there yet?” or “how much longer”. So I decided to make a map. I made two copies, one for the drive down and one for the drive home. Once we left and we knew the direction we would be going, I placed 10 stars along with the name of cities along our drive. Whenever we came to a city, I would let Melody know. This gave her a good way to track, and we only got asked those questions a hundred times ;)
During our March 2023 trip, we spent our second day at the Disney parks (third day in Orlando) at Magic Kingdom that morning and Hollywood Studios that evening. We had a big, late breakfast at Cinderella’s Royal Table, so we didn’t do a real lunch. We decided to make a dinner reservation at Sci Fi Dine In Theater once we secured the plans for Magic Kingdom. Melody had never been there, and I hadn’t been there since our trip with friends in 2014
Leaving Disney World is always one of the hardest parts. We really had such a fun time this trip, and we loved almost everything about it. (I will speak to the negatives in a future post. All were in regards to changes (such as Genie+.))
Day Six was our final day at Disney World before heading back to Huntsville. We opted to start our day at Hollywood Studios doing some of the bigger rides we didn’t do on day three. Then we wanted to end with our favorite park, EPCOT.
Our fifth day was a day we had been look forward to for the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique experience. It would be Melody’s first time getting to do it, and Vicki was so looking forward to it. And while the time originally wasn’t ideal, we ended up being happy with it. So this was definitely a Melody kind of day ahead!
On our second day, it was our first FULL day at Disney World visiting the parks. We spent the morning at Epcot and the evening at Animal Kingdom. We did open the park, but we made sure we didn’t exhaust ourselves and didn’t close the park. Follow along below.
For Spring Break, we went to Disney World with Brad’s parents. We opted to drive to save money. We started our trek after school on Friday. We had originally planned to check Melody out once we were packed and ready, but she had a field trip that afternoon. So I check her out from the field trip, and we headed out.
It has been over a month since our return from Disney, but I am finally getting to posting all about our fun trip! Brad does not entirely agree, but I must say that this was one of my least tiring trips to Disney World in quite some time. I did get to sleep in one day while he got up early to take Melody to Magic Kingdom (more on that soon), but the trip overall went so smooth.
Back in October, we made a last minute decision to head to Disney World for Melody’s fall break. We had Hilton points, so that made the trip more appealing. We had enough to stay for free at DoubleTree at Disney Springs. It was the best deal out of all the Disney Springs Hilton hotels, and we did like the idea of having the separate bedroom and mini-kitchen.
We spent our last day at Disney at Epcot. We opted to dedicate the whole day to Epcot. We had briefly considered returning to another park, but realistically staying at Epcot all day allowed us to see both Emily’s group and Rebekah’s group.
Tuesdays always seem to be a great day to visit Magic Kingdom, so we opted to do that. We ended the night at Epcot for the food! Epcot is our go to for great food, and we always have to fit in our must-dos. We snagged a decent timed reservation for Chefs de France on this evening, so we opted to do that.
We decided our first day would be spent at Hollywood Studios followed by the evening at Animal Kingdom. We opted for Hollywood first for a few reasons. One, we knew we wanted to also do Magic Kingdom and Epcot for sure. And those were fitting on Tuesday and Wednesday. Magic is never a good idea on Monday, and with the Food and Wine Festival going on, Epcot wasn't ideal for Monday either. We love doing Animal Kingdom at night, so that left Hollywood during the day. Melody LOVES Dinoland at Animal Kingdom, and we find it best in the evenings.
Not much fun is involved on travel days to Disney World. Especially when you are driving 10-12 hours. We got up as early as we could and headed down. We had to make the trip in one day, and we needed to get down to Orlando early enough that we could go to Shades of Green to get our park tickets before the ticket office closed.
Months ago, we found out both our in laws (brother/sister/nieces) and best friends were both going to Disney World during Fall Break. While it sounded fun to plan and tag along, several things kept us from booking a trip: money, 50th anniversary, Brad’s travel, crowds, etc. We also didn’t want to invade on their vacations. Well about two weeks before fall break, we still were not sure if Brad would be home or not. So I started looking at several options for Melody and me, including Disney. A few days before fall break, Brad found out he would be home, and we started floating around the idea. We kept going back to not going due to money and just the exhaustion of driving and a short trip. Melody was clueless about our family and friends going. But that changed the Friday before fall break. Her best friend, Lydia, found out she was going, and Melody started asking to go to Disney too. After a lot of talking, negotiating, and even some arguing, we decided Saturday morning we would head to Disney on Sunday. THE NEXT DAY! Thankfully I am a seasoned Disney goer, so this wasn’t impossible.
Something new to Disney World since COVID is their park pass system. It was originally put in place to truly manage park capacity in the early days of reopening after COVID. You could not park hop, so this kept Disney World in complete control of where everyone would be. Then park hopping started. They still require that you book a park pass for your first park, then after 2 pm, you can park hop to any park with availability. It looks like the park pass system is here to stay until at least January 2023. So I wanted to do a post about booking said passes. Check it out below.
During our recent Disney World trip in May 2021, we stayed at Pop Century. During this time, there were still a lot of COVID protocols going on. [I am not sure when you are reading this as to the accuracy of how things are in the present, so keep that in mind.] With these changes, I wanted to refresh our experience at the food court here at Pop.
So if you have been here awhile or have been reading up on my Disney posts from the past, you will know we were NOT fans for Pop Century back in 2017. We had a lot of bad experiences here, and even though there is some nostalgia from it being the first Disney hotel Melody stayed in, it was totally not our favorite by any means. I never would recommend this hotel. Well back in May we gave it another try. Not because I wanted to, but when we booked our trip it was pretty much all that was available that was reasonably priced. So we gave it another go.
