WDW Tips

I know, I know..it’s been a while since I have truely updated here.  I really need to do better. I’ll try promise

With that being said, WE ONLY HAVE 11 MORE DAYS TILL OUR TRIP!!! Some changes have happened around here since I began to plan the trip way back in April.  We are now staying at the Boardwalk Inn. We are both really happy to be staying here as it is one of our favorite resorts and we just love the proximity to EPCOT and this year’s Food and Wine Festival

We are looking forward to enjoying F&W as well as the new ride at Disney’s Hollywood Studios Toy Story Midway Mania. This is the first time Jim has been to the F&W or attended Mickey’s Not so Scary Halloween Party

We are also going to spend one day at Universal Studios and attend their Horror Night’s Event.

I am hoping to be able to video blog each day and possibly do a short written recap as well.

This is a picture taken by an online friend of ours. She just returned from a few days at the Magic Kingdom, SeaWorld, and Universal. I was pretty bummed that we were not at Disney this past weekend but after seeing these pictures…..well we both would have just been stressed out. On a side note it is good to see crowds like this now. Between gas prices and the unsure economy I was worried about the parks. Let’s just hope it is no where near this crowded in Oct! (by szlea)

Here’s the link from when Sig, Edgar, and Norman Hansen were at the Norway Pavilion earlier this month. There are some pretty good pics on their flickr account as well. Boy do I wish we could have been there!

Well, what can I say other than “this sucks!” I know that there had been rumors of this happening, but I honestly thought they would leave Adventurer’s Club alone. Unfortunately that is not the case as it was confirmed today that it too would close on September 27th. Distant Creations has some concept art while The Disney Blog has the press release.

I am just sick over this. We loved going to the Adventurer’s Club on each trip. We would spend most of the night there taking in as many shows in the Library, Mask Room, or Trophy room as we could. We loved the personal interaction with the Pamela, Hathaway, and Emil to just name a few. I am so sad that I will not be there before it closes to have one more Kungaloosh. This was truly an unique experience for Disney and one that will be missed by many, many guests.

We’ll we’re 2 months + away from the family vacation.  I have a few observations:

• OKW was not near as enjoyable as I remembered.  The resort is HUGE.  We were in the same building as last time. There was really nothing bad about it but I think that unless we get an amazing rate I don’t know that we will stay there again. I really, really just enjoy the monorail or EPCOT resorts so much better. We had no problems with transportation but relying on Disney buses is just not as enjoyable as the monorail or boats.
• The parks were pretty crowded.  It was clear Disney was not prepared or staffed for the crowds.  We saw very few Photopass Photographers in comparison to what we saw in Jan/Feb.
• The Flower and Garden Festival was pretty neat.  I wish we had been able to spend more time enjoying it.
• The fireworks cruise was amazing.  We were on the Breathless, which beforehand I was upset about but in retrospect it was perfect.  My husband, dad, and brother all fell in love with that boat.
• We also did a photo session at the Grand Floridian. We ended up with about 80 pictures from our 30 minute session.  Our photopass CD finished up with about 600 pictures once all the edits were made.  You can now convert pictures into black and white which is a neat feature.
• Magical Express worked well going back to the airport, however we had to wait almost an hour to leave the airport to get to OKW.  We arrived around midnight and they waited until the bus was about half full before we left.  Luckily we were the first stop.

All in all it was a most incredible trip. The pictures are up on our flickr account. There are many, many more but that gives you a good overview. It was very overwhelming at first to be there with my family who I had not been together with in so long. I hope it is not the last family vacation we take. Disney Cruise anyone?

Something that might be of interest to some of you out there. PassPorter Press has recently released a book titled “PassPorter’s Open Mouse”

It was written by by Deb Wills and Debra Martin Koma who are the founder and editor in chief of Allearsnet.com and it deals with any type of special needs when traveling to Walt Disney World or on the Disney Cruise line.

As you guys know I love the PassPorter Books and have had one since 1999. I think this could be a great tool for anyone traveling to WDW in the near future. It covers all types of challenges ranging for physically handicaps, dietary issues, even had advice for pregnant travelers.

If you are not signed up for twitter I strongly suggest that you look into it. I am really enjoying keeping up with the Disney parks via other people’s experiences. Some of the people I follow are The Disney Blog, Window to the Magic, Digital Steve, and the Big D . Several of these also have blogs and/or podcasts that I read/listen to on a regular basis. Oh and by the way you can find me on twitter at shelleyg74.

Jim and I were at breakfast the other morning and noticed 2 ladies sitting at a table going over plans for a WDW trip. It was obvious that one of them had planned out the trip for the other. They were going over transportation, dining, and ticket options. The biggest shocker to me was that the book that the “planner” was using was the Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World. Now, don’t get me wrong I have used this book in the past, however I find that a Passporter is much more useful.

The entire time while were were eating I was wondering if I should go over and say something to them…just offer my help. I didn’t but trust me I wanted to.

I have always offered to friends and family that I will plan out trips for them. I have been the master planner for several group trips as well as the trips that Jim and I take. I am wondering though if I should expand who I help. I mean I guess my first response normally is to send them to Allearsnet.com but should I start doing more? What do you think?

Got an offer from Disney earlier this week for 20% off the purchase of a Photopass CD before we began our trip. The cost is normally $125 and you can pre-purchase for $99. You get all the pictures that Disney takes as well as any cropped pictures on your CD. It also arrives with a copywrite waiver so you can make as many copies in any size that you might want. Although I have not had much use for the Photopass photographers until now, we decided that splitting the cost by 4 and knowing that all 4 of us would be in all the pictures this is worth it. I can tell you that knowing I have already spent the $$ for the CD I will no longer walk past a Photopass Photographer without getting them to take my picture. It’s a pretty smart move on Disney’s part if you ask me. It keeps the Photographer’s busy and sells the CD’s for them. I have heard of people having 300+pictures on their CD. I think if we can manage 150-200 we will be doing good.

Magical Express is a service Disney offers which allows guests of the resort to have shuttle transportation to/from the Orlando International Airport and the Walt DisneyWorld Resort. On trips prior to this service it would cost us anywhere from $25 pp for Mears Shuttle Service to $80+ tip for a towncar service. We only did the shuttle service once; it was horrible we were crammed onto a 15 passenger van with people who were going to several different hotels. It took us over an hour to get to the hotel. For later trips we switched to a towncar service. It was very nice. We were greeted at the gate and assisted with our luggage. We also were given a 30 minute grocery stop to pick up water, cokes, pop tarts, etc. They also picked you up for your return trip home.

When Disney started the Magical Express I was a little worried. I thought it would be more like the Mears shuttle, but hey this is Disney, they are not going to cut corners right? My first experience with Magical Express I was flying Southwest, which is not one of the preferred airlines. However, we had a very little wait time and in no time were on the very nice motor coach on our way to Caribbean Beach Resort. Our luggage was delivered to our room within an hour to our room. Since we were not a preferred airline we could only hold our luggage on the way home at the end of our trip but it was a very pleasant experience. Our next trip we were flying a preferred carrier and let me tell you the $20 or so that you save by flying a discount airline is no longer worth it. I always take that into consideration when I am looking at airfare now. Basically you check you luggage when you arrive at your home airport and don’t deal with it again until you get back to your home airport at the end our your trip. Disney has the hotels which each motor coach services grouped together well and the wait is not bad at all. This is a great added value to your Disney vacation.