Boudin
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- May 8, 2014
Once upon a time about a month ago my wife was browsing through her email on a Sunday morning and came across a SWA special from NOLA to Orlando for around $85 bucks. We fired off a quick text message to a couple friend of ours that are Disney freaks like us, and within 10 minutes we had a trip in the works! Since this was a spur of the moment trip, we decided to go as cheap as we could within reason and booked a room at ASM. I typically refuse to stay at the value resorts only because I've had horrible, traumatic experiences with WDW bus transportation, but I agreed to give it another shot.
DAY 1
We arrived at MCO around 11PM and caught Magical Express to AS Movies with minimal delays. We were up bright and early Saturday morning so we could get to AK at rope drop. To my great surprise, a bus arrived in 2 minutes and whisked us on our way in record time and we wound up with an hour to spare!
Off we went to Everest, where we walked right on, then again. From there we backtracked to Dinosaur and our requisite ride on primeval whirl. A quick stop for a really delicious breakfast sandwich at Starbucks had us pumped up and ready to tackle the rapids. I only got partially soaked for a change and then off to Harambe Theater for the Festival of the Lion King which is as good as it always was. All this and it's not even 11:30 yet. The crowds were fairly large, but manageable and we had a good plan. It's Tough To Be A Bug and Finding Nemo concluded our morning of fun and we were all ready to hit our beloved Flame Tree for lunch. My wife and I split a half rack of ribs and some of those fantastic fries with the pulled pork on them. Feeling satisfied and in need of a little break it was time to hop over to DHS for the afternoon.
We had saved our fast passes for the always busier afternoon and we smoked through TOT, RNR (our longest wait of the day at 40 mins), Voyage of the Little Mermaid, Muppets, and the Great Movie Ride. Throw in a couple of cold Yuenglings and what a great afternoon it was. We were all in shock that we had accomplished so much in one short day. A quick photo with Chewbacca at the Launch Bay and another cold one had us ready for our dinner res at Mama Melrose's. All I can say about that is Wow! We got the heirloom tomato and mozerella salad as an app and it was fantastic. I got the steak, the other guy in our party got the saltimbocca and both ladies got the chicken parm. It was all very good, excellent in fact. I used to say Yachtsman had the best steak in WDW, but that one was every bit as good. It was one of my most memorable meals at The World. We will definitely be back.
Even though DHS and AK are heavily under construction, combining them like this made for a really great day.
DAY 2
Back up early for welcome show and rope drop at MK. Again, the magic bus was there waiting on us and we arrived with not much delay at all. Because this was such a short trip, we knew one park was going to have to get left out, so we decided to skip Epcot because we spent a lot of time there at Christmas. We blazed into Frontierland and rode BTMR and SM and hit Haunted Mansion all in a flash. Again, the crowds were fairly heavy as they always are now, but not unmanageable. Our first FP of the day was for Peter Pan because one of our traveling companions had never been on it. Then we decided to try Winnie the Pooh. That was the only unpleasant experience of the day. Sign said 35 minutes and we bailed out after 20 when we were nowhere close. That cue is an unorganized mess. By now it's 11:00, so we exited the park and caught the resort monorail over to Poly for a light lunch at Kona. My wife is addicted to the potstickers... so it's a required stop on any trip. We got back to MK and headed to Tomorrowland for a ride on the people mover and Carousel of Progress to let our lunch settle. Then we caught the Festival of Fantasy Parade, which is becoming a favorite for us, although that 3:00 time always seems to be inconvenient. We polished off the rest of our to-do list including a welcomed air conditioning break at the Hall of Presidents which I absolutely love (the show and the AC). We re-booked fast passes as we cleared them off and re-rode some of our favs. We ended up the day with dinner at Skipper Canteen. We got the steak salad, mac n cheese, head on shrimp and the strip steak respectively. Everyone really enjoyed their dinner. MK desperately needed a dining option like this. The staff is top notch and the theming was really cool. We finished the day off with Wishes and a stroll down main street to do a little shopping and hit the confectionary on the way out as is our custom.
CONCLUSION
There were a few take-aways from this trip that stuck with me. The first is, you can absolutely do a 2 day trip to WDW if you are willing to buy a hopper and sacrifice some sleep lol. It's a commando trip with no time for lounging by the pool, but for the hard core Dis-er it's more than doable. Second is the bus system seems to have improved greatly. Maybe it's coincidence, but it ran like a well oiled machine. I'll be willing to try it again in the future. It really was a fantastic trip, one of our more memorable, magical ones.
DAY 1
We arrived at MCO around 11PM and caught Magical Express to AS Movies with minimal delays. We were up bright and early Saturday morning so we could get to AK at rope drop. To my great surprise, a bus arrived in 2 minutes and whisked us on our way in record time and we wound up with an hour to spare!
Off we went to Everest, where we walked right on, then again. From there we backtracked to Dinosaur and our requisite ride on primeval whirl. A quick stop for a really delicious breakfast sandwich at Starbucks had us pumped up and ready to tackle the rapids. I only got partially soaked for a change and then off to Harambe Theater for the Festival of the Lion King which is as good as it always was. All this and it's not even 11:30 yet. The crowds were fairly large, but manageable and we had a good plan. It's Tough To Be A Bug and Finding Nemo concluded our morning of fun and we were all ready to hit our beloved Flame Tree for lunch. My wife and I split a half rack of ribs and some of those fantastic fries with the pulled pork on them. Feeling satisfied and in need of a little break it was time to hop over to DHS for the afternoon.
We had saved our fast passes for the always busier afternoon and we smoked through TOT, RNR (our longest wait of the day at 40 mins), Voyage of the Little Mermaid, Muppets, and the Great Movie Ride. Throw in a couple of cold Yuenglings and what a great afternoon it was. We were all in shock that we had accomplished so much in one short day. A quick photo with Chewbacca at the Launch Bay and another cold one had us ready for our dinner res at Mama Melrose's. All I can say about that is Wow! We got the heirloom tomato and mozerella salad as an app and it was fantastic. I got the steak, the other guy in our party got the saltimbocca and both ladies got the chicken parm. It was all very good, excellent in fact. I used to say Yachtsman had the best steak in WDW, but that one was every bit as good. It was one of my most memorable meals at The World. We will definitely be back.
Even though DHS and AK are heavily under construction, combining them like this made for a really great day.
DAY 2
Back up early for welcome show and rope drop at MK. Again, the magic bus was there waiting on us and we arrived with not much delay at all. Because this was such a short trip, we knew one park was going to have to get left out, so we decided to skip Epcot because we spent a lot of time there at Christmas. We blazed into Frontierland and rode BTMR and SM and hit Haunted Mansion all in a flash. Again, the crowds were fairly heavy as they always are now, but not unmanageable. Our first FP of the day was for Peter Pan because one of our traveling companions had never been on it. Then we decided to try Winnie the Pooh. That was the only unpleasant experience of the day. Sign said 35 minutes and we bailed out after 20 when we were nowhere close. That cue is an unorganized mess. By now it's 11:00, so we exited the park and caught the resort monorail over to Poly for a light lunch at Kona. My wife is addicted to the potstickers... so it's a required stop on any trip. We got back to MK and headed to Tomorrowland for a ride on the people mover and Carousel of Progress to let our lunch settle. Then we caught the Festival of Fantasy Parade, which is becoming a favorite for us, although that 3:00 time always seems to be inconvenient. We polished off the rest of our to-do list including a welcomed air conditioning break at the Hall of Presidents which I absolutely love (the show and the AC). We re-booked fast passes as we cleared them off and re-rode some of our favs. We ended up the day with dinner at Skipper Canteen. We got the steak salad, mac n cheese, head on shrimp and the strip steak respectively. Everyone really enjoyed their dinner. MK desperately needed a dining option like this. The staff is top notch and the theming was really cool. We finished the day off with Wishes and a stroll down main street to do a little shopping and hit the confectionary on the way out as is our custom.
CONCLUSION
There were a few take-aways from this trip that stuck with me. The first is, you can absolutely do a 2 day trip to WDW if you are willing to buy a hopper and sacrifice some sleep lol. It's a commando trip with no time for lounging by the pool, but for the hard core Dis-er it's more than doable. Second is the bus system seems to have improved greatly. Maybe it's coincidence, but it ran like a well oiled machine. I'll be willing to try it again in the future. It really was a fantastic trip, one of our more memorable, magical ones.
