Castles, Candy Canes & Mold Spice - WDW TR 11/10-11/17

[MKTokyo]

Trip Details
Who: My immediate family (me & my parents)
When: November 10-17, 2018
Where: Beach Club Villas
Why: No reason! Kind of a family reunion We also celebrated my dad's birthday on this trip!
Transportation: JetBlue flights & Disney transportation (+ Uber & Lyft/Minnie Van)
Tickets: APs for me & my dad, and a 7-Day Park Hopper for my mom. My dad had three business trips to Orlando this year. He likes to ride some things & eat dinner in Epcot when he's down there, so the AP made sense for him. I purchased my AP on a trip back in January.
Extras: Tables in Wonderland, D23 Gold & a few other things!

Cast
Please note that the man in the following photo is NOT my father I insist that any resemblance to me is simply a coincidence.

​

I'm Mimi, 23 years old, and I live in Japan with my fiance & our dog I'm an NYU alum, currently a graduate student at the University of Tokyo and I work as a curatorial fellow. I'm also a passholder for the Tokyo parks & spend many happy days there. I am a huge fan of the controversial-in-the-US Duffy & was very sad to see he's basically been erased from WDW. I'm an only child and very close to my parents so I was really looking forward to this trip.

Favorite Movie: ALL OF THEM! (Especially any princess movie

)
Favorite Character: Cinderella, Marie, Chip & Dale
Favorite Resort: Polynesian, Grand Floridian, Beach Club
Favorite Park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: Haunted Mansion & Tower of Terror

In the photo with me & "Not the Papa" is my mom, (redacted) years old. She is a librarian, which is the perfect career for her as she loves books and her favorite hobby is reading. I couldn't wait to take her to meet Gaston Her second favorite hobby is shopping & that's something we both could not wait to do! She is also a big fan of Flynn Rider (AS AM I) so we made sure to hit the Bon Voyage breakfast.

Favorite Movie: Dumbo, Lady and the Tramp, The Lion King
Favorite Character: Lady, Flynn Rider, Ursula

Favorite Resort: Polynesian & Grand Floridian
Favorite Park: Epcot
Favorite Ride: Haunted Mansion & Soarin'

​

This is my dad, 55 years old. I clearly chose to post the most flattering photo of him from this trip. Thankfully, he has a good sense of humor He is a real estate attorney & I keep asking him to look into how long I'd have to squat in the Cinderella Castle suite before Disney would be unable to evict me. So far, no luck. He is a big nerd (I inherited this trait) & loves Star Wars, Star Trek, Marvel, etc.

Favorite Movie: The Lion King
Favorite Character: Goofy
Favorite Resort: Yacht Club & Contemporary
Favorite Park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: Space Mountain, Expedition Everest, Star Tours

My family has been going to Disney parks together since I was a baby - and before that, too. My parents went to WDW on their honeymoon & stayed at the Contemporary. I had no chance to avoid the lure of the mouse... (Happy 90th, Mickey! Looking good.) We have had a lot of fun & made a lot of great memories over the years. I hope that I will also have "Disney kids" one day

Highlights
Some special events/packages that we did & I will write about...

• HEA Fireworks Dessert Party (Tomorrowland Terrace version)
• Early Morning Magic - Fantasyland & Toy Story Land
• Festival of the Lion King Tier 1 Package with private safari & dinner at Tiffins
• Tony's Most Merriest Town Square Party during MVMCP on November 15th

& our restaurants for this trip, with upcoming reviews...

• Rose & Crown (L)
• 'Ohana (D)
• Sanaa (L)
• Cinderella's Royal Table (D)
• Grand Floridian Cafe (L)
• AMC Dine-In Theater (D)
• Sci-Fi (L)
• Garden Grill (D)
• Ale & Compass (B)
• Nomad Lounge
• Tiffins (D)
• Afternoon Tea at Grand Floridian
• Be Our Guest (D)
• Bon Voyage Breakfast at Trattoria al Forno
• Yachtsman Steakhouse (D)

 

[MKTokyo]

Chapter Links

November 10th, Part 1: Travel Day
November 10th, Part 2: My 'Ohana Takes on 'Ohana

 

[QueenJen]

joining in - sounds like a fun report. love your humor.

 

[cmarsh31]

We were there the same time!

 

[SantaDuffy]

Hi , meant to tell you thanks very much as we found the Duffy outfit on eBay. Can’t find the other posting I did now, oh well. Not good with these things . But will look forward to reading the report as our holiday was the same time.

 

[SweetSerenity]

I'm joining in!

 

[DLo]

Following along

 

[cinderaimee]

Following along! So jealous you get to visit the Tokyo parks so often - they look like heaven!

 

[KailaH]

Hi! Following Along!

 

[MKTokyo]

joining in - sounds like a fun report. love your humor.

I hope it's fun to read!

We were there the same time!

We had a really great trip Hope you did too! It seemed to be a good time to go.

Hi , meant to tell you thanks very much as we found the Duffy outfit on eBay. Can’t find the other posting I did now, oh well. Not good with these things . But will look forward to reading the report as our holiday was the same time.

I think that thread was moved. I'm glad you were able to find the outfit!

I'm joining in!

Following along

Following along! So jealous you get to visit the Tokyo parks so often - they look like heaven!

I have a little extra love for them because they were "home" for me when everything else was still so strange.

Hi! Following Along!

 

[MKTokyo]

November 10th, Part 1: Travel Day

My last exam for the current term was on November 7th, in the morning I flew to the US later that day so that I could have a couple of days to acclimate to US time and visit family & friends there before our trip. It's a 13 hour flight, but because New York was 14 hours behind Japan at the time, I ended up landing just one hour after I took off.

​

Time zones are amazing.

I had a lie-flat seat so I spent a lot of the flight sleeping & still ended up with jet lag. In 2011, when I did my first study abroad in Nagoya, I was 16 and bounded off the plane knowing basically zero Japanese beyond "hello, I am from America!" & useful phrases like "my aunt has three cats." I'm pretty sure I was awake for 36 hours straight. I felt nothing. Now I need a nap after sleeping through a flight.

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(Some teens are really into Japanese media of some sort & would have been at a great advantage. Unfortunately, I was not one of them. Japan simply happened to be the country my high school had an exchange program with that year, and I wanted to do an exchange. When I say I knew nothing, I truly knew nothing beyond the few months of intense study I did in preparation. But, clearly, I didn't hate it )

We spent the night before our trip finishing up as much packing as we could (minus the last-minute, departure morning stuff) and printing out our plans on index cards because my mom likes to have one of those for each day. I went to bed around 10 PM & woke up EARLY, about four hours later, for our EARLY, 6:07 AM flight out of JFK. Did I mention it was EARLY?

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It was sooo hard to get into and then out of the shower. However, when I went to make myself some tea, the Vacation Fairy had left everyone some new pins on the counter, and I magically didn't feel so tired anymore! We were going to Disney World!

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Perfect for the never-ending question: "You're going AGAIN?!"

After the three of us pumped ourselves full of caffeine, we put those final items in our bags & got the luggage (and our tired selves) ready for the airport. We hired a car service and they picked us up right on time Our driver was great. He was silent as the grave, which is exactly what you want at 3:30 AM.

We got to the airport around 4:15 AM and checked in for our flight. We all have Global Entry, but there was really nobody there at that hour, so it didn't save us all that much time. It's still great not to have to take your shoes off & computers out, though. Once through security, we headed for our terminal, and then to a nearby lounge for - you guessed it! - MORE caffeine. We hung out there until it was time to board. Boarding was, as always, a trip - almost a literal trip, as everyone in the first boarding groups had to practically climb over people in the last boarding group who decided to camp out in front of the walkway. Annoying.

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My amazing view from middle seat 2B.

The flight attendant doing the safety presentation greeted everyone by saying, "Welcome aboard JetBlue flight 583, with service to Mickey Mouse Land." Clearly, she's one of us.

The flight itself was pretty uneventful, and only three hours long. Dad finished the work he had to do before he could really disconnect for vacation, Mom read a book, and I watched Twilight Zone episodes on Netflix. I've seen them all already, but I'm basically obsessed with the show and will take any opportunity to watch it. When I was little, I used to watch VHS tapes of it at my grandparents' house and tell them I was going to marry Rod Serling. Imagine my dismay when I learned he had been dead for something like 20 years by the time I was born. Oh well.

​

There he is Portrait of my Not-Husband as a Young Man. (Or, at least, a not-dead one.)

Before I knew it, we were landing at MCO and our trip was about to officially begin!

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We headed to the first ride of every Disney vacation...

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... & poked around in the Universal store for a little while. My two best friends & I are all huge Harry Potter fans and I wanted to see if I could pick up a little gift for them, but I didn't see anything I liked. Mom was looking for something with the Grinch, but she also didn't see anything she wanted to buy. After that, we headed down to the Magical Express to catch the bus to our resort. It was still pretty early, but there were lots of people waiting. We were glad to be able to get on the first bus that arrived.

About halfway through the trip, we got a text that our room was ready!

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Before long, we were pulling up to one of our homes away from home, the lovely Beach Club. We own DVC at BLT, BCV, and the Polynesian, but we hadn't stayed at BCV in about five years, so I was really happy to be staying here once again because I have such good memories of the resort - and of the AMAZING pool! (We had totally packed our swimsuits in our carry-ons & would make good use of them later.)

We walked in, took a deep breath, and the three of us were like...

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It was the Beach Club holiday scent & it was one of the greatest things I have ever smelled in my life. (The top three being my grandmother's cooking, my mother's cooking, and my future mother-in-law's cooking.) A CM told us it comes as a gingerbread scent and I'm sure that's true, but we talked about it with another admiring family and we decided it smells like the Yankee Candle scent "Caramel Pecan Pie." Except better. I didn't realize until just now how hilarious it is that not only my mom & myself, but another woman and both of her daughters all knew Yankee Candle scents well enough to pinpoint this as "Caramel Pecan Pie, mostly" That smell, though. It really was that good.

We finally dragged ourselves away from the lobby & went to check out our room, sort out what we needed for the day, and put away the rest. As the text stated, we were in room 276, which was quite a hike from the elevator, but it was very quiet.

Our Towel Mickey was waiting!

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We were very happy with that room throughout our stay. The view was nice, too!

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I quickly made up the sofa bed for myself because I knew I wasn't going to want to do it later. We also got to unload some of the weight from our carry-ons. I forgot that the Beach Club has the weirdest drawers. They're very deep but also very short. It's basically impossible to maximize the space unless you fold your clothes up & stack them.

We were all hungry & it was shortly after 11 AM, so we thought we'd head over to Food & Wine, but that didn't work out. It was hot, crowded, and my mom was just not feeling it. Instead, we looked for last-minute ADRs and found one waiting for us at Rose & Crown. We all like their food, so we decided to take it. When we arrived, we were shown to a really beautiful waterfront table with a nice breeze blowing through.

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And thus we all went into...

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I split a Scotch egg and a salad with my mom. Dad had the fish & chips.

After lunch, we walked around the UK Pavilion for a while, wandered in the garden & went into the shops when we wanted to get out of the sun. My mom & I are going to London together next year so we enjoyed talking with the CMs and getting recommendations for various things to do/see/eat.

We had fun shopping, too. My dad collects beer steins and he got a really cool one to take home. Then, he went to watch the UK band while my mom and I picked up some holiday tea & chose some candy to try.

​

And, what did we think of our selections?

• Quality Street: My mom wanted to get these because she remembered them from her childhood. She says they taste just as good.
• Aero: The label says that you can "feel the bubbles melt!" We didn't. Should have stuck with Cadbury Flake.
• Turkish Delight: Basically, chocolate-covered jelly that smells/tastes like roses. Not great, but not terrible. I still don't know whether or not I liked it.
• Digestives: I love these & think they're great with tea. I've never had them on their own. I imagine they'd be a bit dry.
• Bailey's: We almost didn't get to try these because I had left my bag outside with my dad & when I went to buy these, I got carded Who knew that was a thing that happened when buying cookies? I waved my mom over & she had to buy them instead. They were good. I don't think there's enough liquor in them to make an ant tipsy, though.

Once we were done shopping, we headed back to the resort to walk around & swim before dinner. We were really glad we had our swimsuits with us because our luggage had not been delivered yet. (It actually showed up about an hour later, but we hadn't been expecting it until evening.)

Along with forgetting about those odd drawers, and despite my fond memories of it, I had completely forgotten that the pool has a sand bottom. We tried to be cool about it. We really did. However, I imagine that to anyone watching us when we first got in the pool, we kind of looked like this...

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I waved to my parents, grabbed a tube, and floated away down the lazy river. I had no phone, no watch, and absolutely no idea what time it was. I figured my dad would come find me & overturn my tube without warning to let me know when we had to get ready for dinner (He did. As always.) But, until then, it was just wonderful to think about nothing, for once!

All that relaxing really works up an appetite, though...

Next up: My 'Ohana Takes on 'Ohana

 

[MKTokyo]

It's been a while since I started this TR & I'm finally able to work on it again!

Life updates, in brief:

• Had a visit from my parents over the winter holidays, which was a lot of fun!
• We were about to close on a house, subsequently lost that house at the last minute (mad), then were shown another house, which is 100% perfect for us & reminded us that things generally happen for a reason. We have since closed on that house & are all moved in
• Booked our wedding venue!

& that is that.

Back to WDW & our arrival night dinner at...

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This is another Disney tradition for us & one we always look forward to. We had a reservation for 5 PM & we were seated right away! I didn't even think it was possible to be seated immediately at 'Ohana. A nice CM with a delicious loaf of pineapple-coconut bread brought us to our table.

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(As a side note, anyone who says "don't fill up on bread" doesn't know me. I LIVE FOR BREAD.)

We were greeted by our long-lost family member, Cousin Kalani. Cousin Kalani is now one of my favorite family members, because he brought my beloved Lapu Lapu.

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My mom, who doesn't usually drink rum, wanted to try it, and I was like...

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I managed to remember how to share, though, and she liked it so much that she got one of her own. My dad is more of a beer guy and got something or other that he seemed to like. I don't drink beer so I cannot comment

We've eaten a lot of meals at 'Ohana over the years & this was neither the worst nor the best. Everything was quite good. I am actually more into the potstickers, veggies, noodles and wings than the meat & shrimp. I'm sure that makes my portion of the meal Not Worth It, but hey - it is better than all those princess meals we did growing up where I ate a single chicken nugget & the inside of a roll.

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Of course I found room for some of the meat, too! The steak was my favorite this time, followed by the chicken. The shrimp seemed a little bit "fishy" in a way that shrimp is not supposed to be. We all decided better safe than sorry & we didn't eat it, which was a little disappointing but left us with that much more room for the BEST part of the meal... the awesome bread pudding. I always wish I could start with this and then try to fit in everything else! I did not take any pictures of it because my mom & I descended on it as though we hadn't eaten for a year instead of for about five minutes. Oh well.

I loved eating at 'Ohana with my 'ohana, wearing our 'ohana buttons! After dinner, we walked on the beach for a while, then caught an Uber back to the resort. We were super tired after our very EARLY start. I FaceTimed my fiance out on the balcony while my parents watched TV and we were all in bed by 9-10 PM.

All in all, this was a very nice first day. We had a really early start planned for the next morning & didn't particularly care that we hadn't "made the most of" our first night.

Next up: Flight of Passage, Magical Makeover & Princess Dinner

 

[FoxC63]

Wait, is there more? I want more please!