ml sumner
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- May 23, 2013
My family just spent 7 nights/8 days staying at All Star Music for our first time. I thought the resort was nice, clean and quiet. We had a preferred room in Calypso, under the free dining bounce back we booked last October. We have stayed at all the All Stars, Pop, Coronado, POR, and AK Lodge in the past and I must say I find the All Stars adorable and small where everything seems close by no matter where you are at. We declined housekeeping for the gift card and called for towels when needed.
This trip we decided to drive to the parks since my husband had been studying google maps for several weeks prior to our trip. I must say I don't know why we didn't do this years ago (we always drive since we are only 4 hours away). Getting to Animal Kingdom, Hollywood, and Epcot was within minutes. Magic Kingdom on the other hand is a nightmare to drive to right now. There is construction going on at the TTC and it makes for longer walks. This is the only park that I feel taking the bus would have been much better.
My first tip that I learned from these boards is to get on some of the popular rides close to park closing. Folks, this is so true. We were in Hollywood Studios Monday night and at 8:20PM with a 9:00PM closing, the wait time read 65 minutes for Slinky Dog Dash. We jumped in line and timed it and it took 25 minutes! We waited this long for this ride on our Early Morning Magic we had booked for that Wednesday. I must say Toy Story Land is so much prettier and Slinky Dog is so much better to ride at night vs day. We also tried this same scenario at Animal Kingdom on Wednesday night with FOP. We got in line at 8:25PM with a 9:00PM closing and the wait time said 155 minutes. We got on the ride in 55 minutes!! My husband even asked walking in the line to one of the cast members if the wait was really that long, and all they would say was maybe a little bit shorter of a wait. While we were waiting in line they kept playing a message saying the wait times were increased due to the ride not being ran at full capacity, but we didn't leave. I don't know if that was true at one point or if they were just trying to empty the line.
We also got a same day fast pass for FOP on Thursday, I couldn't believe it!! We were standing at the monorail right after the parade getting ready to head back to our car and we decided we were going to go to AK that evening. I jumped on the MDE app to see what was open and it first pulled up a Navi River for around 6:30, which I did grab. I kept refreshing to modify the time and a FOP fast pass popped up for 3:45-4:45. It was 3:40 at that time so we booked it over to AK and got to the ride by 4:30. I don't know if fast passes drop for this ride every day at 3:40 or if it was pixie dust for us but it can and does happen.
Being we were on the dining plan this trip we booked lots of Character meals. One of them was the Storybook Dining at Artist Point. This meal for 2 Adults and 1 child was $180. There is no way I would ever pay this much for this meal. The food was decent, but nothing great. I got the Brothers Grim Chicken and my hubby got the Prime Rib. I didn't like any of the appetizers and thought the shrimp looked strange being stuffed in the glass jar. The desserts were just okay. This meal was probably a one and done. The characters were good and the Evil Queen is great. I did enjoy exploring the resort and would love to stay there one day. It is gorgeous place.
Garden Grill was great as always. We booked a PPO and it was so nice to not have to wait outside with the crowd. After our meal we lined up for Soarin and then jumped on Living with the land.
Ohana was good, but sure missed the bacon they use to serve. I read somewhere on here where you could ask for some, but I didn't and made do with the ham and sausage links.
Tusker House is a great breakfast buffet. We booked this one at 10:30 because my hubby was wanting to try some of the lunch. Next time we will wait to book this like at 10:45 because the lunch didn't make its way out until 11:15. The characters came around super fast and we just kept sitting there waiting for my husband to get some lunch!
Crystal Palace was good and again the characters came around super fast and we were finished with meeting them and eating within 45 minutes of sitting down, which is good because they told us that it could take up to 90 minutes for all the characters to make their rounds.
We have the Landry card so we ate at Yak N Yeti, T-Rex, and Rain Forest. My son and hubby loves these restaurants and it is nice to get a table immediately without having a reservation so these restaurants worked well on our AK days/nights and for Disney Springs.
At Disney Springs we finally made our way to the Coca Cola store and we order the International flight and the Float flight. This consisted of 3 trays with 24 different sample cups. My son absolutely loved doing this and we will probably try this again. If you haven't been there it is worth a visit if your at Disney Springs.
Rain showers occurred every day we were there, which was not a problem for us. Let me say that Disney's rain ponchos that they sell have definitely gotten thinner through the years. We had some of our old ones from several years past, but bought my son a new one and they are so thin now and don't hold up. You can trade them in and they will give you a new one, but we have decided that we are buying a nice rain jacket before we go again to take with us to the parks.
All in all we had a great trip and can't wait to go again.
This trip we decided to drive to the parks since my husband had been studying google maps for several weeks prior to our trip. I must say I don't know why we didn't do this years ago (we always drive since we are only 4 hours away). Getting to Animal Kingdom, Hollywood, and Epcot was within minutes. Magic Kingdom on the other hand is a nightmare to drive to right now. There is construction going on at the TTC and it makes for longer walks. This is the only park that I feel taking the bus would have been much better.
My first tip that I learned from these boards is to get on some of the popular rides close to park closing. Folks, this is so true. We were in Hollywood Studios Monday night and at 8:20PM with a 9:00PM closing, the wait time read 65 minutes for Slinky Dog Dash. We jumped in line and timed it and it took 25 minutes! We waited this long for this ride on our Early Morning Magic we had booked for that Wednesday. I must say Toy Story Land is so much prettier and Slinky Dog is so much better to ride at night vs day. We also tried this same scenario at Animal Kingdom on Wednesday night with FOP. We got in line at 8:25PM with a 9:00PM closing and the wait time said 155 minutes. We got on the ride in 55 minutes!! My husband even asked walking in the line to one of the cast members if the wait was really that long, and all they would say was maybe a little bit shorter of a wait. While we were waiting in line they kept playing a message saying the wait times were increased due to the ride not being ran at full capacity, but we didn't leave. I don't know if that was true at one point or if they were just trying to empty the line.
We also got a same day fast pass for FOP on Thursday, I couldn't believe it!! We were standing at the monorail right after the parade getting ready to head back to our car and we decided we were going to go to AK that evening. I jumped on the MDE app to see what was open and it first pulled up a Navi River for around 6:30, which I did grab. I kept refreshing to modify the time and a FOP fast pass popped up for 3:45-4:45. It was 3:40 at that time so we booked it over to AK and got to the ride by 4:30. I don't know if fast passes drop for this ride every day at 3:40 or if it was pixie dust for us but it can and does happen.
Being we were on the dining plan this trip we booked lots of Character meals. One of them was the Storybook Dining at Artist Point. This meal for 2 Adults and 1 child was $180. There is no way I would ever pay this much for this meal. The food was decent, but nothing great. I got the Brothers Grim Chicken and my hubby got the Prime Rib. I didn't like any of the appetizers and thought the shrimp looked strange being stuffed in the glass jar. The desserts were just okay. This meal was probably a one and done. The characters were good and the Evil Queen is great. I did enjoy exploring the resort and would love to stay there one day. It is gorgeous place.
Garden Grill was great as always. We booked a PPO and it was so nice to not have to wait outside with the crowd. After our meal we lined up for Soarin and then jumped on Living with the land.
Ohana was good, but sure missed the bacon they use to serve. I read somewhere on here where you could ask for some, but I didn't and made do with the ham and sausage links.
Tusker House is a great breakfast buffet. We booked this one at 10:30 because my hubby was wanting to try some of the lunch. Next time we will wait to book this like at 10:45 because the lunch didn't make its way out until 11:15. The characters came around super fast and we just kept sitting there waiting for my husband to get some lunch!
Crystal Palace was good and again the characters came around super fast and we were finished with meeting them and eating within 45 minutes of sitting down, which is good because they told us that it could take up to 90 minutes for all the characters to make their rounds.
We have the Landry card so we ate at Yak N Yeti, T-Rex, and Rain Forest. My son and hubby loves these restaurants and it is nice to get a table immediately without having a reservation so these restaurants worked well on our AK days/nights and for Disney Springs.
At Disney Springs we finally made our way to the Coca Cola store and we order the International flight and the Float flight. This consisted of 3 trays with 24 different sample cups. My son absolutely loved doing this and we will probably try this again. If you haven't been there it is worth a visit if your at Disney Springs.
Rain showers occurred every day we were there, which was not a problem for us. Let me say that Disney's rain ponchos that they sell have definitely gotten thinner through the years. We had some of our old ones from several years past, but bought my son a new one and they are so thin now and don't hold up. You can trade them in and they will give you a new one, but we have decided that we are buying a nice rain jacket before we go again to take with us to the parks.
All in all we had a great trip and can't wait to go again.
