franandaj
I'm so happy, I could BOUNCE!
- Joined
- Nov 15, 2009
Welcome to another franandaj trip report!
I don’t want to start this out on a bummer note, but if you have followed my trip reports in the past, I’m sorry to inform you that Fran will no longer be participating in the trip reports. She passed away back in April, a day before we were supposed to take our last planned trip to Walt Disney World.
I know that she would want me to continue these reports because she knew how much I enjoy sharing my experiences with my DIS friends. And while it's bittersweet to continue using this username, I feel like it's the right thing to do. She was a HUGE part of my life and I feel like I should honor her memory.
If you didn't know us, check out any of the links in my signature for our escapades. I'm moving forward with the folks who will be playing a role in this trip report and there will be introductions in this post.
Fran was one of the main instigators who made this trip to 21 Royal happen, and many toasts in her honor were shared that night. But first you might ask “What is 21 Royal?” Well let me get to the backstory and everything, it’s going to take a while, so pour yourself one of your favorite beverages, sit back, I’ll tell you a tale, a tale of a fa-er wait, that’s another tale….sorry!
The concept of 21 Royal began back in 2016. There were experiments by the Disney staff with various pricing options. At first the option of a la carte pricing was considered. However, in the end when the actual product launched they had settled on a fixed price experience. The concept launched in 2017 with a price tag of $15,000 all inclusive. There was no requirement for the minimum number of guests, however, the maximum number of guests is twelve.
The location of 21 Royal is above Pirates of the Caribbean. Once upon a time it was the Disney Gallery. You could book a dessert package here to watch Fantasmic! Later it was converted to the Dream Suite, and eventually became the location of 21 Royal.
Back in 2017, Fran and I thought we were going to come into a bit of money about the same time the new 21 Royal opened. We figured that an experience at this price level could never last, but we wanted to get in on it before it went away. So we went ahead and booked it, basically treating our friends to the experience. Most people we know couldn’t afford that sort of experience. Of course the money fell through, but we had already committed so live and learn.
This TR is not about that experience, but that’s what awakened Fran’s appetite for a repeat visit to 21 Royal. That’s when the search began to find another 10 people who were willing to split the cost.
We didn’t have to look far for the first one, Jill immediately signed up when we told her we were gathering another party. It was around September of 2019 when Su-Lynn (@chunkymonkey) said that she and her hubby would be interested as well as a friend who lived in Florida. Here’s a pic from when we met up in 2021 just before we confirmed everything.
And me and Jill earlier this year.
OK, now we’re up to six people. I started talking about it with Allyson (@DnA2010) during the pandemic and by the time things were opening back up she and her hubby were on board. This is Allyson and Dorian.
It wasn’t until after the reopening of things that we got our last folks. I have other crazy Disney friends that I met outside of the DIS. They’re super foodies and when I explained it to them they were onboard. Meet Angi and Ken.
Finally it came down to the last two spaces. Jenny knew that she would be kicking herself if she and Michael weren’t in the group with us. But she also knew he would kill her if she took that kind of money from the bank account and gave it away for something as frivolous as dinner. We came up with a “layaway plan” for her. She was able to send me funds without his knowledge when she had extra personal money in her venmo, and eventually paid off her share of the dinner. But we had to be very careful when talking about the dinner around Michael. It would have been easy to slip up and talk about it like they were part of everything, but we were able to keep it quiet until just a few days before when Jenny told him about it. Here they are with Fran and I.
Now we had our party of twelve, the next thing was to finalize a date. This was in October/November of 2021. Because we had people coming from Florida, New Jersey, British Columbia, Denver, and Arizona, it took a while to settle on a date, but finally we picked September 8, 2022.
So 2022 rolls in and everyone was excited, this was the year we were going to 21 Royal! And then Fran suffered the colon rupture. Everyone was thoughtful and understood when we decided that the date should be rescheduled. In July of 2022 we were able to pick our new date, which turned out to be May 11, 2023. I immediately booked a two bedroom Villa at the VGC. Fran and I would have the Master, Jenny and her Hubby would take the other bedroom and Jill would sleep on the couch.
While we waited for the new date to come around our Florida resident had to back out and we added a friend from Utah. Fran underwent no less than five different surgeries and it started to take a toll on her body. Me being the eternal optimist, I never thought that it would become too much for her.
We went on our cruise in February of 2023 and I always thought she would recover and go back to being Fran. If you haven’t read that TR you can find it here. I know there is a lot of back story here, but bear with me. I’m sorry that there have been so many words, here are some random Disney pictures for now!
So with our 21 Royal Date less than 2 months away, the ladies had started to plan our outfits. We had a facebook group set up for all of us where we could plan and share ideas and other things. I was going back and forth on what dress I planned to wear when I happened to go to the DLR to meet up with @dizneeat and saw this dress at the Disney Dress Shop.
I knew that THIS was the dress that I had to wear to our evening at 21 Royal. The problem, they had all the sizes below the two sizes I could possibly wear, and all the sizes above, but not my size or one I could possibly pull off.
Karin and Tom were so kind as to go to EVERY dress shop on property with me to look for my size, but not one store had it in stock. When I got home, Fran looked at the Disney Store online, eBay and anywhere else she could think of and it wasn’t anywhere. So I pouted and evidently texted quite a few of my friends attending the dinner of my displeasure.
This was mid March and I was very much into planning for Fran and my trip to WDW in April. Little did I know that not only would it not happen, but she would leave the physical world, and change all the plans moving forward. She passed on April 15, just a little less than one month before this dinner.
I decided to invite my friend Leonard (who has made appearances in past TRs) as my “date” for the evening, which sort of changed the dynamics of the sleeping arrangements, but we worked it out. We had one more change when the friend from Utah had a death in the family and she had to back out at the last minute as well. She “gifted” her spot to Jenny’s daughter at the last minute and so our party changed yet again, but we were determined to have a good time, and honor the memory of Fran who started the whole process rolling.
I hope you will follow along and see how things play out and our amazing evening!
I don’t want to start this out on a bummer note, but if you have followed my trip reports in the past, I’m sorry to inform you that Fran will no longer be participating in the trip reports. She passed away back in April, a day before we were supposed to take our last planned trip to Walt Disney World.
I know that she would want me to continue these reports because she knew how much I enjoy sharing my experiences with my DIS friends. And while it's bittersweet to continue using this username, I feel like it's the right thing to do. She was a HUGE part of my life and I feel like I should honor her memory.
If you didn't know us, check out any of the links in my signature for our escapades. I'm moving forward with the folks who will be playing a role in this trip report and there will be introductions in this post.
Fran was one of the main instigators who made this trip to 21 Royal happen, and many toasts in her honor were shared that night. But first you might ask “What is 21 Royal?” Well let me get to the backstory and everything, it’s going to take a while, so pour yourself one of your favorite beverages, sit back, I’ll tell you a tale, a tale of a fa-er wait, that’s another tale….sorry!
The concept of 21 Royal began back in 2016. There were experiments by the Disney staff with various pricing options. At first the option of a la carte pricing was considered. However, in the end when the actual product launched they had settled on a fixed price experience. The concept launched in 2017 with a price tag of $15,000 all inclusive. There was no requirement for the minimum number of guests, however, the maximum number of guests is twelve.
The location of 21 Royal is above Pirates of the Caribbean. Once upon a time it was the Disney Gallery. You could book a dessert package here to watch Fantasmic! Later it was converted to the Dream Suite, and eventually became the location of 21 Royal.
Back in 2017, Fran and I thought we were going to come into a bit of money about the same time the new 21 Royal opened. We figured that an experience at this price level could never last, but we wanted to get in on it before it went away. So we went ahead and booked it, basically treating our friends to the experience. Most people we know couldn’t afford that sort of experience. Of course the money fell through, but we had already committed so live and learn.
This TR is not about that experience, but that’s what awakened Fran’s appetite for a repeat visit to 21 Royal. That’s when the search began to find another 10 people who were willing to split the cost.
We didn’t have to look far for the first one, Jill immediately signed up when we told her we were gathering another party. It was around September of 2019 when Su-Lynn (@chunkymonkey) said that she and her hubby would be interested as well as a friend who lived in Florida. Here’s a pic from when we met up in 2021 just before we confirmed everything.
And me and Jill earlier this year.
OK, now we’re up to six people. I started talking about it with Allyson (@DnA2010) during the pandemic and by the time things were opening back up she and her hubby were on board. This is Allyson and Dorian.
It wasn’t until after the reopening of things that we got our last folks. I have other crazy Disney friends that I met outside of the DIS. They’re super foodies and when I explained it to them they were onboard. Meet Angi and Ken.
Finally it came down to the last two spaces. Jenny knew that she would be kicking herself if she and Michael weren’t in the group with us. But she also knew he would kill her if she took that kind of money from the bank account and gave it away for something as frivolous as dinner. We came up with a “layaway plan” for her. She was able to send me funds without his knowledge when she had extra personal money in her venmo, and eventually paid off her share of the dinner. But we had to be very careful when talking about the dinner around Michael. It would have been easy to slip up and talk about it like they were part of everything, but we were able to keep it quiet until just a few days before when Jenny told him about it. Here they are with Fran and I.
Now we had our party of twelve, the next thing was to finalize a date. This was in October/November of 2021. Because we had people coming from Florida, New Jersey, British Columbia, Denver, and Arizona, it took a while to settle on a date, but finally we picked September 8, 2022.
So 2022 rolls in and everyone was excited, this was the year we were going to 21 Royal! And then Fran suffered the colon rupture. Everyone was thoughtful and understood when we decided that the date should be rescheduled. In July of 2022 we were able to pick our new date, which turned out to be May 11, 2023. I immediately booked a two bedroom Villa at the VGC. Fran and I would have the Master, Jenny and her Hubby would take the other bedroom and Jill would sleep on the couch.
While we waited for the new date to come around our Florida resident had to back out and we added a friend from Utah. Fran underwent no less than five different surgeries and it started to take a toll on her body. Me being the eternal optimist, I never thought that it would become too much for her.
We went on our cruise in February of 2023 and I always thought she would recover and go back to being Fran. If you haven’t read that TR you can find it here. I know there is a lot of back story here, but bear with me. I’m sorry that there have been so many words, here are some random Disney pictures for now!
So with our 21 Royal Date less than 2 months away, the ladies had started to plan our outfits. We had a facebook group set up for all of us where we could plan and share ideas and other things. I was going back and forth on what dress I planned to wear when I happened to go to the DLR to meet up with @dizneeat and saw this dress at the Disney Dress Shop.
I knew that THIS was the dress that I had to wear to our evening at 21 Royal. The problem, they had all the sizes below the two sizes I could possibly wear, and all the sizes above, but not my size or one I could possibly pull off.
Karin and Tom were so kind as to go to EVERY dress shop on property with me to look for my size, but not one store had it in stock. When I got home, Fran looked at the Disney Store online, eBay and anywhere else she could think of and it wasn’t anywhere. So I pouted and evidently texted quite a few of my friends attending the dinner of my displeasure.
This was mid March and I was very much into planning for Fran and my trip to WDW in April. Little did I know that not only would it not happen, but she would leave the physical world, and change all the plans moving forward. She passed on April 15, just a little less than one month before this dinner.
I decided to invite my friend Leonard (who has made appearances in past TRs) as my “date” for the evening, which sort of changed the dynamics of the sleeping arrangements, but we worked it out. We had one more change when the friend from Utah had a death in the family and she had to back out at the last minute as well. She “gifted” her spot to Jenny’s daughter at the last minute and so our party changed yet again, but we were determined to have a good time, and honor the memory of Fran who started the whole process rolling.
I hope you will follow along and see how things play out and our amazing evening!
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