Our first October Disney vacay!! A full week at Fort Wilderness, golf cart included, with Genie+ dropping during the trip!

[jrmint427]

I'm joining in!

I know that for some people, driving 24 straight hours feels like torture. And all of those people are right. Every single time we do it, I say "I am never driving to Florida again" and then 1-2 years later, somehow I find myself doing it again. It's just so convenient in so many ways, not to mention the money it saves!

I love road trips! Always exhausted by the end but it's a fun way to travel and build up the excitement for the trip. Going home is always much harder.

I'm so jealous of people who get to look at these animals from their hotel room balcony. One day I MUST stay at this resort.

We spent just 1 night in a safari view room to have this experience! And then moved to a non-safari view for a much more reasonable price We couldn't justify the price for days that we were at the park from open to close.

The safari ended up being a little longer than normal because the giraffes were causing (as identified by our tour guide) a "giraffic jam".

Haven't heard this one before, it's cracking me up!

 

[jvz82]

Wow! Great that someone not only turned in your band, but that your mom was persistent on checking out Guest Services one more time. I lost my camera at Universal back in 1/2020 and fortunately got it back the following day.

Yes, we got lucky! That's amazing that you got your camera back too. That would be so devastating to lose a camera full of pictures!

I'm joining in!



I love road trips! Always exhausted by the end but it's a fun way to travel and build up the excitement for the trip. Going home is always much harder.



We spent just 1 night in a safari view room to have this experience! And then moved to a non-safari view for a much more reasonable price We couldn't justify the price for days that we were at the park from open to close.



Haven't heard this one before, it's cracking me up!

Yeeeeeep, the road trip home is way worse!

Yes, I'd love to do that one day... just one night in a safari room! It's hard having so many kids, Disney resorts are not made for families of 6! But maybe one day. Thanks for joining in!

 

[jvz82]

Well, we've made it to our LAST DAY of Disney! Why do the trips always have to end?

But we saved the best for last. It was Magic Kingdom Day!!!!!

Magic Kingdom is just a different energy for me. I'm just running on pure adrenalin and happiness all day long! It was a beautiful day and we were up early to catch the ferry.

We had decided to buy Genie+ for the day so I tried to do a little research and figure out how to make it work for us. I don't know that I did a great job of it, but considering Genie+ dropped during our trip, I did the best I could. At 7 am, I booked Jungle Cruise for 10 am. The parks opened at 8:30 am for resort guests and we planned to get there early and head straight for 7DMTR.

The sky over the lake on our way to MK was beautiful. It was going to be a great day!




We arrived quickly and made our way towards the entrance!




Can you tell how happy I was?

My family was actually annoyed with all the selfies I was taking. I'll spare you some of them (but I'll still show a lot lol).

We were let right onto Main street and I LOVED all the Halloween decorations! Most of the time we go to Disney at Christmas time so I really had to soak up all the fun Halloween stuff. We may never go back at this time!



The Cinderella pumpkin carriages?!?




I'm glad I have pictures of this. When we hit Main street later in the day, it was sooooo crowded and I never would've gotten to see any of it.



And there it is! The beautiful castle, all decorated for the 50th!!! I absolutely adore the paint colors. I think I took pictures from pretty much every angle throughout the day.

As we were rounding the corner towards Fantasy Land, I saw the most adorable bunny. This was one of the moments when my family was teasing me. But seriously, it's Thumper, right?! It was very magical, like it was posed just for me.


And I loved the reflections of the castle in the pond in this one.


10 pictures on and we haven't even gotten to a line yet. More to come!

 

[jvz82]

I forgot to post our family picture in front of the castle!



It turned out so well.

So, there was a big crowd of people waiting outside of Fantasy Land and we joined the crowd. I think I mentioned the park officially opened for resort guests at 8:30 and they did not let us in until even just after 8:30. In the meantime, we took advantage of the photo filters that Genie+ gives you access to.





And then finally we were allowed to enter.

BUT there was a problem. We heard a cast member say that 7 Dwarves was experiencing delays!! Shoot. Ugh. We had to make a quick decision about what to do. Did we want to waste our morning in a line that may not go anywhere?

We decided it wasn't worth it. We changed directions and made our way towards Space Mountain.

Of course by that point we had lost precious time. But it was still the best decision. 7 Dwarves would stay closed for a couple hours after that, and the line for Space Mountain wasn't that bad. I think maybe 25 minutes.






My poor husband, at 7 feet tall this is the only ride that he cannot fit on at Disney! So he missed out. My kids always feel a little bad telling them that Space Mountain is their favorite ride!

After SM, we went over to Buzz Lightyear.





My mom and dad were there somewhere but apparently I didn't get a picture of them!



Up next: Who lets 6 year olds drive anyway?

 

[rdkeim]

Your MK day is off to a good start! You saved the best for last. The park was looking good especially with the Fall decorations. Anxious to hear how the rest of your day went!

 

[jrmint427]

As we were rounding the corner towards Fantasy Land, I saw the most adorable bunny. This was one of the moments when my family was teasing me. But seriously, it's Thumper, right?! It was very magical, like it was posed just for me.

I think that is true Disney magic! I don't know how they do it... the day sounds off to a really great start!

 

[StarWarsMomofGirls!]

And then my mom appeared, very dramatically as the ball started lighting up and music was playing, and she had my magic band! It's a disney miracle!

Amazing! Leaving parks is hard! Especially when you know the trip is coming to an end.

I booked Jungle Cruise for 10 am. The parks opened at 8:30 am for resort guests and we planned to get there early and head straight for 7DMTR.

Jungle Cruise is one they say to book early. So, sounds like you made a good decision!

My poor husband, at 7 feet tall this is the only ride that he cannot fit on at Disney! So he missed out. My kids always feel a little bad telling them that Space Mountain is their favorite ride!

I might have told this story to you already, but one time I did see a guy probably as tall as your husband in line for Space. His head was basically hitting the ceiling in that hallway area you go in if you go to the left. And he some how got in the ride vehicle! It couldn't have been comfortable.... but he did it some how!

 

[MickeyMouseLove]

Thank you! I have a Cricut so for the shirts I used printable vinyl or layers of vinyl that was cut on the Cricut, and a heat press to apply the vinyl. I love making the shirts!

They look wonderful. Nice work! You are making me want to get into shirt making. I love your designs and the actual shirts themselves. I don't have a Cricut, but one may just have to be in my future...
I didn't even know printable vinyl was a thing.
Thanks, again, for sharing everything. So fun.

 

[Minniemoo15]

I love all of your trip reports, and this one is equally as great! I have so many memories of driving down with my family every March (4 kids, my parents and my grandma)… 32 hours in a minivan… totally worth it !!

Your shirts are absolutely amazing and you’ve inspired me to (try to)make some for our upcoming trip in a couple weeks!

 

[Kerr84]

Tell your husband that his back is lucky he can’t go on Space Mountain!

 

[gopherdame]

Hi from a fellow Minnesotan. We are retired and drive down and stay for 4 weeks. We go in the winter to get away from the cold. I agree about Space Mountain. It's very hard on your back. I had back problems when I worked and did a lot of heavy lifting. It's gotten so much better that I can enjoy Space Mountain with the grandkids now. Glad I found your report.

 

[jvz82]

Your MK day is off to a good start! You saved the best for last. The park was looking good especially with the Fall decorations. Anxious to hear how the rest of your day went!

October was such a great time to travel too! I loved the weather.

I think that is true Disney magic! I don't know how they do it... the day sounds off to a really great start!

Absolutely, I love the Disney magic!

Amazing! Leaving parks is hard! Especially when you know the trip is coming to an end.


Jungle Cruise is one they say to book early. So, sounds like you made a good decision!


I might have told this story to you already, but one time I did see a guy probably as tall as your husband in line for Space. His head was basically hitting the ceiling in that hallway area you go in if you go to the left. And he some how got in the ride vehicle! It couldn't have been comfortable.... but he did it some how!

Yes! The cast members have told us that 7 feet tall people have ridden before. The problem is that my husband's legs are just so long, they're not in proportion to his body (he has Marfan syndome so that's common) and he can't fit his legs in. It's a bummer that he'll never get a chance to ride since he never went to Disney as a child!

They look wonderful. Nice work! You are making me want to get into shirt making. I love your designs and the actual shirts themselves. I don't have a Cricut, but one may just have to be in my future...
I didn't even know printable vinyl was a thing.
Thanks, again, for sharing everything. So fun.

I have sooooo many Disney shirts. It's a problem really lol.

I love all of your trip reports, and this one is equally as great! I have so many memories of driving down with my family every March (4 kids, my parents and my grandma)… 32 hours in a minivan… totally worth it !!

Your shirts are absolutely amazing and you’ve inspired me to (try to)make some for our upcoming trip in a couple weeks!

I hope you did decide to make some shirts! They are really fun.

Tell your husband that his back is lucky he can’t go on Space Mountain!

Yes I'm sure that's so true!!

Hi from a fellow Minnesotan. We are retired and drive down and stay for 4 weeks. We go in the winter to get away from the cold. I agree about Space Mountain. It's very hard on your back. I had back problems when I worked and did a lot of heavy lifting. It's gotten so much better that I can enjoy Space Mountain with the grandkids now. Glad I found your report.

Yes that makes sense! He does seem to handle Thunder Mountain okay but I don't know how Space would be. Glad to find another Minnesotan!

 

[jvz82]

It's been so long since I posted to my trip report! Life has been so busy. But with another Disney trip fast approaching (March Spring break!), I figured I should wrap this up!

So we left off with us getting off the Buzz Lightyear ride and we then decided to get on the Speedway cars. This isn't my favorite ride, but my youngest was finally old enough to drive the cars and all the kids wanted to drive cars on their own.

Let me tell you, this does not make me look forward to this kid driving a car lol.


Omg I love this picture! He was a disaster lol.


I also love the view here with the new Tron ride and Space Mountain.


After the ride was over, we left Tomorrow Land and headed over toward Adventure Land! We had Jungle Cruise booked coming up soon.

On the way, I snapped a few pictures.






It wasn't quite time for us to get to Jungle Cruise, so we thought we'd wait for another ride. I think early magic hours had recently ended and Adventure land had just opened so somehow the crowds were pretty heavy when we arrived. We had to wait for like 15 minutes to get on Magic Carpets, which I thought was ridiculous. But what else were we going to do?





Then we headed over to Jungle Cruise! They had added some new jokes this time related to the new Jungle Cruise movie so that was super fun.


After we checked into Jungle Cruise, I hopped onto Genie+ and the next ride I grabbed was It's a Small World so we started making our way to Fantasy Land!

 

[jvz82]

I think it's possible we ate lunch after Jungle Cruise but I can't find any evidence of where or what we ate and my memory doesn't seem to be finding it either! I'm pretty sure we ate at Pecos Bill's. I can't believe I didn't take any pictures!

Up next, Fantasy Land!

We used Genie+ to go to It's a Small World. I know that I then booked another while we waited to board, but I can't remember for sure which ride it was. I think Barnstormer.



As we were leaving, something happened that I've never seen before (and I've ridden this ride so many times!). The big clock tower started loudly chiming and playing music. It was exactly noon. I suppose I've just never been on the ride at exactly noon!


We left IASW and my oldest son asked if he could use the bathroom so we all sat and rested while some people used the bathrooms. He disappeared for quite a while, turns out he had a stomachache. He came out of the bathroom and literally just laid down on the ground!


I felt bad for him. I let him lay on the ground for a while and he went back to the bathroom again and then did seem to be getting better so we were able to hit the Barnstormer next!


After we checked into Barnstormer, I am pretty sure I booked Genie+ for Haunted Mansion but we had some time before we could go on so we had to find other things to do. We headed back towards Frontier Land and went to Country Bear Jamboree to get a break from the sun for a while.

Afterward, we came out and the bears were actually up on the building waving and interacting with guests! That was exciting, I don't think I'd ever seen the bears before.



Then we headed over to the Tiki room. While we waited for the show to start, I ordered some Dole Whips for us to get after the show. I think I've mentioned this before, but mobile ordering is literally my favorite change of all the changes that Disney has made.





Next up - watch me whip...

 

[jvz82]

Since going on this trip, my daughter has dealt with significant stomach/eczema/allergy issues. She is now dairy-free, peanut-free, egg-free, and chicken-free. She's unable to eat a LOT of foods. But guess what? She can eat Dole Whips!! Maybe not all flavors, but many of them anyway. She's happy about that!





Next we went to Thunder Mountain and this ended up being the longest line we waited in today. We weren't able to get a Genie+ for it because we were waiting on another, and unfortunately the line was pretty long. I don't remember for sure, maybe 45 minutes? I just remember it was hot lol and we looped back and forth, and back and forth.




But finally we got on!


Look how sweaty we were lol. My hair was pulled back now!

Next up, we went to Haunted Mansion. We book a Genie Plus for Peter Pan's flight for late, like 6 pm after we checked in.








Following Haunted Mansion, we had decided to buy a Lightning Lane for 7DMT since it was down all morning. I had been worried we might not be able to use it because I kept checking the app and it was probably 2-3 hours that the app told me the ride was closed. Luckily we were abe to get on by late afternoon!


I do have other pictures but the quality was pretty blurry honestly.

Next up... there's a great big beautiful tomorrow!

 

[jvz82]

We had sort of a weird amount of time between getting off 7DMT and dinner, so we decided to catch a showing of Carousel of Progress!

I'm definitely one of the people who LOVES this ride. My youngest son sings this song constantly, even when we're not at Disney!


After Carousel, we decided to have a somewhat early dinner. We went over to Pinocchio Haus because it was right by Peter Pan, which was our next Genie+.

The restaurant was TOTALLY empty. It was amazing! It was definitely early, like 4:45 but I was shocked to see how empty it was. We got a prime spot overlooking It's a Small World.

The backstory - when Reid was 3, we sat at this same table and he waved at every single boat as they went by. I mean, he was so persistent with it that he barely even ate his food. So we recreated it lol.




We had just a little bit more time left before Peter Pan after we finished eating. My dad (if you remember, my dad was recovering from cancer treatments) decided he was just done for the day and he went home after dinner. But my family and mom stayed on and we headed over to Dumbo!







This is one of my favorite pictures!!! My youngest son brought the yoda backpack to Magic Kingdom and in the morning, my mom commented "I just know I'm going to get stuck hauling that thing around later" and then sure enough, here she is lol.


Then we finally made use of our Peter Pan Genie+ and had another one coming up for Pirates after!




I never have understood the photo from this ride lol. Everyone always looked so bored!


Next up - castle photos, shopping, and fireworks!!

 

[jvz82]

I think it's possible I took these pictures slightly earlier in the afternoon, because I'm pretty sure when we left Pirates it was getting dark. But that's ok!

We decided to do a quick photoshoot by the castle.












We decided to spend some time shopping on Main Street. This was really not our best decision honestly. We didn't want to go earlier because we didn't want to haul stuff around with us al day long, but the shops on Main Street were sooo busy as it got closer to fireworks time. So shopping was hard and a bit stressful trying to keep track of so many kids. My big splurge was a toy Disney Castle! For myself of course lol.

After we were done shopping, it was dark and people were getting ready for fireworks. We found a spot near the end of the street to wait for fireworks. I love the fireworks so so much, but I find the crowd really stressful.


Look at all those people. Blah.

Reid decided to lay down. He was so tired!




I don't have any firework photos because I made my tall hubby record the whole fireworks show! It makes me cry every time.

Speaking of crying, after the fireworks were over, it was time to catch a ferry back to Fort Wilderness. If you've been following along, you'll know that leaving the parks has NOT been going well for my daughter. And tonight was so much worse. She sobbed all the way to the ferry and she sobbed the whole boat ride home. She's like "I just don't want to leave, I love it here so much." It's just so bittersweet to love something so much but have to say goodbye. But we took lots of pictures from the ferry and talked about planning our next trip.

Up next: Saying goodbye.

 

[jvz82]

This was honestly one of the best Disney vacations we'd ever taken, with the exception of not getting to see characters in the parks. The kids were all old enough now that it made travel so much easier. We had minimal meltdowns (from kids or adults lol). We had so much fun. My parents agreed it was really pretty incredible! It was definitely more costly than other trips we've taken, but it was an instant favorite.

Our trip for March is going to be exciting because we purchased an RV this fall and we plan to drive that to Disney and stay in the campsites at Fort Wilderness! We are so excited to try something new.

I'll leave you with this image - I said "let's take a picture of us looking really sad as we leave" lol. Honestly I think some of us were truly feeling this way!



And there you have it! It only took me 14 months to finish this trip report lol. I hope you all enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it! I'll have another one I'll get to start writing in April after we get back from our next trip.

See you real soon!

 

[alohamom]

LOVED your report!

 

[rdkeim]

Thanks for finishing your TR! It was fun following along - your last day seemed pretty magical I love Ft. Wilderness. Looking forward to your next TR!