Our very own fairytale: First WDW vacation Trip Report!

[princessgabriella]

Our first Walt Disney World vacation!​

Hi everyone!

So this will be my very first trip report, to recount our adventures on our very first WDW vacation! I love the idea of writing down everything we did, for the memories, and also to help with this HORRIBLE withdrawal I have been experiencing since coming back a week and a half ago...

And who knows, maybe a few of you will tag along with me! I know I love to read trip reports (I was a lurker on theses boards for quite some time before we left), so I hope i'll be able to write a half-decent one. Keep in mind, english is not my first langage, so this might be a bit of a challenge for me!

So without further ado, let's get on with the presentations.

Our fabulous party of two!​

Gabrielle (me)
Favorite Disney Character: Eeyore
Favorite Disney Princess: Tiana
Favorite rides: Regal Carousel, Soarin, Splash Mountain

My name is Gabrielle, i'm a 22 year old from Québec, Canada. French is my first langage, so that maybe explains a few grammatical errors here and there I'm currently studying to become a Physical Therapist, I should be graduating in two years. I'm a child at heart, and Disney has definitely helped with that...

Nicolas (my DB)
Favorite Disney Character: Pluto
Favorite Disney Princess: Rapunzel
Favorite rides: Monster Inc Laugh Floor, Splash Mountain, Tower of Terror

My boyfriend's name is Nicolas, he's 26 and he loves Disney just as much as I do (okay, maybe not as much! but he does like it).

So that's it for presentations! I do hope you tag along to read about our trip. It was the most MAGICAL vacation, ever!

We stayed at the Pop Century from October 25 to November 1st. We visited all four theme parks and did Epcot and MK twice each. We also went to MNSSHP on October 27!

Can't wait to tell you all about it

Quick links:

Day 1 - Hollywood Studios

Part 1: Travel day and a morning in Hollywood Studios!

Part 2: More Hollywood Studios fun!

Part 3: A night to remember

 

[princessgabriella]

Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures of our travel day, so i'll just quickly recap the whole thing. We left on saturday, october 25. Our plane was at 6 PM, so we had the whole day to pack and get excited! I wasn't so happy about our flight time, especially since we had to transfer in Newark, which meant we would not be in Disney until midnight. At least the tickets were cheap.

We did arrive on time, even a little early. I was BEYOND excited, and could not even sleep for one second. Obviously, my boyfriend slept the whole time.

When we got there, the whole "Magical Express" experience was truly perfect. We just got out of the plane and into the bus. Loved it! We had chosen to pack all of our things in a carry-on, which I did regret a little bit later on (so many souvenirs...), but I have to agree it was very easy to get on and off the plane without having to check any bags.

Getting on the Magical Express was so much fun. It was like being already there. Loved the little movie, and our driver was funny and helpful even so late at night.

We arrived at the Pop Century Resort at about 1 AM. Again, the staff was very friendly and nice, and we got checked in quickly (we had done the online check-in prior to our arrival). Unfortunately, we were not very happy with our room. We got one of the rooms designed for people with disabilities, which meant we had no bathtub, and the shower took up the whole bathroom. Since we were so tired, we decided to just go to bed and sort it out in the morning.

We got up at around 7:30 AM, and my boyfriend walked to the front desk to see if we could change rooms. The staff was very understanding about it. We packed up our bags again and dropped them off at the Bell Services. They told us it would all be in our new room when we got back from the parks tonight. Perfect service!

So off we were to Hollywood Studios!

Hurray! I really don't remember much about those first few hours in the parks. I kept running around, telling my BF how perfect everything was. He just laughed and told me I would go crazy when we got to Magic Kingdom.

We took a few pictures before our first FP+ time.

Then we were off to Tower of Terror. This was our first ride of the trip, and a memorable one at that...

I screamed, I laughed, it was all amazing. Loved all the little details, the theming... Because it was my first ride in WDW, I do feel like it will always hold a special place in my heart from now on.

To be continued! Thanks for reading!

 

[BOG Obsessed]

Subbing. As another fellow Canadian, I'm looking forward to reading your First ever TR.
Love POP. Yikes 1am arrival...

 

[princessgabriella]

Subbing. As another fellow Canadian, I'm looking forward to reading your First ever TR.
Love POP. Yikes 1am arrival...

Hi there! Hope you like reading it! Yup, 1 AM arrival... Next time I'll definitely pay a little more to get to WDW early and have an extra day in the parks!

 

[princessgabriella]

After Tower of Terror, we had a little bit of time on our hands while waiting for our next FP+. We stopped to eat at the closest quick meal restaurant, since we were going to Rock n' Roller Coaster next. We shared some pizza and caesar salad at Rosie's All-American Cafe, and I got my first (of many) Mickey Ear ice cream bar of the trip!

Needless to say, it was huge and delicious and perfect in every way! But I could eat ice cream all day...

Then, it was time for our FP+. My boyfriend was really excited for Rock n' Roller Coaster, because he loves big rides and he remembered this one very well from his last trip to WDW. I'm not usually a fan of thrill rides because i'm afraid of heights, but this was inside so I really enjoyed it!

After the ride, we walked over to the Beauty and the Beast show. I wasn't expecting much, but the musicals ended up being one of my favorite things in the parks. This one had all the good songs from the movie, great actors and amazing costumes. Loved it! I highly recommend getting there early to get better seats. The area is shaded so you wont be too hot while waiting.

Our next FP+ was for Star Tours, so we headed back towards Echo Lake. We rode the Great Movie Ride on the way, since there was only a 10 minute wait. We were pretty lucky, as the park was almost empty on that day at Hollywood Studios. We got to do most of the rides once, some twice, because most wait times were under 20 minutes!

After the Great Movie Ride, we headed over to Muppets 3D (loved it!), and then walked back to Star Tours. My boyfriend ended up feeling sick after this ride because it moves around but doesn't go "forward" (I can't really explain why this particular type of ride makes him sick!), so we decided to just walk around a bit. We got to see some funny street animation and just "take it all in". I kept saying how I couldn't believe we were finally in Disney World and how I loved it already. It's really amazing when you plan so much for a trip and then you're finally there... I had imagined how it would be, and it was exceeding my expectations already.

We also went to see Walt Disney: One Man's Dream, which I thought was fascinating. I didn't know much about Walt Disney himself before the trip, but I did become very interested with his story after visiting. I ended up buying a book about the history of the parks just to learn more about it.

We had ADRs at Sci-Fi Dine-In at 4:25 PM, which felt a little early, but I had booked it anyway knowing I really wanted to eat there.

The theming of this restaurant was amazing, but the food was just okay. Also, it's a fun idea, but eating on a tiny little "car bench" behind two other people is a little strange. We felt stuck, and didn't appreciate our meal as much as we could have if we were sitting at a normal table. I did like the look of it though I ordered the American Burger and my boyfriend got the fish burger. Both were pretty plain, but we still enjoyed the ambiance and had a fun time.

After dinner, we walked around a bit to take pictures. We passed by Daisy and Donald by Echo Lake, and the line was really short for Daisy, so we decided to go take our first character picture of the trip!

Hurray! To be continued...

Next up: Our night in Hollywood Studios, Fantasmic, rides and some shopping!

 

[princessgabriella]

After dinner and a few pictures, we had about an hour left before heading over to Fantasmic. My boyfriend remembered this show very well from his last trip and was really looking forward to it, so we had gotten an "extra" FP+ for it after using all of the others up.

We decided to go ahead and wait in line for the next Frozen sing along show. This was very popular so it was a good thing we got there early for the 6 PM show. We enjoyed it, although I would of liked to see more of the characters from the movie! But the "historians" were funny and it was cute to see everyone singing along to the movie clips.

We got out quickly after and walked back to Fantasmic. The sun was setting on ToT and I snapped a picture of the scenery.

At this point, our first "magic" interaction with a CM happened! We had just started walking on the pathway to the show when a CM stopped us and asked if we were just us two. We told him yes, and he gave us two passes for the "dinner VIP" section (I don't really remember how it's called, but it was the BEST spot to watch the show!). He just told us to have a great first trip. I don't know if he could tell it was our first night, but it really made it for us. We had a completely unobstructed view of the show, and I was beyond excited to see it all. I even bought light up minnie ears to celebrate!

The show was amazing. I cried a little... I'm a pretty emotional girl, and this was just too much! Especially since Fantasmic has all the characters from the 90s movies I grew up with.

I got a couple of nice pictures from the show.

After Fantasmic, we got to stay in the park late because of the extra magic hours. It got really empty at this point, and we got to ride everything again. We even did RnRC twice in a row

We left the park at about 10. We were feeling pretty exhausted, and since we were going to MK the next day, I wanted to get a good night's sleep.

And that's it for Hollywood Studios! We only had one day in that park, so we proceeded to say goodbye to the Mickey Hat and caught a bus back to Pop.

Next up: MAGIC KINGDOM!!

 

[princessgabriella]

Even though we had fallen asleep at about midnight, I got up at 6 feeling completely overwhelmed with excitement. We're going to Magic Kingdom! Come on! Get up!

But my DB was... sleeping. So I got ready, took a walk around the resort and came back at 7 to wake him up.

We ate a quick breakfast and headed over to the bus stop. We were a little caught back by the line for MK. The day before, we had barely waited for HS, but it seemed we weren't the only ones going to MK that monday. It was pretty predictable though, because with MNSSHP going on almost every day of that week, monday was the only time that MK was staying open late and having all it's usual shows (whishes, main street electrical parade, festival of fantasy).

So we waited about 20 minutes, and two buses filled up before we could get in. We ended up missing the opening show, but we got there pretty early anyways.

As soon as we got there, I started getting overly excited and crazy. The music, the feeling of it all... Seeing Main Street for the first time was just overwhelming.

The Halloween decorations were AMAZING. I wasn't expecting so much. I spent about 15 minutes just taking pictures everywhere, telling my BF how everything was perfect and beautiful. He just laughed and told me we were going to miss our first FP+, so off we went.

But first, gotta take that traditional castle picture... (more of those to come, I went a little crazy)

After all the pictures, we were off to Splash Mountain. Getting wet first thing in the morning sounds like a great idea!

Loved Splash Mountain, one of my favorite rides of the whole trip. I don't think I need to go into much details about why I loved it. It's pretty self explanatory

After Splash Mountain, it was time for another mountain! Our FP+ for Big Thunder Mountain Railroad was up. Another favorite, we rode this one more times than I can count in the whole trip.