The Shortest, Gayest Trip Report Ever: A May 2019 Disney Trip

abarriger

Mouseketeer
Joined
Jun 5, 2014
Welcome, dear reader, to a trip report! I think this is my third trip report, and so far I'm 3/3 on writing them and then abandoning them. I swear, this time will be different! (it may actually be, because I'm a teacher, and summer is approaching.) But anyway-- let me set the stage for you.
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That's me. I'm Amy, preschool-teacher by day, and Disney planner by night. I LOVE all things Disney-- I read the blogs, listen to the podcasts, and spend a lot of time day dreaming about Disney world. My most favorite things are Frozen, The Little Mermaid Ride, parades, baked goods, and just about anything Magic Kingdom.

I work hard to fund our Disney trips, teaching Hebrew school on weekends and babysitting whenever I can, and I spend at least a year planning our trips. Usually.


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That's my loving wife, Marjorie. She is a graduate student, soon to be PhD. It might not be evident from this photo, but her passion for Disney does not reach my level. That said, she is a wonderful partner and is very willing to humor me once a year or so. There are definitely parts of Disney she enjoys-- she loves Tiffins, exploring the resorts, Finding Nemo: The Musical, and the vegetarian breakfast sandwich at Art of Animation. She hates rope drop, bland food, and long days in the park.

To be honest with you, M. and I probably never would have gone to Disney in the first place-- except a few years ago, her parents bought a beautiful condo about 2 hours from Disney. This means that our limited vacation budget doesn't have to stretch as far to make it to Orlando, so we've been almost every since then. (We did take 2017 off for our wedding!)

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This was the first trip, in 2014. It was a one day trip, we opened and closed MK, crashed at Pop, and drove back to Sarasota the next day. It was magical, and it led to three more trips over the years, including this one
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where we got engaged, and this one
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where we sort of honeymooned (but not in the traditional sense... it was over a year after our wedding). That trip was our longest yet, and, sadly, Marjorie felt it really did us in. There were three park days, 2 rest days, and more food than any human has any business eating (including the most spectacular brunch at the California grill.)

So, this trip is a little different than any of our others, for a number of reasons. Stay tuned!
 
Following along! It's fun to see how others "do Disney" different than us :) Looking forward to reading more.
 
Following along! It's fun to see how others "do Disney" different than us :) Looking forward to reading more.
I agree! I so wish we could afford (financially and time wise...) to have trips that looked like some of the ones I enjoy reading about on here, but we find a lot of joy in our shorter trips as well :) This one is a first for us in a few ways.
 
So... I'm two days out from my trip, and I'm at work. I could be writing end of year reports for my students, but instead I'll think about my trip! Here goes.

What Makes This Trip Different from All Other Trips?

Marjorie and I always, always do Disney in August. It may be painfully hot (it always is) but it's a good time for us-- I usually have a bit of time between summer school and the new year, and M. usually doesn't work summers, and crowds are generally pretty manageable, in my opinion (and we don't have a whole lot of flexibility, so it doesn't really matter anyway.)

So, you might be saying... it's not August.

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Excellent observation, dear reader. It isn't. Remember how I said Marjorie is a grad student? Well, she's wrapping up her final year. Which means she's been on the job market all year, which means she's been miserable and stressed, and I've been miserable and stressed-by-proxy. But a few months ago she landed an AMAZING job at an amazing college in the Midwest, not too far from Chicago. Which means... I needed a new job, so then the stress was passed on to me. And her job start date is.... wait for it....


August 1st. And summer camp ends July 27 for me. There is no time for a summer trip this year.

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(actual footage of my reaction)

But seriously, our life has been up in the air all year, planning for one job then then the next, her interviewing, me interviewing... and there's just no room on the calendar for a 5 day jaunt to Disney this summer. It's just not happening. And I was having a hard time. M. must have said to me about 50 times, "What about a weekend trip?" but still, one day I called her with an amazing, totally original, idea-- "Let's take a weekend trip!"

So, that's the plan. I have requested exactly one day off from work, making it a three day trip. And we planned this whole thing 65 days before leaving, meaning there was no waking up 180 days out to book dining reservations or anything. For the first time, we are planning fast. Which, I must admit, I don't love, but it beats no Disney.

So-- this trip is going to be really different for us.

1. We're going in SPRING, not August, so we won't look quite as sweaty as we usually do.
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(like, fun fact, after taking this photo in August, my phone shut down after giving me a dire warning about dangerous heat.)

2. We threw this trip together in two months.

But... we're not done!

3. We're taking friends!

M. and I have done Disney a bunch of times-- I've been for short periods without her, but primarily we do it just the two of us. But, last year just before going to Disney, we went with a group of 20 other Chicago-land couples in their first few years of marriage on a ten day trip to Israel. It was amazing, it was inspiring, it was almost as hot as Disney. On this trip, we met some amazing friends, including
D and A. (I'm not going to name them here, I don't know about putting other people's info out there without their permission!) but we really hit it off. And D. went on a trip to Disney just recently-- with work. She showed up to AK at 11:00 am, and was frustrated that she couldn't ride FOP or get fastpasses for literally anything good. So I said, "If you want to do it right, you have to do it with us!" and then casually mentioned when we were planning the trip-- and they were all in! So, this trip should be twice the fun-- and I'm particularly excited to get to show A around because she's never been to Disney before!

Of course, taking into account a new set of people means shifting plans slightly-- this trip is about making sure D and A are able to see what Disney is all about (and, of course, getting on FoP.)
 


Excited to read along! You two seem like a great couple! Have a lot of fun!
 
Sounds like a great trip. I can't wait to hear all about the fun time you had.
 
We've been in August, and just returned from our 3rd May trip. I LOVE May! I think the weather is gorgeous plus you have Flower and Garden which is my favorite of the 3 festivals.
 


Day 1-- in Which we Travel!

Sadly, this is going to be a post without so so many pictures.

Thursday was a full day of work for me, so I was a bundle of excited anxious energy. It was a holiday at work: I work at a Jewish school, and it was Israel's Independence Day. We had a parade for the kids, and everyone wore blue and white, and cupcakes abounded. I created a Yom Ha-atzmaut/ Disney Day Mashup in the form of this bow for my ears.

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Work was good, but slow. I raced out the door at 3:28 (school technically ends at 3:30, but a generous friend at work covered for me!). M met me in the car, we zoomed to a friends house nearby to leave the car, and called an Uber frantically.


And waited. And waited.

12 minutes later, we anxiously were Ubering off to the airport. D and A beat us there by about 15 minutes, and we saw them in the security line, but didn't meet up for a while because

1. They took forever to search our bag because they had to confiscate my sunscreen :mad: and

2. Then we had to stop somewhere to try and buy sunscreen. (I blame M for this whole debacle, as she was confident we could make it through with a larger-than-3-oz tube. She was wrong.) But, anyway, we made it through sans-sunscreen.

We stopped for a mediocre salad with D and A, which I was too excited to eat any of-- AND THEN, while in the bathroom waiting for the flight, I got the text I had finally given up on-- the text from Res Finder that there was a res for brunch at CG.pixiedust: If this wasn't a good omen, I don't know what could be.


Our flight left almost on time-- D and A sent this photo of me from behind.
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I watched all of Frozen and didn't sleep.
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We arrived "early," according to the pilot, but it was a total of about 1 minute ahead of schedule
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The ME left about 6 minutes after we boarded, and we made it through the arch 25 minutes later.

By the time we got to POR, we were all pretty beat. Our rooms were ready, so we trudged along the path, suitcases in hand. Our room requests had been largely ignored except for the part about having two rooms together (which is definitely the most important request, so I can't complain) but these rooms were pretty miserably located. We were 8295 and 8294 in the Acadian House building of POR. It probably took 15 minutes to get from the front lobby to our rooms, but that assumes you knew how to get there, which I never really mastered. They were tucked in a back corner... I wouldn't recommend these rooms to be honest, even if the buildings are beautiful.

But I was happy, the weather was warm, and, most importantly, I was at Disney! Stay tuned for the first parks day!
 
HI Amy joining along. I hope you do finish this TR cuz you got me excited to see how you enjoy the trip. By chance you guys aren't relocating to Champaign Urbana are you?
 
I love your enthusiasm! We do a lot of small 3 day trips so I'm excited to see how your group does it.
 
Day 1
In Which I Say Goodbye to my 20's in my Most Favorite Place

So, before this trip, D &A and I sat down and reviewed our plans for Orlando. I dramatically explained the importance of rope drop. They countered with their need for sleep. We compromised in the sense that I did what I wanted and they did what they wanted :drinking:

So, M. and my alarm went off at 6:00 am (but not before my shooting out of bed and announcing to Marjorie "I'm ready to go!" to which she announced "It's THREE AM!") We get ready unbelievably fast at Disney (despite how long it takes on an average workday...) so we were at the bus stop by 6:30.

We had the best bus luck ever on this trip.


The bus pulled up at 6:38, and we were at MK shortly thereafter.

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The rope drop procedure was a little funky this time-- we were lined up in one spot, then moved to the total other side of the entrance in order to scan magic bands for EMH. But then, somehow, everyone was staying on the left side, and I veered over to the right (well, I guess left and right depend on perspective. I veered towards the side of SDMT). Which meant, for the first time ever, we were the first ones in the pack. Like, truly first.

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We captured the moment with a bad selfie. Don't worry, we won't stay at the front, because, of course, we are not that aggressive. Above is the crowd behind us at at about 7:30, here it is by 7:48.
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It looks bad here, but honestly it felt pretty light, relatively speaking. It was a pretty smooth rope drop procedure, they let us in to the castle around 7:50 and held us there until 8:00 on the dot.
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Doesn't the castle look funny with no moat? We had a fastpass for SDMT later, but, since we were there, we made our way over and were zooming through the mines by 8:07.

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I love this ride. I am not a fan of big scary rides, so I think this is a perfect balance of a bit of a thrill with amazing animatronics. I love that part where you first enter the mine... but anyway.

At this point in the morning, I was riding high. It was 8:13 am and we had ridden Mine Train. In that moment, I started an initiative to document each ride with a photo and the number of fingers. In order to determine how long my beloved wife could tolerate that, you will just have to keep reading.

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We quick-walked over to a Honey Pot at that point
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Normally I would have done PPF before Pooh, but we were shifting that typical order somewhat because I had deemed PPF an essential experience, so we had a FP for it when D&A arrived. I have mixed feelings about Pooh... sometimes I love the ride, other times I feel like the animatronics, scenery, etc. just look... I don't know, cheap? compared to some of the other rides. Marjorie declared herself "over it."
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Ride three entailed my (pathetically low) score beating Marjorie's (equally pathetic) score on Buzz Lightyear. After riding TSMM last year, I feel this ride shows its age somewhat, but it was enjoyable given the short wait.


At this point, I wanted to meet Mickey today, but the cast member with the Ipad outside the castle told us somewhat ominously that he "didn't know" if he was even meeting (despite the app showing a 25 minute wait?) and also seemed unclear on whether regular guests could meet Mickey, since it was outside of Fantasyland or Tomorrowland, so we moved backwards instead.
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This is a favorite for us.
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Also, fun fact, just riding through Space Mountain scares the bejeezes out of me.

Since the Cast-member made it sound like we were trapped in Tomorrowland and Fantasyland (and really, if I have to be trapped somewhere, there's nowhere I'd rather be!) we rode these two next.
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I feel like if you had statistics on the number of photos Marjorie and I have both taken in our lives, the number one ranked location would be Dumbo. And yet we still take 50 photos each time, because can you beat that view?

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Also, before we rode Barnstormer, I said "Remember this is short." As we disembarked, Marjorie remarked, "Did you know how short that was?"

So-- will we ever leave Fantasyland? Only time will tell!!! Stay tuned for further updates!
 
I’m amazing at starting reports and abandoning them, but I do plan on starting one for this trip!
Uhm, I 100% understand this. My name is Amy and I am a trip-report-abandoner. It has been 300 days since I last abandoned a TR. Maybe we can support each other in writing them!! I want to finish one just for my own memory's sake, but life gets in the way.
 
A Magical (Kingdom) Morning-- Part 2

When I last wrote, Marjorie and I were whiling away a day in the MK. It was glorious, the weather was decent, the crowds were manageable. I was blissfully happy- -but it was also nearly 10am, and we hadn't eaten anything OR drunk anything all day. I blame myself for that one: I mean honestly though why doesn't the food court sell anything other than croissants at 6:00 am? Marjorie was fading faster than I, so we hit up Gaston's.

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I've never been here before, but I've obviously heard a lot about it. We had one Lefou's brew, one diet coke, and one monstrous cinnamon roll.
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Opinions are mixed the the Schaeffer household about this thing. I thought it was AMAZEballs. I loved the caramel sauce, I would rate it 8/10 (and if it had a bit more caramel sauce to cut through the enormous portion of bread, I'd rate it even higher.) BUT my lovely wife told me this morning that she disliked the caramel, prefers a cream cheese based sauce, and wouldn't consume this again.

The brew was weird. It did grow on me (mostly because I was hot and dehydrated, I think) but I didn't love the weird aftertaste that I think was meant to be passionfruit. I think straight frozen apple juice would have been better.

Later in the day, our friends gave us a lot of crap for eating nothing all morning and then eating pure sugar. I wasn't unhappy about it, but I do feel as though Disney could do a better job offering protein based options in the morning.

Breakfast eaten, it was time to find Mickey!
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We paused briefly for a lovely meet and greet. Short and sweet and eyes closed.
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She complimented my ears and asked if they were from "Fairy Godmother Etsy." (The bow was actually from Fairy Godmother Magical ribbons, the ears from the main mouse himself. )
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We paused again for a quick castle pic. Nothing beats that view. We were hoping to meet D & A around 11:00, it was just after 10, Mickey and Minnie were posting a looong wait, ugh, but we got in line anyway.

Entertainment was provided in line by these adorable children on leashes who were running amuck. They started in line for Tink, then an ominous announcement came over the PA that "Tinkerbell is experiencing serious delays." I did wonder what that was about :scratchin
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So then the parents of these cuties moved them into Mickey's line, and then they left shortly thereafter, without meeting anyone. My heart went out to them as they didn't seem to be having the best day... and I want everyone to have the best day in Disney.

Anyway, this line was loooong and full of an enormous pack of maybe 30 cheerleaders and their entourage of parents and siblings. Marjorie commented blandly that "Wow that's a lot of cheerleaders." The girl ahead of us glared and announced snidely "Well you know Summit was last weekend." M and I thought this was endlessly hilarious-- as though the whole world knows what Summit is. :confused3We hadn't the faintest idea (although we certainly know now!)

Anyway, we had an ominous feeling about how long this pack of girls would take, because I had to imagine that they would want photos in every possible combination of people. I don't blame them of course, but we were dreading the wait, until they all randomly just evacuated? We thought maybe they were being taken in through the FP line, but they seemed to all just be leaving en masse. And so we saw Mickey about 10 minutes after joining the line.
:mickeyjum
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We don't generally view ourselves as big Meet and Greet people, but
1. It was my 30th birthday and
2.Mickey and Minnie were obviously dressed up for my birthday.

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(that was Marjorie's "silly face.")

By and large this wasn't a remarkable meet and greet-- pretty quick and to the point-- but I'm 100 percent satisfied and will treasure these photos. Sadly, neither mouse even noticed my bow which I specially picked out to match their outfits.

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Having accomplished my major must-do for the day, we left happy and ready to meet D and A, who were actually on their way!
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While waiting, we had the time to stop for a PP in a spot we had never captured before. The crowds look insane, and they were, until we realized it was time for the start of the Move-it-Shake-It-Whatever-the-Heck-It Parade! Which I have never watched before, and still can't say that I saw much of.
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But the music was happy and peppy-- and then we spotted D and A! So we booked it over to them for sweaty (on our end) hugs.

Keep reading to hear about our first moments in the parks, all together!!
 
So, M. and my alarm went off at 6:00 am (but not before my shooting out of bed and announcing to Marjorie "I'm ready to go!" to which she announced "It's THREE AM!") We get ready unbelievably fast at Disney (despite how long it takes on an average workday...) so we were at the bus stop by 6:30.

We had the best bus luck ever on this trip.


The bus pulled up at 6:38, and we were at MK shortly thereafter.

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The rope drop procedure was a little funky this time-- we were lined up in one spot, then moved to the total other side of the entrance in order to scan magic bands for EMH. But then, somehow, everyone was staying on the left side, and I veered over to the right (well, I guess left and right depend on perspective. I veered towards the side of SDMT). Which meant, for the first time ever, we were the first ones in the pack. Like, truly first.

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We captured the moment with a bad selfie. Don't worry, we won't stay at the front, because, of course, we are not that aggressive. Above is the crowd behind us at at about 7:30, here it is by 7:48.
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It looks bad here, but honestly it felt pretty light, relatively speaking. It was a pretty smooth rope drop procedure, they let us in to the castle around 7:50 and held us there until 8:00 on the dot.

Good job for you guys making it there that early! I always talk about the importance of rope drop, and then never make it there myself :sad2:

In that moment, I started an initiative to document each ride with a photo and the number of fingers. In order to determine how long my beloved wife could tolerate that, you will just have to keep reading.

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This is such a cute idea! I love your enthusiasm (especially so early in the morning!)

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This is a favorite for us.

Love the Peoplemover! :love:

Later in the day, our friends gave us a lot of crap for eating nothing all morning and then eating pure sugar.

Don't they know that is the proper Disney diet?!

She complimented my ears and asked if they were from "Fairy Godmother Etsy."

That's cute!

And so we saw Mickey about 10 minutes after joining the line.
:mickeyjum
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We don't generally view ourselves as big Meet and Greet people, but
1. It was my 30th birthday and
2.Mickey and Minnie were obviously dressed up for my birthday.

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(that was Marjorie's "silly face.")

Hurray for not having a long line! And happy belated birthday!

By and large this wasn't a remarkable meet and greet-- pretty quick and to the point-- but I'm 100 percent satisfied and will treasure these photos. Sadly, neither mouse even noticed my bow which I specially picked out to match their outfits.
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That's too bad that it wasn't a great meet and greet for you guys! They were a lot of fun when we met them (but I was also wearing a floor-length fancy dress and my husband was in a suit...)

What day was this? Just trying to figure out if we ever crossed paths without realizing it!
 
Good job for you guys making it there that early! I always talk about the importance of rope drop, and then never make it there myself :sad2:



This is such a cute idea! I love your enthusiasm (especially so early in the morning!)



Love the Peoplemover! :love:



Don't they know that is the proper Disney diet?!



That's cute!



Hurray for not having a long line! And happy belated birthday!



That's too bad that it wasn't a great meet and greet for you guys! They were a lot of fun when we met them (but I was also wearing a floor-length fancy dress and my husband was in a suit...)

What day was this? Just trying to figure out if we ever crossed paths without realizing it!

Were you getting married??? We were in MK on May 10, and AK on the 11th!
 
Were you getting married??? We were in MK on May 10, and AK on the 11th!

I was married at Disney, but not on this trip. We were dressed so fancy because we went to Highway in the Sky :love:

Also - we spent a good portion of May 10th at MK as well! We arrived around 2pm or so, left for supper then came back until the park closed at 11pm that night :)
 

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