Day 2, Thursday, January 12th    

We didn’t set an alarm and we woke up at round 8:00, had breakfast in our Villa, got ready and headed to DHS. 

We headed right to Star Tours and enjoyed the ride. They did have a technical problem with our flight just before it ended and we were offered another and we took it. Afterwards we walked through the Streets of America and we were quite surprised that a lot of the Osborne Lights were still up. 

We went in One Mans Dream and looked and read and then went to view the film. We headed towards the Hat and decided to go on the Great Movie Ride. We had a great CM on this and that makes it more enjoyable. 

Toy story Mania didn’t have fast passes available until 6:30 PM and I don’t think it was worth the wait of 90 minutes so we skipped it and went to see the Muppets. 

It was time for our Mamma Melrose’s lunch. We enjoyed this very much. We started with Mamma’s Margarita and we asked for the recipe and the bar tender wrote it down for us. I had the Strip Steak w/ five cheese macaroni. Patti had the Chicken Campanelle. For desert we had another Margarita. We headed out of the park and walked to the Boardwalk and looked around for a few minutes and then walked to Epcot. 

We walked to Soarin’ and got fast passes for later that day and then around World Showcase and enjoyed the views of all the countries. We stopped to watch the drummers in Japan and took a few minutes to watch Mo Rockin’ perform.   

By 6;00 PM we were getting tired, still worn out from our early wake up the day before  and decided to gift our fast passes and found a nice older couple that were trying to decide if it was worth doing standby for the hour wait. They had never been on Soarin’ before. When I asked if they would like to use the fast passes, they asked how much we wanted for them. I said to just play it forward and do something nice for somebody else. They were surprised but took them and said they would. 

We left the park happy and headed back to our Villa and relaxed and eating a sandwich and watching a little TV before bed.

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pogo....AKA: Tom
Mouse-aid Staff
pogo@mouse-aid.org

@mouseaider on Twitter
Next Trip 05/01/2013 - 05/08/2013 Maybe.
Head Possumator, JQU

I want to put my two cents in

 

 

Day 3, Friday, January 13th   

 

 

We changed up our plans today because it was only going to get into the low 50’s and decided to go to AK and see if the cooler weather had the animals moving around and we were not disappointed.  

 

We headed right back to the safari and it said we had a 20 minute wait. I pulled out my phone and started the stop watch as we walked through the que.  I stopped it just before we boarded our truck and showed a CM that they exceeded the estimate. It was only 17 minutes.  

After the safari we went to see the gorillas. We saw the male that is having heart issues and he didn’t look good at all. He has lost a lot of weight and I expect to hear the sad news of his passing soon. 

We left and walked to Camp Minnie Mickey and watched the Festival of the Lion King. Then it was our lunch stop at Flame Tree BBQ. I had the pulled pork and Patti had the Smoked Turkey Breast - with cranberry mayonnaise and fresh fruit. We love eating here and love the fact that you can use your TIW card here for a 20% discount on their great food.

We walked around people watching and decided we had enough of AK for the day and jumped on a bus back to Kidani. We hung around the room for a little bit and then headed to MK to enjoy all the little things there. 

We shopped a little and walked around. We took the People Mover for a spin and though of Bret and Sherrie. Then we got fast passes for Buzz before we went to see the Carousel of Progress. And while we were in there we heard Wishes going off. Oh well…. It’s not like we haven’t seen it. 

When we got out we noticed that Space Mountain was only a 10 minute wait. All of a sudden we saw about 150 teens flat out running to get into line and the wait time changed to 60 minutes in a heart beat. 

We went on Buzz and I was proclaimed a Galactic Hero! I don’t know how I did it but I did. Then we went to Laugh Floor and it was just kind of OK. I was picked as the churro guy but with a small crowd in there the show was just OK. 

We decided it was time to head back to the resort. Syracuse had already won #19 and it wasn’t on TV so I missed their game for the first time this season. We got on our bus and returned to Kidani. We stopped out by the fire pit and spoke with the CM’s from Africa and it was interesting to hear then talk about their experiences in their country. 

We walked the long hallway back to our Villa and were soon ready for bed.

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pogo....AKA: Tom
Mouse-aid Staff
pogo@mouse-aid.org

@mouseaider on Twitter
Next Trip 05/01/2013 - 05/08/2013 Maybe.
Head Possumator, JQU

I want to put my two cents in

Thanks for the report Pogo and I want to know more... Day 1 What were your impressions of the room?  I love AKV and I know some ppl just hate it. Speaking of environment only (not buses) what did you think of the atmosphere and the room?  

How was your burger at Pecos?  Great memories there remember the last time we were there together with you and Patti, Marilyn, Tom and Angel and I and of course Shanda and Bailey.  

Which ornament did you purchase? did you get one to represent all the parks or a specific character?  Last ornament I got was the 40th anniversary. 

Do you have pictures of the expansion?  Is it dramatically different from when we were there in Oct?

Day two 

I want to hear more about your lunch. Are you going to do a review or tell us more about what you ate? 

At star tours did you get two different adventures???  Have you seen them all?

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Mouse-Aid Staff - WebMaster
Next Trip: May 18th - 25th - Wilderness Lodge!!!...

Beth@Mouse-Aid.com

Thanks Pogo just curious. I know you always do such a super job on the site.

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Mouse-Aid Staff - WebMaster
Next Trip: May 18th - 25th - Wilderness Lodge!!!...

Beth@Mouse-Aid.com

Mama's Margarita.........

1 1/2 oz. Jose Cuervo Traditional

3/4 oz. Triple Sec

1/2 oz. lime juice

1 oz orange juice

2 oz. sour mix.

Take 1 lime wedge and rub the rim and then dip glass in coarse salt. Save lime for garnish.

Shake and pour in a glass and add the lime wedge to the rim.

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pogo....AKA: Tom
Mouse-aid Staff
pogo@mouse-aid.org

@mouseaider on Twitter
Next Trip 05/01/2013 - 05/08/2013 Maybe.
Head Possumator, JQU

I want to put my two cents in

How many different adventures are there in Star Tours?

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MrsGaribaldi ~aka: Stephanie~

next up March 2012 Mouse-Aid Staff
Pretrip Reports
Chronic Illness
Grief & Loss:
-Special Needs Adults
-Disney Pets
Medical issues while at Disney


Smokes128@msn.com/ MrsGaribaldi@mouse-aid.org

 

 

Day 5, Sunday, January 15th

 

 

Today we got up at around 8:00 and had breakfast before heading to Disney Hollywood Studios.  We were in no hurry to get there so we took our time and didn’t get there until after 11:00.  

We rode Star Tours and experienced a trip we hadn’t seen before and it was fun. 

We headed to the Animation Studio for another drawing class and this time we drew Donald Duck. We really loved doing this again. We watched the Pixar Parade and then went to American Idol Experience and enjoyed the show. 

When we came out we decided we had done everything we wanted to do at DHS so we walked to the Boardwalk again and had lunch at Boardwalk to Go. We both had the foot long hotdogs there and enjoyed eating in the sunshine watching all the activity on the boardwalk. 

When we finished lunch it was time to walk to Epcot and met a new friend. Her name is Jenny and she goes by the handle of Epcot Jenny. We traded texts to figure out how to meet and we found her in the UK waiting for the World Showcase Players to perform. These guys are hysterical and you must watch them if you haven’t already. They performed Cyranose de Bergerac and always include a couple of people from the audience to act out parts. Very funny if you like what I call dumb humor.  

After we walked over to see the British Revolution perform again. It was a great show from some really nice guys.  

We parted ways with Jenny for a little while and walked around watching people again and we returned to the UK and found Jenny once again after the British Revolution show. She was going to watch the World Showcase Players perform the Holy Grail. We found a spot off to the side as the show started.  

This story is about King Arthur and it is as foolish as all the other shows they do. I was not paying to much attention when Phil (one of the actors) snuck up behind me and picked me to play the role of King Arthur. Patti and Jenny were laughing their butts off the whole time.  

We returned for the last show of the day from the British Revolution and after decided we better check out the line at Soarin’ again. We were surprised it was still an hour wait so we left and walked on Spaceship Earth one more time before leaving the park. 

After a quick bus ride we were back in our comfortable little Villa for the night.

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pogo....AKA: Tom
Mouse-aid Staff
pogo@mouse-aid.org

@mouseaider on Twitter
Next Trip 05/01/2013 - 05/08/2013 Maybe.
Head Possumator, JQU

I want to put my two cents in

Day 7, Tuesday, January 17^th 

This is our last day in the parks and we always do MK for that. But we hadn’t been on Soarin’ yet so we decide to start the day at Epcot. We were up and out a little earlier today arriving at Epcot at around 9:30.  We went straight to Soarin’ and got fast passes for 12:30 – 1:30 and then to ride Nemo and see Crush. After, we went to see what Figment might be up to today.   

It was almost 11:00 so we made our way our way to Canada and watched the new film. It isn’t really new but we hadn’t seen it since it was. We enjoyed it very much. We also watched the film in China and France before our ride on Soarin’.  We were in the second row and the flight was fun. There were some people in the glider to my left that were riding it for the first time and I had more fun watching their expressions. 

We left Epcot for our monorail ride to the TTC and changed to the MK monorail. Does this sound familiar? We do this a lot. 

We arrived at MK at around 2:00 and headed to Tomorrow Land. We grabbed some fast passes for Buzz and went into the Laugh Floor to see Mike and Roz. There was a big group of people for this show and it always makes it more fun. And for once, I wasn’t chosen as the guy to buy the churros or “That Guy” either. 

But much to our surprise, Patti was picked to let Buddy Boil read her mind. There are so many jokes I could insert here but she might actually read this so I better not. 

But seeing her on the big screen made my whole trip.  It’s usually me that always gets picked.   

She was asked to pick a number between 1 and 100. Buddy said to tell the audience what it was while he closed his eyes so he couldn’t hear. Patti has seen the show many times before so she quietly said, “10”. Buddy couldn’t hear her but everyone else could. And his reaction when he got frustrated because he couldn’t guess it right made everyone laugh. 

It was now time to visit Buzz and we once again scored well. This was the second time that I scored enough to be proclaimed a Galactic Hero! I think Patti was a Space Ace. 

We walked all over the park watching people enjoy the magic. We took time to watch Move it Shake it parade and went into the Emporium to buy a couple of little gifts for our neighbor’s girls. We decided to eat dinner at Cosmic Rays. I had a cheese burger and Patti had a turkey sandwich. And we watched the Electrical Parade from the patio area. 

When we finished we made our way to Main Street and find a spot to watch, “The Magic, the Memories and You” and Wishes.  We think the area between Casey’s and the Ice Cream Shop is perfect for this. 

We moved closer to the Castle after Wishes to watch the kiss goodnight as most of the people left the park. Our visit to my favorite place on earth was fast coming to an end so kissed the park goodnight with a last look before we walked out to the bus back to Kidani Village. 

We got back to our villa and got a little better organized to leave in the morning. Then it was light’s out….. and some much needed sleep.

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pogo....AKA: Tom
Mouse-aid Staff
pogo@mouse-aid.org

@mouseaider on Twitter
Next Trip 05/01/2013 - 05/08/2013 Maybe.
Head Possumator, JQU

I want to put my two cents in

Final thoughts.

This was a trip that was supposed to be with some family members but they changed their minds after we purchased our airline tickets. Had we known in advance, we might have cancelled this trip and saved the money for our Hawaii trip in April.

I am glad we didn't know. Patti and I had the most relaxed trip we've ever done at WDW. Kidani Village has become our # two favorite DVC Resort. It was extremely quiet and peaceful there every single minute of the day.

The bus service was great but it does seem like you are on a bus forever when you head to the parks. we love the Boardwalk Villas the most because of the location. As you can see from reading along, we love to walk to the parks. We even employed some of the same thinking during this trip. We never did a full day at any of the parks but chose to break the day up by park hopping.

I normally do not talk about how much we spend while at WDW but this trip was done on a shoestring budget. We had annual passes, TIW card, DVC room and a companion airline ticket so we spent a fraction of the amount that a couple would spend for seven nights at WDW.

As far as food goes, I will speak about that when I do some reviews.

I know somebody will ask about photo's..... we posted some on Facebook so please see them there under Patti's or my pages.

Thanks for reading along.

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pogo....AKA: Tom
Mouse-aid Staff
pogo@mouse-aid.org

@mouseaider on Twitter
Next Trip 05/01/2013 - 05/08/2013 Maybe.
Head Possumator, JQU

I want to put my two cents in

Thanks for the report..... I am so glad you though of me on your trip... hee hee........ It sounds like you had a great time. I have had fun reading the report. You got so much done. Thanks again for the report.  

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Bret.. ... CaptTigger@Mouse-Aid.org