Jeff & Joe's September Trip Report! **Updated 10/8**

Monday, 9/16 " Hollywood Studios

Monday was Hollywood Studios day! YAY! We decided to walk from the Beach Club, as it was such a nice morning.

There was some lifeguard training happening along the way:

Joe offered to throw me in the water as a practice dummy (!) but I reminded him that it was my birthday week and I deserved lots of respect. And I was old and would call the authorities for elder abuse. That worked.

Outside HS, there is a new (to us at least) display for Monsters University:



By the time we got to the entrance, the line was only marginally long, and we only had about a 15 minute wait. I was glad to see they got rid of those turnstiles (from hell). Getting through was super easy.

Through My Disney Experience, I had made FastPass + reservations for TSM, Rock n Roller Coaster and Tower of Terror in the morning. I *really* liked not having to rush to TSM for a FP.

We made a bee-line to Rock n Roller Coaster and ToT; and rode each twice. Then over to Star Tours and the Muppets before hitting TSM. We were super-excited that we got a totally different version of the Star Tours ride than what we have ever had before. We ended up under sea!

By then our FP+ for TSM was ready, and we buzzed right through so quickly that I totally forgot my 3-D glasses! What was I thinking?!!? Joe gave me his (what a sweetheart!) though I took them off a few times to see how hard it was without them. At least now I know one secret to winning " don't let Joe have 3D glasses! J

And now, a very special moment. FINALLY! We got the Cappuccino cupcake from Pizza Planet!

Oh my. This is love. And Heaven. And all around goodness. It was excellent. My new favorite " thanks Jess for the recommendation! You were so right.

We had some time to kill before our lunch ADR, so I decided to have a little fun at Walt's expense:









I was waiting for lightening to strike me for doing this.

On to lunch and the Sci Fi Dine In. It was busy " they were turning away anyone without an ADR.

Jeff: Flame-broiled New York Strip Steak - with Garlic Mashed Potatoes (I asked for fries instead) and Seasonal Vegetables topped with Blue Cheese Butter and crispy Onion Rings:

Joe: Salmon BLT - served on crusty French Roll with Arugula, Vine-ripened Tomatoes, Bacon, red onion and d Chili-Chive Aioli, served with cucumber salad:

For desert, we went with the Out-of-This-World Turtle Cheesecake - with Heath Bar, Pecans, Chocolate Chips, Caramel Sauce, and topped with Whipped Cream:

Excellent! Enjoyed both.

We checked out the killer candy shop at the corner by Starring Rolls and watched them make some fun caramel apples:

We walked back to the hotel and hit up Storm Along Bay " my favorite pool! While swimming, it started to drizzle a bit. But it did not last very long.

Back to HS! Rode a few rides, did some shopping, and decided on the ABC Commissary for dinner. Nothing worth mentioning. I had the Seafood Platter(Fried Shrimp, Fried Fish and French fries) and Joe had the Couscous, Quinoa and Arugula Salad with Salmon:

The Strawberry Parfait desert was really kinda ick. Not quite my thing. Note the disproportionate application of blueberries on top: 3 one, 1 on the other. Ha.

We walked around to the Christmas Shop, then decided we needed a snack for Fantasmic. And what did we want? That famous Carrot Cake Cookie from the Writer's stop!!

We always wanted to try this, and finally did! OMG it was soooo good! I get it now....

We made our way over to Fantasmic, cookie in hand! They were having 2 showings that night, and we decided to hit the early show at 8:30. It was a gorgeous evening:

The show was packed, and awesome! The boat that brings all the characters out at the end is being refurbed, so all the characters just appeared on center stage at the end.

As we headed back to our room, I started to quietly smirk and laugh inside! I knew a big surprise was waiting back at the room!!! If you remember from our last trip in April 2012, I had contacted Disney Floral and Gifts and arranged for the Petals of Romance surprise for Joe mid-way through our trip. And if you remember, it never showed up! It turns out they set it up in the wrong room!

Karen from Disney Floral was so apologetic and kind, and told me at the time that when we come back, contact her and she will make it right, with a few added surprises to make it magical, on them!

So when we booked our trip a year later, I decided to contact her. And she remembered! And was ready to make good on her promise! Awesome! I had it set up for Monday, the 16th. Boy, would Joe be surprised!

Well, what I didn't know was that Joe contact Karen behind my back! And they conspired to turn the tables on me and turn it into my birthday surprise!!!

When we opened the door, just as i was about to yell "SURPRISE!!!", Joe beat me to it and yelled "SURPRISE!!!!!!!!!". And this was waiting for me:

OOOo, they were sneaky!!! I was punked!! I found out later they had been conspiring for MONTHS!!! She was even going to the Art Store at DTD and taking pictures of things and sending to him for his consideration!! AND, she had a connection in the Pin Department and was getting pin ideas from said connection and running them by him! They were BFFs!! He stole her from me!! Dastardly, indeed...but an awesome surprise for me

I'll post pics of the little surprises later.

I know, right?! It really sounded good. But it was nothing close to "fudge", and just not good. I never thought anything from Karamel Kuche would disappoint, especially with those 3 magical words strung together!! Oh well, we made up for it later

Tuesday, 9/17 " Magic Kingdom Day! And MNSSHP!!!!

My Kingdom! It missed me!

We made it in time for rope drop and the opening ceremony.




That always makes me happy!

Our first stop was the Fire Station to get new SOTMK cards. We were told by the CM that times, they were a' changin' starting on Sunday. No more cards just for showing up; you will have to play at least 1 portal before you can get a new set of cards for the day. Something about e-Bay, too many people getting cards just to try and sell, yada.

We headed back to BTMRR (we decided to pass on Splash Mountain because we just didn't want to get wet yet ) and checked out the refurb.

What fun!

We hit up all the usuals " Haunted Mansion, iasm....

....Peter Pan, Mickey's Philharmagic " and then strolled on over to the new area of Fantasyland! What a fun area! We saw the crew working on the Seven Dwarfs Mine Ride " looks like that will be fun when it's finished!

We took a detour to the Winnie the Pooh ride " how often do you get to ride in a honey pot?!






We had FP+ ressies for the new Little Mermaid ride later in the day (and I really was not planning on doing it - it was a bonus FP for the day), but there was no wait, so we decided to check it out. And we were glad we did " that was a pretty cool ride! I would ride again in a heartbeat.

We passed this really fun popcorn stand along the way:

Next we checked out Gaston's Tavern.

We were intrigued by the LeFous's Brew " it sounded really good and the people next to us were "ooo"-ing and "aaahh"ing over theirs.

But since it was close to lunch time, we decided to wait. Note: we did try it later and it was really good at first, but by the time we got about half-way done, we both thought it was a little too sweet for our liking to finish. Next time, we will split one between us)

We headed over to TomorrowLand for a quick round of Buzz Lightyear. And I have NO IDEA WHAT HAPPENED! One minute I look at our scores and we are apart by 400 points. 5 seconds later I looked again and he was a HALF A MILLION POINTS AHEAD OF ME!!! My jaw dropped! He claimed he had no idea. The end result was pitiful....



Losing so badly made me very hungry, so guess where we went for lunch!! Guess! GUESS!!!



I had the requisite cheeseburger and fries:

...and Joe had the turkey sandwich.

For desert, we both went with the gelato " chocolate for me and Mango for Joe.

Both were pretty darn good!

After lunch, we headed back to the hotel, took a swim break, and then we drove over to the Contemporary. We decided to park there, take a quick run over to MK to get some of the MNSSHP special event items before dinner, then walk back to the Contemporary for our ADR at The Wave.

We got over to MK right around 4:00, and got our MNSSHP wrist bands and treat bags " yay! It was very festive:

There was a small line at the Firehouse for the SOTMK cards, so we decided to be super-smart and go back to the location by the Christmas Shoppe. And how did that work out for us? Not so well. The CMs told us they were not giving cards out the MNSSHP special event cards until 7:00. Rats.

We decided to just head back to the front of the park and make our way back to the Contemporary. But when we got back to the Firehouse, we noticed the line was quite a bit longer! We were suspicious, so I stuck my head in and asked a CM inside when they would be giving out the special even cards, and he said "Now! That's why everyone is in line!"

Dang it! So we got in line and it only took about 20 minutes to get though and get the Hitchhiking Ghost cards.



YAY! And we were glad we did it then " the lines later were ridiculous.

Dinner ADRs were are the Wave....of American Flavors over at the Contemporary, so we walked on back over. We always wanted to try this place but just never did. I'm glad we did it this time. The food was spectacular.

I went with the Seared Lamb Chops - Dijon reduction, toasted summer risotto with wild rice and vegetable of the moment:

And Joe got the Thompson Farms Pork Tenderloin -soy-pineapple honey marinade, pineapple salsa, boniato and cauliflower mash:

We would highly recommend both of these. So good!

For desert, we split the Creamy Indulgence - Butterscotch creme brulee with espresso macaroon; New York cheesecake with apple-cranberry compote, olive oil-infused chocolate truffle mousse with salted caramel sauce.

More please!!

After dinner, we walked over to MK. As we walked by the bus drop off area outside MK, we noticed that the buses seem to be getting a new look. Here's the older version:

And here's the new version:

Once inside the park, we went to the Emporium on Main Street to check out some of the Halloween wares:




And there we noticed people were buying the special event Pins for MNSSHP! And it was only 6:30! So we decided to go ahead and pick one up of the MNSSHP pins.

They also had a box set available, but I didn't really care for it.

As we worked our way to Frontierland, we noticed a HUGE line outside the Frontierland Trading Post store. And the second entrance was blocked off and Marked Exit Only! So we asked a CM standing by that exit what the line was for. He told us it was for the Special Event pins! I asked him if they had any different ones than the Emporium, and he said no, everyone had the same ones.

I told him we were just able to go buy them at the Emporium with no line, so why was everyone lined up here? He looked perplexed and said something about they always have a line for their pins.

We just laughed and wondered how long those people were waiting, and whether we should tell them that the Emporium was already selling the special event pins.

Just as the witching hour was starting, we spotted this special Mickey Halloween Popcorn Container:

Had to have! We also saw this Coffin container:



We almost got, but decided we really only needed 1 popcorn container.

By now the Trick or Treat lamps started going up, and we began the candy rounds. Lines were a little long but moved fast. And the CMs were ready to go!

The station by Splash Mountain was quite the maze, but had 4 candy stops. 4! Awesome. We worked our way around to all the stations, then went through again. Hee hee.

We decided it was a perfect time to hit up the Haunted Mansion again. And what did we find outside the Mansion? This!

So fun.

We wandered around a bit, then caught the headless horseman doing his/her thing then the parade and fireworks.






A few more treats and we called it a night. In the end, after hitting all the stations, we wound up with just over 6 pounds of candy.



We are still working our way through it all. There were some really fun and creative costumes, but we were glad we didn't dress up just because it was still pretty hot and humid into the evening.

Oh, and I forgot to include on our HS DAy report that we took in the new Pirates attraction:

Um. Yeah. There's 30 minutes I will never get back....

Wednesday, 9/18 " Animal Kingdom Day!

We arrived to AK just after opening, and went straight to Everest. We hit it up twice in a row, now wait. Woo! The first time we got thee very first seats in the first car!!

What an awesome experience! Was a gorgeous day too.

After that, we hit up the Maharajah Jungle Trek.

We realized when we were looking at our customized maps, that we never did this before! Probably because we don't do the Kali River Rapids ride. So we did it! It was pretty cool.

We rounded out the morning with the Lion King I love love love the Lion King!):

....and Rafiki's Planet Watch. The train conductor stopped the train after warning a person 3 times to sit down. She decided she wanted to put on her rain poncho since it was stating to sprinkle. He was alot more polite and patient than I would have been!

We had a lunch ADR at one of my all-time favorites - Yak & Yeti. And as soon as we sat down started pouring!!! It rained entire time we were eating. We may or may not have laughed at people outside as we sat dry inside.

I had to have this: Kobe Beef Burger - 10 oz grilled American Kobe beef burger, sesame-soy sauce, mayonnaise, crispy shoestring fries. topped with choice of shiitake mushroom & scallion compote or Asian slaw

Joe chose the Maple Tamarind Chicken - Seared chicken breast, Indonesian tamarind glaze, coconut ginger rice, baby bok choy, shiitake mushroom stir fry.

I could eat here every day. Yes indeed.

Desert was a no-brainer: Mango Pie - shortbread cookie crust, fresh whipped cream, raspberry sauce. I shared. Some. Kinda.

Without fail, one of my absolute favorite meals of the trip.

We decided to stop over at MK to get our daily allotment of Sorcerer cards " and were surprised to be told by the CMs that they went live with the new SOTK requirements (you must play at least one portal!!!) effective immediately!! We were told 2 days ago it would not happen until Sunday).

The CM was very kind about it though, and explained that they were caught a bit off-guard by the sudden implementation. Weirdly, the system processed Joe's key card without him playing, but would not process mine. The CM gave us a break and gave us both cards, and said guests should not be inconvenienced by this sudden change and the confusion that was surrounding it! Yay for CMs! J

We headed back to the room for a break, then went over to DTD. Along the way, we ventured inside Lane Splitters " check out the cool bowling balls!

Looks like a fun place.

The Vinylmation Store seemed to be less Vinylmation-y and more other stuffs.

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-4VYH8A4PMc8/UlQVj7i_9uI/AAAAAAAAEd8/3wXjsOJR8Zo/s1600/IMG-20130918-00767.jpg

The giant Mickey made up of little Vinylmations was gone.

We headed over to the West side and I got my Ghirardelli fix, Christmas Shop fix, and Art of Disney fix.

I tried to sing a few Christmas carols with my close personal friends, but holy cow these guys could not carry a tune. Haha.

Dinner was Earl of Sandwich (we both got the Ham & Cheese " no pics, sorry!) and walked around enjoying everything. And by now, I had to finally admit that I started getting a sore throat earlier in the day, and I was getting worse!

We got back to the resort, and took a stroll around the Boardwalk. We decided Beaches and Cream was the perfect place for some throat therapy, and got some ice cream cones. That made me feel better, at least temporarily.

Ahh, my very last night as a 40-something....it's ok, I can handle it....maybe....

Thursday, 9/19 " Magic Kingdom! And my birthday!

HAPPY 50th BIRTHDAY TO ME!

I declared it KING JEFF DAY! Where it's all about me and everyone pays attention to me! To which Joe said "And that's different than any other day...how?" Smartie. Though it's really not that different at all...

We got to the Transportation Center and noticed that the Monorail line was over at the Resort monorail side and not the MK side! For some reason, it was not running. Someone did NOT get the memo about KING JEFF DAY! Heads would roll later....

The line was long and slow, and the CMs knew they were in trouble, so they started the ferry service early and began directing people to the boats! After 2 monorails (and they were not one right after the other...nooooo, they were not!) we decided to skip the monorail and catch the boat. That strategy worked out well and I think we beat the monorail. Note: Joe would NOT let me go up to the bow and scream "I'M THE KING OF THE WORLD!!!!" Party pooper.....

We got to MK by about 9:30. As we strolled down Main Street, we came upon a performing group in the middle of Main Street, and guess who was directing the guests around the show! Cast Member Barbara!!! We love Cast Member Barbara! We walked past here, and 2 seconds later, I decided that I just had to go back and ask her for a picture! So I did! And she did not hesitate!! She grabbed me by the arm, pulled me over, and posed!! Check out the awesome pic!!:



*sigh* Yeah, I know...seriously?!?!?! The camera was in transition and trying to adjust to the humidity and fogged up on us. Grrrr!!!

Oh well. I will live with the memory in my head!

We hit up a few rides, then took a stroll back up Main Street to Starbucks.




Because it was my birthday and I wanted a Frappuccino at 10:00 am. And at 50 I can do whatever I want! To which Joe says again, "And that's different than any other day...how?"

Personally, we like the addition. Though the ratio of CMs to Customers was about 600:1.

Here are a few pics from inside, including the bakery options:




As we came back outside, we came upon my long time personal friend, Mayor Weaver!!! And the Fire Chief! No way I could pass this up without a few pics!

When I asked the Mayor if I could have a picture taken with him he said "I take pictures with pretty women and ugly men! You can decide which one you are!" He was a hoot....he gave me his card afterwards.

We made arrangements to meet up with ROBYN AND SY at the Dole Whip stand around 11:00. And sure enough, we met up!!!!!! It was a massive amount of celebrating that day " my birthday just happens to be their anniversary! Happy 4 years to them! YAY!

We had some dole whips (thank you again!!), chatted for about an hour or so. Such a nice couple " it was so exciting to actually meet them in person!!! We had such a good time chatting that I totally forgot to snap any pics! Can you believe it?! Dopey me.....

We hit up Pirates, and then headed over to lunch at Pinocchio Village Haus " pizzas for both. The crew came over half-way through the mean to sing and wish me happy birthday. YAY!

Another break back to our room, a bit of a swim, and then back to the park for our dinner ADR at BOG!!!

We got in the line queue, and we quickly helped by this very friendly CM....

A quick check in and a buzzer thingies and we were all set! It only took about 10 minutes for them to come get us at the gate and escort us in.

The interior of the place is very coolio. I think they did an excellent job with the theming and atmosphere.




I knew what I wanted: Grilled Strip Steak - with garlic-herb butter and pommes frites



Joe went for the Braised Pork Coq au Vin style, with mashed potatoes and roasted vegetables.

Both were excellent. At one point Beast walked through the room.

For desert, they were offering up the Grey Stuff in a chocolate tart! How could I not do that?! The waiter added a candle for me, and I also got a card signed by Belle and Beast J



After dinner, we checked out the other rooms, saw where Beast was taking pictures (I didn't feel like waiting for that), and headed out.

We wandered around, just taking it all in, which is exactly what I wanted to do for the evening. Here's an array of pics, including the castle (which varied from craned to not-craned!)

I got to watch the fireworks with my awesome husband, and then we headed back to room for the evening, as I was feeling a bit not-good by now.

This despite the 40 gallons of hand sanitizer and 63 packs of sanitizing wipes we brought with us.....