MillieHubbard's TR

Day 8 - Resort Relaxation

Not much of interest to report today...oh I take that back! This was the day we dined at Citricos!!

During the day we just relaxed at our resort, enjoyed the pool, took the boat down to Downtown Disney for some shopping and pin trading. Just a nice relaxing day...we really needed it after being at MK until the wee hours the night before!! I think we actually slept in until about 10:30 - that's LATE for me! I have two furbabies that get me up by 6:30 am EVERY morning - weekends included!

We had a 7:00 pm reservation for Citricos so we headed back to the resort about 4:00 to get showered and dressed for dinner. We had decided to leave for the Grand Floridian early so we could enjoy the resort grounds a little bit before dinner. It was a good thing we did - true to CFL weather, as we pulled into the Grand Floridian the skies opened up!! Being true NYers we do NOT pay for parking unless we can't avoid it! Our plan was to drive over to the Poly, park there, (we'd come back for drinks later) and hop on the Monorail to the GF. That worked fine since the next stop from the Poly would be the GF, of course on the way back to our truck we'd pass by the MK, Contemporary, TTC and then the Poly. We wouldn't mind, riding the Monorail is one of the fun, free things to do at WDW!

We made it to Citricos in plenty of time for our reservation, in fact at 7:00 the dining room was nearly empty. I guess the fine dining folks arrive a little later in the evening. By the time we left at 9ish the dining room was starting to fill up. We were both really looking forward to enjoying this meal. It was our "Signature" experience of the week. We'd saved our TS Dining Credit from Sunday night so we could "double-up" for this signature meal. Let me tell you it was well worth it.

As we were seated at a romantic table for two, our host presented us with customized menus. Preprinted with Happy Anniversary, just one of the many times during the week we were wished Happy Anniversary and/or Happy Birthday. Such a small, minimal cost thing for Disney to do but it certainly made us feel special all week. Ah---the Disney Touch!

I decided to "splurge" and have an appetizer even though it was not included in the dining plan, I just couldn't resist the Arancini Crispy Risotto. The risotto had Italian sausage, Quattro formaggi and White Truffle Aioli. I just love Risotto and this was delicious, I savored it slowly, this was a meal to spend time with, not rush through. I was so glad that we had scheduled it for a non-park day. We were so relaxed to begin with and this dining experience was greatly enhanced by that.

Both DH and I are "meat lovers" and not just on pizza!! He ordered the Braised Veal Shank and I ordered the Filet Jardiniere. His veal was served with Carrot-Potato Puree, Roasted Vegetables and Toasted Citrus Gremoloda. The presentation was beautiful (sorry, yet again I don't have pictures!). My filet was served with Quattro Fromaggi Crushed Potatoes, house-cured vegetables and Veal Glace. Delicious. We both made a point of eating slowly so as to enjoy all of the flavors and complexities of these entrees - this was not your typical steakhouse dinner!

For dessert I ordered Tiramisu and DH ordered the Warm Chocolate Banana Tart. The presentation was again just beautiful. DH's plate was certainly a work of art, very similar to one of Zapper's photos in the Disney Food Photos thread. It didn't have the Year of a Million Dreams theme since that promotion has ended. But the "What Will You Celebrate Theme" was just as beautiful. My plate had "Citricos" in chocolate on the plate, similar to the Beauty and the Beast picture.

My mouth is watering as I write this...and this is exactly what I mean about the Dining Plan being an excellent way to eat at a restaurant that might be out of your price range. Had I had to shell out $46 for just one entree I would have definitely had second thoughts about making a reservation. But on the dining plan we were free to order what we wanted and not be constrained by our "checkbook".

After dinner we spent a little time strolling around the GF lobby and just enjoyed the atmosphere, it is such a beautiful hotel. We had eaten dinner here on our Honeymoon 20 years ago so we had some nice memories return to us as we sat and relaxed on the sofas for a few minutes. Soon we were ready to head up to the Monorail station and return to the Poly to pick up our truck. When we returned to the Poly we both decided that we'd had a wonderful dinner and had no room for drinks, we did walk around the grounds and enjoy the flowers and plants. It was a very relaxing evening but we were going to call it an early night since we'd been up so late the night before. We were to check out of Riverside the next day so we started to head back to the resort.

Day 9 - Riverside checkout

Day 9 - Checkout of PO Riverside and into Comfort Inn Palm Pkwy

Sadly it was time to check out of Riverside, it's such a beautiful resort that it's hard to leave. That said, we had a wonderful stay and it was time to ease ourselves back into the world -- the non-Disneyworld that is!! We got up early and went to the food court for breakfast, coffee - in our mugs - and some pastries. We're not really big breakfast eaters so we just went for something light. After relaxing for a few minutes, we went over to the lobby and Fulton's General Store to do a last little bit of pin trading before checking out. Some of the CMs who had been so kind to us all week were working so we had an opportunity to say goodbye and thank them and that we hoped we see them again soon.

After saying our goodbyes, we made our way back to our room to do the last bit of packing that we had to do. I had put the 2 days worth of clothes that I'd need in a smaller bag so I could just close up the "big" suitcase for the trip home. We really only had today and tomorrow to worry about since we'd be hitting the road day after tomorrow. We loaded up the truck, wasn't too bad of a job. We actually had a good room location for getting to the parking lot, not so close that it was noisy but no so far that we had to walk a mile. We got all loaded in only 2 trips and we were ready to head off. I'm always sad when I leave the resort for the last time, we usually have tentative plans for when we'll be back but you know how plans can change or life gets in the way so it was a little bittersweet.

We made the short drive over to Palm Pkwy, that's what I love about Riverside, it's so centrally located! The hotel was about what you'd expect for $50 per night, but since we were only staying 2 nights, and really just needed a place to park our stuff and crash I wasn't looking for much more. Luckily we had a ground floor, parking lot room so we could park right outside our door. Made it really convenient for hauling our stuff in. Once we got the car unloaded we basically turned right around and headed to the MK Kennels to check in on the furbabies and take them for a short walk. We had called the Kennel the day before when we'd decided to just keep the pups there for the rest of the trip. They would have been out "of control" in the room so rather than get them all excited we decided to "let sleeping dogs lie" so to speak!!

They were so happy to see us and I was actually glad to see them. We had missed them but had enjoyed having a break from them too. They are sweet little dogs (Mini Doxie & Chihuahua) but they can be a handful at times and it was nice to have a vacation from them too!! We spent a little time walking them around the area they have at the Kennels they got to "visit" with some of the guests coming and going at the TTC. There were a bunch of people who clearly missed their "babies" and were happy to get a puppy-fix!! It was starting to get warm so we wanted to get the pups back inside out of the heat-and we wanted to head over to DTD for lunch!! We had one more CS meal to enjoy and we had plans for DisneyQuest in the afternoon.

We already knew where we wanted to have lunch - our favorite place at DTD - Earl of Sandwich. We keep telling ourselves that we should try someplace else but we both LOVE the sandwiches there so much that we're never able to NOT go there!!

It's always a struggle to make a decision at the Earl - the sandwiches are sooooo good. I usually end up getting my favorite though, The Full Montagu - DH usually gets the same or sometimes the Earl's Club - he went with the club this time. We had a choice of a side or dessert which is a nice feature at the Earl. I went with a side of Macaroni Salad and DH went with a cookie - of course!! He has a pretty big sweet tooth!

After lunch it was time to head down to DisneyQuest. I have to confess I wasn't much looking forward to it. I'm not much on video/computer/VR games - but I had PROMISED!! So off we went. As I expected the place is sensory overload with lights, noise and activity - I might have enjoyed it ittle more at the beginning of the trip,before I had used up all my energy at the parks. That said, there were some fun things even for a non-video person like myself. I did especially enjoy the unlimited Pinball-it was a good place to hang-out while DH was getting his video game fix. We enjoyed some of the VR games together and I did enjoy some of those, although I got bounced out of my seat on the River Rafting ride-confirming that I should never actually do that in REALITY!! I also got the nerve up to do CyberSpace Mountain-did I say I'm NOT a roller coaster fan, but when I learned that we could make it a very MILD ride I decided to give it a try. I have to say it was kind of fun, but also confirmed that YEP I don't want to do that in reality either!! After I exited the ride, DH got to stay for one more ride, and asked the CM to give him her best!! There is NO WAY that I would EVER ride a coaster like that. The necklace he was wearing was floating in mid-air the entire time!! He came out laughing his @ss off!! So I guess it was good!!

We decided to take break and hit the snackbar, we had done a little investigating earlier and discovered that our remaining "Snack" would net us one of those monsterous cupcakes. I had the Chocolate Butterfinger and have to confess I can't remember what DH had-something with white frosting. I have to say that they were delicious- we shared with each other. We spent a couple more hours at DisneyQuest re-riding some of the rides we especially enjoyed-we both voted Pirates to be our favorite - nothing beats blowing up Pirate Ships!!

By this time we were pretty beat and decided to head back to the hotel to get a good night sleep. We had a big day planned for our last day in Orlando. We were heading for Typhoon Lagoon in the morning/early afternoon and then off to DTD again to see my favorite singer in the evening.

Day 10 - Typhoon Lagoon and Joseph Martens to follow...our last day in Orlando

It was a pretty awesome trip!! We can't wait to go back!