We got back late last night. I'm going to try and finish this today, but we'll see. Also, I haven't uploaded any pictures yet but I will post those soon. Especially some super special ones we got from the photo pass!!!!
So day 1, we arrive at MCO around 1030 a.m. and our town car is waiting for us, so after we get our bags from baggage claim we were on our way to AKL. I had reserved a king size room over looking the savannah. We were only staying there one night so we splurged!! I did online check-in so the process was really quick at the resort. We received our happily ever after pins and we set out to find our room. The room was nice, the view was AMAZING!!! We were supposed to have a king bed, instead it was 2 doubles. I was going to go back to the front desk, but Ed reminded me that we were only there for one night. The balcony was such a nice spot and there were zebras and giraffes outside! We were starving and itching to get to a park. We didn't even unpack. We set out to find some food and the dvc pointed us in the direction of Mara. So we grabbed a quick lunch. Basic but good. I had chicken tenders and a salad and Ed had some flatbread. We then went straight to AK.
AK - Day 1. It was a sunday and the place was pretty crowded. someone handed us fast passes for the safari when we walked in. (SCORE!!!) We then walked through a little bit and went over to everest to grab fast passes for there. We then went on primeval whirl and then dinosaur. I loved dinosaur. It was probably one of my favorites. We headed back to everest. That ride was fun, but I thought you were supposed to see the Yeti? I never did. The place was too crowded to walk around so we left and "promised" to come back to explore more. We broke that promise. =( As we were walking out Ed had some questions for me about the hoppers and then was like so then can we just go hollywood studios now, ride tower of terror, come home, nap and then go to dinner. YES! and that's exactly what we did. Plus made reservations at Sci-fi for the next night. We had dinner at Jiko that night. They knew we were on our honeymoon and had a card for us that was very sweet. We ordered a bottle of wine and the taste of africa for an appetizer. Ed ordered duck and I had the peri-peri chicken. for dessert we the "one last cup." We kept getting these little dishes brought to us during the dinner. It started with small samples of cous-cous, then a raspberry sorbet that was placed over a shot of vodka, and ended with cinnamon cookies. It didn't look like anyone else got that stuff so we chalked it up to a perk of being on our honeymoon. the raspberry sorbet was fantastic!!!
Day 2. Halloween or otherwise known as the most magical day ever!!
We checked out of AKL and transferred to POR. This proved to be somewhat of a headache as there were some issues. I'll go into all of that later. Bell services took our bags and we bought ponchos and headed to MK. The rain was coming down in buckets but braved it anyways. I am so glad we did. When I walked in snow white was greeting guests and taking pictures. I ran over really quick. One of my flower girls told me that snow white was her favorite and wanted me to meet her. So i snapped a picture and sent it to her mom (my cousin). We had no idea where we going in MK and we wanted to find things indoors so we went to the information stand to ask a nice looking cast member for a map. he started to talk to us a little and asked how we knew eachother. I told him we had just gotten married and were on our honeymoon. He then asked what we were doing around 3pm. Nothing.....I started to get suspicious and thought maybe we were going to get one of those parade FP. NOPE! we were asked to be the grand marshall of the celebration parade! HOLY CRAP!!!! We had to be back at the fire station by 2:45. so we ran around fantasy land and that surrounding area. We did pretty much every ride in 3.5 hours. We grabbed lunch, but I don't remember where now. And we headed back to be GM of the parade. There was another couple with us. The photopass guy took a ton of posed pictures of us. Then the cast member who picked us gave us some sweet gifts!! we each got Mickey ears with our names one it. THEN he gave each of us bride and groom mickey ears with our names on them!! and we had to wear those in the parade. THEN he gave each of us a coveted "just married" pin. I had heard those were gone and very few resorts still have them. So it's kind of a big deal when you have them. OMG! this couldn't get any better. We climbed in the car and the doors opened and off we went. Smiling and waving! it was absolutely amazing. At the end they have a section when you get out to watch the end of the parade. So every character comes up to and congratulates you. After that we left MK and went to POR to check and change out of our wet clothes.
This is where i'm going to stop. My apt needs a major cleaning after the hecticness of the last 2 weeks. I will finish this tonight or tomorrow!
we hung out on the patio at a store for awhile. We had no idea if this starbucks was even in the right direction, but we didn't really care. Once we finished our coffee and had a nice conversation with the baristas working there we got back in the car. We looked up directions to Universal on the GPS and off we went. The park opened at 9am. We arrived around 830. By the time we parked and walked over there it was just about 9. a very good friend of mine and his girlfriend gave us tickets to universal/ioa as a wedding present. with those was also a gold GAP pass. GAP means guest assistance pass. It's basically a pass that people with disabilities use or celebrities. My friend works for NBC which is owned by Universal. So the passes came from there. The best part about that was, the express pass you can buy didn't include the Forbidden Journey. Ours did. The lines were pretty low in the parks that we didn't really use it that much. We started by superhero section. Since we had those passes we didn't feel the need to run to WWOHP. I was really the only one super excited about Harry Potter. Ed has never seen the movies. I've read the books a few times each and seen the movies. We started with Spiderman. Loved it. We then went to Dr. Dooms fear fall. I passed on that ride. I don't like free fall rides that much. I do go on ToT, but I think because I can't see the fall I don't mind it. We then wandered through there went on the Cat in the Hat ride and a few others. We skipped the water rides so we wouldn't be wet all day. Wandered through Jurassic park and then on to WWOHP. My heart skipped like 10 beats when I saw the castle up close. I took like a 100 pictures and then locked up my bag and got on the forbidden journey. I think even Ed was impressed by the walk through the castle. The talking pictures, Dumbledores office, the sorting hat. It was so incredible. I had no idea what to expect with the ride, and I was impressed. It was so fun, I loved the dementors and flying through the Quidditch pitch. after the ride we got a butter beer to split. We opted for frozen. We should have each gotten our own, it was so good. We tried to find somewhere for lunch but IOA had nothing open yet. So walked over to Universal Studios. We scoped the park out first and ended up getting some pizza somewhere. We watched some street performers and went on Disaster!, Twister, Jaws, MIB, The Simpsons and Shrek. Ed went on Rock It, but I chickened out. We went back to IOA because Ed wanted to go on the Incredible Hulk, and the Duelling Dragons and I wanted to go on Forbidden Journey again and get another butter beer. We did all of that! We were then beat and decided to head home. It was only about 3pm. (that's how empty the place was). On the way home we decided to stop at the Outlet mall. We were both getting crabby and we needed to go somewhere with out tons of kids. (no offense to children, we both love them and can't wait to have our own). While at the outlet mall I bought some crocs because my feet hurt so bad and ed bought a bunch of nice stuff at J. Crew. We got some more coffee and headed back to Alamo to return the car. 