Trip Report: DISNEY DREAM - VILLAS AT GRAND FLORIDIAN - BEACH CLUB VILLAS AND DISNEYLAND

Randoms of my favorite place in the World

Yes it is a video dance club and you can often have the whole place to yourself. Atlantic Dancehall, right across from Jelly Rolls. If you are at JR, you can check it out. I heard they have some promotion, where they had a band playing and you could play (or sing) with the band. I forgot all about it when I was in the World.

more randoms

I only post this picture because my puny right arm looks awesome. Welcome to the gun show...

Support your men in green

laser vision

fancy wedding at the Boardwalk Gazebo

adorbs...

incoming...

more randies baby

the last chance to ride this ever...I passed

Thanks Ken. That's my go-to spot for Illuminations. For some reason it's always available. I guess some people don't want the gate in their sight lines, but I think it adds perspective.

World Showcase

Pirates

I got the mermaid but the other fellow is a blur

The Halloween Party was the same as always. It rained a bit but it was not bad. I just want to mention one thing. You get three times more candy at the trick or treat stations in Disneyland. I don't understand why that is, but they are really miserly in WDW.

This kid had my favorite costume

We went to the villians bash at Liberty Tree Tavern- it was fun for a few minutes- Cruella was nice enough to take a picture with a half-assed pirate

random stuff

The parade was wonderful. The CMs really seem to get into this one. There was no headless horseman at the early parade because of wet pavement. I was on rides during the late parade and I heard he showed up for that one.

I'm pretty sure they use this float in the Christmas parade as well.

Thanks all.

The last part of this WDW trip was for Frozen Summer Fun at WDW. I blew off the last performances of Off Kilter in my desire to see fireworks at DHS which I had never seen. I should have stayed at Epcot.

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In typical Disney fashion they hyped up this Frozen Summer fun at DHS to the point where I was actually excited about it. It was probably awesome if you were an eight year old girl. It was how shall I say- OK? It was pretty good if you bought the premium package (the new Disney way to harvest more $$$ from the devoted). Then you got a prime viewing location in front of the hat stage, food, drinks and a dance party with a few characters. There was a band on the hat stage that was actually pretty good. There was a store selling Frozen merchandise (surprise!), there was a skating rink where you could skate for 30 minutes with a reservation, which I did not bother to make. I wished I did- skating at DHS is a novel idea. A little patch of ice where you could make a snowman. I heard there was a parade that I wasn't around for so I can't comment on it. And I think there was some character meet and greets that I did not partake in. At the end of the night there was a pretty awful stage show and then the fireworks. I guess for the little ones, all these things were pretty great. But to my 50 something self, they were blah, blah blah.

The fireworks were very good as you would expect from Disney. There were a few skirmishes between guests over fireworks viewing spots. An actual fist fight with punches thrown! I haven't seen that in a while at WDW. Tempers were flaring by the end of the night. I had scored a table in front of the SS Down the Hatch and settled in there. Not the best spot, but I could get the hat and the fireworks in the pictures, so not a total washout. Of course by fireworks time, people were getting uncomfortably close and invading my personal space, but what can you do.

The way there

The band- they were a lot of fun.

let's make a snowman! or an iceball

This ice rink actually looks like a nice size in this picture. Open hockey anyone?

Olaf overdose

fireworks

we had some Frozen fun- we're frozen

Yes, some bumps in the road, but all in all a great trip.

Have FuN!

I'm sure you are planning your next trip!

Yeah it was meh. But it was the first night. Hopefully they will add some more juice to it. I will try it again if they are still offering it because it has great potential.

DISNEYLAND

I booked a long weekend at Villas at Grand California for the sole purpose of visiting Disneyland. I flew late on Wednesday night, had three full park days, and flew home early Sunday morning. I understood that you could see everything in that amount of time. I wished I had another day or two. One because I really loved the place and two so I could just chill at the pool and eat at Napa Rose one day.

I took Super Shuttle from the airport based on recommendations from Disney Tourist Blog and the folks at VGC. It took forever because we had a stop on the way to drop someone off. I really wasn't in a rush because our flight landed at 9:30- too late to really do anything. But after a five hour flight, I was in no mood to be sitting in a van.

We had company..

Well, we finally arrived and of course since I was so late, my upper floor park view room request was out of the question. We had a park view, but on the ground floor. We dropped the bags at the room and headed to the bar for a bite. I noticed right away that the food was going to be good. This was after hours bar food and they had Kobe beef sliders and all kinds of nice stuff. Even micro brews on tap.

We went back to the room and I looked at the wall behind the TV and I saw a giant bug. In NYC we call them roaches. I've heard them called Palmetto bugs and other such things. Whatever, this thing was about six inches from the tips of his antennae to his tail. I think he had wings too. He was so big, you could make out like a face on him. He had a black head and brown around his eyes like a mask.

Well, needless to say, my wife flipped out. She was immediately on the phone trying to get us a new room. While she was doing that, I tried to nail the bastard with a shoe. He must have had pretty good vision because every time I got near him, he took off.

He was so big that he couldn't get in cracks in the woodwork or crevices like a normal bug. I tried not to take my eyes off him because I didn't want him to get away. Finally he climbed under the sink counter and went in the closet under the sink.

In the meantime, my wife has told them we must have another room- immediately. Guess what? There is not another available room on the whole hotel. So we tell them we will sleep in the lobby. They send up a team of maintenance, janitorial, gardeners, and housekeepers- all men. They get in that closet, and I think when they finally saw that bugger they were a little startled, because he got away at first. But they hunted him down and killed him. They had to step on him a few times to make sure he was dead. I made them bag him to show the front desk. I wasn't exaggerating about the size. We could have had him mounted in the study next to the moose head.

Well that's great. But what if he had friends? I understand these things can't do you any harm, but they are F'g creepy. Imagine waking up and one is on the bed, or in your luggage, or on you! If you want us to sleep here, you'd better take this room apart and I want it certified bug-free.

So they did. They moved furniture. Tossed the beds. Vacuumed. Shook out the drapes. Changed all the sheets. Checked the closets. Changed all the Linens. New Towels. Etc, etc.

By this time it was 1:30am Cali time, which is 4:30 am NYC boy time. So we were able to pass out. They moved us to the fourth floor the next day. And they were in no hurry to do it, so I again had to straighten them out. Our room should have been the first one cleaned as soon as it was vacant- because we had no room until then. Jeez, since we were up half the night, maybe we would want to take a nap or something, or take a shower, whatever. To smooth things over they gave us breakfast vouchers...woo woo!

I don't fault them too much for the bug. It's a ground floor room, someone opens the terrace door, next thing you know there is a roach as big as a Buick in your room. It happens. But leaving us for half the next day without a room to go to; I do fault them for that.

The rest of the stay was fine. As long as you don't need the hotel to do anything, they are great.

And me, the guy that takes pictures of everything, didn't even think to get a picture of that giant, enormous, hideous insect.

OK I got that off my chest, now I can talk about the parks, which I loved!