Tag: Hollywood Studios

January 2017 – family trip – report 8

January 30th:

We got the kids up and moving and I headed into Hollywood Studios with the kids after a quick breakfast of left over pizza.

Heather stayed at the hotel to get laundry done and have a bit of a relax but the kids and I were on a mission to make sure we hit Star Tours since we hadn’t gotten it done earlier in the week.

We walked over and even though it was cool it was still a sunny morning – so it was a nice walk. It is nice when I can spend some time with the kids when we don’t all have our noses buried in electronics!

After we got through security we went immediately to Star Tours – it indicated a 20 minute wait but it took less than that to get through the line.

We decided to ride again even though it said there was now a 25 minute wait. It took less than that again.

K on the speeder bike

Next was Muppets 3D before grabbing some lunch and heading out of the park.

Once we made it back to the hotel we stopped at the laundry room and helped Heather bring the clothes up to the room.

Heather relaxing by the pool at Disney’s Boardwalk Villas while waiting for laundry to finish.

After a bit of a rest we got ready and took the bus to Magic Kingdom.

K Princess on the bus

We wanted to see if we could find our daughter’s glasses so we took the monorail to TTC (whoohoo – whole car to ourselves!) and walked to the lost and found area. The guy working there seemed a bit out of it and couldn’t find the glasses.

We hopped the monorail back to Magic Kingdom and asked at the Town Hall guest services and they didn’t have anything so they suggested checking at the ride, just in case.

After that we still had some time so we decided to check out the Sorcerers of Magic Kingdom game for the first time. We got the run through from the cast member and our first set of cards. We got part way through the game before we decided we had to stop to get to our fast pass.

We went and used our Space Ranger spin fast pass and then walked up to the People Mover. It looked like they had just had to stop the ride and after waiting for a while we decided we couldn’t wait anymore.

We were just heading out of Tomorrowland when they got People Mover working again but we continued on to Cinderella’s Castle for our dining reservation at Cinderella’s Royal Table.

After getting checked in we went in we had a short wait and managed to quickly grab a pic of 3 little princesses dressed as Cinderella all waiting for supper.

3 Cinderella’s at Cinderella’s Royal Table

We got our pictures taken with Cinderella and had a short wait until we were called up to the restaurant.

Disney Photopass – Cinderella at Cinderella’s Royal Table

 

Disney’s Photopass – the family with Cinderella at Cinderella’s Royal Table

 

Cinderella’s Royal Table Menu

We had a great meal, good food, great service, had the 4 princesses visit the table and got pictures. Had some champagne too.

Aurora at Cinderella’s Royal Table

 

Aurora at Cinderella’s Royal Table with K and T

 

Snow White at Cinderella’s Royal Table

 

Ariel at Cinderella’s Royal Table

 

Jasmine at Cinderella’s Royal Table

After the fun supper, we wandered out to check at Barnstormer to see if they had K’s glasses. The Cast Members described their nightly and daily routine and it sure made it sound that they would not have missed the glasses in the pouch. We resolved to go back to TTC lost and found and hope a different cast member was there.

We let the kids ride the ride and they were supper excited to get front row.

Then we went and watched Wishes from the bridge area between Be Our Guest and Gaston’s.

Heather got a shot of me shooting fireworks

We then went and rode the Ariel ride twice back to back.

Scuttle on Ariel’s Undersea Adventure

 

Ursula in Ariel’s Undersea Adventure

After that we did Philharmagic and ended with Peter Pan.

Then a walk out to the buses and the ride back to the hotel. Bus to Magic Kingdom had been direct for Boardwalk but at the end of the night they were running the 5 Boardwalk area resorts together. Still was fairly quick to get back to the hotel.

We checked out the main store before heading back to the room to relax and unwind.

February 2016 – Disney World Vacation – Post 5 – Feb 14th and 15th

Unfortunately this post is pretty light on photos as we didn’t take a lot of pictures for a few days. We did get a few photopass photos that are included below.

Feb 14th

Got up and did a short run this morning – I took a path that completely avoid the main building because the crowds in that area were insane!

Once I got back the room and cleaned up we all headed out for breakfast and headed over to the lobby to catch the shuttle to do the DVC tour. The tour occurs over at Saratoga Springs where they have a full area where you can view the different room styles all decorated in the styles of the newest DVC resorts.

The tour was pretty cool and the facility was great.

One very awesome thing was that our tour guide Mark  is part of Off Kilter – the band that used to play at the Canada pavilion in Epcot. Sounds like they still play festivals and have a new album coming out. It was a great experience meeting Mark and it was a very good tour.

We are pretty sold on DVC but the Canadian dollar needs to recover before something like that could even be seriously thought about.

Another cool thing about the DVC tour was that we got 3 special fast passes for each of us that could be used at any time during the next few days at any parks and they didn’t need to be reserved. Pretty awesome! Because we also did a morning tour they also gave us a $50 gift card too. Nice!

The kids enjoyed the kids club area including the arts and crafts while we did the tour – our son enjoyed video games while our daughter made a bunch of stuff.

After the tour we were treated with ice cream at the tour center and then given a shuttle ride to where ever we wanted to be dropped off. We decided on Animal Kingdom figuring we maybe could use some of the special fast passes there.

So we got to Animal Kingdom and it was insanely busy. To the point that we were holding onto the kids to make sure we didn’t lose them.

We first tried Kilimanjaro Safari but the fast past line was huge and we didn’t want to wait – unfortunately this made this the only trip we have never made in on the safari ride. That is a bit disappointing.

We then went to Everest and the fast pass line was over 20 minutes for our son and I to make it through. So he and I had burned one of our special fast passes each so far.

We then had a normal fast pass time for Primeval Whirl and our daughter was finally tall enough to ride – she had a blast!

It was still pretty early but the crowds were just too much – so went back to the hotel to get ready for supper reservation at Narcoosie at the Grand Floridian resort.

Narcoosie was great – we all got a bit dressed up for Valentines Day – we had a window view of the boats on the Seven Seas Lagoon and of the monorails and the entrance to Magic Kingdom. While we were there it got dark and we were able to see everything get all lit up. A fantastic setting really.

We then did a tour around the gorgeous Grand Floridian resort before grabbing the monorail over to Magic Kingdom. We didn’t have park hopper tickets and we were all pretty tired so we decided to not bother to upgrade our tickets and instead head back to the hotel by bus.

That was a pretty full day.

 

Feb 15th

I woke up around 6-7 because my back was hurting – got up and took some advil and lay back down. Surprisingly fell back to sleep.

I then got up and started to run just before 10 – already pretty warm outside – seemed like it was going to be a warm day. I ran 3.6 miles – went the opposite direction than I had been going – that helped with the crowds near the main building.

Then after getting back to the room and shower and having a shower we went for lunch / breakfast at the hotel and figured we would go in the pool after. But after a wander we found it too cool due to surprisingly cool breeze so we looked at the updates to the main pool area and let the kids play on the play structure for a while before heading back to the room.

We grabbed sweaters and left the room and took the boat to Disney Springs – after some quick shopping (our daughter needed socks) and a snack (Wetzel’s Pretzles – jalapeno cheese dunk was phenomenal).

We then took a boat to Old Key West and did a quick wander around to check things out. Then took a bus from there to Hollywood Studios.

At Hollywood Studios we all did Rockin Roller Coaster – Heather was not feeling well after that even after having taken some of her meds for motion sickness – of course she got the front seat too to make it more interesting. It was also our daughter’s first time on the ride – she didn’t much like it either. I enjoyed it.

Rockin Rollercoaster - Hollywood Studios

Outside Rockin Rollercoaster - Hollywood Studios

Then did the Voyage of the Little Mermaid show.

Next thing we had was the Frozen Sing a Long – it was actually very good – quite funny. Kids loved it.

Was raining a little bit after that but not too bad.

We all then did Star Tours before leaving the park.

We had supper reservations at Beaches and Cream at the Beach Club Resort – it is about a 20 minute walk and we just made it (3 minutes late). It was pretty awesome having the Symphony in the Stars fireworks going off as we wandered over.

Another great meal at Beaches and Cream – the Classic Root Beer float with the hard root beer was very tasty!

Walked around Beach Club and Beach Club Villas and then the Yacht Club.

Walked over to Board Walk and checked out the model villa – very nice.

After a bit more walking we grabbed a cab to Riverside ($10.80)

Put on the Duffy show for the kids and then we were off to bed. My calculations had us walking over 6 miles today – the kids did great!

Feb 2016 Disney World Vacation – post 4 – Feb 12th and 13th

Feb 12th

Breakfast reservation this morning for the character breakfast at Tusker House in Animal Kingdom. This meant we had to get up and moving quite early compared to what we had been doing – we were all out of the room by 8:30! Crazy.

We got to Animal Kingdom just after 9 and got our first indication that the park was going to be crazy – there was a very long wait for back check and we just got to Tusker House in time for our 9:25 reservation.

Overall the food was good – fresh and a very good selection. The characters took longer to come around then what I remember from other character breakfasts but it wasn’t a bad wait. I would go there with the kids again.

Safari Mickey Mouse - Tusker House - Animal Kingdom

Safari Goofy - Tusker House - Animal Kingdom

Safari Goofy - Tusker House - Animal Kingdom

Safari Donald - Tusker House - Animal Kingdom

Safari Daisy - Tusker House - Animal Kingdom

After breakfast we abandoned the park because the lines were already crazy.

After a few minutes back at the hotel we decided to try Blizzard Beach – it was the first day of the trip where it was warm enough to actually go to a water park and we wanted to hit Blizzard Beach at least once while we were there. Every time we have gone in the past Blizzard Beach has been closed for winter reno and we have gone to Typhoon Lagoon instead – this year we lucked out and they were switched.

We got to and in the water park at around 12:45 but surprisingly they hadn’t opened until 12:30 (was supposed to be 10). I’m not sure what the issue was but it did mean the park wasn’t that crowded and we were hit everything without too much of a wait.

In the end we did every slide and kids’ area except for the Downhill Double Dipper as it was closed for some repairs. Several of the slides we did more than once. It was a lot of fun and I think in the end we enjoyed it more than Typhoon Lagoon.

Blizzard Beach

We left the park around 4:45 (after stopping at the med station to get a bandage for scraped toe) – we then waited for a bus until 5:30. That was a just plain irritating frankly. And then to make it worse the bus got stopped by some kind of weird traffic jam on the way back to the hotel – we sat on one of the roads for pretty long time. Once we got going though there were many cheers through the bus!

The bus stopped at French Quarter first and after a quick discussion with Heather, I decided to get off there and run to the hotel room while she continued on the bus with the kids. We would then meet up back at the room. I have been trying to run every day as part of a challenge to run every day of 2016 and I hadn’t run in the morning so I needed to get that run done. So I hopped off and met up with everyone after a couple miles of running.

After that we had supper at the resort and did a bit of shopping through the general store there.

Later I took our son to the arcade for a little while (whoops – found out later he had lost his resort mug there).

Then we went back to the room to crash and have a relatively early night for a change.

Feb 13th

I got up and out for a run at around 9 and man, were my legs ever beat up after the day at the water park the day before. Ouch. The run was fairly slow due to a lot of extra traffic at the resort.

When I got back to the room our daughter was up and all dressed wanting to come run with me – so back out we went and did a little tour while having some daddy-daughter time.

After a quick cleanup we all went and had breakfast before coming back to the room to get changed to do some more swimming. The main pool at the Riverside was closed for reno while we were there and we decided to go try the French Quarter pool today.

Port Orleans Riverside mansions paths

Port Orleans Riverside mansions fountain

So we walked over to the French Quarter (there is a shuttle as well but we decided to walk down) and spent a few hours there swimming and the kids enjoyed the slide and doing a bunch of the pool side trivia games, etc.

They were in the process of building a new splash pad area at the FQ pool when we were there and it is probably open by now. They were also in the process of putting extra gates around the pool (I suspect to ensure that only hotel guests are coming into the pool areas such as what was done at Art of Animation).

We also took a few minutes to let the kids run around on the play structure before we caught the golf cart shuttle back to the Riverside.

We decided to head to Hollywood Studios to see if we could get into Fantasmic that night as well as see Symphony in the Stars. On the way to the bus stop we stopped and talked to the Disney Vacation Club guy there and decided we should probably just do a tour. We go frequently enough and with how we vacation at Disney it would probably make some sense for us to get into DVC. Granted the Canadian dollar was fairly awful at that point but we figured if we did the tour and got the info we would be in a better place to make a decision once the dollar gets better. So we booked an appointment for the next morning.

Then off to Hollywood Studios! Very busy there as well so we didn’t end up getting on any rides but we did manage to get into SciFi Dinner for supper. The last time we were there our son had gotten a bit freaked out by some of the movie shorts they had been playing and he really didn’t want to go this time but they had changed just enough of the movies that he had a blast.

After supper we did a wander around the Launch Bay Hanger to get a look at all the Star Wars merchandise – it would be easy to lose a fortune in there…

We watched Symphony in the Stars right in front of the Great Movie Ride – it was a beautiful thing. Fantastic fireworks but the power of the music was great.

We went then to see if we could get into Club Disney that I had heard about a while back but apparently it was no more – that didn’t last long…oh well.

So then we went and got a seat at Fantasmic and had a great time before heading back out of the park to catch the bus to the hotel.

At this point we needed to get some laundry done so I went down to the quiet pool and the laundry facility to see if anything was available. Found out about something I had never heard of before – there is a laundry tracking site for all the laundry rooms at Disney World. You go to the site, pick the hotel and the laundry facility and it will tell you which machines are free and where the active machines are in their cycles (including time to completion). That is a phenomenal thing! Super convenient. www.laundryview.com/disneyworld/

Thinking Disney Thursday – Why can’t you wear a Minnie Mouse dress on a Star Wars Speeder Bike? Don’t put limits on imagination – December 12th, 2013

Thinking Disney Thursday today comes from our family trip to Disney World in January/February 2012.  We stayed at the Beach Club Resort and really enjoyed being able to walk to Epcot and Hollywood Studios from the hotel.  Today’s pic was taken at Hollywood Studios just outside Star Tours.

Our daughter spent a fair bit of time that trip in her Minnie Mouse dress which created some interesting pictures that you wouldn’t get anywhere else – such as someone sitting on a Star Wars speeder bike while wearing a Minnie Mouse dress?

Now, granted this picture was taken before Disney purchased Lucas Film and the rights to Star Wars so you will probably start to see more things like this as time goes on but before that you really wouldn’t see places where franchises mixed.  Hollywood Studios is a special place where you can see Disney, Indiana Jones, Star Wars, Muppets, etc – most places you see one franchise.  The mixing of franchises is pretty cool and allows for some cool mashups and images.

Basically – Why can’t you wear a Minnie Mouse dress on a speeder bike?  Frankly from a child’s perspective it makes perfect sense and they will mix and match franchises all the time when they are playing – it is only as adults that we feel the need to keep them compartmentalized and that limits our imagination.

That is my Thinking Disney Thursday thought for today – don’t place limits on imagination.

K on speeder bike at Hollywood Studios wearing Minnie Mouse dress

Sometimes you just need to dance – Magic Memory Monday – November 4, 2013

The memory today is actually 3 photos in a series.  During our first family trip to Disney World in January 2008 for the Disney World Marathon we ended up at Hollywood Studios one night while the kid dance party was going on (can’t remember the official name for it).

Our son was only 17 months at the time and really didn’t know many of the Disney characters yet but the music was hopping and he couldn’t get out of the stroller fast enough to get dancing.  He charged up to dance on the edge of the group of kids dancing and just did his thing.  I believe he danced a bit with Goliath the Lion.

Being on the edge of the group though he was the only one who saw Mickey and Minnie coming in from off-stage.  I’m not sure he really knew who they were at the time but he sensed they were something special and charged over to them – luckily I had my camera because even as it was I only managed to get one quick shot of him running toward them.  Not the best photograph but just awesome that it is just T running to them and them reacting to him with really no one else around – brings back some great memories.  A special moment.

After that Mickey and Minnie joined the dancing kids and T got into the mix.  So there is a shot of him dancing with Mickey with Mickey clapping for him and you can tell at least one other parent in the background is watching T and smiling and pointing.  Spreading the joy with dance!

Even with Mickey then turning around to interact with others just got deeper into dancing and you can see the joy and happiness he had just other dancing and grooving to the music.

The only downside is we had to shut things down a bit early as T decided to sit down for a rest in front of the big speakers and since we figured him being able to continue hearing was important we decided to call it a night.  He cried most of the way out of the park at that point – sometimes you just need to dance and he wanted to keep going.

Still a great memory from that first trip – just the joy he had dancing and interacting with the characters was fantastic and it is always nice to remember those moments when there is unconditional happy!

T running toward Mickey and Minnie at Hollywood Studios
T running toward Mickey and Minnie at Hollywood Studios
T dancing with Mickey clapping at Hollywood Studios
T dancing with Mickey clapping at Hollywood Studios
T dancing at Hollywood Studios
T dancing at Hollywood Studios

Disney trips – racing and family – January and February 2014 – Pop for #wdwmarathon weekend and Beach Club in Feb with the kids

So as highlighted on biggoofyrunner.com, my wife and I will be doing a couple only trip to Disney World in January 2014.  We will be participating in the Disney World Marathon weekend (we are both signed up to the Goofy Challenge) and as we will both be running we are not bringing the kids with us.  We decided when we when we booked it we would do that trip as inexpensively as possible while still staying on Disney property.  This led us to booking the Pop Century resort for the 5 nights we will be there – by booking a Disney hotel we are getting the Magical Express which will make it a lot simpler and faster to get to the hotel from the airport (also makes the heading home day a bit less stressful).

When we booked the trip we intended to not buy any tickets and just enjoy non park Disney stuff during this trip as we weren’t bringing the kids.  We are both annual passholders but my ticket expires before we get there and my wife’s expires the 2nd day of our trip.  As we didn’t intend to have a family vacation with the kids to Disney World this winter (due to putting in a pool this past summer) we figured we wouldn’t renew our passes and then on our trip if we couldn’t take not going to a park we would buy a day pass each and just go with that to get our fix.

That was our plan back in September at least.  As time progressed I think we both started feeling guilty about not taking the kids on the Disney World Marathon weekend trip, plus we were both starting to look at Disney stuff as we were getting ourselves pumped for the race trip and frankly I know I wasn’t very good at hiding what I was looking at from the kids.

So long story short we were randomly looking around at flight prices on Expedia and hotel deals on Disney.com and we found some surprising deals that we thought we might be able to deal with financially.  In the end we found flights out of Minneapolis (we will have to drive there from Winnipeg but even with gas, food and hotel rooms for the drive there and back we will save well over $1000).  We have done the drive to Minneapolis before as part of our Winter 2013 family trip to Disney World and the kids did really well – we do have to watch for winter storms coming in but with the timing of the trip we can adjust our driving day going down by a day or 2 and beat the storms.

We are doing the Pop Century as part of the Disney World Marathon trip for my wife and I – we have stayed there before and we found it tight when we were there with just our son – now with 2 kids we are worried about it being too crowded.  Plus the double beds at the Pop are a bit small for me (at 6′ 2″ 218 pounds with wide shoulders I can use a double myself if I am greedy).  So we wanted to bump up to a moderate to get bigger beds and maybe a bit more room – we really were hoping for French Quarter but that didn’t work out with our travel times.  We looked a few of the other moderates online to see what would work and in the end we admitted to ourselves that we have been spoiled our last few trips to Disney World with the family.  We have done our last 2 family trips to Disney World at the Beach Club Resort and we love it there.  A huge part of the draw is the ability to walk right into Epcot and have a short walk to Hollywood Studios (plus the kids love the pool area).

Once we made that admission to ourselves it didn’t take too much to convince ourselves that the club level jump in cost wasn’t too bad considering we know how much we have used the club room (Stone Harbour Club) in the past when we got a bump to club level.  We used it for all breakfasts, snacks, travel cokes and waters and beers for the room – with the discounted room rates this was a cost win bumping to club for the trip.

Yeah…so we went from saying no trip so that we could rebuild our reserves to doing a week club level at the Beach Club…I think we may be very slightly addicted to Disney World.

Thinking Disney Thursday – Sometimes you just have to run on the beach like a maniac – October 24th, 2013

Like the title says – sometimes you just have to run on the beach like a maniac.  There is so much to do at Disney World and it is all so easily accessible if you are staying that the Beach Club Resort like we were on this trip.  But even with Epcot being 5 minutes walk away and Hollywood Studios less that 20 minutes sometimes you just have to ignore that and go with the simple pleasures.

Like running up and down a beach, yelling at the top of your lungs and trying to catch seagulls – ahh to be 5 again like my son is in this picture.

That is one of the beautiful things about Disney World – there are these opportunities to get away from the crowds and do your own thing and just be a kid.  Awesome.

T on the Beach Club / Yacht Club beach
T on the Beach Club / Yacht Club beach

Thinking Disney Thursday – with a little help you can take on anything – October 17, 2013

This one comes from our last family trip to Disney World – Hollywood Studios specifically.  The Jedi Training Academy – once our son heard about it we knew we were going to have to do it.  Over the course of the 9 day trip we tried twice and on the second go we got him in and while we were at it we signed up our daughter who had just turned 4 a couple months previously.

She was excited at first and then got scared once she realized she was going to have to fight Darth Vader and started saying she didn’t want to do it.  We knew she would be disappointed if she didn’t do it in the end so we cajoled her (and think a bribe was involved too) to follow through with it.

She definitely had fun doing it (as did our son of course) even though she was maybe a bit young and had a few issues doing exactly what she was told – she tried but got a little overwhelmed.  The Disney Cast Member who was teaching the Padawans that day was very good and when it came to be her turn he really helped her out and kept chuckling through the whole thing.  In the end I think her total was 1 hit on the Jedi Master and 2 on Darth (she was swinging pretty wild) but everyone had a good time.

But I guess the big thing I took out of this was that she was a bit scared and intimidated by Darth but with the help of someone who genuinely wanted to be there and help out she was able to fight past being scared and enjoy herself.  With a little help – you can take on anything.

The pic was near the end of the encounter – she has already gotten Darth a couple times at this point and if you look closely I think you can see that Darth looks a bit frightened.

K versus Darth Vader - Hollywood Studios - Jedi Training Academy
K versus Darth Vader – Hollywood Studios – Jedi Training Academy

Magic Memory Monday – October 7th, 2013

This one comes from our latest trip to Disney World in late January / early February 2013.  (trip report for that family trip to Disney World is here)

The little Jedis in training had just finished defeating Darth Vader and were having a frozen treat as their reward.

Even with all the hustle at Hollywood Studios that day we were able to find this quiet spot to sit and relax for a few minutes and let the kids unwind and just relax.  You can see happy and relaxed they are.

Combine the happy mood of the kids with the peaceful area and lovely flowers this whole picture really captures what we were trying to get out of that trip.  We wanted these moments when everyone was just happy and peaceful altogether as a family.  It is hard sometimes to get that when you are at home and are running around trying to get everything done that needs doing – this picture helps remind me of why we go to Disney World and how important it is to find times where we can connect with the kids like this.

Hollywood Studios - frozen treat after defeating Darth Vader
Hollywood Studios – frozen treat after defeating Darth Vader

Magic Memory Monday – September 30th, 2013

This one comes from our late January 2012 trip to Disney World.  Here our daughter (3 at the time) is very excited and happy to see the Muppets fountain in Hollywood Studios.

She is wearing her Minnie Mouse dress and a pair of sunglasses fit for a star – definitely fitting for Hollywood Studios.

She was so excited by the fountain splashing water all over that she was running around all smiles and high pitched squeals of joy.  And I managed to grab this shot in the flurry of excitement.

The picture just seems to capture the joy and excitement kids have at Disney World, when I see this picture I can’t help but smile.

K at Hollywood Studios - Muppet Fountain - 2012
K at Hollywood Studios – Muppet Fountain – 2012