Wednesday 25 March 2009

Trip Report... Part One






And so, I promised you a trip report from my last trip - and finally, I come through with it! I will break this up into three parts so that I am not filling you all with too much information! Hopefully you all enjoy it.

Day 1 - Thursday 5th March
The Queen and I arrived at Orlando, via Newark, around 5.00pm. Our luggage was ready on the conveyor belt for us (well, we are Royalty!) and we went to the Magical Express desks at the airport, ready for our wee journey to the Caribbean Beach Resort. The last time I had used ME our bags had not turned up and we had a very big problem with them, so this time we decided to collect our luggage ourselves.

Anyway, we arrived at the Caribbean Beach Resort around 7.00pm. Managed to get checked in and then head off to our room - all the way in Trinidad South. Now, we stayed at CBR many, many years ago, when the Queen Mother had came with us too and it was our very first Disney Resort stay. So we knew that the buildings were spread out. But, actually, things were not spread out too badly. Okay, so our room was the other end of the resort from the check-in, but we only used check-in to do just that. For the rest of our stay, we were quite happy wandering along to Old Port Royale, which was only about 5-10 minutes of a walk.

So, our room was a lovely Pirate room! If you don't know me very well, I have quite an obsession with Pirates and Pirates of the Caribbean. So the King had treated us to a Pirate themed room. And it was great fun! The beds were like ships, the carpet was like wooden planks, the fridge was like a barrel and the light fixtures were similar to the ride! The room was great fun, although probably not practical for a family of four. We were in a handicap accessible room, however, so it may make it slightly different.

After getting settled in the room, we headed along to the food court and happily stuffed our faces there, before heading back to the room to catch up on our sleep for a busy week ahead!

Day 2 - Friday 6th March

A bright and early start due to jet lag, we both arose and headed straight to Disney's Hollywood Studios and Toy Story Midway Mania! My mum had not been on this ride yet, and I was keen to make sure we went through the actual queue, without having to wait for hours. If you head to the queue before any of the fast passes start letting in (usually 10am), the queue moves along pretty quickly! So, we managed to have a good look at Mr Potato Head, which the Queen was very impressed with!

We spent the rest of the time at the Studios wandering around the shops, just taking in the atmosphere and enjoying the nice weather. As I had the half marathon in the next few days, I was enjoying taking it easy and not going on the thrill rides for the time being. I would get to all that once the main event was out the way!

We then headed over to the Wide World of Sports for the packet pick-up for the Princess Half Marathon. And oh my goodness, was it an event! I had never been in the Milkhouse before - and just the sheer scale of that building impressed me no end! Add to that the amount of people there (and we arrived about 20-30minutes after the event opened), and the various things to look at and see, it was very, very exciting!

It took us a few hours to finish up at the packet pick-up, by the time I collected my race packet, my t-shirt, the after-party tickets, etc. I also managed to order a lovely souvenir of the race, and some socks! Very exciting! Anyway, after we finished up, we jumped on a bus straight back to the CBR and unloaded everything.

We had a dinner with Royalty booked - dinner with Cinderella and Prince Charming at 1900 Park Fare! It was a great dinner, with a fantastic buffet - one of the best that I have been to for dinner. We managed to meet Cinderella, Prince Charming, the Ugly Stepsisters and Madame Tremaine - although she was too busy for a photograph with us. After dinner, both of us were truly full, so we headed off to the Magic Kingdom to enjoy Wishes - a firework show that always brings a tear to my eye and a lump to my throat.


Day 3 - Saturday 7th March

An early start today for the fantastic Princess Storybook Breakfast over at Restaurant Akershus in Norway. I had done the dinner once, many years ago (before it was a mainly themed Princess dinner), so I was excited at the breakfast. And we really enjoyed ourselves! We met Belle (in her gold dress - my favourite!), Mulan, Jasmine, Snow White and Aurora. A great group of Princesses - I was in good company!

We then spent the rest of the morning at Epcot, meeting some characters and taking in Futureworld. We went on Soarin' and I went on Test Track, before heading over to Animal Kingdom. We spent the afternoon there, and I went on Dinosaur and Expedition Everest (twice for that one, of course!), and then we watched the Mickey's Jammin' Jungle Parade. I really enjoy this parade, as it is very interactive and there are so many 'hidden' good spots for the parade too!

After the parade we headed back to the resort and had dinner, before heading down to Downtown Disney for a walk around the shops (and some free chocolate, of course!). We enjoyed an ice cream at Ghirardelli, which is a must when you have a half-marathon the next day, right?

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