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"And what will you be celebrating?" "Um...everything??"

Princess of the Poly

Earning My Ears
Joined
Jan 22, 2012
So as you can see, I am new to the DIS. So, this will be my first PTR. Apologies if I break any cardinal rules of PTRs, and please let me know if there is anything I should add or that you would like me to add.

I am 25 years old and this will be my 14th trip to Disney. I was born in New York but grew up in PA, so I'm a bit too New York for people here but can't keep up with New Yorkers. I'm a cultural orphan. I graduated from Penn State University fairly recently (2009) and could not stop saying how terrible school was and how glad I was to finally be done. Well, it is 2012 now, and I am about a year into my Masters through Lehigh University. Despite this, I can assure you I'm one of the least serious people you'll ever meet.

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This is the DBF John and I. As of January 31st, we have been dating for over a year, but have known each other longer than that. We met at work and not only is he a supervisor, but he is 14 years older than me. Scandal, right?! Not really; my work actually encourages the whole "family" atmosphere, and once my parents got to know him they got over the intial freaked outedness. He is the furthest thing from a "boring old guy". I have never been able to be silly and immature and just myself in general with someone as much as I do with him.

John has never been to Disney World. He really only knows about it from me talking about it. Disney World is a BIG deal to me. When he was with me during treatments I received to get rid of early stages of cancer, I had to choose a happy memory/thing/whatever to think about when the pain was bad and I always talked to him about the beach at the Polynesian. Through that crappy process, I realized that he could very possibly be "the one" and he realized how much Disney means to me, and that he wanted to experience that. We decided on the week of Feb 11-16 to celebrate Valentines, our anniversary 1/31) and his birthday (2/8). Of course we couldn't get them all in one trip so this week seemed to work best, and we would avoid the President's Week crowd. Any doubt that we made the right choice was eliminated when I realized that the free dining promo fell on this week too. We booked in August.

I will post some more later when I have more time and my creative juices are going a bit better! I'd appreciate any feedback thus far!
 
I am eager to read more about your plans. What a wonderful way to spend valentines day :lovestruc
 


I am eager to read more about your plans. What a wonderful way to spend valentines day :lovestruc

The planning part was the most difficult for me. Despite being to Disney 13 times prior, this is the first time I've really had to plan. 11 times I went with my mother under the age of 18. Once I went as a friend's date for a wedding, which isn't much different than going with my mother (get handed a piece of paper and show up these places at these times lol). And last time was just my 27 year old sister and I. Our flight to Austin in March to see South by Southwest was cancelled and we couldn't get on any others. Rather than be stranded in Charlotte airport and waste our days off, we took the next flight to Orlando and managed to get a room in the Dolphin. Don't get me wrong, the spontaneity of that trip was awesome. But I wanted to make sure that John's trip wasn't ruined by waiting 2 hours to get into restaurants without reservations (not to mention I wasn't a huge fan of the Dolphin).

First of all, as they say, love is compromise. This trip was not just about me and in order for us both to enjoy it, I wanted to do things I knew John would love and that would make him want to come back (maybe some day with mini Johns and Sams?? Am I being psycho? :laughing:). He's never been a fan of "tropical" themes and even hates "island" music (WHAAAT???), so I decided I should skip the Poly this time (sob!!). I've always wanted to try the Wilderness Lodge, and John loves the outdoors. In fact, while planning this trip he always joked "why don't we go on a REAL vacation and hike/camp in the Northwest or something??". A funny thing happened when I showed him pics of the lobby and room: he stopped his usual "pshhh yeah, and how much is THAT gonna cost?" and instead responded with "Oh yeah, we need to stay there." We booked a woods view room. I thought a nice quiet room would be great if John gets kiddie overload, especially because he lives somewhere with a lot of privacy and property and is pretty accustomed to that.

I didn't want to admit this to John, but wow...the prices shocked me!! As I said before, my mother always planned our trips. Just for fun I priced out the Club Level Theme Park View she used to get us every year at the Poly and almost fainted...this is value season?? I was also surprised by how much less per night the Wilderness Lodge is than the other deluxe resorts. It has mostly the same anemities. Maybe because it's not on a monorail line? Anyway, our wonderful cast member who booked our trip via phone talked me into upgrading to the deluxe dining plan so we went for it. Once everything was said and done we were a few days past our 180 day start date to book ADRs....
 
Enjoying reading your plans so far. Spending Valentines Day at Disney with my sweetheart sounds like a great plan! :lovestruc

Good choice on the Wilderness Lodge. We've only stayed there once, but we loved it! :thumbsup2 (Now, we're a family of five, and won't fit! )It's very romantic-I think y'all are going to love it!
 
This trip was a milestone: this is the first time I've ever been solely responsible for ADRs. Mom aka Disbot :-)laughing:) passed the torch both literally and symbolically by giving me her large manilla envelope she compiled early that year with menus for her trip. Somewhere between her generation of WDWers and mine somebody at Disney decided to put everything online, and boy am I glad they did. Finding the restaurants was easy, even if I didn' necessarily remember the name.

My boss (who also knows DBF) suggested California Grill for Valentine's Day. I had never been there but it sounded great, so imagine my disappointment when it was already booked for Valentines Day during the fireworks! Hello, it was AUGUST!! I managed to get it for the 11th which was our first night there. Bizzare as that the only weekend night of our trip and the only one I could get it for!

DBF did not like the idea of ADRs, but once I explaned that dilemma to him he got it. My second choice for Valentine's was Disbot's suggestion, Narcoosee's. I half heartedly made the reservation for 6:45 that night. DBF and I looked at the menu and realized we were actually more excited for that than Cali Grill anyway!

Now I will try to make a breakdown of our reservations and what we will be doing/celebrating each day (plans are subject to change due to my and DBF's short attention spans :lmao:):

Saturday, February 11th
5:00 AM- Driving to Philly airport (about an hr away). DBF will stay in our guest house overnight so that we can get on the road as soon as possible. Dad graciously offered to drive us. Wish we could have flown out of ABE which is less than 10 mins away, but I waited too long to book and the price tripled!

8:00 AM Our AirTran flight leaves for MCO!

10:45 AM We land in MCO (or so they tell us!) and take the ME to Wilderness Lodge.

3:00 PM Couples Massage at The Contemporary. I was REALLY hoping for the GF but they're closed for renovations. WL cannot accomodate two massages at once and Saratoga Springs was a bit out of the way (not to mention more expensive). I have minor back problems, so a nice massage is a great way to get rid of post-plane soreness and an AWESOME way to start our trip if you ask me!!

7:20 PM ADR at California Grill. Celebration: John's first Disney trip. This will be his first time seeing Wishes, and my first time seeing it from this view!

MK is open until 11 this night so if we aren't completely pooped, we could get started a little early on the rides I hope!

Any other suggestions on how to make my first timer's first day special without running him into the ground? :laughing:
 


Wilderness Lodge and Narcoosee's for Valentines Day... :love:

My DH is awestruck by WL as well, the architecture is unique. I love that your mom is so into Disney and is passing the planning torch. I think your first day sounds perfect.
 
I'm in! Everything sounds great so far! Have you considered having something delivered to your room from the Disney Florist? They have some pretty awesome things for guys on their site.
 
Hi!
I've never stayed at the WL but we did stay at Fort Wilderness campground once and every night we would pass in front of WL on the boat. I think it is the best themed hotel. Hope you guys have fun!
 

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