April 2019 TRIP REPORTS

[bama_ed]

You made it!

Yes April is a great weather time to be at the Fort. A couple years ago I was there in April and recall setting up the tv outside to watch the Masters.

Good luck with rope drop tomorrow!

Bama Ed

 

[Teamubr]

What site did you get. I prefer the 100 loop, but I've had some nice ones in 200 too.

And April is probably one of the best times to visit. Goldilocks weather. Just right.

j

 

[cruising spud]

Off To The Magic Kingdom

Now, remember, we are doing a bit of an experiment. We did not buy Disney tickets until we arrived. That said, could we get any fastpasses? Yesterday, once we got settled, I tried getting Flight of Passage fastpasses for any day of our visit. No can do. No problem-I didn’t think we would. I will do the occasional refresh to double and triple check, but if we don’t that’s fine and dandy. So, we decided to go to the Magic Kingdom today. We did rope drop at 8:00 am, and I scored fastpasses for the Jungle Cruise and Pirates of the Caribbean (there are only two of us, so that probably made it easier. On the other hand, there are a fantastic number of people here). Rope drop worked well-we rode a lot of rides, got a fastpass for Buzz Lightyear this evening, and are now back at our campsite for a rest, and then back to the Magic Kingdom tonight. How did we do with rope drop-great. We rode a lot rides. Even managed a Dole Whip.


Teamubr-we have site 235. Some shade and it feels fairly secluded. We like these loops because they are so close to the Trading Post, which is why I decided to buy the refillable mugs. I wasn’t going to do that if we weren’t close to the drinks.

And, I am amazed at how many boys use the basket ball hoop. Who would have quessed?

 

[Teamubr]

Teamubr-we have site 235.
And, I am amazed at how many boys use the basket ball hoop. Who would have guessed?

We had one of the sites right at the beginning of the loop. 201 or 203 maybe. It backed up to the BB hoops. I had to go out about 1030 several nights and tell them it was getting pretty late for little kids trying to sleep. I was sort of surprised. No dirty looks or snide comments. Just a surprised look and a "No problem".

Have a great time. I've been down twice the week before Easter. Twice was enough. The crowds were pretty impressive.

j

 

[tiggerdad]

I will typically shell the peanuts for them. The reason is that it leaves no mess of peanut hulls on the ground as my experience is that most of the time they will chew it up right on the spot.

 

[cruising spud]

Lessons learned at Fort Wilderness

#1. After 32 years of doing Disney, I have finally discovered how wonderful it is to do Disney in a relaxing fashion. With only my husband and myself, we are not worried about making sure that everyone sees everything they want to. We slept in, rode bikes, and didn’t leave for Hollywood Studios until 1:30 today.

#2. On the other hand….although there are benefits to going to Disney with only your spouse, there have been moments I have missed having our daughters along.

#3. I can feed squirrels. But as of tomorrow, I will follow the advice of tiggerdad and shell the peanuts first. See the squirrel? Guess whose peanut it is eating!!!






We went to Hollywood Studio today and got a chance to see the gondolas.





No one was riding them, but they were fun to watch rolling in.



We also saw the new Toy Story Land.


We took a peak, but the lines were atrociously long.



We ended the day with Fantasmic.

Every single child in the audience had one of these bubble blowers.





Overall-a super day.

 

[amcc]

If anyone has lost a dog, it’s at the check-in building.

 

[cruising spud]

Headed for Epcot yesterday with one, and only one fastpass. For Soarin’. Because that is my husband’s favorite Epcot ride. And somehow as I am fooling around with “My Disney app” I lose the fastpass.

So, do you know that if you are a bit righteously indignant ( I mean, this couldn’t be my fault) and approach a Soarin’ ride person, and ask him to explain how this could have happened (okay, and no doubt be a bit dazed and confused) (and, naturally remain calm) they will let you onto the ride? And, maybe even slip you a few paper fastpasses just to get you moving. Disney magic rearing its head up.

We also managed to each get one of these:



Today we planned to head on over to Animal Kingdom to see about the possibility of riding Flights of Passage. We had a plan. No am tea or coffee. VERY limited fluid intake. Hit the bathroom as soon as we get off the bus. Can you tell we are a bit on the old side?

We got to FoP and the cast member at the end of the line said the wait was 1 ½ hours. We can do this. This is what we saw at the end of an 1 ½ hour wait.


This is what we saw at the end of a two hour wait.



By the end of three hours, I was too tired to lift my camera. By the end of 3 ½ hours, we were on the ride. Which, by the way was not my cup of tea at all (good for me, I will never have to wait again. BUT, my husband loved the ride).

After the ride, a storm was approaching, so headed back to the rv. I filled our refillable mugs (I am going to get my worth out of these babies), did a load of laundry, and settled down to watch the storm.

 

[tigger92662]

We had a plan. No am tea or coffee. VERY limited fluid intake. Hit the bathroom as soon as we get off the bus. Can you tell we are a bit on the old side?

That's not being old, that's being prepared

 

[cruising spud]

Back to Animal Kingdom today. We wanted to take a closer look at Pandora, see some shows, look at some animals. Pandora is great to look at, but not as big as I expected. We did eat at the Satul’li Canteen, which was fun.



We also saw Kevin.






And, my favorites, the mole rats.



We saw the show, UP (wonderful), had some fastpasses, and got home before it got too dark.

 

[cruising spud]

We headed back to Epcot today. A beautiful day. In the fifties a few nights. We had debated bringing our heater and decided against it. The chilly mornings are manageable-after thirty years of going to Disney during the summer, it is hard to wrap my mind around nice weather. What a delight. The Flower Festival, or whatever Disney calls is, is going on now. Fantastic visuals.







We got a fastpass for Frozen, the Norway ride. Cute, but I’m glad I didn’t stand in line to see it.


We also realized that our trip winds down in a few days, and we haven’t even eaten (we did a breakfast) dinner at Trails End, so I went over and made reservations for tomorrow.


Another sign we are getter older-although we bought a few gifts for our daughters, there is nothing I see that I want to buy for me. The only thing in the parks that excites me are the frozen coke slushies. Looks like I am coming home richer than I expected.

 

[cruising spud]

What a crowd !!!!

We headed over to the Magic Kingdom today. This place was more crowded than I have EVER seen it!! Packed to the roof. Luckily, we enjoy people watching, we had fastpasses, and I had my eye on a caramel apple for lunch, which kept me in a good mood.

This guy and his friends were out dancing in the streets. Fun to watch. We managed quite a few rides and then headed back to Fort Wilderness. When we got back to our site, I made some reservations for campgrounds on our way home-glad I did. Many campgrounds were full/pretty full. My head is still in the Pennsylvania mindset, where the camping season hasn’t really begun yet. Down here in the south, people are already out camping.



Then, we hit Trails End for dinner. After we ate I got this shot:



We had thought we would get a drink after dinner (of the alcoholic variety), but my husband and I were both too full.

 

[Teamubr]

What a crowd !!!!

Then, we hit Trails End for dinner. After we ate I got this shot:
View attachment 396188

We had thought we would get a drink after dinner (of the alcoholic variety), but my husband and I were both too full.

Great TR. And nice job on the top rail shoe shot!

I know exactly how you feel about grabbing something at Crockett's. The only time we managed to save room was when we came in right off the boat and hadn't had dinner yet.

j

 

[bama_ed]

Top rail. Congrats indeed, spud.

I would ask that you also post that feet-on-the-rail picture in the "Kickin' It" thread started by our poster mightyexplorers which has now rolled to page 2 of the Camping Board. That's the "sole" purpose of that thread.

Bama Ed

PS - bad pun indeed,

 

[bama_ed]

This is crowded time of year for sure at WDW (week before and week after Easter Sunday).

I was looking at easywdw's twitter pictures https://twitter.com/easywdw coupled with posts from the DIS Theme Parks board and when the FastPass line for Big Thunder Mountain has a Cast Member holding a sign ("FP Line for BTM starts here") back down the bridge toward FrontierLand and the CM is nearly in the big walkway in front of Pecos Bill's and the wait is 90 minutes (for the FP line!), you know it's crowded.

Crowds like that give me the heebie jeebies!

Bama Ed

 

[4077]

That's the "sole" purpose of that thread.

Bama Ed

PS - bad pun indeed,

Yes.... a hundred times yes.

 

[cruising spud]

Took a long bike ride today. Biked through the loops and saw the construction by the beach. There was a pile of logs. Not sure what for. Also, down by the tent loop there was a much smaller construction area. Yesterday, our bus driver thought this might be made into another rv loop.






Next- Hollywood Studios. We rode Star Tours several times. One of my most favorite Disney rides. We also headed back to Toy Story land to ride Toy Story Mania. And, took a peek at Alien Saucers.



And then at the end of the night, we did it-we actually had our first alcoholic Disney drink at Crockett’s Tavern. On the porch. Even managed to snag a rocking chair.

 

[cruising spud]

The End

Well, I’ve fed my last squirrel (note to self-two 6 pound bags of peanuts is waaaay too many nuts), ridden my last ride, and am wrapping up this trip report.

Woke up to a dead squirrel today about five feet from our rv. Vultures were eating its remains. They were interesting to look at until they started walking on our neighbor’s rv. At that point, my husband got a stick and threw the body in the trash.






New discoveries during this trip?

#1: Visiting Disney when the weather is gorgeous is a 100% true delight. We could easily go to the parks in the afternoon and not melt. Actually, if we ever come again in April, I will bring our heater. There were a few chilly nights.

#2: What about getting fastpasses at the last minute? Even though we didn’t do the whole fastpass thing until we arrived at the Fort, we were able to snag fastpasses for every ride we wanted, except Flights of Passage. Now, let me say-I wasn’t able to get a fastpass for Kilimanjaro Safaris or Na’vi River Journey until our very last night here (and we stayed two weeks or that wouldn’t have happened), but we got every other ride/fastpass we wanted. We even did some of our favorites two or three times. And, although there were more people here than in July (our usual Disney trip month) the ability to get fastpasses and the wonderful weather more than made up for the crowds. Except for the Monday after Easter Sunday at the Magic Kingdom-that was a 10+++ in crowd size.

#3: For thirty Disney years we were rope drop people. I used to sneer at families who couldn’t make it to the parks “on time.” After all, this is a Disney vacation-pull-up your big girl pants and get your butt out of bed!!!! And, then this trip and the realization that relaxing during a Disney vacation is supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. We slept in most days (now, granted for us, sleeping in means getting up at 7:00 am), exercised, and rode bikes, and still hit the parks and did the rides we wanted. We spent about five hours at the parks per day. Now, a disclaimer-we have been here before, and had no one to please but the two of us. And, the weather made the afternoons doable.

#4-Bike riding around the Fort is a heck of a lot of fun.

#5-Interesting-while we were at Disney there were a fair number of Florida campers who came to camp and did not visit any parks. I was a bit surprised about this. Disney does have a nice campground, but once you take proximity/ease of access to the parks away, I don’t think I would spend the money just to camp here. Just my opinion.

We had a super time. Thanks to everyone who read my trip report.

 

[Teamubr]

Well, I’ve fed my last squirrel (note to self-two 6 pound bags of peanuts is waaaay too many nuts)

Woke up to a dead squirrel today about five feet from our rv.

I hope it wasn't the 12 lbs of peanuts that did it.

j

 

[amcc]

The End

New discoveries during this trip?

#1: Visiting Disney when the weather is gorgeous is a 100% true delight.

#4-Bike riding around the Fort is a heck of a lot of fun.

#5-Interesting-while we were at Disney there were a fair number of Florida campers who came to camp and did not visit any parks. I was a bit surprised about this. Disney does have a nice campground, but once you take proximity/ease of access to the parks away, I don’t think I would spend the money just to camp here. Just my opinion.

We had a super time. Thanks to everyone who read my trip report.

Thanks for a great trip report - so jealous of your two weeks there!!!! We were there last Thursday to Monday and were one of those Florida campers that didn’t visit the parks. Since our trips tend to be shorter, we have commando park trips and then relax at the Fort trips.

We left Miami at 3 and my Suburban promptly broke down at rush hour. 3.5 hours later, having dealt with AAA, Uber, 2 of my brothers, and transferring everything to 2 cars we were on our way and at the campground by 1am.

Friday greeted us with posted warnings of an afternoon storm so we headed early to the pool for some slide time. We got the last boat to the Contemporary before they stopped service and spent a great couple of hours monorail bar hopping.

First stop, Contemporary to see the Easter eggs which were beautiful and grabbed a cupcake. (Sorry if the pictures are not in the right place, I can’t seem to figure that out). Then, Poly for people watching in the lobby while killing 90 minutes wait time!! for Trader Sams. We had never been there and that was so fun and so Disney!! We had sent home the kids with my brother in law and cousin so by then we knew there was no damage to our sites - the weather was so bad we were truly worried - so we were able to enjoy carefree.

Saturday was a pool day again, chilling on the site. It was so cold after the rain!!! We’ve been camping all winter and this was the first time we didn’t have to turn on the air! Campfire, singalong and movie rounded out a perfectly relaxing day.