From Steamboat Springs to Teamboat Springs: Grumpy Rope Drop at DHS (11/11 Update)

Hey, y'all! I'm sorry I didn't have an update for you this weekend. Big things were afoot! I flew to MI on Friday to celebrate Buszia's last day of work - she is officially a retired woman! Even more exciting is that she and my Dad will be joining me tonight on my return flight to Colorado and then spending the next 3 weeks with us. Yay!

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We had a lovely dinner Saturday night, celebrating Buszia's 23 years with the Ford Motor co.

And then last night... Well, last night one my lifelong dreams was fulfilled and my Dad, Brie and my Uncle Dave and I saw Paul McCartney on his One on One tour:
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And last but not least... A beer pic!
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You can't come to Michigan and not enjoy a Two Hearted Ale from Bells. I promise to be back next week with the beginning of day 2. Have a great Monday, and see you real soon!
 
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Pics aren't working but congrats to your mom on her retirement. I'm sure the PM concert was amazing! Was it a surprise?
 
Pics aren't working but congrats to your mom on her retirement. I'm sure the PM concert was amazing! Was it a surprise?

Thanks for letting me know about the pics... I think I fixed it. The concert was wonderful - it was my birthday present, but not a surprise.
 
I’m just going to head right to the apologies for not posting for weeks….Life gets in the way! Now for the excuses… Papa and Buszia were here the last three weeks (they left Sunday) and while they were here we were BUSY! Sports or some other activity each evening, weekend trips to National Parks, and so on and so forth. But things are settled down now, and we have narry a weekend excursion in sight. And a whole week of no sports for the girls! Woo Hoo! Ok. Enough with the excuses. On with the report.

Day 2: Sunday, June 4th, 2017 – Resort: AKL and BCV – Parks: Epcot

The day dawned grey and bleak after a full night of rain. Luckily, it seems the clouds had spit out all their precipitation. Caz and I rose early to put a breakfast casserole in the oven. We thought we had given Buszia the delicious recipe from their Christmas visit earlier in the year, but apparently not. In any case, it still turned out well and when the kids finally rose, they gobbled it up.

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The animals were out again, much to the children’s delight:
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And then it was time to pack up. On the upside we didn’t really unpack so it didn’t take long, but packing and organizing in general can raise tensions, and Brie and Buszia had a bit of a spat over what little Brie did have to pack. Another downer was how poorly Brie was feeling. She was already feeling blue because she had that appendectomy surgery just weeks ago and was bummed about how restricted she would be in terms of rides, then on top of that she was pretty sure she was going to pass a kidney stone! EEK! So needless to say she was in pain and pretty cranky. Poor thing. In the end I believe she went with my Dad over to BCV to check-in to our new digs and then took a rest as our Studio was ready. I know this sounds pretty serious, but don’t worry, Brie will be alright… More later...

In the meantime, the rest of us went down to the pool for one final dip. The sun was not cooperating today, but it wasn’t raining. And honestly, can you complain when you’re enjoying yourself here:

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The kids enjoyed the pool and then we had lunch at the Mara. Papa returned from bringing our stuff over to BCV, and since we were officially checked in, our Deluxe Dining Plan kicked in. I can hear you thinking, “Gosh, the DxDDP, that’s a lot of meals, and a lot of money for 10 people…” Well, we worked Disney’s rules to our favor here. If you recall, we have a studio and a two-bedroom villa for five nights at BCV. We put one adult, Clara and Ryan in the villa, and the rest of us in the two-bedroom, but only “on- paper.” Anyways, with the DxDDP, adult and child credits are indistinguishable, and you can share your credits with anyone. So for just under $1K (one adult and two kids pricing), we were able to get 3 x 3 x 5 = 45 dining credits, 3 x 2 x 5 = 30 snack credits and three refillable mugs. When we did the math we were pretty amazed as this saved us a ton of $. We actually called Disney multiple times to ensure that we could share credits and that kid and adult credits were interchangeable. So for the next five nights we were eating on Disney’s dime. Win! Back to report...

After our lunch we headed towards the busses. Can I say that I love the monitor that updates you on when your bus will arrive? It was nice to know, and with that knowledge we took a few minutes to browse in the AKL store. Before the bus arrived the kids joined Caz outside for a little hack-sack:

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While we waited, Brie sent us this image of the line for Figgie as she headed to hang and relax at the DVC Member lounge:

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Yikes! It would be one of those crazy busy days that makes me grateful for FP+, but more on that later. Brie was feeling much better as she already passed her kidney stone. Yes, you read that right. A bit TMI here, but Brie’s body unfortunately produces kidney stones at an alarming rate, so although passing them still sucks, she handles it like a champ as she does it all the time (like multiple times per year). Can you imagine passing a stone in the morning and then touring Epcot later that afternoon? Well Brie did. Rock star.

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So while Brie enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere of the DVC lounge, most of us took the bus to join her, aside from Andrea and Papa as they took the car back over to BCV and entered in through the back door. We strolled in, and took the first Photopass pics of the trip:

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Funny faces pic (except for Caz - apparently he's too cool):
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We stopped and said “hi” to Gramps (Buszia’s dad who passed in 2006) as per the tradition:
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We all regrouped at Spaceship Earth where the line was CRAZY!
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And with that, here is my ode to Fastpass+. Before this wonderful innovation, you would need to be in the park as soon as it opened (on a busy day like this day) to be able to get Fastpasses to big ticket rides like Soarin’ or TT as they run out pretty early in the day (again, on a busy day). But with FP+ we were able to spend the morning at our resort and then begin riding rides with almost no wait in the middle of the day. When lines for rides like SPE are 45 minutes long, that is a gift! And with that we took a journey through time, learning about communication, smelling great smells and making silly faces:

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Here’s a video of Clara and Ryan’s future:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/ZUPm91bJHeiiEJSL2

After SPE we used our bonus FP+ from the magic band challenges Caz dealt with the night before for Soarin’, bypassing a 75 minute line. Our family loves Soarin’, especially the pre-show with Puddy from the show Seinfeld. Smiles were abundant:
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Selfie time!
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And now a non-selfie:
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For some reason we love to take pictures in the queue of Soarin’. It’s kind of a tradition. Anyways, we requested B1, and waited an additional cycle to get front and center. After a tour of the world, it was time for our FP+ for TT where the kids enjoyed making cars:
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Followed closely thereafter by Mission Space, which was the day before it closed for its recent refurbishment. These three kiddos went for the Orange side:
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And with that we were done with rides for the day… But for a super crowded day, four rides with no waits between the hours of 2:30 - 4:30 is pretty epic! The weather was still pretty grey and the radar showed that a storm was quickly heading our way.We decided to hightail it over to our first ADR of the trip, Les Chef de France. On the way we paused for a moment for our first full group photo:
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We arrived in France just after 5 pm and were seated promptly despite the fact that our ADR wasn’t until 5:30 pm. As if orchestrated, it started raining almost right as we entered the restaurant. Win!

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With the DxDDP we were all able to get appetizers and many of us had the onion soup which had lots of bread and not many onions. I ordered the duck… It was delicious!
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Everyone found the meal to be top notch, and Josh in particular enjoyed eating as an adult:

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As we checked out, my mom and I held our breath as they handed us the check… Just as Disney promised, we were able to share the dining credits with no problem. Whew. With dinner under our belts (literally), it was time to head to the second resort of the trip. I will wrap up day 2 with my next offering which will include a tour of our rooms! Thanks for reading and…

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Day 2: Sunday, June 4th, 2017 – Resort: AKL and BCV – Parks: Epcot

After dinner we waddled out of Epcot and made our way over to BCV. We stopped by the statue of Ariel and snapped a ceremonial pic:
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Oh my, how they’ve grown! Here’s a pic from 2014…
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I wish Josh was standing so you could see how tall he was, but oh my! How they’ve grown… Slow down time!

I really love BCV. It is so well situated, so relaxing and well, you can't beat the pool… I mentioned this earlier, but as we had a party of 10 we couldn’t fit in a 2 BR. On our last trip Caz wasn’t with us for the BCV stay so the 9 of us legally squeezed into one 2 BR villa. It was tight but it worked. This time we booked a studio to go along with the 2 BR, and requested that they be close together and on an upper floor. Our wish was granted. We were assigned 533 and 527. Here’s the layout of BCV so you can get a sense of how close we were to each other:

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The arrow by our rooms pointed to “woods” and indeed we did have a view of the woods, but also DHS in the distance. We could easily see the top of ToT! No one in our party took photos of the view... BUT - Touring Plans to the rescue! Here are pics from the 2 BR balcony that someone else kindly provided:
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And here’s the view from the studio directly to the right of my parents:
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Anyways, this was an ideal location - close to the elevator and each other. Win! The actual distribution of people in the rooms was as follows: Brie, Papa and Buszia were in the studio (of which I have no photos - sorry), and in the 2 BR, Caz and I were in the master (heaven), Drea on the pullout bed in the living room, and the four kids were in the other bedroom.

This was the first time Caz and I had the honor of sleeping in the master and it was truly a gift. Five nights (!) of luxury. I have to say I LOVE the renovation that was done on all BCV rooms. Yes, they are not overtly Disney, but there are fun Disney touches throughout. Everything was clean, new, bright and it felt like we were staying in a high end resort (which we were). The last time it was so shabby, with pinks and green plaid. So here’s our digs:
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It was amazing. The one negative about our villa was how small the living room is. There is a large entry way and I often wonder why they didn’t originally make that slightly smaller and then make the kitchen and living room larger. Oh well… Here it is:
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No pics of the kitchen, sorry… Here’s the 2nd bedroom. The kids were thrilled they got it to themselves:
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(Clara was ready to hit the pool)

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We enjoyed the villa for about one minute (seriously, we had four kids running around it, that’s not too relaxing), and then headed out to the pool. Sadly, the weather was still poor, but when you’re a kid you don’t care that it's drizzling if there is a huge slide to take on. And take on the slide they did. At least until it really started storming and ruined their fun. So we came back to the room and the kids took showers and then crashed. It was so drama-free - I love how Disney wipes kids out. Honestly, it was pretty critical they went to bed early (9pm ish) as the next day was action packed...

With the kiddos snoozing, Drea, Caz and I prepped for a special event that was to take place the next day… Ryan’s 8th birthday!
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Ryan is one lucky little guy… This is the second time he got to celebrate his birthday at WDW, and what a birthday he planned, starting off with a rope drop, which was only one of two planned for the whole trip. The decorations will tip you off as to where we’re headed in the morning. So what do you think… Will birthday joy conquer the pain of getting up early?
 
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I really love BCV. It is so well situated, so relaxing and well, you can't beat the pool
I'm considering Beach Club Villas for my December 2018 trip. I'm doing a 3-resort split stay, 2 nights at AKL, 4 nights at an Epcot resort (first choice BWI standard, then BWI preferred, then BC), and ending with 3 nights at WL (CCV or BRV). Hoping to rent points and get studios, but it'd save soooo much money vs booking thru Disney, even including possible room-only discounts! I'd love to try out Stormalong Bay, but it could be cold, so may not get a chance to enjoy it if I stayed there!

Oh my, how they’ve grown! Here’s a pic from 2014…
Oh wow-I love those photos with kids growing up! I wish I could read your older TR (but photobucket messed up the photos!)
 
I'm considering Beach Club Villas for my December 2018 trip. I'm doing a 3-resort split stay, 2 nights at AKL, 4 nights at an Epcot resort (first choice BWI standard, then BWI preferred, then BC), and ending with 3 nights at WL (CCV or BRV). Hoping to rent points and get studios, but it'd save soooo much money vs booking thru Disney, even including possible room-only discounts! I'd love to try out Stormalong Bay, but it could be cold, so may not get a chance to enjoy it if I stayed there!

Oh wow-I love those photos with kids growing up! I wish I could read your older TR (but photobucket messed up the photos!)

Wow, that is a lot of resort hopping for 9 nights. I'm sure you know what you're getting into, but it is a lot of work to pack up and move. I honestly LOVE BCV, BWI is just a little too fussy for me and that clown pool is so uninspiring. But to each their own... As for my old report, I considered going back and changing out the images, but boy, that would be a lot of work! It's such a shame that Photobucket started charging for things like that. I'm glad the Disboards changed the way people can share photos. So much better!

Following along, loving the report so far

Sweet! Thanks for joining in!!
 
Wow, that is a lot of resort hopping for 9 nights. I'm sure you know what you're getting into, but it is a lot of work to pack up and move. I honestly LOVE BCV, BWI is just a little too fussy for me and that clown pool is so uninspiring. But to each their own... As for my old report, I considered going back and changing out the images, but boy, that would be a lot of work! It's such a shame that Photobucket started charging for things like that. I'm glad the Disboards changed the way people can share photos. So much better!
Oh I totally understand not wanting to go back and change photos! I only had one post in my PTR where I had to switch them and it was pretty annoying!

For the split stay, it's most likely to be a solo visit (I'm ok with traveling to Disney solo, as I still get to have dismeets and do what I want, when I want)! So at least no kids to shuffle around. And I can pack strategically so I don't have to unpack fully at each place.
 
Day 3: Monday, June 5th, 2017 – Resort: BCV – Parks: DHS (but you figured that out based on the last post, right?)

Hi, there! When we last met, it was the eve of Ryan’s birthday:
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If you couldn’t tell, the theme of the day is Star Wars (duh) and we would be spending it at DHS. Andrea woke her little man up and as the custom of their family took a morning birthday selfie:
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And with that all the kids woke up without much fuss and they ate their breakfast:
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And that is where it started going downhill… The kids were not thrilled that they had to eat, get dressed and hustle out the door. Now, this was something they agreed to well in advance, but kids are fickle. The plan was to get to DHS at rope drop (Buszia would drive them in the car) and sign the kids up for Jedi Training, while Caz and I (and anyone else who is up and willing) would head right to RnRC.

Ryan was very hands on when it came to be planning his birthday, we laid out his options many times, but when it came to the actual day he was not into it. He was quite spicy and even said to his mom “You just want to get rid of me so you can drink.” Which is crazy as Drea rarely drinks and it was only 7 am in the morning! He even refused to wear his birthday button. In the end all the kids got it together (for the most part) and headed out with Buszia at 7:50 am.

In the meantime, Drea, Caz and I were ready to head out so we strolled to the boat dock and then picked up our pace when we saw the boat arrive. Of course, because we walked/ran (which was really hard on Drea - she’s got chronic back and foot pain), the boat wasn’t headed in our direction. So Caz and I decided to power walk over to DHS, while Drea and Papa, who had just arrived, would take the boat. Caz and I were on a mission to beat the boat, and we did by a good 5 minutes. Yes, we were sweaty, but this was Caz’s only opportunity to ride RnRC, so getting there early was critical. Unfortunately, early we were not. We arrived at turnstiles at 8:45 to a mass of people. Luckily, it was just Caz and I so we wove our way through the crowd, using the stores on the right side of the street to get near the front and cool off in the A/C. The park officially opened and Caz and I made our way to the front of the pack and were on RnRC in no time flat. Actually 9:03 am to be exact:
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Papa was behind us by a few minutes, but made the mistake of going into the single rider line. Typically a good idea, it slowed him down by 15 minutes or so as there really wasn’t a line in the stand-by.
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Caz and I decided to wait for him before going on ToT, keeping an eye on the wait time. By the time Papa arrived it was about 9:20 and we strolled over to ToT where the posted wait was 5 minutes. The line was snaked all the way down the queue. There was no way this was a 5 minute wait! The CM at the front of the line agreed. So ToT was not to be, although we tried to arrange a later FP+. And with that, we joined Buszia who was with the kids over at Jedi training sign-up.

Have the kids’ attitudes improved? This has been a text heavy post, so here’s a preview pic…
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So, no. Not at all. Buszia got them all to the park, up to the front left and just a few people back from what would be the line for Jedi Training. And then “Nina” needed to go. Clara is notorious for having to use the bathroom and waiting to mention this until the last possible moment. For those of you wondering what the Nina reference is all about, it is a short cartoon played on the Disney Channel where a little girl “needs to go” and her crazy cool Grandma comes and gets her to the restroom in the nick of time. Here’s a video of a Nina short if you’re interested: Nina Needs to Go - Waterpark

Of course they’ll lose their place in line if they all go. So it being Disney, a cast member comes to the rescue and allows Buszia to take Clara to a restroom past the “rope” while the other kids stay put. In the end, they had to sign up for the 11:40 training, which messed with our Indiana Jones FP+. Oh well. The CM’s tried to do some arranging for us, but with such a big party we couldn’t really change our plans. C’est la vie! With that we headed to Star Tours (the kids had already been once before we met up with them).
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There was no wait, and oddly enough the kids got the exact same sequence as before. Hmmm… I thought there were like 90+ permutations...Right? We then headed to the Muppet show:

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The kids really loved the show… Lots of giggles. Then it was time for our first FP+... Another ride on Star tours! Yay! Thank goodness for Dramamine. By this point, the wait time had risen to 45 minutes! Yikes! And somehow we got the same exact sequence. Three times in a row. What’s up with that? Seriously? What happened to all the options? Anyways, one last set of pics of the girls (now smiling!). Where were these taken? Seriously, 'cause I don't recognize the location...
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And with that we come to the time for the kids to gather for Jedi Training, and that’s where I’ll stop for the post… Will the kids continue to shed their crankiness? Will they battle against the dark side of the Force, or succumb to the anger and join Darth Vader? You’ll have to wait until the next post to find out!

See you real soon!
 

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