The Princess Turns 3...My Toddler's 1st trip

MrsTurnerLovesDisney

Mouseketeer
Joined
Oct 9, 2015
Hello all and welcome this will be a pretty simple trip report. I don't have a photo hosting site account so I don't think I will be adding any photos in but wanted to give a run down of our trip and offer my reviews in case anyone out there was looking for this info :)

I was doing a pre-trip report in my signature but that never actually happened :badpc: I got busy with work and life and yea just totally didn't stay on top of things.

So here's the info from this trip
When:
Nov 23rd-Dec 3rd with Disney days Nov 25th to Dec 1st to celebrate our baby girl turning 3 on the last day of the trip.

Where:
Animal Kingdom Lodge Jambo House

Who: Me, DH, DD and my in laws


So let's get to day 1:

4am rolled around super early on a cold and frosty North Louisiana Thanksgiving morning. IT was seriously 30 degrees when we left out at 5am. I had been up most of the night I was excited but also just could not get comfy in the bed.

We had hoped DD would sleep in the car but instead she was wide awake with excitement asking did we pack her princess dresses and wanting to talk to her grandparents over the walkie-talkie in their car.

We stopped in Vicksburg for our traditional McDonald's breakfast and she was back asleep once we got on down the road. The drive to Tallahassee was pretty uneventful and not much to look at along the way either.

We arrived at the Holiday Inn Express I-10 around 5:30 local time so 4:30 our central time and we were tired. The hotel is super nice and I would def recommend it to anyone looking for a place to stay right off I-10. it was very clean and in a safe looking area. There was a steak and shake nearby and the food was excellent. THe breakfast the next morning at the hotel was also very good.

We left Tallahassee around 730ish the next morning heading to the Russell Stover Outlet store in Wildwood FL. This is a very neat place and we got a huge bag of candy for only $27. Santa is filling stockings this year with chocolate! :Pinkbounc

By this time it was getting on up in the afternoon. We hit Wendy's for lunch and decided to skip trying to make it to the Vineland outlet mall and just head for downtown Disney.

I have not been to Disney Springs since it became Disney springs and yea I don't like it! (More on that later)

We finally found parking in the orange garage and hiked down to the marketplace for some shopping. It was so crowded but I chalked it up to being Black Friday. (It was :crowded: crowded all week!!)

We decided to eat Rain Forest café and luckily timed it just right. At 4pm they told us it would be about a 30 minute wait and people behind us were being told it was a 4 hour wait! :eek:

We shopped around the gift shop and DD rode the little carousel.

Rain Forest Café was fine I don't love it but DH does so it was excited. I got the Rasta Pasta minus the walnuts and it was really great! After so many burgers on the road it was great to have some real food.

We made our way back to our cars and found our way just off property to the Courtyard by Marriott on Palm Parkway.

This hotel was ok. Can't say I would stay there again. THe biggest thing it had going was it was a true suite with a bedroom door. Inlaws slept in the bedroom me and DH took the pullout which was not even close to comfy.

But it was for 1 night and we were all exhausted. We got to bed early knowing the next day our Disney fun would start.

More updates to come.....
 
Ok so let's get going with the Disney part of the trip :)

Saturday I was up around 5:30am thanks to that less than sleepable pull out bed. I flipped on the tv to local news and saw that is was SUPER FOGGY out! I was able to rally the troops with the news that we can't see anything and we got on the highway about 6:45 headed for AKL-Jambo House.

Luckily there really wasn't any traffic and within about 10 minutes we were pulling up to the gate house. My in laws almost took a wrong turn into Animal Kingdom park but otherwise we got there fine.

Pulling up to Jambo House with the dense fog was spectacular. It made the building even more beautiful and walking in the lobby and seeing the huge Christmas tree was amazing!

The guy who handled our luggage was excellent! I think his name was Chris and he was a manager/supervisor of some sort as he was dressed differently from the regular bellhop staff.

THe line at the check in desk was obnoxious and there was very few people working the desk. Since we had done online check we attempted to find our way to Mara to eat breakfast. Luckily a very nice older couple found us and had us follow them since they were headed there as well.

We got our mugs for the Dining Plan. When I setup the PIN I didn't realize I needed it for DDP and well forgot to remember what it even was. It worked for me and then I had to use mine for my inlaws. (Later this would be an issue) but we got our mugs and some breakfast.

The Mara is cute but I hate how dark it is inside. I don't like to eat in the dark. Also it's small the ordering area is small and the drink/condiments area is very small and often felt cramped. I'm use to the sprawling food courts of the All Star Resorts so this was quite different. I don't recall what all was purchased for breakfast but I know DD had waffles and DH had the breakfast crossiant sandwich and said it was good.

In know time we were headed back up to the lobby to head to the bus stop for our day at Hollywood Studios. (This was something else I didn't care for at AKL, the dining is on the bottom floor but you must go back up to the lobby on the 3rd floor to walk out and down a hill to catch the busses. It seems there should be a cut thru path near the pool to the bus stop. Would have saved us a ton of walking.)

We arrived at the bus stop and within a few minutes our bus to Studios (it's still MGM to me!) was pulling up. The wait time boards are awesome. It helps make the wait so much more manageable when you know how long it's going to take.

We arrived at Studios and made it to the gate around 8:50-9am?

The Christmas decorations were so pretty I love the really vintage look of it all! Daisy and Donald were meeting just off to the left as we came into the park. I quickly asked DD if she wanted to meet Daisy. She was excited to see her but I really wasn't sure how she would feel about being face to face with Daisy. We jumped in line and within a few minutes we were next.

DD happily handed her autograph card to Daisy and then I said "hug her" and DD gave Daisy the biggest hug. SHe loved it and was laughing the whole time. With that success under our belt we took off to get in line for Donald and waited about 10 minutes more for him.

We didn't have a lot planned for the day so we slowly meandered down to see Gertie the dinosaur's new santa hat, the Christmas tree in Echo Lake and met Olaf or Snowlaf as he's called at our house. Olaf was a hit and a lot of fun! We maybe waited 15 mins total for him. We dashed around the corner and stumbled upon Chip & Dale in scarves and winter hats. Of course we had to meet them also.

We hopped in line for Mickey and Minnie but the line was going very slowly and much past the posted 10 minute wait time. We were getting to time for our Frozen Singalong Fast Pass. We jumped out of line and ran around to the theatre for Frozen.

Frozen show was at 10:30 it was really cute I liked all the actors in the show and thought they all did a great job. DD LOVES Frozen and she really enjoyed this show but it wasn't torture for the adults either.

After Frozen we set off to Toy Story Midway Mania for our next FP. So glad we had one the line for standby was an hour or so. We got on in about 20 minutes and most of that was walking from the outside of the building all the way in to the ride itself.

DD truly loved this ride and shot the cannon the whole time but refused to wear the glasses.

.........will post 2nd half of DAY 1 tomorrow :)
 

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