My husband and I go somewhere every year for a vacation. We usually rotate mountains and oceans, but this year we opted for just plain fun.
A week at Disney World is nothing to shake a stick at. We stayed at Pop Century Resort in the Wide World of Sports Area, and found ourselves in a corner room on the first floor with accessibility features like an actual bathtub. Unfortunately, at the end of each day, I was too tired to think about soaking in a tub, and opted to shower and go right to bed.
We chose Pop Century Resort because of the added transportation option – the Sky Liner – to Hollywood Studios and Epcot, with Disney buses providing transportation to the other parks and Disney Springs. We discovered that we could also drive to the parks and be able to park for free since we were staying at the resort. Needless to say, we opted to not drive at all the entire week and took advantage of available transportation, all of which began running an hour before resort guests’ 30 minute early entry to the parks.
Day 1 was spent at Epcot, where we managed to quickly arrive at the back of the park to Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure, and then spent the rest of the day at a fairly leisurely pace enjoying the topiaries and queuing up for attractions like Soarin’, Frozen Ever After (do not recommend unless you have little kids), and Nemo and Friends. We enjoyed the Garden Rocks concert package which included a meal at the Rose and Crown, and guaranteed seating to see one of our favorite bands, MercyMe.
Day 2 was pretty much all about Star Wars at Galaxy’s Edge in Disney’s Hollywood Studios. We experienced Smuggler’s Run twice and took advantage of Lightning Lane passes for Rise of the Resistance. So fun!
We ate at Ronto’s Roasters, which I thought was a coffee place, but no, it was some sort of roasted meat. Fortunately, Ronto’s Roasters also offers plant-based options for vegetarians like me.
We also enjoyed Mickey and Minnie’s Runaway Railway (so fun!) and Lightning McQueen’s Racing Academy, and we took a break from the heat and sun inside Launch Bay.
Day 3 was a Magic Kingdom kind of day. I was most looking forward to seeing Cinderella’s castle with the 50th Anniversary theme.
We took things slowly and paced ourselves, and managed to experience Pirates of the Caribbean, the Haunted Mansion, the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train (not as good as I hoped it would be), Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin, Monster’s Inc. Laugh Floor (I’m watching, always watching. – Roz), Space Mountain, People Mover, and Barnstormer. I found a Baymax t-shirt in one of the shops, and we had a nice dinner at Tony’s.
Day 4 – back to Hollywood Studios. This time we managed to experience the Hollywood Tower Hotel and all of its magnificent drops and Aerosmith’s Rock and Roller Coaster. We rested a bit during the short stage performance of Beauty and Beast, and we wandered back to Galaxy’s Edge for another rendition of Smuggler’s Run, and another Lightning Lane of Rise of the Resistance. We also did Star Tours again (we did it twice on day 2), and we queued up in a long line for Toy Story Mania and discovered it was totally worth it!
Day 5 was Disney’s Animal Kingdom which was a rainy day but we still managed to experience Expedition Everest, Dinosaur!, Kiliminjaro Safari, Avatar’s Flight of Passage (Lightning Lane), Festival of the Lion King, Feathered Friends in Flight, and It’s Tough to be a Bug.
We wanted to end our day with Kite Tails, the new show on the lagoon, but the gray clouds and distant thunderclaps canceled the show. We strolled through the park a few more times, and decided to head back to Pop Century.
To sum it all up, we drove two days each way to get to Orlando and then back home (stopping overnight each way at my sister- and brother-in-law’s home in South Carolina). We walked nearly 45 miles during the five days at Disney World, and let’s not talk about how much money we spent but it was a lot. (But we had budgeted for it, so it’s all good).
We’re back to home to our fur kids, and back to work, and oh! how hard it is to go back after a fun vacation like we had!
Now back to regular crochet related programming! Thanks for checking out our Disney vacation recap!
-Kim
Hooked on Whimsy 