Baltosam
06-14-2008, 11:59 PM
First update, day two well under way:
Cast: Me (Sam) Wife (Becky) 16 yo daughter (Sarah) 13 yo son (Sammy) BIL (David)
My first time doing a trip report while actually still on a trip!
Let's see we left the Baltmore area at about 4:00 pm on 6/12 and our plan was to drive straight through to WDW only stopping to eat and get gas etc. We had no real traffic problems to speak of and we made exellent time. Only thing out of the ordinary was when we got about 50 miles from the South Carolina line. There were several car loads of teens driving in four cars and were making sport of blocking the travel lanes speeding up to about 75 then slowing to about 45 they did this all the way to South of the Border where they exited. I know they were probably bored and that was thier idea of fun, but as is usually the case with that sort of thing I'm sure they didn't realize how dangerous that can be. I was back in the pack too far to get any tag numbers to report to the authorities.
Anyway with that little setback behind us we made it to the Beach Club at 7:10 am and true to form for a Friday the 13th they had no rooms available yet. (we had on previous trips been very lucky and gotten in our rooms when we arrived that early) So finally about 3:30pm our two-bed room was ready! Believe me after 24 hours in our Suburban I was ready to get in our room!
We got un-packed and headed up to our room and again Friday the 13 got us! Only half our reservation was ready, the studio portion of our two-bed room was cleaned and mousekeeping had only just started on the one-bedroom! I called down to the front desk and the CM didn't have that room reserved for us! The desk had us checked into a studio! All 5 of us. Well, after about 5 mins on the phone they had it taken care of. Bell services dropped off all our stuff in the studio and about 30 mins later the other half of our room was ready. No biggie just had to lug most of my crap into the other rooms. I was somewhat surprised that they didn't even follow up with a call to see if everything was alright.
Finally by 4:30 or so it was WELCOME HOME!
Wife and I decided we are not going to gamble in the future we will leave home much later in the evening, to time our arrival at WDW to be closer to 2:00 pm.
The rooms were clean and everything was in working order and I like the BCV a lot. Being this close to EPCOT is great. We will be staying here again. We had nothing planned for this travel day aside from dinner at Biergarten. We were not as well rested for this as I would have liked but there is nothing like that good old German comfort food to get the vacation started (the beer didn't hurt either!)
So today, Saturday 6/14 is our first real day here; the travel day is always a wash out for us.
We started our day at the Magic Kingdom with breakast at The Crystal Place its a good way to kick off a WDW vacation. It's funny to watch some of the people who are in full on comando mode. There was this one young mother at breakfast who was really just a nuisance to everyone there. She didn't seem to think that the line to order from the omelette station or the orderly line at the buffet applied to her, I saw her recieve some serious stares from both CM's and guests alike.
Then she spent the next 45 mins or so dragging her husband and child around to the other tables trying to intercept the characters. I thought maybe she didn't speak English or understand the way character meals work but that wasn't the case because she was very close to our table at one point talking to her husband. She could not seem to understand why the characters were ignoring her and her child. On two seperate occasions I saw CM's try to explain things to her but she just never got it. My daughter was so entertained watching her that when the napkin parade started and she joined in with her child my daughter took her picture. She plans to feature her if she ever writes her book about how not to have fun in WDW.
The weather is awsome so far today and my brother in law finally got up the courage to go into the Haunted Mansion (no small feat, he has Down's Syndrome) We were all very proud of him. He said he liked it but doesn't want to go back again till our next trip. We saw the Cowboy Camp show that they do in Frontier Land with Woody and Jesse. That's always fun, its fun to see my kids 13 and 16 years old forget to be cool for a few minutes. (happens alot in WDW).
Then we saw the Country Bears Jamboree; I was shocked to find out that my son had never seen it because he thought it would be lame. Well, by the time it was over, he was singing along with me to Big Al's Blood on the saddle song. He now has a new appreciation for another one of what he likes to call, Dad's lame attractions.
After that my kids were tired of walking at the pace we keep with David (my BIL) so off they went for action while me and my wife and BIL rode the monorail around one complete circuit then to the Poly. There we got on the motor launch back to WDW, after all it was David's Magic Kingdom day and that's what he wanted to do.
We left the Magic Kingdom about 1:30 for a rest, the kids got back soon after and went for a swim. We took David out to get him some thing to eat about 5:00 and I took a break to type this while my wife is getting ready for our dinner at The Rose and Crown.
So far a great first day, I'll check back in when time permits to update if anyone is interested.
Cast: Me (Sam) Wife (Becky) 16 yo daughter (Sarah) 13 yo son (Sammy) BIL (David)
My first time doing a trip report while actually still on a trip!
Let's see we left the Baltmore area at about 4:00 pm on 6/12 and our plan was to drive straight through to WDW only stopping to eat and get gas etc. We had no real traffic problems to speak of and we made exellent time. Only thing out of the ordinary was when we got about 50 miles from the South Carolina line. There were several car loads of teens driving in four cars and were making sport of blocking the travel lanes speeding up to about 75 then slowing to about 45 they did this all the way to South of the Border where they exited. I know they were probably bored and that was thier idea of fun, but as is usually the case with that sort of thing I'm sure they didn't realize how dangerous that can be. I was back in the pack too far to get any tag numbers to report to the authorities.
Anyway with that little setback behind us we made it to the Beach Club at 7:10 am and true to form for a Friday the 13th they had no rooms available yet. (we had on previous trips been very lucky and gotten in our rooms when we arrived that early) So finally about 3:30pm our two-bed room was ready! Believe me after 24 hours in our Suburban I was ready to get in our room!
We got un-packed and headed up to our room and again Friday the 13 got us! Only half our reservation was ready, the studio portion of our two-bed room was cleaned and mousekeeping had only just started on the one-bedroom! I called down to the front desk and the CM didn't have that room reserved for us! The desk had us checked into a studio! All 5 of us. Well, after about 5 mins on the phone they had it taken care of. Bell services dropped off all our stuff in the studio and about 30 mins later the other half of our room was ready. No biggie just had to lug most of my crap into the other rooms. I was somewhat surprised that they didn't even follow up with a call to see if everything was alright.
Finally by 4:30 or so it was WELCOME HOME!
Wife and I decided we are not going to gamble in the future we will leave home much later in the evening, to time our arrival at WDW to be closer to 2:00 pm.
The rooms were clean and everything was in working order and I like the BCV a lot. Being this close to EPCOT is great. We will be staying here again. We had nothing planned for this travel day aside from dinner at Biergarten. We were not as well rested for this as I would have liked but there is nothing like that good old German comfort food to get the vacation started (the beer didn't hurt either!)
So today, Saturday 6/14 is our first real day here; the travel day is always a wash out for us.
We started our day at the Magic Kingdom with breakast at The Crystal Place its a good way to kick off a WDW vacation. It's funny to watch some of the people who are in full on comando mode. There was this one young mother at breakfast who was really just a nuisance to everyone there. She didn't seem to think that the line to order from the omelette station or the orderly line at the buffet applied to her, I saw her recieve some serious stares from both CM's and guests alike.
Then she spent the next 45 mins or so dragging her husband and child around to the other tables trying to intercept the characters. I thought maybe she didn't speak English or understand the way character meals work but that wasn't the case because she was very close to our table at one point talking to her husband. She could not seem to understand why the characters were ignoring her and her child. On two seperate occasions I saw CM's try to explain things to her but she just never got it. My daughter was so entertained watching her that when the napkin parade started and she joined in with her child my daughter took her picture. She plans to feature her if she ever writes her book about how not to have fun in WDW.
The weather is awsome so far today and my brother in law finally got up the courage to go into the Haunted Mansion (no small feat, he has Down's Syndrome) We were all very proud of him. He said he liked it but doesn't want to go back again till our next trip. We saw the Cowboy Camp show that they do in Frontier Land with Woody and Jesse. That's always fun, its fun to see my kids 13 and 16 years old forget to be cool for a few minutes. (happens alot in WDW).
Then we saw the Country Bears Jamboree; I was shocked to find out that my son had never seen it because he thought it would be lame. Well, by the time it was over, he was singing along with me to Big Al's Blood on the saddle song. He now has a new appreciation for another one of what he likes to call, Dad's lame attractions.
After that my kids were tired of walking at the pace we keep with David (my BIL) so off they went for action while me and my wife and BIL rode the monorail around one complete circuit then to the Poly. There we got on the motor launch back to WDW, after all it was David's Magic Kingdom day and that's what he wanted to do.
We left the Magic Kingdom about 1:30 for a rest, the kids got back soon after and went for a swim. We took David out to get him some thing to eat about 5:00 and I took a break to type this while my wife is getting ready for our dinner at The Rose and Crown.
So far a great first day, I'll check back in when time permits to update if anyone is interested.