Disney Honeymoon - Trip Report

[Psypher]

Hi All,

My Wife and I got back from our trip over a week ago. I've been playing catch-up on a few things, but I think I'm ready to write the Trip Report. It was an amazing and memorable trip with lots of great stories. I'm looking forward to reliving the magic while writing. I hope you enjoy.

If you're interested, read my pre-trip report to get the backstory.

Here's a quick summary of the pre-trip report:

Who: Me (27). Wife (25)

What: 11-night honeymoon in Disney. Also celebrating my Birthday on May 1st. This is also our first visit to Disney as a couple and our first visit as DVC members.

Where: 1 night at a Fairfield Inn in Charlotte, NC on the way down. 5 nights at Boardwalk Villas. 6 nights at Old Key West. 1 night in a Fairfield Inn in Chester, VA on the way back up.

When: Leaving Home 4/29. Arriving 4/30. Leaving Disney 5/11. Arriving Home 5/12.

How: We're driving down from CT the morning after our Wedding.

Trip Report:

Sunday, April 29, 2012

My Wife and I woke up at 7am and were out the door at 8:30am. Since I decided to take the “scenic route”, we actually had to go North a bit in order to go South. It took us about 40 minutes just to get onto I-84. We took 84 from central CT to Scranton PA where we picked up I-81. As soon as we got onto 81 we noticed a steady bump/vibration in the car. I thought for sure I had a flat tire. I was freaking out and I was hoping to get to the next rest area so that I could check out my tires. After about 10 minutes or so, the bumping went away and I realized that it must have just been these strange notches that were on the the road in that area. Now if I could just relax a little bit, I should be able to have some fun. Pennsylvania seemed to last a lifetime. Some of the views were really nice, but after seeing 20 different mountains, they all begin to look the same. We were also amazed at how many farms and cows we saw.

After PA, things got more fun. Maryland went by quickly. So did West Virginia. We stopped at all of the state welcome centers and it was fun comparing them to one another. Virginia reminded me of PA because it just seemed to go on forever. It was interesting to see all the different food chains as we traveled more and more south. I've never heard of Bojangles and not exactly sure what it is. I've also never seen a Waffle House before, yet there was a sign for one every mile or so it seemed. We got dinner at a Wendy’s (I'm not very adventurous with food) off of the highway. I think at this point I was driving for over 10 hours with just quick 5 minute breaks. After I got out of the car, I noticed that I was shaking and a bit nauseous. It felt good to take about 30 minutes to just chill and eat something.

We got back on the road again. After about 2 or 3 more hours we got off of I-81 and onto I-77. At this point, it was pitch dark out. Right after getting onto 77, there was this huge downhill slope that lasted for about 7 miles. It was on the edge of a mountain and we could see town or city lights off in the distance. It was a little scary at some points because there were trucks that were flying downhill and I kept trying to pass them. We then made it to North Carolina. After about 2 more hours we were finally almost into Charlotte. For some reason, each time we looked at the GPS, the time left to our destination kept going UP! I found out later that this was due to traffic. I was shocked. I heard that traffic was bad in Charlotte, but it was 11pm and I couldn’t believe there would be traffic at this time of night. It turned out to be due to construction. We were stuck in traffic for about 30 minutes. Our hotel was right on the outskirts south of Charlotte.

We arrived at the Fairfield Inn in Charlotte at around 11:30pm. The lady at the front desk asked why we were staying there and we told them we were headed to Disney for our honeymoon. She said something like "oh we got a lot of people stopping here on their way down from Ohio and Indiana and..." she cut herself off as she noticed we were from Connecticut. I was like "Yeah, we took the long way down". I was so tired and just crashed on the bed as soon as we got to our room. I had trouble falling asleep because I knew I would be at Disney the next day and was sooo excited. It reminded me of one of my favorite Disney commercials growing up with the Dad saying "I can't sleep I'm too excited". I think I finally went to sleep at around 12:30am.

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That is the first day. Thanks for getting this far. I promise, things will get more interesting when we get to Disney. It's getting a bit late, so I will continue this tomorrow. It will probably take me a few days to finish the report. I also took some pictures and will try to add them in where they fit.

[Stitch101]

Great report so far I chuckle because we went down from the 4th through the 12th and we drove down from NH. We left at 6 pm and drove straight through. We took 84 to 64 to 95 all the way down and stopped at Jacksonville Fl arriving at 5 pm. I thought the same thing about bojangels but we did stop at a waffle house good waffles. We also stay at OKW!

[Brian5581]

Off to an excellent start. Congratulations again! Looking forward to much more...

[debbieandroo]

So glad you're writing a trip report about your honeymoon. I was following along with your pre-trip adventures so it's nice to read the rest of the story.

There's absolutely nothing that will jolt the nerves more than strange noises, dashboard lights, or movements in your car as you begin a road trip. Last year, halfway to Hilton Head, my check-engine light came on - oy! Thankfully, nothing was wrong [just a weird thermostat thing that didn't mess me up] and I was happy to read that nothing was wrong with your car as well.

I was in the World the same week that you were, too -- reading your TR will help ease my homesickness.

[Psypher]

Monday, April 30, 2012


We woke up in the hotel room at 6:30am. We grabbed breakfast downstairs at 7am and were on the road again by 7:30. Since we were already passed Charlotte, we didn’t have to deal with any of the rush-hour traffic. It only took a few minutes before we hit South Carolina. We then picked up I-26. Somewhere on 26 we spotted our first palm tree. That got us really excited. It wasn’t long before we were on I-95 heading south through SC, GA, and finally into Florida.

We had to stop at the Florida welcome center. We heard rumors on these forums that they gave away free orange juice there. It turns out the rumors are true. We walked in and on the left they have probably 8 juice dispensers lined up. A man was waiting behind the counter and just said “Orange or Grapefruit?!” in a perky tone and a VERY southern accent. It may have been the highlight of our drive down as it was a very “Welcome to Florida” moment and it really started to make it sink in that we were practically there. I think the GPS said we had 3 more hours to go. The next big milestone was getting to Daytona Beach. There was a really cool Daytona Beach sign written out in stone (I think) across one of the underpasses. We then got onto I-4 for the home stretch and saw the first Disney billboard. I believe it was for “Wishes”. My GPS didn’t have “Epcot Resort Boulevard” in it, so I just programed it for Epcot and knew I could follow the signs once I got on property. We took the exit for Epcot and went under the Disney World arch. We followed the signs for Epcot Resorts and got to Boardwalk without a problem.

We stopped at the Hess station first so that I could fill up the gas tank so that I wouldn’t have to do it during our trip and for the way back. The place was a mad house. It was jam-packed with people going ever which direction. Cab drivers were taking up spots and leaving their cabs their so nobody could use the pumps. We were so excited to get to the resort, but we must have spent a good 20 minutes trying to get a spot to pump gas. We then pulled into the Boardwalk parking lot and got passed the gate. The guard suggested we pull up straight to the resort. I didn’t feel like having to worry about tipping bell services or the valet, so I pulled into the self-parking area. I was surprised at how far away the self-parking was from the resort. They probably have 80-90% of the closest spots blocked off for valet parking and the farthest 10-20% are for self-parking. This doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. We had rolling suitcases and l carried everything else from the car to the font desk. I felt like an idiot as nobody else was doing it this way.

Walking into the lobby of BWV was awesome. The place is absolutely beautiful. We were blown away. We walked up to the online check-in desk and dropped our stuff on the floor. The CM behind the desk was very pleasant. She handed us our welcome packet and our “Happily Ever After...” pins. I also got a Birthday pin. She showed us on the map where are room was and pointed us to the elevators. We grabbed our stuff and headed to our room. We had a 1-bedroom Boardwalk view room and I requested a high floor in hopes of having a better view. We got room number 5051. What a room! Granted this was our first DVC visit, but this had to be nicest hotel room I’ve ever been in. The place was immaculate and there was so much space. One of my Wife’s family members sent us a gift basket that was waiting in the room for us. The basket had bride and groom Mickey hats, Mickey-shaped chocolates, a bottle of sparkling grape juice and two champagne glasses. The view was incredible! The balcony overlooked the courtyard. Across the way was Boardwalk Inn and above that was a straightaway view of the Epcot geosphere. A little off to the left was Crescent Lake and the boardwalk itself. I wanted to just sit and chill after driving for 8.5 hours, but my Wife wanted to go straight to the parks. We went down and checked out the gift shop. I really loved all of the DVC merchandise. We then went on the boardwalk and explored some of the shops. We jumped on the boat and headed to Hollywood Studios.

We had pre-purchased DVC discounted annual passes. I had the vouchers with me, but we needed to stop at guest relations to redeem the actual APs. I created a post a while back about how I was concerned because in order for a non-dvc member to get the discounted rate, they need to be a family member living at the same address as the member. Since we just got married 2 days before, I didn’t really have any proof. The worrying was all for nothing as the CM didn’t even ask about it. We did have our Happily Ever After buttons on. My Wife and I have never been on Tower of Terror and we kept telling ourselves that we were going to this trip. We aren’t big into “thrill rides”, but we really wanted to try to experience everything. We were pretty tired from the long trip. At this point it was probably around 6pm. There were extra magic hours at the Studios tonight, but we realized that we were probably better off going back to the hotel early since we needed to get up very early the next morning. We decided that we would maybe try to hit up one attraction and then get in line for the 8:30 showing of Fantasmic. We headed straight to Tower of Terror. The sign in front said it was only a 10 minute standby wait and we decided to get it over with. As we went around the corner, a Cast Member said that the wait was over 30 minutes and that they were waiting for the sign to get updated. We didn’t want to miss getting a good seat for Fantasmic, so we bailed. We grabbed quick service right near where a small line was forming for Fantasmic. After eating, the line was already pretty far down Sunset Boulevard. The numbers may have been deceiving though because people were pretty spread out. We waited in line for about 30 minutes and I think they let us into the amphitheater at around 7pm, which I was pleasantly surprised about. We got great seats. Dead center and around 7 rows back. We sat and waited for about an hour and then they started the pre-show. The pre-show was a little corny, but it helped pass the time until the real show. Fantasmic was incredible! I loved the way the movies were projected on the water that was spraying up. It was really great to see all the characters together. After Fantasmic, I left the real world and totally bought into fantasy world of Disney.

After the show was over we left the park. The boat back wasn’t there at the time, so we decided the try out the walkway. This may have not been the best idea since I was already starting to get blisters on my feet. It was still pretty fun. We met another nice couple and talked with them the whole time. We got back to the hotel room and went to bed.

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Tomorrow will be my Birthday as well as a Chef Mickey's breakfast and a full day at Magic Kingdom!

[Psypher]

Honeymoon Gift Basket


View from balcony - Day


View from balcony - Night

[Brian5581]

Nice pictures! Impressive gift basket.

[Jay324]

Congrats on the Wedding and thanks for writing the TR. It is always fun to read about a Disney Honeymoon. The view just looks incredible for just seeing your photos makes me miss the whole boardwalk area.

Tuning in to the rest of the report and glad your off to such a great start.


Jay

[chevl66]

Love the pictures! We haven't been there yet as owners (going to BLT in January) but this resort looks nice! I'll have to plan my next trip "home" and try to stay there!!!

Congrats!

[kiapgh23e]

Congrats on the wedding, sounds like the honeymoon went well. Looking forward to more.