[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, and welcome to very amusing.
[SPEAKER_00]: Your one-stop shop for these stories, secrets, and shenanigans of a popcorn fueled theme park journalist.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm Curly Wise Allen.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm back from Walt Disney World and I cannot wait to tell you all about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh yeah!
[SPEAKER_00]: A summer trip to Disney World!
[SPEAKER_00]: Pretty hot!
[SPEAKER_00]: It is pretty hot there.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I want to take the intro here not to talk about the weather, not to limit the weather.
[SPEAKER_00]: But to instead, harp on something that we discussed a few weeks back.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, I have gotten a few messages about this and a few chose calls.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think there were a few other messages that I was able to get back to when I apologize in advance.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we discussed how, you know, looking at the back half of the year, I really wanted to focus on getting the little things done that I always push aside.
[SPEAKER_00]: That always take less time than I think they will and are just hanging over me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I wanted to mention this because I knew other people haven't dealing with this and recognize this in themselves, too.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just putting off the little chores that could be solved so quickly.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm here to tell you that I did start doing this.
[SPEAKER_00]: I actually didn't follow through, which is rare for me.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I did follow through and it has been really, really great.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, I will say my to-do list is still just as long, but I'm really hoping that this motivation and like actually crossing things off will help me get to the end of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And of course, the things I've been putting off the most were doctor appointments and like physical things that I need to get looked at by different experts.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, listen, I want to have a baby, this slice open, I have a baby, your body's a mess.
[SPEAKER_00]: The whole thing, and I just need to like physically, I just want to be able to work out and be physical and move well.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I am actually taking care of that and making the appointments and seeing all the people that I need to see.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it feels really responsible to be able to cross the stuff off the list.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if you heard that at all in an earlier episode, I forgot which one it was.
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like it was gabsash.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you heard that a few weeks ago when it resonated with you, this is a check-in.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you have been in accomplishing stuff, incredible.
[SPEAKER_00]: I applaud you.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are in it together.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if not,
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe start this week just trying to cross a few of those things off because oh my goodness the weight of those chores on your shoulders when you have to do them It just takes up so much space and now that I'm finally getting through a few of them It's just it's a lot better and if you are not neurodivergent and this is not a fly to you Wow, I'm really jealous the fact that I could like I don't know go to my post office without having a whole mental thing about it That would be great.
[SPEAKER_00]: That would be great to run an air into not be overwhelmed by the idea of parking
[SPEAKER_00]: But regardless, if you were someone like me, then yeah, it is something I'm working through.
[SPEAKER_00]: Anyway, we are going to talk about my trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: Ooh, my trip, my like, back to back cruise stay at Disney World.
[SPEAKER_00]: Next week's episode will be real Caribbean.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wanted to make sure I just got back.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I wanted to make sure I had enough times like really research and organize that episode for you because it is the first time we've done a recap of a sailing on that cruise line.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I want to give you all the important information and not rush it after I come back.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because this one's one of a gam-sash?
[SPEAKER_00]: We're rolling with it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So stick around, we're gonna talk about Disney World and I can't wait to tell you all about my trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: Ah!
[SPEAKER_00]: Who's fun?
[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome back.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, I'm not going to lie to you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had an unbelievable week.
[SPEAKER_00]: A lot of it has to do with my sailing on star of the seas, which I will tell you about next week and I'm trying so hard and not really, no, no, I'm trying like bury every detail that I haven't ever know that I took, but we're going to talk about the next week in detail.
[SPEAKER_00]: I really want that episode to be organized to cover it from all angles, whether you're
[SPEAKER_00]: Ten million with real Caribbean, and you don't know about this new ship, whether you're a Disney Cruise Line person, and you're kind of like, why is everyone talking about this big old ship?
[SPEAKER_00]: What's going on there?
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to have that episode be more like a guide and organized, and really give you all the information you need to plan your trips.
[SPEAKER_00]: However, the reason I went to Disney World was because my travel just kinda shook out that way.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want to give you like a, like, four minutes on my travelite in your area, but essentially, just to set the scene, I went to Chicago for my grandma's ninety-fifth birthday, very exciting.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I knew that a few days later, I was going on star of the seas.
[SPEAKER_00]: It didn't make sense to go home and come back.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had pro with me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was bringing her on the cruise because my husband was telling me it's a whole thing again.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want to give you too much information.
[SPEAKER_00]: All you need to know is that it worked out where I was able to go to Disney World before the cruise.
[SPEAKER_00]: After a cruise, I don't like to go straight to the airport.
[SPEAKER_00]: I find it to be very, very stressful to do a boat, a bus or a vehicle, and then an airplane in the same day.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's just like a little too much, and I don't want to do it, especially when I have free will and a credit card, and could spend it night at a Disney World Hotel if I so choose.
[SPEAKER_00]: As you can tell, a lot of my motivation comes from not understanding spending, and that in annual past, I already paid for a once, I don't feel the pain of paying it, I paid for it like a year ago.
[SPEAKER_00]: To me, that's money that's been spent it's gone.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you know, it's really fiscally responsible for me to just use my annual pass more.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's how math works for me.
[SPEAKER_00]: But anyway, the packing of a cruise.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so if you haven't been again, I wasn't going to talk about cruise.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're going to do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: When it comes to a cruise, there's this thing where the night before you leave, you pack your bags and you leave them in the hallway.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't want to drag your luggage off the ship yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: Typically, that's something that people prefer to do because the elevators can be really busy.
[SPEAKER_00]: This way you can hypothetically, if you don't need to take an elevator, you can go down the stairs and you can leave before everyone else leaves off the ship.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't have to wait for the luggage to go through, it's a whole thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: I pack a lot and I had stroller and baby stuff, so I had to put a bag through and the last night packing being like, what am I gonna need in the morning?
[SPEAKER_00]: What are we gonna need for the airport?
[SPEAKER_00]: I find that to be overwhelming.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I always like to add, if I can, a night after a cruise at a hotel, whatever possible.
[SPEAKER_00]: It just so happened because Star of the Seas was going out of Port Canaveral and I was renting a car anyway.
[SPEAKER_00]: I got to go to Disney World before and after my sailing on Star of the Seas and I am so excited to tell you about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because there is something about a Disney World trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: When it's not like you're dedicated six day vacation, when you're not like this is it, we're lightening, we're doing it all.
[SPEAKER_00]: This felt like a bonus trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: This felt like a, I hate to go, I get a little treat, I get a little treat, I get to go to Disney World before and after on this trip that I did not anticipate,
[SPEAKER_00]: and it was just such a delightful way to ease us into a very, very fun sailing and then kind of ease us out to have a little time to relax and reset before a long travel day of flying back to LA.
[SPEAKER_00]: But both halves of this trip were very different from each other.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was only a Disney World for a total of sixty-five hours and
[SPEAKER_00]: And your girl squeeze all the juice out.
[SPEAKER_00]: I really did too much.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think, again, self-proclaimed queen of doing too much.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is unbelievable how much I shoved into this trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, there's a bit of a chicken in the egg when it comes to planning a trip like this.
[SPEAKER_00]: One that's not dedicated doesn't have a sole purpose.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not like it is our spring break trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm here to see a holiday parade.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, this was truly just a gift from the scheduling gods and it all kind of worked out.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've let the pieces fall into place truly based on hotel pricing.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I, I know this is the regular part of the podcast, this isn't the part where I talked to Becky, but as you know, there have been unbelievable discounts at Disney World, and the reason I stayed on both ends is because I got such a steal on these Deluxe level rooms.
[SPEAKER_00]: I ended up booking at Yacht Club for two nights before the cruise, and then I booked at Disney's Wilderness Lodge on the other end.
[SPEAKER_00]: Once I saw these rates and was like, oh my lord, I kind of susted out where on the front end, we would spend most of our time in Epcot and on the back end, we would spend probably our final night in Magic Kingdom.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when I tell you, it worked out so perfectly, it just fell into place as the most perfect trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, I'm gonna Disney World a lot.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know this, it's my job, even though it sometimes feels like vacation, it's like a job, it's a little more like a vacation, sometimes feels like a job, but I was looking forward to this trip so much.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't usually like, you know, the thing where you're like counting down the days, you're getting excited, your brain starts to like, the back of your brain while you're doing other tasks, doing dishes, sending emails, your brain's like, it's like picturing the places you're gonna go and like,
[SPEAKER_00]: pictureing the snacks you're gonna get and mmm it just gets like so excited to be there just to be back in that place and I really was feeling the joy and excitement from the second I stepped off the airplane.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now it was a little bit in that because I flew from Chicago and it was a much shorter flight and it was gleeful yes and if you are driving distance in Disney World please know I am jealous of you
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think of you every time I check out of a hotel and watch people pack their car to drive home and I'm like, wow, can you imagine a world where you stop at a wall wall and then maybe a book is and then you're in your house like eight to twelve hours later, that would be, that would be something.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if you live nearby, just know that I'm jealous of you and I hope you appreciate it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like the fact that you could live somewhere not a Disney world and just drive there and have dinner and drive back hypothetically.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's like how I felt when I moved to LA and was like, when do you mean I can just drive to Disneyland?
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't drive in the freeways at the time, so there was a time when I drove just taking side streets.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it took two hours to get there, which is kind of the same as the freeway.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it was totally fine.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now again, we were arriving at Yacht Club, which was under construction.
[SPEAKER_00]: When I booked it, it had all of those warnings about the massive pool at Yacht Club Beach Club, a storm along Bay, if you were familiar by name, this thing in bottom pool, the water slide.
[SPEAKER_00]: All that was under construction for a really long time.
[SPEAKER_00]: I booked this beach.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I saw a Disney food blog that they were like basically done with construction and I figured we'd probably be okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we were so okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now the Porta Cousher, which is the thing where you like drive up and you go in the little like turn about, that was closed.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I don't want to sound like a miserable person, but it wasn't a little bit of a bummer.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I was like, I'm telling you, I was armed.
[SPEAKER_00]: I got the car, I got the car and MCO.
[SPEAKER_00]: I sweat through all my clothes trying to install a car seat in the dark in the Hertz parking lot garage.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was not a pretty look.
[SPEAKER_00]: We got on the road, we were driving and went past the Disney road and gates.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm flying and high.
[SPEAKER_00]: I get there and I'm like, oh man, construction wall.
[SPEAKER_00]: But that was kind of the only bad thing that happened on our stay at Disney's Yacht Club.
[SPEAKER_00]: We checked in and we had some time to kill before our room was ready.
[SPEAKER_00]: We checked in, got to the room, unpacked a little.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to do some, listen, I'm gonna keep it really simple.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's just say emergency laundry from a child.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you know, you know, that's all we're gonna leave it at.
[SPEAKER_00]: I did do some emergency laundry.
[SPEAKER_00]: Pearl had had a long day.
[SPEAKER_00]: There was a huge tantrum and the reason I'm telling you this is because out of this tantrum came definitive proof of why
[SPEAKER_00]: I love staying at Walt Disney World, why I love cast members, why the people who work for this company just get it and are so good at what they do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because basically, we couldn't go to, we couldn't go to Epcot until I did this little laundry.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I don't want it, this is not going to be a pro-centric episode, but I'm telling you this for a reason.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to get to the laundry room.
[SPEAKER_00]: And she was kind of feral at this point.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, she'd been out of town for a few days.
[SPEAKER_00]: We've been doing a lot.
[SPEAKER_00]: We traveled.
[SPEAKER_00]: We drove.
[SPEAKER_00]: We flew.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was a lot for an interior world.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I was trying to get her to the laundry room.
[SPEAKER_00]: There were no signs for the laundry room.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was stressed.
[SPEAKER_00]: She was screaming.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought we were going to be banned from the hotel for life.
[SPEAKER_00]: And one of the employees came out from behind the desk and came over to us and was like, trying to help direct me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then another person who's more of like a supervisor role, I'd say, came out to help.
[SPEAKER_00]: Went in the back and brought out these
[SPEAKER_00]: tiny crowns.
[SPEAKER_00]: These kind of like they were sold in probably like a twenty four pack that were a bunch of them.
[SPEAKER_00]: These little glimmering semi disposable crowns and offered Pearl to choose whatever color she wanted.
[SPEAKER_00]: This cast member gave one to me, gave one to my mom.
[SPEAKER_00]: It fully calmed her down.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, we were like, this was like the worst moment of the trip by far.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to call my mom to run downstairs.
[SPEAKER_00]: My mom came downstairs like bait like her shoes untied like just ran.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it was very stressful.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they made such a wonderful moment out of it that I have this picture now that I'm looking at that's all of us in our crowns.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm like truly my nervous system is shot from it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But Pearl is happy because someone came by and like identified a problem and solved it.
[SPEAKER_00]: and I love that Disney cast members just really can at times exhibit hospitality to the highest degree.
[SPEAKER_00]: It truly saved our trip, it honestly saved our trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: It took a while for us to get into Epcot that night.
[SPEAKER_00]: I made a video about like the whole breakdown of times of everything we did, which by the way is a format I never usually do on Instagram, but I also never really have time to edit a video and being able to do that and not having to do a voiceover has weirdly opened up a new world of
[SPEAKER_00]: Content creation for me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just always assume everything needs a voiceover and there's like a way I picture it and then I never have time to do it and then I never post I have about fourteen videos from my Alaska cruise that I still want to post and I just never got around to it when I went in the cruise in March and then didn't cruise I did day one day two I never did day three I never made day three because I'm like oh I gotta do a voiceover I have to do all this things and I never got around to it But I've actually posted videos with this trip which is so fun because I love sharing visuals along with this when we're talking about this stuff.
[SPEAKER_00]: We went to Epcot for the
[SPEAKER_00]: Extended evening hours which come from if you stay at a deluxe hotel and I've never really utilized these because often just by the time you get there by the time you get back it's just too late and I often have to do everything's a little worky everything's a little traveling and cram in these trips in real tight and it's just the timing doesn't work out
[SPEAKER_00]: but the timing worked out so well here.
[SPEAKER_00]: And being walking distance from Epcot, when you are going to Epcot, like when you're doing the other parks, you're always far from something.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's my approach about Disney hotels.
[SPEAKER_00]: People usually hold these monorail hotels as like, oh, the best and do not quote me on my hotel ringing episode, because I know I ranked one of them at the top.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I know he's not like a little bit of a hypocrite, but you see what I'm saying.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's always like if it's not on the monorail of dust, but truly I love to stay centric to where you are spending your time.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you're spending the majority of your time at Epcot,
[SPEAKER_00]: Being at one of those hotels, not having to think about how you're gonna get home, car, bus, skyliner, lines, weights.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hurry, we gotta go with bus run.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not having to do any of that, taking transportation completely out of the equation was so relaxing and so calming and made that visit so much more special.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because we could just roll out and roll right back.
[SPEAKER_00]: That was it.
[SPEAKER_00]: We just walk out and walk in the park and then walk back to our room and made it solo stress that anything we did that night, especially because the Deluxe hours were just like, come on in, do whatever you want.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was so chill.
[SPEAKER_00]: It just made it bliss.
[SPEAKER_00]: I won't repeat myself too much because I think most of you probably saw that video and saw everything we did, but we did a lot of the slower rides.
[SPEAKER_00]: We went on Nemo.
[SPEAKER_00]: We went to Mexico.
[SPEAKER_00]: We walked around.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was just a really, really great way to start the trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: The next day was our one full day, a Disney World, or only day and night at Disney World, where we woke up there and then went to bed there.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I don't know why this trip did this to me, but it has changed a lot of my opinions that I've said on this podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: There are two that come to mind that I feel strongly about now, that I need to rectify and acknowledge.
[SPEAKER_00]: The first is that
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, club is now easily up towards the top for me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I know I've been called out by this.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've been called out on this.
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, I know I say, yeah, I say beach and yacht and I think it's supposed to be yacht and beach.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm so sorry that I know that you're a tates people.
[SPEAKER_00]: I use them interchangeably like twins.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know that's maybe not the way you do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if I do it wrong from here and out in the podcast, I apologize.
[SPEAKER_00]: Anyway, I really, really started to love Yacht Club after this episode.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think it's just being in a small footprint, being in a hotel room that feels thematic, but not, like, like, clearly it is a refreshed hotel room, but it's not Mary Ann.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not giving high it.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, a lot of these places, boardwalk and many others feel sterile and this still felt like it had the theme.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's still felt special.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's still felt Disney while also feeling modernized and not dated.
[SPEAKER_00]: We will be talking about something dated very shortly and it sticks out like a sore thumb in modern Disney.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now this day was a day that we didn't really have a schedule for.
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, I made a video about this on social media, so I will not bore you with the play by play, but our goal for the day, because whenever you travel with a toddler or a baby, at Disney, I always say have one goal, it doesn't even have one goal.
[SPEAKER_00]: Have one thing that if you do it, your day's gravy, you're good.
[SPEAKER_00]: Or one thing was going unfrozen ever after.
[SPEAKER_00]: My mom did convince me sent me a long essay over text after, well after I recorded my easy Disney episode that we just ran.
[SPEAKER_00]: And was like, I do think that we should schedule a fast goes or a schedule lightning lane.
[SPEAKER_00]: See, I still use the old terms.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's so locked into my brain.
[SPEAKER_00]: I do think we should schedule a lightning lane, send me a whole thing and I screamed at her over text.
[SPEAKER_00]: I will own it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am sorry mother.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, absolutely not totally what to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want any plan.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want any schedule.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want any rushing.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then I was like, okay, you are right.
[SPEAKER_00]: I apologize.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just purchased them.
[SPEAKER_00]: And she was right.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just listen, I didn't want to spend like close to sixty bucks to only to go on that ride, none of the other lightning lane rides.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't even think we used one lightning lane for spaceship Earth, but I do feel like it's sacrilegious that that and things like living with the land have lightning lane.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just such a cop out.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's so dumb.
[SPEAKER_00]: Those rides should not have lightning lane, but it did come in handy for Frozen.
[SPEAKER_00]: It wasn't helpful.
[SPEAKER_00]: My mom was right.
[SPEAKER_00]: Even if we did rush to get there, we did really rush.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was hard, but we made it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it was just really nice to bring my frozen obsessed child to a frozen ride.
[SPEAKER_00]: It just felt really good.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's a ride I've had many, many complaints about for years.
[SPEAKER_00]: Motherhood has softened me.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the ride I still think is, well, that's not one of the two things.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's not one of the two things.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's not one of the two things that I have to rectify.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, I still think that dark hallway with no effects is bunkers.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that the projection on the faces needs to be re-done?
[SPEAKER_00]: This, literally, especially now that we've seen much, much better versions of this, literally within the same franchise at other parks around the world, we shouldn't have the worst one.
[SPEAKER_00]: How does the first one, the first person to be like, yeah, we're locking in frozen.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, why do we have the worst version?
[SPEAKER_00]: They've updated it up to it ours.
[SPEAKER_00]: We should all have good frozen rides.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, I'm on a tangent, but the two things I was gonna say one yacht club.
[SPEAKER_00]: Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, I will be returning there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I loved it.
[SPEAKER_00]: The second thing?
[SPEAKER_00]: I casually, on last week's episode, I casually slandered Epcot's nighttime entertainment.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was, I was on listen, I was on a roll talking about fan-tasmic, talking about how much I love that show, how it's easy, how it's great.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think I said something along the lines of that Epcot's show, luminous does not click with me.
[SPEAKER_00]: It just doesn't really grab me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I need to take that back.
[SPEAKER_00]: I need to take that back because having seen it, I saw twice.
[SPEAKER_00]: I saw twice while I was at Epcot this past week.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I realized, oh, the reason I don't like luminous is because I've never had an opportunity to see it where it didn't feel like my world was ending because what I had realized had happened is that I had seen luminous twice.
[SPEAKER_00]: And both times, my child had a grade A meltdown.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know how it happened.
[SPEAKER_00]: But both times she lost her mind.
[SPEAKER_00]: The first time was at literally the media event for the show.
[SPEAKER_00]: I happened to be in town when it was first debut.
[SPEAKER_00]: I went to the party saw the PR people I know talked to some executives ran into some friends and had to urgently leave because my child was done.
[SPEAKER_00]: I went back another time to try to see it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we had to leave a dinner in a restaurant because my child was done.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just to say it, just to put it out there a disclaimer, if my child is done with something we leave.
[SPEAKER_00]: My child is my top priority.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's nothing wrong with her having, being upset about something that she's figuring out her emotions.
[SPEAKER_00]: She's upset.
[SPEAKER_00]: She's in a new place.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's loud.
[SPEAKER_00]: Completely understand?
[SPEAKER_00]: She did nothing wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: The person who didn't think wrong was me, who mistakenly forgot that the reason I had a little negative memory attached to the show isn't because of the show.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just because I suffered a minor trauma during it.
[SPEAKER_00]: The show is actually exceptional.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've been able to enjoy the music.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've seen the fireworks.
[SPEAKER_00]: The fireworks at the show are fantastic.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know when I was thinking when I kind of dinged it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And for that, I apologize.
[SPEAKER_00]: To you, Epcot, you are perfect and beautiful.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm sorry that I insulted your evening look.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now because you know kind of how the rest of that day went, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna harp upon it.
[SPEAKER_00]: We met on an Elsa.
[SPEAKER_00]: I went on test track.
[SPEAKER_00]: I will talk a little more about that because I went on test track and I'll tell you I loved it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now I have been avoiding all sorts of test track spoilers.
[SPEAKER_00]: I hadn't even really seen any reviews in my feed.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I don't mind a spoiler without a review, but
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't even see any.
[SPEAKER_00]: None came across my desk, so to speak.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think partially that is because there wasn't like a national media event for it.
[SPEAKER_00]: There is a big media event that includes a bunch of people going on to test track this week.
[SPEAKER_00]: The media event starts, wait, day is it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It starts the day you're listening to this.
[SPEAKER_00]: I sadly had to decline going because I was in Florida until like two days before and I have to come home and I couldn't get back there and then come back in time.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was just too much, too much travel.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to call it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wish I was there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I will be very sad this week when all my friends and colleagues are there and going on things together and enjoying stuff.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it's okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm a big girl.
[SPEAKER_00]: I can be tough and I will see.
[SPEAKER_00]: I will see the new things later.
[SPEAKER_00]: I can always go back.
[SPEAKER_00]: I can always go back and it's totally fine.
[SPEAKER_00]: As you can tell, I'm struggling with it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I do not like to say no.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love to be a Disney world.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's a separate thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I really hadn't seen a lot of people talking about test tracks.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I posted this video of me being loud.
[SPEAKER_00]: I walked out of the ride and was like, I need to tell my internet friends, like I need to tell my friends how much I love this attraction.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know until the comments section when like comments started coming in.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know that people didn't like it.
[UNKNOWN]: I'm like,
[SPEAKER_00]: What?
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know how people didn't like that ride.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought it was a pitch-perfect redo of test track.
[SPEAKER_00]: It just felt updated and felt like they had breathed new life into it.
[SPEAKER_00]: They made it a ride that I wanted to go on again.
[SPEAKER_00]: They made a ride that makes sense for this moment in time.
[SPEAKER_00]: A lot of times in Epcot and it is part of the reason we love it.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're looking to a future that is already happening.
[SPEAKER_00]: And here, they updated it.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're really so like they were looking towards a new future.
[SPEAKER_00]: It felt like that type of updated Epcot attraction.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it actually, I know that I for a while have been like, if they change space to birth, I'm writing.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm picking in front of the park.
[SPEAKER_00]: This made me think that they could do a really good job.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I even went on space to birth after and was like,
[SPEAKER_00]: I see how there is room for an improvement.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if they do what they did on TestTrack, a little bit of that here, a little bit of that new magic, I'm all for it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I found it to be a very, very enjoyable ride.
[SPEAKER_00]: I found it to be the perspective of it was, it was like timeless and timely in a way.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm not gonna spoil it for you and mention any scenes and mention any more descriptors beyond that.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I think if you were a little on the fence, like, oh, they're doing a TestTrack, I think you might like it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And as a huge diehard Epcot fan,
[SPEAKER_00]: I really, really loved the way that it felt like, you know, it felt like they had the same mentality for when they originally built the park, but here they were looking forward from the time period we're in now.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I just thought it was so good.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought they did such a good job, and I was so impressed.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was really impressed by it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I hope if any of you are on your trip, make sure to seek out test track if you can.
[SPEAKER_00]: They have a single rider line where I know it's kind of like, just split up with your party, but it does get you in so much quicker.
[SPEAKER_00]: And honestly, now that there's no more customization, something that I thought I would be upset about, you no longer customize a ride at the beginning.
[SPEAKER_00]: And before a single rider, you'd be like, in other people's video game.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, it didn't really feel good to be like, well, I guess we'll see how their cars do, we don't have a car because I didn't want to be mine.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now we're all the same.
[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't matter.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it makes the single rider line even more beneficial because you're just all enjoying the same ride.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're not like competing with these little robot vehicles that you made.
[SPEAKER_00]: I loved it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I loved it so much.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I also loved it because the lines are so short.
[SPEAKER_00]: You guys.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know that I have been talking every week on this podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm talking to Becky.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're chit chatting about deals.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I know that I partner with mouse fan travel.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know I work with them.
[SPEAKER_00]: They are the travel agency that I use.
[SPEAKER_00]: They book a musical loser.
[SPEAKER_00]: They are wonderful at their jobs.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I love them.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the reason I keep being like, guys, there's a lot of deals.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like guys, there's a lot of deals.
[SPEAKER_00]: A lot of deals right now is because there are low wait times right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: There are low weight times right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: There are low weight times.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can do stuff that you wouldn't think would be possible.
[SPEAKER_00]: I went on a random day in summer, which towards the end of summer.
[SPEAKER_00]: So like some people write as well.
[SPEAKER_00]: There weren't a lot of people that I've got.
[SPEAKER_00]: It took me five minutes from entering test track to being in the vehicle.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you're like
[SPEAKER_00]: That's bananas.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me tell you the second layer of that.
[SPEAKER_00]: They like goofed on what Roe I was supposed to be in.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we would have been even shorter.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I had to wait a little extra not complaining.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm just informing you for how the timing is.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would have waited probably three and a half minutes otherwise.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is bonkers y'all like we the Frozen the Anna and Elsa meet and greet and royal summer.
[SPEAKER_00]: Who's it was it was like I forget I put in the video it was like seven minutes seven and a wait I've been in that front room you know when you've I've sat in that front room my friend Leah and her sons and we were just sitting there forever I felt like we were never gonna get out this was so quick
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't judge how long the actual standby wait was for Frozen when we lightning laid, but it was never posted less than forty and guys listen, I'm gonna take off my journalist cap and just talk to you like we're a casual friend.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that the wait was probably more like twenty five maybe thirty minutes.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think they didn't want to post it to let people know, because now that they're charging for a lightning lane, now that they're charging for a fast-pass like product, it is in Disney's best interest to make it look like the weights are longer.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because if the weights are twenty minutes here, twenty minutes here, first of all, not only is the conversation online going to be nobody should pay for lightning lane, nobody's at this park, there's nobody in line.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whether or not that is accurate, that is what the conversation on social media is going to be.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's going to be in TikTok.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's going to be everywhere.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I believe Disney to not let a posted wait time be below any certain amount.
[SPEAKER_00]: And while the queue was full, for first and ever after, I didn't feel like it was that long.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then I feel like it wasn't moving that slow.
[SPEAKER_00]: So what I'm saying is consistently over my quick trip,
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't wait that long for almost anything.
[SPEAKER_00]: The longest line I waited in may have been just people mover on a Saturday night in Magic Kingdom.
[SPEAKER_00]: That little pocket of time, like, I have been looking, I have been looking and searching for these days at Disney when it feels like Labor Day weekend used to feel eight years ago.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you've been around that time, you know what I mean.
[SPEAKER_00]: There were these days where you could depend on these weekends, these little holiday weekends that weren't as populated these little times when you could go and the wait to be low and it would be bliss.
[SPEAKER_00]: That went away for a very long time and I think quietly it might be back It might because listen Disney is not going to discount stuff if they don't have to and they're discounting a lot in discount have been extended through the end of the year as you've probably heard Becky say they're now like giving you a gift card I haven't even seen that promotion I don't know where Becky pulled that out of that's why we do this segment because Becky knows everything but like
[SPEAKER_00]: This might be a pattern that continues.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's all I'm saying.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I feel that in a few years, we're gonna look back and be like, this was the time to go when we missed out.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm saying, I don't, if you can't go right now, I completely understand.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just feel like I got a raise a little flag.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's my job to be like, y'all, this might be the time.
[SPEAKER_00]: This might be the time to go, go, go, go, go.
[SPEAKER_00]: Cause things might change in the future and you never know.
[SPEAKER_00]: So this date was bliss partially because we just didn't wait for anything.
[SPEAKER_00]: We did whatever we wanted.
[SPEAKER_00]: We moved freely and it was so wonderful.
[SPEAKER_00]: I went back to the hotel, Pearl took a nap, and then I was determined to make it to the pool.
[SPEAKER_00]: I kind of planned this in my mind for a post-nap early evening hang to avoid the sun, possibly avoid any weather, which was not to to my own horn, but to do genius of me, because as we came back from Epcot and went to the hotel, they dumped the entire pool.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everyone had to leave for weather, lightning thunder, I'm not exactly sure.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think it did rain, I was in the room, so I didn't really see.
[SPEAKER_00]: But they, everyone had to clear out of the pool, so when we went back later, the weather had already passed, we were good, we got to swim.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now I was thinking, because, you know, Storm along Bay, which is the pool that both Disney's Beach Club and Disney's Yacht Club share, I thought my child would love this.
[SPEAKER_00]: A sand bottom pool.
[SPEAKER_00]: She doesn't like the expanse of the beach.
[SPEAKER_00]: She keeps going where does it go?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like she doesn't understand the water just keeps going.
[SPEAKER_00]: She's used to seeing the end in a pool.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I thought sand bottom pool, she would love it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I've done her feet.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, zero entry.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like a safe beach for someone who hasn't quite wrapped their head around the concept of a beach.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: She did not like the sand.
[SPEAKER_00]: She did not like the situation.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was talking to my friend Kelly.
[SPEAKER_00]: Kelly, you're listening.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hello, Ash, you're listening, hello.
[SPEAKER_00]: And Kelly told me that her son also felt the same.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I thought this was gonna be a hit, and it was not.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we were able to still enjoy the pool and enjoy other sections of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I mentioned that because if you aren't traveling with young kids, they might be a little weird about the sand of the pool.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought you'd be delighted by the whimsy of it all, but the sand bottom pool was not her favorite.
[SPEAKER_00]: We spent a lot of time in the pool, we like, had a blast.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then we went to beaches and cream to get ice cream.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I, I don't even, I have debated if I was going to say this on Mike.
[SPEAKER_00]: I actually like still haven't played.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to do this one by just stop speaking immediately.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I need to admit something really, really, really embarrassing.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I hope you know that I am good at my job, that I care a lot, that I spend a lot of time doing what I do, that I'm very passionate.
[SPEAKER_00]: Some of you are probably like, where is this going?
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm very passionate about what I do.
[SPEAKER_00]: I take it very seriously.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I know that I'm like fun and have a lot of, well, I don't know if I'm fun.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm definitely annoying.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll give you that.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know that I'm loud.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm a little cookie.
[SPEAKER_00]: And even as like, you know, like, cookie and silly as I am, I have a journalist brain.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I all care about our facts.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I try to have that in my mind whenever I'm doing my job.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know how this happened, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know how this happened.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know how I had a lapse in judgment or maybe I was offline for a week.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just missed it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would blame having a baby, but the timing doesn't work out.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, I really don't want to take a public album.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't realize they remodel beaches and green.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I knew that I remember.
[SPEAKER_00]: I remember they were remodeling it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I remember, you know, I get Disney food blogs emails.
[SPEAKER_00]: I get the headline where it's like, oh, you know, like popular ice cream place closed temporarily.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I knew that they closed and reopened.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I didn't know, that's what they did to beaches and cream.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought they just expanded it because I know they expanded it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know that they made it another Marriott style eatery.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am so horrified.
[SPEAKER_00]: I did not know this happened and it happened years ago.
[SPEAKER_00]: Where have I been?
[SPEAKER_00]: Have I been living under an ice cream list rock?
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know how this message did not make it to me because I think I just have walked past.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've truly walked past beaches and cream in front of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like recently like I've walked past it and it didn't even fit didn't even clock in my brain to just look to the right because I didn't realize that they got it the entire space.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought it still had that whimsical ice cream parlor gorgeous fun seeming.
[SPEAKER_00]: It does not.
[SPEAKER_00]: It has that sad new build quick service restaurant feel and it's heartbreaking.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you were learning this first hand for me, I am sorry, but also I'm grateful that you didn't have to learn this in real time.
[SPEAKER_00]: By running down, I literally ran down from the room during this trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, oh, I'll put our name in and we'll go down there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I ran down and was gagged, gagged.
[SPEAKER_00]: I looked in the window and went, are you kidding me?
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything I loved about it was gone, completely gone, just evaporated.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this was years ago.
[SPEAKER_00]: This was truly, truly years ago that they did this.
[SPEAKER_00]: I texted my friend Brandon and was like, what?
[SPEAKER_00]: And he was like, yeah girl.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had no idea.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I feel so dumb.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I feel really bad at my job.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I know that the two don't exactly correlate.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I feel so stupid that I didn't know beaches and cream was getted.
[SPEAKER_00]: Got it!
[SPEAKER_00]: Gone!
[SPEAKER_00]: So I, um, on principle, will never step footing there again.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was so sad.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was such a sad empty room.
[SPEAKER_00]: But after we swam, I was able to get over myself and get Pearl some ice cream.
[SPEAKER_00]: I got myself some ice cream.
[SPEAKER_00]: I got cookies and cream.
[SPEAKER_00]: Ooh, a good cookies and cream is good.
[SPEAKER_00]: Lately they make cookies and cream with like non-orios.
[SPEAKER_00]: You need an Oreo for a true cookie and cream.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we both got ice cream.
[SPEAKER_00]: We sat on a bench.
[SPEAKER_00]: We ate it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Postswim.
[SPEAKER_00]: Heavenly.
[SPEAKER_00]: Lovely.
[SPEAKER_00]: But did I look behind me?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like very, like very, um, very aides down.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I didn't want to look behind me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't want to know.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't want to acknowledge what was happening.
[SPEAKER_00]: Uh, I will never look at that space again so that I can still retain the memory of the original beaches and cream in my brain.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you don't know what I'm talking about, if you were driving, pull over.
[SPEAKER_00]: ball over and Google the new pages of cream is bad.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's bad.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's real bad.
[SPEAKER_00]: Huge Disney Miss.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like just what a fail to make these spaces look so clinical.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why?
[SPEAKER_00]: You have the theme.
[SPEAKER_00]: You have the theme right there.
[SPEAKER_00]: And on the other end of the spectrum, we ended up going to a different theme to establishment the next day, which I will talk to you about in a moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because
[SPEAKER_00]: The way this day went, we spent all day at a, we had a blast, we had a nap, we had a swim, we had ice cream, and we were like, okay, we are boarding a cruise ship, and now we're in twenty minutes away tomorrow.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are going to play it easy tonight.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're going to have a casual dinner at the hotel.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're going to relax.
[SPEAKER_00]: Who made me gonna watch a little blue-y?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like we're just gonna have a nice time.
[SPEAKER_00]: But then the wheel started turning in my head.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, but we're here.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we're here.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're walking this in Epcot.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if we're gonna get food, why would we eat it the quick service of the hotel which we already did?
[SPEAKER_00]: Why don't we just get him get?
[SPEAKER_00]: Why don't we just go to MCOT?
[SPEAKER_00]: Ehh, yeah, next we can move for dinner and then bring him back.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it was an ill advised idea because we had a lot.
[SPEAKER_00]: We had to wake up so early the next day.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we got it done.
[SPEAKER_00]: We got it done.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm making a video of this.
[SPEAKER_00]: It should be out the day before you listen to this.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I won't go into too much detail to bore you.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we, so we like jam.
[SPEAKER_00]: We had to wake up early the next day.
[SPEAKER_00]: We had to go on a cruise.
[SPEAKER_00]: But again, I'm Kuku bananas.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I have to do some while I'm at Disney World.
[SPEAKER_00]: I gotta squeeze all that juice out.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I booked us a character breakfast at Cape May Cafe for the next morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: We also went to the park before that, which I'm making a video.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not going to spoil it here.
[SPEAKER_00]: We went on an adventure to the park in the morning, and that's all I'm going to mention for right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we needed to pack and get to bed so that we could wake up and go to this Cape May Cafe breakfast, which if you don't know what that is, it is the character buffet at Disney's Beach Club, which is the neighboring hotel to Disney's not club where we stayed.
[SPEAKER_00]: I haven't been there in a millennia, and it retains the nineties-faming that beaches and cream also had like this old retro like old Disney-faming like the theming you grew up with it while Disney World Resort you know what I mean?
[SPEAKER_00]: Back on me called it while Disney World Resort.
[SPEAKER_00]: However, never have I been in a space and thought, hmm, can you stop date?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because, can't be cafe is
[SPEAKER_00]: So retro which I love I want to cherish it, but I feel like enough time is past where like we know how to design a restaurant a little more efficiently and this ain't yeah like the flow of the restaurant is big bad like it's not there's like you are
[SPEAKER_00]: Constantly stuck in someone else's photo or like like desperately in their way to get like sliced ham or whatever those meats are the people get like you are just in the way no matter where you are it is so silly like never have I had photos with the character where we're both like blocking servers we're being able to get their trays
[SPEAKER_00]: To the place where you dump all the plates and also blocking people from the buffet like the walkways are that tight where we there's no where to go like at a certain point I just I didn't get out of the booth so when Pearl met a character and then Donald like crawled in the booth to be with her which was so
[SPEAKER_00]: Funny, like the video is instantly iconic in my household, it's amazing.
[SPEAKER_00]: But Kate make her pay, it's like a double edged sword for me because I hadn't been in so long and I went and I was like really excited to see what a retro Disney character breakfast was like and that I loved.
[SPEAKER_00]: There are some photos I took with a flash on my phone that look like they're from nineteen ninety two and there are very few places I think you can still do that with character specifically at Disney World at this moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: I like made these cherished memories that feel like they were decades old.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, simultaneously being like, why are there basically no food options here that I want?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, the food was so random.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything was white.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, they have this cinnamon roll bread stuff that is white, and then you dip it in a sauce, also white.
[SPEAKER_00]: They have biscuits, white.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I feel like my whole boy looked at my plane.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, is everything in this city beige?
[SPEAKER_00]: What is happening here?
[SPEAKER_00]: The costumes are also so funny.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the girlies are just fantastic.
[SPEAKER_00]: Fantastic.
[SPEAKER_00]: Daisy, mini, looking great.
[SPEAKER_00]: Goofy?
[SPEAKER_00]: Looks like he got lost on the way back from Castle Weki.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like he is just wearing a rash guard in some shorts.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's very strange.
[SPEAKER_00]: They also have this like Victorianie and breakfast feel.
[SPEAKER_00]: And while I do want to do want to drag it, I do want to drag this place because I left a little hungry and was like none of this food is appealing to me at all.
[SPEAKER_00]: The strawberries were
[SPEAKER_00]: Like oh they were they had turned they had turned they were not great I was like talk a lot of notes which I will I'll get into eventually it will be doing restaurant reviews and making videos and I will Give my proper opinion then because I had a blast But also it was not the best like I understand why the ratings are typically solo on this place It's just so funny and yet I loved it so much because
[SPEAKER_00]: When else can you have one of these old truly retro Disney experiences these days?
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't, on one hand, slam beaches and cream for looking like, I don't know, a chiropractors waiting room and also, malign this place for being retro with hack?
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't, oh another, another white thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: They have mini-shaped waffles there, which, yeah, yeah, I love that.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love a specialty-shaped waffle, but it has a cream, oh, I don't know, it has a cream-unglace sauce, another delicious white food, all the white foods are delicious.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it's like a lot, that's like a, I can't process.
[SPEAKER_00]: I need a protein, man.
[SPEAKER_00]: I need a protein, and I just couldn't really find it there, but that cream-unglace sauce was really good.
[SPEAKER_00]: With a mini-waffle?
[SPEAKER_00]: Fantastic.
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, pros and cons to this place, but so silly that you can go somewhere and have in nineteen nineties experience two day down the walkway from a place that they have pulled the nineties out of.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's so silly.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're so silly for that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, stick around.
[SPEAKER_00]: We have more theme park to discuss and I haven't even told you about our secondary hotel stay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Our theme park day and all of the magic became with it.
[SPEAKER_00]: We had a perfect day and I came in to tell you about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Stick around.
[SPEAKER_00]: We will be right back.
[UNKNOWN]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome back.
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, I know I know y'all in Beach Club Beach and y'all.
[SPEAKER_00]: Please don't drag me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't remember the correct way to me.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're interchangeable.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know that I didn't ring them as high as I could have, but they are rising in my ranks.
[SPEAKER_00]: And also, I stand behind everything I said about Boardwalk.
[SPEAKER_00]: When it comes to any hotel there, here's the order of hotels I would first stand.
[SPEAKER_00]: yacht club number one beach club number two swan and dolphin.
[SPEAKER_00]: Three only because locationally they're further than beach and yacht and I also love a small hotel, but I do love swan and dolphin.
[SPEAKER_00]: So they are up there too.
[SPEAKER_00]: If we're talking like price doesn't matter, this is the right me for talking price swan and dolphin straight to the top fantastic that you can get the Disney perks while also just being right there.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right there, but you know, I love the small hotel feel now.
[SPEAKER_00]: I really love it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like the Disney wonder of hotels.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Anyway, that's like three and four swan dolphin and reserve just lob reserve in there.
[SPEAKER_00]: Three, four, three, three is swan is just swans in the dolphins, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: Then Borgok.
[SPEAKER_00]: Borgok is my bottom ranked one of the lists.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just, hmm, divide's not there yet.
[SPEAKER_00]: If they can open like two more really good things on the Borgok, I will change, but I'm still mourning.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do you ice cream shop that they used to have?
[SPEAKER_00]: Emble Hills?
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, P. I love that Bob Ager was just like, I love this ice cream and then he brought it there and we don't have it anymore.
[SPEAKER_00]: That makes me sad.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we are moving on.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are not talking about these what tells me more.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've said what I said about the ranking.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've said what I said about Epcot fireworks.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are back because after we disembarked star of the seas also like what what a wild day.
[SPEAKER_00]: My mom turned to me the second day of the cruise, which is the first full day.
[SPEAKER_00]: She turned to me and was like we're
[SPEAKER_00]: were were we the character breakfast yesterday and I'm like no that was a week ago and we were like oh my god that was twenty four hours ago that was yesterday morning we just like to jam in as much as we can and we we did play that on the cruise we will talk about next week
[SPEAKER_00]: But post crews, we woke up.
[SPEAKER_00]: We got ready.
[SPEAKER_00]: I repacked our bags the night before so that I had all of my stuff for spending the day at Disney's wilderness lodge because we were going to get to the hotel around ten again.
[SPEAKER_00]: We knew our room would not be ready for many, many hours.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I had everything ready to go to just chill at the hotel.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I never do that.
[SPEAKER_00]: I never just chill on my arrival day at the hotel because I never arrive early.
[SPEAKER_00]: What I'm flying in from LA the earliest I can typically get to a hotel is about six thirty p.m.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like this is an experience I never have and oh my gosh.
[SPEAKER_00]: How fun!
[SPEAKER_00]: How fun to just chill out at the hotel during the day!
[SPEAKER_00]: Not in the middle of your trip, which I also recommend doing.
[SPEAKER_00]: I also recommend if you're going to the, to the parks for a while, especially if you're with children.
[SPEAKER_00]: Take the third day off, take the third day off to chill.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do two part.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't never do three park days in a row if you are traveling with an family.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I, I've never had the opportunity to do this and we had the best time.
[SPEAKER_00]: We arrived to check in.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, I'm moving the mic because we're getting serious now.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we pull up to the hotel, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like ten, ten.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm thinking I'm gonna have to say a prayer to get a hotel room.
[SPEAKER_00]: We get the bags out.
[SPEAKER_00]: We, I parked the car, I come back in, I go to check in.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was thinking, so I booked this DVC studio room because I've sent this on the podcast so many times.
[SPEAKER_00]: At this point, my room on a Saturday night was three hundred and forty dollars.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have never seen a Deluxe
[SPEAKER_00]: Studio DVC style room for that price.
[SPEAKER_00]: In all of my days, I was floored.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, there's a lot of deals to be on your traveling.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can help you hit up mouseman traveling.
[SPEAKER_00]: We have to do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I booked this room, and I basically had a plan to talk to some friends.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I had an idea.
[SPEAKER_00]: I walked in and went to the check-in, spoke to the loveliest cast member.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's basically like, uh, here's the deal.
[SPEAKER_00]: Uh, we arrived really early.
[SPEAKER_00]: We came from this cruise.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have a toddler who naps about like a half hour before check in.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm happy to take whatever kind of room comes up first.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like my top priority.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't care if my mom and I have to share a bed.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't care if it's at the end of the hall.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like whatever you got, if something opens up early, I would love to take it.
[SPEAKER_00]: We will be hanging out of the hotel.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are going to the pool until you text me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whatever works, I'm flexible.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so this employee is cast member.
[SPEAKER_00]: Takes their little device, and they look, and they go, okay, so the availability for one bedroom bill is, and I go, next, excuse me, what?
[SPEAKER_00]: And they go, for your one bedroom bill, and I go, I didn't, I didn't, I didn't, I didn't book on one bedroom bill, did I get upgraded?
[SPEAKER_00]: And she goes, yeah!
[SPEAKER_00]: And I cannot tell you how excited I was in this moment, because I have been stressed about this truly the whole drive from Port Canaveral.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, how are we gonna get it done?
[SPEAKER_00]: How are we gonna get it done?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because it was too full for why we needed to get into the room.
[SPEAKER_00]: This was our dry-out day between the crews and going on the airplane.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't want too much travel for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was very stressful.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the end of a ten-day trip for Pearl and I. This is a big old trip for me.
[SPEAKER_00]: A meal loan is an adult, let alone with a two-year-old who is now going to her fourth destination that she is sleeping in.
[SPEAKER_00]: We, our plan, was that we really wanted to spend the day of the spend of day of the hotel, relax, probe and take her nap, and once she woke up, we would pack our bags as quickly as humanly possible so that we could squeak out maybe an hour and a half and matter kingdom.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was a pipe dream.
[SPEAKER_00]: I hope do it happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: We were flexible.
[SPEAKER_00]: We didn't know if it would.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do you want bedroom villa?
[SPEAKER_00]: meant that we were able to pack wall pearl naped in the other room.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we got everything done because of this room upgrade.
[SPEAKER_00]: And not only that, but I was stressed.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I was stressed the whole drive about this.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was waiting in the line to check in.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then I hear someone go goofy.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I like move past one of the pillars I'm standing by.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I see freaking goofy in the lobby saying hi to people.
[SPEAKER_00]: So as
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, high level, high level stress, as I was being like, oh my god, if we can get an early, it'll save, it'll save us, it'll save the night, it'll save the trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, this will save the tour.
[SPEAKER_00]: As much as I was like, high key stress, I was in line and went new, but and I got on the line and immediately went to Huggoofy.
[SPEAKER_00]: So not only was I riding high from getting off a fantastic ship, drive in here, easy, easy drive, totally fine.
[SPEAKER_00]: Except told roads were very stressful and the hurts is gonna charge me like, truly, two hundred dollars.
[SPEAKER_00]: My husband's gonna have to call them.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a whole thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know that on the told roads, then I was like, I'm not doing easy past.
[SPEAKER_00]: My mom brought sixteen dollars worth of quarters.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, we were prepared to rock it old school.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I did all the toll boost on the way there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I handed the money to the people.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, we had a little chat.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was fine.
[SPEAKER_00]: Totally cool.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know that sometimes you pull off the highway and there's nobody there.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's just like not even a person for you to pay.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you're automatically get photographed and, oh god, I'm gonna owe so much money.
[SPEAKER_00]: about it, but that's, that's for my efficient detail oriented husband to sort out.
[SPEAKER_00]: Anyway, got there, did this saw goofy, found out we had a one bedroom villa, and then I learned that they were doing this thing called Cool Kids Summer, which I knew was happening at the parks at our hotel.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I asked like, oh, I didn't even see any of this when we were at Yacht Club.
[SPEAKER_00]: And wonderful cast member who's checking me and said, oh, yeah, we're actually, it's just, this is the only deluxe hotel it's happening at.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when I tell you it was fantastic!
[SPEAKER_00]: They had a little like borrow a book library set up in the lobby, so Pearl got like read some books while I was doing the check-in process.
[SPEAKER_00]: They gave me a tote bag which had blue-y stickers, a blue-y pin and had some drawing pages and had crayons and had like all these little activities for Pearl.
[SPEAKER_00]: And while this was basically like, we're talking like printouts.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like it wasn't, they weren't given that much good stuff away.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was such a kind gesture and so thoughtful that I really appreciated it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they also had this cool kids map specifically for our hotel telling us about all of the things that you could do that were part of this cool kid summer.
[SPEAKER_00]: Which I've seen that for parks, but I've not seen that for our hotel specifically, and it just, it really as as a parent of a young child, you often travel and feel like you are a burden to everyone around you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And while like, we were all children once that's how life happens, it just often feels uncomfortable.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's why I feel
[SPEAKER_00]: So much better flying with Pearl to Orlando than I often feel flying with her to any other city because a flight to Orlando is like a school bus like People know with her getting themselves into and it's why I really really feel comfortable visiting Disney with her because this is a safe space for people with young kids Young kids are unpredictable and this is a place where people are used to this and they will help you if you need anything
[SPEAKER_00]: And it just really felt like a tangible way that I felt seen as a parent to have them hand me this kid somewhere back with things my kid will enjoy to be like hopefully this makes your visit a little easier.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hopefully they enjoy the pajama party we have at night is a wind down opportunity before the kids go to bed just to have the hotel a space outside of the theme park.
[SPEAKER_00]: dedicated to really seeing parents and younger kids.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought it was pretty phenomenal.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought it was pretty huge, and even though it truly was like a disposable tote bag with a few sheets of paper in it, it's just that what it symbolized was so huge to me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think it's after that we went to the store, again, a room isn't ready until like three o'clock.
[SPEAKER_00]: We had time to kill.
[SPEAKER_00]: I went to the store and in the store they had tiny kids shopping carts for cool kids summer and so yeah while I did encourage me to spend more money the store than I anticipated okay there's an endgame I got it like Pearl got to take the little straw pick the little shopping cart and go to the reels and pick out the food that she wanted in our hotel room and she put it in and she picked out I think
[SPEAKER_00]: She's it and she picked out.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, God, Realize, she picked out.
[SPEAKER_00]: There was like two or three other things that she tossed in the cart and it was just such a fun experience.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wouldn't have had otherwise if they didn't have this kind of cheeky little promotion.
[SPEAKER_00]: This little thing that like truly you would blow past and not even notice otherwise, but it was just really nice.
[SPEAKER_00]: It made for a really nice unexpected, unexpected little perk.
[SPEAKER_00]: We spent the rest of the day.
[SPEAKER_00]: at Disney's Wilderness Lodge is cool.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm just going to say this, and this is a blanket statement.
[SPEAKER_00]: It will come up next week's podcast and probably in perpetuity on very amusing, but there should not be beach chairs anywhere without umbrellas.
[SPEAKER_00]: This point!
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, that is the platform I am running on.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you are going to be in the sun, and we are dealing with global warming at the scale, we are dealing with it at.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you are poolside, there should be an umbrella covering every chair.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you want sun, close the umbrella, and you'll get sun, you're fine.
[SPEAKER_00]: But especially at a theme park resort, when kids are wiggle worms, and you can't even get sunscreen on them, like family oriented activities, we should have shade everywhere.
[SPEAKER_00]: There was so little shade by the pool that I had to park my stroller in the shade that was cast off from someone else's chair.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it was like right behind their chair and I told them like I promise it won't be hanging out here.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm just parking this here to be covered.
[SPEAKER_00]: They were like, you're so goofy.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's totally fine.
[SPEAKER_00]: But like there was so hard to find shade and like that shouldn't be a thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: It should not be a thing in twenty twenty five, especially in the Disney hotel.
[SPEAKER_00]: It shouldn't be a thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: You should have shacks to shade.
[SPEAKER_00]: everywhere.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I guess that's just someone who doesn't like to be in the direct sun.
[SPEAKER_00]: So maybe I'm biased, but also I think there should be the opportunity for shade if you so choose.
[SPEAKER_00]: They have a really wonderful kid splash pan area that we spent less time in than I anticipated because we ended up in the big pool of the whole time.
[SPEAKER_00]: Pearl befriended a- I want to say maybe like a seven year old we hung out with her for a little Pearl they found these little rubber ducks by the pool that she loved playing with like we spent the most time we've ever spent in a pool at Disney's wilderness lodge and we had a blast it was so fun we went to roaring fork for lunch realized we hadn't eaten in many hours and we devoured I'd say like
[SPEAKER_00]: A small family of five's worth of food.
[SPEAKER_00]: We had grilled cheese.
[SPEAKER_00]: We had a really killer turkey sandwich from there.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was really good.
[SPEAKER_00]: My mom ordered everything and we just showed up.
[SPEAKER_00]: We were like musty food.
[SPEAKER_00]: We got a salad that was a Mediterranean salad that had feta cheese in it that later when I looked at the menu and had quote unquote feta.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it was vegan feta.
[SPEAKER_00]: We did not know.
[SPEAKER_00]: Fold us.
[SPEAKER_00]: We had so many french fries.
[SPEAKER_00]: This was like, this is twenty four hours.
[SPEAKER_00]: I must have had about five servings of french fries and it was divine.
[SPEAKER_00]: We ate.
[SPEAKER_00]: We relaxed.
[SPEAKER_00]: We went back in the pool.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then our room was ready.
[SPEAKER_00]: Our room was ready.
[SPEAKER_00]: We got to go up.
[SPEAKER_00]: Pro-napt.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was bliss.
[SPEAKER_00]: We packed.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was wonderful.
[SPEAKER_00]: We also got to spend time with my friend Kelly at the pool.
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, kids at the pool, it's hard to like wrangle everyone, especially in the heat.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it was wild.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we got to done and Kelly dropped off some gifts for the airplane, which Kelly is still all of my gratitude and many, many thanks for.
[SPEAKER_00]: Pro got up and it was our last opportunity, our only opportunity to go to Magic Kingdom on this trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: And something I was so excited about, especially for this one, was that we, again, didn't have to deal with schedules and things.
[SPEAKER_00]: We were just going to take a boat.
[SPEAKER_00]: The most relaxing transportation option in Disney World.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, the boat does not run in inclement weather.
[SPEAKER_00]: That is something color reminded me of, that I'm very grateful for.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we just, when I tell you, we just squeezed, squeezed this boat right out.
[SPEAKER_00]: We, we were worried, like, we heard rumbling.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like, oh, no, we're never getting into the park.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now we have to go back and get on the bus and get out of yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada yada yada yada yada yada yada yada yada yada yada yada yada yada yada yada yada yada yada
[SPEAKER_00]: My mom loves to go on a small world with Pearl.
[SPEAKER_00]: We went on a small world once and then after they both again like this tiny child came out of me recently and yet like is fully automated and has opinions about female parks they both were like again again again again and I was just like listen no not for me I need food you guys go so they went on at small world I had a divine Mickey pretzel
[SPEAKER_00]: With cheese, I know I've sent some sense of harsh words about peel top cheese, but it was so melty.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was so hot.
[SPEAKER_00]: Both of them were hot, hot, hot, hot.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was wonderful.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was absolutely wonderful.
[SPEAKER_00]: I, um, I, the first night of our trip, I bought a disposable camera that they sold in the gift shop.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was like, twenty, I feel like with my annual past discount was maybe like eighteen bucks.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know where to get this thing developed in LA, but there's gotta be somewhere.
[SPEAKER_00]: I bought this camera and one of the final pictures on the camera roll.
[SPEAKER_00]: I asked a stranger to take a photo of me in front of the carousel with my Mickey pretzel because I just wanted to remember this moment forever.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was like I was with my family.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was having a great time.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything worked out.
[SPEAKER_00]: Things were going well.
[SPEAKER_00]: We had no plan and yet everything went according to plan and I just was so it was so nice to have a little break and just eat a Mickey pretzel by myself knowing that like I would soon be reunited with them and we re onto another adventure and it was just so I can't wait to get that photo back and see it because I was just so gleeful in that moment to really have the best of both worlds and maybe I knew maybe I have like an inkling because immediately after that
[SPEAKER_00]: Things went, things could have gone fully sideways, but they didn't.
[SPEAKER_00]: They ended up closing the carousel, probably wanted to go on, she didn't get to go on, she took it like a, took it like a champ, took it like a champ, and it was around this time that I realized that mom's being kind of weird about stuff, and we were hungry.
[SPEAKER_00]: We were definitely hungry, but my mom was like pretty anxious about being a magic kingdom, and I was weirdly kind of anxious too.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then I remember the last time that my mom and I were in Magic Kingdom together was when everything went down.
[SPEAKER_00]: That terrible day where like the hydraulic system or whatever failed.
[SPEAKER_00]: So like almost every ride in Magic Kingdom went down for what?
[SPEAKER_00]: And hour and a half, two hours.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I'm talking every kid ride, everything.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was not February trip that we went on and then we had to go back to the next day and try and slam all the rides in.
[SPEAKER_00]: We were just kind of like waiting for all the rides to break down in a way that nobody else in the park was.
[SPEAKER_00]: The two of us were just like, oh, like, we gotta get it in.
[SPEAKER_00]: What if they stop running it?
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe I'm just keeping like, what if they stop running?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a small world.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then like, they're not going to stop running into small world.
[SPEAKER_00]: What are you talking about?
[SPEAKER_00]: And then I remember.
[SPEAKER_00]: The last time they did somebody in this boom world, like we tried to get out and it was not working.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it was just so funny to be like, oh my god, we are traumatized.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are like truly deep level traumatized and didn't even realize it from that day when we went to Magic Kingdom.
[SPEAKER_00]: We were like, we have one night in Magic Kingdom.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the the same way we did on this trip, only that time, everything shut down.
[SPEAKER_00]: We ate at Columbia Harbor House.
[SPEAKER_00]: We had salmon as per usual, per letter for some crustable.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know why that's why that's worth sharing, but it was, I don't know, it was a big moment for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then we were like, okay, what are our priorities?
[SPEAKER_00]: What is left for tonight?
[SPEAKER_00]: We wanted, I really wanted to get back on time so we could get everything together before the flight.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because it had been a long week, and I was flying with her alone, and I stressed about it, even though I do it all the time, I just wanted things to be easy.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wanted everything to be easy as much as possible on this trip, which meant leaving at the right time.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we were like, okay, the two things that can make this day, the rest of the state perfect are popcorn from the hub, like the really good popcorn stand in my mom loves, and going on people mover.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I hung out with Pearl, my mom went and got popcorn for both of us, put it in Ziplock bags, we could eat it back in the room, later than that night when she went to sleep, because we, I mean, we'll share, but like, his arms was in popcorn, so, and also, we're like, we want to let him in his mind.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I've got two popcorns at once, got a refill and a refill, because she bought a bucket at the beginning of the trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: We can't help it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I never want to carry a bucket, but with a stroller, I'm not talking like a cutie bucket.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm talking like a utility popcorn bucket, the one that's like, fourteen, twenty-five, and we always end up making our money back as we can't stop eating.
[SPEAKER_00]: We can't say beating it, but we made its people mover and I don't know.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know what got into my child, but I just kept calling it train in the sky and she kept going train in the sky and I'm like, oh yeah, I'm making this kid like the right stuff.
[SPEAKER_00]: It Disney World.
[SPEAKER_00]: She had a gas on people mover.
[SPEAKER_00]: She's one of us.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was fun.
[SPEAKER_00]: We walked around.
[SPEAKER_00]: I said hello to the Stony Clover Collection at the store in Main Street and we got out of there.
[SPEAKER_00]: And something kind of magical happened on the way out.
[SPEAKER_00]: We left the boat approached.
[SPEAKER_00]: We were like, wow, we're gonna make our time.
[SPEAKER_00]: We were a little sad that we had to miss happily ever after.
[SPEAKER_00]: My mom hadn't seen it in full since it returned.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, you're kind of like, oh, bummer.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we got on this boat.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we got to see the finale from the boat.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's something you really can't time out well.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, it's one of those tricky things where if you can time Big Thunder Mountain Railroad during fireworks in the right way, it's heaven.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this was kind of a counter part to that.
[SPEAKER_00]: We were on the boat.
[SPEAKER_00]: The boat was pulling away.
[SPEAKER_00]: All the fireworks were going off.
[SPEAKER_00]: The moderate all the zooming past.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was just like that magical, magical Disney World kind of moment that you just feel in your bones and makes you go like, oh, this place is special and that is why I love it here.
[SPEAKER_00]: I talk about Disney World constantly.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's my job.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's my job to yapp and think about Disney World.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm thinking about it all the time, but being here and just not being here for work like this was vacation.
[SPEAKER_00]: Being here, being able to do whatever I wanted, not having a work I tend to worry, not having an objective, having small little goals that were attainable, just being able to enjoy and relax.
[SPEAKER_00]: and have a good time just reaffirmed to me how special Disney World is.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I love Disneyland and I live near Disneyland.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm looking forward to going there in a few days.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love it, but Disney World just hits different and it really hit different on this trip because it can be a stressful, complicated place.
[SPEAKER_00]: It can be really hard to visit sometimes.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I just feel like the Domino's fell in a way where the hotel rooms are priced pretty well right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: We didn't weigh the lawn, we didn't bother with lightning lanes.
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, playing off of last week's episode, just the emphasis that I want to have on how yes you have to plan for these places.
[SPEAKER_00]: And yes, if you want to do everything you have to schedule it out, but there's a balance there.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the more I do this, the more I realize that, yes, as much as you schedule everything out, there are going to be gaps.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there are going to be these places in your trip where you're not locked into return times.
[SPEAKER_00]: And you're able to just enjoy being there instead of running around.
[SPEAKER_00]: and that really, really the thing that keeps being proven to me time and time again.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mentioned it last week and I really feel that way this week is that it's the unexpected moments that are most important.
[SPEAKER_00]: That moment on the boat with my family watching fireworks, I couldn't have planned that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's one of the most special memories I will take away from this vacation.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just the things that I didn't plan that ended up being so great.
[SPEAKER_00]: Goofy appearing in the lobby, getting out of the car after driving all morning, and just seeing Goofy out of nowhere.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just that type of stuff makes this place so special, and I really, really like visiting with a little bit of a plan, but also with enough space where you can just let the universe tell you where to go.
[SPEAKER_00]: We didn't have a big itinerary for most days in this trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: We just thought maybe we'll go to the pool, maybe we'll do this, and Disney World just really met us where we were at, and everything worked out so nicely.
[SPEAKER_00]: So there is one takeaway from this,
[SPEAKER_00]: Which I also mentioned last week, it's that, yes, you should schedule the lightning lanes.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, you shouldn't make sure that you get to see everything you want to see on this trip, but also leave a little room for unexpected magic, because you never know when it'll happen, and when it does, you just want to be available to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And also, a one bedroom villa is sick.
[SPEAKER_00]: I forgot how good it was.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was sleeping in the same room as my child for nine nights.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I came late to stay in one again.
[SPEAKER_00]: I hope you enjoyed this episode.
[SPEAKER_00]: That was my Disney World trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: We had truly the time of our lives.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was so much fun.
[SPEAKER_00]: And definitely check back next week when we are talking all things, start off the seas.
[SPEAKER_00]: The other half of this trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: The reason why I was in Florida.
[SPEAKER_00]: And just, there's so much, I, I, listen, if I start talking about it,
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm talking about it now, I'm gonna spoil it, but that is all I'll say.
[SPEAKER_00]: Also, if you listen to this far, I'm gonna give you a little treat, and that is then amuse a Palooza details are coming out very, very, very soon.
[SPEAKER_00]: So keep an eye out, and we will talk about it later.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for listening to stick around, we have calls and others that, okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, and let me know if you have any questions about my stay, call them to the show's online.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, I need to go get a snack.
[SPEAKER_00]: Love you, bye.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hi, my name is Becca from Burma and I'm going to have one day to visit Disneyland for the first time ever, beginning of September with Maya Harbund and our soon to be twenty months old toddler.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I have two questions.
[SPEAKER_01]: The first is
[SPEAKER_01]: If we're just spending one day, if it's worth it to get a park hopper, or if we should just stick to Disneyland proper.
[SPEAKER_01]: Toddler is priority, so not going on a ton of thrill rides, even though we like them, might do riders law for something like that for a couple.
[SPEAKER_01]: But when are you going to be worth it to scoot over to DCA as well?
[SPEAKER_01]: And then the other question is about paint the night.
[SPEAKER_01]: It is going to be happening that day to go there at about eight thirty.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was wondering about a sweet spot for where to watch that show that parade.
[SPEAKER_01]: Our toddler usually could hang until that time, but we will be adjusting to a time change.
[SPEAKER_01]: We are going to be going back and taking a long map in the middle of the afternoon.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I'm wondering if we need to bail.
[SPEAKER_01]: So where we should sit so that we could either scoot out right before it starts serving after really wanting to just go with the flow and make sure that we set ourselves up for success and that we have an exit strategy should be needed.
[SPEAKER_01]: Super excited, and yes, thanks for any advice.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hi!
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my gosh, first time to Disneyland, I am so excited for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, I'm gonna be very, very harsh with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: When I say, don't park up.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know you said toddler is a priority, which is a good thing in the column of don't park up, but unless someone in your family is an absolute freak for the movie franchise cars, which someone in my family is, I get it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Unless that is happening, then maybe we would consider park hopping.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is your first time
[SPEAKER_00]: It's three of you, and you've got a twenty month old stick to Disneyland.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's so much to do with Disneyland proper that you really don't need to go there, especially if it's your first time.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're not going to be able to see everything, everything, so like that's how much there is to do with Disneyland that you will feel completely fulfilled by staying in that park.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now I do want to mention, make sure to, if you want to do thrill rides, you and your spouse are not going to be able to ride thrill rides together because of the baby.
[SPEAKER_00]: So make sure to look into single rider lines, which might be the easier way to board.
[SPEAKER_00]: because maybe there's one that you wanna go on, maybe there's one that they wanna go on.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's gonna be much easier for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: When I go to Disneyland with my husband and with Pearl, that's how he gets on Space Mountain.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's how I will watch Pearl, who goes on Space Mountain, will switch things like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: That is just something to keep in your back pocket.
[SPEAKER_00]: There is always a list of single writer available attractions on the Disneyland website.
[SPEAKER_00]: So make sure to check that out so you can maximize your day.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's truly so much to do with Disneyland.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're gonna have a blast.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, when it comes to paint the night,
[SPEAKER_00]: I know you asked for a sweet spot for where to watch it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know you also mentioned that you may need to bail, so I just want to set this in for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Getting out of there with a stroller is not gonna be fun.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's, it's rough dude.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is, it is hard, getting out with a stroller is not great.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you're twenty-month-old or your biceps are in a position where you can carry them in and out of the park where you may not need the stroller, you can put them in a carrier.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was, I was maxed out of carrier by then, and I had a small kid, so I don't really know, but with a stroller, it's gonna be hard to exit.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would say try, but know that you may have to abandon your plan and it might be a little stressful, just be prepared for that.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's going to be hard to exit with a stroller like mid-show with a stroller, but also by the end with a stroller.
[SPEAKER_00]: Also keep in mind the first pain the night of the evening starts at a certain time, but it doesn't hit the end of Main Street until probably like fifteen, twenty minutes later.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it will be a little later than you have been planning for.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just keep that in mind.
[SPEAKER_00]: So maybe like you can play it by your duck into the park.
[SPEAKER_00]: See if there's somewhere to walk to glance at it, but like I don't know if planning to be fully seated and ready to go to absorb paint the night is going to work.
[SPEAKER_00]: for you and the top.
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, long nap might be out in different time in a way that aims you in this.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I would say plan like for the start of paint the night plan like and you won't be leaving until like forty five ish minutes after.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just keep that keep that in mind.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you think your kid can do that, also if you think your kid can hang and stay awake and you can wait for the crowds to disperse, that is ideal.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know which hotel you're staying at and how far away it might be, but that is kind of the plan.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would prioritize the day over the paint the night.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know it's hard for me to say like it's paint the night is very exciting, but I think that might be the key to happiness on your trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you're, you know, if your child's gonna need to go sleep and that freaks out, I just don't want that for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want that for you if we can avoid that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for calling.
[SPEAKER_00]: Have the best time.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my gosh, you're gonna have so much fun.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're gonna have so much fun.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm sure you know, but of course, listen to our baby and toddler episode Disneyland.
[SPEAKER_00]: It will answer all your questions.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's everything you got.
[SPEAKER_00]: Have a good time.
[SPEAKER_00]: Have a good trip.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for calling.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's our show!
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you all so much for listening.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can rate review and follow very amusing on Apple podcasts or rate and follow us on Spotify.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can also give us a call about literally anything at seven for seven trails.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't be scared!
[SPEAKER_00]: The person answering the phone is me!
[SPEAKER_00]: You know that I am awkward and chaotic and a bit odd.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can call about anything and if you have to call back seven times to get the words up correctly, that's fine too.
[SPEAKER_00]: Trust me, I understand!
[SPEAKER_00]: I record audio for a living.
[SPEAKER_00]: I edit things out.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just retake things because I mess up on words and sometimes I mess up.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm sending Jeff the files and I leave a retake in.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so nobody understands better than I do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't be scared to pick up the phone.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am here for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you're planning a trip on Disney Cruise Line on Royal Caribbean, and at Disney World, to have a universe, to Disney Land, and it might just make Disney reach out to Mouse fan travel.
[SPEAKER_00]: They will do it all for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: They will take the work off of your plate, and they won't target a single dime for it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is incredible.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love working with them.
[SPEAKER_00]: I plan my trips with them.
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't say enough good things about it, and stay tuned because they are really powering a music blues that they are making it happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you will hopefully see firsthand why I adore them so much.
[SPEAKER_00]: Had to mouse fan travel.com slash I'm using to get a freak quote or like throw out some dates or be like, hey, how much would it be to stay at Disneyland for these two nights?
[SPEAKER_00]: And sometimes you get a number back and you're like, oh, I'm sold and sometimes you get a number back and you're like, Lord, no, that's why we inquire because we never really know mouse fan travel.com slash I'm using.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can follow me at curling my Zell.
[SPEAKER_00]: and join the foamily at facebook.com slash groups slash Carly Wiesel.
[SPEAKER_00]: To foumbling members or new members, keep in mind we do have teacher wishlist.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is classroom wishlist season.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if you have a few bucks to spare, you want to like, I'm by some fun markers for someone we have many, many, many educators in need and we love to support.
[SPEAKER_00]: We love to support them!
[SPEAKER_00]: Subscribe to my Instagram!
[SPEAKER_00]: Ninety-nine cents a month!
[SPEAKER_00]: It's fun!
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm posting almost every day on there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I really enjoy it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like a little club house.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like an afterschool club.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's what it feels like.
[SPEAKER_00]: It just feels like we all go to camp and the subscribers are my cabin.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's really nice.
[SPEAKER_00]: I highly recommend.
[SPEAKER_00]: This episode was edited comedically by Jeff Fox.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks so much for listening.
[SPEAKER_00]: See real soon!
[SPEAKER_02]: Hi honey, fun at the store.
[SPEAKER_02]: I have not seen you since yesterday, and I missed you so much already.
[SPEAKER_02]: I so agree with you about sometimes going to Disneyland or Disney World with no plans.
[SPEAKER_02]: We recently did this, and it was hot outside.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we decided, oh, we'll go hang out at the pool.
[SPEAKER_02]: And the water was so cool.
[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't.
[SPEAKER_02]: You can't even feel that he was so beautiful.
[SPEAKER_02]: It was such a great idea.
[SPEAKER_02]: And we did the parks in the early evening, and I was wonderful.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's always amazing to see every lie that's lit up.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's so pretty.
[SPEAKER_02]: The Mary's around with love.
[SPEAKER_02]: I love it.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think I love evening.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't present the parts.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's just so different and exciting.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I love it.
[SPEAKER_02]: I love daytime, but nighttime is that, actually, oh, I really love it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Great episode, honey.
[SPEAKER_02]: I love you and I love you, Pearl.